Sean Murray: Hello, welcome back to deBanked TV. I'm Sean Murray.
Johny Fernandez: And I'm Johny Fernandez. And thank you guys so
much for tuning in this week. It's a holiday week. So I'm
excited. Stache is growing a lot better for you, isn't it?
Sean Murray: I mean I, this is basically as far as I think it
really needs to go, right. I mean, how much farther does one
really need to try to grow one?
Johny Fernandez: It's legit.
Sean Murray: It's like it's real. Yeah, actually, somebody
asked me recently, if it was real, because they saw a picture
of it online. They're like, Oh, why is he wearing a? Like a
mustache? Like a, like a disguise? Or whatever? And I'm
like, no, no.
Johny Fernandez: Mine is gone. But it's coming back.
Sean Murray: Are you trying to make it comeback?
Johny Fernandez: Yeah, you know what, yeah.
Sean Murray: You got like, you have like, one week now. I don't
think it's gonna work.
Johny Fernandez: What if I do it instead of No Shave November or
Movember? What if it's just like all next year?
Sean Murray: That would be cool.
Johny Fernandez: I think I'd look good with a mustache, like
a legit one. I had, I had one grown, but I felt like that was
baby steps.
Sean Murray: Well, let me know when you do it for real. Be
happy to check it out. And we'll comment it about it on here.
Johny Fernandez: Alright, so we have a couple of different
topics to discuss today. And also some pretty fun news. For
Broker Fair, that's coming up. I can't believe Broker Fair is
literally right around the corner.
Sean Murray: Finally happening.
Johny Fernandez: I know. It's exciting. Alright, so the first
conversation that we're going to discuss today is MCA agreements,
that being a series, the conversation that started
regarding an article that was posted online. So Sean let's
talk a little bit more about that article, and about some of
the landmark decision that was made back on November 12.
Sean Murray: Yeah, so the the news is that a, an appeals court
in the state of New York reached the conclusion that a merchant
cash advance is not a user use various loan, which is the same
as what a different branch of the Appellate Court in New York
ruled earlier? Yeah. So this is kind of already known people are
like, oh, great. It's not usury. But didn't we know that already,
we pretty much did. This has already gone to the court system
So it's interesting to see what happens and I always find it
before whether or not MCA are loans or not. And we had I think
it was about at this point three years ago, with a case called
champion auto, which took place in the first department. So New
York is broken into four departments when it comes to
like the appellate division. And what the Appellate Division
decides is basically, you know, the law of the land, like
there's no more room for interpretation. Like if you go
to court, and you lose, and you're like, you know, that's,
that's wrong, I'm going to appeal. Right? Yeah. It's cause
like, you feel like that court was wrong. Yeah. And someone
needs to decide once and for all that level of sport to decide
once for all. So we've already had MCAs go to the appellate
level. And in particular, there was a case three years ago
called champion audio that went to the first department of New
York, the first department of the, of the Appellate Division.
And they ruled that that particular MCA was not a loan.
They explained why and that basically solidify once and for
all that MCAs are not loans. However, you could potentially
have disagreement between the judicial departments, because
the first department governs Manhattan and the Bronx. Now,
what happens if you go to the Appellate Department in like,
you know, Western New York, and you're up in like Buffalo, and
Rochester, and all those parts, maybe they have a different
opinion, right? Typically, you're not going to have a,
you're not going to have a major disagreement. Because, you know,
they should all kind of think the same way. But you never know
what's going to happen. And so, the news is that the fourth
department was governed Western New York, agreed with the first
department that MCAs are not loans. And so that's good news
for those who are in the MCA industry.
interesting because there's always I, from what I've seen in
my time working with you guys, MCA, anything MCA related.
There's always something in the courts regarding it.
It's always in the courts.
Johny Fernandez: It's always something in the courts, it's
always some type of new development. Something's always
happening. There's always, you know, law makers trying to get
their say, and like how they think the MCA industry should
work and the business aspect of it. So it's always interesting
to see. Just how, how much it's in the courts.
Sean Murray: Yeah. And in New York, it's weird that people
still challenge them and say, hey, this was really a loan.
When it's gone to the court system, literally, at this
point, hundreds, like you said, always in the courts.
Johny Fernandez: Always in the courts, yeah.
Sean Murray: Gone through the court system hundreds of times
to the point where it's gotten to the Appellate Division and
they're like, it's not a loan. And then you have the other
courts who are like, thank you, you know, for, for, you know,
for making that final and so they tell everyone, like stop
filing these their not loans stop complaining. Stop arguing,
stop complaining about you think their loans because they're not.
Yeah. So somehow one got to another appellate court and
they're like, still not loans.
Johny Fernandez: Yeah and were like if TM changed, but it's,
it's, I mean, it's already been spoken for.
Sean Murray: It's been spoken for. I mean, they're, you know,
there's a right way to do an MCA and a wrong way to do an MCA,
but if you're doing it the right way, you know, New York State
pretty much acknowledges that they're completely legal.
Johny Fernandez: Now it's different. Besides like, and
we've talked about this here, you know, there's certain things
like that they ended up filing and you know, trying to bring it
down, like the whole industry down. But it's also interesting,
the restriction that they put on MCA loans and on small business
financing. So we'll talk a little bit about that later, a
little later on, but I think it's always interesting to see
the regulations that are put on in that the MCA space by
lawmakers. Yeah. So yeah. So.
Sean Murray: It is interesting.
Johny Fernandez: It is it's Yeah, I feel like there's always
yeah. We"ll move onto the next topic. Um, alright, so I want
you guys at home to take a look at your screen, because there's
a picture that's gonna pop up. That guy right there.
Sean Murray: Oh, man, I didn't know we were doing that. Okay.
Johny Fernandez: That guy right there. You may have seen him. I
saw him on the internet. And I was like, oh, very interesting.
I know that I think I know that guy. That guy goes by general
Sean Murray.
Sean Murray: What? So you want me to explain myself now?
Johny Fernandez: A little bit, yeah.
Sean Murray: Okay. So that sign that sign said I'm buying the
Constitution.
Johny Fernandez: So, are you Nicolas Cage?
Sean Murray: You know, I haven't even seen the movie that
everyone's talking about. But it doesn't matter. You know at at
the end of the day, what that was all about was that there was
an internet movement to try and crowdfund the purchase. Of a U
of a US Constitution. Yeah. A copy of it. Yeah. There are 13
copies of the original United States Constitution in
existence. Two of them are in the hands of private collectors.
And one of those two went up for auction at Sotheby's on Thursday
of last week. And so some internet movements started. Dao.
Yeah DAO, a DAO. DO, yeah. That which stands for decentralized
autonomous organization. A DAO, which is just a collective of
people were supposed to be no leader. Yeah. Crowdfunded money
to try to raise enough to be the winning bidder. At the auction
at Sotheby's, it was kind of an insane idea. Right?
Johny Fernandez: Yeah. So So let's back up real quick. So
this whole, you know, the DAO, essentially, so how many? I
think there's like more than 100 people chipped in.
Sean Murray: More than 17,000.
Johny Fernandez: Okay.
Sean Murray: Chipped in.
Johny Fernandez: Okay. So the grand total was they raised up
$47 million via Ethereum. That's a lot of money. Yep. Okay, so
everyone they want to fund, they want to kind of get this going.
They want the copy the copy of the Constitution. So what
happened on Thursday? Because I heard Thursday things went nuts.
Sean Murray: Yeah. So I was there earlier in the day outside
of Sotheby's.
Johny Fernandez: With your with.
Sean Murray: With my sign and my costume on.
Johny Fernandez: General Murray.
Sean Murray: Yeah. General Murray, as they call me around
Sotheby's.
Johny Fernandez: What did people say, when they saw you? Were
they really confused were they like.
Sean Murray: Some people took pictures. Okay. Some people had
no idea what I was doing. I did bump into somebody who, I guess
was a very senior contributor or a member of the entire movement.
And so we took our picture together and we talked in person
for a little bit. But but that was basically it. Okay. I didn't
go inside, you can go inside if you want to. I didn't go inside.
I was wearing a costume. I didn't want to freak out
security and all that other stuff, right? Because they have
a lot of very expensive items in there. And.
Johny Fernandez: So you can go inside to see the copy of the
Constitution?
Sean Murray: You can, yeah.
Johny Fernandez: Okay.
Sean Murray: Yeah. I mean, it's also like an exhibit, like an
exhibit hall during the day, you can go in and check out all the
different pieces of artwork that they have available, they're
going to have up for auction, etc. So I didn't go inside, but
then later that night, they had the actual auction. It was
broadcast on their website and on YouTube. You had this 17,000
plus people all watching a Sotheby's auction, rooting, you
know, for our side or whatever.
Johny Fernandez: So essentially, they were rooting for the
constitution to be bought by the DAO. Exactly. And then what
happened with the Constitution once the DAO gets it, what was
the plan?
Sean Murray: Yeah, what was the plan? So everything was thrown
together so hastily, and you know, I wasn't, I'm not in
charge of it or anything. But the plan was, from what I
understand it was to have it put somewhere some sort of put it in
some sort of publicly accessible and view viewable institution
like a museum where you know, the public could see it and
stuff but then it would be owned by the members of the DAO and so
at anytime they wanted to, to change the location or do
something special with it, it would be up to the DAO to do
whatever they wanted with it.
Johny Fernandez: I have a questiom. This is random. I'm
just curious to know did did anyone ever say that they were
going to turn it into an NFT. Was that ever brought up?
Sean Murray: Um, so I mean, I mean more, I mean, more or less
It's kind of the same concept in a way because they went in, they
went in saying that everyone was going to get fractionalized
ownership of the constitution.
Johny Fernandez: So what does what does that mean? How does
that look like if 17,000 people that contributed.
Sean Murray: So if you contributed Ethereum, you got um
a, a, you got tokens in return digital tokens that wouldn't go
into your crypto wallet. Okay. They would represent your
percentage ownership of the Constitution, should they win
it. Okay. Right. So I put in my contribution, and I got my
people tokens that's what they call them people tokens, because
it's We the People, I got it in my Ethereum wallet, and other
people got a certain amount of people tokens, depending on
their contribution. Okay. And then you could, depending on the
amount of people tokens you have, when it comes to a vote to
decide where the Constitution was going to go, your vote would
count. It would be equivalent to the amount of tokens that you
own, so like someone who put in a million dollars for someone to
put in $10, a person put in a million dollars would have a
much stronger vote. Yeah. Then person who put in 10. And your
people tokens you might have would govern. Yeah. The size of
your vote. So that's, in a way it was like, you know, in a way,
I mean, these tokens are fungible, actually, they're not
non fungible tokens. They're fungible tokens, but it's the
same concept in that it's a it's a, it's a digital representation
of ownership of something physical.
Johny Fernandez: Yeah. Okay, so let's talk about Thursday, the
auction happened, things are going it's chaotic. Everyone's
rooting to, to get the Constitution. And then what?
Sean Murray: Well, here's the crazy part, right. So they went
through 24 different lots at the auction first. And then this
particular one was at the very end, like the main event ended,
and then like the special auction for the high rollers
came up separate. Okay. With a different auctioneer and
everything. Okay. And the minimum bid was set so high that
it they they only had two people. Okay. Who were bidding.
It was the DAO side and the representation for some unknown
person at the time, we didn't know who the other side was. And
it was all very confusing, because there were two agents
bidding one was representing the DAO one for someone unknown. And
we didn't know which side was ours. So everyone's going
everyone's cheering and booing. But no one knows which of the
bidders is ours literally.
Yeah, that's great.
Nobody knew and at the end of it, the the Constitution sold
for less than the amount that was raised by the DAO. So there
was this assumption that the DAO must have won because they had
more money than the winning bid. In fact, all the news outlets
went out and reported that the DAO won, Coin Desk, CNBC,
basically everyone in the discord channel all over
Twitter. And I'm like, I don't think we won, even though I
didn't know which was our person. Yeah. The amount that
the winning bid was much too high for the DAO to have one
because they there's the buyer's premium. There's the sales tax,
there's the overhead premium.
Johny Fernandez: And let's talk about the sales tax. Yeah.
Because being in New York, you get taxed for everything. So how
much was the sales tax do you know?
Sean Murray: It's 8.875%, on top of a sales price that you can
add, you know, just if you want to do quick math just add 10% to
the sales price, you already know what the sales tax is going
to be. And so I'm doing the quick math, and I said, you
know, the DAO doesn't have enough, like that winning bid no
way it's ours, because we don't have enough, but nobody thought
it nobody realized that. I'm sure there were people who knew.
But when you look at the masses who were all like, yeah, yeah,
because it was an internet movement. It was like a meme a
meme gone wild. Everyone's just throwing.
Johny Fernandez: Everyone was doing the Nicolas Cage meme, and
that was everyone's, let's get constitution.
Sean Murray: Exactly with this whole thing. And, you know, once
once the reality set in that the DAO did not win people thought
that the whole thing must be a scam because more money was
raised than the winning bid. And it was impossible to tell
someone that there was a fee and sales tax. They didn't want to
hear it. Like no I was it was it was a scam, I was scammed. And
it just it turned the whole thing turned into a gigantic
mess. The discord channel was completely out of control. And I
was like, I can't even watch you know, watch this. Like so many
people went in under so many like. Assumptions. False
assumptions. Yeah. You know what I mean that like and then them
want and then watching their reaction after the fact. They
had no idea. They didn't know who was bidding on what they
didn't know what the terms of the auction were. They don't
know how Ethereum works. They don't know anything. But they
all threw their money into this thing. Man, people were
literally someone someone said it like fester, like, you know,
you know, I didn't think in 2021 people would be fumbling into
the Constitution. But here we are. Yeah. Like, people just
wanted to be in and be part of it.
Johny Fernandez: Well, it's $47 million. That was raised. And
it's interesting, because I think what gets to people that
really don't do transaction like that in New York. Is that sales
tax, I mean, just the amount of stuff that gets put on top of
any transaction is insane. And you get charged an insane amount
just for, you know, doing a transaction like that.
Yeah. All right. Well, that was an eventful day, wasn't it?
Sean Murray: Yeah, you know, I would just say on that note that
other outlets have come up with their own figure as to what the
total set price was. Yeah. I think their still incorrect.
Okay. Because I don't see any that have that included the
sales tax. Okay. It seems like a pretty important part. Yeah.
It's a huge. The sales tax was probably around $4 million.
It was an eventful day.
Johny Fernandez: Did you stay the whole time in front of
Sotheby's or?
Sean Murray: No, no I wasn't. I wasn't there like all day and
all night. No we were out there for like, a little over an hour.
Okay. Yeah.
Johny Fernandez: I saw I'm taking the train general Murph,
Murray. And I'm like oh, I wonder what's going on. And then
I started following. I was like, wait a minute. He's at Sotheby's
right now. But I think the beard made it look even more official.
I mean, the moustache made it look even more official.
Sean Murray: Yeah, you and I, we sit here and we talk about NFT's
and whether or not like an autograph is real and all that
other stiff if it's digital. For me, this connected the real
world a real world object with crypto. Yeah. Because it was
going to go into the backed by something kind of cool. You know
it's the Constitution. You might say, well, Sean, I don't get to
own it and put in my house. You know, what's it worth to me? At
the end of the day, this is something that was gonna have to
go into like a museum anyway. Right. It wasn't going to be
able to go into anyone's house. Yeah. And this token was just
going to represent your fractional contribution to it.
Yeah. But it would still be cool to be a part owner of the
Constitution. Even if it was a tiny piece.
Johny Fernandez: But that Constitution was not the
original Constitution it was a copy of the Constitution.
Sean Murray: It is the original.
Johny Fernandez: Oh, that was the original?
Sean Murray: Yeah there's 13 of, 13 of it. And this is one of
them. There all the all 13 are the original. So they made 500.
In essence constitution, they originally made 500. There are
13 surviving copies of it. Okay. It's not like one is the
original and the other copies. All 500 are the original. Okay.
There's only 13 left. This is one of them.
Johny Fernandez: Okay, okay. So I thought it was there was one
original Constitution, and they copied it.
Sean Murray: No this is an original, it's original as the
original.
Johny Fernandez: Oh okay. That is pretty cool, though.
Sean Murray: It sold for more than $43 million. Yeah. And, you
know, I don't know. You want to hear more about like, the other
side of it. But I've been wanting to know, who did we lose
to? Who did you who did we lose to? We lost to the CEO of
Citadel, which is the Hedge Fund that was all involved in the
Robin Hood and Gamestop debacle. So he outbid the DAO. And so
he's kind of the villain in the Gamestop Robin Hood story. Yeah,
he's now come back to destroy the hopes and dreams of an
internet movement by jacking the Constitution from them. I don't
I don't have any animosity to it, but others do they feel like
he's like this big villain and stuff. But from my understanding
is that, he also is going to put the Constitution in a public
place. He said that he's going to have it on display at a
library in Arkansas.
Johny Fernandez: Okay. All right.
Sean Murray: So it's you know it's not the same because he
owns it. And not the people.
Johny Fernandez: Not the people. We the People. Well, I mean,
hey, that's a cool experience regardless, so you can now tell
your grandkids that you dressed up and was on the Upper East
Side.
Sean Murray: I can tell them that I wore a costume one day
I'll tell my kids that I wore a costume on the Upper East Side
forget about the Constitution the DAO one day I'll tell my
kids that I wore a costume on the Upper East Side.
Johny Fernandez: Cause you didn't go into the building so
you can't like you were outside.
Okay, but I did contribute to the DAO.
You did you did contribute to the DAO. So you could you could
tell them your costume on the Upper East Side. And you almost
won a fraction of the Constitution. Almost. Almost so
close but no cigar. So, I love the picture are we gonna see
that picture again? It's a great picture.
Sean Murray: There it is. There it is. You know, somebody on the
street thought it said I'm burning the Constitution.
Johny Fernandez: That's what it looks like the B
Sean Murray: Really you thought that I'm burning? I was like,
why are you burning the Constitution? I'm like, buy,
buying, buying the Constitution.
Johny Fernandez: Oh. Good stuff. Yeah. I love it. All right, so
this next topic kind of goes in hand with our first
conversation. Well, Congress introduces new restrictions for
small business financing. So we know that Representative
Velazquez and Senator Robert Menendez they have hoped to stop
small business loans, sorry, small business loans by by
applying broad consumer protection to small business
borrowers nationwide. And it's actually interesting because
this would probably be the most more restrictive than the New
Year commercial financing disclosure law. So we have some
supporters there also Lending Club and Funding Circle so Sean,
it's interesting cause from how I see it, they're not stopping
it. But they're putting more restrictions.
Sean Murray: So they're not stopping anything at this point.
Yeah. It's just a bill. Yeah. It's just the here's their idea.
And they hope it becomes the law.
Johny Fernandez: It does. But it's interesting, because like
we said earlier, there's always people always try to put
restrictions on it. And sometimes it works. Sometimes it
doesn't work. So these restrictions, like it's, they
want to, like, monitor and make sure everything goes pretty much
is beneficial to the other side. But they're not stopping
anything. They just want to put more restrictions on it.
Sean Murray: Well, it would, it would probably stop most of it,
it would probably, it would probably shut down the vast
majority of a small business lending industry in the country.
Johny Fernandez: But do you think their their approach? What
I mean, what restrictions? Would they be putting up on it? Cause
it's more restricted than New York, the New York law?
Sean Murray: Yeah, it would be all types of disclosures, all
type of reporting and noticing that you have to do after the
fact, basically, so here's, here's what, and this is my
personal opinion, you know, maybe I'm stepping out of
bounds. But here, here's what some members of Congress and
maybe state legislators don't understand is that they think of
Small Business Finance as something commoditized. Because
if you apply for a consumer loan, they're looking at your
credit score, and how much money you make, sometimes not even
that, sometimes they're not even looking at anything, they're
like you are a person, I will give you this. And what
regulators and legislators want to do is like, make sure that
there were no other characteristics about you that
were used in that that could be used to discriminate against
you, right? Or that there were things in there that were
designed to, like, trick you, right? Because there's there's
really nothing else in the underwriting for a consumer
loan. It's very cut and dry. A business loan is a very
intensive, personalized process. Yeah. How long has this been in
business fo? What type of product do they sell? What do
they sell? You know, what type of customers do they have? What
are their sales like this time of year? What are their sales
like going to be like next time a year? You know, what's, what's
their supply chain like? Are they going to be affected by
COVID. Right? What's what's the marketing message and the story
of the business? All these different factors, how long are
they going to be at that location? Are they moving?
What's the relationship with the landlord? Oftentimes, it's this
this type of like underwriting process. It doesn't, it doesn't
connect with those who were who trying to create and change the
law, they don't realize that all this is happening. They think
it's just like commoditized. They're like, oh, they just
judge them on their gender. Yeah. They just judge them on on
their race. Yeah. That must be it. That's why this person was
approved and this person was declined. It has to be that
because they both own the store. And one was, you know, this, and
one was that, so there must it must have been discrimination,
you're like, oh, this person was doing 100,000 in sales a month.
This one was doing 20,000 in sales a month, right? This one
looks like the safer bet. They don't realize that this whole
big thing to it. Yeah. And so they're trying to add a
commoditized type of regulation to something that is very
subject subjective, personalized, and intense. Yeah.
And it probably in my opinion, if it were to ever to go
through, it would make it so much more cumbersome to do any
of these deals. Yeah. If you had to treat these, these
transactions as if as if they were, as if they were all the
same. You know, everyone's within a name and a number and
stop thinking about the business. It would make it very,
very difficult. I think for a lot of the small business
finance companies around the world, around the world around
the country to carry on. That's what I think would be the
outcome.
Johny Fernandez: Yeah. So it's interesting to see what will
happen regarding that.
Sean Murray: It's just a bill at this point. This particular
bill, some version of it came out last year too it never went
anywhere. Yeah. It you know, it comes with a big scary press
release about how they're going to go after, you know, predatory
this and predatory that I'm not sure where they get their
information from when everything is predatory, supposedly, or
whatever. But you know, we'll see where it goes. This Congress
is a little bit different than the ones we've had in the past.
So it could have some legs to it this time around.
Johny Fernandez: Yeah. Cool. So the last thing we're going to
just talk about, is Broker Fair. So Broker Fair is how many days
away?
Sean Murray: It's two weeks, two weeks away.
Johny Fernandez: Two weeks? To the day, right? Yep. Okay, it's
two weeks away. So it's exciting. I've talked to a lot
of people that are excited to be here and come and join the pre
show, and then go to Broker Fair. They're excited because
it's first event that has actually happened since pre
pandemic. So you want to talk about the raffle first?
Sean Murray: Oh, yeah, so we announced it last week, we are
doing a raffle. The cool part about this raffle is that nobody
has to do anything to enter it. You don't have to do anything.
Johny Fernandez: That's great.
Sean Murray: Well actually have to do one thing.
Johny Fernandez: What is that thing?
Sean Murray: You just have to have a ticket to be entered into
this raffle. You don't have to physically do anything other
than own a ticket prior to the, to the raffle itself.
Johny Fernandez: So if you have a ticket, you're entered into
the raffle. What exactly is the prize?
Sean Murray: The prize is if you win, you get a refund of your
ticket, but you still get to come to the show.
Johny Fernandez: That's great. Here's a question I have for
you. If they ordered a pre show ticket, do they get that money
back?
Sean Murray: You know, I don't even know the answer to that.
That's the that's a good question for the team.
Johny Fernandez: Yeah. So if they came with a buddy, do they
get does his buddy get the money back? Or is it just the person?
Sean Murray: It's just the one.
Johny Fernandez: Just one? Okay, just one.
Sean Murray: This isn't like you and all your friends get a
refund. It's just one lucky winner.
Johny Fernandez: So when will people find out about who won?
Sean Murray: So we're gonna announce it on Cyber Monday.
Again, you don't have to enter to do anything, you just have to
have a ticket. This is a good way for people to hurry up and
get their ticket now versus waiting until it's too late. As
I've said in the past, we do typically turn off ticket
registration prior to the event. And we don't sell tickets at the
event. So we're doing this for your own good to make sure you
have a ticket before Cyber Monday. And then the benefit of
that is that on Cyber Monday, we will pick one ticket holder at
random. Even if they have no idea about what we're doing.
Even if they're not watching. They don't get the email,
they're not paying attention. One lucky winner is just gonna
get a refund on their ticket. And that's it. And still get to
come.
Johny Fernandez: That's awesome. What could people expect at
Broker Fair?
Sean Murray: Alright, so we have, we have a really large
crowd shaping up. We have a lot of networking setup. We have a
lot of good panels and speakers. We have the founder of
Indiegogo, Slava Rubin is speaking at the show, we have a
lot of broker centric content there, we probably have more
broker centric content this year than any previous Broker Fair.
In the past, we've had a lot of funder centric and institutional
and legal panels that can be helpful to brokers and like
knowing and understanding the big landscape. Yeah. This time
around, we went very broker sales centric. And so most of
the panels are dominated by people who are brokers. And we
have two good sessions, one by Oz, and one by Leo, two people
who are basically broker trainers, and train 1000s of
brokers to work from home, we're going to be presenting on stage
in person at Broker Fair teaching brokers who are
attending all their tips and tricks. Oh, and the other thing
is, we also now have a certification you can take while
you're at Broker Fair, we were fortunate to land a a
partnership, this time around, probably the only time we'll
ever have it, partnership with the SBFA to enable the the
certification of you becoming a small business finance
professional, this is a brand new certification. There's never
been a small business, finance, professional certification, it's
brand new. And at the show, you can now take the time out of
your day to go and take that exam and go and learn about the
industry and get certification all in one place.
Johny Fernandez: So if someone has hesitations about buying
their ticket, and they want to wait to the last minute, we're
at the two week mark, what would you tell them?
Sean Murray: You know, it's not you know, this is not an ad
because in the past when we turned off ticket registrations,
it's been turned off. And people would say, why would you do
that? You know, surely I can go to the event, buy a ticket,
you're not going to turn down the money? Yes, we will. In the
past, we have told people who showed up on event day with
money, sometimes offering to pay double per ticket, if they can
just get in and we said unfortunately, you can't get it.
We do not have the infrastructure there to register
new people, we will not accept anyone who does not have a
ticket into the event period. It doesn't matter how much money
you have. Doesn't matter if you know me, doesn't matter who your
friends are doesn't matter. If you know, you know someone who's
a sponsor. If you do not have your ticket prior to the event,
you can't come to the event. We don't sell on site. We don't
sell them the day before we usually turn it off a few days
before. Don't wait until it's too late. Again, it's not it's
not an ad. It's to prevent you from being disappointed. Yeah.
For when we turn it off, and you not being able to get that
ticket because we only have so much infrastructure in place.
And once we hit a certain we hit a certain number, we say that's
it. That's it. You know, we now need to focus on actually
producing the event itself.
Johny Fernandez: Okay, so let's talk about vaccine cards. We
have people coming from out of New York. This vaccine mandate
is something part of New York City. So what do you say to
people that aren't vaccinated it's two, it's two weeks away or
that loss their vaccine card you know, don't want to comply? Have
questions about the vaccine mandate, what would you say to
them?
Sean Murray: Lost a vaccine card? You know, I don't know
that's a good one, you're gonna have to have it, that's for sure
you have to have proof of vaccination. If you don't have
your vaccine card, you're gonna have to have whatever, you're
gonna have to have an app that will confirm your vaccination
status.
Johny Fernandez: Just to make sure you clarify, because we
want people to know, we are not putting the vaccine rule that is
brought to by the actual venue.
Sean Murray: Oh, yeah, we had nothing to do with it. Yeah,
yeah. So the city requires that you be vaccinated to enter any
establishment, we have nothing to do with it it's not our
decision is not something we we wanted to do.
Johny Fernandez: We had no say.
Sean Murray: It wasn't our, we have no say in it, it's the way
it is. For any event in New York City. If you're like, if your
idea is to go to a bar or restaurant in the city, thinking
that you're going to escape it, you won't, because you have to
have it in order to go into any restaurant or bar in the city.
Johny Fernandez: And they will check and they'll check your ID.
Johny Fernandez: Again and those are the venue people like there
Sean Murray: They'll check your ID, they'll check your ID,
no one from deBanked is checking vaccine cards.
they'll check your vaccine card it's not a joke I want I was
Sean Murray: deBanked is not checking the venue is going to
just in Madison Square Garden just last week, and they checked
check. So if you try to pull one of us aside and say, you know,
my vaccine card, I go to a restaurant I pick up lunch, I go
anywhere, I have to show proof of vaccination. The city does
not accept a negative COVID test, the city does not accept
whether or not you've had COVID before and you have the
antibodies, they don't care about any of that, you know,
that you can feel about that however you want. You know what
I mean? It's unfortunate that things like that would not make
a difference. But we're not the city at the end of the day. So
like I said, we don't have any say in any of that. So to comply
with New York City Law, the venue will be checking your
vaccination status at the event, at the door, you won't be able
to get in, it doesn't matter if you say I forgot it at home. And
I'll show it to you later. They're not, they're not going
to let you and I have I have to say it because if on that day,
you can't come get me or somebody and say, Sean, let me
in because I'm not gonna have any say or control on that part.
Only the venue will control that part.
you know me, wink, wink, wink, you know, yeah, I don't have a
vaccine card. I can't do anything. Because it's not up to
me. It's the city and the and the venue is gonna be checking
on behalf of the city. It is what it is, you know, you may
have your own opinion on it. I get it. I understand, you know,
you have everyone should do what they think is in their own best
interest. But this is what Broker Fair requires.
Johny Fernandez: Yeah. So I'm excited. That's all I can say.
Sean Murray: It's gonna be good, the numbers are shaping up to be
very good.
Johny Fernandez: Yeah. So it's exciting. We'll, we'll obviously
we'll be there. And I'm excited just to meet everyone. Again, in
person, the pre show, if people are interested in getting pre
show tickets, let's talk about that. Where can they go?
Sean Murray: You can also go online. So when you go to
register your ticket, it'll give you the option of buying the
type of ticket you want. Whether your broker funder, a general
admission, and a pre show ticket, which is a separate
selection if you want to do the the conference and the pre show
the night before he got to make sure you select both and pay for
both. If you buy just the conference ticket, and you show
up to the to the event the night before, you're not going to get
into that. So you got to make sure you have a ticket to both
if you want to go to both parts.
Johny Fernandez: Yeah. All right. Well, countdown started
two weeks from today.
Sean Murray: Two weeks from today. And we're going right
into Thanksgiving. And like I said Cyber Monday, we're going
to announce the the refund winner free refund to some
random lucky person who already has a ticket. And after that
we're going to be so close to the show. At some point we're
going to have to turn off registration prior to the event.
I say that just to make sure that you are not disappointed.
So don't wait until it's too late.
Johny Fernandez: Yeah. All right, you guys. So that is the
latest from here again I'm Johny Fernandez.
i'm Sean Murray.
General Sean Murray.
Sean Murray: General.
Johny Fernandez: And we'll see you guys next time. Have a good
one.