July 29, 2022 • 55 mins
To some, Bitcoin and similar cryptocurrencies are the future of finance, deregulated and free from the problems of the existing financial others. To critics, they're little more than a bad investment or an outright ponzi scheme. But what happens when the coins begin to crash? In today's episode, the guys explore what led to the ongoing Bitcoin crash -- and why some believe there's more to the story.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of My Heart Radio. Hello, welcome back to the show.
(00:25):
My name is Matt, my name is Noel. They called
me Ben. We're joined as always with our super producer
Paul Michig, control decand most importantly, you are you. You
are here and that makes this the stuff they don't
want you to know now. Folks, you've heard us talk
about bitcoin before. Bitcoin is a specific sort of alternative
(00:49):
currency or cryptocurrency, but it's it's not alone in that field.
It's the most well known of several different similar things,
like ethereum or doge coin personal favorite of mind. These
are popularly called crypto or coins. Unlike currency of previous eras,
bitcoin is not backed by any government or corporation. It's decentralized,
(01:13):
meaning there is no issuing authority, no central banking system.
Depending on which sources you ask, this is either one
of the greatest revolutions, innovations, and financial history, or it's
a grift or well. First things first, here are the
facts we we want to give you. A brief recap
(01:36):
of how bitcoin works, help blockchain works. But we're gonna
we're gonna just go high level because longtime listeners you've
heard us discussed this in depth in previous episodes, sometimes
with the help of our pal Jonathan Strickland. Yeah, he
was certainly the first person that I ever even heard
about blockchain and cryptocurrency from many years ago. Yes, so
(01:58):
let's let's talk about it. Uh. It runs on peer
to peer. This is very important. It's a network that
is peer to peer, like old school stuff that you
used to do on the Internet, probably where somebody's computer
is running part of the brain that's running the game
you're playing, or if you're let's say, using lime wire
(02:18):
something to share stuff across the network. That was a
well known peer to peer network, and as you said,
been the most important thing is that there's no centralized
server that is running any of this stuff. Yeah. If
you're using bitcoin, uh, each user's computer is part of
this larger network, what you could rightly call an ecosystem,
(02:40):
and it shares the burden of generating bitcoins and logging transactions.
It's this decentralized nature that makes bitcoin arguably impervious so
far to things like government intervention, whether that is by
monitoring the way you would monitor UH or orthodox banking transactions,
(03:01):
or regulation. And it's the weird thing, is okay, So
we're going to describe some things that may sound complicated.
But if you are an end user, if you are
like so many people, getting into bitcoin a little dipping
your toe in, a little bit at a time, you'll
find that it is astonishingly simple to do. So you
(03:22):
get a bitcoin wallet. This encrypts and maintains your bitcoin
balance on your computer, smartphone, or in the cloud, and
this happens with any any other version of cryptocurrency. Then
you can use your bank account or a credit card,
which I think is kind of dangerous, or another form
of payment to get bitcoins to up your wallet or
(03:47):
for most people realistically a fraction of bitcoins. Can you
use a credit card to buy securities by traditional stocks
and bonds? I wouldn't know. I'm an enemy of credit cards.
I just wonder. I mean, you know, it seems you're
it's seems dangerous, It seems like a slippery slope. If
you're not actually converting wealth, you know, into stocks, then
(04:07):
you're just gambling essentially, with with credit it's you know,
you can't use a credit card to pay off another
credit card, I just order the lottery right or to
go to casinos. So I would think probably there's some
guideline with the ftc UH that doesn't allow you to
buy stocks with credit cards. So that's not the case
(04:29):
with with crypto. You can you can't buy it with
credit cards, which is super slippery um. And it's a
little more complicated than some maybe more you know, kind
of technophobe type folks might be uh cut out for,
because you do have to you know, getting the wallet
is one thing, but then also to get the bitcoin,
you have to transfer it to the wallet because if
(04:50):
you keep it on in exchange, which is where you
buy it, that leaves it more kind of susceptible to things,
which many yeah, all exactly all sorts of things. So
in the code there's like a like a string of
of weird digits that are you know, your key for
transferring you know, the purchase to your wallet, and if
(05:11):
you get just one digit of that wrong and it
goes away into the ether never to be seen again.
And you have to be careful with any financial decisions
because I like the way it was put earlier somewhere
on the internet, probably Twitter. Somebody wrote to me up
and bowling hs W or I found it somewhere and
they said, you know, if you let someone shannan one
(05:33):
thing's for sure, they're gonna Shenan again. Sure, sort of
fool me once, shame on you fool me twice, can't
be fooled again. So so this is relatively um uncomplicated.
There is a learning curve for people entering his end users.
But before any of that happens, before bitcoin can be transferred,
(05:56):
can be spent, can be used at all, has to
be made. And this happens via mining process a k A.
A big reason that many of our gamer friends in
the audience today still don't have a PS five to
to a chip shortage. Uh. This this mining process uses computers.
(06:18):
You get a mining app, it's free, they're out there,
and mining requires the entire network of these let's call
them bitcoin participant computers to do essentially a ton of
difficult math problems, a bunch of number crunching, and there's
a set amount of work that these do and when
(06:38):
you reach that threshold of work, you get rewarded with
bitcoin and in the early days, there would be people
who were just at their houses, maybe setting up their
own kind of computer networks that would just do this work,
would just crunch these numbers and make them bitcoin. And
some of those people made quite a killing off of this.
(07:02):
But and I'll see the quiet part out loud, just
with things like with any quote unquote disruptive industry like podcasting.
Pretty soon the big fish got involved, and now some
people and some very powerful organizations has been thousands, thousands,
if I possibly millions of dollars making computers specifically to
(07:24):
mine bitcoin and nothing else. This became, and this is
fair to call it such, this became a global arms
race of sorts, a digital cutthroat arm race. At once
stat I found that I thought was pretty illuminating. Shout
out illumination global unlimited. As of two years ago, a
(07:46):
full nineteen per cent of the world's GPU graphic processing
unit production went entirely to mining not all crypto, but
just ethereum. And this was a huge, huge factor in
the ongoing global computer chip shortage. That means that even
if you never cared about crypto, if you've never heard
(08:08):
about it, had no plans to participate in it, you
were still being affected in a very real and sometimes
dangerous way. To my understanding as well, the way um
mining works is these GPUs are are the blockchain their
part and parcel they are. They are verifying transactions using
(08:30):
by solving these complex you know, like puzzles, essentially really
complex math problems. So in order to for the blockchain
to function, since it is decentralized, it's sort of like
crowdsourcing st you know, the way ST uses. Like, you know,
people can combine all of their computer processes together in
a way that allows them to participate in certain algorithms
(08:50):
that are taking place, you know, through a thing organization
like CT to monitor you know, space, etcetera. So when
these people that are putting forth all of this power
into from their personal you know property, uh solve these
equation leads equations, they are rewarded essentially with a little
bit of a bitcoin, not like a whole bitcoin. You
(09:11):
gotta do a gazillion of these to make any meaningful. Gosh,
is that y'alls understanding as well? That's correct, Yeah, The
and the the SETI crowdsourcing is not a bad comparison because,
as we'll find the rules of the game are set
to evolve over time. Right now, just as a result
(09:31):
of the bitcoin kind of gold rush throughout four of
what we'll call crypto winters UH. As a result of
that gold rush, almost a hundred and seventy distinct industries
have been affected by the computer chip shortage. It can
only make so many due to supply chain issues, even
(09:51):
pre pandemic. And the thing is that these chips can
be used for all sorts of stuff that is not
involved with bitcoin. So you could argue that add a
certain threshold. Every time somebody is scooping up technology and
dedicating it to mining bitcoin, they're scooping it away from
(10:13):
UH these other industries. Goldman Sacks specifically found a hundred
and sixty nine industries have been impacted. The circle on
forever you might be thinking. And if so, if you're
thinking that, you're on the money, because here's how the
rules change. There is a cap. There are only twenty
one million bitcoins that can ever exist and to create.
(10:38):
To like sort of manage this generation, the Bitcoin network
adjust the exact amount of work and number crunching required
to make coins. So they adjust at such that the
number of bitcoins will rise at a steady predetermined rate,
and it will continue to do us. The reasoning goes
(11:02):
until the number of bitcoins in circulation reaches that twenty
one million cap right now, that's projected to occur around
one forty. So if you are hearing this right to
the show, let us know if that ended up being correct.
Is it complicated? Yeah, of course, but don't make a mistake.
(11:23):
There was money to be made, so everyone for a
while went absolutely nuts for this. They went bonkers and bananas,
your faithful correspondence. By the way, some of our friends included.
As crypto's popularity skyrocketed, people began learning more about one
of my favorite parts of the story. It's incredibly shady origin,
(11:43):
and I think we have to talk about that. This
is a little bit here's where it gets crazy, but
it is worth knowing if you're not aware of this.
Uh previously Matt Noel, who made who made bitcoin? Who
invented it? Satan? Is that English set? Final answer? No
(12:07):
lifeline making it? No one was No one is listening
to this, guys. I have I have bad news. Civilization
collapses in uh less than two decades, so the very
at least been engulfed engulfed by the signs not making
it all right. Well, so I'll have to work with
(12:29):
the AI version of you guys. Uh, probably be really
high quality by that. Yeah, that's the thing. So our
optimism versus pessimism versus what something we called realism aside.
The truth is this, the identity of bit coins creator
is a huge mystery. The story really starts with the
(12:51):
mystery the phrase cryptocurrency as a as Neil Stevenson. As
it may sound, it was not coined by him. The
concept first comes out in a person named way Die
Uh mentions this idea, pitches it on a mailing list
for something called cipher punks see why p h e
(13:13):
r Punks and bitcoins creator who went by the identity
or the persona Setoshi Nakamoto. In two thousand nine, Setoshi
publishes the first specification like practical description of bitcoin and
proof of concept, and then later towards the end of
two thousand ten, this identity this persona ghosts it's gones
(13:39):
off the grid, uh. And all we know really is
that this person or people using this handle did create
the idea the practical application of it, and then did disappear.
And we know that that name, that handle is not
their real name. Bitcoin dot org, by the way, is
(14:00):
low key hilarious about this because they have to dispel
a lot of fear right and they say this person
whom they identify as Mail by the way, they say,
this person does not currently control bitcoin and that due
to the nature of the open source tech. This is
my favorite quote here. You can find it on bitcoin
(14:21):
dot org. They say, quote the identity bitcoins inventor is
probably as relevant today is the identity of the person
who invented paper. And we don't know who invented paper.
That's the point that well, it's mimetic though, it's like
a self replicating system, you know, once it kind of
gets off and running. Right at that point, it doesn't
(14:41):
It's like who invented d NA? Obviously, I think you
just insert the word flash into that sentence, invented flash paper? Okay,
Matt Math's got some some hot takes, some flash hot takes.
But no, but it's true. I mean, like at this
point it's kind of irrelevant. It would be interesting to know.
But would there be a reason you think? I mean,
(15:04):
I could think of many or that person would not
come forward because they probably I don't want to be
but don't don't want to have their spot blown up, essentially,
you know, because it is something that's pretty controversial still,
and I would imagine they've cashed out and they're probably
living the yacht life at this point. Yeah, quite possibly,
(15:24):
if indeed it is a single organic individual. I mean,
there are a couple of guesses we could make with Yet,
there are a couple of guesses we could make. One
they could have been working out of school using some
knowledge from their day drop that might be considered proprietary.
You know that got Blake Lemoinne fired. Uh. Second, second,
(15:46):
it could be it could be an op, it could
be a front, it could be a government organization. There's
it's I'm completely secure in saying that because there's no
proof otherwise anyway. So if there are controversies, surprise with bitcoin.
It's got a shady origin story. Uh, it involves a
lot of often misunderstood technology. Oh and it's also a
(16:09):
load of money. You can understand why bitcoin is controversial
given those three factors. Governments are have always been publicly
skeptical of bitcoin and blockchain technology in general. It's true
that some outliers like El Salvador have adopted it as
a recognized currency, but major economies, including Uncle Sam to
(16:32):
this day refused to recognize it as what's called legal tender.
And if you look at the if you if we
assume the perspective of countries and financial institutions, then we
can see how this idea, the skepticism and caution makes sense.
I mean, bitcoin potentially does a lot of things that
are dangerous. If you're happy, you know, at the top
(16:55):
of a financial or governmental regime, the citizens of your country,
we can undermine government authority because they can kind of
circumvent and skate around capital controls. Obviously, this can help
launder all sorts of things that can disguise criminal activity
for sure. And then the other thing, the third thing
(17:19):
that they don't say as much out loud officially, is
that potentially bitcoin and things like it could destabilize the
entirety of the existing global money regime, global financial infrastructure,
and then the irony there is. For the longest time,
the conversation from like you know, crypto bros and evangelists
(17:42):
has been this is an alternative to the crooked system
of capitalism that that is, that is legally you know, recognized. Uh,
and you know, you better get in while they getting
is good, they say, um, you know, because this is
gonna be the only game in town before you know it.
And as you don't, you want to, you know, protect
yourself from from the ebbs and flows and the whims
(18:02):
of of the FED and all that stuff. It's it's
not gonna follow any of those trends, right, that's the idea.
But and and that's the question, how long can this
thing last? Right? Uh? It could just be another currency
(18:24):
related bubble. This has definitely happened in the past, with
numerous things identified as currency by one civilization culture or another.
From day one, there were plenty of critics who were
certain that Bitcoin would eventually come crashing down, and now
it appears they just might be correct. What are we
(18:46):
talking about, We'll tell you after a word from our sponsor.
Here's where it gets crazy. Bitcoin crashed, feel what a
free fall? But like so did the stock market? You know,
(19:09):
I mean it's I think it's no, it's what we
were talking about earlier. I think there's Uh, I don't
know if there's a direct connection, but it certainly casts
a little bit of question into this whole notion that
bitcoin is bulletproof and crypto is its own thing, unconnected
to the rest of the economy, because these two things
kind of happened in tandem, you know. I mean, we
haven't experienced a full crash or a full recession, but
(19:29):
it sure feels like we're heading that way. But the
stock market isn't a currency, right if we're if the
statement was the dollar crashed, right, that would be applicable
to what's going on here. Right, there's a difference. It
feels like you're buying some kind of commodity, some kind
of you know, shares or stock when you're buying bitcoin,
(19:51):
I think the way it feels when you've got it,
because it's worth so much real world money. But it
is in itself a currency, I think, which it's That's
why it's weirding me out because we do think about
it as a stock market going up and down, but
in reality is the value of a currency, but the
value of like traditional currencies, they don't ebb and flow
(20:12):
the way cryptocurrencies and cryptocurrencies ebb and flow much more
like stocks, and and I believe are treated more speculatively
in the way that stocks are often treated. That's why
I think they're it's sort of in the middle, like
they're they're they're related but but different. But I see
exactly what you're saying appen. And so this brings us
to another another important issue. I want to paint the
(20:33):
scene here, so cash your memory back. By the end
of twenty one, big coin itself had fallen thirty from
its peak. Its peak was about sixty nine thousand dollars
seventy thousand dollars per coin, and it fell down to
forty seven thousand, six six dollars and eighty one cents. Ethereum,
(20:57):
which is sort of the Pepsi to the Coca cola
here also fell to three thousand, seven hundred sixty nine
seventy cents, And throughout a lot of January, much of
late January through let's call it late April, cryptocurrency and
(21:18):
general struggled, and Bitcoin was swinging back and forth. You know,
Edgar Allan Poe Pitt in the pendulum style. Sometimes it
was thirty five thousand, sometimes it was forty eight thousand.
And now, look, if you're an investor, this is your
what the f moment? But before anyone panics, we have
to know what that Bitcoin value has fluctuated before. To
(21:40):
your point, Matt, about treating something as a currency V
and investment, it would be weird if an investment did
not fluctuate to some degree. The crypto market, in fact,
has fallen by fifty percent or more on four different occasions,
including the current crypto winter of one two. Uh. But
(22:02):
is a little different now because back in the day
for a long time, Bitcoin was of the crypto market
until about so you could arguably just say the first
crypto winter really was a bitcoin winter. But this crash,
the one you're in now, has people worried, partially because
(22:23):
of the many other factors evolved, as well as the
extent where I should say, the timeline of the crash
it seems to be continuing. This is what is sometimes
called a free fall. Anyway, if we go back to
stay in one for a second, this is the first
time that a bitcoin associated industry announces layoffs job cuts.
(22:48):
April one, just a few days after everything goes to pot,
an outfit named bit Mex lays off of its employees.
Let's just fast forward to crash continues as of the
month we're recording this July two, both Bitcoin and ethereum
are down by more than sixty percent from their peak.
(23:12):
I want to shout out a couple of journalists in
this episode. One Tom Mitchell Hill, Tom I love your
last name, uh, is writing a coin Telegraph and said,
you know, just this past June, this means in real
terms that more than eighty thousand people who were millionaires
thanks to bitcoin are no longer millionaires. They're no longer
(23:36):
in the money. Yeah. That that. Uh. When I first
read an article from that outfit, I really thought it
was coin Telegraph, like really, but no, that that article.
It's pretty intense because I just give you a quick
rundown of those specifics there. Um, okay, So back on
(23:57):
November twelve, just uh, this is from the article by
Tom Mitchell Hill. Back on November twelve, just days after
bitcoin hit a new all time high of around sixty
nine thousand dollars. That been just mentioned, a little under
a hundred and nine thousand bitcoin addresses reported reported a
balance of greater than a million dollars. So an individual
(24:18):
address a wallet, right, So that's probably individuals, maybe a
few people having multiple ones, but that's a lot of people,
a hundred nine thousand who were at least a million
dollars worth in there. So you fast forward to today
that they were recording this and uh it says only
twenty six thousand, two hundred and eighty four addresses now
(24:42):
have holdings valued over a million dollars. So like eighty
thousand people just got wiped out. That's insane to think about.
It's wild. But also think how exponential the growth was.
Of course the decline is also going to be exponential.
I mean, so many of these people like made their
their their money by getting in at the right time,
(25:03):
and they didn't start with that much money. They invested
you know whatever, a respectable amount and it blossomed into
this crazy amount of money. But then if you bet
if the farm on those holdings, thinking it's just gonna
last forever, and you're leveraged against those holdings, that's something
you can do with crypto. You don't ever have to
cash out. A lot of people don't cash out. They
(25:24):
just leverage against it. You can borrow against it, you know,
they're they're exchanges or wallets rather like one called nexo
that allows you to leverage your holdings into zero interest
loans that then you pay back with little you know,
um hits little little taxes I guess on your holdings,
but you never actually have to cash out, because once
(25:46):
you cash out, then you're out of the system, and
then you're out of the game. But so the goal
for a lot of people is to stay in the system.
But of course when the hit like this happens, it's
also gonna be of epic proportions, you know, just like
the winds were and this is you know, the whales
got hit as well. I'll take the hit on that
(26:06):
one guy's because I snuck in a tongue tongue twister
in the In the notes, uh, there were per Mentchell
Hills reporting there were ten thousand, five eighty seven addresses
that had a minimum cash value of ten million US
dollars in November of last year, and now less than
(26:27):
half of them are still at that level. Only four thousand,
three and forty two hold the same status. So quick
cocktail napkin math. That's a fifty eight percent decline. And
another note for anybody who likes dancing on graves, please
don't be that I told you so. Guy to your
bitcoin friends, give them give him a couple of weeks.
(26:48):
You know, they've got a lot of stuff going on,
And how do we know these things? Well, the reason
we know them is that Bitcoin has something really interesting.
There is anonymity, but you can still due to the
nature of the interactions in this ecosystem, you can see
a dress like which addresses have certain amounts of coin?
(27:10):
And right now Bitcoin has been struggling to stay above
twenty thousand dollars US per coin. Now, uh, and like
you said, Matt, you see the decline with the people
holding a million. You see the descline with people holding
more than ten million. Now we have to ask what happened? Right?
It's questions so many people are asking, and we will
(27:30):
get into conspiratorial aspects here. But first, the best way
to say it is there are a couple of factors
we can point to with certitude, and there are several
other factors we can guess at. First things First, I'll
say this the big boys, big fish, they wanted some
more regulations. April one, the SEC starts swinging their h
(27:53):
mentionables around. The Securities and Exchange Commission of the u
S says, okay, guys, pump the breaks. We need to
put some regulations on these crypto agencies. And just that
just a financial superpower like the US moving toward a
regulatory environment made a lot of people sell off everything.
(28:16):
I guess they were like, let's get while they getting
is good. We'll support the cartels some other way. Get
back into fine art, where are loose diamonds all that jazz? Uh.
And then there's something that I, you know, I don't
know how familiar this is to a lot of people,
but there's something called stable coin. Stable Coin is a yeah,
(28:38):
it's a it's a crypto um crypto thing that can
occur in three different kind of buckets. So it's either
collateralized by cryptocurrencies, it's sort of based on other crypto,
or it's pegged to something like the Euro or the
US dollar, which means it's fiat backed. That's not a
(28:58):
hot take. Those are currencies. Or it relies entirely on
algorithms to maintain supply and demand, so it picks a
certain relationship to something like a dollar, and then it
just modifies on the back end everything to make it
maintain that value. Stable Coin is called stable coin because,
(29:20):
as you can imagine the idea, the main feature of
this is that it is not supposed to be subject
to all the wiles and whims of the marketplace, and
then that proved to be untrue. Luna Tara huge stable
coin crashed and this was such a this was such
a shock to the overall financial system of crypto that
(29:44):
when it plunged in value by eight percent, it rocked.
It rocked the foundations of the entire crypto market. So
that's one thing that happened. The stuff that was supposed
to be stable turned out not to be stable in
any case. And then, um, you know, we said the
sec started started paid interest. But in general, whether or
(30:07):
not you're in crypto, if you live in the US,
uncle Sam wants you to pay interest to what a
terrible segue. Now everything's bad. Uh, hikes and interest rates.
That's that's huge. Like we're talking about you mentioned earlier,
and all the idea of a recession historically, if you
look back in the span of you modern US civilization,
(30:30):
when interest rates start rising aggressively, it is it is
not proof, but it is definitely a sign that the
FED beliefs recession is on the horizon. So this hits
all the investment things, you all, most of the investment
vehicles you can think of. FED increases rates, stock market
(30:52):
and the crypto market have this huge downfall because ultimately,
you know, they're voting on articles of faith, right, it's
worth how much other people want it. So investors start
selling and this creates a blood bath in the crypto
market because the more people the secret of crypto is,
(31:14):
the more people who are selling off stuff in a
short time interval, uh, the less and less individual bitcoins
are worth. Yeah, it is interesting to um the link
between inflation and cryptocurrency because you know, in the same way,
a lot of folks have touted cryptocurrency to be sort
of resistant to some of the market trends that that
(31:36):
we're seeing, you know, hit the stock market and all
of that. Uh. Similarly, it's been said that that they're
resistance to inflation. So I marning with inflation kind of
going up, why aren't cryptocurrency is doing better? Um, you know,
it's a lot of it's a lot of factors, but
it is It is interesting that an additional thing to
(31:56):
to consider and then came financial trouble for a lot
of the companies that handle cryptocurrencies, the ones that are
actually exchanging things, that do other various things with bitcoin, uh,
that have lots and lots of employees because it's kind
of like Netflix if you think about a lot of
cry cryptocurrency companies. They've been staffing up like crazy historically
(32:20):
because there's just gains and gains and gains and gains,
so they need more human beings to do more work.
And then when these crashes happen, these winters come through,
it gets cold and they gotta they gotta get rid
of all these new people they've hired because their overhead
becomes too expensive, which was the case with Celsius Network.
This is one of those decentralized finance outfits, the things
(32:42):
we've been talking about. They said they were putting a
freeze on all crypto transactions, which is never good, right.
That's like when you freeze the stock market because stuff
is going downhill. Guys, we gotta stop trading, uh, Which
has happened right? Well? I I you know again to
your point that this to your it's your beautiful point
about currency versus investment. I would say a more immediate analogy,
(33:07):
even more impactful, would be the idea of banks not
allowing cash withdrawals or withdrawals or transfers to other financial institutions.
When that happens. It's what what we could rightly call
bad bad, it's it's double plus un good. So if
you're banking at the Celsius network, then this is this
(33:29):
is your wells Fargo saying we know you have money,
you just can't have it because we don't have it. Yeah,
that's the kind of stuff that happened like during the
Great Depression. That's that's a real bell weather of things
to come. Yeah, and and post something like that where
there is some kind of freeze, often not always as
we saw with Game Stop and some of the some
(33:50):
of the other weirdness that happened in the stock market, well, uh,
not that long ago. But what what happens after one
of those is a massive sell off. And that is
indeed what occurred of the Celsius network. Uh. And there
are a bunch of other companies that went through like
real rocky, real rocky month. Yeah. Yeah, And it's a
(34:12):
real rocky month that appears to be going much longer
than thirty days. It's a it's a non ending month.
I don't know if it ever resolved. Um, but a
buddy of mine had some stuff in Celsius, and I
think as far as he what he was getting for
message wars and some maybe like more seasoned crypto people,
was that don't hold your breath. Yeah. Unfortunately others would
(34:36):
follow suit a lot of this. Uh. Really, if you
look back on some of our previous work on this show,
you'll what you'll see is the danger of feedback loops
and they can happen in any financial sphere. Shortly after
our good friends at Celsius make their announcement, which they
by the way, they cited as a result of consequence
(35:00):
of extreme market conditions. Shortly after they do this, another
crypto exchange finance, which have all heard of if you're
involved in blockchain and bitcoin, they do the same, but
they say their freeze on bitcoin withdrawls was quote due
to a stuck transaction causing a backlog, and originally they
(35:20):
said this will take thirty minutes to fix. Spoiler, it
took longer than thirty minutes in the case of bitcoin specifically.
Experts are arguing something that I agree with wholeheartedly. This
is a symptom of a larger global economic climate. BBC
did a great job with this. Uh. They we pulled
(35:43):
some quotes from this. They said procession looms, inflation, is
soaring interest rates, arising living costs, are biting a little
bit of accidental freestyle there, I like it. Stock markets
are wobbling to with the U, S, S and P
five hundred now in a bearer market, meaning that a
down from where it was. And they point out, we'll
(36:04):
just summarize this part that as a result of this,
in a more hostile financial climate, even the really big investors,
like the people who don't really have jobs the way
normal people do, the people who just move money around
and live off the interest, they are less free with
their spending and investing. And that means that if you
(36:26):
are an ordinary investor rank and file, you're not you
don't own a hedge fund, you're not a corporation, you're
just you're just a schmuck. Then you have less money
in general to invest in anything. So why would you
invest in something that's not regulated, that doesn't have certain constraints.
From this perspective, we see the argument becoming something like
(36:50):
the same lack of regulation that make crypto so sexy
and appealing also for many investors makes it too unpredictable espec. Actually,
in times of austerity, do you want to buy something
that used to be sixty dollars. Now it's twenty dollars,
and just sort of roll the dice on whether it
will ever be sixty dollars and a penny like al right,
(37:14):
at twenty a penning might be more fair. So this
feedback loop has been created. Bitcoin's value is tied to
its desirability. The more people sell, whatever their reason might be,
the less bitcoin is worth. More people see the value decrease,
maybe they sell as well, they cut their losses, they
(37:37):
get out of the game, but it's too late. They're
perpetuating that feedback cycle. Bitcoin has no tangible assets underpinning it.
This is true. It means literally that the prices only
defined by what people are prepared to buy it for.
And then to your point, Matt, about Domino's falling coin base.
(37:59):
Later in June announced their own layoffs. They let go
of eight percent of their workforce. And when they did
this in their announcement, they didn't just say extreme market conditions.
They used the term crypto winter. And if you are
interested in this, I would highly recommend reading that official statement.
(38:21):
I thought it was transparent, I thought it was to
the point um and I don't think it was good news.
Nose terrible news. And coin Based Global Incorporated, which is
a wonderful name, isn't the only one that was laying
off people. There was also Crypto dot Com, Gemini, Trust,
block Fi Incorporated. All of these companies had huge numbers
(38:43):
of layoffs. And you know, just what, as you think
about coin Base, this is one of the biggest names
out there in in the crypto game. It what is
it had to lay off eighteen percent of its workforce
one thousand, two hundred people. Like, that's a lot of layoffs.
I mean. Also Crypto dot Com, which is probably the
(39:05):
most recognizable one because they literally named the Staples Center
after they had some pretty significant layoffs too. So everybody's
getting everybody's getting a little bit of the splashback. Actually
they're getting a lot a bit of the splashback. And
this is worrisome because with each announcement, with each decision,
each layoff, each sell off, the loop exacerbates, right, the
(39:30):
pace quickens, and so you have to wonder eventually where
the floor will be. But for many of us listening today,
many of our fellow conspiracy realists, this doesn't feel like
the whole explanation you might be thinking Okay, guys, come on,
what really happened? We'll pause, we'll tackle this after a
(39:50):
word from our sponsors. Okay, here is a conspiracy theory.
I don't know if you all have read this, but
I enjoyed it. It's from Reddit. I want to shout out,
juicy juice juice not spelled the way you think it's.
(40:11):
It's fun. Yes, yeah, juicy juice um soon to be
Pulitzer Prize winning juicy juice juice. No. Seriously, I thought
this was a really fascinating idea. I've been uh following
along with some contacts who are listening today. I've been
following the uh the whole game stop Wall Street stuck
stuff for a while now, and this conspiracy theory really
(40:37):
interested me. The idea is juicy juice Juice is asking
what if Krypto was purposely created to hide asset inflation,
making another financial path for the US dollar to pass
through inflating new different assets Like what if the full
quote then you can see this another media. The full
(40:58):
quote is Crypto creates the perfect trading vehicle for a
short time before becoming the scapegoat for whatever crash is coming.
If this is true, it would essentially mean that crypto
either became or was explicitly created to function as a scapegoat.
You know, it's getting pumped up into a bubble to
(41:20):
absorb ordinary existing inflationary pressure. That's a cool if that's true,
that's a really impressive shell game. But it's currently very
difficult to prove and it would also, let's be honest,
it would require some incredibly smart, dedicated people with an
(41:40):
insanely sophisticated level of cooperation. I haven't seen proof for
it yet. That doesn't mean it doesn't exist. It take
a ton of cooperation, or would it. I mean, you
just think about the seven eight crash, and that all
had to do with the amount of exposure big institutions had, right,
the amount of money they had invested or tied up
(42:03):
with subprime assets and packages. Right. Um, in this case,
if there when a major, major crash happens in the
stock market rather than in the cryptocurrency world, you could blame,
you know, the collapse of other major investing institutions on
their exposure to cryptocurrency, because we know those major institutions
(42:27):
are are investing more and more of their money into cryptocurrency,
not a ton of it right, not enough to play
the scapegoat, I don't think, but I know they are
investing millions of dollars. I mean, I think that's a
valid point. Matt the there. I still have some issues
with this though. I think it's really clever. And I
(42:49):
will admit a little bit of a personal bias here
because I missed the YouTube days where somebody with a
name like surf Daddy sixty nine whole hand x x
x would make a great point about the gold standard
in the eighteen hundreds. It would be able to write
back and say like, oh, that's a great point, uh,
surf Daddy sixty nine x x x or whatever. Uh.
(43:12):
But juicy Juice Juice does bring up I'm going to
say that name is mutations, right. Um makes a good point,
and I think you make a good point to their
The issue is that one would have to sort of
you can imagine the circumstances that would lead to that,
(43:33):
but we would have to if we were to prove
that we would we would just need some more right,
which is why juicy juice juice is astute. When they
call it a theory at this point, there's another crazy theory.
I don't know how much time we want to spend
on this one. But there's this idea that Russia may
(43:54):
have added some high octane fuel to the fire because
of their central bank statements. Russia's central bank came out
not too long ago and demanded a blanket ban across
the board on not only any crypto trading, but any
crypto mining. They wanted to cut it off, to cauterize it,
(44:16):
to amputate it from the system. They more or less
called bitcoin a pyramid scheme, and they said, look, if
we keep messing with bitcoin, it's gonna pose a risk
to the financial severenity of our nation. Which is funny
because you would think with all the problems Russia has
been having with things like Swift in other parts of
(44:39):
the global banking system, they would welcome decentralized thing like
a cryptocurrency, right, wouldn't logically makes sense? I mean yet
to me, like, I don't know, I don't, I'm not
the right person. I think the whole thing is a
Ponzi scheme. Hey man, I got this magical thing. You
should buy it? How much is it? I don't know? Okay, awesome?
(45:03):
And then that present, Hey, check us out, how this
thing I got you should buy it. How much is it?
I don't know, twelve dollars? Okay? Great? And it works.
It works so well until you're the person at the end.
But now now we have to ask, like why does okay,
why does Russia's opinion matter? You know what I mean?
(45:23):
Like what if what if Bhutan or Canada or Chile
or something, what if they said we don't like crypto?
So far, the only people have been unavowed Lee on
board with it or else Salvador and I hope it
works out for that country. But Russia's opinion matters more
than most because for a time they were the third
(45:45):
largest bitcoin mining hub in the world. So if they're
getting out of the game, that has a definite impact.
And this is long and short of it. These are
some of the conspiracies, These are some of the true factors,
the things we can improve. Um, we have to ask,
we have to close bask and what does this mean
for the future. For a lot of experts, a lot
(46:07):
of what Corporate America would call leaders in the space,
this crypto winter, unlike the previous three, seems set to
continue for some time. I found a lot of estimates
that commonly projected this would last for about two years
or so, But every reliable estimate or gues estimate about
(46:30):
that that I found at least did note it's very
difficult to make a solid guest here due to all
the non crypto variables involved. You know, like what about
the role of climate change? Does that affect it? People
don't know yet. Um And in an effort to be positive,
I do want to point out this may not necessarily
(46:51):
be all bad news. If a bunch of people get
out of crypto, and and then maybe that will up
your chances of getting the GPUs that you wanted, or
getting the chips that you need, or buying products that
have those chips. So maybe you can't get a PS five.
And also, if the price of bitcoin goes down, it's
(47:12):
obvious they're going to be more people who might be
interested in buying it while it's low, so there might
be more of what are called whole coiners. I never
heard that phrase before. Whole coiners just means people with
one or more whole bitcoins in their wallet, because I
think it's pretty it's pretty common nowadays for people to
have a percentage of a bitcoin right like slice, not
(47:34):
many have to drop into a whole coin in one
go like that. I mean, yeah, that's it's just weird
to me because for so many individuals crypto has become
almost a retirement account. I was reading an article from
The Guardian written by a Syrian kale Um, and it
(47:57):
was just discussing the real human impact, the emotional like
physical impact that the crash has been having on people. Um,
because it did at least for quite a time there,
and it still does for a lot of people. Um
seem like this is the way you could retire early,
Like take some of your whatever excess savings you make,
(48:18):
if you've got any, and invested in your bitcoin wallet
or your theorum or whatever it is wallet, and hopefully
that will continue to grow into a point where you've
got enough money to retire in like five ten years,
maybe even maybe in less time than that, depending on
how high the ceiling is. But a big thing too
in the I think maybe an investing community in general
(48:40):
is when in doubt zoom out. Um. So you know,
there have been dips like this in the past, maybe
not quite this so severe. But also let's remember that
cryptocurrency is still a really young thing compared to like
the stock market, and we certainly have seen the stock
market go horrible, horrible, terrifying places over the you know,
(49:00):
many many more years, and it's been around um, so
you can always just look at that graph and just
pull it out and you'll see those little ebbs and
flows that look much more like tiny little blips rather
than a huge, massive swings. Well said, guys, this this
is where, this is where we're at now, and this
is sort of the beginning. We may need to follow
(49:23):
up in future Strange News segment, or maybe we come
back and see if all the fears were unfounded and alarmist.
Maybe maybe we'll get to learn the real identity of Setoshi,
in which case we're totally throwing the rest of our
schedule out the window and and trying to interview him
(49:44):
or them or they or her or whomever used to
work at the Puzzle Palace and invented this daddy, lads,
and he said, I'm aid my bones off this, I
got I got that what twelve billion dollars or have
(50:04):
a many billion dollar mansion? Oh gosh, yeah, And it's
so you know, okay, I don't want to judge people's taste.
It's your mansion. Decorated how you want, but there's something
to be said for subtlety and aesthetic. I do want
to close this out today with so I don't know
if this will be a recurring segment where it's just
(50:25):
a one and done, but we read so much fantastic
work by so many people that Matt Noel Michigan control.
If you all are okay with it, I'd like to
do a little sound cue at an honorable mention. Our
honorable mention today goes to Zoe kleinman Is writing over
(50:48):
at the BBC guy. Zoe had my probably my favorite
beginning line of all the stuff I've read uh in
in this endeavor, like over the years. With bitcoin, Zoe says,
the first rule of writing about bitcoin is don't write
about bitcoin. The story of the world's best known cryptocurrency
is astonishingly fast moving, and its fans will soon line
(51:11):
up to tell you you've got it all wrong. So
there you have it, adorable mentioned is zone looking forward
to the feedback. I'm sure I was. I've been down
in this episode and it's just I'm sorry reading it.
Maybe it is just reading about so much of this
and another crash like this um specifically that Guardian article
and one from Bloomberg by Emily Nicole and Olga Careif.
(51:34):
It's just like pretty brutal. It just makes me feel
like somehow, somewhere, individual humans are being taken advantage of
by the hype beast that is cryptocurrency and n f
T s and all all this stuff that's just out there.
It's just people get so into it and they become acolytes.
Not like you're talking about the people who have those
(51:55):
phrases that sound like they should be on a you know,
on a little sign in your grandmother's kitchen or something.
It's like whatever, what was it? Don't what was it?
Jump zoom? Something about zooming? Or like hold the what
is it? The one that's like, don't ever sell diamond hands. See,
there's just like all of this, all this stuff. It's
(52:16):
like a cult. It's like this thing that's just like
it's designed to get everybody else into your thing, to
have these code words and cash phrases that make everybody
else want to be a part of that thing because
oh that's cool. I want to know what that phrase means.
I want to use that phrase on a regular basis
because or at least be able to say that and
not feel silly. I don't know that. This whole thing
(52:37):
is just really bothering me. Sorry, crypto fans, I just
don't get it, and I don't I don't really like it. Well,
we're gonna see what develops right now. That's where we're at.
A new crypto winter is upon society. No one is
quite sure how it we'll pan out and less of
course there's something they don't want you to know, But
(52:59):
you know what we want to know, folks, We will
tell you. We want to know what you think. Is
there something more to this story? Is this just the
you know, the danger of large scale financial systems? Is
someone trying to sink crypto? Those are allegations we had
heard as well. We can't wait to hear your thoughts.
We endeavor to be easy to find online, we sure do.
(53:21):
You can find us on Twitter, you can find us
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(53:43):
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The more people who pre order, the awesom er it
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you don't want to read, we get it. Maybe you
(54:04):
want to just talk with us, and if so, we've
got a phone number. The rumors are true. Also to
back up, Matt, Yeah, order our book. If I'll say it,
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I will record a thank you message and I will
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(54:24):
I don't know if it will be a funny message,
but we'll see how it goes in the meantime. As
you said, Matt, we do have a phone number. It
is one eight three three st d w y t K.
Call in. You'll have a familiar voice telling you you're
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(54:44):
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(55:07):
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(55:37):
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From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of My Heart Radio. Hello, welcome back to the show.
(00:25):
My name is Matt, my name is Noel. They called
me Ben. We're joined as always with our super producer
Paul Michig, control decand most importantly, you are you. You
are here and that makes this the stuff they don't
want you to know now. Folks, you've heard us talk
about bitcoin before. Bitcoin is a specific sort of alternative
(00:49):
currency or cryptocurrency, but it's it's not alone in that field.
It's the most well known of several different similar things,
like ethereum or doge coin personal favorite of mind. These
are popularly called crypto or coins. Unlike currency of previous eras,
bitcoin is not backed by any government or corporation. It's decentralized,
(01:13):
meaning there is no issuing authority, no central banking system.
Depending on which sources you ask, this is either one
of the greatest revolutions, innovations, and financial history, or it's
a grift or well. First things first, here are the
facts we we want to give you. A brief recap
(01:36):
of how bitcoin works, help blockchain works. But we're gonna
we're gonna just go high level because longtime listeners you've
heard us discussed this in depth in previous episodes, sometimes
with the help of our pal Jonathan Strickland. Yeah, he
was certainly the first person that I ever even heard
about blockchain and cryptocurrency from many years ago. Yes, so
(01:58):
let's let's talk about it. Uh. It runs on peer
to peer. This is very important. It's a network that
is peer to peer, like old school stuff that you
used to do on the Internet, probably where somebody's computer
is running part of the brain that's running the game
you're playing, or if you're let's say, using lime wire
(02:18):
something to share stuff across the network. That was a
well known peer to peer network, and as you said,
been the most important thing is that there's no centralized
server that is running any of this stuff. Yeah. If
you're using bitcoin, uh, each user's computer is part of
this larger network, what you could rightly call an ecosystem,
(02:40):
and it shares the burden of generating bitcoins and logging transactions.
It's this decentralized nature that makes bitcoin arguably impervious so
far to things like government intervention, whether that is by
monitoring the way you would monitor UH or orthodox banking transactions,
(03:01):
or regulation. And it's the weird thing, is okay, So
we're going to describe some things that may sound complicated.
But if you are an end user, if you are
like so many people, getting into bitcoin a little dipping
your toe in, a little bit at a time, you'll
find that it is astonishingly simple to do. So you
(03:22):
get a bitcoin wallet. This encrypts and maintains your bitcoin
balance on your computer, smartphone, or in the cloud, and
this happens with any any other version of cryptocurrency. Then
you can use your bank account or a credit card,
which I think is kind of dangerous, or another form
of payment to get bitcoins to up your wallet or
(03:47):
for most people realistically a fraction of bitcoins. Can you
use a credit card to buy securities by traditional stocks
and bonds? I wouldn't know. I'm an enemy of credit cards.
I just wonder. I mean, you know, it seems you're
it's seems dangerous, It seems like a slippery slope. If
you're not actually converting wealth, you know, into stocks, then
(04:07):
you're just gambling essentially, with with credit it's you know,
you can't use a credit card to pay off another
credit card, I just order the lottery right or to
go to casinos. So I would think probably there's some
guideline with the ftc UH that doesn't allow you to
buy stocks with credit cards. So that's not the case
(04:29):
with with crypto. You can you can't buy it with
credit cards, which is super slippery um. And it's a
little more complicated than some maybe more you know, kind
of technophobe type folks might be uh cut out for,
because you do have to you know, getting the wallet
is one thing, but then also to get the bitcoin,
you have to transfer it to the wallet because if
(04:50):
you keep it on in exchange, which is where you
buy it, that leaves it more kind of susceptible to things,
which many yeah, all exactly all sorts of things. So
in the code there's like a like a string of
of weird digits that are you know, your key for
transferring you know, the purchase to your wallet, and if
(05:11):
you get just one digit of that wrong and it
goes away into the ether never to be seen again.
And you have to be careful with any financial decisions
because I like the way it was put earlier somewhere
on the internet, probably Twitter. Somebody wrote to me up
and bowling hs W or I found it somewhere and
they said, you know, if you let someone shannan one
(05:33):
thing's for sure, they're gonna Shenan again. Sure, sort of
fool me once, shame on you fool me twice, can't
be fooled again. So so this is relatively um uncomplicated.
There is a learning curve for people entering his end users.
But before any of that happens, before bitcoin can be transferred,
(05:56):
can be spent, can be used at all, has to
be made. And this happens via mining process a k A.
A big reason that many of our gamer friends in
the audience today still don't have a PS five to
to a chip shortage. Uh. This this mining process uses computers.
(06:18):
You get a mining app, it's free, they're out there,
and mining requires the entire network of these let's call
them bitcoin participant computers to do essentially a ton of
difficult math problems, a bunch of number crunching, and there's
a set amount of work that these do and when
(06:38):
you reach that threshold of work, you get rewarded with
bitcoin and in the early days, there would be people
who were just at their houses, maybe setting up their
own kind of computer networks that would just do this work,
would just crunch these numbers and make them bitcoin. And
some of those people made quite a killing off of this.
(07:02):
But and I'll see the quiet part out loud, just
with things like with any quote unquote disruptive industry like podcasting.
Pretty soon the big fish got involved, and now some
people and some very powerful organizations has been thousands, thousands,
if I possibly millions of dollars making computers specifically to
(07:24):
mine bitcoin and nothing else. This became, and this is
fair to call it such, this became a global arms
race of sorts, a digital cutthroat arm race. At once
stat I found that I thought was pretty illuminating. Shout
out illumination global unlimited. As of two years ago, a
(07:46):
full nineteen per cent of the world's GPU graphic processing
unit production went entirely to mining not all crypto, but
just ethereum. And this was a huge, huge factor in
the ongoing global computer chip shortage. That means that even
if you never cared about crypto, if you've never heard
(08:08):
about it, had no plans to participate in it, you
were still being affected in a very real and sometimes
dangerous way. To my understanding as well, the way um
mining works is these GPUs are are the blockchain their
part and parcel they are. They are verifying transactions using
(08:30):
by solving these complex you know, like puzzles, essentially really
complex math problems. So in order to for the blockchain
to function, since it is decentralized, it's sort of like
crowdsourcing st you know, the way ST uses. Like, you know,
people can combine all of their computer processes together in
a way that allows them to participate in certain algorithms
(08:50):
that are taking place, you know, through a thing organization
like CT to monitor you know, space, etcetera. So when
these people that are putting forth all of this power
into from their personal you know property, uh solve these
equation leads equations, they are rewarded essentially with a little
bit of a bitcoin, not like a whole bitcoin. You
(09:11):
gotta do a gazillion of these to make any meaningful. Gosh,
is that y'alls understanding as well? That's correct, Yeah, The
and the the SETI crowdsourcing is not a bad comparison because,
as we'll find the rules of the game are set
to evolve over time. Right now, just as a result
(09:31):
of the bitcoin kind of gold rush throughout four of
what we'll call crypto winters UH. As a result of
that gold rush, almost a hundred and seventy distinct industries
have been affected by the computer chip shortage. It can
only make so many due to supply chain issues, even
(09:51):
pre pandemic. And the thing is that these chips can
be used for all sorts of stuff that is not
involved with bitcoin. So you could argue that add a
certain threshold. Every time somebody is scooping up technology and
dedicating it to mining bitcoin, they're scooping it away from
(10:13):
UH these other industries. Goldman Sacks specifically found a hundred
and sixty nine industries have been impacted. The circle on
forever you might be thinking. And if so, if you're
thinking that, you're on the money, because here's how the
rules change. There is a cap. There are only twenty
one million bitcoins that can ever exist and to create.
(10:38):
To like sort of manage this generation, the Bitcoin network
adjust the exact amount of work and number crunching required
to make coins. So they adjust at such that the
number of bitcoins will rise at a steady predetermined rate,
and it will continue to do us. The reasoning goes
(11:02):
until the number of bitcoins in circulation reaches that twenty
one million cap right now, that's projected to occur around
one forty. So if you are hearing this right to
the show, let us know if that ended up being correct.
Is it complicated? Yeah, of course, but don't make a mistake.
(11:23):
There was money to be made, so everyone for a
while went absolutely nuts for this. They went bonkers and bananas,
your faithful correspondence. By the way, some of our friends included.
As crypto's popularity skyrocketed, people began learning more about one
of my favorite parts of the story. It's incredibly shady origin,
(11:43):
and I think we have to talk about that. This
is a little bit here's where it gets crazy, but
it is worth knowing if you're not aware of this.
Uh previously Matt Noel, who made who made bitcoin? Who
invented it? Satan? Is that English set? Final answer? No
(12:07):
lifeline making it? No one was No one is listening
to this, guys. I have I have bad news. Civilization
collapses in uh less than two decades, so the very
at least been engulfed engulfed by the signs not making
it all right. Well, so I'll have to work with
(12:29):
the AI version of you guys. Uh, probably be really
high quality by that. Yeah, that's the thing. So our
optimism versus pessimism versus what something we called realism aside.
The truth is this, the identity of bit coins creator
is a huge mystery. The story really starts with the
(12:51):
mystery the phrase cryptocurrency as a as Neil Stevenson. As
it may sound, it was not coined by him. The
concept first comes out in a person named way Die
Uh mentions this idea, pitches it on a mailing list
for something called cipher punks see why p h e
(13:13):
r Punks and bitcoins creator who went by the identity
or the persona Setoshi Nakamoto. In two thousand nine, Setoshi
publishes the first specification like practical description of bitcoin and
proof of concept, and then later towards the end of
two thousand ten, this identity this persona ghosts it's gones
(13:39):
off the grid, uh. And all we know really is
that this person or people using this handle did create
the idea the practical application of it, and then did disappear.
And we know that that name, that handle is not
their real name. Bitcoin dot org, by the way, is
(14:00):
low key hilarious about this because they have to dispel
a lot of fear right and they say this person
whom they identify as Mail by the way, they say,
this person does not currently control bitcoin and that due
to the nature of the open source tech. This is
my favorite quote here. You can find it on bitcoin
(14:21):
dot org. They say, quote the identity bitcoins inventor is
probably as relevant today is the identity of the person
who invented paper. And we don't know who invented paper.
That's the point that well, it's mimetic though, it's like
a self replicating system, you know, once it kind of
gets off and running. Right at that point, it doesn't
(14:41):
It's like who invented d NA? Obviously, I think you
just insert the word flash into that sentence, invented flash paper? Okay,
Matt Math's got some some hot takes, some flash hot takes.
But no, but it's true. I mean, like at this
point it's kind of irrelevant. It would be interesting to know.
But would there be a reason you think? I mean,
(15:04):
I could think of many or that person would not
come forward because they probably I don't want to be
but don't don't want to have their spot blown up, essentially,
you know, because it is something that's pretty controversial still,
and I would imagine they've cashed out and they're probably
living the yacht life at this point. Yeah, quite possibly,
(15:24):
if indeed it is a single organic individual. I mean,
there are a couple of guesses we could make with Yet,
there are a couple of guesses we could make. One
they could have been working out of school using some
knowledge from their day drop that might be considered proprietary.
You know that got Blake Lemoinne fired. Uh. Second, second,
(15:46):
it could be it could be an op, it could
be a front, it could be a government organization. There's
it's I'm completely secure in saying that because there's no
proof otherwise anyway. So if there are controversies, surprise with bitcoin.
It's got a shady origin story. Uh, it involves a
lot of often misunderstood technology. Oh and it's also a
(16:09):
load of money. You can understand why bitcoin is controversial
given those three factors. Governments are have always been publicly
skeptical of bitcoin and blockchain technology in general. It's true
that some outliers like El Salvador have adopted it as
a recognized currency, but major economies, including Uncle Sam to
(16:32):
this day refused to recognize it as what's called legal tender.
And if you look at the if you if we
assume the perspective of countries and financial institutions, then we
can see how this idea, the skepticism and caution makes sense.
I mean, bitcoin potentially does a lot of things that
are dangerous. If you're happy, you know, at the top
(16:55):
of a financial or governmental regime, the citizens of your country,
we can undermine government authority because they can kind of
circumvent and skate around capital controls. Obviously, this can help
launder all sorts of things that can disguise criminal activity
for sure. And then the other thing, the third thing
(17:19):
that they don't say as much out loud officially, is
that potentially bitcoin and things like it could destabilize the
entirety of the existing global money regime, global financial infrastructure,
and then the irony there is. For the longest time,
the conversation from like you know, crypto bros and evangelists
(17:42):
has been this is an alternative to the crooked system
of capitalism that that is, that is legally you know, recognized. Uh,
and you know, you better get in while they getting
is good, they say, um, you know, because this is
gonna be the only game in town before you know it.
And as you don't, you want to, you know, protect
yourself from from the ebbs and flows and the whims
(18:02):
of of the FED and all that stuff. It's it's
not gonna follow any of those trends, right, that's the idea.
But and and that's the question, how long can this
thing last? Right? Uh? It could just be another currency
(18:24):
related bubble. This has definitely happened in the past, with
numerous things identified as currency by one civilization culture or another.
From day one, there were plenty of critics who were
certain that Bitcoin would eventually come crashing down, and now
it appears they just might be correct. What are we
(18:46):
talking about, We'll tell you after a word from our sponsor.
Here's where it gets crazy. Bitcoin crashed, feel what a
free fall? But like so did the stock market? You know,
(19:09):
I mean it's I think it's no, it's what we
were talking about earlier. I think there's Uh, I don't
know if there's a direct connection, but it certainly casts
a little bit of question into this whole notion that
bitcoin is bulletproof and crypto is its own thing, unconnected
to the rest of the economy, because these two things
kind of happened in tandem, you know. I mean, we
haven't experienced a full crash or a full recession, but
(19:29):
it sure feels like we're heading that way. But the
stock market isn't a currency, right if we're if the
statement was the dollar crashed, right, that would be applicable
to what's going on here. Right, there's a difference. It
feels like you're buying some kind of commodity, some kind
of you know, shares or stock when you're buying bitcoin,
(19:51):
I think the way it feels when you've got it,
because it's worth so much real world money. But it
is in itself a currency, I think, which it's That's
why it's weirding me out because we do think about
it as a stock market going up and down, but
in reality is the value of a currency, but the
value of like traditional currencies, they don't ebb and flow
(20:12):
the way cryptocurrencies and cryptocurrencies ebb and flow much more
like stocks, and and I believe are treated more speculatively
in the way that stocks are often treated. That's why
I think they're it's sort of in the middle, like
they're they're they're related but but different. But I see
exactly what you're saying appen. And so this brings us
to another another important issue. I want to paint the
(20:33):
scene here, so cash your memory back. By the end
of twenty one, big coin itself had fallen thirty from
its peak. Its peak was about sixty nine thousand dollars
seventy thousand dollars per coin, and it fell down to
forty seven thousand, six six dollars and eighty one cents. Ethereum,
(20:57):
which is sort of the Pepsi to the Coca cola
here also fell to three thousand, seven hundred sixty nine
seventy cents, And throughout a lot of January, much of
late January through let's call it late April, cryptocurrency and
(21:18):
general struggled, and Bitcoin was swinging back and forth. You know,
Edgar Allan Poe Pitt in the pendulum style. Sometimes it
was thirty five thousand, sometimes it was forty eight thousand.
And now, look, if you're an investor, this is your
what the f moment? But before anyone panics, we have
to know what that Bitcoin value has fluctuated before. To
(21:40):
your point, Matt, about treating something as a currency V
and investment, it would be weird if an investment did
not fluctuate to some degree. The crypto market, in fact,
has fallen by fifty percent or more on four different occasions,
including the current crypto winter of one two. Uh. But
(22:02):
is a little different now because back in the day
for a long time, Bitcoin was of the crypto market
until about so you could arguably just say the first
crypto winter really was a bitcoin winter. But this crash,
the one you're in now, has people worried, partially because
(22:23):
of the many other factors evolved, as well as the
extent where I should say, the timeline of the crash
it seems to be continuing. This is what is sometimes
called a free fall. Anyway, if we go back to
stay in one for a second, this is the first
time that a bitcoin associated industry announces layoffs job cuts.
(22:48):
April one, just a few days after everything goes to pot,
an outfit named bit Mex lays off of its employees.
Let's just fast forward to crash continues as of the
month we're recording this July two, both Bitcoin and ethereum
are down by more than sixty percent from their peak.
(23:12):
I want to shout out a couple of journalists in
this episode. One Tom Mitchell Hill, Tom I love your
last name, uh, is writing a coin Telegraph and said,
you know, just this past June, this means in real
terms that more than eighty thousand people who were millionaires
thanks to bitcoin are no longer millionaires. They're no longer
(23:36):
in the money. Yeah. That that. Uh. When I first
read an article from that outfit, I really thought it
was coin Telegraph, like really, but no, that that article.
It's pretty intense because I just give you a quick
rundown of those specifics there. Um, okay, So back on
(23:57):
November twelve, just uh, this is from the article by
Tom Mitchell Hill. Back on November twelve, just days after
bitcoin hit a new all time high of around sixty
nine thousand dollars. That been just mentioned, a little under
a hundred and nine thousand bitcoin addresses reported reported a
balance of greater than a million dollars. So an individual
(24:18):
address a wallet, right, So that's probably individuals, maybe a
few people having multiple ones, but that's a lot of people,
a hundred nine thousand who were at least a million
dollars worth in there. So you fast forward to today
that they were recording this and uh it says only
twenty six thousand, two hundred and eighty four addresses now
(24:42):
have holdings valued over a million dollars. So like eighty
thousand people just got wiped out. That's insane to think about.
It's wild. But also think how exponential the growth was.
Of course the decline is also going to be exponential.
I mean, so many of these people like made their
their their money by getting in at the right time,
(25:03):
and they didn't start with that much money. They invested
you know whatever, a respectable amount and it blossomed into
this crazy amount of money. But then if you bet
if the farm on those holdings, thinking it's just gonna
last forever, and you're leveraged against those holdings, that's something
you can do with crypto. You don't ever have to
cash out. A lot of people don't cash out. They
(25:24):
just leverage against it. You can borrow against it, you know,
they're they're exchanges or wallets rather like one called nexo
that allows you to leverage your holdings into zero interest
loans that then you pay back with little you know,
um hits little little taxes I guess on your holdings,
but you never actually have to cash out, because once
(25:46):
you cash out, then you're out of the system, and
then you're out of the game. But so the goal
for a lot of people is to stay in the system.
But of course when the hit like this happens, it's
also gonna be of epic proportions, you know, just like
the winds were and this is you know, the whales
got hit as well. I'll take the hit on that
(26:06):
one guy's because I snuck in a tongue tongue twister
in the In the notes, uh, there were per Mentchell
Hills reporting there were ten thousand, five eighty seven addresses
that had a minimum cash value of ten million US
dollars in November of last year, and now less than
(26:27):
half of them are still at that level. Only four thousand,
three and forty two hold the same status. So quick
cocktail napkin math. That's a fifty eight percent decline. And
another note for anybody who likes dancing on graves, please
don't be that I told you so. Guy to your
bitcoin friends, give them give him a couple of weeks.
(26:48):
You know, they've got a lot of stuff going on,
And how do we know these things? Well, the reason
we know them is that Bitcoin has something really interesting.
There is anonymity, but you can still due to the
nature of the interactions in this ecosystem, you can see
a dress like which addresses have certain amounts of coin?
(27:10):
And right now Bitcoin has been struggling to stay above
twenty thousand dollars US per coin. Now, uh, and like
you said, Matt, you see the decline with the people
holding a million. You see the descline with people holding
more than ten million. Now we have to ask what happened? Right?
It's questions so many people are asking, and we will
(27:30):
get into conspiratorial aspects here. But first, the best way
to say it is there are a couple of factors
we can point to with certitude, and there are several
other factors we can guess at. First things First, I'll
say this the big boys, big fish, they wanted some
more regulations. April one, the SEC starts swinging their h
(27:53):
mentionables around. The Securities and Exchange Commission of the u
S says, okay, guys, pump the breaks. We need to
put some regulations on these crypto agencies. And just that
just a financial superpower like the US moving toward a
regulatory environment made a lot of people sell off everything.
(28:16):
I guess they were like, let's get while they getting
is good. We'll support the cartels some other way. Get
back into fine art, where are loose diamonds all that jazz? Uh.
And then there's something that I, you know, I don't
know how familiar this is to a lot of people,
but there's something called stable coin. Stable Coin is a yeah,
(28:38):
it's a it's a crypto um crypto thing that can
occur in three different kind of buckets. So it's either
collateralized by cryptocurrencies, it's sort of based on other crypto,
or it's pegged to something like the Euro or the
US dollar, which means it's fiat backed. That's not a
(28:58):
hot take. Those are currencies. Or it relies entirely on
algorithms to maintain supply and demand, so it picks a
certain relationship to something like a dollar, and then it
just modifies on the back end everything to make it
maintain that value. Stable Coin is called stable coin because,
(29:20):
as you can imagine the idea, the main feature of
this is that it is not supposed to be subject
to all the wiles and whims of the marketplace, and
then that proved to be untrue. Luna Tara huge stable
coin crashed and this was such a this was such
a shock to the overall financial system of crypto that
(29:44):
when it plunged in value by eight percent, it rocked.
It rocked the foundations of the entire crypto market. So
that's one thing that happened. The stuff that was supposed
to be stable turned out not to be stable in
any case. And then, um, you know, we said the
sec started started paid interest. But in general, whether or
(30:07):
not you're in crypto, if you live in the US,
uncle Sam wants you to pay interest to what a
terrible segue. Now everything's bad. Uh, hikes and interest rates.
That's that's huge. Like we're talking about you mentioned earlier,
and all the idea of a recession historically, if you
look back in the span of you modern US civilization,
(30:30):
when interest rates start rising aggressively, it is it is
not proof, but it is definitely a sign that the
FED beliefs recession is on the horizon. So this hits
all the investment things, you all, most of the investment
vehicles you can think of. FED increases rates, stock market
(30:52):
and the crypto market have this huge downfall because ultimately,
you know, they're voting on articles of faith, right, it's
worth how much other people want it. So investors start
selling and this creates a blood bath in the crypto
market because the more people the secret of crypto is,
(31:14):
the more people who are selling off stuff in a
short time interval, uh, the less and less individual bitcoins
are worth. Yeah, it is interesting to um the link
between inflation and cryptocurrency because you know, in the same way,
a lot of folks have touted cryptocurrency to be sort
of resistant to some of the market trends that that
(31:36):
we're seeing, you know, hit the stock market and all
of that. Uh. Similarly, it's been said that that they're
resistance to inflation. So I marning with inflation kind of
going up, why aren't cryptocurrency is doing better? Um, you know,
it's a lot of it's a lot of factors, but
it is It is interesting that an additional thing to
(31:56):
to consider and then came financial trouble for a lot
of the companies that handle cryptocurrencies, the ones that are
actually exchanging things, that do other various things with bitcoin, uh,
that have lots and lots of employees because it's kind
of like Netflix if you think about a lot of
cry cryptocurrency companies. They've been staffing up like crazy historically
(32:20):
because there's just gains and gains and gains and gains,
so they need more human beings to do more work.
And then when these crashes happen, these winters come through,
it gets cold and they gotta they gotta get rid
of all these new people they've hired because their overhead
becomes too expensive, which was the case with Celsius Network.
This is one of those decentralized finance outfits, the things
(32:42):
we've been talking about. They said they were putting a
freeze on all crypto transactions, which is never good, right.
That's like when you freeze the stock market because stuff
is going downhill. Guys, we gotta stop trading, uh, Which
has happened right? Well? I I you know again to
your point that this to your it's your beautiful point
about currency versus investment. I would say a more immediate analogy,
(33:07):
even more impactful, would be the idea of banks not
allowing cash withdrawals or withdrawals or transfers to other financial institutions.
When that happens. It's what what we could rightly call
bad bad, it's it's double plus un good. So if
you're banking at the Celsius network, then this is this
(33:29):
is your wells Fargo saying we know you have money,
you just can't have it because we don't have it. Yeah,
that's the kind of stuff that happened like during the
Great Depression. That's that's a real bell weather of things
to come. Yeah, and and post something like that where
there is some kind of freeze, often not always as
we saw with Game Stop and some of the some
(33:50):
of the other weirdness that happened in the stock market, well, uh,
not that long ago. But what what happens after one
of those is a massive sell off. And that is
indeed what occurred of the Celsius network. Uh. And there
are a bunch of other companies that went through like
real rocky, real rocky month. Yeah. Yeah, And it's a
(34:12):
real rocky month that appears to be going much longer
than thirty days. It's a it's a non ending month.
I don't know if it ever resolved. Um, but a
buddy of mine had some stuff in Celsius, and I
think as far as he what he was getting for
message wars and some maybe like more seasoned crypto people,
was that don't hold your breath. Yeah. Unfortunately others would
(34:36):
follow suit a lot of this. Uh. Really, if you
look back on some of our previous work on this show,
you'll what you'll see is the danger of feedback loops
and they can happen in any financial sphere. Shortly after
our good friends at Celsius make their announcement, which they
by the way, they cited as a result of consequence
(35:00):
of extreme market conditions. Shortly after they do this, another
crypto exchange finance, which have all heard of if you're
involved in blockchain and bitcoin, they do the same, but
they say their freeze on bitcoin withdrawls was quote due
to a stuck transaction causing a backlog, and originally they
(35:20):
said this will take thirty minutes to fix. Spoiler, it
took longer than thirty minutes in the case of bitcoin specifically.
Experts are arguing something that I agree with wholeheartedly. This
is a symptom of a larger global economic climate. BBC
did a great job with this. Uh. They we pulled
(35:43):
some quotes from this. They said procession looms, inflation, is
soaring interest rates, arising living costs, are biting a little
bit of accidental freestyle there, I like it. Stock markets
are wobbling to with the U, S, S and P
five hundred now in a bearer market, meaning that a
down from where it was. And they point out, we'll
(36:04):
just summarize this part that as a result of this,
in a more hostile financial climate, even the really big investors,
like the people who don't really have jobs the way
normal people do, the people who just move money around
and live off the interest, they are less free with
their spending and investing. And that means that if you
(36:26):
are an ordinary investor rank and file, you're not you
don't own a hedge fund, you're not a corporation, you're
just you're just a schmuck. Then you have less money
in general to invest in anything. So why would you
invest in something that's not regulated, that doesn't have certain constraints.
From this perspective, we see the argument becoming something like
(36:50):
the same lack of regulation that make crypto so sexy
and appealing also for many investors makes it too unpredictable espec. Actually,
in times of austerity, do you want to buy something
that used to be sixty dollars. Now it's twenty dollars,
and just sort of roll the dice on whether it
will ever be sixty dollars and a penny like al right,
(37:14):
at twenty a penning might be more fair. So this
feedback loop has been created. Bitcoin's value is tied to
its desirability. The more people sell, whatever their reason might be,
the less bitcoin is worth. More people see the value decrease,
maybe they sell as well, they cut their losses, they
(37:37):
get out of the game, but it's too late. They're
perpetuating that feedback cycle. Bitcoin has no tangible assets underpinning it.
This is true. It means literally that the prices only
defined by what people are prepared to buy it for.
And then to your point, Matt, about Domino's falling coin base.
(37:59):
Later in June announced their own layoffs. They let go
of eight percent of their workforce. And when they did
this in their announcement, they didn't just say extreme market conditions.
They used the term crypto winter. And if you are
interested in this, I would highly recommend reading that official statement.
(38:21):
I thought it was transparent, I thought it was to
the point um and I don't think it was good news.
Nose terrible news. And coin Based Global Incorporated, which is
a wonderful name, isn't the only one that was laying
off people. There was also Crypto dot Com, Gemini, Trust,
block Fi Incorporated. All of these companies had huge numbers
(38:43):
of layoffs. And you know, just what, as you think
about coin Base, this is one of the biggest names
out there in in the crypto game. It what is
it had to lay off eighteen percent of its workforce
one thousand, two hundred people. Like, that's a lot of layoffs.
I mean. Also Crypto dot Com, which is probably the
(39:05):
most recognizable one because they literally named the Staples Center
after they had some pretty significant layoffs too. So everybody's
getting everybody's getting a little bit of the splashback. Actually
they're getting a lot a bit of the splashback. And
this is worrisome because with each announcement, with each decision,
each layoff, each sell off, the loop exacerbates, right, the
(39:30):
pace quickens, and so you have to wonder eventually where
the floor will be. But for many of us listening today,
many of our fellow conspiracy realists, this doesn't feel like
the whole explanation you might be thinking Okay, guys, come on,
what really happened? We'll pause, we'll tackle this after a
(39:50):
word from our sponsors. Okay, here is a conspiracy theory.
I don't know if you all have read this, but
I enjoyed it. It's from Reddit. I want to shout out,
juicy juice juice not spelled the way you think it's.
(40:11):
It's fun. Yes, yeah, juicy juice um soon to be
Pulitzer Prize winning juicy juice juice. No. Seriously, I thought
this was a really fascinating idea. I've been uh following
along with some contacts who are listening today. I've been
following the uh the whole game stop Wall Street stuck
stuff for a while now, and this conspiracy theory really
(40:37):
interested me. The idea is juicy juice Juice is asking
what if Krypto was purposely created to hide asset inflation,
making another financial path for the US dollar to pass
through inflating new different assets Like what if the full
quote then you can see this another media. The full
(40:58):
quote is Crypto creates the perfect trading vehicle for a
short time before becoming the scapegoat for whatever crash is coming.
If this is true, it would essentially mean that crypto
either became or was explicitly created to function as a scapegoat.
You know, it's getting pumped up into a bubble to
(41:20):
absorb ordinary existing inflationary pressure. That's a cool if that's true,
that's a really impressive shell game. But it's currently very
difficult to prove and it would also, let's be honest,
it would require some incredibly smart, dedicated people with an
(41:40):
insanely sophisticated level of cooperation. I haven't seen proof for
it yet. That doesn't mean it doesn't exist. It take
a ton of cooperation, or would it. I mean, you
just think about the seven eight crash, and that all
had to do with the amount of exposure big institutions had, right,
the amount of money they had invested or tied up
(42:03):
with subprime assets and packages. Right. Um, in this case,
if there when a major, major crash happens in the
stock market rather than in the cryptocurrency world, you could blame,
you know, the collapse of other major investing institutions on
their exposure to cryptocurrency, because we know those major institutions
(42:27):
are are investing more and more of their money into cryptocurrency,
not a ton of it right, not enough to play
the scapegoat, I don't think, but I know they are
investing millions of dollars. I mean, I think that's a
valid point. Matt the there. I still have some issues
with this though. I think it's really clever. And I
(42:49):
will admit a little bit of a personal bias here
because I missed the YouTube days where somebody with a
name like surf Daddy sixty nine whole hand x x
x would make a great point about the gold standard
in the eighteen hundreds. It would be able to write
back and say like, oh, that's a great point, uh,
surf Daddy sixty nine x x x or whatever. Uh.
(43:12):
But juicy Juice Juice does bring up I'm going to
say that name is mutations, right. Um makes a good point,
and I think you make a good point to their
The issue is that one would have to sort of
you can imagine the circumstances that would lead to that,
(43:33):
but we would have to if we were to prove
that we would we would just need some more right,
which is why juicy juice juice is astute. When they
call it a theory at this point, there's another crazy theory.
I don't know how much time we want to spend
on this one. But there's this idea that Russia may
(43:54):
have added some high octane fuel to the fire because
of their central bank statements. Russia's central bank came out
not too long ago and demanded a blanket ban across
the board on not only any crypto trading, but any
crypto mining. They wanted to cut it off, to cauterize it,
(44:16):
to amputate it from the system. They more or less
called bitcoin a pyramid scheme, and they said, look, if
we keep messing with bitcoin, it's gonna pose a risk
to the financial severenity of our nation. Which is funny
because you would think with all the problems Russia has
been having with things like Swift in other parts of
(44:39):
the global banking system, they would welcome decentralized thing like
a cryptocurrency, right, wouldn't logically makes sense? I mean yet
to me, like, I don't know, I don't, I'm not
the right person. I think the whole thing is a
Ponzi scheme. Hey man, I got this magical thing. You
should buy it? How much is it? I don't know? Okay, awesome?
(45:03):
And then that present, Hey, check us out, how this
thing I got you should buy it. How much is it?
I don't know, twelve dollars? Okay? Great? And it works.
It works so well until you're the person at the end.
But now now we have to ask, like why does okay,
why does Russia's opinion matter? You know what I mean?
(45:23):
Like what if what if Bhutan or Canada or Chile
or something, what if they said we don't like crypto?
So far, the only people have been unavowed Lee on
board with it or else Salvador and I hope it
works out for that country. But Russia's opinion matters more
than most because for a time they were the third
(45:45):
largest bitcoin mining hub in the world. So if they're
getting out of the game, that has a definite impact.
And this is long and short of it. These are
some of the conspiracies, These are some of the true factors,
the things we can improve. Um, we have to ask,
we have to close bask and what does this mean
for the future. For a lot of experts, a lot
(46:07):
of what Corporate America would call leaders in the space,
this crypto winter, unlike the previous three, seems set to
continue for some time. I found a lot of estimates
that commonly projected this would last for about two years
or so, But every reliable estimate or gues estimate about
(46:30):
that that I found at least did note it's very
difficult to make a solid guest here due to all
the non crypto variables involved. You know, like what about
the role of climate change? Does that affect it? People
don't know yet. Um And in an effort to be positive,
I do want to point out this may not necessarily
(46:51):
be all bad news. If a bunch of people get
out of crypto, and and then maybe that will up
your chances of getting the GPUs that you wanted, or
getting the chips that you need, or buying products that
have those chips. So maybe you can't get a PS five.
And also, if the price of bitcoin goes down, it's
(47:12):
obvious they're going to be more people who might be
interested in buying it while it's low, so there might
be more of what are called whole coiners. I never
heard that phrase before. Whole coiners just means people with
one or more whole bitcoins in their wallet, because I
think it's pretty it's pretty common nowadays for people to
have a percentage of a bitcoin right like slice, not
(47:34):
many have to drop into a whole coin in one
go like that. I mean, yeah, that's it's just weird
to me because for so many individuals crypto has become
almost a retirement account. I was reading an article from
The Guardian written by a Syrian kale Um, and it
(47:57):
was just discussing the real human impact, the emotional like
physical impact that the crash has been having on people. Um,
because it did at least for quite a time there,
and it still does for a lot of people. Um
seem like this is the way you could retire early,
Like take some of your whatever excess savings you make,
(48:18):
if you've got any, and invested in your bitcoin wallet
or your theorum or whatever it is wallet, and hopefully
that will continue to grow into a point where you've
got enough money to retire in like five ten years,
maybe even maybe in less time than that, depending on
how high the ceiling is. But a big thing too
in the I think maybe an investing community in general
(48:40):
is when in doubt zoom out. Um. So you know,
there have been dips like this in the past, maybe
not quite this so severe. But also let's remember that
cryptocurrency is still a really young thing compared to like
the stock market, and we certainly have seen the stock
market go horrible, horrible, terrifying places over the you know,
(49:00):
many many more years, and it's been around um, so
you can always just look at that graph and just
pull it out and you'll see those little ebbs and
flows that look much more like tiny little blips rather
than a huge, massive swings. Well said, guys, this this
is where, this is where we're at now, and this
is sort of the beginning. We may need to follow
(49:23):
up in future Strange News segment, or maybe we come
back and see if all the fears were unfounded and alarmist.
Maybe maybe we'll get to learn the real identity of Setoshi,
in which case we're totally throwing the rest of our
schedule out the window and and trying to interview him
(49:44):
or them or they or her or whomever used to
work at the Puzzle Palace and invented this daddy, lads,
and he said, I'm aid my bones off this, I
got I got that what twelve billion dollars or have
(50:04):
a many billion dollar mansion? Oh gosh, yeah, And it's
so you know, okay, I don't want to judge people's taste.
It's your mansion. Decorated how you want, but there's something
to be said for subtlety and aesthetic. I do want
to close this out today with so I don't know
if this will be a recurring segment where it's just
(50:25):
a one and done, but we read so much fantastic
work by so many people that Matt Noel Michigan control.
If you all are okay with it, I'd like to
do a little sound cue at an honorable mention. Our
honorable mention today goes to Zoe kleinman Is writing over
(50:48):
at the BBC guy. Zoe had my probably my favorite
beginning line of all the stuff I've read uh in
in this endeavor, like over the years. With bitcoin, Zoe says,
the first rule of writing about bitcoin is don't write
about bitcoin. The story of the world's best known cryptocurrency
is astonishingly fast moving, and its fans will soon line
(51:11):
up to tell you you've got it all wrong. So
there you have it, adorable mentioned is zone looking forward
to the feedback. I'm sure I was. I've been down
in this episode and it's just I'm sorry reading it.
Maybe it is just reading about so much of this
and another crash like this um specifically that Guardian article
and one from Bloomberg by Emily Nicole and Olga Careif.
(51:34):
It's just like pretty brutal. It just makes me feel
like somehow, somewhere, individual humans are being taken advantage of
by the hype beast that is cryptocurrency and n f
T s and all all this stuff that's just out there.
It's just people get so into it and they become acolytes.
Not like you're talking about the people who have those
(51:55):
phrases that sound like they should be on a you know,
on a little sign in your grandmother's kitchen or something.
It's like whatever, what was it? Don't what was it?
Jump zoom? Something about zooming? Or like hold the what
is it? The one that's like, don't ever sell diamond hands. See,
there's just like all of this, all this stuff. It's
(52:16):
like a cult. It's like this thing that's just like
it's designed to get everybody else into your thing, to
have these code words and cash phrases that make everybody
else want to be a part of that thing because
oh that's cool. I want to know what that phrase means.
I want to use that phrase on a regular basis
because or at least be able to say that and
not feel silly. I don't know that. This whole thing
(52:37):
is just really bothering me. Sorry, crypto fans, I just
don't get it, and I don't I don't really like it. Well,
we're gonna see what develops right now. That's where we're at.
A new crypto winter is upon society. No one is
quite sure how it we'll pan out and less of
course there's something they don't want you to know, But
(52:59):
you know what we want to know, folks, We will
tell you. We want to know what you think. Is
there something more to this story? Is this just the
you know, the danger of large scale financial systems? Is
someone trying to sink crypto? Those are allegations we had
heard as well. We can't wait to hear your thoughts.
We endeavor to be easy to find online, we sure do.
(53:21):
You can find us on Twitter, you can find us
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(53:43):
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(54:04):
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(54:24):
I don't know if it will be a funny message,
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you said, Matt, we do have a phone number. It
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Call in. You'll have a familiar voice telling you you're
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(54:44):
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(55:07):
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(55:37):
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