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  • Bitcoin Headed to a $300T Market Cap? Michael J. Saylor’s Demonstration Is More Than Solid

    Bitcoin Headed to a $300T Market Cap? Michael J. Saylor’s Demonstration Is More Than Solid

    Bitcoin will eat everything in its path in the future.

    Illustration by Sylvain Saurel

    The year 2021 started as incredible for Bitcoin as the year 2020 had ended. Bitcoin ended the year 2020 with a new All-Time High (ATH) for its price nearly every day. The beginning of the year 2021 saw Bitcoin do the same with a (temporary) ATH of $41,946 reached on January 8, 2021.

    I say temporary ATH here because the price of Bitcoin is expected to go much higher in the months and years to come. Regardless of the corrections that await Bitcoin price in the coming months, the price of Bitcoin still has the potential to rise so much that the current price will look extremely cheap in the future.

    On January 8, 2021, Bitcoin also broke its record in terms of market cap, reaching almost $780 billion. This is a colossal sum that is more than two and a half times greater than the maximum market cap reached by Bitcoin during the 2017 Bull Run.

    Seeing Bitcoin move closer to the $1 trillion market cap has brought up an old question that many people in the Bitcoin world are asking themselves.

    That question is this: How far can the Bitcoin market cap go in the future?

    Bitcoin will first surpass the gold market cap

    The first step for Bitcoin will be to replace gold as the favorite store of value for investors. Currently, the market cap for gold is around $10T. When Bitcoin reaches the current gold market cap, its price will be around $540K.

    I say when here, not if. This is a conscious choice I am making because I believe that by the end of this decade, Bitcoin will have surpassed gold in terms of market cap. It’s only a matter of time in my opinion before a majority of people will eventually embrace Gold 2.0.

    The world is changing as it digitizes. No sector will be able to resist this digitalization of the world. Gold will not escape the rule. As a version 2.0 of gold within the framework of its properties that make it an incredible store of value for the greatest number, Bitcoin can only surpass gold in terms of market cap.

    Once Bitcoin has seen its market cap exceed that of gold, how far can Bitcoin go?

    After overtaking gold, Bitcoin will not stop, that’s for sure

    Then it will be a big unknown to me. The day we get to that point, we will obviously have more clues to try to hypothesize how to answer this question. In the meantime, we can only do prospective.

    This is precisely what Michael J. Saylor, a wonderful ambassador for Bitcoin, just did in an interview on YouTube. In his interview, Michael J. Saylor believes that once Bitcoin has passed the gold market cap, it will continue its forward march to eat the market cap of other markets.

    The first interesting thing to take away from his interview is that he believes that many organizations and investors do not use gold to protect their money from crises like the ones we are currently experiencing:

    “It’s important to note there are a lot of organizations and a lot of investors that don’t use gold as their safe haven. They use government debt, sovereign debt, and so cash is a safe haven, and sovereign debt is a safe haven, and another safe haven people use as a store of value is the index funds. Bond index funds and stock index funds like the Russel 2,000 the S&P 500, the Dow index.”

    These organizations and investors use government debt, sovereign debt, or even index funds. From this observation, it is clear that the money used as a reserve of value exceeds the gold market cap.

    Money used by people to protect themselves in times of crisis far exceeds the gold market cap

    Michael J. Saylor “thinks there’s between $300 and $400 trillion worth of fiat instruments: cash, debt, stock, commercial real estate indices”. On this colossal mass of money, Michael J. Saylor estimates that “50% and 75% is simply seeking a store of value as a container”.

    The example given by Michael J. Saylor concerning index funds is relevant in my opinion:

    “Like when I buy the S&P 500 Index or the Vanguard fund, I’m not buying it because I equally love all 500 S&P stocks equally in proportion to their market caps… I bought the index because I had a million dollars and I knew if it was cash it would be debased in purchasing power and so I needed to put it into something which was going to return more than the economic hurdle rate, or the cost of capital.”

    For Michael J. Saylor, it makes sense to consider that all the money dedicated to being placed in a store of value ends up in Bitcoin. Indeed, Bitcoin is the best store of value for the greatest number of people on Earth. Buying Bitcoin simply requires a smartphone and an Internet connection.

    Bitcoin could therefore drain much more than $100T in theory:

    “In theory, all monetary energy that’s simply looking for a store of value safe haven index should presumably drain out of real estate, cash, stocks and bonds into the Bitcoin network and as that happens the price discovery will return to real estate and bonds…”

    If the top is not $100T, Michael J. Saylor estimates that it will rather be between $100T and $300T of today’s money:

    “The top is more than $100 trillion, it’s somewhere between $100 trillion and $300 trillion in today’s money.”

    Bitcoin price can legitimately target 14 million dollars in the future

    By reaching a market cap of $300T, Bitcoin would see its price reach $14 million. While this may sound crazy to some people today, Michael J. Saylor’s demonstration is extremely solid once you understand that Bitcoin is the best store of value that exists in the world.

    The best store of value in the world will necessarily ultimately attract all the money that is intended to be protected from the ravages of monetary inflation and censorship. It is therefore only a matter of time before the Bitcoin market cap reaches heights that many still imagine unreachable.

    Bitcoin is used to that anyway. In fact, when it was created, nobody would have imagined that Bitcoin would be so close to a market cap of 1,000 billion dollars. Bitcoin has always been an outsider, and it will continue to be so in the months and years to come.

    In the meantime, there is only one thing to do: you need to have the same confidence in Bitcoin as Michael J. Saylor, who has repeatedly admitted that MicroStrategy has been ready for HODL Bitcoin for over 100 years. So, the long-term vision in Bitcoin is the key to being among those who will benefit the most from it.

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  • Bitcoin’s Opponents Are the Symbol of the Losing Battle Between the Disrupted and the Disruptors

    Bitcoin’s Opponents Are the Symbol of the Losing Battle Between the Disrupted and the Disruptors
    Illustration by In Bitcoin We Trust

    Disruptors always win in the end.

    The economic crisis in which the world is currently immersed is completely reshuffling the cards. Everything that seemed impossible before seems to be possible now. In the last 10 weeks, we have seen the Fed cut interest rates to zero, before printing over 3 trillion U.S. dollar.

    The other central banks have done the same in slightly lower proportions. As for governments, they have continued to accumulate even more public debt to support their respective economies.

    The American public debt thus exceeded $25 trillion as a result of the various actions taken by the American government, which exceeded $3 trillion. A $1,200 stimulus check was sent to all eligible U.S. citizens.

    Everything that has already been done is clearly not enough given the extreme poverty of millions of people

    Some are even beginning to talk about the need to put in place some sort of universal basic income in the United States until the economy returns to its pre-crisis level of coronavirus.

    In the meantime, the price of U.S. crude oil has even been on the negative side at minus $38 when the May futures contract expired at the end of April 2020.

    Mindset about Bitcoin is starting to change

    In a world where everything seems to be turned upside down, you shouldn’t be surprised to see some of Bitcoin’s opponents starting to radically change their position towards the cryptocurrency king.

    We haven’t yet gotten to the point where Warren Buffett would have dubbed Bitcoin. Nevertheless, we are at the beginning of a journey of a thousand steps, to paraphrase Lao Tzu.

    It all started in early May 2020, when Paul Tudor Jones, a famous American hedge fund manager, announced in a letter to his investors that he would now prefer Bitcoin to gold to protect himself from the risks of the great monetary inflation that we are currently experiencing.

    This great monetary inflation is a direct consequence of the trillions of dollars currently being printed by the Fed and other central banks in order to save the current monetary and financial system no matter what the cost.

    Millions of poor people are bearing the brunt of this unreasonable spill of fiat money, as Jerome Powell confirmed in an interview for 60 Minutes :

    “The people who’re getting hurt the worst are the most recently hired, the lowest paid people. It’s women to an extraordinary extent. We’re actually releasing a report tomorrow that shows that, of the people who were working in February who were making less than $40,000 per year, almost 40% have lost their jobs in the last month or so. Extraordinary statistic. So that’s who’s really bearing the brunt of this.”
     — Jerome Powell

    Jerome Powell’s Interview Confirms That the Fiat System Is Flawed, Bitcoin Is the Solution

    The Fed knows full well that its unlimited quantitative easing program is hurting those who need help the most right now.

    Despite this, central banks continue to respond to all the ills of the economy in the same way: printing more and more money to support the economy of their respective countries.

    Donald Trump is even currently putting pressure on Jerome Powell to go further by switching to negative interest rates.

    The Fed is resisting for the time being, because such a decision would be far from being the “gift” that Donald Trump imagines.

    If the Fed set negative interest rates, it would ultimately benefit Bitcoin in my opinion. I think Jerome Powell and many others are aware of this. That’s why I think they won’t do it.

    With interest rates at zero since mid-March 2020, individual investors, but also institutionals investors, are looking for new investments that offer them more attractive returns.

    Pragmatism was in mind of Paul Tudor Jones when he opted for Bitcoin. Gold remains an excellent store of value, but Bitcoin’s potential in this area is objectively superior.

    Furthermore, Paul Tudor Jones points out that Bitcoin is clearly undervalued at the moment with a price below $10,000.

    JPMorgan follows in the footsteps of Paul Tudor Jones

    Many macro investors are expected to follow in the coming months and years. Earlier this week, JPMorgan has even just started to put a foot in the Bitcoin world.

    The bank headed by Jamie Dimon has announced that it is extending its banking services to Bitcoin using the Gemini and Coinbase trading platforms.

    It seems a long time ago that Jamie Dimon was extremely aggressive towards Bitcoin. However, that was less than three years ago in September 2017. Jamie Dimon said then:

    “Bitcoin is a fraud. I would fire in a second anyone at JPMorgan found to be trading in Bitcoin. It’s not a real thing, eventually Bitcoin will be closed.”
     — Jamie Dimon

    It would appear that Jamie Dimon has come a long way since those statements made at the Delivering Alpha conference.

    Goldman Sachs, another banking heavyweight in the United States, is offering a conference call on May 27, 2020 to allow its clients to get a clearer picture of the current economic situation. This is nothing new. What is new, however, is that Bitcoin appears roughly in the title of this conference:

    Goldman Sachs begins to show a strong interest in Bitcoin

    You know as well as I do that famous quote:

    “Only fools and dead men don’t change their minds. Fools won’t and dead men can’t.”
     — John H. Patterson

    So it seems that JPMorgan would rather change their mind about Bitcoin than stay on the side of the fools. It’s the same with Goldman Sachs. And many more will follow in the future.

    Everything that’s happening right now is extremely positive for the adoption of Bitcoin in the months and years to come. Things are slowly getting in place and then we will see a lot of institutional investors coming in.

    Many are finally beginning to understand that Bitcoin is here to stay. It’s never too late to do well, as they say.

    The Bitcoin revolution will happen whether you support it or not.

    If you choose to waste your time opposing Bitcoin, you will be among the big losers of the Bitcoin revolution. It’s always the same in life. Those who embrace a major technological revolution before others do have an incredible advantage.

    For Bitcoin, it’s exactly the same thing.

    Fierce opposition to a major disruption like Bitcoin is déjà vu

    Thinking about it, I think it is possible to draw a parallel between Bitcoin and many other major technological disruptions in recent decades.

    When television was really able to develop after the Second World War, all the major radio station executives were unanimous. For them, television was a bad idea.

    Some even went so far as to say that television would have no success, and that radio would remain dominant.

    Today, we can see what the situation is like. Television plays a dominant role in the lives of billions of people on Earth. Nevertheless, radio has not disappeared. Its uses have evolved, and the most resistant have been forced to undergo the television revolution.

    When the mainstream Internet began to become widespread in the late 1990s, many newspaper bosses took to the streets, saying that the Internet would not be successful.

    They said that newspapers could never be replaced.

    When I was looking for old newspaper articles from the mid-1990s, I found an article in Newsweek with a rather tasty headline when you read it in 2020:

    The Internet? Bah!
    Hype alert: Why cyberspace isn’t, and will never be, nirvana

    Newsweek article “The Internet? Bah!”

    If it is true that it was rather difficult to quickly find what you wanted on the Web at the time, the arrival of Google has changed the situation and made the Web extraordinarily practical.

    From now on, when someone has a question about any subject, his reflex is always the same: he turns on his computer, or goes to his smartphone, and does a Google search.

    Newspapers haven’t disappeared, but they have had to evolve. The ones that took the longest to evolve are the ones that finally had the hardest time surviving. Most newspapers have now a digital-first strategy.

    You don’t stop a major technological disruption just because you feel threatened. The revolution will happen with or without you.

    The evolution of the species that have inhabited the Earth for millennia has taught us at least one essential truth:

    Evolve or Be Extinct

    The examples obviously do not stop there. I could have cited taxi drivers who resisted the arrival of Uber, hotel owners threatened by the incredible rise of Airbnb, or Spotify against which all record labels have been fighting for years.

    The situation for Bitcoin is exactly the same.

    Bitcoin is a perfect symbol of the losing battle between disrupted and disruptors

    Bitcoin is a major technological disruption that threatens the absolute power of the central bankers, banks, and rulers over money to give it back to the people.

    All the people who benefit from the current monetary and financial system therefore naturally feel threatened by Bitcoin. The total paradigm shift Bitcoin represents scares them.

    Bitcoin represents the first step in separating money from the state. People at the head of the current system obviously don’t want to see that happen.

    Unfortunately for them, and fortunately for the inhabitants of Earth, history shows that disruptions always end up overtaking disrupted. The latter have no choice but to evolve sooner or later.

    The opponents of Bitcoin, represented perfectly by Warren Buffett, are the perfect symbol of this losing battle between the disrupted and the disruptors.

    In the end, Bitcoin will triumph. This is consistent with history.

    The monetary and financial system will not disappear, but it will have to evolve as all the other disrupted I have just mentioned had to do.

    In the future, it is very likely that Bitcoin will co-exist with the fiat system, as well as being the protocol for money on the Internet. An alternative allowing citizens around the world to have the choice to switch to a more protective and respectful system.

    The fiat system will have to adapt, regardless of the personal feelings of central bankers and governments towards Bitcoin.

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  • Ladies, Gentlemen, Welcome to Bitcoin Club — Here Are the Rules

    Ladies, Gentlemen, Welcome to Bitcoin Club — Here Are the Rules

    Bitcoin from the Fight Club perspective.

    Illustration by In Bitcoin We Trust

    Released in 1999 in cinemas, the film Fight Club marked a whole generation. During the course of the film, the two main characters played by Edward Norton and Brad Pitt create a Fight Club that should allow men to regain their true place in society by allowing them to express their virility which has been scorned for years.

    At the launch of the club, Tyler Durden, played by Brad Pitt, reveals to the other participants the 8 rules of the Fight Club.

    Being a big fan of this film, I had fun drawing a parallel between it and Bitcoin by defining the essential rules of what constitutes the Bitcoin Club.

    Less macho than Fight Club, Bitcoin Club is as open to women as it is to men since the real opponent is the current monetary and financial system we all live under. That is why the first sentence to the newcomers will be :

    Ladies, Gentlemen, Welcome to Bitcoin Club. Here are the rules.

    Rule #1: You Do Not Reveal What You Own in Bitcoin

    Some people love to tell everyone how much money they make. They even go so far as to reveal all the details of what they have in their bank account.

    People who flaunt their wealth in front of everyone justify themselves by saying that they have nothing to hide because they earn that money by working hard.

    There is nothing wrong with being proud of what one earns. However, this is clearly not the mentality you need to have if you want to be a member of the Bitcoin Club.

    To be a member of the Bitcoin Club, you need to embrace its first essential rule, and apply it no matter what:

    You must never reveal what you own in Bitcoin to anyone.

    Being a true Bitcoiner requires humility in order to be willing to learn more and more about Bitcoin, and money in general.

    The humility you develop will cause you to be discreet about what you own in Bitcoin.

    Rule #2: You Do Not Reveal What You Own in Bitcoin

    By joining the Bitcoin Club, some take the first rule lightly. They get tricked into answering questions about how many Bitcoins they own. This is an unforgivable mistake for any Bitcoin Club member.

    Never revealing to anyone what you own in Bitcoin is also a matter of security.

    From the moment you reveal what you own in Bitcoin, you can jeopardize your own security.

    Bitcoin price is set to rise sharply in the years to come. So it will be tempting for ill-intentioned people trying to steal your Bitcoins.

    It would be a shame if you were to miss out on the Bitcoin revolution in the future for breaking these first two Bitcoin Club rules.

    In the future, if someone asks you what you own in Bitcoin, you will only have to answer that you are forbidden to say. This is part of the Bitcoin Club rules.

    In fact, that is my answer to those who frequently ask me this question when I publish stories online. They take it as a joke and ask me again, but my answer is always the same: I never break these two golden rules of the Bitcoin Club.

    I would advise you to do the same.

    Rule #3: Someone Yells “Dump”, Stay Cool, Then Say “I HODL”

    Bitcoin is relatively young, with only eleven years of existence behind it. Its price is therefore naturally very volatile. It is very common for Bitcoin price to rise or fall by almost 10% in the space of 24 hours.

    So you should never panic then letting your emotions take precedence over your behavior with Bitcoin.

    When Bitcoin price drops, everyone will start screaming “Dump” on social networks. A FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) feeling can quickly develop. It will push some people to sell their Bitcoin without even realizing that there is nothing rational about this decision.

    You should be aware that Bitcoin price varies greatly over short periods of time. In order to avoid these variations, you need to think long term with Bitcoin.

    Bitcoin is here to stay. Its revolution will take time, and it is more interesting to rely on its fundamentals which are excellent rather than frantically looking at its price every 5 minutes.

    Whenever the market gets excited and Bitcoin price drops sharply, the best thing to do is to keep a cool head.

    Then, all you have to do is say to people who are panicking: “I HODL Bitcoin”.

    You should even see these drops in Bitcoin price as an opportunity to buy new Bitcoins that you will HODL for the long run.

    Rule #4: Just Bitcoin in Your Portfolio

    Joining the Bitcoin Club requires sacrifice. In order to be admitted to this demanding club that wants to accompany the Bitcoin revolution in the best possible way, you will need to have only Bitcoin in your cryptocurrencies portfolio

    99 percent of all cryptocurrencies will tend towards zero in the future.

    Bitcoin is clearly a hegemonic king, and the cryptocurrency that has the most potential for the future. By focusing on Bitcoin alone, you will take fewer risks.

    Many Bitcoin Club members even go so far as to say that other cryptocurrencies are just Sh*t coins. These members are the Bitcoin Maximalists.

    I confess that I have already broken this rule by owning other cryptocurrencies, especially Ethereum.

    BAT tokens are also often paid to me by people thanking me for the content I publish online. I believe in the Basic Attention Token innovative model, and especially in its Brave Browser which is an excellent alternative to Chrome.

    The goal here is always to preserve my online privacy as much as possible by reducing my digital footprint.

    Nevertheless, being a member of the Bitcoin Club requires sacrifices as I said before. To remain a full member, you have to make choices.

    I’m willing to do these sacrifices because I strongly believe in the Bitcoin revolution.

    Rule #5: One Buy After Another

    I meet with some people who tell me they are interested in buying Bitcoin but find that buying a whole Bitcoin is too high for their investment budget. My answer is simple:

    Bitcoin is divisible up to 8 decimal places. You must take advantage of this.

    The current goal is to get 1 BTC in full.

    However, if you can’t afford it, you have no reason to give up Bitcoin. Quite the contrary!

    Many people choose to buy Bitcoin on a regular basis in order to smooth out their costs.

    This is a great strategy, and you can follow it by starting to buy just $100 in Bitcoin. Then, little by little, you will increase what you own in Bitcoin as you continue to buy.

    With Bitcoin, another essential rule is to be consistent by focusing each time only on your next buy.

    By moving forward one buy after another, you will accumulate more and more Bitcoins, which you will take care to keep safe, allowing you to show your faith in Bitcoin by declaring to its opponents: “I HODL Bitcoin”.

    Rule #6: Not Your Keys, Not Your Bitcoins

    People who join the Bitcoin Club are delighted to regain control over what they own by buying Bitcoins. However, they should keep in mind that they only own their Bitcoins as long as they are in possession of the associated private keys.

    So rule number 6 of the Bitcoin Club is easy to remember:

    “Not Your Keys, Not Your Bitcoins”

    In the traditional banking system, the bank guarantees the amount you have in fiat money in your account. Your bank is responsible for what you have in fiat money.

    If your bank gets hacked and loses millions of dollars, you will get your funds back because the bank is insured against this type of risk.

    With Bitcoin, things are totally different from traditional banking system.

    First of all, you need to understand that the expression “own Bitcoins” is a shortcut. No one actually owns Bitcoins.

    In reality, you own the cryptographic keys to part of the Bitcoin Blockchain. This subtlety is essential to understand what is to come.

    If you buy Bitcoins via a trading platform, and then leave your Bitcoins on that trading platform, then the trading platform will have the private keys to your Bitcoins.

    The trading platform will then own your Bitcoins.

    You will have the same risk of censorship as with the current monetary and financial system.

    To really take care of your Bitcoins, you must transfer them immediately to a hardware wallet where you will be able to control the private keys of your Bitcoins.

    Therefore, rule number 6 was created primarily to protect the wealth of Bitcoin Club members.

    Rule #7: You Will Continue to Buy Bitcoin As Long as You Have To

    Like all great disruptive technological revolutions, Bitcoin will take time to fully take hold and achieve its goals. Great successes don’t happen overnight.

    You must accompany the progression of Bitcoin like a missionary.

    To do so, you must be convinced that Bitcoin will triumph. You must have an unshakeable faith in Bitcoin, and the revolution Bitcoin is building day after day.

    If you have true confidence in Bitcoin, you will be able to support it by continuing to buy Bitcoin on a regular basis for as long as it is needed.

    Then you will need to HODL Bitcoin for the long term.

    This “Buy Bitcoin, Then HODL” strategy will not only support Bitcoin by making it even scarcer, but also by supporting its price, which will attract new entrants to discover this totally revolutionary system.

    Rule #8: If This Is Your First Time at Bitcoin Club, You Have to Buy Bitcoins

    Within the Bitcoin Club, there is no place for people who say they are interested in Bitcoin, but that don’t make the effort to buy some Bitcoins. If you come to the Bitcoin Club for the first time, you have to buy some Bitcoins.

    Don’t be one of those people who are going to have regrets 10 years from now saying: “And if I had bought Bitcoin 10 years ago, my life would be different.”

    The best way to change your future life is to take action now.

    If after discovering Bitcoin, you’re convinced by its fundamentals and the paradigm shift it brings, you should buy some Bitcoins. This will allow you to put into practice what you have discovered.

    This first buy of Bitcoins can even be small: $10 or $100 for example.

    The important thing is to get into the Bitcoin system, so that you are familiar with how Bitcoin works. Little by little, you will be able to increase what you own in Bitcoin.

    In any case, you should take care to buy Bitcoins only with money you can afford to lose. The goal is to support the Bitcoin revolution in a sustainable way, not to put you in a dangerous financial situation.

    Conclusion

    Within the Bitcoin Club, the opponent is the current monetary and financial system that has taken control of what the people own. In fact, unlike the Fight Club, the Bitcoin Club welcomes men and women.

    Apart from this exception, the rules of Bitcoin Club are similar to those of Fight Club in the sense that to be a member you must have complete faith in Bitcoin, and not let a golden opportunity to change your future life pass you by.

    The Bitcoin Club pushes you to take action in order to accompany Bitcoin. Your main objective is to be among the first beneficiaries of the fairer and freer future world for all that Bitcoin is building.

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  • Is a Bull Run Possible for the Price of Bitcoin in 2023? Some Food for Thought.

    Is a Bull Run Possible for the Price of Bitcoin in 2023? Some Food for Thought.

    Fans of technical analysis will not have missed that a Golden Cross is approaching for the price of Bitcoin …

    Illustration by Sylvain Saurel

    The year 2022 is coming to an end. As we enter the final week of the year, we don’t have to look back very far to remember that 2022 will have been more than a rough year for Bitcoin.

    The price of Bitcoin will have been swept away by the Bear Market that hit the cryptocurrency market, while scandals have been rampant throughout the year. The silver lining, if one were to take away, is that more and more people are beginning to make a key distinction:

    Bitcoin != Cryptocurrency.

    Bitcoin is a species apart. Bitcoin provides incredible guarantees, and the only limit to Bitcoin’s soaring price is that more people will come to understand it. Of course, after a record-breaking 2021, many people were talking about a supercycle, thinking that the price of Bitcoin would no longer experience a big correction as it has in the past.

    “The 10 Incredible Guarantees Bitcoin Protocol Gives You.“

    Read the end of the article in In Bitcoin We Trust Newsletter:

    “Is a Bull Run Possible for the Price of Bitcoin in 2023? Some Food for Thought. Fans of technical analysis will not have missed that a Golden Cross is approaching for the price of Bitcoin …“

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  • Michael Burry Explains (Indirectly) Why You Need to Get Your Cryptocurrencies off the Exchange…

    Michael Burry Explains (Indirectly) Why You Need to Get Your Cryptocurrencies off the Exchange…

    Auditors don’t know how to audit exchange platforms and give you the guarantees you deserve. It is up to you to take control.

    Image: Shutterstock

    Do you know Michael Burry?

    I’m sure you do if you are interested in the world of investment. If you are a fan of good books or movies, you probably discovered his story in “The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine,” a best-seller by Michael Lewis that was later adapted into a successful Hollywood movie.

    In this case, when I say Michael Burry, you must think directly of the face of Christian Bale who played his role in the movie “The Big Short.”

    Michael Burry is a well-known investor and hedge fund manager. He became known for his role in the run-up to the subprime crisis.

    Since then, Michael Burry’s opinions are still very much listened to and followed. He is not right every time, but the fact that he saw the subprime crisis coming seems to give him credit “ad vitam aeternam” for many investors.

    Indeed, Michael Burry was the first investor to foresee and profit from the 2008 crisis. It was the subprime mortgage crisis in the United States. Which occurred between 2007 and 2010.

    Typically, Michael Burry posts tweets to give his opinion on current topics in the world of investing, finance, and even cryptocurrencies from time to time. Once his tweet has generated enough buzz, after a few hours, Michael Burry has a habit of deleting it.

    Fortunately, a Twitter account called @BurryArchive takes care of archiving every single one of his tweets, so we can fully enjoy his opinions.

    Michael Burry’s latest opinion concerns audits of cryptocurrency exchange platforms such as Binance and FTX. Michael Burry bluntly explains that audits regarding these platforms are “meaningless.”

    For once, Michael Burry hasn’t written it off yet:

    “In 2005 when I started using a new kind of credit default swap, our auditors were learning on the job. That’s not a good thing. Same goes for FTX, Binance, etc. The audit is essentially meaningless.”

    https://twitter.com/michaeljburry/status/1603786372996665344

    The tweet comes after accounting firm Mazars Group halted its audit of Binance’s proof of reserves and other trading platforms. Burry’s tweet refers to a Bloomberg article:

    This Bloomberg article explains that the accounting firm Mazars Group has suspended its work on cryptocurrency companies. The reason stems from concerns over intense media scrutiny and indications that markets have not been reassured by the proof of reserves reports released so far, including for Binance, Crypto.com, and Kucoin.

    This news follows criticism from the founder of rival exchange platform Kraken, Jesse Powell. Indeed, Jesse Powell recently denounced the proof of reserves of Binance audited by Mazars. Last week, more than $3 billion of funds were withdrawn from Binance.

    Changpeng Zhao, the CEO of Binance, was asked why Binance does not use one of the Big Four accounting firms. These firms include the big four, Deloitte, EY, KPMG, and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC). This would be useful in terms of auditing. Therefore, some consider that the cryptocurrency company was not in a position to provide files and data for the auditors to give their approval.

    CZ’s response confirms what Michael Burry said in his tweet: he considers that most accounting firms do not know how to audit cryptocurrency trading platforms.

    So, this mismatch between these new tools that are cryptocurrency trading platforms and what audit firms currently master makes all audits meaningless to use Michael Burry’s terms. It will be some time before these auditing firms can increase their skills in these new subjects and produce audits that are truly satisfactory and reassuring for users.

    In the meantime, there’s only one thing to do: get your coins out of the trading platforms. There is no safer way to keep the fruits of your labor than to have the private keys of your coins in your possession. You are the person you can trust the most. That’s what the slogan “Not your Keys, Not your Bitcoin” is all about.

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  • Bitcoin Is Not A Get Rich Quick Scheme, Its Purpose Is Much Greater

    Bitcoin Is Not A Get Rich Quick Scheme, Its Purpose Is Much Greater
    Illustration by In Bitcoin We Trust

    Bitcoin is a solution for a better world in the future.

    Bitcoin has become a very popular subject. This is an undeniable fact. So, everyone has an opinion on Bitcoin now. Whether positive or negative, everyone has an opinion and many debates are now taking place on Bitcoin. This is an excellent thing because it contributes to the questioning of the current system and the democratization of Bitcoin.

    This ever-increasing popularization of Bitcoin allows the reference cryptocurrency to see an ever-increasing number of new investors enter its market. This is a good thing in a way, but the main problem is the reasons why some people buy Bitcoins.

    For many, Bitcoin represents nothing more than a get rich quick scheme. The revolutionary side of Bitcoin and everything it can bring to the world in the future is totally beyond them. This mindset can be problematic because very quickly, seeing that they do not get the huge profits expected, they will become fierce opponents of Bitcoin before leaving the market totally depressed.

    I therefore think it is fundamental to restore a fundamental truth about Bitcoin, and that is precisely what I will try to do through this article.

    The World Has Never Been So Unequal

    Globalization was intended to make the world more egalitarian. That’s what his ardent supporters promised at all times. Unfortunately, the situation of the world in terms of inequality has continued to deteriorate since the end of the Second World War.

    The world’s inequalities in income, health, living conditions and education have never been greater.

    Consensus on the state of the world is never easy to achieve. Nevertheless, with regard to the inequalities of the world in which we live, everyone agrees on extraordinary growth over the past fifty years.

    The graph below highlights global inequalities in living conditions:

    People in developed countries are living much longer in better conditions and earning much more money.

    A resident of Sierra Leone has a life expectancy of 52 years while a resident of Japan has a life expectancy of 84 years. In terms of income, the difference is even more striking. Thus, a resident of Qatar earns 172 times more money per year than a resident of the Central African Republic.

    Each year, the wealthy become richer while the number of very poor increases.

    The current system benefits only a minority of people around the world. These people who lead the world have a vested interest in the continuation of the current monetary and financial system. However, the world will not be a better place for the greatest number of people if a new, more equitable system does not emerge.

    It All Began In Bretton Woods In 1944

    At the end of the Second World War, the Bretton Woods Agreement defined a new monetary and financial system that put the U.S. dollar at the centre of the game. In 1944, a gold exchange standard system was set up:

    With Bretton Woods System, the value of the US dollar is directly indexed to gold while other currencies are indexed to the dollar.

    The reserves of the central banks of each country in the world must therefore be made up of currencies instead of gold. The U.S. government guarantees the value of the dollar, but is not required to have a gold counterpart to the dollars issued.

    This system guarantees that the United States will be the pillar of the new global economic architecture and will establish its domination over the world at the end of the Second World War.

    The most surprising thing is that no controls have been put in place by the Bretton Woods Agreement on the amount of U.S. dollars issued. The United States has the option of not meeting its external account commitments.

    Richard Nixon Ends Dollar-To-Gold Convertibility In 1971

    The considerable expenses that the U.S. had to incur to cope with the Vietnam War and the race for space caused an inflation of the U.S. dollar throughout the 1960s.

    The countries that export the most to the United States accumulate huge reserves in dollars, giving rise to as many issues in their own currency afterwards. All this fuels an increasingly worrying inflation.

    The system reached $46 billion in 1970. Highly sensitive to inflation, the Federal Republic of Germany decided in 1971 to no longer follow the provisions of the Bretton Woods Agreement.

    Requests for refunds of excess gold dollars are beginning to flow. The United States does not want to see its gold stock disappear.

    Under these conditions, Richard Nixon decided to suspend the convertibility of the U.S. dollar into gold on August 15, 1971.

    The fixed exchange rate system collapsed definitively in March 1973 with the adoption of the floating exchange rate system, which was established according to market forces. The end of the legal role of gold at the international level was definitively agreed on 8 January 1976 following the Jamaica Accords.

    Since then, there is no longer an organized international monetary system.

    The Predominance Of The U.S. dollar Is Problematic

    The absence of an organized international monetary system does not prevent the predominance of the U.S. dollar, which most countries had made huge reserves under the Bretton Woods System.

    This predominance of the U.S. dollar only increased in the following decades.

    The United States is taking advantage of this predominance of the U.S. dollar to impose its will on the rest of the world. They are the world’s policemen and can decide to impose economic embargoes on any country arbitrarily.

    The United States may decide to prevent any company in the world from trading in U.S. dollars with another company.

    If the company, regardless of its size, were to fail to comply with the United States’ wishes, the sanctions it would face could simply lead to its loss.

    A Tool For Oppressing Peoples

    The current monetary system is simply a tool for oppressing people. Venezuela is a perfect example of this situation with a people suffering in the face of a totalitarian regime that continues to devalue its national currency.

    The Venezuelan people suffer from the regime of their dictator but also from U.S. economic sanctions.

    There is no shortage of examples from around the world either. The disadvantaged populations of these countries have no choice but to suffer. Indeed, the current monetary and financial system simply does not offer them any prospect for the future.

    The Current Monetary System Is Deficient

    People all over the world are increasingly protesting against the current monetary and financial system. It is a reality. At the heart of their criticism is everything I have just told you, in particular the fact that this system only benefits a minority.

    The current monetary and financial system continues to increase global inequalities on a daily basis.

    One country alone cannot decide the fate of other countries in the world, no matter how powerful it may be. Unfortunately, the U.S. has been doing so for decades.

    When a president like Donald Trump becomes the head of the world’s leading economic power, we can see the damage that can be done. Financial oppression is increasing and Donald Trump is continually threatening all countries in the world with financial sanctions.

    Donald Trump can afford his arrogant and threatening attitude because of the predominance of the U.S. dollar.

    The world cannot continue like this. A better solution must emerge. For a better solution to emerge, it must simply come from the people themselves.

    Bitcoin Is Building A Better Financial System

    Politicians have shown their inability, or lack of will, to reform this failing monetary and financial system. A more equitable solution can only emerge from the people.

    Bitcoin was created by Satoshi Nakamoto following the economic and financial crisis of 2008 to be made available to all.

    The people must seize the Bitcoin opportunity to make it the financial system of tomorrow that will reduce global inequalities.

    A maximum of 21 million Bitcoins may be put into circulation. This limit has been defined to ensure that 1 BTC will always be equal to 1 BTC. What you have in Bitcoin can never be devalued.

    This is essential in today’s world where central bankers are constantly creating more fiat currencies. This devalues what you have in fiat currency.

    Bitcoin Is A Neutral Currency For A Better World

    Bitcoin is no leader and neutral currency. No one can stop you from trading in Bitcoins. Your Bitcoins really belong to you and you can enjoy them as you wish.

    Banks may prevent you from using your fiat currency at any time.

    The money you own in the bank is yours unless your banker decides otherwise. Unfortunately, he has the power to do so.

    With Bitcoin, oppressed peoples in countries like Venezuela will be able to continue to live properly and avoid being collateral victims of the financial oppression set up by the United States or the dictators at the head of their country.

    Bitcoin is therefore absolutely not a get rich quick scheme. Sorry to disappoint greedy people who choose to buy them.

    Bitcoin is a revolution that can make a big difference for the good of the whole world by installing a new neutral and non-political financial and monetary system.

    Bitcoin is an opportunity to be seized and it will be what we decide to do with it. It is up to all of us to seize this unique opportunity and participate in the process of making the world less poor, slowly but surely.

    ,
    ,

  • Bitcoin Is Still the King and It Will Remain so for 3 Reasons

    Bitcoin Is Still the King and It Will Remain so for 3 Reasons
    Illustration by In Bitcoin We Trust

    Its competitors are light years away from Bitcoin.

    Bitcoin is still the king in the cryptocurrency industry. In fact, I’d say Bitcoin is a hegemonic leader. Whatever your opinion on Bitcoin, you will at least agree that Bitcoin’s dominance of this industry cannot be challenged.

    Behind the advent of Bitcoin, a true cryptocurrency industry was born. Within this industry, every cryptocurrency project dreams of only one thing: to take the place of the king and to become the new king.

    Ethereum, Ripple, Bitcoin Cash or Litecoin are cryptocurrencies fighting every day to one day surpass Bitcoin. It is a logical and honorable ambition. Indeed, one always seeks to surpass the best in one’s field.

    Unfortunately for these cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin will remain the king in the cryptocurrency industry for a very long time to come. I see three main reasons for this.

    1. Bitcoin Has Been Able To Leverage Its First-Mover Advantage

    Officially launched on January 3, 2009, by Satoshi Nakamoto, Bitcoin is the first successful implementation of a cryptocurrency based on the Blockchain concept.

    Bitcoin takes full advantage of the first-mover advantage.

    Bitcoin is a true revolution that has given birth to a whole industry in its own right: that of cryptocurrencies.

    By being the first in this segment that it has created itself, Bitcoin necessarily has a significant advantage over its competitors. Over the past 11 years, this advantage has never diminished.

    On the contrary, Bitcoin has continued to widen the gap over its competitors and more and more users are coming on board.

    The success of Bitcoin for more than 11 years reinforces users’ confidence in the security of Bitcoin and its future.

    Due to its ever-increasing number of users compared to the number of users of other cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin also benefits from the so-called network effect. This effect is also known as Metcalfe’s Law.

    This theoretical and empirical law was enunciated by Robert Metcalfe. It stipulates that the utility of a network is proportional to the square of the number of its users.

    This law would apply under the assumption of homogeneity of the nodes of the network, which may consist of agents or objects.

    In concrete terms, the more Bitcoin users there are, the more useful the Bitcoin network becomes squared.

    As this network utility increases, new users will have a greater interest in using Bitcoin when they enter the world of cryptocurrencies.

    It is a virtuous circle that benefits Bitcoin to the full.

    When the general public thinks of Blockchain or cryptocurrencies, they immediately think of Bitcoin.

    When a person wants to get into cryptocurrency world, he will necessarily exchange his fiat currency into Bitcoin.

    As a result, Bitcoin is constantly seeing much more new money coming in than its competitors, which only reinforces its dominance in the market, which has risen to over 65% in 2019.

    With Bitcoin’s third Halving scheduled for May 2020, it is highly likely that Bitcoin’s market dominance will even return to well above 70%.

    Bitcoin has been able to leverage its first-mover advantage over the past decade. Now, the lead that this has given Bitcoin seems almost unattainable for its competitors.

    2. Bitcoin Is Truly Decentralized With No Leader

    Among the most capitalized cryptocurrencies on the market, Bitcoin is the only one that is truly decentralized with no leader. Bitcoin has a permissionless and trustless blockchain.

    Bitcoin belongs to everyone and anyone can decide to become a node on its network.

    This unique feature of Bitcoin makes it much more resistant to censorship than its competitors.

    Governments in different countries cannot take anyone to court to try to block the rise of Bitcoin.

    Bitcoin gives power back to its users and by extension to the people.

    No one can stop you from making transactions on the Bitcoin Blockchain.

    Your Bitcoins are entirely yours and you can use them as you want.

    This lack of leadership forces the community to find consensus to move forward and make Bitcoin evolve.

    Some people find that this slows down the evolution of Bitcoin, but I sincerely believe that this is the price to pay for a truly democratic system.

    This protects Bitcoin from arbitrary decisions that would go against the interests of its users.

    As such, Bitcoin makes a huge difference with the current monetary and financial system but also with its competitors in the cryptocurrency world.

    3. Innovation Around Bitcoin Is Permanent

    Bitcoin’s competitors in the cryptocurrency world criticize Bitcoin’s aging technology for being obsolete. Bitcoin is based on Proof-of-Work which leads to high consumption of electricity according to them.

    The electricity consumption required to produce new Bitcoins is what makes Bitcoin so valuable.

    Some also argue that Bitcoin does not support enough transactions per second.

    These people need to understand that Bitcoin is the only cryptocurrency to really face such scalability issues due to the very large number of users on its Blockchain.

    Cryptocurrencies that claim to be able to handle from 100K to 1 million transactions per second only promise but are not based on anything concrete.

    They have never, and will never be able to test their allegedly superior technologies under real-world conditions.

    Others believe that Bitcoin should include functionality to support smart contracts like Ethereum.

    The truth is that Bitcoin Core software should be kept as lightweight as possible.

    The strong community around Bitcoin and the growing number of companies building services based on the Bitcoin Blockchain enables continuous Bitcoin innovation.

    A company will necessarily offer smart contracts as an additional layer on top of Bitcoin if the need becomes real in the future.

    If cryptocurrencies offer features that Bitcoin does not support but are particularly useful, companies will offer this around Bitcoin as well.

    The very large number of people involved in Bitcoin will allow it to stay ahead of other cryptocurrencies via its ecosystem and not mandatory through Bitcoin Core.

    A good example to consider is the Lightning Network, whose generalization over the Bitcoin Blockchain should exponentially increase its scalability.

    The Lightning Network will be proposed as an additional layer to Bitcoin.

    When you think about Bitcoin, you need to think about its entire ecosystem, not just its Blockchain.

    Bitcoin alone is already the king in the cryptocurrency industry. Add to that the complete ecosystem that has developed around it over the past 11 years and Bitcoin has an even stronger advantage over its competitors.

    Conclusion

    Bitcoin has been responsible for the creation of an industry in its own right: that of cryptocurrencies. As a first-mover in this brand new industry, Bitcoin benefited from the first-mover advantage.

    This first-mover advantage allowed Bitcoin to grow with a considerable lead over its competitors. In the 11 years of its existence, the Bitcoin community has capitalized on this advantage and has continued to build on it.

    As we enter a new decade, Bitcoin’s advantage over its competitors has never seemed more important. Bitcoin is still the king and will remain so for many years to come in my opinion.

  • The Race to Own 1 Full Bitcoin Has Begun

    The Race to Own 1 Full Bitcoin Has Begun
    Illustration by In Bitcoin We Trust

    And time is running out.

    The year 2020 is a special year for Bitcoin as in May the third Halving in the history of Bitcoin will take place. A very strong bull market is expected following this event based on what happened in 2012 and 2016 during the two previous Bitcoin Halvings.

    Bitcoin started the year 2020 with a price of $7,200 and had a pretty exceptional January in which its price gained 30%. At the end of the month, its price was $9,300.

    The approach of the Halving but also some unexpected world events, such as the imminent risk of a war between the United States and Iran or the coronavirus crisis, justify this historic January 2020 for Bitcoin.

    For many, Bitcoin has now entered a bullish phase and as soon as the price of Bitcoin rises above $10K again, nothing will be able to stop the increase in its price.

    Given the scarcity of Bitcoin, more and more people are finally starting to realize that owning 1 whole Bitcoin could make them extremely rich in the future.

    The race to own 1 Bitcoin is now on and time is running out if you want to get there before it’s too late.

    Only 21 Million Bitcoin for All the World’s Inhabitants

    Satoshi Nakamoto designed Bitcoin to be comparable to a commodity such as gold. Bitcoin therefore exists in finite quantities, since it is limited to 21 million units.

    The production of new Bitcoins slows down over time as a result of automatic events called Halving.

    Currently, 12.5 BTC are newly created and offered as a reward to miners validating a transactions’ block in the Bitcoin Blockchain.

    After the Halving of May 2020, the reward will decrease to 6.25 BTC.

    The Halving process is written into the Bitcoin source code and by 2140 all Bitcoins will have been mined.

    When all Bitcoins have been mined, we will have 21 million Bitcoins available for all the people on Earth.

    In fact, there may be even less, since it is estimated that nearly 3 million Bitcoins have already been lost permanently.

    This would only make Bitcoin even scarcer and more important to own at least one.

    The latest estimates published by the United Nations indicate that the Earth’s population is expected to reach 9.8 billion in 2050 and 11.2 billion in 2100.

    Estimates do not extend to 2140, but the world population could be even larger by then.

    Taking the United Nations estimates of 2100 as a reference, this would give us a maximum of 21 million Bitcoins for 11.2 billion people.

    There will be a maximum of 1 Bitcoin for 533 people.

    Assuming that there is an equitable distribution of Bitcoin for each inhabitant of the Earth, each inhabitant could own a maximum of 0.001875 BTC.

    Bitcoin is already establishing itself as a reserve of global value.

    Phase 2 of its adoption has begun with merchant support for transactions that is expected to develop in the coming years.

    If Bitcoin reaches phase 3 of its mass adoption by becoming a unit of account, we would be at the beginning of the hyperbitcoinization of the world that many Bitcoiners fantasize about.

    People owning 1 Bitcoin in its entirety would therefore have a significant advantage over the majority of the world’s other inhabitants.

    Less Than 1 Million People Own at Least 1 Bitcoin

    Owning 1 full copy of something that is likely to become as in demand as Bitcoin in the future is something you can’t pass up.

    I don’t know if Bitcoin will succeed or not in its revolution. Nevertheless, I don’t want to take the risk of missing out on this revolution if Bitcoin succeeds.

    If you are sensible people, I imagine that you don’t want to miss such an opportunity for your future either.

    As the month of February 2020 begins, I find it interesting to take a closer look at the distribution of Bitcoin by addresses on its Blockchain:

    After analyzing this distribution, you must have noticed that only 631,814 addresses have at least 1 Bitcoin.

    Since people may have several addresses with Bitcoin, it is possible that people may have several addresses with amounts less than 1 BTC but whose cumulative amount exceeds 1 BTC.

    Nevertheless, it is quite conceivable that less than 1 million people own at least 1 Bitcoin on Earth.

    By making the decision to buy 1 full Bitcoin, you will de facto become part of the 2.18% richest Bitcoin addresses.

    Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong shares the same analysis as many Bitcoiners:

    “For better or worse, I do think owning one whole Bitcoin will increasingly become a big deal. Only 21M will ever be produced, and some people already own much more than one.”
     — Brian Armstrong

    With a complete Bitcoin in your possession, you will leave with a phenomenal advantage over the majority of the world’s inhabitants if Bitcoin is mass adopted and the hyperbitcoinization of the world takes place.

    The Last Year With a Bitcoin Under $10K

    Many make the mistake of only looking at the highest price Bitcoin has achieved year after year since its inception in 2009. These people find that the Bitcoin price has failed to reach again its historic high of $20K that was reached in December 2017.

    Many therefore have the impression that since the end of 2017, the price of Bitcoin is no longer on the rise.

    In fact, the real number that counts for Bitcoin is its yearly lowest price. And in this area, the price of Bitcoin has been rising steadily since 2010:

    This chart shows us that the evolution of Bitcoin’s yearly lowest price follows an overall upward trend.

    The evolution of the price of Bitcoin is cyclical and each cycle lasts 4 years starting with a Halving.

    The year of a Halving marks the beginning of a bull market for Bitcoin, with the strongest increase concentrated in the N+1 year.

    In the years N+2 and N+3 following a Halving, we usually see a correction in the price of Bitcoin but the lowest price is still above what it was before.

    With the upcoming Bitcoin Halving in May 2020, Bitcoin price will necessarily exceed $10K this year.

    The peak of Bitcoin price increase is expected in 2021.

    Nevertheless, Bitcoin price could already be well over $20K by 2020.

    The lowest price of Bitcoin since the beginning of the year at $6,950 could well be the lowest in the whole year 2020.

    There is a strong probability that 2020 will be the last year with a Bitcoin priced below $10K.

    Buying Bitcoin at this price therefore remains clearly affordable given the sharp increase that is expected in the coming months.

    The Last Year to Buy an Entire Bitcoin

    The strong bull market that Bitcoin is expected to experience in the coming months may well bring its price to between $20K and $30K by the end of 2020.

    As I explained earlier, the biggest increase in the price of Bitcoin is usually in year N+1 after a Halving.

    The year 2021 may well see Bitcoin price increase even more sharply to between $50K and $100K.

    No one can predict the future, not even me, but all these figures regarding Bitcoin price are assumptions that should be seriously considered.

    If Bitcoin price were to reach such a high level, it would become impossible for ordinary people to own a whole Bitcoin.

    The year 2020 is therefore probably the last year to buy an entire Bitcoin.

    Beyond this year, it will be too late to aim for full ownership of a Bitcoin because the price will be too high.

    The more reasonable target will then be to aim for the possession of 0.1 BTC.

    With the current distribution of Bitcoin, owning 0.1 BTC would put you among the 2 million richest addresses in the network, i.e. among the richest 7%.

    All this is interesting but less than owning 1 Bitcoin in its entirety.

    You still have the choice of what you want to do with Bitcoin for your future and it’s a real luxury considering what’s in store for the future.

    It is up to you to make the best decision for your future so that you have no regrets afterwards when you no longer have a choice.

  • HODLING Bitcoin Is a Great Way Using Bitcoin

    HODLING Bitcoin Is a Great Way Using Bitcoin

    Stop listening to people that say HODLing Bitcoin is not good.

    Illustration by Sylvain Saurel

    In the Bitcoin world, there is a special category of people: the Bitcoin Maximalists. These people have an unshakeable faith in Bitcoin, and are willing to do anything to support its revolution. They are convinced that in the cryptocurrency industry, there will be only one left, and that will be Bitcoin.

    The Bitcoin Maximalists can be seen as missionaries who are willing to make every effort to help Bitcoin achieve its mission.

    To fully accompany Bitcoin in its mission requires humility, patience and resilience. The Bitcoin Maximalists have no shortage of these qualities. Their strategy with Bitcoin is simple: HODLing Bitcoin no matter what.

    When Bitcoin entered a very strong bear market in 2018, the Bitcoin Maximalists’ HODLing Bitcoin strategy kept the price above $3K.

    So, contrary to what many people claim, HODLing Bitcoin is already a way to use Bitcoin, and it’s even a great way to do so as I will explain in what follows.

    The people who say that HODLing Bitcoin is not using Bitcoin are often people from the traditional monetary and financial system who have not well integrated the complete paradigm shift proposed by Bitcoin.

    Current Monetary and Financial System Pushes You to Spend Your Money

    Since the end of the convertibility of the U.S. dollar into gold, unilaterally decided by Richard Nixon in 1971, fiat currencies have not been based on anything tangible.

    Since that time, politicians and central bankers have been pursuing policies of monetary creation aimed at constantly increasing the money supply in circulation.

    Printing more and more money is the answer used almost systematically by the proponents of the current monetary and financial system to address all the ills of the economy.

    As soon as the economy shows the slightest sign of slowing down, interest rates are lowered to allow the creation of ever more money that is based on nothing.

    So it is no surprise that the Federal Reserve has just decided on an historic 50 basis point cut in interest rates at a time when the world is going through a phase of total uncertainty with the coronavirus crisis.

    The Federal Reserve Printing Always More Money Is the Best Marketing Campaign for Bitcoin

    The people at the head of the current system live in a total utopia hoping that the economy will never stop growing. This is a very strong misconception.

    The virtually uninterrupted growth of the money supply that has been in circulation for over 40 years devalues what you own.

    For example, 1 U.S. dollar in 2020 is actually worth less than 1 U.S. dollar in 1980. And the trend is not about to stop.

    The monetary policy of the current system gives people the impression that money is something easy to get. This pushes people to spend more and more.

    What’s the point of trying to save fiat money that is bound to be devalued?

    There is no point in that. So you have to invest if you don’t want to see inflation fighting against you, or spend on goods and services.

    Many people who are used to this flawed system don’t understand the Bitcoin Maximalists’ attitudes who choose to keep their Bitcoins without spending them.

    Bitcoin Is Totally Different From the Current System

    People who haven’t bothered to discover Bitcoin don’t understand that Bitcoin is a totally different system from the current monetary and financial system.

    The total supply of Bitcoin is set at 21 million units, and it can never be changed.

    Furthermore, the creation of new Bitcoins is constantly slowing down over time. In 2020, after the third Bitcoin Halving, the annual inflation of the Bitcoin supply will fall below 2% to 1.8% for the first time.

    Starting with the third Halving, which will take place around May 12, 2020, there will be only 900 newly created BTC every day.

    In the future, the scarcity of Bitcoin will only increase as Bitcoin Halving is an event that automatically repeats itself every 210,000 validated transaction blocks.

    In the future, somewhere around 2140, when all Bitcoins have been created, this inflation of the Bitcoin supply will be equal to zero.

    You read that correctly. When all 21 million Bitcoins have been mined, there will be no more new Bitcoins created.

    These unique characteristics of Bitcoin make it regularly compared to digital gold. They guarantee that 1 BTC of today will always be equal to 1 BTC of the future. This is a verifiable fact that is guaranteed by the Bitcoin source code.

    Bitcoin’s motto is simple: “Don’t trust, verify”.

    Bitcoin is totally transparent, which again differentiates it from a totally opaque monetary and financial system that many people don’t understand how it works.

    Indeed, the proponents of the current system prefer that the majority of people do not understand how it works, otherwise a revolution may well come about, as Henry Ford pointed out:

    “It is well enough that people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning.”
     — Henry Ford

    Bitcoin Gives You the Choice by Protecting What You Own

    Through its unique and immutable technical characteristics, Bitcoin returns power to the people. It is a true democracy that gives you back control and fully protects what you own.

    The fact that Bitcoin guarantees you protection of your wealth gives you a real choice.

    With Bitcoin, you can choose to save what you own rather than spend it on anything.

    As Bitcoin is scarce, with demand for it growing in the future, its price will inevitably rise. In fact, it’s in your best interest to keep your Bitcoin safe.

    Let me remind you again of the numbers: 21 million Bitcoins for 7.8 billion people on Earth in 2020.

    According to the latest United Nations estimates, the world population will continue to grow in the coming years to eventually reach 9.7 billion people in 2050, and then 11 billion people in 2100.

    In 2100, there will still only be 21 million Bitcoins for those 11 billion people on Earth.

    So if you own 1 Bitcoin in 2020, you have every interest in keeping it preciously by fundamentally believing in a Bitcoin system that is a real paradigm shift.

    HODLing Bitcoin Is a Great Way to Support Bitcoin

    By totally changing the rules of the game in relation to the current monetary and financial system, Bitcoin makes the HODLing strategy totally appropriate. Indeed, by keeping your Bitcoins, you don’t lose money. On the contrary, you gain money.

    HODLing Bitcoin is a great thing for you, but also for the Bitcoin network.

    By having full confidence in Bitcoin, Bitcoin Maximalists can HODL Bitcoin no matter what. Whether the price reaches $20K as in late 2017, or $3.5K as in 2018, Bitcoiners keep their Bitcoins.

    By doing so, they not only get richer as time goes by, but they also do Bitcoin a service.

    HODLing Bitcoin is a strategy that makes the supply of Bitcoins in circulation even scarcer. The supply that naturally shrinks over time is made even more scarce by this practice. With demand continuing to grow, Bitcoin price can only increase.

    Increasing Bitcoin price allows more and more people to take an interest in Bitcoin, which plays an essential marketing role in attracting new users.

    Contrary to what many people claim, HODLing Bitcoin is, therefore, an excellent way to use Bitcoin.

    Rarely does this practice benefit you both individually by increasing your wealth, but also collectively by supporting the mission of the Bitcoin Blockchain while allowing new people to discover this revolutionary new system.

    Bitcoin stands out once again by showing that it helps build a fairer system for the greater world that truly empowers you as an individual.

    ,
    ,

  • The 6 Priorities for Bitcoin Development in the Coming Years

    The 6 Priorities for Bitcoin Development in the Coming Years
    Photo by Dmitry Demidko on Unsplash

    The community needs to focus on these priorities.

    Bitcoin is a phenomenal success. Even its fiercest opponents agree. No matter how much they criticize Bitcoin, they cannot deny the reality of the numbers. And the numbers are simply phenomenal.

    In just over 11 years of its existence, Bitcoin has managed to reach a capitalization of over $166 billion. Its price, which is around $9.1K today, has even reached $20K by the end of 2017.

    Its security has never been compromised, and Bitcoin has an uptime of 99.98%, which has nothing to envy to Web giants such as Google, Facebook, or Amazon.

    When you look at how far Bitcoin has come so far, it’s quite incredible to think that Bitcoin has only reached a tiny part of its goals. This is something that says a lot about the potential of Bitcoin, whose mission is to provide everyone with a real alternative to the current monetary and financial system.

    In order to succeed in its mission, Bitcoin will have to be accompanied by Bitcoiners, who will play the role of missionaries. For the years to come, I see 6 priorities in which the community must invest in order to move Bitcoin forward the right direction.

    1. Spreading Bitcoin by Educating Always More People

    Estimating the number of users of the Bitcoin Blockchain is not an easy thing to do. The number of addresses created on the Bitcoin Blockchain is not an accurate estimate of the number of Bitcoin users.

    Among the figures we have available is the estimated number of wallets created on the Bitcoin Blockchain.

    As of March 6, 2020, we know that there are 46,389,789 users of the Blockchain.com wallet for the Bitcoin network:

    Screenshot from author

    This number is for one platform only. To this number, we have to add the wallets on Coinbase, Binance, … In total we must be close to 200 million wallets.

    However, this figure does not accurately reflect the number of users on the Bitcoin network since users have the option of owning multiple wallets.

    In addition, this number of wallets also includes wallets that have not been used for a long time. Their owners could therefore disappear and leave the network.

    Actually, some estimates put the number of unique users on the Bitcoin network at 5.9 million.

    However, for what follows, this will not make much of a difference. So I will start from the approximate figure of 200 million wallets on the Bitcoin Blockchain.

    Currently, the United Nations estimates that there are 7.8 billion people on Earth.

    That means that less than 0.60% of the world’s population currently uses Bitcoin.

    Even worse, of those 0.60% of the world’s population who use Bitcoin, many don’t realize that Bitcoin’s purpose goes far beyond the financial aspect.

    Bitcoin is a revolutionary system that aims above all to allow you to live on your own terms rather than being subjected to a flawed system that doesn’t protect you.

    In the years to come, a lot of work will have to be done to spread the good word around Bitcoin to as many people as possible.

    The challenge of democratizing Bitcoin will be twofold:

    1. To promote understanding of Bitcoin by showing the general public how it is different from the current monetary and financial, and especially more protective for people.
    2. To show that the Bitcoin revolution is multifaceted: technological, industrial, social and ideological.

    This work of evangelization will pass through the Bitcoiners who will continue to explain Bitcoin in an educational way to the greatest number of people. This will obviously start with the journalists who will have a role in spreading the right message about Bitcoin.

    The production of quality documentaries about Bitcoin will also be important because television helps to spread the message faster.

    2. Improving Privacy Again and Again

    Bitcoin is a pseudonymous network that guarantees much more privacy than the current monetary and financial system. When you tell someone about Bitcoin, you should not hesitate to highlight this aspect of Bitcoin.

    Bitcoin will be the last line of defense in protecting the privacy of citizens in the face of the surveillance society that is taking hold around the world.

    Of course, Bitcoin alone will not prevent the installation of facial recognition surveillance cameras in cities. Nevertheless, it will preserve the confidentiality of your transactions.

    And it will already be something essential in the future that will benefit all Bitcoin-using citizens of the world.

    Future developments of Bitcoin will bring ever greater privacy to the users of the network.

    Bitcoin Is More About Living on Your Own Terms Than Simply About Money

    I’ll take it as proof:

    • Taproot which will make each Bitcoin transaction similar to the others by removing information about unrealized conditions.
    • CoinJoin which is an information mixing technology that helps to better disguise users participating in a transaction.
    • The Lightning Network which will allow transactions to be taken out of the monitoring of the main network into a secondary layer.

    All of these community efforts will need to be sustained and continued in the future so that Bitcoin will always be a little more respectful of the privacy of its users.

    3. Making It Even Easier to Use Bitcoin

    Bitcoin leaves no one indifferent. Bitcoiners find it, rightly in my opinion, revolutionary. People who take advantage of the current system find it dangerous. Nevertheless, these two categories of people agree on at least one fundamental thing:

    Bitcoin is the most innovative and disruptive technology since the Internet emerged.

    In the early days of the Internet, the older people will remember how inconvenient sending email could be. The user experience was disastrous.

    For those who didn’t know, this is what the Microsoft Mail application that allowed sending emails under Windows 3.1 looked like:

    Microsoft Mail under Windows 3.1

    You quickly understand why many people needed extensive training to be able to use computers and the Internet in the early days.

    Today, the user experience has improved enormously, and everyone can easily send emails without even knowing all the technology behind it.

    Bitcoin was born at a time when smartphones were beginning to take over. Dedicated mobile applications were soon offered.

    I personally find that the user experience of Bitcoin after 11 years of existence is much better than that of the Internet at the same stage of its evolution.

    Nevertheless, there is always room for improvement. In order to promote the adoption of Bitcoin to the greatest number of people, buying Bitcoin should become as simple as buying goods on Amazon.

    When introducing Bitcoin to non-technical people, one should not immediately talk about the technical advantages of Bitcoin.

    Many Bitcoin users may be put off if you talk to them about decentralization, cryptography, sovereignty or privacy.

    Wallet applications must hide all the underlying complexity of Bitcoin from end users.

    Conducting Bitcoin transactions should be a natural thing, and the average user should not need to know the details of the Bitcoin public/private key system for example.

    So a lot of work needs to be done on usability in the coming years.

    4. Boost Bitcoin Scalability With Lightning Network

    Currently, Bitcoin can handle up to 7 transactions per second. Comparisons with centralized systems such as Visa or PayPal do not do Bitcoin justice.

    Visa processes 2000 transactions per second, and claims to be able to handle up to 24K transactions per second.

    PayPal supports up to 200 transactions per second.

    These systems can display this kind of performance because they are fully centralized.

    In contrast, Bitcoin is completely decentralized. Its Blockchain is permissionless and trustless. Thus, anyone can become a node in the Bitcoin network if they wish.

    Guaranteeing the security of a network such as Bitcoin by ensuring its smooth operation while maintaining such a level of decentralization is a feat.

    Bitcoin does it perfectly. Nevertheless, it induces lower performance than the centralized systems to which it is frequently compared.

    In the future, Bitcoin will have to support more transactions per second. Improving the scalability of Bitcoin will be a key issue in the coming years.

    One promising solution is the Lightning Network, which should allow Bitcoin to have almost infinite scalability.

    For this, the Lightning Network protocol proposes the creation of micro payment channels. These micro payment channels will help to relieve congestion on the main Bitcoin network, and prevent it from becoming saturated.

    The solution will therefore be located at the level of a second layer built on top of the Bitcoin.

    Work on the Lightning Network is progressing slowly, but this protocol will be essential to make Bitcoin usable by millions of people in the future in a non-custodial way.

    As is often the case with Bitcoin, solutions are emerging from the many startups building services around Bitcoin. This ultra rich ecosystem is also what allows Bitcoin to remain the king in the cryptocurrency industry after all these years.

    5. Promoting the Acceptance of Bitcoin as a Means of Payment

    Bitcoin has already proven itself as a safe haven in times of crisis. It is an accomplished store of value alongside gold now. This corresponds to Phase 1 of its mass adoption by the general public.

    Phase 2 of its mass adoption has already begun, and corresponds to the increasing use of Bitcoin as a means of payment.

    Merchants accepting Bitcoin for payments are growing in number.

    In the coming years, this trend will intensify. As a Bitcoiner, you should also spread the word by urging merchants you know to support Bitcoin.

    One of the arguments that is hitting home with merchants is that they will be among the early adopters by supporting Bitcoin now. This will allow them to attract many Bitcoiners.

    Bitcoin will see its price rise sharply, and it will be important that happy Bitcoin owners can use what they own for their daily purchases.

    Since the world will not become all Bitcoin overnight, it will also be important to promote Bitcoin’s liquidity.

    This means allowing Bitcoin owners to withdraw corresponding fiat money when they go to places where Bitcoin is not supported as a means of payment.

    ATM Bitcoins play an important role in allowing Bitcoins to be bought with fiat money, and Bitcoins to be sold for fiat money.

    The number of ATM deployed worldwide is constantly increasing. As of March 7, 2020, there are now more than 7,000 ATM:

    Crypto ATM Installations Growth — Source: Coin ATM Radar

    In the coming years, this figure is also expected to grow strongly.

    These ATM will also accelerate the adoption of Bitcoin by the general public.

    6. Limiting the Personal Information to Be Disclosed When Using Bitcoin

    As I frequently explain, Bitcoin should allow you to preserve your privacy as best as possible. As such, you should be able to use Bitcoin with minimal disclosure of personal information about yourself.

    Currently, cryptocurrency trading platforms such as Coinbase require more and more information about you when you open an account.

    This is part of the KYC (Know Your Customers) movement. However, this requirement puts your privacy at risk since your identity can be more easily linked to your Bitcoin wallet, then to your addresses on the Bitcoin network.

    In fact, third parties can potentially know what you own in Bitcoin, but also list all the transactions you have made on the network.

    In the future, a lot of work needs to be done in order to use Bitcoin with a minimum of personal information to reveal.

    The widespread deployment of the Lightning Network should be a good solution to make the use of Bitcoin more confidential for users.

    This will be something to watch for in the years to come.

    Conclusion

    Bitcoin has come a long way so far. So is the road ahead in the years to come. Bitcoin is here to stay, and the best is yet to come.

    It’s crazy to say that when Bitcoin’s market capitalization already exceeds $160 billion. Nevertheless, it is the pure truth, and it shows how special Bitcoin is.

    In order to help Bitcoin fully realize its mission in the future, Bitcoiners will have to focus their efforts on the 6 priority areas of development that I have detailed in this story: education, privacy, user experience, scalability, promotion as a means of payment, and limiting the amount of personal information to be disclosed.

    As always, the Bitcoin community is already fully aware of these challenges, and has been working on them for a long time. So the coming years are going to be extremely exciting in the Bitcoin world.

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