As Kent Halliburton stood in the bathroom of the Rosewood Hotel in the center of Amsterdam, thousands of miles from home, and ran his fingers over an envelope filled with crisp €10,000 notes, he began to wonder what he had gotten himself into.
Halliburton is the co-founder and CEO of Sazmining, a company that operates bitcoin mining equipment on behalf of clients, a model known as “mining as a service.” Halliburton is based in Peru, but Sazmining operates mining equipment in third-party data centers in Norway, Paraguay, Ethiopia and the United States.
According to Halliburton, the day before, on August 5, he flew to Amsterdam to meet with Even and Maxim, two representatives of a wealthy family from Monaco. The family office has offered to purchase hundreds of Bitcoin mining rigs from Sazmining for about $4 million, which the company will install at a facility currently under construction in Ethiopia. Before finalizing the deal, the family office asked Halliburton to meet in person.
When Halliburton arrived at the Rosewood Hotel, he found Even and Maxim sitting in a booth. They struck him as a playboy and a high roller, especially Maxim, who wore a brown three-piece suit and looked meticulously groomed, his long dark hair parted in the middle. A Rolex protruded from his sleeve cuff.
Over a three-course lunch of ceviche with caviar, Chilean sea bass and cherry pie, they discussed the terms of the deal and exchanged details about their pasts. Even was talkative and humorous, telling stories about loud parties in Marrakech. Maxim was on the sidelines; Mostly he looked at Halliburton, holding his gaze for a long time, as if assessing him.
As a relationship-building exercise, Even suggested that Halliburton sell the family office for approximately $3,000 in Bitcoin. Halliburton was hesitant at first, but considered it a dating ritual of sorts. One of the guys handed Halliburton an envelope containing cash and told him to go to the bathroom so he could count the amount in private. “It was like something out of a James Bond movie,” Halliburton says. “It was all very exotic to me.”
