People Die; Crypto Doesn’t: Plan Your Crypto Estate with Pamela Morgan at ETHDenver 2019
What happens to your cryptocurrency if something happens to you?
Pamela Morgan has been an attorney and educator for years. Whether she’s teaching clients how to form a blockchain L.L.C. or teaching individuals how to protect their crypto estate, one thing is clear: Morgan is on a mission to empower individuals to take action over their digital assets.
“I’ve always looked for ways to help people navigate bureaucracy when necessary and avoid it whenever possible. I’m committed to building new systems that can deliver equal access, equal outcomes, and equal justice. But that doesn’t happen overnight. In the meantime, I love to make complex, daunting legal tasks easily accessible to everyday people.” Morgan told us.
Most recently, that passion developed into a book which Morgan published just last year. Cryptoasset Inheritance Planning: A Simple Guide for Owners is a step-by-step tutorial in how to plan your cryptocurrency inheritance process. Though her book is for any crypto asset owner, the idea for it started with Morgan’s work as an attorney in the blockchain space.
“I was working with companies to implement multi-sig and disaster preparedness and most were funded in bitcoin at that time. After we would get done with their business plans, I would ask the question, ‘Now that we have your business in order, what about you? How much of your net worth is in bitcoin?’ And the answer was always, ‘All of it!’”
From there, Morgan started asking clients if they’d considered how their cryptocurrency assets would be distributed if something happened to them. Rarely did a client have a plan in place.
“That’s when we started helping our clients with cryptoasset inheritance planning.” Morgan said. “During 2017, when the prices of cryptocurrencies skyrocketed, the need for inheritance planning did too. People realized that something that used to be ‘play money’ all of a sudden became 25%, 50%, even 80% of their net worth. And so people started to see they needed to look at this topic.”
As she continued her legal work with blockchain companies, Morgan realized she needed to create something for the everyday crypto holder.
“I wrote the book because I don’t scale and there were a lot of people interested in it all at once. I wrote the book as a way to guide people: For 80% of people the book is enough and for the extra 20% who have unique situations, they can hire someone.” Morgan said.
Crafting a creative action plan that readers can actually walk away with and do something about was one of Morgan’s main goals in authoring the book.
“Everyone with cryptoassets needs to do some sort of inheritance planning, but it sounds like a depressing and terrible task. And it seems like it will take a ton of time. But it doesn’t have to. In just a couple of hours, you can build a basic cryptoasset inheritance plan. The first section of my book is all about doing that. It’s about sitting down and just getting something on paper! The rest of the book is about making that plan better, making it legal, and keeping it fresh.” she told us.
Beyond her book, Morgan recommends utilizing a number of free templates she’s published on her website to start your crypto estate planning. And of course, to come chat with her at ETHDenver next month, where she will be speaking about her new book and what you can do to start planning your own crypto estate.
“I am so excited to be able to talk to everyone at ETHDenver and make inheritance planning doable. I’m looking forward to helping people overcome the mental barriers around this topic and to provide them with actionable items that they can take away and actually do. This isn’t going to be a boring lecture; this session will be engaging, a bit interactive, and empowering. You’ll get the tools you need to make your own plan in a way that will be fun, painless, and make you feel really good after!” she told us.
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