We are so back.

Hello world 🐣It feels great to be writing on Inside Basis again - I can’t believe it’s been over a year since we last published an article! This post is going to be a mix of personal and professional updates in the Hash Basis universe. We’ve still been working with customers and noodling on crypto accounting problems this whole time, just without our usual fanfare and marketing. But creativity has struck me again, and I find myself longing to get back into the content game once more.

Mackenzie’s Personal Updates

As the reader might know, I got married at the end of last year to my best friend, Nikhil. Our wedding was a beautiful four-day event since we had both traditional American and Indian weddings - which meant there was a lot of planning that went into it! We’d been planning these weddings for over a year and navigating all of the family and logistical drama that comes with the territory. Juggling full-time work and wedding planning was a challenge, especially since we didn’t have a planner and Nikhil had recently started working at a little startup called Perplexity. But the wedding went off without a hitch and afterwards we spent a dreamy week in Kauai, soaking up the sunlight and squeezing in some work when possible.

We came back to reality and settled into our San Francisco home as a married couple. And from there, it was off to the races with month-end close, year-end close, audit prep and tax season. The contrast between the highs of the wedding and the lows of excel drudgery was stark. I have a wonderful team supporting me, but a lot of the work naturally falls on my shoulders since I often struggle with delegating. I was heads down for months trying to meet all of the deadlines and preserve the quality of my work. If there’s one thing I’ll never compromise on, it’s the high standard I hold myself to. All accounting problems can be solved, and so I strive to have numbers that are clean and make sense. Hash Basis is still a small business (we are a small but mighty team!), but it means that when intense work sprints are happening, marketing falls to the wayside. So January through May melted away in google sheets and tax return software - and then summer happened, and I finally took a breather. ☀️

Nikhil and I spent the last few weeks camping, hosting family and friends in our house, celebrating Nikhil’s 29th birthday and visiting family in Florida. Summer is my favorite season, and something about the late sunsets and balmy weather recharges me. Life can get tumultuous at times, but then I remember I’m surrounded by people I love and work that feels meaningful to me.

So yes, my head was buried in the day-to-day sand for a while, but I’ve popped up again with fresh eyes and spirit. We are so back.

Hash Basis Happenings

First off, our website got a makeover! It was time for a revamp of our Services and Home pages - we also created a new page that reviews what to expect when you work with Hash Basis, from the initial sales call to steady state. We’ve gained valuable experience over the years and are (hopefully) wiser than when we started off! We have a better pulse on what our clients need, want and expect, and our goal is to deliver above and beyond that. Our services have also evolved, and we’re re-launching our four core main services:

• Monthly Crypto & Fiat Accounting
• Monthly Crypto & Fiat Accounting + Annual Tax Return
• Crypto Subledger Implementation
• Special Projects

The biggest change is we’re no longer offering individual crypto tax services. We are zeroing in on companies based in the US (C corps and S corps mainly) and their monthly accounting and tax needs. I’m also personally excited for the Special Projects categories - it’s essentially scoped-out consulting with predefined metrics of success. I love thinking outside the box and tinkering on side projects, so I’m curious to see what one-off problems crypto companies are having.

We also dropped a new video on our How We Work page (I know it’s dorky, but it helps to put a face to the name!).

Second, we are bringing back Inside Basis articles! We are dropping a new article every week for the next month to get back into the swing of things - we’re also resurrecting our newsletter, albeit in a more bite-sized version. Our first article is How to Actually Reverse Impairment in Bitwave which is as technical as technical gets. But don’t worry, it’s not a total snooze fest - it’s just an issue I encountered with several customers, so I’d figure I would share my knowledge. :) I’m also envisioning a different flavor of articles that are more “bloggy” and less crypto bro. For example, articles about running a crypto accounting firm, lessons learned over the years, outsourcing talent, the state of the accounting industry in the US, etc. After waking up from this burnout haze, I realized I have a lot to say. It’s so hard being creative again, but once the ball gets rolling, it’s more difficult to contain the human expression.

The final update is….Hash Basis is starting a podcast! I know, I know, everyone has a podcast these days, but ours isn’t about crypto accounting or some other banal financial topic. It’s about the history of accounting, and we’re calling it Mr. Martino’s Ledger.

You might be wondering, Who the heck is Mr. Martino?!

Don’t fret, all will be revealed during our episode on Luca Pacioli. 🧮 I’m a huge history buff, and since I was 14 years old, I’ve been obsessed with Ancient Rome and Greece (specifically Greek Mythology) and art history. In fact, I almost got a bachelors degree in art history instead of accounting - I’m so entranced by Baroque, Renaissance and Neoclassical art and just thinking about the ancients sends a shiver down my spine. I feel strangely connected to the people of the past because they’re not irrelevant or simply “dead.” A window onto their world can be revealed through a fragment of paper or piece of stained glass. I started researching the history of accounting and became similarly obsessed. I found this PhD dissertation on Accounting and Auditing in Roman Society and realized there’s a whole world of accounting history scholarship out there. And no one has talked about it!

We’re here to illuminate this fascinating history in an entertaining and educational way. My first priority is to make sure Mr. Martino’s Ledger isn’t boring, so we’ll come with lots of stories that make you laugh instead of fall asleep. You can find our teaser trailer here.

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And there you have it! Hash Basis is a reflection of my personality and the seasons of change in my life, and I can’t wait for this upcoming chapter. We are as dedicated as ever to clean books, happy customers and continual learning. And I promise I won’t go MIA for another year. 😺

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