Yoni Assia introduced GoodDollar at Web Summit

Web Summit Was Where It All Began For GoodDollar Back In November 2018

GoodDollar has come a long way since it was introduced 12 months ago, at Web Summit, by Yoni Assia, Chief Executive of multi-asset trading platform eToro. Inequality took centre stage in Lisbon and they initially pledged $1 million to launch the not-for-profit project that is aiming to reduce global wealth inequality using blockchain and universal basic income (UBI) principles. you can see the 15-minute presentation here.

Mr Assia, who first wrote about his desire to use technology to reduce global wealth inequality in 2008, used this year’s Web Summit, held between November 4 and 7 in Portugal, to press the case for GoodDollar.

“There is a very big problem in the world: inequality,” he said. “The gap is getting bigger and bigger. That is leading to political instability and populism. Potentially that could get much worse with automation.”

Addressing the Web Summit audience, Mr Assia urged tech leaders to collaborate in order to help hit the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals by 2030. “We are all here building technologies to replace more jobs. Potentially people are going to lose those jobs. There is a very big problem on the horizon in terms of financial health. As tech leaders, we need to think about solutions.”

He continued: “We are looking at the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals [and] we are focused on inequality and how what we do could eventually improve equality. We have this big, hairy audacious goal of ending poverty. For that purpose, we have created a not-for-profit organisation, GoodDollar, which uses UBI and blockchain.”

For this edition of Web Summit, Mr Assia spoke twice at the event, which gathers the great and the good of the technology world and has been labelled “the Olympics for tech”.

GoodDollar: Web Summit Star

On centre stage, he contributed to a panel discussion titled “The three things every leader should know”, alongside top representatives from Walmart, Mozilla, and Andela. Shortly afterwards, in another session asking “Do fintechs care about your financial health?” he featured with Elnor Rozenrot of CreditStacks.

He pointed out that eToro is the “world’s largest social trading network”, with 12 million registered users. It was put to Mr Assia that it is becoming incumbent upon financial institutions to consider the financial health of their customers. “It is important to point out that financial health is subjective,” he said. “Different people will say different things.

“I think the amount of money you have is a big part of financial health. It is also about being able to understand the markets.”

He argued that this is what eToro does, through democratising trading, educating users, and allowing them to copy the trades done by more experienced users. And with projects like GoodDollar, he hopes the fight against global wealth inequality can be won.