They call what they are building Puertopia. But then someone told them, apparently in all seriousness, that it translates to eternal boy playground in Latin. So they are changing the name: They will call it Sol.
Dozens of entrepreneurs, made newly wealthy by blockchain and cryptocurrencies, are heading en masse to Puerto Rico this winter. They are selling their homes and cars in California and establishing residency on the Caribbean island in hopes of avoiding what they see as onerous state and federal taxes on their growing fortunes, some of which now reach into the billions of dollars.
And these men because they are almost exclusively men have a plan for what to do with the wealth: They want to build a crypto utopia, a new city where the money is virtual and the contracts are all public, to show the rest of the world what a crypto future could look like. Blockchain, a digital ledger that forms the basis of virtual currencies, has the potential to reinvent society and the Puertopians want to prove it.
For more than a year, the entrepreneurs had been searching for the best location. After Hurricane Maria decimated Puerto Ricos infrastructure in September and the price of cryptocurrencies began to soar, they saw an opportunity and felt a sense of urgency.
So this crypto community flocked here to create its paradise. Now the investors are spending their days hunting for property where they could have their own airports and docks. They are taking over hotels and a museum in the capitals historic section, called Old San Juan. They say they are close to getting the local government to allow them to have the first cryptocurrency bank.
Whats happened here is a perfect storm, said Halsey Minor, the founder of the news site CNET, who is moving his new blockchain company called Videocoin from the Cayman Islands to Puerto Rico this winter. Referring to Hurricane Maria and the investment interest that has followed, he added, While it was really bad for the people of Puerto Rico, in the long term its a godsend if people look past that. ... Mr. Pierce paced the room with his hands in fists. A few times a day, he played a video for the group on his phone and a portable speaker: Charlie Chaplins 1940 The Great Dictator, in which Chaplin parodies Hitler rallying his forces. He finds inspiration in lines like More than machinery, we need humanity.
Im worried people are going to misinterpret our actions, Mr. Pierce said. That were just coming to Puerto Rico to dodge taxes.
He said he was aiming to create a charitable token called ONE with $1 billion of his own money. If you take the MY out of money, youre left with ONE, Mr. Pierce said.
Hes tuned in to a higher calling, said Kai Nygard, scion of the Canadian clothing company Nygard and a crypto investor. Hes beyond money.
The force of Mr. Pierces personality and his spiritual presence are important to the group, whose members are otherwise largely agnostic. Mr. Pierce regularly performs rituals. Earlier that day while scoping out property, they had stopped at a historic Ceiba tree, known as the Tree of Life.
Brock nestled into the bosom of it and was there for 10 minutes, Mr. Nygard said.
Mr. Pierce walked around the tree and said prayers for Puertopia, holding a rusted wrench he had picked up in the territory. He kissed an old mans feet. He blessed a crystal in the water, as they all watched. He played the Chaplin speech to everyone and to the tree, Mr. Nygard said. ... Mr. Lopez said he and a childhood friend, Rafael Perez, 31, were trying to set up a Bitcoin mine in their hometown. But electricity has been inconsistent, and mining even a single Bitcoin takes a lot of power, he said.