FU Money
Daily Ramble
I joined the solar industry in 2005. Until 2008, the industry was dominated by a cast of characters that isn’t so different from the crypto industry: pot-smoking hippies, anarchists wanting to burn it all down, garage tinkerers, and climate change activists. Growing up in Bandon, Oregon, which yields the highest ratio of characters per capita of any town (I’m willing to wager), I thoroughly enjoy hanging out on the island of misfit toys. Never a dull moment, especially when participating in a conference that’s drawn all the odd-ball moths to the flames.
Getting into crypto, I suspected that the industry would evolve similarly. In 2008, the solar conference scene started to change as more suits showed up. By 2010, the dominant force in the industry was the suits. The characters who’d driven the solar industry into the mainstream were found huddling around the edges of the conference, both grumpy at being the lesser force in the industry and self-congratulatory to see their ideas and efforts validated. I was someone who attempted, unsuccessfully, to make the transition. By 2012, when I left the corporate circuit, the colorfulness of the industry that had attracted me had been muted into dull pastels.
At the Bitcoin 2021 conference, it took me a couple of days to realize that the game would play out differently despite solar and Bitcoin both being disruptive technologies. Why? Because the longer folks are in crypto, the closer they get to post-economic. I love the term “post-economic.” Means, literally, don’t give a sh*t about money. Bitcoiners have termed this concept FU money. Yeah, it’s what it sounds like. I haven’t validated the numbers, but I heard someone say that by the time Bitcoin reaches $200k in price, most billionaires on the planet will be Bitcoiners. Read that last sentence a couple of times and let that sink in. The biggest wealth transfer in history and done without violence — humanity is growing up!
But more exciting to me is knowing that the conference circuit will stay just as weird, funky, and wild into the foreseeable future. When people stop kowtowing for their paychecks, they’re just themselves. There’s no higher form of freedom than being yourself, and bloody hell if free people aren’t one of my favorite sights.
Most Impactful Thing on the Interwebs
Coming from life in Portugal, these images were shocking. And it wasn’t much different in Miami. Surprisingly, I heard no one speaking of the homeless population lining the streets. Are homeless people not people here?
Bitcoin Price Prediction
Yesterday: $34.6k - $39k
Today: $28k - $34k
Tomorrow: $28k - $34k
Despite multiple Latin American countries exploring the use of Bitcoin in their countries, the market broke to the downside setting up the strong potential of further selling. We’re currently at $32k and dropping as the market seeks a strong area of liquidity for buyers to step in. Regardless, the next leg of the trend is down. I’m currently watching the $30k-$32k and the $28k-$30k regions as the next two primary support zones. If both of those should fail, we will need to see a full-blown capitulation, driving the price down to the $20k area or even lower. Albeit painful, the capitulation scenario would be most likely to bring the bull out of hibernation. But no matter how we slice it, the bulls are on the defensive. If you’re holding Bitcoin now, this is where you earn your stripes as a HODLer.
Bitcoin Q & A
Q: Can I automate recurring payments using Bitcoin?
A: Not at this point.
On the Bitcoin network, there is no way to do pull transactions. A pull transaction is how a company automatically debits your bank account each month to pay for a subscription service. Without the ability to pull transactions on the Bitcoin network, recurring payments need to be initiated by the sender each time. I suspect tools for recurring transactions will exist in the future when crypto becomes more mainstream.
Thanks for reading,
Kent
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