This is Brian Armstrong

He is the co-founder of a multi- billion dollar crypto exchange: Coinbase 

Here's the story of how he co-founded coinbase 🧵.

Growing up, Brian was a shy intelligent kid who was very interested in computers.

This interest was further encouraged by his parents who were tech professionals themselves.

His dad - an environmental engineer

And his mom?

A software engineer at IBM

After high school, Brian went to Rice University to study computer science.

One day, he and his roommate were considering ways to make extra cash.

Then the idea of tutoring high school students came to their minds.

But why tutor students individually when you could help students find tutors close to them and get paid for it?

And...

this was exactly what they did.

They launched a web app, UniversityTutors, that matched students with tutors close to them, and it wasn’t long before the cash came flowing in.

To the extent that people at their bank called and were questioning the money that was coming in.

Eventually, after Brian graduated, he sold off the app because, according to him, "I couldn't really get it to break out and be a real success."

Brian graduated from college in 2021 and obtained his master's in 2022.

After college, Brian wasn't sure what to do, so he decided to try something new. Brian decided to move to Buenos Aires.

Despite some concerns from his parents, he moved to Buenos Aires.

While in Buenos Aires, Brian noticed something.

Brian noticed that the people of Buenos Aires had distrust for their government.

A distrust that stemmed from hyperinflation and poorly run monetary systems.

And to Brian, it just felt wrong.

He didn't make any moves, but this probably laid the foundation for "a safe and secure payment system that people could trust" in his subconscious.

Come Christmas 2010, Brian headed back to California to spend time with his family and stumbled upon the Bitcoin whitepaper.

He was so intrigued by the whitepaper that even when he was being called down for Christmas dinner, he couldn’t come down because of how intrigued he was by the whitepaper.

Christmas done, he...

went Argentina, and made the decision to take a job at Airbnb as a software engineer, where he worked with payment systems.

But Brian couldn't stop thinking about Bitcoin and how to make it easy and safe to use. 

While at Airbnb, he saw the difficulty that came with sending money to certain countries and conceived the idea to solve payment issues with Bitcoin.

And so it began...


Brian began working weekends and nights to develop a software prototype that could enable the buying and storing of cryptocurrencies.

Then, in 2012, he entered Y Combinator to obtain funding for his software.

As soon as he was accepted, he quit his job at Airbnb.

He initially entered as a sole founder but along the line decided that he needed a co-founder.

3 days to the deadline, he still hadn't found one.

With this deadline in mind, he took to Hacker News and Reddit and posted that he was looking for a co-founder.

Fred Ehrsam, a forex trader at Goldman Sachs, happened to stumble upon Brian’s post. 

He also had a bullish view on Bitcoin and decided to join hands with Brian. 

He quit his job and met with Brian to begin working on his idea.

The two joined hands and were able to obtain a $150,000 fund from the startup incubator program.

And later that year, Coinbase was launched.

Sure, it was launched out of a two-bedroom apartment.

But...

Fast forward to today

Coinbase:

- Is among the top 5 largest crypto exchanges

- Has 110+ million users

- Has a valuation of $50+ billion dollars

- Operates in 100+ countries

Thank you for reading.

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@barmstrong x @base x @kylepatrick.eth x @dummie.eth x @dwr.eth