Episode 151 - Jimmy Song

You're listening to the only place on the internet that offers the perfect blend of high quality premium cigars and cryptocurrency news and commentary. Welcome to cigars and crypto. Now here's your host, Invest New York. Good evening ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to this episode of cigars and crypto. You know who it is. You should point who are let me tell you how excited and elated I am

of cigars mookers into becoming Bitcoin maximalists. I have been slowly moving down this road for about maybe six months now. With everything going on, I'm starting to feel more comfortable and confident. Bitcoin is the answer to a lot of the questions and problems that I have with getting both my personal finances where I want them to be in my business off the ground. So let's start

with one question. How did you get into Bitcoin? I got into Bitcoin back in 2011. I saw a story on this technical website that I used to read called slash time and it said, oh, almost exactly 10 years ago actually. It said basically Bitcoin has reached dollar parity and I didn't really know what that meant. I couldn't really even parse that sentence. And when I looked

into it and learned a little bit more about it, I found out that it had a 21 million limit. And that was when, you know, like something primitives just sort of like kicked into gear, you know, I discovered that. Okay, I better be one of the first people to get in on this thing if this thing has any legs and not one of last. So that

led me down a journey to try to go purchase Bitcoin. And back then it's not like today. You can, you know, today you can just like go on cash. I'm going to buy it back then you had to open an account on Mt. Cox to actually go and buy some. But you couldn't get money to Mt. Cox that easily because they're a, they were an exchange

of Japan. So what you have to do was to create an account on the service called Dua La. You have to get your bank account approved there and everything else. And that took like a week and after everything had been set up on Dua La, you would have to then transfer that money to Mt. Cox, but that took another week or so. So it would take

like two weeks and then you can go market by or whatever, live it by Bitcoin. And then, you know, you'd have some Bitcoin. Process took a little too long, so I didn't really buy any. When I first heard about it back when it had just broken a dollar. And, you know, it took a while longer before, actually, bought some Bitcoin. 2013, I, you know, by Benaheads

of Bitcoin and, you know, price was going a little crazy. And I decided to, you know, like learn more about it, how the programming endurance of it and all that. I did that. I was able to contribute to some open source projects. And eventually that led to the career that I have today, which is writing books, teaching people, you know, advising, consulting and all that. You

know, there are so many different ways that people get into the space. And there are so many different roads that lead in one direction. And as of late for me, that direction has become Bitcoin. So I think the next couple of questions I'm going to ask are related to the evolution from shit corner to full on Bitcoin. Maxi. I have to admit, when I started in

this space, I started purely as a Bitcoin miner. Because I saw that I could buy plane tickets. And unlike most people today, I didn't see Bitcoin as a saving mechanism. I saw it as money. And I actively sought out people in businesses that would accept Bitcoin in exchange for goods and services. And in that evolution, I moved into a bunch of other coins. And I, I

started to think that it was a great idea. I think I've said this maybe once or twice before in my podcast. Back in the day in like 2014, in the 2014, beginning of 2015, no one would have been able to tell me that name coin would not be the next Bitcoin. So I was going to tell you how old that is. Right. But I, I have

in the last maybe years. So been running into issues with getting my business off the ground in terms of ease of payment. Right. And as I have looked at accepting all kinds of coins in the past, the only one that really kind of resonates with me is Bitcoin. And as I'm moving towards this maxi state, right. Is it. One of the things that I'm having to

trouble with is trading because I'm always traded to build my Bitcoin back. But as a maxi, is that something that's round upon? I mean, no one can really tell you what to do with Bitcoin. Right. It's all verified. Don't trust. And you know, if you, if you were trying to make more Bitcoin by trading, and you happen to be a good trader, I don't think anyone's

really going to condemn you for that. I know plenty of Bitcoin, maximalists that do. But going back to kind of what you said. They're sort of like a journey that a lot of people take. And almost all everyone sort of goes through a lot of the same steps. And I remember this wave back in 2011, even that, you know, when, when you learn about Bitcoin and

you find out about this mining stuff, you immediately start thinking, okay, well, how can I get into mining? And it doesn't matter if you got an in 2011 or 2020. There, there, that, that sort of thing. And I think that's sort of the instinct that we have because we know that the money production business is very profitable. And if you can get in on that, we're

thinking, oh, okay, well, that, that must be where it is. I would love to be printing my own money. And, and mining seems like the way to print it. And of course, you know, you find out very quickly that it is a very low margin business. It is very difficult to get the equipment. And it's very difficult to source the energy and that only the very

best make any money at all. And I know so many people that spent way too much money on miners that didn't understand trying to, you know, mine Bitcoin and doing things. And that's usually step one of the Bitcoin journey. And then after they find out that mining doesn't really work, they could go by Bitcoin. But feeling, you know, I think that's the way to get into

mining. Having somewhat like their late to the party, they typically go into all coins. And I, I remember feeling the same thing. And, you know, I, I remember game coin and light coin and things like that. Back from the class of 2011 or whatever. And this is again, a natural thing, I think, because it's very easy to think that your late to the party, that you're

not going to be one of the first people. And therefore that you're going to try to make another coin like, you know, the Bitcoin. And, you know, you might even own Bitcoin at that. But the idea being, hey, I want to, I want to make sure I get in on the ground floor and something else in case this turns into Bitcoin. And I think at heart

that's driven by envy or something like that. And a desire to be one of those first people. And, you know, not have to work or something like that in the future. Now, that of course leads to disappointment, because when you find out that the all coin isn't nearly as good or nearly as interesting or nearly as useful, it's Bitcoin actually is. Then finally, like you come

to grips with yourself and say, you know what? I think I'll finally get into Bitcoin. And that's sort of like the journey that many of us have been on. And I wrote like a, like a whole list of things that you end up doing. And some people don't get out of any of those stages. And they, you know, like kind of get stuck in one stage.

But, you know, like in the end, we all capitulate. We will all be Bitcoiners in the end. Whether you're you know, jacked, they're kicking and screaming or whether you go there voluntarily and with enthusiasm, we're all going to get on a Bitcoin standard eventually. And it's still early. You don't have to feel like you're late. And, you know, the world's going to figure it out soon

enough. That's amazing. I feel like I feel like I told you to say that because that was my journey. You know, I like to feel like I've been voluntarily come towards maximalism just because it just seems like the simplest thing to do. You know, it's it's simple to do. There's so many nuances and struggles and challenges with all coins that that just make it just not

sustainable for me. And, you know, that's a great segue actually to my next question. One of the things I struggled with and one of the things I struggled with is onboarding people in my circle. When I first got into this space, I remember, and this is actually still the case, Bitcoin isn't doesn't have like a marketing team, right? And my first exposure to Bitcoin came through

a business willing to accept it for flights. But when I fell down the rabbit hole, the only thing I felt was that I was like, I don't know if I could have been able to do it. The only thing I heard was, sound money, hard money, transaction times block height, that kind of stuff, right? And as I'm trying to simplify the message for people that I

interact with, I found that I don't say any of those things to them. And I'm curious. Yeah, good question. And the thing is, I've been trying to convince friends and family to invest in Bitcoin for a very long time. I think I started in like 2013, Bitcoin hit like $80 and basically I posted on Facebook, hey, this thing's at $80. I think I really think you

should buy some. I told that to my parents. I told it to my in-laws. I told that to my friends. Basically, nobody really listens to me. And that's okay. That happens. And that's that's part of being a long-term holder is that you're going to find that a lot of people are skeptical. But you know what? Like a lot of those people, guess who they're calling now,

right? Like, as the question comes out. Like I said, they're all going to capitulate at some point. It's just a matter of when. And they thought I was kind of strange back then, but then 2017 comes around. They're like, huh, maybe he's not so odd after all. Maybe there is something to this thing. And now they're like, okay, something is really weird. I need to really

find out what's going on and do something about it. But that said, like, I wish there were magic words that I could just say to get people to really consider Bitcoin. But unfortunately, you know, there aren't such words. I mean, maybe for a specific, group, there could be some words or whatever. But, but you know, I'm a Christian, right? And one of the things that I

wish there were are words that I could just say to somebody to help them understand why I'm a Christian and maybe have have people consider that too. But that's usually not how it works. And generally what happens is you're just friends with them for a long time. And, you know, I don't know. Eventually, they just kind of become a little more curious. And, you know, if

ever, you know, if they ask, it's, it's usually after a long friendship. And then at that point, it's, hey, you know, I, I noticed you're like this, like, you know, what, what's the deal here? There used to be a point in my life where I would bring up Bitcoin in every conversation, like 2014, 2015. My wife, I think, I think I'm going to be a little

bit more careful. My wife used to basically yell at me because I would bring up Bitcoin all the time. And it's like, can you, can we please just talk about something else? Like it, like you, you talk about Bitcoin every time. And, you know, a lot of people come out confused. And they think we're weirdos or something. Yeah, you know, there, there is such a thing

as sort of like oversaturating it. Certainly, if they are interested, I will talk their heads off. But most of the time, I think, I think I'm going to be a little bit more careful. Most of the time, you know, until people are ready, like you saying something won't necessarily move the needle. Now it's said, there are people that are very convincing. And they, they're very empathetic

and can feel out what sort of argument needs to be made in order to get them sold on this. Usually they tend to be in sales, right? They, they know how to like, both for that sort of thing. I'm not really in sales. So I don't, I don't do that that well. But, but if you're one of those people, maybe there's, you know, some sort of

process or formula that can work. But what I found is that generally you just, you know, you talk about it. If they ask, you know, you mentioned it in passing if possible, but like really trying to convince them beyond, you know, like what they're really trying to convince them. What they're ready to do now is generally kind of a futile thing. And your, your job as

a friend is just to be there and let them know, like, like that you are. You know, I mentioned that I first talked to my parents about Bitcoin in 2013. My dad decided to buy some in 2016. And he bought, he bought some at like 600 bucks. And of course it went down to like 300 bucks. And, and you know, he, you know, he didn't complain,

but you know, he, he kind of knew after I talked to him, you know, what, what this was about. Now he's very happy. My mom, on the other hand, never bought any Bitcoin. And she's still like kind of confused a little bit, but she's at least very happy that I have Bitcoin and my dad has Bitcoin. So it takes time. It takes patience. And you don't,

you know, it's a long game. You don't have to convince everyone right away. And if you're there and patient and available for them to talk to when they're ready, that's ultimately, I think the only way to get people on board. Hey, are you looking to invest in Bitcoin? Coin Flip is the easiest way to get people on board. Hey, are you looking to invest in Bitcoin?

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coinflip.tech. That's COINFLIP.TECH coinflip.tech. Don't forget, use that discount code. I was thinking about what you were talking about. And the first thing that popped into my mind is how knowledgeable you are on Bitcoin. Right. So let me take a moment to chill the three books that I just purchased today. Programming Bitcoin, which is I know going to go over my head. I've been in IT 23

years, but I'm an infrastructure guy. I don't know anything about Bitcoin. But I'm going to read it. The one that I'm really looking forward to reading is the little Bitcoin book. And thank God for Bitcoin. Now before I ask you about those books, I want to know, where did you go for information that helped you get to a point where you could author or co author

these books? Because I get that question a lot. Where, you know, people ask me, where can I go to get good information? And I'm not, I'm not a really a visual guy. I'm not a big like YouTube guy. I like books like tangible paper books. What, what did you read that helped you get prepared to be where you are today with Bitcoin? Well, the first book

programming Bitcoin, that came as a result of me trying to program Bitcoin. This was back in 2013. I was working on some open source projects. And back then, it's interesting. I was working on a Bitcoin open source project called Colorcoins. And the lead developer actually hired me from Reddit. There was a board called Jobs for Bitcoin. And I responded to an ad he put on there.

And he is a guy out of the Ukraine. And he needed more developers for his projects. So he's like, I'll pay you in Bitcoin. I was like, okay. I'm all yours. At that time, it was like, wow. I can't believe I can't believe I did that. And then I did that. Like, Bitcoin was going on a bull run. I think October 1st, it was like a

hundred bucks. November 23rd, it was like 11 hundred bucks. So that was a very exciting time. And it was during that time that I responded to that. And he gave me some work. And you know, there was a bunch of stuff that I had no idea what was going on. So I had to actually look it up. And it was during that process of finding out

what was going on. What, you know, how to implement some of this stuff that I had to go and learn. And the fact of the matter is there weren't that many good resources for programmers that wanted to program Bitcoin. A lot of the aspects were very dry and hard to understand. There were a lot of different concepts that were, you know, hard to grasp. A lot

of tricky things from a programming perspective that you really needed to understand. That weren't really documented anywhere. So that frustration and learning is ultimately what led to me writing that book. Because that frustration and learning led me to teach other developers who hadn't gone through what I had gone through. But I needed to teach them because, you know, there were usually coworkers or something that didn't

understand some aspect of Bitcoin programming. And I would just sit there and teach them. And that that led to me. Writing the book because this is the resource that I wish somebody that existed when I was getting started. Instead of, you know, random piece of documentation here or there. So that was the first book programming Bitcoin. The second book was done as a book sprint. And

it was eight of us. And this was 2000. 18. Well, well, 2019. Yeah, that's when we, well, 2019 was when we wrote it. But basically, we got together at a house, all eight of us were staying there. And we did nothing but write the book from soup to nuts, just wrote the book. And by the end of the week, we had the little Bitcoin book uploaded

to Amazon. And that, you know, I mean, I think that's the first book I've ever read. The book was something that we wanted to write collectively to show why Bitcoin was important. Not only why Bitcoin was important, but, you know, what Bitcoin was to sort of like the layperson. And, and yeah, it was a resource that, you know, we drew resources from all of our experiences

and all of the, you know, different things that we had read about Bitcoin. You know, most like, there's eight of us. And, you know, we have representatives from like every content, right? And it was a really enjoyable book to write because of that collaborative thing. And it was ultimately a way for us to explain Bitcoin and explain, you know, how it benefits humanity in a way.

And, and yeah, that, that was what we wanted to do. And we wanted to talk about that book was about. And the last one was, is thank God for Bitcoin. And this came out of a Bible studies that slash book club that we had on Zoom during the pandemic. And we, you know, towards the end of it, we were getting a little bit frustrated with the

other books that had this sort of crossover of talking about monetary policy and Christianity. And we, you know, we had a lot of questions about that. The two books that we studied were Ethics of Money Production by Gretel von Halsman and Honest Money by Gary North. And we were frustrated with both books because neither of them mentioned Bitcoin. And the endings were just so depressing. It

was essentially, we need to get a political action committee together to convince enough people to adopt back to the gold standard. And we need to elect the right policy. But hopefully employment is probably the kind of potential we have that are given to Bitcoin all at an equal at all. It's just here's all the things wrong with the current system and very much in the spirit

of those two other books, but sort of distilling it down into plain language with good examples and memorable stories and things like that to help the reader understand what is just so morally corrupt about the current system and how it affects politics, how it affects our personal choices, how it affects even the church. The final two chapters are here's Bitcoin and here's why this is a

really good alternative and how it'll fix so many of the ills that we're seeing in society today. Those books were a large inspiration, obviously studying the Bible was also an inspiration as well and that's ultimately what led us to write that book and hopefully it speaks to the people that are reading it. Awesome, thank you so much Jimmy. I just have one last question for you.

And I don't do price on my show, but I just want to know where you see the future of Bitcoin in the next three to five years. Where do I see Bitcoin in the next three to five years? Well, here's the thing, here's the pattern that I'm starting to pick up on, which is that a lot of assets in the finance market are starting to take

on some Bitcoin characteristics. So for example, micro strategy has like 90,000 Bitcoin, which is a lot of money. That's about four and a half billion. Or something to that or 45, four and a half billion dollars with the Bitcoin. And their stock is currently trading in such a way as to correlate very strongly with Bitcoin. And they have a business, but their, you know, Bitcoin is

a main part of the Bavaria proposition of buying that stock. And in addition, they've issued a couple of convertible notes to the bottom market. Where the bondholders are going to be able to buy the stock. So let's get some upside to micro strategy stock. And therefore some upside to Bitcoin. Tesla is buying some Bitcoin. There are other companies that have Bitcoin on their balance sheet. So

what I'm seeing in the next three to five years is essentially the Bitcoinization of financial assets. Whether that means that, you know, it's a corporation that's putting Bitcoin on the top. It's a balance sheet in a significant way. Or even if it's not significant because Bitcoin price tends to go up so quickly, you know, it becomes a significant part. You know, you might start with a

1% allocation of your treasury. You find out very quickly that it becomes like 2%, 5%, 10% and it can overtake your portfolio very fast. So I think that's a lot of the convertible note type bonds will come into existence. A lot more people will be chasing yield with Bitcoin rather than through leverage. I see Bitcoin becoming a big part of the system and sort of entingling

itself and making it more rational if it makes sense. So, you know, three to five years. I think, you know, it'll be a big part of the financial world. And we'll be thinking about how did we ever have a system without Bitcoin? Outstanding. I want to take a moment, sort of. Thank you so much for taking time out of your day to speak with me and

educating me and my listeners. I really do appreciate it. Thank you so much. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Jimmy. So. Thank you.