When you first meet Joel Ives, you’ll see him as your typical Australian bloke. He has the obvious Australian accent where he shifts his vowels to a long ‘e’, misses out ‘r’s here and there, ends statements like questions and calls everyone ‘mate’. On top of that, he’s a big fan of the Australian Football League which is much more brutal compared to American football. 

Of course, he is no brute as he is very respectful of everyone around him. His sense of humour is also rather distinct as he is a huge fan of Pepe the Frog of which he constantly spams people with GIFs and Stickers. 

Prior to delving into the world of finance, Joel studied Science and Psychology in The University of Western Australia. He loves understanding human behaviour and how the brain works but soon realised that the financial industry is where the moolah is. After graduating, he continued his studies and graduated with a Bachelor of Commerce, Financial Accounting & Corporate Finance. 

While holding a job in auditing, one of his mates introduced him to crypto. The investment didn’t go so well but with the help of that same friend, he reinvested into Ethereum and Bitcoin. 

Joel did not touch his crypto holdings for a while though. He continued working as an auditor, corporate accountant and company secretary in various companies in Perth. 

Then, in 2017 during the Bitcoin Bubble, Joel made some pretty nifty investments and he moved to Malaysia to be with his wife and that was when he met BitOrb’s co-founders, Hoong-Teng, Jeremy and Umair. 

In BitOrb, Joel is the office’s favourite (once-a-month) boss because he basically gives us all our salary. Jokes aside, he is the Chief Financial Officer. He initially joined the company as an advisor when he met the co-founders in April 2018. After witnessing the progress which they have made, he realised that the company is going into a very interesting direction and he joined as the CFO in May 2019. 

“I’m excited about where BitOrb is heading and I’m glad to be part of the team.”