July 16, 2025 • 70 mins
Marty sits down with Pascal Hügli to discuss his co-authored book "Bitcoin Enlightenment," exploring how the abandonment of the gold standard created our current era of monetary relativism and why Bitcoin represents a return to economic reality and individual sovereignty.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
You've had a dynamic where money has become freer than free.
(00:10):
You talk about a Fed just gone nuts.
All the central banks going nuts.
So it's all acting like safe haven.
I believe that in a world where central bankers are tripping over themselves to devalue their currency,
Bitcoin wins.
In the world of fiat currencies, Bitcoin is the victor.
I mean, that's part of the bull case for Bitcoin.
(00:31):
If you're not paying attention, you probably should be.
How can we tie tennis to Bitcoin?
I think one thing you just said, it's a mental battle.
You're all by yourself on an island.
Yeah, that's true.
Yeah, how can we tie it?
How can we tie tennis into Bitcoin?
(00:52):
Well, this is actually, this is a great segue.
you were just talking about tennis Wimbledon final was yesterday center beat Alcazar and
as God was just explaining to me he's been getting into tennis and it's a transition
for you because you played soccer your whole life team sport high contact moved to tennis
(01:15):
one-on-one mental battle I feel like this is something Bitcoiners know all too well the the
internal mental battle you're basically know something that most people in your immediate life
do not understand or grok and you're constantly battling volleying with them trying to explain why
(01:36):
bitcoin can lead to a potential enlightenment which you wrote a whole book about yeah yeah
exactly now that's actually a good way to segue into this yeah i mean the mental struggle is real
with Bitcoin for sure.
You know, I mean, I've experienced it my entire life
or like my entire life,
like the last nine years, I would say, you know,
(01:56):
like it's just been, yeah, you come across this thing.
It really dawns on you.
And for me, I have to say like my Bitcoin story
is really because I've been into Austrian economics.
I was really curious during my university year.
So it did click once I found it,
which wasn't that early, 2015-ish or something,
You know, when I was, I think I told you last time I was in Auburn, Alabama at the Mises U summer school and it clicked for me immediately, you know, and I was like, I was, yeah, I was hooked from the first second.
(02:28):
And then obviously, yeah, just grasping everything.
The more you get to know, you want to talk to people about Bitcoin and they just sometimes, they just don't care, you know, and then you have to sort of talk to yourself.
And every now and then, if we have the all time highs that people come and they ask about Bitcoin and how to make a quick buck.
(02:48):
And you're like, well, now is not actually the time I want to tell you about it.
Why haven't you come a little earlier?
And then, you know, it's just this really this struggle.
And at some time, at some point I was like, OK, better just stick to myself, you know, do my podcast, maybe do a group of people that maybe want to join me and follow along.
(03:08):
And I'm still sort of here in Switzerland, I have a small following of a couple of hundred people, but they are now really interested.
And obviously they have had the mental journey as well and have tagged along.
But for everybody else, it's just, yeah, I feel like I could have, with the curiosity that I have, at least in my friend circle and stuff, I could have helped maybe other people financially.
(03:36):
but in the end it's also not it's not it's not my obligation you know if people don't want
but that's that's the thing and that's why i i just always try to yeah be my own call coach and
and learn more and that's what tennis is about you know you just nobody you can talk to coaches
but in the end it's with every sport but with tennis particularly you know you really have to
(04:01):
go go into the flow and at some point you feel like now now i'm getting it you know and
it just becomes natural and so that's that's that's the amazing part about it as well
yeah you reach a level of zen where you where you know the basics you put in your 10 000 hours
and you could just sort of operate that's where i feel like today especially as it pertains to
(04:24):
bitcoin i found my bitcoin zen we're meeting at another all-time high currently sitting like right
under $122,000 per Bitcoin, which is hard to, it's not really hard to imagine when it's like,
we all think this day is going to come. And we've been proclaiming that it's going to come for many
years, but now it's here, it's like, holy crap, Bitcoin's $122,000. Yeah. I mean, the excitement
(04:51):
isn't like, that's what I sometimes get, you know, people who are close to me that are like,
dude, you don't seem to be as excited anymore, you know, as you used to be. And obviously this
is probably also some sort of marginal return or declining marginal you not not utility but
something is like obviously when it was in 2017 and we had this first push you know where where
(05:16):
i was involved i was yeah like stupidly even making videos to some of my closest friends you
know like head banging my head uh to the all the meme songs that we had and i pulled them up every
now and then on my iPhone, they're like, dude, what was I doing here? And nowadays it's like,
that's what I hear. Where's the excitement? And I feel like a lot of Bitcoin or you and others
(05:40):
for sure as well feel that it's like, yeah, it's the vindication obviously, but we're so mentally
in that, in this thing that we're like, yeah, it always had to come that way. It had to,
the fulfillment was pre-programmed, so to say, and now it's actually happening. And so maybe,
yeah it's this meme you know with the candle you go like okay 122k and now let's go next all-time
(06:05):
high when it's coming yeah there's a diminishing marginal return on dopamine hits you get from
from bitcoin pumps over the years that's probably it exactly yeah you get to your zen zen state and
it's like okay it's happening let's try to usher as many people onto the lifeboat as possible while
we can not be too pushy but put the content out there it is here if you want it writing it and
(06:30):
that's what i mean diving fully and transitioning fully into the bitcoin enlightenment um i'm still
waiting to get my hard copy but you guys did have uh a chapter available on uh the safe house so i
read that this morning took some notes and i guess let's just start before we jump into
(06:52):
maybe we can talk about chapter four the economic murder of god but it's the book overall you co-wrote
it with um ricardo salinas and um one other gentleman whose names daniel jung and he's a
swiss uh fellow colleague of mine yeah yeah so you daniel and ricardo got together how did you
three connect yeah why why this book specifically yeah it's sort of a weird story i mean uh me and
(07:19):
Daniel, we've been longtime friends.
I've been in Bitcoin.
I sort of maybe orange-pilled him.
One of the people I managed to orange-pill because he has this natural curiosity as well.
And at some point, he was like, you're in this Bitcoin thing.
Can you tell me more?
And then he got interested in himself and did his own sort of study and stuff.
And so we've just been longtime friends.
(07:41):
And then we started our journey as digital nomads, sovereign individuals, where me, my
wife and him, because again, he was just the one really tagging along.
We asked some other people if they would join us on this journey, and he was the only one
that would really come along.
And so we went to all these different places all over the world, experiencing what Bitcoin
(08:02):
culture is like in these countries like Pakistan, Argentina, other countries.
And one of the countries was Mexico as well.
And I was Googling to see if I could interview or talk to any interesting people who are in
Bitcoin in these countries. And in Mexico, it was Ricardo Salinas that obviously was all over
the internet when you Googled for a Bitcoiner, a real Bitcoiner. And I was like, wow, that's an
(08:26):
interesting dude. He's the owner of 24 companies still. His conglomerate is 170K employees all over
Latin America, mostly Mexico, and I think into the US as well. And so I was like, really impressive
that somebody like of his ranking and status could really have the time to also focus on
(08:50):
Bitcoin and be that knowledgeable.
From what I read online, and that's why it piqued my interest, I reached out to him and
his team and had to do a couple of rounds until they sort of figured out, okay, that
dude knows one or two things about libertarianism, about Austrian economics, topics he's interested
in as well.
(09:10):
And that's why he then said, okay, you can come to the headquarters and we do an interview. And we did that interview with him, got sort of viral on YouTube, went really well. And so that's why the book was born, because I then followed up and asked, would you be interested in sort of co-authoring a book with us? And he was like, yeah, yeah, sure, let's do this.
(09:32):
And then we had a couple of more back and forth with him.
In the end, we were the ones writing it, putting in the hard work in terms of like really doing the typing and everything.
And we just spun a lot of the sentences and ideas in the books off of his sort of ideas that he shared with us.
And we were just impressed, even though, as I said, he doesn't have that much time on his hand with all the companies.
(09:57):
He's still pretty well informed and just an amazing dude.
And so, yeah, that's how it came about.
And just for us, obviously, a great opportunity to do something like this with a person of his profile.
Yeah.
And I mean, this has been a theme or a sub-theme within Bitcoin for a while.
(10:19):
People, like I truly believe that Bitcoin is one of the most revolutionary pieces of technology,
specifically monetary technology that humanity has come into contact with in quite some time.
innovation on par with the internet steam engine printing press name your pivotal technological
advancement over the last two millennia and bitcoin i think stands on the pantheon of those
(10:45):
sort of demarcation technologies and i do truly believe in fix the money fix the world is
is something we say a lot here at tftc it's outside of our studio in austin bitcoin fixes this
is a very popular meme and i think it's one that when i put out there gets the most pushback
(11:09):
it's like bitcoin doesn't fix everything like that we're not going to fix if we fix the money
it doesn't mean we fix the world there's so many other bigger problems and i agree bitcoin directly
is not going to solve these problems but i do think indirectly falling back to like economics
101, positive and negative externalities exist as a concept. And I think the negative externalities
(11:34):
that emanate from a broken monetary system do inevitably touch everything. And so if you can
fix that problem at the core of the system, which is money, money is one half of every transaction,
arguably the most important tool we use as humans like if you can fix that core issue and turn those
(11:57):
negative externalities into positive externalities you can begin to fix everything and i think
getting to that point of understanding does
uh it it sort of you need to have this enlightenment moment personally to get to that point
(12:18):
yeah before you even get to that enlightenment point most importantly and what i can grok from
chapter four from the book is you have to understand how everything got broken and the
core of the system yeah exactly yeah or yeah no that's true maybe maybe to your point when it
comes to like the does bitcoin fix everything i mean that's the question that i've been grappling
(12:41):
with myself for quite some time and even writing the book you know like like really okay on what
levels does it really fix things you know and maybe maybe this is something i'm still grappling
with as i said you know and and even writing the book like maybe sometimes bitcoin get over their
skis as well in terms of what it actually fixes, you know, and, and, or I have to put it this way.
(13:07):
I'm like, I had really had to, in the book as well, that's what we did differentiate between
different levels, you know, the individual one, like where it can really for, for, for like
individuals like me, you and others, you can really say like fix stuff, you know, and, and,
and help them to, to turn a better life and stuff. Societally, I'm, I'm with you in the sense of like,
(13:30):
if the core foundation is really broken, a lot of things emanate from that, which are really bad.
But at the same time, writing the book, doing the research, really digging deep into monetary
history as well, and kind of figuring out how amazingly big or even like frighteningly big
the government's sort of grapple or how would I say, strangle of money has always been. That's
(13:57):
something that really impressed me as well. The state always really had this overarching hand over
money. And even though there's like two stories to money, with the market emerging money,
governments always wanted to co-op money and they have always. And so long story short, I'm still
sort of at the point where I'm like, okay, will we really be fixing it on a societal
(14:22):
sort of level?
Or is Bitcoin just really the tool that challenges the old system, but maybe never really supplants
it?
But I mean, that's maybe a story for another day, so to say.
But that's why we also then really hard separated the topics in the book, that we said, okay,
(14:46):
we want to talk to the individual and really show the individual what has gone wrong.
on a societal level and then how he can really save himself.
And then we do speculate about a little bit the societal aspects
and where he might be going, but there we're a lot less sure
in the sense of like, okay, hyper-pricanization will really mean
(15:08):
that everything else, all the fiat currencies, everything will go extinct.
And so, yeah, that's sort of the separation we make in the book.
But as you said it really important to really obviously then also show the individual where things went wrong and why he experiencing what he experiencing you know like uh yeah that because a lot of people feel that
(15:31):
something with money is wrong but they just really can't really articulate and that's what we try to
do as well yeah and so if you were to try to pinpoint exactly where in chapter four you talk
about two monetary sins which is the creation of the central bank and the abandonment of the gold
standard does the story of corruption of that monetary system start with the introduction of
(15:56):
central banks or as you go further back you're mentioning government control yeah over money
where would you say the the corruption of the system began well i mean yeah that's that's really
hard to pinpoint in the end as i said i i believe that human beings probably also crave some sort of
authority and just some sort of fiat structure. And they have always, you know, and that's what I
(16:20):
mean when we go back in history. But it never could really get out of hand until maybe the
foundation or the establishment of the central bank, you know. And that's when you look historically
exactly, governments, they were around, they were messing with money, you know, with different
gold currencies that they sort of debased. We all know the story, you know, all the Bitcoiners know.
(16:43):
And we delve into all of this and really try to show that this has been a historic constant for people who might not know this, you know, culminating maybe in something called the Great Depression or the Great Debasement.
Sorry, that's what it was called, you know, in England when some of the kings were really going full fiat already back then, you know, debasing the gold coins and the silver coins.
(17:10):
And there's this interesting story, actually something that we learned from Ricardo himself, because he was always reciting this.
It was really Henry VIII, I think, was this king back then, you know, and he was debasing the English currency back then as well.
And people didn't know that this was happening.
But then at some point they figured it out because the coins, he would then really remelt them, obviously.
(17:35):
And they had like a core, which was out of copper and just sort of a silver coating.
And because they had his face on it as well, on the coin itself, there was like this little
nose that came a little further apart from the coin, so to say.
And when that was rubbing against like the bags that the money was kept in, it came off,
(17:59):
you know, the silver coating came off.
And then you saw the copper coming here, the copper nose, so to say.
And that's why this King Henry VIII, he went down as Sir Henry Coppernose.
And that's really when people figured it out that he was tricking them.
And so that was always the case.
But it wasn't until the foundation of the central bank where this really got institutionalized.
(18:25):
And we called it the first sort of monetary sin, exactly, because then they really found the way to perpetuate, you know, to continuously stealing from the public by having this entity that could finance wars and then also where they could bring in the private sector as well, you know, because the Central Bank, the Bank of England was really this sort of private entity in the beginning.
(18:53):
And it sort of merged then with the king.
And it was this hybrid.
And until today, we have these discussions going on, you know, with the Federal Reserve in the US.
Is it private? Is it public?
But it's this weird hybrid thing.
And this was already the case with the Bank of England.
And so, yeah, for us, this was really the starting point because everything else followed from it.
(19:15):
You know, the development of the bond market, the currency, the public currency.
And it all is so instrumental in making this institutionalized money printing that we have possible.
And so we called it and said it started with the establishment of the Bank of England.
Yeah. And the second monetary sin is the abandonment of the gold standard, which set us clearly down the civilizational path towards fiat.
(19:46):
and you put a Nietzschean lunge on it,
cutting gold's golden anchor is akin to killing God.
I'm so interested to hear you elaborate on that.
Yeah, exactly.
Well, exactly.
I mean, the first thing was the establishing of the Bank of England
and this really had to then go a long way in establishing,
(20:08):
as we said, public bond markets
where you could really borrow from the public
and you don't have to go to all these private people again
And then you could also have the central bank like secretly buying up the bonds and everything.
So that was all going on. But obviously, there was always this gold anchor remaining, you know,
and with every war in the US and then also during the Napoleonic Wars and stuff,
(20:32):
countries sometimes went off the gold standard because it was really this sort of hinge, you know,
or the shackles that was holding them back. And at some point they just went full fiat. And that's
That's what we then called the economic murder of God, you know, in 1971.
And Bitcoiners obviously know this all too well.
But we then wanted to put a sort of philosophical framing around it as well, because I studied political philosophy in university, obviously read Nietzsche and was always interested in hearing what he had to say.
(21:07):
And for me, he was really so visionary in the sense that he said, well, he was describing what was happening.
A lot of people think Nietzsche is like an atheist and he was really against God.
And I don't even know if he was, but I think he was just describing a system and human beings were sort of fostering that.
(21:28):
And the same is with money, you know.
And then there is this book where he writes about this dude with the lantern, you know, that's what we quote in the book.
It is this guy who runs to the marketplace and he's like, we killed God.
We killed God.
Where will we find him?
What would we do?
And all the people laugh at that guy.
And then he really rambles this amazing sort of text, you know, where he says, who are
(21:54):
we that we wipe away the horizon with a sponge?
We kill the sun, you know, no more anchor.
We don't know.
Are we going up?
Are we going down?
Are we going sideways?
And when I read this, and he obviously, Nietzsche himself didn't, at least to my knowledge, make any connection to the money, but it all reads so clearly.
(22:15):
And you could just apply it to the money, you know, because that's what happened when we really unhinged fiat from gold.
You know, that was something we hear today quite often like, OK, is Bitcoin going up or is fiat going down?
We don't know.
You know, it's sort of the price signals are all distorted.
And so I think even Nietzsche unknowingly called it and the same we quote Dostoevsky, another guy, you know, Russian writer who said like, if God is dead, everything is permitted, everything is allowed.
(22:49):
And obviously it's the same.
If gold is gone, then fiat is full fiat and everything is allowed.
And then we see what springs from that.
All the meme coins, all the shitcoin trading, all the companies that have no value but trade at immense, highly PEs and stuff.
So yeah, there is a philosophical angle to this for sure.
(23:10):
And that's what we tried to explore in this chapter four that you mentioned.
no and it was uh it was very happy to see sort of that thread in chapter four and i was reading it
because independently last week when the price went up to like 118 i tweeted out like this is
great and the price goes up obviously it feels good as an individual bitcoiner because you're
(23:37):
being validated something you've been screaming for the rooftops for for myself for the better
more than a decade now at this point like it is being validated in real time but more importantly
the price signal is a fact is a signal that other people are getting it to we're getting closer
to the point where we're bringing back monetary sanity to the world and i did specifically use
(24:02):
the phrase like we're going to anchor the global economy back to reality which i think many people
don't realize and they they intuit it they understand it that that things are wrong and
things are getting more expensive and uh even though we live in this incredibly advanced
technologically advanced society with the internet we're streaming from different parts of the world
(24:26):
right now we'll upload this and high definition later on will be distributed globally um and the
cost to do so is very low but even so there are still these negative externalities that
have emerged throughout society you see them in deaths of despair here in the united states how
unhealthy people are there is an argument to be made that some people are getting stupider
(24:51):
we've got birth rate decline in developed countries around the world and it just feels
like there's this this odd feeling that we're untethered from from reality and all these
negative things are extending from that but i do hope that bitcoin adoption increasing which is
evident by the price going up um does send the signal like okay this is the money we should be
(25:17):
organizing around and if enough people do that you can anchor back to reality bring opportunity cost
back to the economy and force better capital allocation decisions that that lead to
better outcomes for everybody.
And I think you guys dive into this in chapter four too,
but I think the best way to describe
the sort of intuited knowledge that things are wrong,
(25:41):
but you can't really put your finger on it,
is the fact that we live in a world
that is measuring things with Wittgenstein's ruler,
which is something that you guys write about.
Yes.
It's hard to be anchored to reality
when you have the measuring standard of things.
The rule that you use to measure the inputs
(26:05):
that you base your decisions off of is constantly changing,
so that leads to bad decisions at the end of the day.
Yeah, exactly.
Because of this economic murder of God,
because the foundation or the monetary truth or reality was sort of murdered,
we then entered this age of monetary relativism.
(26:26):
That's what we call it, you know, and that really follows from it.
And it's exactly it's this Nassim Taleb quote, you know, the Wittgenstein's ruler.
I mean, he elaborated on this on his book and it's sad to see him nowadays shitting on Bitcoin as well,
but because he would be among the ones who should really get it.
But he had this quote, you know, saying like, really, I have it here.
(26:47):
unless you have confidence in the rules reliability,
if you use a rule to measure a table,
you may also be using the table to measure the ruler.
The less you trust the rules reliability,
the more information you are getting about the ruler and the less about the
table itself, you know, and, and that's exactly the problem, you know?
And, and so it's, it's really like if, if you, if you have sort of,
(27:11):
if you wanted to measure the length of a meter stick by using a rubber band,
that's the same thing, you know, because the rubber band is just too elastic.
And so you don't know in the end, okay, what is it?
How long is it really? What's the right measurement?
And so there's all these sort of analogies that you can in the end draw.
(27:33):
I mean, we had now this cover, you can see, you know,
it's really like the dark age in lightning.
we also had the idea of a lighthouse, you know, maybe with Bitcoin being really in a roaring sea,
because that's the other thing. Like, yeah, if you are on a roaring boat tossing in the high seas
and up and down, and then you don't really know, okay, what's up, what's down, you need some sort
(27:56):
of lighthouse, which is Bitcoin, you know, absolutely scarce. So you can measure things
against and uh yeah it's just amazing that this nowadays exists and people like you and others
are building these uh i saw i don't remember the name you know but uh this uh add-on that you can
now use to to measure everything against bitcoin and i think that's that's so important for people
(28:17):
to really figure out what's happening here you know and now we have it we can actually do this
which is amazing yeah opportunity cost opportunitycost.app if you want to add the add-on or
extension to your browser it does it's crazy i've been in bitcoin for a while now and it wasn't until
i built the extension and started using it like even myself having been in it is jarring when you
(28:42):
price everything in bitcoin on the internet it really does induce that sense of okay i need to
make sure that i'm really honing in on my expenses making sure that i'm saving in bitcoin as much as
possible. Yeah. No. And I mean, maybe just to add to this, you know, in the end, this is really the
(29:02):
problem. If monetary relativism, you don't know what's happening, then again, a lot of things will
follow from this, you know, and we have this other sub chapter in chapter four, where we talk about
the financialization of society, also not the first to do this, you know, but we just wanted to really
right on show that there's so many things which are also criticized by many fiat people,
(29:25):
people on the left, you know, like in terms of companies who have their main businesses nowadays,
not their actual business anymore, but some sort of financialized department that they have. And
that's where they're getting all the money from, you know, it's so a lot of car companies are
actually not selling cars, but they are doing a sort of car mortgages and loans, you know,
(29:47):
and that's where they get the money from.
Or Macy's is a store that when I was in the US,
obviously I know it, the department store,
as far as I know, most of their money is coming from another business,
which is sort of then also tied to financial credit and everything,
you know, and there's many other like airlines is the best example,
(30:11):
you know, that you can point to, which is crazy.
And so this is really the financialization.
And then, yeah, a lot of people don't see this, you know, and they pinpoint something maybe superficial and don't see it for the real cause.
And that's the problem that we wanted to address as well.
(30:31):
Yeah and something as we diving down this thread of the conversation I think that one of the harder things being in Bitcoin is people ask like all right I think the one word sort of rebuttal that people have put out there that highlights this overarching question of when will we know we on a Bitcoin standard or more importantly when will
(31:00):
If it's not now, when will Bitcoin be reliable as this ruler?
Right. And the one question is like, I can't know with no merchants.
I can't spend my Bitcoin anywhere, so therefore it can't be money.
um but that's something i wonder like we're sitting at 122 000 now at what price point
at what market cap at what level of merchant adoption will we know that that bitcoin is
(31:22):
a a ruler that can be dependable um to make long-term economic decisions about i think for
long-term savings it's obviously dependable maybe it already is a better ruler than the fiat system
But during this adoption and monetization phase, how do you know when you've crossed the Rubicon of Bitcoin being the standard ruler that you can be comfortable with?
(31:47):
Does that make sense?
Yeah, I know.
I mean, it's probably a hard question to really answer and to say again.
And it goes back to the point that I was making earlier in terms of individual-wise and then society-wise.
You know, like I don't want to judge for society and it's really hard to really also extrapolate and really pinpoint and say, OK, at this point in time, maybe all of society will sort of use this ruler and they will have adopted it.
(32:15):
And I probably I hope that this will happen, but I'm just not really sure.
And I don't want to sort of miss the forest for the trees, you know, like all speculate about when it's going to happen in society.
But but I should be. And that's another quote that we have in the book.
You know, like Bitcoin, be the change in big, like all the Bitcoiners should be the change they wish to happen in the world.
(32:40):
They should something like borrowing from Muhammad Gandhi, you know, but I mean, that's what I see for myself.
And I would say personally, it already in a lot of ways is my standard that I go by, you know, in terms of like the easy thing that we heard with consumption.
Am I going now? Will I do that type of consumption? Will I consume that or will I forgo the consumption because I know I could put it somewhere else? And then also, you know, in terms of like a bigger stuff like a house, should I now go for this? Or doesn't it make sense to maybe wait another year and have a longer time horizon there?
(33:24):
all these type of things.
I mean, that's where Bitcoin for me is already very, very valuable and probably my standard.
And the more people that adopt this, I mean, at some point we might reach the societal point
where it's actually there, but it's probably really hard.
We will only know in hindsight, you know, probably some historian will only know in
(33:49):
hindsight and can then tell, okay, this was the time everything switched.
we are that sort of in the midst of it all we probably don't have the ability to really zoom
out and say okay now i think it's switched and and and it's just a gradual process you know market
is really a process it's not like this zero or one thing it's probably just yeah and gradually
(34:12):
still yeah and not not that sudden but i mean sometimes we have to sudden faces yeah like now
yeah yeah no it's somewhere like great wars throughout time you don't really know that
they've started once they have started it's only in retrospect where a historian goes back and
says well actually world war ii started here um world war one started here with the with the
(34:38):
assassination of france ferdinand i don't think at that time i was like world war one is on it was
like oh france ferdinand got assassinated things are getting heavy and then things escalated and
in retrospect somebody comes in and is like yep that's when world one one started yeah
no probably that's that's a good analogy as well yeah yeah and so
(34:58):
what what other like if you were to sort of think of the book that you've written and
think of like the one overarching message you're trying to get through to the audience
to the readers reading it, what would that be?
Well, yeah, that's the thing.
(35:20):
That's what we were discussing internally as well.
Like, what is the overarching message?
I mean, in the end, it's probably several messages, you know,
because we wanted to also write a book that's accessible
to different groups of people, to some hardcore Bitcoiners.
And that's why we have some of the historic chapters in it as well,
(35:41):
you know, where it really goes deep, as I explained,
with the Bank of England and everything.
And so that's really the Bitcoin nerdy stuff.
And then we have chapter four,
where it's probably more to the average Bitcoiner
or appealing to it, as we said,
describing really what's happening here
and then where you can also really relate
and maybe not only the average Bitcoiner,
(36:02):
but also then the average person,
the millennial, the Gen Z, these people.
I mean, we go into all these sorts of problems nowadays
that you have that you struggle with, you know, if you are a younger person or even a millennium
like me, you know, looking for housing and do we even get a house? You know, isn't it too expensive?
(36:24):
But then at the same time, we also talk about, okay, is it all that bad? You know, because that's
what I'm hearing from my boomer friends, my dad, who's sometimes like, okay, you can't complain,
You just traveled the world, met up with this Mexican billionaire, something I could have never done.
And you tell me you live in a world which is worse than mine.
(36:46):
And I'm like, OK, that's actually true.
I see what you mean.
It's probably not that black and white.
And so that's what we try to address as well.
But in the end, I think the story really comes down again to this individual thing.
You can understand Bitcoin.
You have to understand it on a foundational level.
(37:08):
Also, what it does to society, really what it does to everything, your surroundings around you, that you maybe get a better understanding of, okay, it's maybe not me.
It's not others.
It's really the game, which is sort of rigged.
Again, this quote, you don't hate the players, hate the game.
And from there, but then like, okay, what can I do?
Okay, I can save in Bitcoin.
(37:29):
And I can at least partly opt out and live a better future.
And that's what we ended on with the book as well.
It's not one of these books, which is then everything is going to burn, you know, fiat, fiat go to hell.
But it's more like ending on an optimistic note that we're saying maybe, yeah, Bitcoin is here to make the world a better place, even make fiat great again.
(37:53):
Maybe that's how polemically how we say it in the book.
And so, yeah, we also dive into what's happening, you know, on the banking front with a lot of institutions getting online, helping to build Bitcoin into their products and offerings and stuff.
And so, yeah, that's what we wanted to address as well.
(38:16):
So, yeah, and it's probably also in Ricardo's interest because he owns a bank himself.
He has the companies.
I mean, even though he is a true Bitcoiner, he knows that there's another world which is also still spinning.
And I think two things there.
Don't hate the player.
Hate the game.
(38:37):
It's very important to recognize.
Opt out of that game and into the game of Bitcoin where the rules are transparent.
You can audit them yourselves and have a high degree of certainty that they're not going to be changed.
And so you can sort of base decisions off of the rules that set forth in that game pretty confidently.
And then the other thing is this sort of integration of Bitcoin into the institution.
(39:04):
I'm happy you brought that up because I wanted to touch on that when you consider what's happening today and what's happened, I would say, over the last year and a half since the ETFs launched.
is you've had this different sort of archetype of new Bitcoiner come to market,
which isn't an individual.
It's typically a corporation or an institution that is made up of individuals
(39:25):
but operates on a completely different order of magnitude in terms of capital flows
and just access to capital that can flow into Bitcoin.
So on that note with what's happening right now,
Obviously, here in the United States, Trump administration seems very keen on fostering the Bitcoin industry in the United States.
(39:48):
Executive order for a strategic Bitcoin reserve.
Nothing's been passed and enshrined in Talal yet, but they're saying they want to accumulate as much Bitcoin as possible.
Obviously, the trend of Bitcoin treasury companies, people following in Michael Saylor and Strategies Wake beginning to accelerate.
We're seeing them pop up, not only here in the United States, but around the world.
(40:12):
You've got other nation states adopting Bitcoin, most famously El Salvador, where you have the president, President Bukele, sharing screenshots of the gains the country's made in Bitcoin since they started accumulating it.
Obviously, we've got Bhutan up in the Himalayas, which has been mining Bitcoin and using it to their advantage.
(40:34):
different archetype of buyer institutions not necessarily individuals but institutions are made
up of individuals at the end of the day like what do you think about this sort of archetype
of new buyer and new demand source for bitcoin as we head into the second half of 2025.
(40:56):
Yeah yeah I mean it's very interesting to see and for me and for us in the book and we dive
into this as well. It was sort of inevitable, you know, because I feel like some people structure
like the Bitcoin's journey into these several sort of stages. You know, you had like the early
adopter stage or like even before you had all the nerds and techies, then the early adopters,
(41:20):
then the finance people. It was all the individuals, the retailers that were first,
you know, which is really neat about Bitcoin. It's probably the only industry where this really can
happen. It's not the institutions first. But then at some point, obviously, and I think we reach now
this threshold where with 100K, it's really people who have been in Bitcoin for maybe five,
(41:41):
seven, six years, they made probably astonishingly amounts of wealth as well, even sometimes life
changing stuff. And they have huddled through all these troughs and the ups and downs. And I mean,
they're now feeling ever more compelled to act out their beliefs, you know, and pushing for the adoption of Bitcoin.
(42:03):
And now with strategy, having shown this playbook, I think this is what we're seeing across different spectrums of institutions, you know,
like really people, the Bitcoiners themselves, who maybe have even come into positions where they can sort of move the needle inside companies.
You know, I myself are sort of a person.
(42:25):
I mean, I'm not a banker myself.
I never I'd never studied finance at university.
And here I am.
I find myself among investment managers in one of the Switzerland's top banks, you know, as a big coiner.
And I can now also try to drive policy, even though within a bank, it's still sort of hard, you know, because there are all these regulations.
(42:46):
But but yeah, there's there's other examples that I can point to.
For me, Dylan Leclerc is the best example.
He's this guy, really young, coming from the trenches, so to say, and is now moving the needle with MetaPlanet.
And I think that's what we're seeing.
(43:07):
We will keep on seeing this.
That's why I believe there's so much more to come on that front.
because just a lot of people, a lot of Bitcoiners who want to now use this leverage that they have.
And then the amplifier are the institutions which can do everything on a greater scale.
And that will amplify everything with all the bad, the pros and cons, I guess.
(43:29):
I mean, when it comes to these Bitcoin treasury companies, I'm not sure.
This is probably also somewhat overhyped.
And at some point, some will die again.
And I mean, I just have anecdotal evidence again, but I mean, I'm now also being asked to be an advisor to some companies that want to start in Switzerland, you know, and I'm just a small big corner, maybe here in Switzerland, some sort of expert, but I have a small following.
(43:56):
But the case or the fact that they're now asking me kind of shows me, okay, I'm not proficient enough, but they just want to maybe have somebody who can slap a pretty face on.
Yeah, exactly. And source of attention and stuff. And so this sort of is anecdotal evidence for me that we might be in the stage where these things are getting overhyped. I also believe that maybe in Switzerland, a Bitcoin treasury company might not make that much sense after all, because when it comes to buying Bitcoin, we're world renowned to be among the best places, you know, with the banks where you can already enter.
(44:34):
We have like all the ETPs for very early on.
We have no capital gains on Bitcoin.
So no real moat that you will have as a Bitcoin treasury company.
And I believe it's probably similar with other countries.
And with some, it's not.
In the US, you have strategy.
They really have like their edge.
Or it seems like in Japan, you have MetaPlanet.
(44:55):
They have some sort of regulatory arbitrage that's going on there.
So in some countries, it might work, but not in all.
And so, yeah, I mean, it's always the same.
It's pros and cons to everything.
But I think it's just not going away because of the force that we describe in the book,
you know, with all these hotlers that really want to be the change that they want to see
(45:20):
in the world, you know?
Yeah, it's funny.
It's the chat behind the scenes in the industry right now.
I was like, particularly for podcasters,
is like, when are you going to join the next treasury company?
Yeah, I was waiting for you to join soon, you know?
To all the listeners out there, if I ever join one,
(45:41):
it's a sign at the top.
My timing is not great.
And I'm not fit for purpose for that type of role.
I like to talk about Bitcoin.
It doesn't mean I'm an expert at capital market arbitrage.
yeah i don't want to piss on anybody particular but even in the us you might know who i'm
(46:01):
referencing but there are other people you know big broadcasters who who now are wearing a hat
you know and there like some company name on it and so i like okay this this looks a little toppy to me as well But we see Maybe not Maybe this time is different after all
We shall see.
(46:21):
I'll be happy just to do what I'm doing here at TFTC in 1031.
That's enough for me.
I don't need to join a treasury company.
But it is insane.
Another thing I was thinking about as we were talking about,
Like institutions are made up of individuals and as Bitcoin monetizes, the price goes up and the individuals in Bitcoin get wealthier.
(46:43):
They can influence policy. They can deploy capital to build companies and goods that they want to see in the world.
They can get politically active, whatever it may be.
And this reminds me of a presentation that Turdemister gave in Austin early last year during a Bitcoin urbanism meetup.
(47:03):
it might have been two years ago now at this point but it is a pretty wild stat like as bitcoin
does a 10x every four to six years whatever whatever it averages out to be like the amount
uh the the steps individual bitcoiners make into the top one top 0.1 top 0.01 percent of the global
(47:28):
wealth ladder increases. And I think what he said during that presentation was, I don't think we
realize how quickly we're going to get to a point where like the 0.01% is made up of like 50%
Bitcoiners. And then you can really begin to use that capital that you've saved and accumulated to
(47:48):
change the world for the better, which is incredibly optimistic in a good way,
Not overly optimistic, not naive optimistic, but it's an optimistic view of the future where you found this thing, you found it early, you put in the hard work to understand it, make money to buy it, to accumulate it and hold it for a long period of time.
(48:13):
And then maybe that is the path to fixing all these things is enough Bitcoiners who are philosophically and ideologically aligned getting to a point of wealth where they begin to deploy that capital and fix the systemic issues in the system.
No, that's a great point.
And I mean, I know what talk I think you're referencing by tour.
(48:34):
I think it was put online as well.
And I watched it too, because I think it's a journey that many Bitcoiners will go through as well.
I mean, I'm going through this myself in terms of I'm a true libertarian at heart.
And so when I first discovered Bitcoin, I was like, okay, this is really something that helps me not to care about politics anymore.
(48:57):
And to some extent it does.
It gives me some reassurance.
Also, when it comes to the portfolio that you have, like, okay, maybe what all the clowns are doing out here, maybe it might not affect me that harsh.
because I have my secret stash here
and at least this is giving me some reassurance.
But then at the same time,
(49:17):
I feel like it can also be a little naive.
I just saw this post a couple of days back
by Max Keiser.
And again, he wrote a praise for our book as well
because he's good friends with Ricardo
and so don't want to shit on him at all.
But he had this meme sort of,
without Bitcoin, I'd be forced to care about politics.
(49:39):
You know, that's what we what he posted to some other thing that he was referencing.
And I was like, yeah, maybe if you are that well off like him and you can escape to El Salvador, that's true.
But maybe it's not true for everyone, not even for every Bitcoiner, you know, because at the margin, some might not be as well off as him.
(49:59):
And so maybe it and that's where I'm then questioning myself again.
So maybe it's not that good. It wouldn't be that good if all the Bitcoin is just really retreat and don't care about. And luckily, I think that's also not what we're seeing, because as you said, in the US, you have, I think, the BTC Policy Institute, all these institutions that are picking up as well.
(50:23):
I see it here in Switzerland as well, all the institutions and entities that are being founded to really influence politics in some way.
And then you also have the resources by now, you know, because usually like all these political groups, all the libertarians, they didn't have that much money.
But nowadays they have it and money sort of moves some things at the margin as well.
(50:47):
And so I think that's really interesting.
I'm looking forward to see what influence Bitcoiners will have.
I'm just reading this book, Satoshi's paper by Natalie Smolenski.
And in the beginning, she references all these acts in the US that you guys put through,
like sometimes even behind closed doors, sort of the Patriot Act, the anti-drug money act,
(51:13):
whatever act there is.
I don't even know.
You might know it better than me.
The Bank Secrecy Act.
Yeah, the Bank Secrecy Act.
all these acts, you know, and she's also in the book, they're like, okay, maybe Bitcoin will have
the financial power, the interest, the stamina, everything else to reverse these things and go
up against this. And so that will be very interesting to see. And that would, as you said,
(51:34):
your point, make the world a better place, at least in our eyes, probably. And so it's going
to be interesting how that pans out as well. Yeah, you may not care about political power,
but political power cares about you it's uh for somebody who's um definitely slanted more towards
libertarianism that uh it's it's a hard thing to come to grips with but i think you have to realize
(52:00):
you're in a game and you're an actor in that game and you may not like the rules and want to
opt out but if you if you're looking for the optimal outcome you probably have to play ball
to a certain extent.
And I think Bitcoiners, particularly here in the United States,
have really woken up to that in the last three years and began to.
And I think it's also very important because one other thing that really,
(52:23):
that I learned when I was researching and then writing the book,
I went full deep down the rabbit hole towards MMT, you know,
like modern monetary theory.
I mean, I always knew sort of what it is.
I studied Georg Friedrich von Knopp, which is like sort of the founder back in the 19th century and stuff.
(52:43):
But researching the book, I did this deep dive on MMT and I found it so fascinating.
Even though I'm not sort of fond of their conclusions, I feel like these guys, they're spot on when it comes to describing today's system.
I think you had Mel Madison on just a few weeks ago, and I had an episode on my podcast with him as well, where we were discussing that Trump is really sort of following these MMT policies.
(53:11):
And so I found this so interesting because they have these MMT guys.
I don't know. Have you seen the movie Finding the Money?
You know, this documentary?
I can really...
Yeah, I can recommend it because as a Bitcoiner, I could sort of relate, you know, because they have been jumping through similar hoops in terms of like they're being called monetary fringe people and cringe, you know.
(53:37):
And so everybody laughs at them.
But then when they really go talk to people and they sort of not orange pill, but MMT pill them, I mean, they sometimes really manage this, you know, because they're like, OK, we're in fiat now.
And then they make all these sort of promises as well, you know, because with MMT, you can finance everything.
(53:59):
no sort of lack to the money that you can create and stuff.
And so, as I said, even though I don't really can subscribe to this theory in terms of like
morals and philosophy wise, I feel like this is just what's going to happen in the fiat
system.
You know, these people are going to be ever stronger voices.
And maybe if at some point Democrats are coming back to power, I mean, they will be all over
(54:25):
their ears.
And so it's all the more important that we have Bitcoin because in an MMT world, I mean, control and everything is just going to be a lot harsher.
And that's why it's even more important that we have the Bitcoiners who we take to the stage as well and then sort of try to refute them as well, you know, and have some counter arguments ready.
(54:47):
because I think this theory is gaining a lot of momentum
and it's just because they're promising la-la land to everyone
and that's what people want to hear in the end.
And the rules of the game are such that they can
it's in the realm of possibility in that rule set
(55:07):
so they can go effectuate what they want to happen
which is unnerving
because like you said it i don't agree with it morally philosophically and it's a complete
it's basically like an admission we become completely untethered from reality and so
(55:28):
once you do that here's what's possible you can the debt doesn't matter you can finance everything
exactly printed dollars then you just tax them out of the system yeah but but the thing to me is
And like a lot of people, like we call them the useful idiots, you know, I mean, they might just go happily go along with this, you know, because for me, the pandemic or plandemic or whatever you want to call it was like a perfect example for this, you know, like a lot of people just went along with it.
(55:57):
They didn't care. And so I think the same might be happening there, especially if these economists and politicians who are influenced by these economists are then promising them the entire world, you know, by, okay, we can get rid of climate change.
We can get rid of this. We can finance everyone just because the money doesn't matter. We just sort of have to mobilize the real resources because that's what they can't print, you know, not yet, you know, at least that's not possible.
(56:27):
And so, I mean, I think people will just go along with it.
And then, yeah, the system itself will need more levers to pull to sort of steer people into the right direction in terms of providing the real resources.
That's why the control screws will probably be tightened, you know.
But I could imagine people go along with it because like both of the systems sort of have these useful idiots, you know.
(56:53):
like the traditional one has these with the people going along.
The Bitcoin system also has these useful idiots like all the crypto people who buy
into crypto and then end up being Bitcoiners.
So they start out as useful idiots.
And then this also helps our cause in the end because more money is
(57:14):
like initially coming into the space.
And so, yeah, I think this will probably be the defining battle going forward
for me you know mmt versus bitcoin uh like philosophically again but i just think uh the
more i studied it now i i wouldn't just uh laugh it off anymore because i think it's it's a serious
(57:34):
serious development and will only uh catch more and more fire at least that's that's what i think
yeah yeah i think you only have to look at the front runner for mayor of new york city um to
to see that it is certainly gaining
in terms of influence.
He's in this documentary as well.
And yeah.
(57:56):
Is he?
I have to watch this.
I think so.
Yeah, I think he is in there as well.
Or at least one of his advisors.
Yeah, so it is interesting.
It is.
Another thing I wanted to come back on
because you brought it up,
Max down in El Salvador
and this idea of flag theory,
Like just when shit hits the fan, just leave where you where you grew up and go find you'll find like mine a Bitcoin or somewhere on an island around the world.
(58:28):
Build your citadel like that is always internally.
I've paid credence to it in the past, but as I've gotten older and had children, I find it like just like untenable for me personally.
somebody who has a pretty strong
nuclear and extended family
I think the idea of like
abandoning where I grew up from
(58:49):
like I was telling you before we hit record I just moved back
to my hometown of Philadelphia
partly for this reason
because my family's there my extended family
my friends that I'm still
really close with who I grew up with
are all there and this idea of just
abandoning your roots
to go find like minded people
elsewhere just has never
(59:09):
sat well with me and uh maybe it's naive maybe it's idealistic but i do think there is credence
in being that individual who gets bitcoin and understands or likes to think that he understands
a lot of the uh what's causing the problems and the strife and how the game is messed up
(59:32):
in the world um to sort of put the flag down and say no i'm gonna make sure that
where i grew up my home um does not just get washed in the wave of fiat debasement and fiat
politics and um put up a fight to try to slowly but surely um convince people that hey there's
(59:53):
another way to do things and bitcoin's part of that way yeah no that's that's greatly said i mean
i was going through the same thing you know as i said the book came about because we were traveling
as sovereign individuals slash digital nomads, you know, and we were really sort of unregistered
from Switzerland. So like, no strings attached, you know, we wanted to really live this life.
(01:00:17):
But after two years, we figured, yeah, it's tough. As you said, I'm also well rooted with family,
extended friends. And so I'm like, wow, if you can really pull this off, I mean, I'm impressed.
I have now some digital nomad friends who've been doing this for plus 10 years.
And so it's crazy.
But if you then, without, again, calling anyone out, but if you look at these people, they're living all by themselves.
(01:00:45):
Usually they have no wife, no family and just traveling.
And so, yeah, maybe if it's for you, then it's okayish.
But like, I'm probably similar to you.
I couldn't do this.
And so, yeah, going back to where your roots are and really try to make a difference, like maybe, for example, Peter McCormack, you know, who's really now trying to get his city around and investing in the soccer club and everything.
(01:01:12):
That's just that's another legacy that you can leave.
And so, again, I mean, that's Bitcoin gives you the optionality, you know, in both ways.
And that's what I like about it.
And so, yeah, everyone to each his own, I guess that's that's what it is.
But I'm with you on that.
Yeah, no, I think that I mean, maybe that's the most important
(01:01:35):
point to get out of.
your individual Bitcoin enlightenment is that it gives you that optionality,
which is far preferable to the lack of optionality that exists within the fiat system today.
Yeah, no, that's definitely, that's something, this optionality,
which is, I think, what freedom is for me eventually about, you know,
(01:01:58):
like you get the options, you get to choose and exactly.
That's also coming back to this whole MMT thing, you know,
So, I mean, yeah, I do understand where they're going.
But in the end, as I said, if you can only print the money and you cannot print the real resources, you have to source it from somewhere.
And usually this only goes through like soft force or even hard force, you know, and then you sort of have to mandate stuff and you have to get people to work in health care.
(01:02:28):
And that's why, because that's where you're spending all the money.
And then so the resources has to sort of be transferred there and channeled into these industries.
And so it's all through force.
And in the end, exactly, that's not what my philosophical underpinning and belief is about.
And that's what I prefer about Bitcoin.
(01:02:49):
Everyone is adopting it freely and it gives you the choice to either live this nomadic lifestyle or go back and become a tribal big coiner in your family And we have a subchapter on this on the book as well
It's exactly this in chapter seven, where we talk about this dichotomy or just like, yeah, the citadel versus like maybe the nomad or.
(01:03:17):
Yeah, so it's probably going to be the future has we'll have both, I guess.
Yeah.
I would agree there.
I would agree there.
I'm not fucking leaving.
Yes.
I'm not leaving.
This has been great.
Where should we send people?
(01:03:37):
The safe house?
Yes.
Yeah.
In the end, it's the safe house.
Yeah.
That's where you get the book.
It's also on Amazon.
For anybody listening from Europe, I guess, Amazon.de from Germany is probably the best
site because then you get no shipping costs.
I don't know if we have figured it out on Amazon.com yet, but if you're from the States or internationally, it's the best place is probably to go and order it from the safe house because there it's the highest quality books that you get.
(01:04:06):
Also in terms of wrapping and everything, I mean, safe is really making sure this is high standard.
Safe building out a publishing empire one book at a time Yes he is He is Exactly You in great company at the safe house yes yeah that that for sure i mean it it amazing it it i mean i would have never imagined that
(01:04:27):
we will ever publish a book through safe but i mean ricardo being a huge fan of his and that was
maybe his his biggest requirement you know write a book which is close to the bitcoin standard and
And we were like, dude, this is quite some pressure that you're putting on us here.
And obviously, we didn't want to rewrite everything that Safe has already written.
(01:04:51):
And that's why we tried to, with the philosophical angle that we talked about, with the historical angle that might not have been addressed so far.
And so, yeah, in the end, I hope we did it.
But yeah, it's such a privilege to be on board with him.
So I can't complain for sure.
Well, thank you for writing the book. I'm going to wait for my hardcover to show up. I'm a physical book maxi.
(01:05:18):
Nice. Yeah.
To finish the rest of the book beyond chapter four. But no, I think this message is incredibly powerful and important.
I mean, there's many different ways through which people come to Bitcoin.
I mean I long been an advocate of the more content the more angles on Bitcoin education the better People often ask me as somebody who been podcasting about Bitcoin for eight years now like oh you ever get triggered by all the new Bitcoin podcasts come to the market all
(01:05:48):
the new books?
I'm like, no, the more, the better.
Each individual has something that they connect with differently.
And the more angles you're sort of describing the problem and the solution, the better.
Yeah, it's true.
The less we get and we don't get to print any Bitcoin at all, the more we have to print
Bitcoiners like you and me or like we have to print Bitcoin podcasts. And so everything else
(01:06:13):
is probably fine. So yeah, keep them coming. All right. Well, Pascal, hope you enjoy your night.
And Freaks, go pick up the book. Go pick up the book. Put it on the bookshelf. Read it. Spread it.
And I'm sure we'll catch up this fall as well because there's going to be a lot going on.
(01:06:35):
Great, Marty.
Thanks for bringing me on.
Keep up the work as well.
And too bad I don't get to see you in Riga, but maybe, as you said, in fall or somewhere
else.
Yeah, Bitcoin is still a small world, at least among the core Bitcoiners, I'd argue.
So every now and then we get to meet.
We'll run into each other somewhere.
(01:06:56):
Sure.
Somewhere around the world at some point.
Exactly.
Cool.
Thanks a lot.
Have a great one.
Thank you, you too.
Peace and love, Freaks.
The key!
You've had a dynamic where money has become freer than free.
(00:10):
You talk about a Fed just gone nuts.
All the central banks going nuts.
So it's all acting like safe haven.
I believe that in a world where central bankers are tripping over themselves to devalue their currency,
Bitcoin wins.
In the world of fiat currencies, Bitcoin is the victor.
I mean, that's part of the bull case for Bitcoin.
(00:31):
If you're not paying attention, you probably should be.
How can we tie tennis to Bitcoin?
I think one thing you just said, it's a mental battle.
You're all by yourself on an island.
Yeah, that's true.
Yeah, how can we tie it?
How can we tie tennis into Bitcoin?
(00:52):
Well, this is actually, this is a great segue.
you were just talking about tennis Wimbledon final was yesterday center beat Alcazar and
as God was just explaining to me he's been getting into tennis and it's a transition
for you because you played soccer your whole life team sport high contact moved to tennis
(01:15):
one-on-one mental battle I feel like this is something Bitcoiners know all too well the the
internal mental battle you're basically know something that most people in your immediate life
do not understand or grok and you're constantly battling volleying with them trying to explain why
(01:36):
bitcoin can lead to a potential enlightenment which you wrote a whole book about yeah yeah
exactly now that's actually a good way to segue into this yeah i mean the mental struggle is real
with Bitcoin for sure.
You know, I mean, I've experienced it my entire life
or like my entire life,
like the last nine years, I would say, you know,
(01:56):
like it's just been, yeah, you come across this thing.
It really dawns on you.
And for me, I have to say like my Bitcoin story
is really because I've been into Austrian economics.
I was really curious during my university year.
So it did click once I found it,
which wasn't that early, 2015-ish or something,
You know, when I was, I think I told you last time I was in Auburn, Alabama at the Mises U summer school and it clicked for me immediately, you know, and I was like, I was, yeah, I was hooked from the first second.
(02:28):
And then obviously, yeah, just grasping everything.
The more you get to know, you want to talk to people about Bitcoin and they just sometimes, they just don't care, you know, and then you have to sort of talk to yourself.
And every now and then, if we have the all time highs that people come and they ask about Bitcoin and how to make a quick buck.
(02:48):
And you're like, well, now is not actually the time I want to tell you about it.
Why haven't you come a little earlier?
And then, you know, it's just this really this struggle.
And at some time, at some point I was like, OK, better just stick to myself, you know, do my podcast, maybe do a group of people that maybe want to join me and follow along.
(03:08):
And I'm still sort of here in Switzerland, I have a small following of a couple of hundred people, but they are now really interested.
And obviously they have had the mental journey as well and have tagged along.
But for everybody else, it's just, yeah, I feel like I could have, with the curiosity that I have, at least in my friend circle and stuff, I could have helped maybe other people financially.
(03:36):
but in the end it's also not it's not it's not my obligation you know if people don't want
but that's that's the thing and that's why i i just always try to yeah be my own call coach and
and learn more and that's what tennis is about you know you just nobody you can talk to coaches
but in the end it's with every sport but with tennis particularly you know you really have to
(04:01):
go go into the flow and at some point you feel like now now i'm getting it you know and
it just becomes natural and so that's that's that's the amazing part about it as well
yeah you reach a level of zen where you where you know the basics you put in your 10 000 hours
and you could just sort of operate that's where i feel like today especially as it pertains to
(04:24):
bitcoin i found my bitcoin zen we're meeting at another all-time high currently sitting like right
under $122,000 per Bitcoin, which is hard to, it's not really hard to imagine when it's like,
we all think this day is going to come. And we've been proclaiming that it's going to come for many
years, but now it's here, it's like, holy crap, Bitcoin's $122,000. Yeah. I mean, the excitement
(04:51):
isn't like, that's what I sometimes get, you know, people who are close to me that are like,
dude, you don't seem to be as excited anymore, you know, as you used to be. And obviously this
is probably also some sort of marginal return or declining marginal you not not utility but
something is like obviously when it was in 2017 and we had this first push you know where where
(05:16):
i was involved i was yeah like stupidly even making videos to some of my closest friends you
know like head banging my head uh to the all the meme songs that we had and i pulled them up every
now and then on my iPhone, they're like, dude, what was I doing here? And nowadays it's like,
that's what I hear. Where's the excitement? And I feel like a lot of Bitcoin or you and others
(05:40):
for sure as well feel that it's like, yeah, it's the vindication obviously, but we're so mentally
in that, in this thing that we're like, yeah, it always had to come that way. It had to,
the fulfillment was pre-programmed, so to say, and now it's actually happening. And so maybe,
yeah it's this meme you know with the candle you go like okay 122k and now let's go next all-time
(06:05):
high when it's coming yeah there's a diminishing marginal return on dopamine hits you get from
from bitcoin pumps over the years that's probably it exactly yeah you get to your zen zen state and
it's like okay it's happening let's try to usher as many people onto the lifeboat as possible while
we can not be too pushy but put the content out there it is here if you want it writing it and
(06:30):
that's what i mean diving fully and transitioning fully into the bitcoin enlightenment um i'm still
waiting to get my hard copy but you guys did have uh a chapter available on uh the safe house so i
read that this morning took some notes and i guess let's just start before we jump into
(06:52):
maybe we can talk about chapter four the economic murder of god but it's the book overall you co-wrote
it with um ricardo salinas and um one other gentleman whose names daniel jung and he's a
swiss uh fellow colleague of mine yeah yeah so you daniel and ricardo got together how did you
three connect yeah why why this book specifically yeah it's sort of a weird story i mean uh me and
(07:19):
Daniel, we've been longtime friends.
I've been in Bitcoin.
I sort of maybe orange-pilled him.
One of the people I managed to orange-pill because he has this natural curiosity as well.
And at some point, he was like, you're in this Bitcoin thing.
Can you tell me more?
And then he got interested in himself and did his own sort of study and stuff.
And so we've just been longtime friends.
(07:41):
And then we started our journey as digital nomads, sovereign individuals, where me, my
wife and him, because again, he was just the one really tagging along.
We asked some other people if they would join us on this journey, and he was the only one
that would really come along.
And so we went to all these different places all over the world, experiencing what Bitcoin
(08:02):
culture is like in these countries like Pakistan, Argentina, other countries.
And one of the countries was Mexico as well.
And I was Googling to see if I could interview or talk to any interesting people who are in
Bitcoin in these countries. And in Mexico, it was Ricardo Salinas that obviously was all over
the internet when you Googled for a Bitcoiner, a real Bitcoiner. And I was like, wow, that's an
(08:26):
interesting dude. He's the owner of 24 companies still. His conglomerate is 170K employees all over
Latin America, mostly Mexico, and I think into the US as well. And so I was like, really impressive
that somebody like of his ranking and status could really have the time to also focus on
(08:50):
Bitcoin and be that knowledgeable.
From what I read online, and that's why it piqued my interest, I reached out to him and
his team and had to do a couple of rounds until they sort of figured out, okay, that
dude knows one or two things about libertarianism, about Austrian economics, topics he's interested
in as well.
(09:10):
And that's why he then said, okay, you can come to the headquarters and we do an interview. And we did that interview with him, got sort of viral on YouTube, went really well. And so that's why the book was born, because I then followed up and asked, would you be interested in sort of co-authoring a book with us? And he was like, yeah, yeah, sure, let's do this.
(09:32):
And then we had a couple of more back and forth with him.
In the end, we were the ones writing it, putting in the hard work in terms of like really doing the typing and everything.
And we just spun a lot of the sentences and ideas in the books off of his sort of ideas that he shared with us.
And we were just impressed, even though, as I said, he doesn't have that much time on his hand with all the companies.
(09:57):
He's still pretty well informed and just an amazing dude.
And so, yeah, that's how it came about.
And just for us, obviously, a great opportunity to do something like this with a person of his profile.
Yeah.
And I mean, this has been a theme or a sub-theme within Bitcoin for a while.
(10:19):
People, like I truly believe that Bitcoin is one of the most revolutionary pieces of technology,
specifically monetary technology that humanity has come into contact with in quite some time.
innovation on par with the internet steam engine printing press name your pivotal technological
advancement over the last two millennia and bitcoin i think stands on the pantheon of those
(10:45):
sort of demarcation technologies and i do truly believe in fix the money fix the world is
is something we say a lot here at tftc it's outside of our studio in austin bitcoin fixes this
is a very popular meme and i think it's one that when i put out there gets the most pushback
(11:09):
it's like bitcoin doesn't fix everything like that we're not going to fix if we fix the money
it doesn't mean we fix the world there's so many other bigger problems and i agree bitcoin directly
is not going to solve these problems but i do think indirectly falling back to like economics
101, positive and negative externalities exist as a concept. And I think the negative externalities
(11:34):
that emanate from a broken monetary system do inevitably touch everything. And so if you can
fix that problem at the core of the system, which is money, money is one half of every transaction,
arguably the most important tool we use as humans like if you can fix that core issue and turn those
(11:57):
negative externalities into positive externalities you can begin to fix everything and i think
getting to that point of understanding does
uh it it sort of you need to have this enlightenment moment personally to get to that point
(12:18):
yeah before you even get to that enlightenment point most importantly and what i can grok from
chapter four from the book is you have to understand how everything got broken and the
core of the system yeah exactly yeah or yeah no that's true maybe maybe to your point when it
comes to like the does bitcoin fix everything i mean that's the question that i've been grappling
(12:41):
with myself for quite some time and even writing the book you know like like really okay on what
levels does it really fix things you know and maybe maybe this is something i'm still grappling
with as i said you know and and even writing the book like maybe sometimes bitcoin get over their
skis as well in terms of what it actually fixes, you know, and, and, or I have to put it this way.
(13:07):
I'm like, I had really had to, in the book as well, that's what we did differentiate between
different levels, you know, the individual one, like where it can really for, for, for like
individuals like me, you and others, you can really say like fix stuff, you know, and, and,
and help them to, to turn a better life and stuff. Societally, I'm, I'm with you in the sense of like,
(13:30):
if the core foundation is really broken, a lot of things emanate from that, which are really bad.
But at the same time, writing the book, doing the research, really digging deep into monetary
history as well, and kind of figuring out how amazingly big or even like frighteningly big
the government's sort of grapple or how would I say, strangle of money has always been. That's
(13:57):
something that really impressed me as well. The state always really had this overarching hand over
money. And even though there's like two stories to money, with the market emerging money,
governments always wanted to co-op money and they have always. And so long story short, I'm still
sort of at the point where I'm like, okay, will we really be fixing it on a societal
(14:22):
sort of level?
Or is Bitcoin just really the tool that challenges the old system, but maybe never really supplants
it?
But I mean, that's maybe a story for another day, so to say.
But that's why we also then really hard separated the topics in the book, that we said, okay,
(14:46):
we want to talk to the individual and really show the individual what has gone wrong.
on a societal level and then how he can really save himself.
And then we do speculate about a little bit the societal aspects
and where he might be going, but there we're a lot less sure
in the sense of like, okay, hyper-pricanization will really mean
(15:08):
that everything else, all the fiat currencies, everything will go extinct.
And so, yeah, that's sort of the separation we make in the book.
But as you said it really important to really obviously then also show the individual where things went wrong and why he experiencing what he experiencing you know like uh yeah that because a lot of people feel that
(15:31):
something with money is wrong but they just really can't really articulate and that's what we try to
do as well yeah and so if you were to try to pinpoint exactly where in chapter four you talk
about two monetary sins which is the creation of the central bank and the abandonment of the gold
standard does the story of corruption of that monetary system start with the introduction of
(15:56):
central banks or as you go further back you're mentioning government control yeah over money
where would you say the the corruption of the system began well i mean yeah that's that's really
hard to pinpoint in the end as i said i i believe that human beings probably also crave some sort of
authority and just some sort of fiat structure. And they have always, you know, and that's what I
(16:20):
mean when we go back in history. But it never could really get out of hand until maybe the
foundation or the establishment of the central bank, you know. And that's when you look historically
exactly, governments, they were around, they were messing with money, you know, with different
gold currencies that they sort of debased. We all know the story, you know, all the Bitcoiners know.
(16:43):
And we delve into all of this and really try to show that this has been a historic constant for people who might not know this, you know, culminating maybe in something called the Great Depression or the Great Debasement.
Sorry, that's what it was called, you know, in England when some of the kings were really going full fiat already back then, you know, debasing the gold coins and the silver coins.
(17:10):
And there's this interesting story, actually something that we learned from Ricardo himself, because he was always reciting this.
It was really Henry VIII, I think, was this king back then, you know, and he was debasing the English currency back then as well.
And people didn't know that this was happening.
But then at some point they figured it out because the coins, he would then really remelt them, obviously.
(17:35):
And they had like a core, which was out of copper and just sort of a silver coating.
And because they had his face on it as well, on the coin itself, there was like this little
nose that came a little further apart from the coin, so to say.
And when that was rubbing against like the bags that the money was kept in, it came off,
(17:59):
you know, the silver coating came off.
And then you saw the copper coming here, the copper nose, so to say.
And that's why this King Henry VIII, he went down as Sir Henry Coppernose.
And that's really when people figured it out that he was tricking them.
And so that was always the case.
But it wasn't until the foundation of the central bank where this really got institutionalized.
(18:25):
And we called it the first sort of monetary sin, exactly, because then they really found the way to perpetuate, you know, to continuously stealing from the public by having this entity that could finance wars and then also where they could bring in the private sector as well, you know, because the Central Bank, the Bank of England was really this sort of private entity in the beginning.
(18:53):
And it sort of merged then with the king.
And it was this hybrid.
And until today, we have these discussions going on, you know, with the Federal Reserve in the US.
Is it private? Is it public?
But it's this weird hybrid thing.
And this was already the case with the Bank of England.
And so, yeah, for us, this was really the starting point because everything else followed from it.
(19:15):
You know, the development of the bond market, the currency, the public currency.
And it all is so instrumental in making this institutionalized money printing that we have possible.
And so we called it and said it started with the establishment of the Bank of England.
Yeah. And the second monetary sin is the abandonment of the gold standard, which set us clearly down the civilizational path towards fiat.
(19:46):
and you put a Nietzschean lunge on it,
cutting gold's golden anchor is akin to killing God.
I'm so interested to hear you elaborate on that.
Yeah, exactly.
Well, exactly.
I mean, the first thing was the establishing of the Bank of England
and this really had to then go a long way in establishing,
(20:08):
as we said, public bond markets
where you could really borrow from the public
and you don't have to go to all these private people again
And then you could also have the central bank like secretly buying up the bonds and everything.
So that was all going on. But obviously, there was always this gold anchor remaining, you know,
and with every war in the US and then also during the Napoleonic Wars and stuff,
(20:32):
countries sometimes went off the gold standard because it was really this sort of hinge, you know,
or the shackles that was holding them back. And at some point they just went full fiat. And that's
That's what we then called the economic murder of God, you know, in 1971.
And Bitcoiners obviously know this all too well.
But we then wanted to put a sort of philosophical framing around it as well, because I studied political philosophy in university, obviously read Nietzsche and was always interested in hearing what he had to say.
(21:07):
And for me, he was really so visionary in the sense that he said, well, he was describing what was happening.
A lot of people think Nietzsche is like an atheist and he was really against God.
And I don't even know if he was, but I think he was just describing a system and human beings were sort of fostering that.
(21:28):
And the same is with money, you know.
And then there is this book where he writes about this dude with the lantern, you know, that's what we quote in the book.
It is this guy who runs to the marketplace and he's like, we killed God.
We killed God.
Where will we find him?
What would we do?
And all the people laugh at that guy.
And then he really rambles this amazing sort of text, you know, where he says, who are
(21:54):
we that we wipe away the horizon with a sponge?
We kill the sun, you know, no more anchor.
We don't know.
Are we going up?
Are we going down?
Are we going sideways?
And when I read this, and he obviously, Nietzsche himself didn't, at least to my knowledge, make any connection to the money, but it all reads so clearly.
(22:15):
And you could just apply it to the money, you know, because that's what happened when we really unhinged fiat from gold.
You know, that was something we hear today quite often like, OK, is Bitcoin going up or is fiat going down?
We don't know.
You know, it's sort of the price signals are all distorted.
And so I think even Nietzsche unknowingly called it and the same we quote Dostoevsky, another guy, you know, Russian writer who said like, if God is dead, everything is permitted, everything is allowed.
(22:49):
And obviously it's the same.
If gold is gone, then fiat is full fiat and everything is allowed.
And then we see what springs from that.
All the meme coins, all the shitcoin trading, all the companies that have no value but trade at immense, highly PEs and stuff.
So yeah, there is a philosophical angle to this for sure.
(23:10):
And that's what we tried to explore in this chapter four that you mentioned.
no and it was uh it was very happy to see sort of that thread in chapter four and i was reading it
because independently last week when the price went up to like 118 i tweeted out like this is
great and the price goes up obviously it feels good as an individual bitcoiner because you're
(23:37):
being validated something you've been screaming for the rooftops for for myself for the better
more than a decade now at this point like it is being validated in real time but more importantly
the price signal is a fact is a signal that other people are getting it to we're getting closer
to the point where we're bringing back monetary sanity to the world and i did specifically use
(24:02):
the phrase like we're going to anchor the global economy back to reality which i think many people
don't realize and they they intuit it they understand it that that things are wrong and
things are getting more expensive and uh even though we live in this incredibly advanced
technologically advanced society with the internet we're streaming from different parts of the world
(24:26):
right now we'll upload this and high definition later on will be distributed globally um and the
cost to do so is very low but even so there are still these negative externalities that
have emerged throughout society you see them in deaths of despair here in the united states how
unhealthy people are there is an argument to be made that some people are getting stupider
(24:51):
we've got birth rate decline in developed countries around the world and it just feels
like there's this this odd feeling that we're untethered from from reality and all these
negative things are extending from that but i do hope that bitcoin adoption increasing which is
evident by the price going up um does send the signal like okay this is the money we should be
(25:17):
organizing around and if enough people do that you can anchor back to reality bring opportunity cost
back to the economy and force better capital allocation decisions that that lead to
better outcomes for everybody.
And I think you guys dive into this in chapter four too,
but I think the best way to describe
the sort of intuited knowledge that things are wrong,
(25:41):
but you can't really put your finger on it,
is the fact that we live in a world
that is measuring things with Wittgenstein's ruler,
which is something that you guys write about.
Yes.
It's hard to be anchored to reality
when you have the measuring standard of things.
The rule that you use to measure the inputs
(26:05):
that you base your decisions off of is constantly changing,
so that leads to bad decisions at the end of the day.
Yeah, exactly.
Because of this economic murder of God,
because the foundation or the monetary truth or reality was sort of murdered,
we then entered this age of monetary relativism.
(26:26):
That's what we call it, you know, and that really follows from it.
And it's exactly it's this Nassim Taleb quote, you know, the Wittgenstein's ruler.
I mean, he elaborated on this on his book and it's sad to see him nowadays shitting on Bitcoin as well,
but because he would be among the ones who should really get it.
But he had this quote, you know, saying like, really, I have it here.
(26:47):
unless you have confidence in the rules reliability,
if you use a rule to measure a table,
you may also be using the table to measure the ruler.
The less you trust the rules reliability,
the more information you are getting about the ruler and the less about the
table itself, you know, and, and that's exactly the problem, you know?
And, and so it's, it's really like if, if you, if you have sort of,
(27:11):
if you wanted to measure the length of a meter stick by using a rubber band,
that's the same thing, you know, because the rubber band is just too elastic.
And so you don't know in the end, okay, what is it?
How long is it really? What's the right measurement?
And so there's all these sort of analogies that you can in the end draw.
(27:33):
I mean, we had now this cover, you can see, you know,
it's really like the dark age in lightning.
we also had the idea of a lighthouse, you know, maybe with Bitcoin being really in a roaring sea,
because that's the other thing. Like, yeah, if you are on a roaring boat tossing in the high seas
and up and down, and then you don't really know, okay, what's up, what's down, you need some sort
(27:56):
of lighthouse, which is Bitcoin, you know, absolutely scarce. So you can measure things
against and uh yeah it's just amazing that this nowadays exists and people like you and others
are building these uh i saw i don't remember the name you know but uh this uh add-on that you can
now use to to measure everything against bitcoin and i think that's that's so important for people
(28:17):
to really figure out what's happening here you know and now we have it we can actually do this
which is amazing yeah opportunity cost opportunitycost.app if you want to add the add-on or
extension to your browser it does it's crazy i've been in bitcoin for a while now and it wasn't until
i built the extension and started using it like even myself having been in it is jarring when you
(28:42):
price everything in bitcoin on the internet it really does induce that sense of okay i need to
make sure that i'm really honing in on my expenses making sure that i'm saving in bitcoin as much as
possible. Yeah. No. And I mean, maybe just to add to this, you know, in the end, this is really the
(29:02):
problem. If monetary relativism, you don't know what's happening, then again, a lot of things will
follow from this, you know, and we have this other sub chapter in chapter four, where we talk about
the financialization of society, also not the first to do this, you know, but we just wanted to really
right on show that there's so many things which are also criticized by many fiat people,
(29:25):
people on the left, you know, like in terms of companies who have their main businesses nowadays,
not their actual business anymore, but some sort of financialized department that they have. And
that's where they're getting all the money from, you know, it's so a lot of car companies are
actually not selling cars, but they are doing a sort of car mortgages and loans, you know,
(29:47):
and that's where they get the money from.
Or Macy's is a store that when I was in the US,
obviously I know it, the department store,
as far as I know, most of their money is coming from another business,
which is sort of then also tied to financial credit and everything,
you know, and there's many other like airlines is the best example,
(30:11):
you know, that you can point to, which is crazy.
And so this is really the financialization.
And then, yeah, a lot of people don't see this, you know, and they pinpoint something maybe superficial and don't see it for the real cause.
And that's the problem that we wanted to address as well.
(30:31):
Yeah and something as we diving down this thread of the conversation I think that one of the harder things being in Bitcoin is people ask like all right I think the one word sort of rebuttal that people have put out there that highlights this overarching question of when will we know we on a Bitcoin standard or more importantly when will
(31:00):
If it's not now, when will Bitcoin be reliable as this ruler?
Right. And the one question is like, I can't know with no merchants.
I can't spend my Bitcoin anywhere, so therefore it can't be money.
um but that's something i wonder like we're sitting at 122 000 now at what price point
at what market cap at what level of merchant adoption will we know that that bitcoin is
(31:22):
a a ruler that can be dependable um to make long-term economic decisions about i think for
long-term savings it's obviously dependable maybe it already is a better ruler than the fiat system
But during this adoption and monetization phase, how do you know when you've crossed the Rubicon of Bitcoin being the standard ruler that you can be comfortable with?
(31:47):
Does that make sense?
Yeah, I know.
I mean, it's probably a hard question to really answer and to say again.
And it goes back to the point that I was making earlier in terms of individual-wise and then society-wise.
You know, like I don't want to judge for society and it's really hard to really also extrapolate and really pinpoint and say, OK, at this point in time, maybe all of society will sort of use this ruler and they will have adopted it.
(32:15):
And I probably I hope that this will happen, but I'm just not really sure.
And I don't want to sort of miss the forest for the trees, you know, like all speculate about when it's going to happen in society.
But but I should be. And that's another quote that we have in the book.
You know, like Bitcoin, be the change in big, like all the Bitcoiners should be the change they wish to happen in the world.
(32:40):
They should something like borrowing from Muhammad Gandhi, you know, but I mean, that's what I see for myself.
And I would say personally, it already in a lot of ways is my standard that I go by, you know, in terms of like the easy thing that we heard with consumption.
Am I going now? Will I do that type of consumption? Will I consume that or will I forgo the consumption because I know I could put it somewhere else? And then also, you know, in terms of like a bigger stuff like a house, should I now go for this? Or doesn't it make sense to maybe wait another year and have a longer time horizon there?
(33:24):
all these type of things.
I mean, that's where Bitcoin for me is already very, very valuable and probably my standard.
And the more people that adopt this, I mean, at some point we might reach the societal point
where it's actually there, but it's probably really hard.
We will only know in hindsight, you know, probably some historian will only know in
(33:49):
hindsight and can then tell, okay, this was the time everything switched.
we are that sort of in the midst of it all we probably don't have the ability to really zoom
out and say okay now i think it's switched and and and it's just a gradual process you know market
is really a process it's not like this zero or one thing it's probably just yeah and gradually
(34:12):
still yeah and not not that sudden but i mean sometimes we have to sudden faces yeah like now
yeah yeah no it's somewhere like great wars throughout time you don't really know that
they've started once they have started it's only in retrospect where a historian goes back and
says well actually world war ii started here um world war one started here with the with the
(34:38):
assassination of france ferdinand i don't think at that time i was like world war one is on it was
like oh france ferdinand got assassinated things are getting heavy and then things escalated and
in retrospect somebody comes in and is like yep that's when world one one started yeah
no probably that's that's a good analogy as well yeah yeah and so
(34:58):
what what other like if you were to sort of think of the book that you've written and
think of like the one overarching message you're trying to get through to the audience
to the readers reading it, what would that be?
Well, yeah, that's the thing.
(35:20):
That's what we were discussing internally as well.
Like, what is the overarching message?
I mean, in the end, it's probably several messages, you know,
because we wanted to also write a book that's accessible
to different groups of people, to some hardcore Bitcoiners.
And that's why we have some of the historic chapters in it as well,
(35:41):
you know, where it really goes deep, as I explained,
with the Bank of England and everything.
And so that's really the Bitcoin nerdy stuff.
And then we have chapter four,
where it's probably more to the average Bitcoiner
or appealing to it, as we said,
describing really what's happening here
and then where you can also really relate
and maybe not only the average Bitcoiner,
(36:02):
but also then the average person,
the millennial, the Gen Z, these people.
I mean, we go into all these sorts of problems nowadays
that you have that you struggle with, you know, if you are a younger person or even a millennium
like me, you know, looking for housing and do we even get a house? You know, isn't it too expensive?
(36:24):
But then at the same time, we also talk about, okay, is it all that bad? You know, because that's
what I'm hearing from my boomer friends, my dad, who's sometimes like, okay, you can't complain,
You just traveled the world, met up with this Mexican billionaire, something I could have never done.
And you tell me you live in a world which is worse than mine.
(36:46):
And I'm like, OK, that's actually true.
I see what you mean.
It's probably not that black and white.
And so that's what we try to address as well.
But in the end, I think the story really comes down again to this individual thing.
You can understand Bitcoin.
You have to understand it on a foundational level.
(37:08):
Also, what it does to society, really what it does to everything, your surroundings around you, that you maybe get a better understanding of, okay, it's maybe not me.
It's not others.
It's really the game, which is sort of rigged.
Again, this quote, you don't hate the players, hate the game.
And from there, but then like, okay, what can I do?
Okay, I can save in Bitcoin.
(37:29):
And I can at least partly opt out and live a better future.
And that's what we ended on with the book as well.
It's not one of these books, which is then everything is going to burn, you know, fiat, fiat go to hell.
But it's more like ending on an optimistic note that we're saying maybe, yeah, Bitcoin is here to make the world a better place, even make fiat great again.
(37:53):
Maybe that's how polemically how we say it in the book.
And so, yeah, we also dive into what's happening, you know, on the banking front with a lot of institutions getting online, helping to build Bitcoin into their products and offerings and stuff.
And so, yeah, that's what we wanted to address as well.
(38:16):
So, yeah, and it's probably also in Ricardo's interest because he owns a bank himself.
He has the companies.
I mean, even though he is a true Bitcoiner, he knows that there's another world which is also still spinning.
And I think two things there.
Don't hate the player.
Hate the game.
(38:37):
It's very important to recognize.
Opt out of that game and into the game of Bitcoin where the rules are transparent.
You can audit them yourselves and have a high degree of certainty that they're not going to be changed.
And so you can sort of base decisions off of the rules that set forth in that game pretty confidently.
And then the other thing is this sort of integration of Bitcoin into the institution.
(39:04):
I'm happy you brought that up because I wanted to touch on that when you consider what's happening today and what's happened, I would say, over the last year and a half since the ETFs launched.
is you've had this different sort of archetype of new Bitcoiner come to market,
which isn't an individual.
It's typically a corporation or an institution that is made up of individuals
(39:25):
but operates on a completely different order of magnitude in terms of capital flows
and just access to capital that can flow into Bitcoin.
So on that note with what's happening right now,
Obviously, here in the United States, Trump administration seems very keen on fostering the Bitcoin industry in the United States.
(39:48):
Executive order for a strategic Bitcoin reserve.
Nothing's been passed and enshrined in Talal yet, but they're saying they want to accumulate as much Bitcoin as possible.
Obviously, the trend of Bitcoin treasury companies, people following in Michael Saylor and Strategies Wake beginning to accelerate.
We're seeing them pop up, not only here in the United States, but around the world.
(40:12):
You've got other nation states adopting Bitcoin, most famously El Salvador, where you have the president, President Bukele, sharing screenshots of the gains the country's made in Bitcoin since they started accumulating it.
Obviously, we've got Bhutan up in the Himalayas, which has been mining Bitcoin and using it to their advantage.
(40:34):
different archetype of buyer institutions not necessarily individuals but institutions are made
up of individuals at the end of the day like what do you think about this sort of archetype
of new buyer and new demand source for bitcoin as we head into the second half of 2025.
(40:56):
Yeah yeah I mean it's very interesting to see and for me and for us in the book and we dive
into this as well. It was sort of inevitable, you know, because I feel like some people structure
like the Bitcoin's journey into these several sort of stages. You know, you had like the early
adopter stage or like even before you had all the nerds and techies, then the early adopters,
(41:20):
then the finance people. It was all the individuals, the retailers that were first,
you know, which is really neat about Bitcoin. It's probably the only industry where this really can
happen. It's not the institutions first. But then at some point, obviously, and I think we reach now
this threshold where with 100K, it's really people who have been in Bitcoin for maybe five,
(41:41):
seven, six years, they made probably astonishingly amounts of wealth as well, even sometimes life
changing stuff. And they have huddled through all these troughs and the ups and downs. And I mean,
they're now feeling ever more compelled to act out their beliefs, you know, and pushing for the adoption of Bitcoin.
(42:03):
And now with strategy, having shown this playbook, I think this is what we're seeing across different spectrums of institutions, you know,
like really people, the Bitcoiners themselves, who maybe have even come into positions where they can sort of move the needle inside companies.
You know, I myself are sort of a person.
(42:25):
I mean, I'm not a banker myself.
I never I'd never studied finance at university.
And here I am.
I find myself among investment managers in one of the Switzerland's top banks, you know, as a big coiner.
And I can now also try to drive policy, even though within a bank, it's still sort of hard, you know, because there are all these regulations.
(42:46):
But but yeah, there's there's other examples that I can point to.
For me, Dylan Leclerc is the best example.
He's this guy, really young, coming from the trenches, so to say, and is now moving the needle with MetaPlanet.
And I think that's what we're seeing.
(43:07):
We will keep on seeing this.
That's why I believe there's so much more to come on that front.
because just a lot of people, a lot of Bitcoiners who want to now use this leverage that they have.
And then the amplifier are the institutions which can do everything on a greater scale.
And that will amplify everything with all the bad, the pros and cons, I guess.
(43:29):
I mean, when it comes to these Bitcoin treasury companies, I'm not sure.
This is probably also somewhat overhyped.
And at some point, some will die again.
And I mean, I just have anecdotal evidence again, but I mean, I'm now also being asked to be an advisor to some companies that want to start in Switzerland, you know, and I'm just a small big corner, maybe here in Switzerland, some sort of expert, but I have a small following.
(43:56):
But the case or the fact that they're now asking me kind of shows me, okay, I'm not proficient enough, but they just want to maybe have somebody who can slap a pretty face on.
Yeah, exactly. And source of attention and stuff. And so this sort of is anecdotal evidence for me that we might be in the stage where these things are getting overhyped. I also believe that maybe in Switzerland, a Bitcoin treasury company might not make that much sense after all, because when it comes to buying Bitcoin, we're world renowned to be among the best places, you know, with the banks where you can already enter.
(44:34):
We have like all the ETPs for very early on.
We have no capital gains on Bitcoin.
So no real moat that you will have as a Bitcoin treasury company.
And I believe it's probably similar with other countries.
And with some, it's not.
In the US, you have strategy.
They really have like their edge.
Or it seems like in Japan, you have MetaPlanet.
(44:55):
They have some sort of regulatory arbitrage that's going on there.
So in some countries, it might work, but not in all.
And so, yeah, I mean, it's always the same.
It's pros and cons to everything.
But I think it's just not going away because of the force that we describe in the book,
you know, with all these hotlers that really want to be the change that they want to see
(45:20):
in the world, you know?
Yeah, it's funny.
It's the chat behind the scenes in the industry right now.
I was like, particularly for podcasters,
is like, when are you going to join the next treasury company?
Yeah, I was waiting for you to join soon, you know?
To all the listeners out there, if I ever join one,
(45:41):
it's a sign at the top.
My timing is not great.
And I'm not fit for purpose for that type of role.
I like to talk about Bitcoin.
It doesn't mean I'm an expert at capital market arbitrage.
yeah i don't want to piss on anybody particular but even in the us you might know who i'm
(46:01):
referencing but there are other people you know big broadcasters who who now are wearing a hat
you know and there like some company name on it and so i like okay this this looks a little toppy to me as well But we see Maybe not Maybe this time is different after all
We shall see.
(46:21):
I'll be happy just to do what I'm doing here at TFTC in 1031.
That's enough for me.
I don't need to join a treasury company.
But it is insane.
Another thing I was thinking about as we were talking about,
Like institutions are made up of individuals and as Bitcoin monetizes, the price goes up and the individuals in Bitcoin get wealthier.
(46:43):
They can influence policy. They can deploy capital to build companies and goods that they want to see in the world.
They can get politically active, whatever it may be.
And this reminds me of a presentation that Turdemister gave in Austin early last year during a Bitcoin urbanism meetup.
(47:03):
it might have been two years ago now at this point but it is a pretty wild stat like as bitcoin
does a 10x every four to six years whatever whatever it averages out to be like the amount
uh the the steps individual bitcoiners make into the top one top 0.1 top 0.01 percent of the global
(47:28):
wealth ladder increases. And I think what he said during that presentation was, I don't think we
realize how quickly we're going to get to a point where like the 0.01% is made up of like 50%
Bitcoiners. And then you can really begin to use that capital that you've saved and accumulated to
(47:48):
change the world for the better, which is incredibly optimistic in a good way,
Not overly optimistic, not naive optimistic, but it's an optimistic view of the future where you found this thing, you found it early, you put in the hard work to understand it, make money to buy it, to accumulate it and hold it for a long period of time.
(48:13):
And then maybe that is the path to fixing all these things is enough Bitcoiners who are philosophically and ideologically aligned getting to a point of wealth where they begin to deploy that capital and fix the systemic issues in the system.
No, that's a great point.
And I mean, I know what talk I think you're referencing by tour.
(48:34):
I think it was put online as well.
And I watched it too, because I think it's a journey that many Bitcoiners will go through as well.
I mean, I'm going through this myself in terms of I'm a true libertarian at heart.
And so when I first discovered Bitcoin, I was like, okay, this is really something that helps me not to care about politics anymore.
(48:57):
And to some extent it does.
It gives me some reassurance.
Also, when it comes to the portfolio that you have, like, okay, maybe what all the clowns are doing out here, maybe it might not affect me that harsh.
because I have my secret stash here
and at least this is giving me some reassurance.
But then at the same time,
(49:17):
I feel like it can also be a little naive.
I just saw this post a couple of days back
by Max Keiser.
And again, he wrote a praise for our book as well
because he's good friends with Ricardo
and so don't want to shit on him at all.
But he had this meme sort of,
without Bitcoin, I'd be forced to care about politics.
(49:39):
You know, that's what we what he posted to some other thing that he was referencing.
And I was like, yeah, maybe if you are that well off like him and you can escape to El Salvador, that's true.
But maybe it's not true for everyone, not even for every Bitcoiner, you know, because at the margin, some might not be as well off as him.
(49:59):
And so maybe it and that's where I'm then questioning myself again.
So maybe it's not that good. It wouldn't be that good if all the Bitcoin is just really retreat and don't care about. And luckily, I think that's also not what we're seeing, because as you said, in the US, you have, I think, the BTC Policy Institute, all these institutions that are picking up as well.
(50:23):
I see it here in Switzerland as well, all the institutions and entities that are being founded to really influence politics in some way.
And then you also have the resources by now, you know, because usually like all these political groups, all the libertarians, they didn't have that much money.
But nowadays they have it and money sort of moves some things at the margin as well.
(50:47):
And so I think that's really interesting.
I'm looking forward to see what influence Bitcoiners will have.
I'm just reading this book, Satoshi's paper by Natalie Smolenski.
And in the beginning, she references all these acts in the US that you guys put through,
like sometimes even behind closed doors, sort of the Patriot Act, the anti-drug money act,
(51:13):
whatever act there is.
I don't even know.
You might know it better than me.
The Bank Secrecy Act.
Yeah, the Bank Secrecy Act.
all these acts, you know, and she's also in the book, they're like, okay, maybe Bitcoin will have
the financial power, the interest, the stamina, everything else to reverse these things and go
up against this. And so that will be very interesting to see. And that would, as you said,
(51:34):
your point, make the world a better place, at least in our eyes, probably. And so it's going
to be interesting how that pans out as well. Yeah, you may not care about political power,
but political power cares about you it's uh for somebody who's um definitely slanted more towards
libertarianism that uh it's it's a hard thing to come to grips with but i think you have to realize
(52:00):
you're in a game and you're an actor in that game and you may not like the rules and want to
opt out but if you if you're looking for the optimal outcome you probably have to play ball
to a certain extent.
And I think Bitcoiners, particularly here in the United States,
have really woken up to that in the last three years and began to.
And I think it's also very important because one other thing that really,
(52:23):
that I learned when I was researching and then writing the book,
I went full deep down the rabbit hole towards MMT, you know,
like modern monetary theory.
I mean, I always knew sort of what it is.
I studied Georg Friedrich von Knopp, which is like sort of the founder back in the 19th century and stuff.
(52:43):
But researching the book, I did this deep dive on MMT and I found it so fascinating.
Even though I'm not sort of fond of their conclusions, I feel like these guys, they're spot on when it comes to describing today's system.
I think you had Mel Madison on just a few weeks ago, and I had an episode on my podcast with him as well, where we were discussing that Trump is really sort of following these MMT policies.
(53:11):
And so I found this so interesting because they have these MMT guys.
I don't know. Have you seen the movie Finding the Money?
You know, this documentary?
I can really...
Yeah, I can recommend it because as a Bitcoiner, I could sort of relate, you know, because they have been jumping through similar hoops in terms of like they're being called monetary fringe people and cringe, you know.
(53:37):
And so everybody laughs at them.
But then when they really go talk to people and they sort of not orange pill, but MMT pill them, I mean, they sometimes really manage this, you know, because they're like, OK, we're in fiat now.
And then they make all these sort of promises as well, you know, because with MMT, you can finance everything.
(53:59):
no sort of lack to the money that you can create and stuff.
And so, as I said, even though I don't really can subscribe to this theory in terms of like
morals and philosophy wise, I feel like this is just what's going to happen in the fiat
system.
You know, these people are going to be ever stronger voices.
And maybe if at some point Democrats are coming back to power, I mean, they will be all over
(54:25):
their ears.
And so it's all the more important that we have Bitcoin because in an MMT world, I mean, control and everything is just going to be a lot harsher.
And that's why it's even more important that we have the Bitcoiners who we take to the stage as well and then sort of try to refute them as well, you know, and have some counter arguments ready.
(54:47):
because I think this theory is gaining a lot of momentum
and it's just because they're promising la-la land to everyone
and that's what people want to hear in the end.
And the rules of the game are such that they can
it's in the realm of possibility in that rule set
(55:07):
so they can go effectuate what they want to happen
which is unnerving
because like you said it i don't agree with it morally philosophically and it's a complete
it's basically like an admission we become completely untethered from reality and so
(55:28):
once you do that here's what's possible you can the debt doesn't matter you can finance everything
exactly printed dollars then you just tax them out of the system yeah but but the thing to me is
And like a lot of people, like we call them the useful idiots, you know, I mean, they might just go happily go along with this, you know, because for me, the pandemic or plandemic or whatever you want to call it was like a perfect example for this, you know, like a lot of people just went along with it.
(55:57):
They didn't care. And so I think the same might be happening there, especially if these economists and politicians who are influenced by these economists are then promising them the entire world, you know, by, okay, we can get rid of climate change.
We can get rid of this. We can finance everyone just because the money doesn't matter. We just sort of have to mobilize the real resources because that's what they can't print, you know, not yet, you know, at least that's not possible.
(56:27):
And so, I mean, I think people will just go along with it.
And then, yeah, the system itself will need more levers to pull to sort of steer people into the right direction in terms of providing the real resources.
That's why the control screws will probably be tightened, you know.
But I could imagine people go along with it because like both of the systems sort of have these useful idiots, you know.
(56:53):
like the traditional one has these with the people going along.
The Bitcoin system also has these useful idiots like all the crypto people who buy
into crypto and then end up being Bitcoiners.
So they start out as useful idiots.
And then this also helps our cause in the end because more money is
(57:14):
like initially coming into the space.
And so, yeah, I think this will probably be the defining battle going forward
for me you know mmt versus bitcoin uh like philosophically again but i just think uh the
more i studied it now i i wouldn't just uh laugh it off anymore because i think it's it's a serious
(57:34):
serious development and will only uh catch more and more fire at least that's that's what i think
yeah yeah i think you only have to look at the front runner for mayor of new york city um to
to see that it is certainly gaining
in terms of influence.
He's in this documentary as well.
And yeah.
(57:56):
Is he?
I have to watch this.
I think so.
Yeah, I think he is in there as well.
Or at least one of his advisors.
Yeah, so it is interesting.
It is.
Another thing I wanted to come back on
because you brought it up,
Max down in El Salvador
and this idea of flag theory,
Like just when shit hits the fan, just leave where you where you grew up and go find you'll find like mine a Bitcoin or somewhere on an island around the world.
(58:28):
Build your citadel like that is always internally.
I've paid credence to it in the past, but as I've gotten older and had children, I find it like just like untenable for me personally.
somebody who has a pretty strong
nuclear and extended family
I think the idea of like
abandoning where I grew up from
(58:49):
like I was telling you before we hit record I just moved back
to my hometown of Philadelphia
partly for this reason
because my family's there my extended family
my friends that I'm still
really close with who I grew up with
are all there and this idea of just
abandoning your roots
to go find like minded people
elsewhere just has never
(59:09):
sat well with me and uh maybe it's naive maybe it's idealistic but i do think there is credence
in being that individual who gets bitcoin and understands or likes to think that he understands
a lot of the uh what's causing the problems and the strife and how the game is messed up
(59:32):
in the world um to sort of put the flag down and say no i'm gonna make sure that
where i grew up my home um does not just get washed in the wave of fiat debasement and fiat
politics and um put up a fight to try to slowly but surely um convince people that hey there's
(59:53):
another way to do things and bitcoin's part of that way yeah no that's that's greatly said i mean
i was going through the same thing you know as i said the book came about because we were traveling
as sovereign individuals slash digital nomads, you know, and we were really sort of unregistered
from Switzerland. So like, no strings attached, you know, we wanted to really live this life.
(01:00:17):
But after two years, we figured, yeah, it's tough. As you said, I'm also well rooted with family,
extended friends. And so I'm like, wow, if you can really pull this off, I mean, I'm impressed.
I have now some digital nomad friends who've been doing this for plus 10 years.
And so it's crazy.
But if you then, without, again, calling anyone out, but if you look at these people, they're living all by themselves.
(01:00:45):
Usually they have no wife, no family and just traveling.
And so, yeah, maybe if it's for you, then it's okayish.
But like, I'm probably similar to you.
I couldn't do this.
And so, yeah, going back to where your roots are and really try to make a difference, like maybe, for example, Peter McCormack, you know, who's really now trying to get his city around and investing in the soccer club and everything.
(01:01:12):
That's just that's another legacy that you can leave.
And so, again, I mean, that's Bitcoin gives you the optionality, you know, in both ways.
And that's what I like about it.
And so, yeah, everyone to each his own, I guess that's that's what it is.
But I'm with you on that.
Yeah, no, I think that I mean, maybe that's the most important
(01:01:35):
point to get out of.
your individual Bitcoin enlightenment is that it gives you that optionality,
which is far preferable to the lack of optionality that exists within the fiat system today.
Yeah, no, that's definitely, that's something, this optionality,
which is, I think, what freedom is for me eventually about, you know,
(01:01:58):
like you get the options, you get to choose and exactly.
That's also coming back to this whole MMT thing, you know,
So, I mean, yeah, I do understand where they're going.
But in the end, as I said, if you can only print the money and you cannot print the real resources, you have to source it from somewhere.
And usually this only goes through like soft force or even hard force, you know, and then you sort of have to mandate stuff and you have to get people to work in health care.
(01:02:28):
And that's why, because that's where you're spending all the money.
And then so the resources has to sort of be transferred there and channeled into these industries.
And so it's all through force.
And in the end, exactly, that's not what my philosophical underpinning and belief is about.
And that's what I prefer about Bitcoin.
(01:02:49):
Everyone is adopting it freely and it gives you the choice to either live this nomadic lifestyle or go back and become a tribal big coiner in your family And we have a subchapter on this on the book as well
It's exactly this in chapter seven, where we talk about this dichotomy or just like, yeah, the citadel versus like maybe the nomad or.
(01:03:17):
Yeah, so it's probably going to be the future has we'll have both, I guess.
Yeah.
I would agree there.
I would agree there.
I'm not fucking leaving.
Yes.
I'm not leaving.
This has been great.
Where should we send people?
(01:03:37):
The safe house?
Yes.
Yeah.
In the end, it's the safe house.
Yeah.
That's where you get the book.
It's also on Amazon.
For anybody listening from Europe, I guess, Amazon.de from Germany is probably the best
site because then you get no shipping costs.
I don't know if we have figured it out on Amazon.com yet, but if you're from the States or internationally, it's the best place is probably to go and order it from the safe house because there it's the highest quality books that you get.
(01:04:06):
Also in terms of wrapping and everything, I mean, safe is really making sure this is high standard.
Safe building out a publishing empire one book at a time Yes he is He is Exactly You in great company at the safe house yes yeah that that for sure i mean it it amazing it it i mean i would have never imagined that
(01:04:27):
we will ever publish a book through safe but i mean ricardo being a huge fan of his and that was
maybe his his biggest requirement you know write a book which is close to the bitcoin standard and
And we were like, dude, this is quite some pressure that you're putting on us here.
And obviously, we didn't want to rewrite everything that Safe has already written.
(01:04:51):
And that's why we tried to, with the philosophical angle that we talked about, with the historical angle that might not have been addressed so far.
And so, yeah, in the end, I hope we did it.
But yeah, it's such a privilege to be on board with him.
So I can't complain for sure.
Well, thank you for writing the book. I'm going to wait for my hardcover to show up. I'm a physical book maxi.
(01:05:18):
Nice. Yeah.
To finish the rest of the book beyond chapter four. But no, I think this message is incredibly powerful and important.
I mean, there's many different ways through which people come to Bitcoin.
I mean I long been an advocate of the more content the more angles on Bitcoin education the better People often ask me as somebody who been podcasting about Bitcoin for eight years now like oh you ever get triggered by all the new Bitcoin podcasts come to the market all
(01:05:48):
the new books?
I'm like, no, the more, the better.
Each individual has something that they connect with differently.
And the more angles you're sort of describing the problem and the solution, the better.
Yeah, it's true.
The less we get and we don't get to print any Bitcoin at all, the more we have to print
Bitcoiners like you and me or like we have to print Bitcoin podcasts. And so everything else
(01:06:13):
is probably fine. So yeah, keep them coming. All right. Well, Pascal, hope you enjoy your night.
And Freaks, go pick up the book. Go pick up the book. Put it on the bookshelf. Read it. Spread it.
And I'm sure we'll catch up this fall as well because there's going to be a lot going on.
(01:06:35):
Great, Marty.
Thanks for bringing me on.
Keep up the work as well.
And too bad I don't get to see you in Riga, but maybe, as you said, in fall or somewhere
else.
Yeah, Bitcoin is still a small world, at least among the core Bitcoiners, I'd argue.
So every now and then we get to meet.
We'll run into each other somewhere.
(01:06:56):
Sure.
Somewhere around the world at some point.
Exactly.
Cool.
Thanks a lot.
Have a great one.
Thank you, you too.
Peace and love, Freaks.
The key!
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