Hey there, it's Tom Gonstein. And in this episode of Bitcoin
for Millennials, I'm joined by Michael Tanguma, who's the Co
founder and CEO of On Ramp. We dive into how Bitcoin, AI and
energy are converging to reshape finance, why corporate and
sovereign adoption could redefine market cycles, and the
importance of first principles thinking in navigating this new
era. Michael shares his market
insights, thoughts on risk, and what's next for Bitcoin as it
enters the global mainstream. This is an exciting conversation
about how to get ready for a crazy technological future.
I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.
And if you do, please subscribe and like on YouTube or follow me
on your favorite podcasting platform that will help me to
spread the message on Bitcoin even further.
Now let's dive in to this episode.
I wanted to start with something that that you've shared with me
before and that is you've been talking about a great awakening
that has happened happening and that a lot of mental models
about money, technology, society are.
Yeah, kind of breaking down. And yeah, I just want to kind of
like start with that. Like can you unpack the thoughts
you have around it? And, and maybe also, you know,
if these mental models are breaking down, what is going to
replace them? Yeah, I think trying to think
there's there's different angles to take it.
I think there's one and we've probably feel it in technology
and you know you specifically on the kind of growth and how
you've built your business on the podcast side and in a lens
for technology and where it's heading that it like compounds
when you start to understand these tools and leverage them
and there's a lot of people going to be kind of left behind
that. And that's a very small angle.
But when you think about working in the traditional world and
having a certain set of school toolkit and you really can't
move outside of that. And we see this when we try to
hire individuals at On Ramp. And I remember the specifically
back in the day when we were supposed to be helping on the
work side that we work with Mackenzie.
And I just remember this visually like going into a
presentation with them and they were like they saw fire for the
first time when they saw Google Slides.
And that you can in real time audit and edit or you can edit
and you think about those individuals, like, imagine them
today, like there's no way they're using AI tools, There's
no way they're like compounding all these things.
It's just like their, their, their brain got stuck and I
don't know what it is. And so I think that there's this
thing that's happening where some are, they're compounding.
You kind of see this in the Bitcoin space and there's
something to do with truth seeking and, and efficiency.
But then we're I'm kind of where struggled to tie it back was on
what we're just chatting about, which is Bitcoin being a common
sense test. And it's this notion that
independent of if you have all this baggage from the
traditional world and you're 45 years old and you know what
money is in real estate. It's like at the end of the day,
if you're five years old and you say to the little girl or boy,
do you want a unit that has a fixed supplier or one that can
infinitely be created? They're going to pick the one
that has some scarcity to it. And so it's like, well, what
does it look like as the older individuals, these cohorts that
refuse to kind of like, you know, adopt or or can't maybe
maybe they can't. And this new wave, it's like
ultimately gets to Bitcoin as kind of inevitability.
But then the the last thing and what do you get to talk about on
the other content I wanted to bring up, you told me to say was
I still haven't fully wrapped my head around this.
You're somebody in your listener group definitely has because you
have a very big, you know, following is you kind of see
this in like biblical text and there's different, there's
different aspects of this. Like Noah's ark was an aspect
where you could only save so many people.
There's only so many people that were going to like actually get
on and then understand and then they kind of rebuild.
And then similarly with, I think it's Moses taking individuals or
the Israelites out of Egypt, I believe, and then from Pharaoh.
And then they had to go through the desert for 40 years and only
so many people made it in, which were the younger people.
And so it's just, it's a fascinating dynamic on this
great awakening. I don't know if everyone's meant
to see it. And then you kind of feel it
around you where there's some people you can talk to about
Bitcoin, there's some people that get it.
No, I, I like that. I, I don't know if it happens in
a very conscious way. It's more like, OK, my, like if
I'm talking for myself, like my, my interest is piqued.
I'm just studying. I'm finding more connected
subjects and yeah, you, you create a view of where the world
is going. And I think in a sense you're
trying to protect yourself as well, right?
Because it feels like, yeah, if you, if you don't adapt, you
know, it's, it's like adapt or die.
And I think people know that instinctively.
And that is of course a big part of nature.
But when you look at the, the speed of every technological
innovation, it it's going faster, like the adoption is
going faster. Well, whether it's voluntary or
not, right? Because eventually the people
in, in, in in another podcast we we had just now on the
broadcast, we talked about, you know, the gunpowder example,
that safety the moose talks about.
It's like, yeah, you have to adopt something at some point or
else you will literally die, you know, in the, in the, in the
gunpowder example. And I think along the way, you
know, like if you didn't have the Internet, you you didn't
die. If you didn't have, you know, a
voicemail at home or what's it like an answering machine at
home, you didn't die. You know, if you didn't, if you
didn't get like a digital newspaper, he didn't die.
But like AI is going to be is a big threat.
I don't know if you follow Adam Livingston, I'm going to have
him on the pot. He talks a lot about AI and
Bitcoin. And there he has an amazing
video that we're going to dissect on the part.
It's called like the great Harvesting.
And he talks about how humans have secured their economic
prosperity and their path towards the future by applying
their intellect in different ways.
But now your intellect is going to get demonetized by AI
basically, which is which is eventually going to be free.
So how do you adjust to that? So that's kind of how I'm
looking at it. Like this is the first real,
almost like existential technological progression that
we're running against that you have to be aware of or you're
going to be left behind. And when you meet people that
also see that something is happening, it's very
stimulating. You know, if I'm talking for
myself to just learn from that, like, hey, how how can other
people help me to survive the force, the future?
That's kind of where my mind is at, Yeah.
One aspect that you just keep on that remind me something I read
earlier was about like the difference between knowledge and
wisdom, where you can hear somebody pontificate, they go to
school and they sound very knowledgeable.
And you can kind of conflate in a world today.
We talked about this in the last part too, about, you know,
Senator Warren or these other people that sound knowledgeable,
but they have no wisdom like and wisdom comes from just action.
And so I think that's where you're referencing this all
goes, is you can understand like knowledge is democratized.
Everyone has access to everything now, but the wisdom
comes from repetition and, you know, kind of getting punched in
the face, metaphorically speaking.
You got to go out in the world and do things and you can't
actually like, you can't produce that.
And so I think that ties into ultimately like Bitcoin and
accountability because you have to produce things if you're
going to have a push, it's a push system.
So you have to have somebody send you the Bitcoin and produce
some kind of value and it's going to, it's a very scary
thought for a lot of individuals.
I think Ubi is picking up more and more because to your point,
a lot of jobs are going to be displaced.
And I know there's a common narrative of like, well, you
know, we got rid of the horse and then you get a car and more
things are produced. And I do think there's some
truth to that. But I think this is the first
real kind of ultra like disruptive, deflationary, like
technology that is going to leave a lot of people displaced.
And there's going to need to be like societal, like refactoring
of how do you actually make sure people don't starve?
So I think that's where that kind of ties in and the whole
Bitcoin AI thing is there. Here, I feel like this is this
is really going to show the brutality of not only
technological advancement, but in a sense also, yeah, just
nature like your adaptability, like you have to you have to do
it or else other people will figure it out for you.
Even, you know, even even the Ubi example, right like
conceptually I've I think that's that conceptually it's a great
idea if you think about like abundance for everyone,
etcetera. I I don't know if that should be
UI. Maybe it's just Ubi.
Maybe it's just accessibility to, you know, all the basic
necessities to just have a life, for example, that that that that
is free or just very, very accessible.
But but I feel AI is just like a it's it's a crazy threat.
So it's, it's going to force you to change your mental models of
how comfortable you're having it in the world, etcetera.
Like the need to adapt, I think is being reintroduced and that
is going to be very difficult for people.
But how, how, how do you look at that like practically?
So if we talk about this convergence of of Bitcoin AI and
energy, how do you look at or envision how, how these will
interact to kind of like reshape and change everything that we
know, whether that's, you know, financially or economically or
you know, whatever you want to touch upon?
Yeah. I mean, I think the one that I'm
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theoretical, but a lot of times individuals are already
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And I'm not smart enough to be on the like physics side.
And everyone talks about like the state of entropy and like
how the world, you know, wants to always like move into that
framing. But the, the core idea that I
think about is the state, the world wants to be more
efficient. Like that's just the, that's the
law of nature. And if that's true, we'll, it's,
we've been very inefficient because we, the cost of capital,
you know, the number of units, the false pricing signal and
pricing mechanism has been false.
And what happens is Bitcoin changes that because ultimately
people now chase a unit with a fixed supply.
They want more of that. And so at the end of the day,
they want to do more with less. That's just for a micro example
of an individual and then their spouse at home into starting
businesses. And again, this is how on ramp
kind of came about. And also the venture fund early
riders is this notion of like, Oh my God, we're actually
running laps around things because if you have everyone
bought in that we're all partners in this.
We all own equity in a business and the more efficient we build,
the more units we get. You can't, people can't compete
with that because they're usually looking at like, you
know, loftier salaries and they're looking at, you know,
the bonus or, and so you think about it like, how does this
relate to a publicly traded company?
Everyone or anybody that's worked at a large firm knows the
amount of insane bureaucracy. This is where I like suffocated
at the Googles and we work to the world because you can start
off really hot, you know, hot and heavy there and really
scale. But there's always as businesses
grow the the pork and the nepotism and all these things
that exist at large organizations that keep it from
actually achieving its end results.
Because when you have too much money, it just drowns out all
the soundness and all the unit economics.
And so where this ties back to an application, it goes back to
what we talked about with Brian on it's bullish for merchants to
be accepting Bitcoin. It's bullish for people to be
accepting Bitcoin and recognize it for what it's worth.
Because when those world class people understand this and then
they understand that their companies are effectively like
done and they don't know it yet because they can't actually
pivot fast enough versus if they left and started a business that
was 100 times more efficient with 101, one 100th of the
capital. That's how we rebuild this
world. And then it ties back to what we
talked about in the purpose of Bitcoin is to give you room in
space to really like do what you were meant to do.
That's the key is meant to do like that's the, the huge
insidious problem of like the the money.
It is a it's, it's shackles, it's slavery because ultimately
you're told to go to school and then you're told to go to
college and you have the student debt and then you got to get the
job and you got to like, and you're just shackled and you
don't even know why. And then you need to your point
about the real estate, you wake up and you're like, I have this
huge portfolio of real estate. Why you're like, I don't know.
And your life's gone. And so the second that somebody
has the space and room to really think and what they're do, what
they were designed to be on this planet Earth for, that's when
society really starts to flourish.
And so like, I don't know where I stand with him today because
you know, whatever they're doing in Nakamoto.
But like, Bailey had this really great quote a while ago, and
it's like the real party starts when the dollar ends.
And I really thought that was very profound because that's
what that this really implying is like, we can actually go to
where we were supposed to as a species when we get rid of like
these shackles on everyone's productivity.
Yeah. I mean, I do think that is also
where the shock is, because when the dollar is gone, if we get to
a place where there's a real free market competition of
monies, that will also force a real free market economy of
people. Ideas.
Yes.
Ideas. That's a that's a better one.
Yeah. Right.
Which in essence is actually how I look at the world.
It's like it's it's a war of ideas.
Everyone has access to the infinite amount of ideas.
And sometimes you receive an idea, but it can only exist in
the world if you do something with it.
And it's funny because this has been something that I've been
thinking about. You know, I was talking with a
friend and, and we were talking about, you know, even an idea as
Kentucky Fried Chicken exists in the world.
What a what a weird idea. The first time this guy had that
idea, I'm going to make something that is called
Kentucky Fried Chicken. And you have like buckets of
fried chicken and milkshakes and stuff.
Like, what a dumb idea, right? But there's probably ideas that
we would judge to be better, but people didn't do anything with
them, if that makes sense. Right.
So Colonel Sanders actually did something with his idea and he
manifested it in the world, whatever you think of Kentucky
Fried Chicken. But the point is more even an
idea that is Kentucky Fried Chicken can exist in the world
if you do something with it, right?
And where I want to go is that that competition of who is
actually trying to manifest their idea into the world is
going to be way, way harder, way stronger.
Because I agree with you, right? Like the, the, the Internet gave
everyone all the information. Now AI is giving everyone all
the productivity. So even people that thought they
would never have access to this global marketplace of ideas now
have access and they can build anything, anything they want.
So it's going to be way more about speed and adaptability and
stuff like that. And again, that's why I think
this is kind of like it's going to be a shock because that is
something that even in Western societies where we think we have
free capitalism and a free market and stuff like that,
something like this has never existed before.
And this is instantly on a, on a global scale, especially if you
take into account Bitcoin, for example, if you use that as a as
a medium of payment, like it doesn't, it doesn't matter
anymore where the person who created a certain product
resides. If you can pay them with, you
know, a global decentralized money, then yeah, that that
productivity could be exported to to any place in the world.
Yeah, ideas. I mean, this is a complete
aside, but like, ideas are interesting, right?
Because they're almost like divinely, there's something like
higher power or something sends it to you.
And then it's similar to like if you know you should go to the
gym, it's up to you if you actually cultivate it and do it
or whatever you're supposed to do.
It's very similar if you act on the idea, but the idea is that
it's weird when it pops in your head and it feels like an
unlock. But anyway, there's something
that I don't think we've talked about, but it ties into what you
shared is this notion of like Moore's Law and Metcalf's law.
So like Metcalf's law naturally is like, I forgot if it's Dawn
Metcalf, but it's like Ethernet squared.
So it's like the connections of the amount of people in a user
network extrapolate or grow that network in the value around it.
And then Moore's laws obviously being able to do more with less.
And you think about semiconductors and chips getting
smaller, smaller, more efficient with capital.
And so when you think about those two combined, that's where
billions and billions and maybe trillions have been made in
software and technology in the proliferation for the past 20 to
30 years. But if you take those two
directional angles of, you know, doing more with less and then
connectivity, well, you can layer in Bitcoin and AI that
they don't sit aside from them. They get basically like they sit
together because AI is that version of Moore's law because
you can do much more with less and these models and a lot of
the software will be able to run with a lot less compute and
individuals. And then the Metcalf's law is
Bitcoin because of the connectivity aspect.
So if you're in any country on the planet Earth, now your
delivery of services and software is available to any
other place on the planet Earth. And when you take those two on
this side, these two on these side, that both are like
accretive. It's not 1 + 1 = 2.
It's, you know, 1 + 1 = 10 to, you know, whatever.
And that's super fascinating to think about in like growth
networks. Yeah, this is a video that I
still want to make. Like I have a discussion with an
AI to talk about. Would you rather adopt A money
to exchange value with other AIS that's controlled by no one or
controlled by humans? You know, like I think it makes
perfect sense that the AIS will transact in Bitcoin, in a, in a,
in a decentralized currency that no one else can influence just
because. AIS are just computers in that
sense, like they should make the most rational decision.
So that's something I still would love to explore to see if
the AIS actually agree with that or if they actually go for
something that is maybe less less voluntary, for example.
So yeah, I, I like what you said about this conversions.
I, I see that happening to in, in a technological way, but also
in a way that if there's going to be a shock with AI, you know,
and, and this global productivity, how do you protect
yourself? As in how do you create time and
space to figure out what, what the hell is next for you?
If that makes sense, Right. So, and we talked about this
before, but Fiat money creates, gives you more uncertainty
towards the future, where Bitcoin lowers your uncertainty
towards the future. Well, if you know that there in
in general is going to be more uncertainty towards the future,
you know, Bitcoin is, in my opinion, the only way to protect
yourself for this coming shock. So you actually have time and
space to kind of like make sense of it and and see if you can
create a path forward for yourself as well.
Yeah. I mean, I'm curious like where
you think where you think this goes in the sense of like
there's a deflationary aspect and you I mentioned Ubi not
because I'm in favor of it or against it.
I just, it feels like, it feels like the changes are going to be
so dramatic that things that are going to need to be developed
that we've never seen before. And like an example of this is
because there will be an increased cost of capital.
It's not, it won't be a false call of cost.
It won't be 0%, it won't be 6% or whatever the Fed funds rate
is today. It's going to be whatever
bitcoins, you know, growth rate is or appreciation on an
analyzed basis of productivity. Most people aren't prepared for
that because we've seen those like again, it's directionally,
but like remember in 2020 and 2021 during COVID and they had
the product manager that was at the like pool and she was making
her under $50,000 not doing much like.
There's a women. Yeah.
There's a big part of society that just actually forgot how to
produce value at an efficient scale.
And if we think about deflationary tools like AI and
then also individuals that are able to compound that growth.
So one person may be able to do the work of 100 or 1000.
That's where society goes. If you're chasing a a singular
unit that has a finite supply, like it's, it's just again, self
preservation because it's another tool is going to charge
a little bit less Bitcoin, you're going to not be able to
compete with the other company. So it's just you're going to be
able to do more with less. But again, if the individual is
used to this world the way I like and it is like going to a
different planet, they're just not going to be able to breathe.
Because I've seen this like, you know, I've worked with them,
I've tried to hire them. It just doesn't work.
And so I'm just curious, like, how do you think about that?
Because that's the thing that seems very scary is that like,
you take not only this aspect in the workplace or just how do you
generate wealth? But then the the fact that like,
we've been in a world for the past 100 years of an
inflationary currency. And now people are going to have
to manage the fact that like this thing's fixed supply.
And how do you think about, you know, preserving that capital?
It's just that it's a new world that I don't think people are
prepared for. Yeah, that's that's why I call
it a shock. I think it's a shock, but I'm
actually looking at it in a very positive.
Maybe it's a bit the utopian way, but let's let's say it like
this. I think there's a shock.
I think many people will not be able to handle it.
Just just what you said I think is very true.
And you know, if if you listen to people, I don't know, if you
listen to there's a podcast with Tim Ferris and Chris Saka where
they talk about AI in the future and like, would you send your
kids to law school or finance school?
And Chris Sacca just says, fuck no, you know, like this is this
is all dead. Like he, he actually talks about
a commencement speech he did where he just tells all the
graduates like everything you worked for is is done.
You know, so I I don't know where you're going, but where
you think you're going is not ex non existent anymore.
You know, that's a huge. Shocker of of course.
And I think it also depends on on your age.
So on one side, I think it's going to be very hard for a lot
of people. I also think on the other side,
maybe the caveat is if you protect yourself with Bitcoin to
create the time and space to actually have the optionality to
kind of take a step back and figure out, OK, what is going on
here and how am I going to operate in this world?
You actually have an opportunity to figure out what would I
actually enjoy? You know, why am I here or how
can I add value to to the world, you know, and if you you know,
the video of these these these product managers in the pool
being like, yeah, I'm a product manager, growth startup or I
don't know, I don't even know what they're saying.
Yeah. Do you think they really enjoyed
that? You know, that probably they're
like, yeah, I mean, I'm in the pool and I'm making 150 or 200
KA year. So that sounds great.
But yeah, is it eventually about money?
Do you really think you're adding value?
So I think people will be forced to start asking these these
questions, which in general, I would say it's a good thing.
I don't think it's going to be easy, but I do think it's a it's
a good, it's a good thing. I actually look at it as kind of
like possibility to to enlighten yourself a bit.
Yeah, it's a good point like that.
If abundance is is is unilateral or across the board, then you
start to like money doesn't necessarily become this, I think
it's. All what you.
Need what you need in such a large focus because I feel like
there's a lot of gaslighting that goes around that People say
the economy is good in the US. It's like not good.
It's just that it's good for if you sit in very small pockets of
the United States. And so it, money just becomes a
big thing because most people don't have it.
One thing that I want to flag to you, because I've been thinking
about it more and more and we're looking at a, at a company.
I don't know if it'll be this company, but I think you'll
appreciate it because now your, your father and, and multiple
children and, and bright children is this is going to
sound a little bit, a little bit controversial, but like there's
a notion of where there was child labor laws, like people,
like kids don't work, right. If you're 5715, you know, even
like under 15 and a lot of it stem back from the industrial
age and you know, if you went to work, they put them in there,
they lost a finger. But imagine 5 to 15, you know,
is kids are going to be able to really produce a lot of value.
And they should because given that they're going to be
digitally native, they're going to be able to go online.
And nobody really taps into that today.
There's no real like platform. There's no ability for them to
grow in and learn what they care about and come into that.
So if you take that just like small notion, and then I thought
deeply about it for a while of just schooling being really
messed up. Personally, I think about like
high school in the US, it's just a big issue because you go in
there, it's state-run, it's not really productive.
And then it ultimately feeds you into what's I think was the
ultimate like debt slavery is college.
And then you get stuck with four years of debt, not learning
anything, right. And so I've like, I've always
kind of been interested in, well, what if like high school
was like a, a business run enterprise.
In the first two years, you got like the basics.
In the next two years was almost like a trade where you had to
like learn whatever you are most interested in for each quarter
you would switch or every six months, so you know, the
calendar year. But it was run like a private
enterprise because then you would be like a placement into
the company because they'd be producing these most efficient
thing. And then if you were just like a
shit head and and whatever your parents would pay for you to go
to the school or pay more. But you see them going like it
turns into something that actually has to produce an
outcome. And then the last part is there
really is no marketplace for bot for for vibe thinkers.
You know, this is just a new term.
It's like, how does somebody create a portfolio if they do
content marketing, umm, tooling, uh, software.
Like there's no way to just like look at Brom and see the
repository of work that he's done.
And if I'm at Coca-Cola and I want you to take over 1000
person thing. And so we're looking at a
company that's kind of like tying some of these themes
together. And then obviously Bitcoin would
fit into that because you can be able to, you know, be paid
globally and you can even gamify some of the educational content.
But I think this is some of the stuff that helps support what
you're describing of in a world of abundance, you're going to
naturally need to cultivate people from from very early ages
to figure out what they're good at, get them involved.
And it just changes the dynamic between work and life.
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I like that. I mean, I think, I think that
ties into how the future is just going to be different, like
really different in the sense that if you have young children
now, all your ideas around school and education and job and
and stuff like that, whatever you how however you thought
about it before for your child or your future child, like
everything that is our experience is probably dead.
So as a young parent, you have to adjust to actually
understand, I think, what is dead, but also how you, how you
can adjust. And so I, I, I think there's an
interesting idea there, especially in general, I think
we should listen more to children because the children
are, have unpoisoned minds, right?
And in, in general are very smart in, in, in, in my
experience, just in, in general, like, like children have very
innovative ideas, right? So if you can help them
cultivate that mind I, I, I think that would be very, very
beneficial, especially if, and I wonder what you think if you
align. So my idea is, you know, the
robots are going to build robots are going to build robots, you
know, and AI is going to build AI is going to build AI.
So like that pace is only going to accelerate and just keeping
the existential threat case of, you know, AGI with a 300 plus IQ
becoming our overlord, you know, matrix, whatever, which I think
has a non 0 probability, but but we'll see where that goes,
right? If we keep it positive like that
is, it's only going to accelerate, it's going to be
faster and faster. So like our children's
children's lives are going to be different again.
So I think that's going to compress like that, that rate of
change. So even how we, you know, even
the ways that we could help our children now will probably not
be how our children are going to help their children.
And so I think, yeah. I would say yes and no there
that I'm glad you brought that up for for the the first part is
not to get darker morbid, but there's something to the fact
that it's so hard to see. I think we're both struggling to
understand how the future looks that there is a non zero chance
that it all just ends because it's all like that insane from
when you think about the level of acceleration that people just
we don't even know how to fathom.
But let's say let's stay positive and that it doesn't.
I think that there is a deep notion.
I've been thinking about this deeply.
That's why I kind of referenced this is as we get older, people
start passing away, right? And you think about like some of
your memories or stories you heard from grandparents and
other individuals and you think put your like mind into where
they went. Whether I like to think about
like in a saloon and sitting around and the wisdom and the
tells and the stories that are told, those thought to like move
if we don't tell them anymore, right?
Like they kind of die off with them.
And I remember being told when I was younger and then he hear him
and now you have a son and you think about like it's your job
almost to relate those stories and that timeless wisdom.
Because as we change, it's, it's even more important to not
forget that these things, there are certain truths that will be
true forever. And then and that's how it's
always kind of changed. Now we're probably accelerating
faster. But I think that I think that's
an important function. And I think that is what will
give people the ultimate edge and opportunity, because that's
really how you can like win in, in life is that you have a base,
you have to have an arc like an anchor point.
And then everything else revolves around that versus
everything's up for grabs. This is like the open border
policy. It's like, if everyone's open
borders there. And then it's like, well, what,
what's our nationality? Like?
Who are we? What's all those things?
And anyway, this is what tied back to the last part and why it
didn't immediately call out, but it goes into the, the corporate
treasury and all that, the, the buying of, of those assets.
It's like nobody really understands like what they're
doing here and why they're chasing money.
And if they understood why they're chasing it to your point
in self preservation, then you would ultimately say, well, I
want the thing that provides me the risk, the lowest risk to be
able to hold that. And all that's embedded in
everything that's publicly traded holding Bitcoin is by the
definition of risk, you have execution risk, custody risk,
all these things. And so like, that's the big
problem here is that most people don't even understand what
they're chasing. So they get excited about these
things. And there's a lot of wealthy
people similar to the real estate friends that you
referenced, like, well, why are you doing this?
It's like if you ask some of these people, like, I don't
actually actually know why. So anyway.
I think the the don't actually know why is in general, of
course, what what we are talking about with regards to
understanding Bitcoin first, right?
It's just this this intricacy of well, yeah, the the stories that
have been told to us, I think we actually had to shed off some of
that stuff before we could understand Bitcoin, right.
And, and maybe this is actually with each generation, like the
parents tell their children something that has worked for
them or, or how they've looked at life and and what's helped
them along the way, right. But as just, I think the core of
it is, is, is as technology progresses, it opens up the
world even more. Or in a is case, you know, the
productivity and the economy and the, and this this, this free
market of, of ideas that the perspective that we have now is
just something that is just irrelevant when our children are
35. Like that perspective is just
totally out outdated. And maybe this is just always
the way it goes. Actually, maybe maybe we are
talking in a circle and people listening are like, yeah, this
is always how it goes, right? Like when when we get older, we
we can't really look at the world in the same way anymore.
It's like a like each generation is kind of like a paradigm shift
in in that sense. But because it's going faster
and faster, I think it will demand the constant, yeah, a
constant effort to to try to understand where are we actually
going. Yeah, I think that this ties a
little bit into the previous topic of like uncharted
territories. I think we're definitely in
uncharted territories when it comes to this cycle and where we
go from here. I'm increasingly thinking we go
much higher than anybody's expecting TBD on what the
downturn looks like given, you know, leverage and froth in the
system that will will come with it.
But when we think about the just this steady demand from these
corporate treasuries coming in globally, and that's not coming
in in a vacuum. Like the, you see this on
Twitter and you see this in the mem pool.
Like there's not anybody really from a transaction perspective,
especially for the price it at 105 K using Bitcoin at levels
that you would expect in, in like all time high period.
And so, and then we, I've been saying this for the past like 2
years, anecdotally, there's not a lot of demand from net new
buyers. And, and like an anecdote that
my wife told me yesterday was that rich were a big tech
company and, and some all hands or something.
They were talking about fads and like how AI wasn't a fad like
other things. And they referenced crypto.
And the boss of the person was like somebody like chimed in,
right. There's a Bitcoin over there.
They're like, well, Bitcoin's 105K and he's like, oh, not like
Bitcoin or whatever. Like people don't even know that
this thing's sitting at this level.
And so I think that's the thing that like people that listen to
this podcast in our groups, we're in this like super bubble
that the rest of the world doesn't even know Bitcoin is at
like this 100K price point. If they do, they still think
it's all like a Ponzi. And it leads me to believe that
this cycle, if we're still in cycles, it's going to play much
into into 2026, if not longer or we're just in a new uncharted
territory. And I think we are because of
the SBR stuff. I think that's like the final
positioning. If you have sovereign stacking,
then that downward pressure, like they're not stacking to go
into like, what are you going back into dollars stable coins?
Like the only thing you're really buying is probably land.
And that's where like I anchor. I know we kind of have, we, we
prod each other about this, but I always anchor to the gold
stuff because you can look at like what Tether and those guys,
they just are seeing around corners and what their balance
sheet looks like is BTC, gold and land.
So like as Bitcoin runs and you realize those gains, what are
you really doing with them is really, are you buying land or
are you going to diversify into gold?
But you're really not trading it for more dollars when
historically that had been the pair you're trying to get more
dollars. So I think we're just, to your
point, we're just in a different place.
I don't think anybody prepared for it, including us.
Now I, I, I, I think that's a great answer that that's why
this is obviously also so entertaining to follow, don't
you think? Yeah, because it's, it's like
it, it truly is entertaining to follow because the I think the
definition of happiness is or like I'm not making this one up,
but like the definition I thought of was you remember
growing up when you were a kid and you had to go to school for
the first day or there was something exciting, you woke up
excited. Like that's the definition of.
I think what everyone tries to get to is you wake up and you're
excited to go to work. And that's part of what you're
saying here is that we're just like in uncharted territories.
We're right smack in the middle of it.
We get to participate in it. Like what better timeline could
you could you ask for? I know, yeah, it's insane.
It's it's so crazy that when I think about this, right, like
the fact that we are getting to live through this is insane.
Just to have studied it, seeing it just like I feel like I'm
having a chair, like a seat in a stadium and I'm just like
watching it on the fault, you know, Like it's every day I
still learn something new. In participate is the key.
Like I think that this is the biggest thing and I'll shout
forever and because I didn't understand this was nobody has
any idea normally what they're doing in the real world.
They definitely don't know what they're doing in Bitcoin.
Like it's just absolutely true. There's no shortage of 10
different angles. Not to pick on anybody.
They have no clue, but they're looked at as the leader in
whatever respectful, respected area in Bitcoin.
And if that's the case and somebody's smart and understands
this and comes from their professional experience, while
also deeply understanding Bitcoin because you have to
understand Bitcoin, your idea is very paramount and should be
acted on because you can actually influence the
trajectory of whatever that area of expertise.
And so people should do that because the sooner they do that
is, the sooner they're going to be, they're going to benefit the
world benefits, Bitcoin benefits.
And that's like what makes this exciting is you're not just
watching it, you're participating by having these
conversations, sparking ideas, maybe building businesses.
And that's the exciting part is you can actually participate.
You're not just viewing when historically in the Fiat world,
you just get to watch like what the the lizards are are doing.
Yeah, you've also been talking about corporate adoption being
either the greatest asymmetric bet to the.
Upside or the? Downside and I just really
wanted to ask you about that what what you think about that I
mean people are talking about you know Bitcoin treasury
companies are the IC OS of this cycle etcetera.
I've quite a different idea, I think I I think crypto killed
itself with pumped out fun, you know, like there's, there's
there's a million new tokens a week or a month, I don't even
know. And the more serious game of
creating new and exciting type of investments that, you know, I
don't, I don't see Bitcoin as an investment, but a Bitcoin
treasury company is definitely an investment that actually
comes from the Bitcoin treasury company.
So I think this is like an unlock for the people that are
interested in Bitcoin or, or crypto broader and in connection
to the existing, you know, Fiat financial system.
I actually think that the treasury companies are just a
very novel new, new thing that that that people that like
trying to get an edge or, or, or or follow certain investments
could actually have fun with and, and benefit from.
You know, I'm not a crazy trader, so I'm not participating
in that. But that, yeah, that's kind of
how I look at it. But you're either this is up or
crazy down. Yeah, I think that the lens of
the treasury companies, I, I really, my favorite part about
the treasury company craze is it's going to expose everyone
that actually understands Bitcoin and where this goes.
And that didn't, and with the one caveat that there's a non
zero chance that this goes up into the right.
And then everything I want to say I'm I'm completely stupid
and wrong about. And for that to happen, meaning
the treasury companies all adopt Bitcoin, then every other
company adopts Bitcoin and it goes up into the right.
And these companies have some nominal value over Bitcoin.
You can trade those shares for BTC and you make money.
And first people in like, I think that's the thesis.
It discounts 2 things. So for that to happen, it means
that there's no more humans running the companies and that
there's no more hacks or any bad things that happen because
ultimately humans are humans and there's a reason why it's called
animal spirits. And ultimately, as leverage
comes into the system and these companies have to compete with
each other, they'll naturally blow themselves up.
This is just like one-on-one business cycles.
The other side of it, it's discounting that we'll never see
any other hacker insolvency or something bad happened to the
underlying where for 15 years if you centralized the underlying
asset, it ends up. And so as long as if those two
things don't happen, sure, this is that, but what's the chance
of that? And now the downside is
ultimately it goes back to what we talked about in the beginning
of it, it they prey on like the naivete of the individual,
understanding equities. And to your point being
exciting, the sad part about bitcoins 100K is that it makes a
lot of people feel like they missed the boat or they missed
the boat on a on, on the appreciation.
And so that's where you see this nihilism that's existed, whether
it's with, you know, the proliferation of trading or
trading, but also like gambling. And so people look for the next
equity or the next 100 bagger. And what we all, what we talked
about in the previous pod and a little bit earlier here is the
whole, the reason money exists is to give, it's a intermediary
good that captures the individual's productivity and is
meant to be used to give optionality into the future.
Like the person already went out on the risk curve because they
had to develop and they got up in the morning to go hunt the
wolf, build the business, go do whatever they did.
They already were on the risk curve.
So then now you have the money, you store it in something that's
not speculative, and then it increases your optionality to
invest in yourself and other productive endeavors or to
provide for you and your family. That's what money is.
That's not what any of this other stuff is.
And so that's the reason why the meme is stay humble stacks.
That's is you stay humble, you stack the hard money, it grows
in purchasing power, and you live your life better off.
What this other stuff is, is fundamentally the opposite of
it. It's speculation, it's risk, but
it's being conflated as the underlying and the common
narrative when people bring this up is, oh, well, it's an
exposure vehicle. It's all a lot.
It's just a charade to explain that to people because it, it
really reminds you of like, oh, I'm going to build a casino
because somebody else is going to be build a casino.
So I might as well like capture it.
I'm going to build a gambling app because somebody else is
going to build a gambling app. It's like, no, no, no, that's
not the right response because ultimately you're going to be
shown for what it is. It's no, you build productive
tools and services that can allow for people to get into
that right thing. And that's where the valuable
familiar accrue. And so that's where I reference.
It's like the last part to put like just weight behind that is
it's illogical for people once they understand Bitcoin to not
actually get out of these treasury positions.
Because again, the common thought that the big, big people
will say is this, the most sophisticated investors can't
get access to Bitcoin. So they need my bonds or they
need my, you know, equity. It's like, wait, so you're
telling me that these people can't figure out how to get spot
exposure? And I believe there's some truth
to today. They don't understand Bitcoin so
they buy these proxies. But by definition of as long as
they get educated and grow their knowledge base like which all
Bitcoin and holders do, they're going to want the thing that
reduces the counterparty risk. Because mind you, by the while
this is happening, these companies are blowing up and
there's exchange hacks and there's geopolitical risk.
If you have a treasury company and rain or wherever it is and
they decide that this is competing with the local
currency, well, what's the first thing you can do is just go
seize the servers or wherever the the Bitcoin storage.
When that happens, people are going to start to actually
underwrite what these treasury companies are.
And then on the micro level, it's the same thing.
It's like somebody buys this equity and then they're like, oh
wait, why am I not just holding the underline?
And then I guess maybe the last part is like the volatility on
these things is going to be absolutely insane and people
can't even handle bitcoins volatility.
And that's just money. And that's a thesis of long term
storage. So how are you going to hold
some of that? So all this together, it's just
a, it's just nobody's incentivized to tell this story
because people get excited about just like buying this stuff and
then under like, even if people kind of know it, they own
positions in these companies. So then they have to support the
thesis. And the same thing with
Ethereum. When you try to tell people that
got Bitcoin but also Ethereum, it's like, no, it's binary.
It's either one or or nothing. They'll be like, well, my
treasury company is good because it does XY or Z.
Yeah, it's I, I, I think This is why it's also hard to kind of
prepare for the future because there's all these shiny things
that you can do right now, right?
And, and, and when you think about, you know, stay humble,
stack sets and just chill, sit in your seat and wait for the
future, right? I mean, I'm really enjoying
that, but I also know that that's not for everyone, right?
So there is always, always like a certain temptation to, I don't
know, like be distracted is with the shiny things of, of, of
today. I think there's, there's a
natural thing there. But in general, again, if we, if
we go back to the idea of survival of the fittest or adapt
or adapt or die there, there there's, there's challenges with
every choice that that you make, right?
And I think, again, this kind of ties back to if you make this
decision in a conscious way, then or a decision in a
conscious way then, and it's always a good decision in that
sense, no matter what, no matter what the outcome is.
But I agree with you. And maybe that's also the
technological age that we live in.
There's just endless distraction, right?
There's endless distraction. I mean, when I discovered
Etherium at $7.00, I was like, holy shit, this is going to be
the decentralized computer of the universe or something like
that. I mean, it's logical that you
find new and shiny things along the way, but the actual effort
is in understanding what is the, what is the true thing that I
should focus on. And once you get there, that's
what actually gives you, I'd say rest there, a space in your head
as well. That's exactly right.
Like that. That is the wisdom versus the
knowledge because I saw this in when I got into space like
20/17/2018, I was living in New York and I end up working for
the block for a very brief period.
And they all thought I was an insane Luddite because I was a
Bitcoiner and they loved everything under the sun.
The tokenomics, and it was specifically people from
Columbia. That's where a lot of the crypto
people that came in from, you know, prominent school in New
York City. And it ties to the same theme
you're talking about. It's the same type of individual
that loves the financialization of this asset and what's
happening. It's just it's eerily similar to
the tokenomics of how do you like structure a token to
accrete value is very similar to what we're seeing at a higher
level with larger liquidity pool where the real wisdom is the
money is meant to be this, this notion of optionality for you to
get the space to do what you were supposed to do, not
financialize the products. And that's where like, you know,
Parker has a great piece called the bitcoins, the great D
financialization, right? It's the notion of getting away
from this. And so I think that's just the
core part that goes back to and then this goes back.
I think what we all where I was referencing, explaining to our
children, like just these timeless wisdoms, it goes back
to these biblical texts. I'm not like overly religious,
but there's a reason why these texts have lasted for thousands
of years. And they ultimately breakdown
about like this notion of false idols and that everyone's
chasing these like shiny objects or whatever was in vogue at the
time. And they ultimately over like a
long enough time horizon, get smited or they're just kind of
like wiped away because they were missing the signal to the
noise, which was pretty straightforward.
It wasn't complex, but it's a hard thing to do when groupthink
is participating in that. And that's what the group think
is today. Is this like notion of public
treasury. It's demand liquidity, all these
things that are positive for pumping the bags, but ultimately
going to leave a lot of people with less Bitcoin than they
would have already had. And nobody's really I think
we're going to get more and more people talking about it because
the scary part is really in 105 K and this is happening.
I had a call this past week with an individual that owned a bunch
of restaurants and wanted to felt like he missed the boat.
This guy's wealthy feels like he missed the boat and buying
Bitcoin for his corporate balance sheet.
And so now wants to go and extend a bunch of leverage and
and was just bringing up all these different very like risky
concepts. And so that's where I think we
go much higher than we expect, but probably also retrace
significantly again with the volatility because I think
there's going to be a lot of leverage from the uninitiated
because like a lot of this stuff, we can have pattern
recognition from the past eight years.
And this like looks very similar just at a larger scale than what
we saw previously in crypto. But a lot of people have no idea
what happened before. And so they're going to think
about leverage who their counterpart is with custody when
they take out loans to the volatility and the profiles that
are created. And it's just going to end up
kind of we're going to redo the the same things we've done
before. Do you think the cycles then are
still in play or will there be like an 80% drawdown or 40 or
50? I mean, as you're sharing it
now, it seems like you are expecting like a big a big
retrace. Yeah, I think, I think we
probably go higher than we expect and then we do retrace
because of the leverage. I think the thing that's I don't
know what people sell for. So what I think happens is it's
not a popular sentiment, but like nobody ever talks about
what happened with Block Fi and FTX and all the people that blew
up and where did that Bitcoin went because a lot of people
thought they had Bitcoin and it just disappeared.
It reminds me of like, you know, the capital that goes into the
US political system and Ukraine specifically, or Afghanistan.
I think there was $2 trillion we went and we know a lot of it
ends up in different people's pockets.
And so FTX block file, all that people just wipe their hands,
animal spirits, crypto D Gen. san SPF and then we go away.
And I think similar thing happens here where a lot of
money is going to be lost in this next cycle.
And then maybe it doesn't get sold for dollars.
So it doesn't 'cause as much of A retrace, but people don't be
like, oh, where did it go? And it just got it, it blew up
and it's somewhere. And I think that's what these
large honeypots end up being is like ways where it gets funneled
into, you know, other other people's pockets that definitely
aren't the people that were putting in their dollars and
expecting more Bitcoin out of it.
Yeah, in in a previous conversation, I think I saw you
highlight something about the dangers of, of, of groupthink.
And especially now that we are talking about like the future,
how can you think for yourself, right?
Or how do you go back to kind of like first principles thinking?
Yeah. What are kind of like the blind
spots that you that you are noticing maybe maybe even in, in
Bitcoin as well of, of people that are yeah, kind of becoming
complacent or or maybe lazy in their thinking?
I think it goes back to what we talked about it of.
Like, I think the closer somebody really deeply
understands Bitcoin, everything starts to become a lot more
transparent or apparent, and it all just ties back to truth.
Like Bitcoin's just a fair Ledger.
It's the version of meritocracy, accountability, because you have
to produce value to get it. And so I think over time, as
individuals got Bitcoin, it's easy to romanticize whatever
version of the story you like. So if self custody, self
sovereignty is the thing and we're all going to be, you know,
in our citadels, well, then you stop really thinking past that
and thinking about what is the like commercial viability of
that? Like how is grandma going to buy
100% of her wealth there, right. And so like, that's part of
that. I think group think we're I, you
know, and I've been involved in a lot of this.
So like I can speak first hand to believe it, but also just see
that the blind spots, that's one angle.
The other angle is the opposite, which is like, oh, people can't
get exposure to Bitcoin so by my public treasury because that
gives them access. And that's like another version
of group think of like just rationally thinking, is this
going to end up good for everyone, including myself and
my reputation? And so I think those are the
notions of like just deeply thinking about like, what's the
logical progression? How would these things play out?
Where do they go? And then an angle again, I know
it sounds like talking our book, but it's like this notion of
multi institution custody. It's an aspect of like, how
could this really play out from a sovereign or individual that
actually was accretive and conducive to the network's
proliferation? If you saw yesterday, I, I think
the devil's in the details and they weren't saying they were
going to sell or seize their Bitcoin, but it was in
California about an exchange. If you leave it there and then
if you pass or you don't touch those assets for three years,
that the state could take them or or take them into possession.
But you can see how if they don't have the ability to, then
it kind of kneecaps that that proposition.
And in general or taxes, but also, so it's this notion.
Well, you don't want a single counterparty, whether you're a
sovereign or an individual, but you also don't want it all in
your house. Because if everyone knows Braun
keeps all this Bitcoin in his house, well, that's not good for
him or his family. And those are only, there's only
one. I did two options.
You have the hardcore Bitcoin that says, put it on my Ledger
or whatever and write down my 12 words.
Well, that's not really conducive to inheritance and all
the things associated. And then the other side of it is
like, trust my ETF, my corporate treasury or my single custodian.
And we know how gold failed. And so these are examples of
this. And just like really thinking
hard and earnestly, even if it's the joke of do you want to make
money or do you want to be right?
It's not really those topics. It's more of the notion, Do you
want to be right and have your version of the world because you
love that version, be the thing and you be hard nosed about it.
Or do you just want to like go with what will be commercially
viable? Because I think that's like
ultimately what is the deciding factor around good entrepreneurs
is around taste and it's taste for what the market's appetite
will be. And that's where Steve Jobs
understood that from the design of the phone all the way to the
experience through the application is you got to like
have a good feel for what the market will want.
And I think that's like a a big thing that's like missing in the
Bitcoin space is just understanding what is relevant.
Not for us that listen to this pod, but for the next 100
million, the next billion people, like what will they
actually consume that won't leave them scratching their head
or just rather go into negative yielding bonds or corporate
treasuries? Because it just makes more sense
to do that. It's funny because to understand
Bitcoin you have to kind of like diverge, right?
And really study multiple subjects.
But then when you're like totally in in Bitcoin, you have
to kind of like broaden your scope again to see how can I
help this actually fit into the world, right?
Because the first part of going very broad is to understand what
is Bitcoins place in the world? Like what is the problem that it
actually solves? Why is this problem really bad?
Why can't we get out of it in any other way?
Right. OK, so this Bitcoin thing should
exist. But then after that, OK, what
what, what can I actually do to either get more people onto this
thing or build products and services for them that can
actually help? I would say cement bitcoins
place actually in the world, right.
So it's kind of if if we talk in corporate consultants speak like
the double diamond, you know, you know that, you know the so
you like you, you divert, you convert, you divert, you
convert. So yeah, it's like 2-2 diamonds
next to each other I think. That's, I think that's like,
that's like life, right? You zig and zag and it reminds
me of poker. If you ever play poker, like the
best skilled poker players are play loose and tight because you
play tight and the more the the people against you start to
believe you're playing too tight and then you switch to being
loose. And then when they think you're
playing tight, you know, like that's how you actually win in
the game of life. You cannot actually, you can't
go in deep One Direction because you'll end up with a myopic view
of the world. And I think that's.
Yeah. So what's a contrarian or under
appreciated view you hold about Bitcoin or AI or or energy for
that matter that that you wish more people would consider?
And you cannot mention gold. No kidding.
God, I don't know. I feel like everything, I mean,
we, we do pods all the time. I feel like you hear me talk
about enough things that are potentially contrarian.
So I don't, I don't know if you're using.
I feel like everything I kind of said is a little bit taboo at
this point. Or maybe to think it gets you
most push. Back or something?
Well, I mean, I definitely think gold and Bitcoin are going to
persist much longer than people want or, or believe, but that's
not fun. I, I, I think there's something
to ultimately like the energy markets.
This would be fun that you'll appreciate.
And I still need to read this. It's back here.
And because I've only read like a portion of it, it's called the
prize, the epic quest for oil money and power.
And I'm convinced that that book has the answers to everything
you just asked because when you really extrapolate where all
geopolitical tensions come to, they have to deal with natural
resources, specifically oil. And there's a notion that's
talked to us called the Nakamoto point, where all the oil or
energy production starts to hit a 50% where it's either used for
Bitcoin mining or used for civilization and, and power
production. And I think once the markets
understand that you can take energy from the ground and then
either sell them into, you know, whatever the Fiat currency is or
mine it to Bitcoin, you basically you take out the
position for geopolitical tension because you don't have
to do these different trade agreements in different angles.
You can basically source it and then turn it into digital oil,
which is Bitcoin and then go. And I think that's something
that I haven't fully had the time to think through, but
that's where this all goes is you actually are able to reduce
because that's why the Middle East is the Middle East, right?
They have all this money, they have all this natural resources
and everyone's vying for how do they get that energy?
Like Arthur Hayes has a really good notion of everything he
measures in a barrel, a barrel of oil, like he doesn't hold the
barrels of oil, but like everything he's measuring when
he's to make in a trade is on the barrels of oil because
barrels of oil are a proxy for human productivity, because you
need more petroleum to, to live. And so it's like how much is
more gold in Bitcoin or in barrels of oil or gold and, or
other assets? And so I think that's the, and,
and then AI is that last piece because we know you need energy
for the data centers. And so those things are all
about to start to converge together.
And it's really hard to see without being studying those
disciplines and having those backgrounds.
But you can't like salt, but see how they all like intertwine.
And then the, the AI Bitcoin thing is like Bitcoin's what's
going to keep AI from killing us because you're actually going to
need to make, it's going to, it's going to keep it honest
versus being able to plug in and somebody just pay a dollars to
do what it needs to do. So last last question to wrap
up, what makes you most bullish on Bitcoins evolving role in the
global financial system over the next decade, let's say until
20332034 when you know 99% of all Bitcoin has been mined?
I think the truth the the truest thing that is so
underappreciated is the peer-to-peer stuff.
Like if we go down, the logical progression of this is where
I'll caveat with the public codes, like everything's good
for Bitcoin. So even though I said it's bad
for the individual, if the price goes up, that's the ultimate
like proxy for awareness. And then people start to learn
and they want to receive that asset, right?
It's just a logical thing that somebody would want to buy it or
accept for their goods and services.
That underlying asset. And the notion that me and you
can transact without any intermediary is the most bullish
thing on the planet earth because that means you can't
stop it. So as more and more people
recognize they want Bitcoin and their goods and services will
either be denominated or accepted in it, that's how this
all wins. Because you it's impossible to
stop. It's just like water flowing
downhill. And so that's that, that's
what's most like exciting. And it's like they're still,
it's still starting because Bitcoins like a store of value,
right? It's not really used as much as
we would want or see as an intermediary or medium of
exchange. But that's only going to
naturally grow as more people appreciate the underline and
want to be paid in it. Yeah, I, I, I fully agree.
I think this is also what many people miss in the sense is that
this monetary revolution is slow.
Like it's slow. So 1st, it's me.
It's, it's store of value, which has like 400 is an opportunity
of like 450 trillion or even 900 trillion if you, if you count
everything right. But that, that the problem that
that solves is way more prominent than the need for a
better currency to exchange with each other.
Because for many people, that works, right?
But keeping the value that that that the economic value or the,
OR the purchasing power that that you've gathered, keeping
that towards the future, lowering your uncertainty
towards the future is a more proficient use case and need
that people have now. And so I, I like what you said
because I think that's also where we are going.
But I think there are certain phases that people are very
rigid about when they read like the white paper and it's like
peer-to-peer electronic cash. And they're like, yeah, that's
what it should be. And then I, I usually think like
that's what it already is. Like I can buy your shirt and
send you Bitcoin now. Like we can already do that.
Like it, it is that, but the social adoption is just not
there because there are better air quotes solutions already
available for people and and they they don't really
understand yet why they would need a better currency as well.
So I think, I think many people need patience in that sense.
Yeah. I mean, I think, I know we need
a wrap, but that's where you to even bring it up.
And I know it's your favorite and I like it.
It's the gunpowder. I think you've probably been all
in. I'm assuming you have been
because you have this level of Zen that you've held gunpowder
for much longer than everyone else.
And what that means is being like, you know, recognizing
Bitcoin probably is the vast majority of your wealth and how
you store it. And you drastically,
disproportionately outpace everyone else from their return
profile to the opportunity set that you've created for yourself
versus others. Why I'm bringing this up is
because this is what the corporate treasury and a lot of
this other stuff has done is most people think of Bitcoin as
a trade or a small percentage of their portfolio.
So they're looking at other proxies to do it versus
understanding this is just money and it's super like profound and
revolutionary that you can buy this thing.
It doesn't get debased, it increases in purchasing power
and then you don't have to worry about it anymore.
Like that foundational thing is not absorbed by the market.
So they buy little percentages of it.
And even the hardest core people that you see on Twitter that are
like, you know, thought leaders where people allowed have like
5% or 1015%, they haven't come to this understanding that
Bitcoin is the thing. And then they can just go back
to their life and do it. Because once you get there, you
realize the counterparty risk reduction, you know, the aspect
of the execution, like everything that Bitcoins
properties have, you're like, well, why would I do anything
else other than hold it? And like, obviously there's
money's meant to be spent so you can do it, but it's not to like
make more Bitcoin based on these other things, but people that
have smaller position size and that's how they think because
they don't understand Bitcoin is the last trade.
And so that's like the big like unlock is to your point, these
people will eventually just wake up that have been mired by
hyperinflation and capital controls and cut and money being
seized from their banking accounts, realizing how powerful
it is to hold this asset, it not be debased at a creative
purchasing power. They're not going to sell it to
get into like MSTR or some pub Co because they might make a
little bit more Bitcoin. Like it's the most insane
proposition. And that guy ties back to it's
just an IKEA common sense test. But yeah, I.
I love that Bitcoin is the last trade.
That's a great. That's a great ender.
Well, there's a good place by that name.
Yeah. Check it out.
Yeah.
Well, yeah. Thanks again, man.
Great conversation. And I hope, I hope this will
help some people prepare for a future where, you know, Bitcoin
and AI will probably reshape everything that we think we know
right now. So thanks, brother.
Thank you. Yeah.
Thanks for having me on. It's great.
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