4 Must-watch Money Flicks On Netflix

Movies on money often make for great thrillers. The inside workings of the stock markets, what goes on behind the closed doors of investor meetings or how the Wall Street types make those billion-dollar trades or even the billion-dollar blunders, are fascinating to watch. Mint Money lists four films around finance that you can binge watch on Netflix over the next long weekend. Remember, Netflix is an online video streaming website accessible through paid membership, starting with Rs500 a month. This is a biographical comedy-drama based on the book The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine, written by Michael Lewis. The good part is that the movie doesn’t run like a commentary; it’s makers understood that not all viewers can comprehend financial jargon. This 2016 documentary by Christopher Cannucciari traces the evolution of the disruptive cryptocurrency―bitcoin and features interviews of bitcoin entrepreneurs, financial columnists, regulators, and other experts. The first half of the movie tries to explain what bitcoin is and how the blockchain technology— on which cryptocurrencies like bitcoin rely—actually works.

The film travels back in time to the 1990s when the “cypher punks” movement began and gave birth to the idea of having a digital currency. It also tries to unravel the mystery surrounding who Satoshi Nakamoto really is (the unknown creator of bitcoins). The film quickly drifts away and exposes viewers to the Silk Road online black market, which sold illegal drugs, and conducted all transactions through bitcoins. While the documentary tries to showcase the intention to have bitcoin as an honest currency, it also brings forth the challenges in the system. This is a short 46-minute British documentary where the filmmaker meets four ordinary people—Judith, Rebekah, Jonathan and Jalaj (yes, an Indian)—who use unusual ways to penny-pinch. Judith is a voucher queen and every visit to the supermarket means redeeming a bundle, and hardly paying any cash on the total bill. Over the years, she has perfected the art of using vouchers for almost everything.

The story of Rebekah is also inspiring. In a country where the average budget for a wedding is £30,000, she sets a budget of £1,500 for her wedding. Jonathan, on the other hand, has never spent a single penny on meat and depends on road kill for barbecue. Then there is Jalaj and his wife, an Indian couple, who use technology to scan product barcodes on their phone and find the cheapest deals around. They find the best bargains at different stores for their household shopping, saving a considerable sum. This 2009 documentary delves into the cutthroat world of commodities trading and takes you right into “the pit”, i.e., the New York Board of Trade (NYBOT), which used the traditional open outcry trading system to trade commodities. The documentary shows the yelling and the screaming and the hustling by brokers, who try to get the best deals. The trading floor in the movie is an intimidating place. The film has interviews of various brokers who made it big in the pit. It also explains the associated risks and how many people made huge losses by betting big on the trading floor.

Brunei’s ruler is among the few remaining absolute monarchs and one of the longest reigning. 10 billion targeted earlier, achieving the largest private fundraising round ever. International investors including The Carlyle Group bought the dollar-denominated tranche. Ant says it’s investing in blockchain, artificial intelligence, security, and the Internet of Things. 8 billion when it goes public. The Dutch payment firm’s technology is used by the likes of Netflix and Facebook. 257 million) last year, up 38%. Crypto is supposedly the future of money, but regular old fiat payment processors still handle all the transactions. Fortune says blockchain consortium R3 is floundering. R3 disputed claims that it missed revenue targets and is running low on money. It has been 10 years since Satoshi Nakamoto’s white paper was published; people are anxious to see viable projects that provide more than an opportunity to gamble. In crypto’s Wild West, the CFTC is Wyatt Earp. Commissioner Rostin Behnam said crypto will proliferate in every part of the world: “Perhaps we are witnessing a modern miracle.” Is the US commodities regulator crypto’s biggest cheerleader, Coinbase says it’s on track to operate a regulated broker-dealer. If approved, the crypto exchange would be able to offer blockchain-based securities under the oversight of US watchdogs. This contrasts with the regulatory arbitrage waged by the likes of Binance in Malta.

This is a myth, fostered mostly by sensationalistic press coverage and an incomplete understanding of the technology. Much like email, which is quite traceable, Bitcoin is pseudonymous, not anonymous. Further, every transaction in the Bitcoin network is tracked and logged forever in the Bitcoin blockchain, or permanent record, available for all to see. As a result, Bitcoin is considerably easier for law enforcement to trace than cash, gold or diamonds. What’s the future of Bitcoin, Bitcoin is a classic network effect, a positive feedback loop. The more people who use Bitcoin, the more valuable Bitcoin is for everyone who uses it, and the higher the incentive for the next user to start using the technology. Bitcoin shares this network effect property with the telephone system, the web, and popular Internet services like eBay and Facebook. In fact, Bitcoin is a four-sided network effect. There are four constituencies that participate in expanding the value of Bitcoin as a consequence of their own self-interested participation.