← Founder's Story
Founder's Story
The CEO Who Predicted Bitcoin, AI, and What's Coming Next | Ep. 396 with Sam Tabar CEO of Bit Digital (BTBT) and White Fiber (WYFI)
00:32:23
Daniel Robbins sits down with Sam Tabar, CEO of WhiteFiber (Nasdaq: WYFI) and Bit Digital (Nasdaq: BTBT), to unpack how he keeps spotting wave-level technologies before they become mainstream. Sam shares how growing up in a lower-income household fueled a primal drive to create security, why he sees technology as “a proxy for magic,” and how Bitcoin’s evolution mirrors the early internet. They break down Bitcoin as a store of value, Ethereum as programmable money, why AI infrastructure will be a defining business of the decade, and the one thing Sam fears most: loss of freedom through AI-enabled control.
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- [00:00]
Sam
Gold is basically kind of a useless piece of yellow metal. Bitcoin is the world's first global currency that has no weight like gold, that's easily transferable, easily fungible. It's very threatening to governments, it's very threatening to banks, and there is no inflation.
- [00:16]
Interviewer
On Bitcoin, you have such an incredible history. Two publicly traded companies on nasdaq CEO. I mean, that's incredible. Let's go back, though.
- [00:26]
Sam
I think you do need to kill the person you thought you were, in a way. And I remember going to school with kids who had much more than we did. To be honest, it really bugged me. And so I wanted to make sure that when I grew up that I would never have those feelings.
- [00:49]
Interviewer
So I'm excited today. Sam, you have such an incredible history story. Not only have you seen things at the forefront, you've been at the forefront when everyone else I'm sure, was like, that will never be a thing. And you saw it and you did it. Two publicly traded companies on Nasdaq CEO. I mean, that's incredible. So let's. Let's go back, though. French Canadian mother, Nazarene father, born in Canada. I'm sure most people in that situation would not say, one day I'm going to be running two NASDAQ companies. Was there something that was instilled in you from either your parents or something you learned when you were a child that's brought you here today?
- [01:33]
Sam
Yeah, that's a good question. My father was a car mechanic and my mother was a tarot card reader. So I grew up in an unusual household from a lower economic class. And. And I remember going to school with kids who had much more than we did. And there was always a difference, a material difference between, you know, my family and the neighbors or my family in the south and, and the kids at school. And to be honest, it really bugged me. And so I wanted to make sure that when I grew up that I would never have those feelings again. So that's one of my motivations, but also another motivation is that I do like to take care of my loved ones. I take care of my mother. I take care of my. My upcoming new family. And so those are really very primal motivations for me. And I embrace. I embrace that, actually enjoy. I enjoy that. And in this world, unfortunately, money solves a lot of problems, and. And you can't ignore it. So, you know, there. There is an artist in me. But at the end of the day, I do have to look at reality and how the financial pressures can be a really terrible thing when, when you're trying to raise yourself up or raise a family. And so I just want to solve those problems. But there's also other things as well. I really love technology. I think technology is basically a proxy for magic. I love new technologies. I'm always the first one with a new gadget. And. And if. When I looked at the trajectory of my career, I've always been able to recognize patterns when it comes to technology. So when it comes to crypto or artificial intelligence and data centers and so on, we've been able. I've been able to determine that these were going to be massive trends that were going to transform society and capitalism and economics. And so far, I have not been wrong in, in the pattern recognitions that I've been able to surmise. And I've been able to take my thesis to the public markets. And we've gone public on a number of companies that's now currently listed in nasdaq, that being the digital, but more straightforwardly white fiber.
- [03:53]
Interviewer
I remember when Wall street was like, crypto's a joke. You know, there are certain really prominent people who are like, I will never do anything with Bitcoin, who are now investing billions of dollars into Bitcoin specifically, and obviously working with stablecoins. So you, you made this bet. You saw it, you talked about data centers, AI before people were really chatting about it. Obviously it's been around, but it wasn't what it is right now today. What muscle? What. How do you see these things, these visions that you say to yourself, this is going to be a thing?
- [04:33]
Sam
Well, I remember growing up in the 90s when the Internet was invented, and, you know, we were, you know, we were using something called the World Wide Web, which is what WWW stands for, and, and we were doing things like going to websites and emailing, and these things were, like, very nascent. Back in the mid-90s, no one would have ever imagined apps like Uber or Tinder or what have you. No one would ever imagine those types of applications in the mid-90s.
- [05:02]
Interviewer
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- [06:34]
Sam
When the Internet was invented. And so these technologies sort of force your. They kind of break your brain. They force you to imagine or reimagine what society can be like if this technology is taken to its logical limits. So I was blessed to grow up seeing what the analog world was and then what the digital world was. That being analog pre1995 and then digital after 1995, 1996, those are two very different worlds that I happen to live in. And it helped me sort of understand, okay, so what's the next thing? And when. When crypto was invented in, in 2008. Bitcoin was invented in 2008. That was during a very terrible financial crisis that occurred in traditional capitalism. And a very mysterious guy by the name of Satoshi invented bitcoin, which basically is a decentralized monetary store of value. And, and it's, it's, you know, if you think about the history of money, like, think the way money worked in the past is that it came from the earth. So money came, basically was dug up by gold and silver and copper. That was where how the. How ancient society basically had money. All these old coins that you see, the. They're all made out of gold, silver, or copper. And so money came out from the ground in the past, and then as time went on, money came from the top. In other words, government. Government came up with this thing called fiat dollar, pound, dinar, what have you. These are currencies. These are invented fictions by government. And so it went from the ground to the ground to the people, and then from the government to the people. But with respect to Bitcoin, Bitcoin is from the people. It's a decentralized currency that the government can't control, nor does it come from the ground. So this is a currency, this is a technology, a store of value that is people oriented, which is why it's very threatening to the existing capital structure. It's very threatening to governments, it's very threatening to banks. And, and that's why there was a lot of resistance to Bitcoin because governments and banks just can't control that currency, nor can they make money off it. And they can't also manipulate it just as the way they manipulate currencies today. So I kind of enjoy that trajectory, that historical trajectory of the history of money when it comes from the ground. Then it came from the top governments and now comes from the people. This currency just became so big it was just impossible to ignore. And now, as you rightly mentioned, a Bitcoin is now a very, a very received, well received, almost mainstream store value. And to a large extent, it's replacing the gold markets. Gold is basically kind of a useless piece of yellow metal. I understand that you could use it for like fillings for your teeth and maybe some jewelry during weddings. But, but it doesn't deserve the $13 trillion value valuation and market cap that it currently has today. I think it's 13 or 14 million, maybe even more than that. I haven't looked at the most recent data point on the market cap for gold, but there's no point. There's no, there's no reason for it. Bitcoin rather completely take over gold as a store of value. And it's much easier to have bitcoin over gold. You can't, I don't know if you've ever held, you know, a $20,000 pound of gold. It's very heavy. Gold bars are very heavy. You can't really put them in your pocket, nor can you go through airports. If you want to go to United States, to, to for example, Germany. It's, you're, that's going to be a very big piece of metal. And so when you have bitcoin, you have that, you know, there's no weight to it, right? It's, it's an international currency. It's the world. It's, it's also the world's first global currency. All other currencies are denominated in certain nations, like the euro, which is a economic union, then the US Dollar, the Canadian dollar. But bitcoin is the world's human's first global Currency that has no weight like gold, that's easily transferable, easily fungible. And so that is really a technology that I thought was really, really cool. I understand that bitcoin does not have the cleanest beginnings, but in other words, when it was invented in 2008, Bitcoin was used for, like, purchasing drugs or all these weird illicit trades. I just want to remind your audience that when the Internet was invented, it was a pretty dark place as well. The Internet had a lot. It still is. And so, you know, that's how nascent technologies start. They start with, you know, appealing to like the, you know, the, the. The darker aspects of humanity. Whether, you know, for example, the Internet was like, full of porn and a bunch of stuff that, you know, but that it doesn't mean the technology of the Internet is bad. And it's same thing with Bitcoin. Bitcoin started with like, it became this, like in the early days, a currency for illicit trades, but that it doesn't mean that the technology itself is bad. And now it's grown up to be proper and legitimate, and it becomes a real store of value. And it even helps certain developing countries. Like, for example, there are some countries, like, for example, Venezuela, where inflation is running rampant. And so when you have farmers who are trying to build their life savings and they're using the Venezuelan currency, if they save money in the Venezuelan currency, inflation is just going to eat all its value up. So if they just convert it to Bitcoin, they know that the inflation on Bitcoin will not happen. There is no inflation on Bitcoin because nobody's printing an excess amount of Bitcoin that you can't do that. You could do that with a national currency, but you can't do that with Bitcoin. And so it kind of helps, you know, the farmers in the Philippines or in Venezuela, where currencies are volatile, if they put their life savings from all that hard work, say as a farmer or what have you in Bitcoin as opposed to the national currency. So I think there's a really. There are many wonderful use cases for Bitcoin. And when I was a lawyer and at the time a banker, I also realized that cryptocurrency can really disintermediate the middleman, because there's no middleman anymore when you exchange value, when you have Bitcoin. So just going back to the old world of fiat, whenever I send you money, I have to send it to you through PayPal or through a bank or some sort of payment processor. There's always a middleman between us that's slicing a little bit off the top in terms of service fees and what have you for no reason. What does that middleman really do? They're just taking that. But with bitcoin you could just do that without any, know, any commission. It's peer to peer. So I think that's, that was an interesting technology for me.
- [13:56]
Interviewer
So I'm curious too because I've been dabbling since about 2017. I wish at that point I went all in. Like I had these friends.
- [14:05]
Sam
Me too. We all do.
- [14:06]
Interviewer
They were just like, you should buy this. No, they, they told me, they explained the technology and I'm like, I don't understand blockchain. Like, I don't get it. I'm like, if they had just said go all in, I would have went all in. Instead, I just dabbled for the first. We talk a lot in the show about that terrifying moment right before you launch. What if I fail? What if no one buys anything? And I remember those doubts clearly. When I started my first business, I was selling skincare and I was like, I don't know if anyone is even going to buy this. And then I found the most amazing software that I've used still to this day. That is Shopify. Shopify is one of the best partners I've had since day one. It's the commerce platform behind millions of businesses worldwide, powering 10% of all E commerce in the US from household names to brands. Just getting started. If you've ever worried about the technical side, don't be. You can get started with your own design studio using hundreds of ready to use templates, which is how I started to build a store that actually matches your brand's style. They even have AI tools that help write your product descriptions and enhance your photography so you can move faster. And if you ever feel stuck, Shopify has award winning 24. 7 customer support to guide you through which I have used many times. It's time to turn those what ifs into with Shopify today. Sign up for your $1 per month trial today at shopify.com founders story. Go to shopify.com founders story. That's shopify.com founders story. You know, a few years obviously now many people are in it for the ups and down swings and looking at, you know, they want to make instant money or maybe more of an investment type. What do you see other types of use cases maybe in the US market or things that you're excited about. Doesn't have to be bitcoin just Crypto, obviously we have stable coins and other things. What excites you about crypto for use cases in the U.S. well, when I
- [16:15]
Sam
think when it comes to for example Ethereum and by the way, stable, most stable coins are built on Ethereum. I think there is an amazing use case there. So Bitcoin competes with the gold markets for store value, but Ethereum competes with the, with the banks when it comes to exchanging value. And because it has this technology called smart contracts. And basically what smart contracts are is really simple. It's they're if then statements. So if somebody does this, then my Ethereum will go to the wallet over there. So your programming conditions, what happens when you program in conditions? What is that it? That is actually a contract. So if you can program conditions on the movement of money, which is what Ethereum does, you're basically replacing lawyers and you're replacing banks. And so that's huge. And so Ethereum basically took the technology of Bitcoin and just made it much better. The way I see it is sort of like bitcoin is like 1.0 and Ethereum is 2.0 in terms of where cryptocurrency should be going.
- [17:17]
Interviewer
Wow, okay. I, I remember the NFT days. You remember those days.
- [17:22]
Sam
And Yeah, I mean NFTs were a big thing. There were, at one point there were more transactions on NFTs than there was Visa. So like that, that's a, you know, there are a lot of transactions on, there on, on, on all the Visa credit cards in the world. And at one point there were more transactions on NFTs that there were than of all the Visa transactions. Now what does that say? I understand the value of NFTs went down, but the technology was amazing. It never broke like this technology during those h, high, high water mark days. It did not break. All those transactions went through. Nobody's arguing over title of any of these transactions because it's on the blockchain. And you were able to make more transactions than Visa does globally and the system didn't break. I understand the valuation went down, but that's not the point. The point is that technology work.
- [18:13]
Interviewer
Yeah, I remember, I remember learning all about the contract when you talk about this. I remember we actually put on some blockchain events, you know, many years ago in Southeast Asia and such. So it brings back all these memories. So let's talk about reinvention because you've reinvented yourself. You were talking earlier about how you used to be an attorney, hedge fund banker, founder, AI, CEO. Every time you did a reinvention. Was there something you had to change within yourself or something you had to maybe leave behind?
- [18:46]
Sam
It's a good question. No one ever, no one's ever like asked me that question in the way you framed it. I think you do need to kill person you thought you were in a way. I try to make sure there are no holy, there's no sacrilege. Like I try to make sure that I always keep an open mind to new concepts. And even if I'm really married to one concept, I am willing to, to, to let it go if I feel the idea can be theoretically outdated. So when I was a lawyer, I realized that, you know, this is actually an outdated profession. Profession. And I received a lot of social pressure to remain a lawyer because I went to law school. I went to this like well known law school and then I went to this very well known law firm. And on paper I would be the last person to ever leave the legal profession because I had a so called perfect resume in the profession of law. So I had a lot of pressure not to mention student debts. And so I had a lot of pressure to not leave that legal career. But sometimes you have to follow your intuition and you have to, you have to move towards things that excite you and find, and things that you find interesting. So I, you know, I took a financial risk because there's a lot of financial stability being a lawyer. But I felt there was more upside if I followed my interests. And so that's what I did. And I continued to do that being a lawyer. Then I went into being. I was involved in a Japanese hedge fund for seven years and that grew to be a big monster. And then bank of America actually poached me and asked me to be their head of capital strategy for Asia Pacific, which I did. So I was like a banker for a number of years at Merrill, just basically responsible for that entire region from China to Australia and Korea and Japan and Hong Kong. It was quite, quite heady days. And then I took some time off. I went to this festival called Burning man and I took some time off, which was a huge mistake. I would, I highly recommend not taking too much time off. I took a bit too much time off about four or five years trying to figure out what my next move would be. And then I realized it would be a technology company in blockchain. And we, we were called Fluidity, which we co founded. And we, we had this product called Air Swap, which was one of the first decentralized exchanges in the world. Built on Ethereum and we successfully sold that company to Joe Lubin, the co founder of Ethereum and to Consensys. And we had a, you know, it was, we, you know, our shareholders made money which is saying something because most people in blockchain didn't make money in those days. And, and then I was asked to be an executive to Bit Digital and I had some vision on how Bit Digital should transform itself as in terms of being a public company. And then you know when I, when I, when I used ChatGPT, I had the same feelings when I did, when I, when I used email when I was using the Internet in 1995 it was, I'm sure you had that same feeling when you use ChatGPT. It's that ChatGPT moment. Like this is, this is a brand new technology. So that was a couple, that was a few years ago and I remember being in Singapore using it and showing my colleagues and we realized we need to be in this business and so we leveraged our skill set in basically powering AI and now we sit on the intersection of cloud and infrastructure and we IPO'd white fiber last August. Successful IPO and I'm currently running both companies. So that's a long winded answer in saying you just have to keep an open mind and always try to recognize new patterns and follow, follow your interests. And like I said, I believe that technology is magic and so I love always like understanding the latest technology and being involved.
- [23:08]
Interviewer
When you say the World Wide Web, I can't help but think my first Internet days I used to get those AOL free CDs for a month. I couldn't afford to get the Internet so I always get the free cd. They just create a new email address and now you have like unlimited Internet off of AOL and just even the sound, you got mail. Like it's what happened. Yeah, this is a funny like maybe we need more sounds back. Remember like all websites had like music when you would like you. Yeah. Open a website and they all had music and it was like MySpace had music or every website had music. It took forever to load. It's kind of, it's, it's hilarious thinking back to how much, how much has changed and it's only been like 30 years, 20 some odd years. Like it's crazy to think of so much has happened in the last 25 years.
- [24:00]
Sam
Yeah. But one thing that I don't like what's happening is the homogeneity of the world. Like everything is starting to look the same. You Just talked about how every website had like different jingles and different textures. And I find like when it comes to the world, where the world is going, it feels like it's all like collapsing into this one bland thing. Like I feel like all cars in 2026 are getting to look like the same shape and all music is starting to sound the same. All these singers, they're using Auto Tune, all the music sounds the same, all the cars look the same, all the websites have the same format. All, all the, all the corporate CEOs have to sound a certain way. You know, and I kind of, I'm, I'm kind of a closet rebel and I just rebel against things that makes me feel like I have to be this, that need, things need to be uniformed and I don't like the uniformity of where the future is going. I really don't like it. And that's, that's something I, is it
- [25:08]
Interviewer
because of the ease of use of different LLMs and our reliance now on these or other AI tools that we're not really thinking anymore, we're just using them and, and we're just living with the end product?
- [25:22]
Sam
I think you're right. I mean, I, I, I, you know, I have a girlfriend who's a musician and she was telling me that, you know, a lot of music sounds the same because all these like basically musicians are using all the same technology. Right? Right. So because of that you get this like sort of same, similar output whereas in the past people were approaching music differently. And I think just going back to the LLMs that you're talking about, people are just vibing with ChatGPT or Cloud and they're getting similar sort of outputs, they're getting really great stuff. Don't get me wrong, I use chat, I'm a power user of chat and so are you, I'm sure. And, and there are even better technologies out there now, like cloud, but you know, it does create atrophy in some ways in our thinking. I just don't understand how children today, when they go to school, if they're using chat non stop, which they have to. Right. But like, I just wonder if that creates at your mental like the brain is a muscle and if you're not, if you're, if, if you're just vibing with ChatGPT to get this amazingly polished answer to a difficult question, are you really using your muscle? And so I, I just don't know what society is going to look like. And I just wonder if our children will grow up to be soft Brain Humanoids. I just wonder.
- [26:44]
Interviewer
Yeah, talking about society, two things that scare me. One is the algorithm with social media and how we are bending everything we do towards an algorithm. Similar to what you're saying, right? Like you have to make music for an algorithm or for a social platform hoping somebody will do a 10 second dance of it. Right. You have to create something, you have to create a video. Like this interview has to be structured in a way that it gets exposure through an algorithm. Otherwise what's the point, I wonder the impact on our society, social media and this. And I've top of that. I really, really am and can. I'm pretty much convinced that there's a good chance that AI will replace a lot of the jobs. However, I'm excited that I don't really want to work in the future anyway. So I'm hoping like I can just go to Burning man and hang out with friends. So what, what scares you and what excites you about all these converging technologies?
- [27:46]
Sam
Well, what scares me very, very simply is that the loss of freedom. I hope I'm. I worry about governments using AI and using companies like Palantir to take away individual freedoms. That, that worries me. But what excites me is that AI is going to replace a lot of menial jobs and that's going to unleash a large portion of humanity to use their imagination and energy and mental calories to do other things besides push paper or you know, do whatever that, whatever menial jobs that AI can easily do. So that's exciting. But what worries me is the, the use of artificial intelligence to control the masses. That's not something I, I am supportive of.
- [28:39]
Interviewer
I haven't really thought about that. I'm glad you bring that up. I'm going to have to go and I want to stew on this. I like to sleep on something and I wake up in the middle of the night and I like will document with AI the crazy dream that I had about a thought. So I'm glad you bring that up. My wife and I wrote this book here called Unlimited Possibilities and it really reminds me of what you were saying earlier around. It's a breakthrough moment in your life and you've obviously had a lot of unlimited possibilities, a lot of breakthrough moments. I mean the fact that you take care of your mom who was a tarot card reader. I'm sure she tells you all the time how proud she is and thankful, which, I mean talk about how gratifying that could be. But what is an unlimited possibility in your life? That moment that sticks out to you.
- [29:25]
Sam
Well, you just mentioned one. Supporting my mother is a huge source of happiness for me. You know, as I mentioned earlier in the podcast, I'm planning a family. I'm late at this, I'm late at this game, but I'm planning a family. So I'm really looking forward to seeing the types of souls that will surface and how I could help them be optimized human beings. So I'm looking forward to that. But also I realize that these souls come with their own personalities and there's only so much shaping I can do. So I think that's, that's the blessing that comes from, you know, getting older. You realize that you can't control a lot of things. I still try to control things, but I have, you know, as years go by, I let things go.
- [30:13]
Interviewer
Do you think a big part of your success is the fact that you, I can tell, are very grounded? And it seems, at least it seems like you are very grounded to me. You're very humble. It seems you're very connected within yourself, which I don't think. You know, you look really not stressed. E. Even if you might be stressed, which I'm sure you stress out, you know, you have a lot of stressful things, pressures, but you appear to me as if you are very relaxed and grounded. And I think that's not so common with entrepreneurs, C suite until much later in life. Like you mentioned, it's, it's something you have to learn. But has that something that's always been, or is that piece of you a big part of your success now?
- [31:05]
Sam
Well, I'm not gonna, you know, I, I, I, I definitely think about work a lot during my off hours and I spiral sometimes. And sometimes I'm a bit absent minded to what's happening around me because I'm thinking about work constantly. So maybe that's a form of stress. But, but I think definitely I, again, I, I can't sometimes I'm told that's not very CEO, like, and I just, I, I don't give an F. Sometimes I'm just, I'm at a point where like, I'll just, basically, I would like to just rather, I'd rather just be unscripted and say what's on my mind than, than, than just like, just be the mold. I'm, I don't want to be part of the mold.
- [31:46]
Interviewer
I like that. Be who you are, man. Sam, I learned a lot today and what an incredible journey you've had. This is why we have found your story and I hope there's somebody who's listening. Watching was just like you before and they see you and like, wow, I'm going to be like Sam one day. And on top of that, in 20 years from now, I'm going to say, look, the king, the king of bit digital, the king of crypto, the king of AI. Sam, I remember when I talked about. I remember when I had anything, just letting you know. No, this has been great. Sam, I appreciate your time today and thank you so much for joining us.
- [32:21]
Sam
Yeah, thanks for having me. I appreciate it.