tgbex logo TGBEX Limited is on a mission to spread bitcoin ownership and awareness. They manufacture physical bitcoins, which are offline wallets, with the public and private bitcoin keys engraved on the back of specially designed coins. Based in the Isle of Man, TGBEX is operated by Adrian Forbes (a qualified accountant & investment advisor) and David Bailey (who has a long-standing involvement in the physical bitcoin community, as the CEO of HardBTC.org). The physical bitcoins were launched in September 2014, with the first coin manufactured being donated to the local Manx Museum. The coins have been featured in Bloomberg Magazine and on the BBC website/ Radio and have even made an appearance on Bloomberg TV. We caught up with Adrian and had the chance to ask him a number of questions: NEWSBTC: What got you into bitcoin and physical coin manufacturing? Adrian: I have a background in fund administration for venture capital and private equity funds, so seeing them get involved initially got me interested, plus I studied Economic and Social history so the more I looked into bitcoin, the more potential benefits I could and continue to see. What got me into physical bitcoins, was searching for a way to buy my children a bitcoin each. After a lot of research, I came across Casascius coins which I loved, but it was around the time it was shut down by FinCen and the prices soared.I believe physical bitcoins are the ideal way to introduce new people into bitcoin and thought I could use my experience of setting up controls and processes and dealing with regulators to set up TGBEX. What makes your physical coins different to others out there? We spent a great deal of time looking at the market before we launched and were very worried […]
