The Bitcoin Group #343 -Who Invested in FTX - Savi

The Bitcoin Group, the American original. For over the last 10 seconds, the sharpest Satoshi's, the best Bitcoin's, the hardest cryptocurrency talk. We'd like to welcome our panelists, Dan Eave, the crypto raptor. On your beautiful Bitcoin ads. Martijn Wishmeyer from General Bites. Good evening, Bitcoin. And I'm Thomas Hunt from the World Crypto Network, moving on to issue one issue one. We finally know who FTX owes money

to wall street elite big tech airlines and many more. That's right. Not your keys. Not your coins is a lesson to corporations now as the major losers in FTX seem to be large corporations. Just as they said in the great movie, the paper. They lost a lot of some fancy people's money. Dan Eave, what do you think about the FTX client list? Well, it's another eye

opener again, isn't it? As to who's actually been investing in these crypto companies. Obviously before it, it panned out that FTX was a giant fraud. Crazy kind of money hiding in manipulation scheme by by Sandbagman Freed. There are a lot of actual big institutions dipping into it. And I'm not sure if I'm going to be able to do that. And that's kind of evident from these

documents that have been published. They have said like that there is a bunch of names in there. I think they use Goldman Sachs as an example who are on the list, but they may not actually be creditors. But the fact is that there's definitely a lot of big names on there. And it shows that the institutions have been dipping into cryptocurrency companies. Not necessarily buying Bitcoin,

which they should be in just holding their keys. They don't get scammed as people get burned continuously through the process. It's the inception of man. Anything can be defrauded from you will be. And therefore just buy the Bitcoin and own it. And don't give it to someone else to look after it for you. He's going to re-hypothicate it. And that money is just going to change

hands so many times. But it's the same scenario is what happened when Celsius went down. There was the Celsius list was incredible. And of the investors there, there was even governments. Central banks that were holding that are on the list. So every time one of these companies goes down and these lists of creditors gets published, there's more big institutions and big companies, even governments popping out

of the woodwork that have actually invested in cryptocurrency, whilst being very silent or even dismissing Bitcoin under the hood. So I think JP Morgan was another one that was listed on here. So yeah, I think it's, it's a great thing. It's a good sign in, it's obviously bad what's happened with FTX. But it's a good sign in general about all of these companies, institutions, governments that

are actually dipping into cryptocurrency in some way at least, which gets them on the journey to learning about Bitcoin and then holding their own private keys. And as we say about that, you know, not your keys, not your coins. The problem with investing in companies rather than just buying the Bitcoin yourself is kind of like not your keys, not your privacy. If something ends up happening

to that company, then your investment then gets this publicized, which, you know, you'd rather, I'm sure you'd rather just hold Bitcoin and be happy with holding the Bitcoin and not have any of the third party risk that you do have with investing in a in a random company that's going to throw, throw money everywhere. JPMorgan Goldman Sachs Netflix meta and even Apple Stefan Consilla, what do

you think of these FTX? FTX investors. Well, no, I agree with Dan actually. So I think that, you know, if you're going to invest in crypto, you can do it the right way or you can do it the other way. But the problem is they've demonized Bitcoin because of the energy stuff and because they don't understand it. So they go into these, these speculative investments. And,

you know, I'm not a, I'm not in favor of scammers and pyramid schemers and FTX people and shit coiners. But they are separating idiots from their money, which I don't think is a bad thing. Maybe we'll teach people a lesson in the long run. If you want to hold a currency that can withstand the inflationary problems of a fiat currency, it's going to be a cryptocurrency

and that will be Bitcoin. And that's simple and it's not sexy because it's boring. You have to wait for a few years. But they want returns and they want to leverage. And so, you know, you pay the price when you, when you do these things. Artin Wishmeyer, the usual drenching welcome to Bitcoin lose all your money greetings for the corporations. At least now we know why

all our favorite Netflix shows are being canceled at this moment because they're out of money. But, yeah, you know, you put all your money in a shit coin casino, what can possibly go wrong. So, yeah, it's, it's very sad that it's all went down the troops, but it's better if the large corporations lose the money. I think then if individual investors lose it, but, yeah, I

think they learned a hard way. Not your coin, not your key. Not your coin. So, next time I think they're better off buying Bitcoin instead and hold it in a multi-sick wallet. Moving on to the exit question, a new article says institutions announce for 80 85% of Bitcoin buying. Should we welcome our new institutional overlords? And what about that plan where the poor and the normal

people had a chance to buy Bitcoin again? Dan Eve, what do you think about the institution? It's always been a meme, hasn't it? Like in Bitcoin adoption, there's kind of two sides to it, right? There's one is places accepting Bitcoin and that everyone gets excited about when a big company lends legitimacy to Bitcoin by acting it as a form of payment. And the other side is

the very enemy that Bitcoin stands for a place in terms of the existing monetary system. The leaders of that monetary system actually dip into Bitcoin. That lends a lot of credence to Bitcoin and validates it. So it's positive that institutions are buying in. But yeah, it is sad that every day people are still lagging away behind. And they are going to be by the time it

really becomes ubiquitous. The institutions will have already been in and the average person is going to be buying a million dollar bit, but the fractions of a million dollar Bitcoin. Stephens, should we welcome our new institutional overlords? Well, I'm a mixed minds of this, of course. But I actually think that. So if we were to get, let's say an ETF approved, I guess we'll talk about

that later, one of our other talking points, it would pave the way for more people to get a stake in this. And that's what I hope will happen. So I'm not opposed to this at all. I think that I think that people should be able to have many avenues to get exposure to this. But it's just too difficult at the current time. You know, the SEC

keeps denying ETFs to great scale into other companies. Why are they doing this? Why don't they want let people do what they want to do with their 401ks and their savings plans? I don't really mind the institutions. I think it validates Bitcoin as being like serious investments. Got to agree. And I believe once it became over a market cap of $1 billion or $3 trillion or

something, it justifies having a good look at it from like an investment management perspective. Personally, I buy Bitcoin. I get cash back on my credit card and I turn it into Bitcoin every penny I get back. I put it into Bitcoin. So no matter what the price is, whether it's 20k or the rate set, I don't know. I think that if we would all do this,

then the price of Bitcoin would go to infinity. It's just bound to happen. But unfortunately, many people, if we can, they sell and they buy and they think they can gain the market, but it doesn't work like that. You just have to buy some Bitcoin and buy some more and buy some more. And yes, if the price is down, we get more. More Bitcoin, more sets

for less, but even if the price is up, I still don't change anything. I just keep buying Bitcoin. Just buy them all. Buy them all. Moving on to issue two Bitcoin could be a key to saving the environment. Yes, you read that correctly. A new article claims that Bitcoin might actually be good to help the environment, helping use excess and stranded energy. And turning it into

a store of value, then the renewables industry will become more cost-effective and economically viable. Meanwhile, a new nuclear powered Bitcoin mine is opening in the United States. Bitcoiners are trying to make the notoriously polluting cryptocurrency a little more green. Stefan Kinsella, what do you think about the new green Bitcoin? Well, I think that the entire environmental industry is anti-file. I think the whole climate stuff is

nonsense. So a bit long-benefit of nuclear power because of its technical differences with the other industries. But one benefit of it is that it's not polluting. So the problem is this. It's not polluting because it's not polluting. But to my mind, carbon is plant food. So I'm not so sure that that's a drawback of nuclear. We won't put as much CO2 into the atmosphere. So we

won't have as green of a planet if we have a totally nuclear planet. On the other hand, the environmentalists, they won't admit that that's one benefit of it from their point of view. And then they focus on nuclear waste as the other thing. They know anything about it. So what I think is the best thing that will happen, and probably will happen, is that you have

all these flares of these fossil chemical plants and things in Texas and in other states. I think these things will be colonized as well as hydroelectric. Nuclear too as well. And even volcanic and hydroelectric. So there's a lot of things that we can do. Nothing wrong with harvesting wasted energy. But I think that trying to meld the Bitcoin agenda onto this climate change bullshit. And pseudo

science is not the way we should go. We should not buy into the idea that, oh, we're going to destroy the climate unless we do A, B, and C. So that's kind of my perspective. I can understand why people do that to try to get regulatory approval. I don't think that Bitcoin's promise is to stop us from a climate disaster that's not coming in the way

that is predicted by mainstream people. Renewables just aren't going to cut it especially at night. So I think we will need a nuclear background. I think it's neat to use Bitcoin for this. And like you said, for the flares and for hydro power places where getting enough batteries up there might not be an option. Burning some of that power into a Bitcoin mine is an exciting

use of it. Although I'm not sure if this nuclear plant is going to be the best. This might have been the one that they raised with a startup. And it's not really related to the government or a larger power company. And when they generate enough waste, I don't know what the problem is. Probably shut it down. Move on to the next one. Martn Wishmare, what do

you think about nuclear powered Bitcoin mining? I'm not a big fan of nuclear power myself. We've had our share fair share of problems in Europe with it. Well, the US had had had its problems. But it's a. And we see now, especially now that they're like the war in Ukraine. They're constantly bombing near or even bombing the power plant itself and not using any nuclear bombs

or anything. This is could spell the worst disaster ever. So, so you know, if we can avoid it, which I think we should avoid it. There's plenty of other alternative like it in Portugal. Everything I didn't want. Green energy. But I just took an energy company and apparently it's all green. I mean, every single electron flowing through the system is either hydro power wind power or

solar. And you're right at night. There's not enough solar power. But it will just throw some hydro in the mix. And I don't think we need any nuclear energy, but unless you live in France, because that's just all nuclear. But for this Europe, I know the Portugal. I need for it. And I see more future in the flare using the gas methane and waste methane from

from from drilling and all. And using that as a source of fuel for mining Bitcoin, especially given the fact that you can you can just use this energy at the location. You don't have to transport it. You don't have to compress it. You can just use it where you would normally flare it. Just put some modular boxes there. Fill them with one way. And then you

can put the generator and the rest with mining equipment. And it when the field runs dry or production stops. You just load your mining modules on the truck and you put them at the next spot. So I think that is very green compared to any other alternative. And sure, no carbon emissions from from from nuclear energy. But we're still struggling with the waste, which we store

on site. And it's about the US that they're not really good at managing the waste either. And they just leave it at a plant location. And they're still discussing whether they should bury it all in a mountain or not. But nobody wants to be near the mountain or the people near the mountain or one. It's a bit of an issue. And it yes, it might be

cheap to produce. It is good for decades. But we're just pushing the problems to the next generation. And that I don't know. I don't think it we need to. I'm talking about the alternatives and. I drive a gas or link car because I don't want to have a battery operated car. I know you drive that real price car, Thomas. But for me, I like my car

to be ever nice range and the same goes for everything. So I'm not a tree hugging IP myself. But I think if possible, we should just use the methods that are low hanging fruits basically. As energy sources and I think that thing. Instead of flaring gas. And you know, if you've got that, you're not going to have to just use it for Bitcoin mining. Dan Eve

up an atom. What do you think about nuclear powered Bitcoin mining? Yeah, hell yeah. Well, I mean, there's there's two, two different types of, I mean, one's not around yet, right? So the current method is nuclear fusion where there's a lot of, you know, radioactive waste. And you know, there's been also sort of cool ideas discussed about how to get rid of it, whether it's, well,

I mean, one of them is, is to fire it at the sun, but the problem is if one rocket like goes off in the atmosphere, blows up and then you've just spread nuclear waste all around the atmosphere. So that's not a great idea. But bearing it, like, I think in, I think it's Norway. I think it's one of this kind of navy and countries. They, they,

like, very, they, they incase the radioactive waste in concrete and then put it like a kilometer or so down into the earth's crust underneath the mountain. So the likelihood of that even coming up is like so insanely small. And if it does, it's like, you know, it's a giant thing of concrete. But ultimately, what one thing that is, it is quite cool is that there's the

positivity around, I spoke to city AMs like a, you know, big, you know, London sort of finance newspaper and, or they, they call finance section. And it's good that they're acknowledging the positive things around Bitcoin. So that article discusses about the way that it's a Bitcoin actually incentivizes clean energy. And even that there was, there was another article that was around this, the senior article around

that did blabber on about how the really positive thing for crypto currency happened last year when Ethereum dropped 99% of its emissions and whatever. But, but the fact, you know, obviously they, they skip out the fact that Ethereum is now suffering from the same thing. The proof of sake has always suffered from, which is, you know, it's getting essentially can still be gained by the biggest

holders of the currency. Whereas, the proof of work is a lot more distributed, and less likely to be gained. So it's much, game so it's a much better system. But it incentivizes cheap, patchy electricity. And in this that very same article it discusses that the cheapest electricity is around renewables, especially where there's excess. And putting the infrastructure in place where you have windmills that can't produce

energy, you know, or don't produce energy all of the time, but still will produce excess amount of energy. You can't actually store anywhere. It's good to put it into just to a usage doing something else, which in this case is Bitcoin mining since there's really not some, you know, not enough for good methods of storing electricity at the moment. And you can't pump it across vast

vast distances, because it just loses its power as it were a long way. And so we're kind of reaching that stage now where we're maybe this is the 21st centuries equals MC squared where we realize that energy and mass are interchangeable. But, energy and money are interchangeable in this sense. And energy is money. And you need energy is what the all life on earth needs to

exist. And, and so it makes sense that all of our trading should be somehow linked to energy in terms of the value that we're trading. So ultimately, it's it's good for Bitcoin that there's so much more research going into it. And it's not just a bunch of articles that really aren't very well read. And that research just saying that Bitcoin is bad for the environment. And

they're looking at all angles. And one, one of the things that was was really cool in the article that I didn't realize was that. And even with all the things that I've read about Bitcoin mining and even all the positive spin on it. The fact that Bitcoin is the amount of big energy that Bitcoin mining uses is not point. I think it's not 0.0 2% not

point 0.0 2% of the global energy, not point, not 0.2%. Now I bet it's not going to be a lot of energy. So it's going to be a lot of energy to be able to work with it. Most people listening would actually think would have thought because of all these articles that you see about how bad Bitcoin mining is, that it would be work and be

using way more electricity than that. Because it uses more than whole countries. But it's absolutely minuscule compared to all the other industries from, you know, especially even from gold. It's like a fifth of the gold and jewelry industry. And it's like, you know, it's it's less than hundreds and hundreds of thousands of the transportation industry. Just launch from sport alone, let alone see an air and

stuff like that. So it really, it whilst people go on about the Bitcoin energy consumption. And there's called these these called sound bites of saying Bitcoin uses more than a country and blah, blah, blah. It uses actually minuscule amounts of energy. And it also drives energy drives energy prices down because it puts more infrastructure in place to be able to compete because there's more ways to

monetize that energy where you wouldn't have been able to monetize it before. they will update the Xbox during the times where it's most likely that low energy use will be going on. So low cost. They've also made it so the Xbox is having a new sleep function that actually puts the device to sleep and doesn't waste all that power. So we won't be able to say.

That Xbox is in play stations use more power than Bitcoin anymore. But this has become a whole political issue in itself. They call Xbox is woke now because of these settings. But let's move on to the exit question. Kind of a out of nowhere question. Although Dan covered it slightly psychically knowing that it was coming. A new plan by NASA wants to create a nuclear powered

spaceship for long distance exploration. The problem is, how do we get the nuclear power there? Should we launch the spaceship from earth with the nuclear power inside ready to go? Should we use one of our existing spaceships to launch perhaps just the plutonium, then build the spaceship in outer space? Or should we not do such a thing at all because of like Dan said, the obvious

risk of the rocket exploding and destroying all life on this planet. What do you think of our amazing new plans to explore the cosmos? Well, I actually so so I'm not so concerned about the risks of an explosion, whatever. I'm a libertarian at heart, right? So my view always is, why are we doing this? And who's paying for it? Is it worth it? And I think

that all these moonshots and all these space explorations. They're all just soaking the taxpayer for some kind of grandiose thing that will glorify NASA or some congressman or some administration. And I think it's all bullshit. I think let's let's let it be private. And if it if it makes sense, let it happen. And it's on time. We don't need to rush things. I mean, it's it's

it's a little bit bizarre that we landed on the moon. The US landed on the moon in 19 what 69. But it's been like dead. For 50 years that sort of indicate and the technology has gotten way better in the meantime. But we still haven't gone back to the moon. But we're about to, right? But it shows that it's like not economically feasible. So I think

that we should focus on. Having a solid set of laws that protects the rights of the people on the Earth. And less and live good lives. Not these spectacular moonshots and things like this. Let it happen. Organ. It's interesting about this space program is some of the best programs have been the spin offs like Velcro, fireproof clothing and missiles that could hit Russia. And tank. Of

course, Tang. Don't forget Tang. And Tang and astronaut ice cream. Martine, what do you think of NASA's plan? Should we send up the plutonium? We need more missiles for Russia. Oh, I thought we weren't going to get put up. It's not political. That's pretty political. No, no, that was one of the benefits we had. Like, you know, from the space exploration. But yeah, no, I, I,

I, I totally agree that we should have a private enterprise to this and not waste taxpayers money on some, I don't know, prestige project, which doesn't help anyone on planet Earth. Sorry. Yeah. No. No. So, I'm going to go with space here. What, sorry. What was the question? Should we send the nuclear powered rocket into space? Well, it depends, it depends, right? Because even I think

sending the difference between sending large amounts of, of nuclear waste that's just, you know, to be disposed of, front of flight to the moon or whatever. Um, then, you know, it's only to enough to power a rocket to go somewhere is, is, is a big, big chunks of like, depleted your radio or whatever it is, then they're going to be throwing into space. Or is it

depleted your radio? No, I don't know. Maybe I just got that from, from a film or something like, uh, what's it called? The train one with Stephen Keik, Stephen Keik, what's his name? Steven Siga. We use that for, for bullet shells. So I don't know. But you know, but, but I know we're nuclear power rockets. Cool. Cool. But anyway, this is, this, this conversation in, in

maybe 10 years time, hopefully, you know, it's all going to be, you know, it's going to be old school because we're going to have finally cracked nuclear fusion, which, you know, there's, it seems like it's getting pretty close where it's going to be 10, 15 years away. Didn't they, the other day, um, within the last month, they, they, they, finally reached a point where they produced

more energy than it took to actually power up the reactor, but for like fractions of a fraction of the second. So, you know, you just need to sustain that. And then we've been pretty close to realizing this for the past 50 years or so. Yeah. I think, I think nuclear, I think nuclear fusion is complete. So, so, and my, my opinion, this is, I don't know,

um, the environmentalist opposed nuclear fission power, even though it's the best thing we have going to be honest for almost every possible source. And they say, well, if we have nuclear fusion, we'll be in favor of that. But they know that, um, I don't know, I don't know. But that's like never going to happen. It's not going to happen. But for the next 50 years, nuclear

fission, we can, we can have that. And that can have low carbon emissions and no, no, no pollution, whatever. Um, but then they'll say, well, then there's what about the nuclear waste. I mean, this idea of sending nuclear waste into outer space is insane. Um, first of all, if you send it into outer space, you don't have to send it into the sun. What do you,

once you send it out of space, what do you, where do you, where do you want to go? Where do you care where it goes? But yeah, we could bury it a kilometer or put in the Mary out of the trench in the ocean. It will never be, you know, or by the time it's going to be, uh, discovered, it will be, uh, the race, the

waste will be decayed. But there's things you can do other than sending it into outer space. Like the point is the left and the environmentalist left put these impossible obstacles. They'll say, well, we don't want nuclear fission because there's the race problem. And we're a favor of nuclear fusion, but that's never going to happen. So I think we should say compromise and say, okay, if we

can have nuclear fission as a backstop that can back, back up all these soft, soft power sources, right? Like, uh, hydro hydropower and, and solar, which are all intermittent and have all these other storage problems. Uh, if you oppose nuclear fission, uh, you're not really an environmentalist in, in my view, right? Well, you guys probably aren't going to like this, but that's exactly what Bill Gates

says in his new book, how to solve the climate crisis is that, yes, in addition to renewables, though we don't like it, we're going to need the nuclear power. We're going to need that. But we should like it. It's better than renewables. Renewables have so many problems compared to, to nuclear, but, uh, you know, everyone has this, you know, people, people can flake nuclear fission. Yeah,

one of those things like a solar, a solar panel never killed anybody, but a nuclear had explosion, like, killed lots of people, like, it's hard to, yeah, but people think that nuclear power means nuclear bombs, but they're, they're totally different technologies. There's a whole history, which is interesting, which we can't get into here, but, uh, the, the American Western, the world nuclear power project went towards,

um, towards, uh, uh, plutonium instead of towards thorium, because the thorium process doesn't, uh, produce the, the fissile fuels you need for nuclear bombs. And so the entire world's nuclear power industry was distorted because of the need for nuclear weapons because of the cold war and all this kind of stuff. But if we had just done it, uh, uh, it always seemed really convenient that to

run the power plants, we also get the, uh, the radio access to, yeah, the thorium, thorium wouldn't do that. So I think thorium could be the future of a, we don't know because the governments have, they keep blocking us China, maybe onto something here. We don't know yet. But I think that thorium vision nuclear plants, maybe the future of power production for the future. But we'll

see. And we can use them to mine Bitcoin. Yes. Yes. Absolutely. Moving on to the next issue, check out worldcryptonetwork.com where you could click on the hosts and guest button. And it'll load all of the various hosts and guests who have been on our show. Look, Will Pangman and more at worldcryptonetwork.com. Issue three Bitcoin hash rate tops new milestone with minor hotling at a one year

low. Martine Wismer, the hash rate is high, but the hotling is low. What's going on with Bitcoin? Bitcoin miners. I guess they just have bills to pay. The price has been down. So they've been hotling for, you know, that would usually, when you mine some coins, you keep them until the price is better. And then you realize your profits. But if the pressure of like the

energy bill, in most cases, is mounting up and that you don't have any options, you just have to sell. I don't really feel like, you know, I think there's a big relation to the price of Bitcoin that, you know, it will mean that Bitcoin will go up in the near future. But I'm never to worried about it. It might not drop off because they're no longer

profitable. And they stop operations. Yeah. The hash rate might go down a bit, but that's great. It's so high. Anyway, you know, it could have and the network would still be secure. So I'm not worried at all, to be honest. It does seem like a very strange thing. It's a strange rally, perhaps coming up for Bitcoin with the institutions making all the money, the miners and

the normal people being left on the side. Dan, what do you think about the hash rate rising while the huddle rate for the miners is fallen? Well, the hash rate is, it's, I mean, even a bit of a chance that it's saying like $2.95 now. And above, I think three, the 300 something, 300 and 36 16 exerhashes. It's incredible. It just keeps on, it keeps on

growing. It shows that even though the price of Bitcoin is kind of, you know, it's it's multi year lows. The fact is that, you know, if you keep saying the infrastructure keeps on being built, but the investment, the investment is happening is the nuclear being powered Bitcoin. There's volcano powered Bitcoin, like all these projects are growing. They're not actually stopping. So all of this is very

positive and it just goes to show that the even despite the kind of price action where people, you know, got out there are victories again, their Bitcoin are victories. The hash rate is is completely like spying in their face, you know, hitting all time highs over 20 over 22 and now in 23. So obviously the miners, they're probably. What's the word hedging their bets a bit

right? Just in case. So I think a few weeks ago, I said, I said a dead cat bounce. I thought, well, maybe this little pumps a dead cat bounce. I was wrong. What I meant was a ball trap. Because obviously it's not dead. It's just, it's just, but maybe a bit of a ball trap. And I was hoping it was because I want, I wanted to

buy some more. And I was, I've been sat on the fence saying, oh, not some fence, but like, come on, it's going to hit like 12k 12k. Well, that would take it like 85% down from all time high. But no, but no. Now I'm, I'm sat with less Bitcoin than I could have been because it's down 23k because honey badger don't care. If everything's still moving

forward, like there's more investment happening in Bitcoin mining than ever. There's more hash power than ever. That's something that's really obvious. There's more companies that are fabricating Bitcoin mining chips than ever. And so this whole industry is, it's been growing despite all the all the price term, I'll turmoil and all the people, you know, poo pooing Bitcoin, especially about the the environmental fard and, you know,

it's been resilient to be theorem. There was no kind of turning point. On hash power when Ethereum started going, oh, yeah, we've reduced our emissions by 99% and Bitcoins and evil, you know, whale boiling, you know, thing, right. There wasn't a turnaround in hash power then. It's just growing even stronger because the clever people know that that's actually just fard. And it's just BS spread by

people you want to make money out of other, other altcoins or whatever that, that seem to be, you know, trying to get an edge on Bitcoin. But it's great. The hash rate's incredible. The difficulties like 37 trillion, which is, which is insane. And it's only going to grow. It's only going to keep on growing. And just like the, you know, the network effect is is growing

too. Stefan, concealer, the hash rate is high, but the minor hollow rate is low despite the traditional wisdom about the gold rush, the winners being the people that sell the money. What are the shovels? What do you think? Well, I think, I mean, the details are always going to be fluctuating, right. But I think the ultimate idea is that for, for the Bitcoin maximalist, for the

Bitcoin proponents, the idea is that ultimately, you're going to have a cryptocurrency, probably Bitcoin, which will replace the Fiat currencies, right. But for that to happen, it has to happen in a certain process. And as that happens, you're going to see, you know, more and more people realize that, okay, we need to have one currency and people are going to realize which one is the best

one to have your, your money in, right. So I, so I think that's what's happening here. People are realizing that this not going away. It's not going to go to zero. Like all these people that panic, all my friends, like you mentioned these people, oh, I missed out, I missed out. I people like, oh, I've been telling them like 16,000, big coins on sale, like kind

of joking, but not really joking, like it's on sale, because we know it's going higher. And they're like, oh, my brother I'm going to tell him this morning, I missed out is 23,000, I missed out, I'm like, okay, but I've heard this story over and over and over again, I missed out. You haven't missed out. It's on its way up. You have to be patient. You

have to realize that the tendency of the world is to move towards a one world money, because money is a unique good, which meses and hoppa and Rothbard call Sui generis, which means it's not a consumer good. It's not a capital good, which means that consumer goods and capital goods are two different types of goods, but they're both of the type that the more of the

good, the better, right. So the more ice cream cones you have for consumer goods is better, because there's more, there's more goods for people to consume or the more tractors or, or you have the better because you can make more pharmacop, you can make more money. So I think that's what I'm saying. It may build, you know, develop more forms, but money is a different type

of good, because it's a, it's a useful thing. But if you increase the supply of money, it doesn't increase wealth. So it's different than other types of goods. And what, but what that means is you only need one money for society, right. But if you only need one money, then we have to expect that if the governments don't block this process, and they're just going to

get a new one. They're trying to, but we don't think they'll be successful. There's going to be a convergence towards one money, and it will eventually replace Fiat. And I think that's Bitcoin. So you have this kind of, so this idea that these people that are paranoid, like when Bitcoin goes from 65,000 to 16,000, they get paranoid. I guess they think that if they have a

Bitcoin, they're going to lose all of it. How can they lose all of it? They can only lose all of it if Bitcoin goes to zero. If Bitcoin goes to zero, that means, we've given up the social project of replacing analog money, Fiat, state controlled money with digital money. I don't think that's ever going to happen. It's like, it's like saying we're going to get rid

of email and go back to, to snail mail. It's not, it's never going to happen, right. I mean, we've already reached a digital age, and the digital age of money is upon us. But the governments are clinging onto their, their monopolistic positions, and they're not letting a digital money replace the Fiat money. But it will happen eventually, if all things go well. Hopefully, that's, that's my

hope anyway. So that's why I think that, that's why I think that these things are, that people still have hope in them because they kind of see the potential. They have a glimmer of it, and, and they kind of sense that it's not going away. It's not going to zero. If it doesn't go to zero, then the, the, the sky's the limit. It also fits the

history of the analog to digital conversion that we've been living through in everything in our lives. Everything that's analog gets replaced by digital. Sure, we like newspapers. We liked old film cameras, all these things. It was seamlessly replaced. No one listens to cassette tapes anymore. It's all MP3s. But there's still one analog force of power that demands, and deserves your respect. The Bitcoin predictor ball, the

greatest predictor in all of the, now Dan Eve predict against the ball. Will the price of Bitcoin be higher or lower this time next week? I'm stubbornly saying low. Stefan can sell a higher or lower higher. There. Martine Wissmeyer. We've got a mixed panel so far. It's totally higher. The only way is up. Two to one higher. Now we'll ask the ball. Will the price of

Bitcoin be higher this time next week? Most likely, most likely, the ball is positive. Moving on to issue four issue four Arizona Senator introduces bill to make Bitcoin legal tender in the market. From the state, yes, the new legislation would recognize Bitcoin as a form of currency in Arizona, allowing it to be used for all debts, taxes and other financial obligations. This would mean that all

transactions that are currently done in US dollars, could be done with Bitcoin and individuals and businesses would have the option to use Bitcoin as they see fit. Martine Wissmeyer will Arizona become like El Salvador, the United States is Bitcoin. And Republic. I don't know to be honest, I don't think it's that important. Like right now, everything I pay for, I pay with Bitcoin. Okay, it's converted

on the spot at the moment and make a point of sale transaction. But I haven't touched any cash since, well, beginning of the pandemic. That's like three years ago. So everything I pay for is already in crypto. So yeah, and also I don't. Think that it's good. It shouldn't be forced upon people like in El Salvador. People should, you know, the idea behind Bitcoin is that

you decide, you decide, I want to use Bitcoin. It's not that it should be forced on you. On the other end, if Arizona would say it's legal tender, then yeah, it might. It's good for Bitcoin. It gives it some recognition, but it's not. It's really important to my opinion. I know to make myself clear. Dan Eve is this the future of Bitcoin adoption 50 states 50

legal tender acts. Again, it lends legitimacy to it. So, you know, the people would like the idea of paying their their bills in Bitcoin, although I've kind of always told me about this because people don't like spending. And if you're really into Bitcoin that much, you don't want to spend it because you're like, I don't want to pay my my taxes because if I, you know,

if I pay them next year, then or, you know, the Bitcoin next year will be worth X amount more. So it's kind of, yeah, it and we've all got regrets. Like, like, you know, I've got plenty of like stuff like I look back at that object that I bought. And I think of like the one that I bought of that object and then the pile of

them that would have been sat there. If I'd have just kept the Bitcoin until now. Like, you know, so there's that regret thing right that people have. So if you're paying your taxes, it's almost like it's even worse, right? Because you're like, oh, if I gave that Bitcoin to the to the government to pay my taxes, it could have been worth X amount now. And, you

know, and like, Lars Ulrich, I would have that gold plate. It's got sharp tax swimming pool or whatever. If I just held on to the corn. So, but ultimately it's good, right? It for in terms of infrastructure in terms of payment exception. Around the world, it's another positive thing. And, you know, the dollar has such a huge stronghold on the world as it is that I

think the US really needs to delve into Bitcoin a bit more rather than keeping it arms distance to make sure that, you know, they've got a foot in the door for when Bitcoin does become the global reserve currency eventually down the line. So it's good that the US states are individually opening up. You know, Florida has been been kind of quite open about it. And so

seeing Arizona do the same as I think it's very positive. And where else was it? Was it kind of the word now? Was it? That the trace mayor and oh, God. Why are you doing nice and thing? Wyoming, that's it. Wyoming. Yeah. Yeah. And so again, this is really positive news that the that the city's India. Wyoming. Yeah. So, so it's just positive all together that

individual states, whilst the US as a federation of states isn't recognizing Bitcoin specifically that the individual states are. And you know, that just creates a domino effect. The more they do, the more that we'll recognize it. And the more that eventually it will be, you know, it will become recognized by, you know, the wider hierarchy. Well, it does sound fun. I'm not sure if I agreed.

I think Dan's right. We don't really want to pair taxes in Bitcoin. Like, give unto Caesar that, which is Caesar's, as Jesus said. But if you send your Bitcoin, you lose your Bitcoin, you could have bought so much more stuff as well as exposing your address. Maybe the government just wants more Bitcoin. Steffen, can still I'm sure you're going to be thrilled with the US government

and a state, even a great state like Arizona, giving their official seal to Bitcoin. That's what we need. Well, so I think that a major country, the US somehow recognizing Bitcoin status in a way that would. So I think the big impediment towards Bitcoin, one big impediment towards Bitcoin adoption. In addition to the fact that it has to. To overcome the network effect of the dollar

being the main currency. But one big impediment is the fact of capital capital capital gains taxes, which applies to assets or commodities that are not considered to be. Currency or whatever. So I was hoping that the El Salvador recognition of Bitcoin is legal tender would would have that effect because sometimes the US will recognize a foreign currency as legal tender and they won't subject. But they

have. As far as I know they haven't done that yet. So I think the resisting that. And I certainly don't think that any American state can can can do that. And I frankly doubt that Arizona or any state will actually pass these laws. This is all just vaporware and just talking by activists, which. People I support, but I think that they're just like either exaggerating or.

There's there's wishful thinking going going on here. And the other thing is I was reading through this thing. And the article that we were going through Arizona says. So they have a definition in this in this in this in this draft law. They define Bitcoin. How do you have to find Bitcoin right if you're going to make it legal tender. It's the decentralized peer to peer

digital currency. In which your record of a transaction is maintained on the Bitcoin blockchain. Blah blah blah. So okay, but what's the Bitcoin blockchain because you're going to have Craig right and these in chain guy say, oh well, BSV. Is the real one. Like it's a circular definition. Like you can't really anchor it to one thing. It's hard. It's hard to say what Bitcoin is. I

guess you could have found it by its ticker symbol BTC, but even ticker symbol is just a privately adopted nomenclature, which some people fight over and dispute, right. Um, so I guess I don't see this. I think it's hopeful that people are moving in this direction. Um, look for for for marijuana legalization. I think the states are doing something that's not going to be a good

thing. But Tom Woods and the other guys called notification by gradually, privately, by gradually legalizing marijuana in the states by their state laws. Um, they're effectively paving the ground for eventual national legalization of marijuana. But money is different because the money is a national thing and the, and the federal government has a complete monopoly over that. Um, so, so let's say that Arizona makes it legal

tender in Arizona. What does that mean? Does that mean that I don't have to make capital gains taxes on my Bitcoin when I convert them into whatever when I pay my taxes in Arizona? I don't think so. So it's really to me. Um, a fairly meaningless paper gesture, but one that augurs in a potentially significant direction, but let's wait and see. That's, that's my view on

it. It seems the main change of the El Salvador. Accepting his legal tender is that the IRS changed their language to say, while some countries do accept Bitcoin as legal tender, we don't blah, blah, blah, so forth and so forth. Moving on to the exit question, a little bonus Tesla topic here. Tesla keeps losing money on its Bitcoin holdings. Should we be laughing at Tesla as

they were fair weather friends to Bitcoin abandoning it the minute that they heard that Bitcoin might be bad for the environment, even though we've shown it could be good for the environment, or should we feel sad for Tesla and hope that they do well? Martin Wishmer, what do you think about Tesla losing money on Bitcoin? Why are you asking me? I know, I know you know,

I'm not a Elon Musk fan. I would never drive one of the better he operated cars. I don't care if they lose money. I mean, they can probably get some little subsidies and money from the state to cooperate up. I don't, I don't, I don't, I don't think it's. For me, it's not interesting. They're probably, they probably will make money later, but they're already sold some.

So I don't know, I don't really care about Tesla or SpaceX or Elon or Starlink or any of his boring stuff. They're like a cat and they'll land on their legs. Dan Eve, what do you think about Tesla losing money on Bitcoin? Well, I'm still baffled as to how, how, how dumb of me that came if they're mad. They pretty much sold the bottom right. They

sold like near near the bottom, or at least the local bottom that we have now. But just the fact that they you turned on, on, on the fud around environmentalism, you know, on a company that kind of prides itself as like cutting edge technology and the best, you know, research, which produces the best technology. You think they'd reach, they'd have won research, the buying of Bitcoin

a bit more in the, you know, the mining process. And number two, they'd have done just a little bit more research on, on actually how much, you know, on the more positive renewable art schools, rather than just going on the, on the fud, the sort of media headlines. So I think there's, there's probably a bit more to it. Like, you know, pissed off shareholders that, that

maybe made them make that decision. Rather than, rather than it being specifically, you know, mining orientated or whatever. But it's, it's obviously now it's pounding out to be a bit of a bad move because they could have just held that Bitcoin. It would have gone out probably the same amount that they've apparently just written off. So, in that short space at the time, so that's really

not worked out very well. But also they could have played it, you know, the thing about musk is he's quite a, you know he's he's an ex, what's the word? He's like a, you know, he's very, he plays the media, right. He's a, he's been a, he's been an eccentric kind of, you know, plays the media and stuff like that. You'd think that he'd try and

having invested in Bitcoin, and the way he's messed around with his own share prices. So, we get the crazy things that he'd say you think he'd be a bit more balls on the table about Bitcoin, like saying yes, in fact, it's, it's fudge, right the environmental stuff is all fudge were in electric car company, you know that sort of stuff. And they could have done a

bit more. So, it's strange that they played it the way they did and they've ended up losing money. As long as they hold, we know ultimately it's going to, it's going to go up. So, I don't think there's any issue there. But, but yeah, if they, if they end up selling anymore now before the next ball run, that's going to, they're going to look like, they

can have a lot of their own their face when it eventually hits all time highs again. So, if they're going to have money on their Bitcoin holdings, then they ever made from all the cars, stuff and concealer, what do you think about Tesla's Bitcoin holdings trouble? Well, anyone who proposed dogecoin, I mean, I can't feel too sorry for, for what happens to them. On the other

hand, compared to all the other bad guys out there, Musk is not at the top of the heap. I mean, yes, I think Tesla is basically a subsidy seeking. And if we, if we could be, if we could be, if we could be, for example, an environmentalist, a bullshit company. And if a lot of your vehicles make sense, then all the other vehicle companies can do

that too, which they're starting to do. And I see no special advantage of Tesla, unless there's intellectual property, which they to their credit, they claim to have claim to have disclaimed early on, although they didn't do it officially informally. So I guess I would say, you know, if someone loses money on a Bitcoin investment, because they sell when they shouldn't have, then that's just idiots being

part of their money. And that's a good thing. Oh, come on, Elon, dollar cost averaging. Got a hold of keys, man. Get that program. I mean, Michael, Michael sailor seems to be pretty good on this, right? He's, he's not giving in. He's doing good so far. And so is El Salvador. They might turn it around. It might be one of those success stories. Just huddle for

a couple of years. Have a long time horizon. They've stopped the ETF. They said that the proposal failed to demonstrate that the proposal is consistent with the requirements surrounding the prevention of fraud and other malevolent practices. They have allowed futures Bitcoin ETFs where you can invest in the futures, but not a spot ETF where you can invest in the underlying asset. Dan Eve, will we ever

get an ETF in the United States? Yeah, it's going to happen, right? But I think, you know, there's probably a bit more pressure from the SEC after the whole FTX debacle. And what wasn't there like, there wasn't there a guy from the SEC resigned over over the over meeting with with FTX or. That had to step aside or something because. There was a lawyer who where

her husband represented FTX and she had to judge or a lawyer had to resign themselves from the case. Yeah. Oh, no, I thought it was actually someone. So I got the wrong into the sick, but I thought it's someone who is actually in the SEC who'd been meeting a couple of times and. And. And so the SEC kind of caught on the back for about this

one because it's not like, you know, I think it wasn't wasn't FTX wasn't sandbank would freed actually kind of giving. And the SEC kind of regulatory or was working with them about regulatory advice. So I think that if they are having having had that link to FTX. Um, they they would kind of have a egg on their face by by proving a bit quality of F

and if the price dumped a bit or whatever. So and they haven't protected people. So I think they're just now in extra cautious mode. Um, so that that's probably why it's been projected. But again, it goes back to the same old argument to say that. Oh, the Bitcoin prices, you know, Bitcoin price can be manipulated and blah, blah, blah. Um, it's just it's just ludicrous because

that happens in the the normal world anyway with all with all the regulation we have, you know, the libel rates rigging the the the the the silver prices. And that was JPM all wasn't the silver price rigging for silver price rigging for years. So it does happen despite all the all the regulations. And. And actually Bitcoin is is one of their industries that is underscreening. And

it is under the public eye a lot of the moment. So, um, yeah, I think it's going to happen eventually, but there's a because of the price it from all time high. And the recent FTX scandal or the I say the FTX handle with the, you know, the sales is block fire all of that trickle of companies that have failed. Um, cascaded sort of upon each

other failing. Um, that's probably put them put them back a few steps and actually acknowledging Bitcoin as a point of view. Bitcoin ETF games so long, I remember when the Winkelvide applied for eTF several times. And it seemed like they would get it with all of their finance and their background. Stepping can still, what do you agree with Dan Eave? Do you think that SBF and

FTX have cost us a chance at a Bitcoin ETF? I'm not sure. I think there's some kind of opposition to this, right? And I think all the down the down markets have given ammunition to the federal regulatory agencies and the conservative people that want to wait, wait, wait, wait. I used to think it was inevitable. I think that's a good thing. Because it was inevitable, I'm

starting to wonder if they're just going to block it forever. Unlike a lot of the Bitcoin Maxors, I think an ETF would be a good thing. So I see no problem with having an alternative way to own Bitcoin. I would love to be able to own some Bitcoin easily in a 401k or a, or a, or, or these kind of, these kind of things. So, so

I'm not sure. But I will say that like, I noticed that a GBTC, which I invested in a while back, hoping, hoping it would some late, some day become an ETF, right? And I bought it at a discount, like, which apparently everyone did, except for a few people at the beginning, when it was a premium. But, and I just checked online, my latest check is right

now it's at a 41 point. So 42% discount from their, their net asset value. Right. So like we sold all their bitcoins. So, like, I'm not sure if I can do that. Anyone who holds GBTC right now, if they liquidated, if my understanding is correct, and I'm not a financial guy, but I think you would get like a, you'd get, you would get like your full

value. So you get a big bump. And they say this, they say in their statement that, you know, if they fail in their judicial appeals, we would entertain working constructively with regulators to offer a tender offer. So I think what that means is they're saying we're going to give up. And just like, the team, all the, all the Bitcoin values and just return it to the,

to the owners of the GBTC trust, which I assume would mean, you know, I would get, you know, a 40% return or whatever on my investment. So I don't want that to be the case. I'd rather them convert to an ETF and let it rise forward with the market. But if they have to give up, it would be a sad thing. And I hope they don't

have to. But we'll see how this case will, this case, uh, this case, uh, that they're appealing, uh, results in. On part of the reason for the popularity and the existence of the gray scale Bitcoin trustees, because they won't allow a normal Bitcoin ETF. People have to invest in that or something like micro strategy or riot blockchain, one of the mining companies. If you want to

have that exposure to Bitcoin in your traditional portfolio, Martin Wishmare, what do you think? Will we ever see Bitcoin ETF in the United States? I don't know. Sometimes I think there's a bit of a hit on a gem that they're there. So they want to block it indefinitely. But, you know, even though an ETF would not be for me, I, we don't have any for a

one K type of pension saving plans. I think it would be good for the markets. Definitely because people will be able to divert some of their pension funds to Bitcoin. And I think if they can at least like allocate a few percent to Bitcoin, then they will actually have a pension by the time it's time to retire. So yeah, I hope it will happen. But as

I said, I think there's a hidden agenda somewhere that I'll just keep blocking it. You can bet on the future of futures. And, and that, that the price will be going down trying to kill the market basically, but no, you can't buy any spot Bitcoin or spot prices for an ETF. So I think that's a good idea. I don't know. Not very hopeful here, Thomas. It's

almost like they could buy insurance for their portfolios in case everything doesn't work out. And Bitcoin goes up. They'd always have that Bitcoin as a backup plan. We're running out of time. Dan, are you ready with a prediction or a story of the week? Go ahead. On the previous one, I just wanted to add that the only that they want to protect people from, they want

to protect their 401Ks from exposure to Bitcoin, whereas the people who want them in their 401Ks want protection against the dollar. So it's this city like combat. Because I certainly want that. I don't keep like, you know, you've got to have a certain amount of your pension in fear and money. Unless you want just sort of real high risk, but the fear of money is just

waning in like year by year. So, you know, you're losing money in that. So I'd rather be putting that in real money like Bitcoin. And my news or story or the week. No, I've got none. I need a very boring life nowadays, but it's very mysterious. I'm working on some really cool projects, but I can't say anything about them, which is really frustrating. So ultimately, I'm

a boring man who leads a boring life right now. And I have nothing interesting to say. I was in one of those ones. It's on LinkedIn. It's called a stealth startup. I still get emails. Work so excited by your work with stealth startup. Nothing can sell it. Do you have a prediction or a story of the week? I was going to say something boring, a theoretical

like intellectual property will not. I don't know. I'm going to say something boring, a theoretical like intellectual property will not be will not stop being enforced by the governments for the foreseeable future. But let me say this. I just came across this thing. Apparently, a couple of days ago, I saw it on someone's feed. It was a Bitcoin masterclass. Have you guys heard of this? By

Craig Wright and point in Bay in chain and coin base or whatever it is. And it was like this two days seminar in London with like a 15. 15 losers in a room and then like a YouTube channel that no one's watching. And it's like a bad audio and just incoherent graphs on a chalkboard. It's all complete bullshit. But I guess my prediction is that the

Calvin air in chain Craig Wright stuff. It's just going to keep going on for the foreseeable future. Apparently someone in this nook and crannies has enough money. They're going to need to keep pushing their former line. And so I guess I guess that and that was my point earlier with this thing about defining Bitcoin by the Bitcoin blockchain. People could say, well, there's more than one

right and there have been more than one. So I think that the I guess the the ship pointers are going to keep going on for quite some time. I guess that's my prediction. Excellent. Well, the government may continue to enforce copyright. We did get a little bit back this year with an early version of Mickey Mouse. Steamboat Willie joining the public domain. As well as the

arthin cone or Doyle Arthur cone and Doyle Sherlock home stories. At least the early ones. Martine Wishmare. Do you have a prediction or a story of the week? Go ahead. A story of the week. I'm one of our competitors. Genesis coin. They use Jan Megakios machines and they produce software to make it into Bitcoin ATM as many of them are sold. And they sold a company

to another operator called BitStop. So many of their clients are now being basically forced into a new software provider. Might not be ideal. There's lots of changes. It's like a big shift in the whole Bitcoin ATM industry. So, you know, if people are operating those Jan Megakios. And they don't feel happy with their current software provider being sold to their competitor. Then they can contact General

Bites and just install the GM kit which we've launched like a few months ago. And we've been getting really good reviews on it. So I'm I'm totally totally stoked to be honest couldn't come at a better time. So we will we're like the live boat for all the other ATM operators that that are now being forced to deal with basically a former company. So yeah, yeah,

very good. It's very good time in touch. Oh, yeah, it's like, yeah, I had a party a bit. You know, when I heard the news. Well, this is a great cipher punk idea that you could upgrade the software on other ATM machines to open your freedom of running the software that you want to run. It's very cool stuff. And General Bites. Well, thanks everybody for watching

us. Give us a thumbs up down below. Thanks to everybody in the live chat. Give us a comment. Subscribe. All those things. Until next time.