The Driving Force Behind the Bull Market

Charlie McGarraugh, chief strategy officer, Blockchain.com, is responsible for firm-wide strategy, commercial development and Blockchain.com’s markets businesses

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Charlie McGarraugh, chief strategy officer, Blockchain.com at Blockworks Bretton Woods conference; Photo by Mike Lawrence

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In this video, Blockworks’ “Forward Guidance” podcast host Jack Farley sat down with Charlie McGarraugh, chief strategy officer of Blockchain.com, at Blockworks’ Digital Asset Summit in London to talk about what is driving the crypto bull market, including the vibrant digital asset community and innovation in the space.

McGarraugh is responsible for firm-wide strategy, commercial development and Blockchain.com’s markets businesses.

Following a relocation to London in 2009, Goldman named McGarraugh to its exclusive partnership in 2012 as a result of his leadership of the build-out of its highly successful post-financial-crisis European mortgages business. In 2014 he assumed a senior role in Goldman’s commodity department as Global Head of Metals trading, overseeing all base and precious metals activities globally.

In 2016 McGarraugh decided that a fuller embrace of disruptive technologies would be a requirement to be best positioned for transitions in markets over the coming decades, and craving deep hands-on experience in tech entrepreneurship, machine learning, and electronic trading, he left Goldman to join Stratagem Technologies, a London-based AI sports prediction company he had previously seeded, as chairman and CEO.

By 2018, he decided that a pivot to digital assets was the optimal strategy to best deploy Stratagem’s technical capabilities, and the team began serious work on crypto markets. Stratagem caught the attention of Blockchain.com and was acquired in October 2018 to bring McGarraugh and the team aboard.

Watch the full interview below.


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