lawyer | bitcoin | host of @thinkbitcoinpod | humanities evangelist | fix the money and a cultural renaissance follows
Jun 9, 2023 • 23 tweets • 5 min read
Thoughts on Coinbase:
It's worth repeating over and over again since bitcoin Twitter is once again awash in legal takes from folks licensed to practice law nowhere on earth:
What the SEC says in a complaint is not dispositive or precedential. What a federal judge says is. 🧵
Justice Gorsuch from a case last week:
"Naturally, Congress remains free to revise the securities laws at any time, whether to address the rise of direct listings or any other development. Our only function lies in discerning and applying the law as WE find it." (emph. added)
Feb 26, 2023 • 6 tweets • 1 min read
Friendly reminder that Gensler’s opinions on what is or isn’t a security are not legally dispositive.
In this country, judges - not SEC chairs - ultimately determine what the law means and how it applies.
Doesn’t mean his thoughts are irrelevant. They’re just not dispositive.
Which is to say, the SEC can bring enforcement actions and get settlements, but those aren’t legal precedent.
Companies/individuals can choose to go to trial, where SEC would have to prove to a judge that something was a security (if that’s an element of the allegation).
Feb 7, 2023 • 26 tweets • 6 min read
We often contextualize #Bitcoin as a historic development in the evolution of money.
And it is.
But, just as importantly, it’s also a historic development in the evolution of our relationship w/ time which, in its current state, is unhealthy and getting worse. 🧵🧵
The average length of a typical human life on this planet is about 4000 weeks, an amount that serves as the title of @oliverburkeman's excellent book, which is a book about our relationship with time and how we might go about cultivating a more fulfilling one.
Dec 6, 2022 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
Unpopular opinion: Even as a Bitcoiner, I feel a certain level of suspicion toward anyone who has 100% conviction in BTC's ultimate success.
100% faith tends to make one blind to criticism, susceptible to confirmation bias, and subconsciously willing to spin to fit narratives.
We should remember Yeats' admonition that "the best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity."
Lacking 100% conviction/faith does not mean you don't act decisively, lend sincere support, and contribute your abilities to a mission you care about.
Nov 14, 2022 • 12 tweets • 6 min read
I've spent the last 48 hours or so reflecting on the @pacificbitcoin conference.
Shout out to @coryklippsten and the whole @SwanBitcoin team for putting on a fantastic, inspiring event.
It crystallized some important things for me that I want to share publicly.
THREAD🧵
1. I have more confidence in #Bitcoin than ever. Surrounded by low-time preference, mission-driven people, each of whom is committed to advancing this transformative technology, was invigorating.
Jul 18, 2022 • 42 tweets • 9 min read
Why no one should have a 0% allocation to #bitcoin
A 🧵THREAD about risk, retail investors, and the allegedly enduring economic truths that may not endure much longer 👇
Many retail investors and familiar with the known, oft-discussed risks to portfolios. If you’re a personal finance enthusiast/devotee and/or you spend time in the personal finance space, you’re probably pretty familiar with some of the more salient ones.
Jun 6, 2022 • 35 tweets • 8 min read
You shouldn't be forced to invest your money in order to grow or even preserve your wealth.
Saving your money should be effective.
But our current monetary system punishes saving.
This creates massive downstream problems.
And #Bitcoin fixes this. (THREAD 🧵)
If you’ve spent any time in the #personalfinance or #FIRE spaces you’re almost certainly familiar with the popular and widely proclaimed tenet that one cannot save one’s way to wealth; that, rather, one must invest to achieve wealth.
May 23, 2022 • 27 tweets • 8 min read
I was recently asked by a podcast host what I considered the biggest risk to #Bitcoin that isn't being discussed enough.
Here's how I answered.
THREAD 🧵
I think certain mental models in #Bitcoin possess the potential for serious downstream risks. There's one ubiquitous mental model in particular that I view as a prevailing blind spot or a too-easily-accepted premise.
Apr 25, 2022 • 29 tweets • 7 min read
In 2019 I was a committed Bernie Sanders supporter.
Now, in 2022, I'm an even more committed Bitcoiner.
Here's the story of my intellectual and political journey from Bernie to #Bitcoin, a journey I think (and hope) more and more folks find themselves on.
🧵 THREAD 🧵
In mid-to-late 2019, as the 2020 primaries were heating up, I did something I’d never done before: I made my first contribution to a political candidate, one Bernard Sanders. I made a small contribution to his campaign, and then I kept making additional, subsequent contributions.
Mar 7, 2022 • 22 tweets • 6 min read
We're not in the throes of late-stage capitalism. We're living through the late stages and the death rattle of the post-1971 fiat system.
Mistaking the two (and basing solutions/policies on this mistake) is a recipe for disaster.
🧵Let me explain 👇
I think a growing number of people feel a pressing sense that we are approaching the end of something. This sensation of approaching finality, of historical transition, and of fraying order has saturated and informed our politics, as well.
Mar 4, 2022 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
The biggest portfolio diversification criterion that is largely ignored by most investors at present but that will be massively important in coming years:
Diversity of counterparty risk.
If you don't own something that cannot in any way, shape, or form be considered someone else's liability, you are not diversified. Full stop.
The geopolitical landscape is shifting dramatically. As Lenin famously said, "There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen." We appear to be in the midst of such eventful weeks.
Here's how and why #Bitcoin is increasingly relevant:
The geopolitical game is the ongoing struggle for power and influence in the emerging post-petrodollar, post-Pax-Americana system. For the last 50 years or so, since Nixon took the world off gold and established the petrodollar system, the dollar has held reserve currency status.
