川普提名的 NASA 局長賈里德艾薩克曼 (Jared Isaacman) 是一位在穩定幣上大舉押注的加密貨幣億萬富翁

他也是 Shift4 的創辦人，這是一家為企業提供安全支付處理解決方案的金融科技公司。

Jared Isaacman, President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to run NASA, is a 41-year-old space enthusiast, who just months ago commanded the world’s first all-civilian mission to reach orbit.

當選總統唐納德·川普任命的美國宇航局局長賈里德·艾薩克曼是一位41 歲的太空愛好者，幾個月前，他指揮了世界上第一個全民用進入軌道的任務。

He’s also a crypto billionaire.

他也是一位加密貨幣億萬富翁。

Isaacman is the founder of Shift4, a fintech company that provides secure payment processing solutions for businesses. The company’s stock price has jumped almost 40% this year, lifting its market cap to $9.3 billion. Isaacman started the business in 1999 at age 16 and took it public on the New York Stock Exchange in 2020.

Isaacman 是 Shift4 的創辦人，這是一家為企業提供安全支付處理解決方案的金融科技公司。該公司股價今年上漲了近 40%，市值升至 93 億美元。 Isaacman 於 1999 年 16 歲時創立了這家公司，並於 2020 年在紐約證券交易所上市。

In a Dec. 4 post on his Truth Social platform announcing the nomination, Trump wrote, “Jared has demonstrated exceptional leadership, building a trailblazing global financial technology company.”

川普在 12 月 4 日在其 Truth Social 平台上宣布提名的帖子中寫道，“賈里德展現了卓越的領導才能，打造了一家開創性的全球金融科技公司。”

That success can be traced in part to a bold bet on crypto almost three years ago.

這一成功可以部分歸因於大約三年前對加密貨幣的大膽押注。

Inside Isaacman’s New York residence near Central Park, around a lofted conference room with glass walls that sits above the apartment’s living area, Isaacman and members of his executive team sat with Alex Wilson and Pat Duffy, two entrepreneurs who were in the final stages of selling their crypto donation marketplace to Shift4. It was early 2022.

在艾薩克曼位於中央公園附近的紐約住所內，在公寓起居區上方一間帶玻璃牆的閣樓會議室周圍，艾薩克曼和他的管理團隊成員與亞歷克斯·威爾遜和帕特·達菲坐在一起，這兩位企業家正處於出售的最後階段他們向 Shift4 提供加密貨幣捐贈市場。那是 2022 年初。

With a whiteboard behind them, they spitballed on how blockchain-based technology could be applied across the payment company’s business.

他們身後有一塊白板，討論如何將基於區塊鏈的技術應用於支付公司的業務。

Bitcoin had hit a record a few months earlier, jumping sixfold from the end of 2019 through the close of 2021. A range of digital tokens were delivering outsized returns. The market was frothy, spirits were high and meme coins were in their prime.

幾個月前，比特幣創下了新紀錄，從 2019 年底到 2021 年底，比特幣上漲了六倍。市場泡沫充沛，人們情緒高漲，迷因幣正處於鼎盛時期。

But while Elon Musk was touting dogecoin and money was pouring into nonfungible tokens (NFTs), Wilson, Duffy, and Isaacman were focused on a far less glitzy corner of the digital asset world: stablecoins.

然而，當伊隆馬斯克兜售狗狗幣並且資金大量湧入不可替代代幣（NFT）時，威爾遜、達菲和艾薩克曼卻專注於數位資產世界中一個遠不那麼耀眼的角落：穩定幣。

Stablecoins are a subset of cryptocurrencies matched to the value of a real-world asset and are virtually synonymous with U.S. dollar-pegged tokens. Today, they’re collectively worth around $200 billion and are often used to move money across borders at a fraction of the cost of legacy payment systems.

穩定幣是與現實世界資產價值相符的加密貨幣的子集，實際上是與美元掛鉤的代幣的代名詞。如今，它們的總價值約為 2000 億美元，通常用於跨境轉移資金，而成本只是傳統支付系統的一小部分。

Wilson, 31, said the group around the table at Isaacman’s house “all agreed it was more likely that stablecoins would become a regular medium of exchange than bitcoin or ethereum.” They wanted to build products that took advantage of blockchain but were token agnostic.

31 歲的威爾遜表示，艾薩克曼家裡的桌子周圍的人“都同意穩定幣比比特幣或以太坊更有可能成為常規交易媒介。”他們希望建立利用區塊鏈但與代幣無關的產品。

“We wanted to meet users where they were and equip our merchants to take payments in whatever ways their customers wanted to pay,” Wilson said.

「我們希望滿足用戶的需求，並讓我們的商家能夠以客戶想要的任何方式進行付款，」威爾森說。

In front of the whiteboard with marker in hand, Isaacman walked through ways crypto could be applied to the broader Shift4 business. Wilson said Isaacman has an uncanny ability to get in the weeds despite being the CEO of a company that now has more than 3,000 employees.

在白板前，手裡拿著記號筆，艾薩克曼講述了加密貨幣如何應用於更廣泛的 Shift4 業務。威爾森表示，儘管艾薩克曼是一家目前擁有 3000 多名員工的公司的首席執行官，但他卻擁有一種不可思議的撥亂反正的能力。

Weeks later, on March 1, Shift4 announced it had purchased The Giving Block, Wilson and Duffy’s company, and would pursue a “$45+ billion embedded cross-sell opportunity by bundling crypto donation capabilities with traditional card acceptance.” Shift4 paid $54 million and included in the deal a potential earnout of up to $246 million.

幾週後，即3 月1 日，Shift4 宣布已收購The Giving Block、Wilson 和Duffy 的公司，並將透過將加密貨幣捐贈功能與傳統卡接受服務捆綁在一起，尋求「價值超過450 億美元的嵌入式交叉銷售機會」。 Shift4 支付了 5,400 萬美元，並在交易中包含了高達 2.46 億美元的潛在收益。