By Special Feature by Forbes Asia
Imagine having a cheat code for financial markets. Joseph Plazo didn’t just imagine it—he built it. Then gave it away.
In a lecture hall humming with anticipation, Joseph Plazo stood before a crowd ready to rewrite how markets are understood.
PhDs and programmers sat frozen, eyes locked on the projector as a piece of market history appeared as code.
“What you’re seeing,” he said, “is the DNA of something that never lost.”
“And now it’s yours to evolve.”
## The Code That Outplayed Wall Street
Godmode—formally known as System 72—emerged after 12 years and 71 failures.
It marries algorithmic speed with emotional insight, producing near-psychic trades.
It scrapes Reddit threads, decodes Fed speech stress levels, reads derivatives flow, and parses tweet tone.
“Markets aren’t equations,” Plazo explains. “They’re emotional theaters.”
And System 72 delivered.
It predicted the 2024 tech rally. It anticipated 2025’s altcoin run—48 hours early.
Billions flowed in quietly, trade by trade.
## Then Came the Twist
One afternoon, overlooking Manila’s skyline, Plazo dropped a bomb on his partners.
“It’s time the world had this,” he declared.
Silence. Then disbelief. Then resistance.
He wasn’t licensing the code. He wasn’t monetizing it. He was giving away the brain of the most profitable website AI in finance.
“Genius shouldn’t be hoarded,” Plazo told Forbes. “It should be cultivated.”
## The Educational Revolution That Followed
Soon, labs from Singapore to Japan were adapting the code in wildly creative ways.
Jakarta students used it to detect unrest. Seoul labs used it to predict EV charging loads.
“This could be AI’s Gutenberg moment,” one Singapore professor claimed.
International agencies asked for a look under the hood.
## Critics, Controversy, and the Ethics of Genius
Some called it dangerous. Others called it disruptive.
“This is financial anarchy,” warned a U.S. fund manager.
Plazo stayed firm.
“We can’t outlaw brilliance,” he added. “We need to teach it.”
He retained control of execution layers, capital buffers, and trading safeguards.
“The skeleton’s yours to build,” he added.
## Real Stories from the Ground
A part-time data analyst in Manila launched a startup after six months of trading.
Vietnamese undergrads used the model to stabilize food market risk.
In Mumbai, a student cried as he shared: “I never thought I’d understand markets. Now I build AI.”
## The Philosophy That Powers the Gift
Why give away billions in code? “Because intelligence spreads best when it’s not caged,” he said.
Knowledge is infrastructure—not a luxury item.
“We’ve spent decades treating code like gold. I treat it like electricity,” he said.
## Conclusion: The Joystick Is Yours Now
He surveys the room—young minds, old dreams, and new tools.
“I didn’t build this to win trades,” he says. “I built it to win freedom.”
In a world of closed systems, Joseph Plazo did the unthinkable: he handed the joystick to the world.
The next market genius? They might not be in Manhattan. They might be in Mumbai, Manila, or Seoul—with the blueprint in hand.