It was October 2013, and I was repositioning my business. After years of running a commercial photography business, I decided to close it down and start up a creative agency. I had been picking up consulting gigs for over a year, and it was time to choose a direction. Clients were signing. The new model was working. But every month was a race — money in, money out, and not much in between.

I was 5 figures short on outflows for three consecutive months. Payroll, office lease, platform fees — everything was piling up. So when a new client signed and paid a down payment three times my consulting retainer, I exhaled. Briefly.

Then the payment processor froze the funds.

They flagged it as a large amount for my account — even though I processed that much or more every month. Seven days passed before I noticed the delay. Four more went to chasing answers. When I finally reached someone with authority, they offered a “solution”: release 25% now, and the rest in staggered chunks over three months.

I had a track record. The payment was legitimate. The client had confirmed it. But I was being treated like a risk.

I didn’t have time to fight. I had a team to lead. Work to deliver. Instead, I lost hours to emails, phone trees, and back-office limbo. I begged, explained, escalated — and got nowhere.

Finally, I called my lawyer.

Then he and I called the payment processor.

Within an hour of that legal call, the full amount was released.

The issue wasn’t fraud. It wasn’t an error. It was permission.

The processor had the money. The client had confirmed the payment. Everything was legitimate. But access still depended on whether someone in a back office believed I should have it — and whether I had enough leverage to press the issue.

And I only got that leverage because I could afford a lawyer.

That’s what stayed with me.

The contract was signed. The invoice was paid. The funds were sitting there. But access wasn’t automatic — it was conditional. On their system. Their discretion. Their trust.

It wasn’t really about the money.

It was about who gets to move money freely — and who doesn’t.

Once you see that, you can’t unsee it.

Money moves differently depending on who you are, how much you have, and who vouches for you. The system is not neutral. It has gates. And gatekeepers.

Crypto was built to answer that.