7. Initial Coin Offering

Complete story — includes the ending

Having been verbally promised that they will not have to run ads or sell user data, Pied Piper is closing its $30 million series B with Bream-Hall. Dinesh seeks to get a more-exclusive Tesla than his employees. Jared learns that the computing credits Richard gave Laurie have been traded several times, increasing in value to $1.6 million. Due to this, Gilfoyle proposes that Pied Piper launch a cryptocurrency and finance itself with an initial coin offering, or ICO, breaking free of Bream-Hall and securing all board seats. Richard seeks advice from Hanneman, who did 36 ICOs, failing all but one, which could nonetheless cover all the losses. Monica first defends Laurie's offer then realizes Laurie will take advantage of the terms of the deal. Richard proposes that Monica become Pied Piper's CFO to work on the ICO, PiedPiperCoin, which has to increase in value a thousand-fold. Laurie is seemingly unaffected by Monica's departure and congratulates her just before meeting Yao in China. Meanwhile, Belson moves manufacturing of Box 3 to Goldbriar, North Carolina, forcing the town to cut essential services to fund manufacturing improvements. As a result, the factory burns down and valuable materials are looted.