Latest / TFTC: A Bitcoin Podcast / #634: Proof Of Ownership Without Sacrifice with Sam Abbassi

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#634: Proof Of Ownership Without Sacrifice with Sam Abbassi · TFTC: A Bitcoin Podcast

0:00
You've had a dynamic where money has become freer than free.
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If you talk about a Fed just gone nuts, all the central banks going nuts.
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So it's all acting like safe haven.
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I believe that in a world where central bankers are tripping over themselves to devalue their
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currency, Bitcoin wins. In the world of fiat currencies, Bitcoin is the victor.
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I mean, that's part of the bull case for Bitcoin.
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If you're not paying attention, you probably should be.
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Emergency rep late on a Friday.
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My guest here has a wedding in a little bit.
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I am braving the storm on the back porch of my father-in-law's beach house right now.
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But something to talk about.
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The FHA, Bill Pulte, Bill Pulte came out on Wednesday while Sam and I were both at the Bitcoin Policy Institute Summit and announced that they are essentially taking away the spending provision that Biden put in in 2022, which basically made it so if you want to get a mortgage as a Bitcoiner and have your Bitcoin count towards your net worth, you need to sell that Bitcoin, hold it in a bank account.
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all the cash in a bank account for three months, and then the value of that Bitcoin you sold could be recognized
1:26
towards your net worth and towards your credit worthiness.
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Bill Pulte came out on Wednesday and said, hey, we're changing this.
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Bitcoin and crypto holders, your wealth that's held in these assets will be recognized.
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However, they need to be held on a regulated third-party exchange and step in the right direction.
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massively beneficial that Bitcoiners don't have to sell their Bitcoin
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and their assets are being recognized towards their net worth
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in the eyes of banks and mortgage underwriters, but not perfect.
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Nothing is perfect.
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And so I thought, let's bring on Sam Abbasi, co-founder, CEO of Hoseki,
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which is working to solve this problem to basically give institutions the ability
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or individuals the ability to prove that they own Bitcoin while retaining self-custody to
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institutions. That was a long-winded intro. So I'll throw it to you, Sam, if you have any color
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to add there. Thanks for having me on again, Marty. Yeah, good, not great. But with government
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stuff, I think it's probably the best you can ask for. It seems like we'll consider Bitcoin as an
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asset, but you got to give up your keys. So obviously not pretty antithetical to how we
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view the space developing and i think and it's antithetical to this audience and how they want
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to hold their assets in the first place but um it shouldn't be understated i mean that's that's a
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that's a huge development yeah and we were texting back and forth about this last night like i imagine
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i read a newsletter about it yesterday and i'm just running with the assumption that
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the sort of clause that says you have to hold it on a third party exchange probably stems from
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a lack of understanding of the technical details of Bitcoin by people in FHA.
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And they're probably running through the problem in their head like, all right, if somebody goes and they try to claim that they have a certain amount of Bitcoin to count towards their net worth, how do we know that it's actually theirs?
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Like, are they just showing me their brother's wallet, their mom's wallet?
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Did they have somebody send it to that wallet before?
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Like, how do we know it's actually associated with that individual trying to take out this loan?
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And so I imagine, I don't have any inside information, but I'm just running with these assumptions that the tradeoff they made was like, all right, if they have it on an exchange associated with their name, that is a way in which we can confirm that it's actually theirs and they're not trying to dupe the mortgage underwriter.
3:54
Yeah. And we're getting more information in real time to better assess sort of what the idea was and what the inspiration was for this. I mean, more granularly as to why assets have to be held at a custodian. It's just it seems like it's more in line with how traditional finance functions. These are qualified custodians. There's one publicly listed exchange in the US that you can use. So for them, it just felt a lot more comfortable, probably. But, you know, it likely has to do with the lack of understanding with some Bitcoin fundamentals.
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which has sort of been our whole purpose. I mean, we started the company because I couldn't get a
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mortgage with my self-custody assets, realizing that they probably just want a statement,
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something that looks familiar enough or looks legitimate enough to get you through the door.
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But I think explaining to regulators and legislators the nuances of actually holding
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your keys and being able to prove that you are the owner is really important. I've always sort
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of related this to multi-sig and multi-sig companies. That's a Bitcoin primitive. That's
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what Bitcoin does, the protocol level. But what you need is you need companies and you need
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services that are nice wrappers around that, that, you know, my mom could theoretically be able to
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use. And so we're doing the same thing with Bitcoin. I think the most commonly known way
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to do this and the most like generally accepted way is by signing and verifying a message.
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Most Bitcoin users probably haven't done that unless they were around in 2012, 13, 14.
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but that is a core part of what Bitcoin does.
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And we've just developed a nice experience around that.
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So yeah, I mean, again, it's a step in the right direction.
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It's not perfect, but still good.
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Yeah.
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And so let's dive deeper into what you guys have built at Hoseki.
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For anybody listening to this, Sam was on the podcast a year,
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year and a half ago when we did a full debrief.
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But I think for anybody who may have listened to that or anybody who hasn't listened to that yet, just I mean, you briefly described it.
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But I think diving deeper into the details of what you're doing and really leaning into the idea and illuminating the fact that you can get sort of institutional grade assurances while still being able to retain the institutions can get the assurances from individuals holding Bitcoin in self-custody.
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Yeah. So, I mean, our whole purpose for existence is to help financialize Bitcoin, build tooling, build a platform that makes that easier, makes that more accessible and ultimately empowers sovereign individuals, people that are holding their own keys.
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So when we did the first podcast, it might have been maybe, yeah, maybe a year and a half or two years ago at this point.
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It was predominantly sort of an API connection, Plaid-like sort of experience.
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And that's what we were selling to banks. And the objective for that was to just give you more data points on your customers.
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Bitcoin, and they're interested in more than just Bitcoin, but like Bitcoin holdings, whether self-custody or in exchanges.
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And a lot of that was education. A lot of that is sort of explaining to them that you can hold this asset in different ways.
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You can actually hold them yourself, which is just such a break from how traditional finance works.
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You don't hold your own stock certificates. You don't have gold bars in your house.
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But in this case, you can actually hold physical thing itself in your home.
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And so that's always been a challenge in terms of education.
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Through a ton of feedback and a lot of iteration, what we realized is Bitcoin needs like sort of a platform or a set of tools in order to enable the property rights that are baked in.
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So the coolest thing about Bitcoin is that it natively enables property rights without a monopoly on violence.
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It settles and it itself is a traditional system outside of any other system, be it digital or physical.
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That's completely unique as it relates to money.
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It probably is sort of underemphasized, but that's something we recognized early on.
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Just like developing markets, you have assets.
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And let's say in the global south, you have real estate, but you don't have the frameworks to turn that asset into capital.
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And you realize that Bitcoin is in the exact same place that global south countries are in today, except we move at a much rapid and a much more accelerated pace.
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So sort of like the American frontier, being able to claim, like issue a claim, which is what they called it back then, on property that you are using, that you are inhabiting, that you really do practically own is really important in order to represent them and build credit and debt instruments on top of Bitcoin.
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So at a very fundamental level, what we do is we allow people to self-custody Bitcoin to prove that they own the UTXOs that they're trying to prove ownership over, whether that's through manually generating a signature or it's through plugging in your Trezor, your Ledger or whatever other cold storage device, signing a message.
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and in which case we never have access to private keys. That's a really important point that we
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always try and emphasize with our retail users is we never touch your private keys. We can't touch
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your private keys. We don't want to touch your private keys. And we also don't have custody of
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the asset itself. So all you're doing is providing this data that you have control over to a
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counterparty. In the first iteration, it was just a statement. So you have a mortgage broker,
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you have someone that you have a relationship with that you just need to formalize your Bitcoin
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holdings with. But we've enhanced it significantly. We're now a counterparty, be it a bank, any other
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financial institution, OTC trading desk can request certain information from you. So typically just
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that you meet a minimum balance threshold. And you on the other end, in a nice like CRM,
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DocuSign like experience, can connect your Bitcoin, prove that you own it, that you have control,
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and then share that information with what the counterparty is. You see all the information
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that they're requesting, you can approve or reject it,
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and you can always revoke access as well.
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So that really is what the platform does
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at a fundamental level.
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Yeah, and it's incredibly important
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because this is the way it should be done.
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And I think we all wish that FHA was cognizant
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of Hoseki and the ability to do this out of the gate
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when they made the announcement on Wednesday.
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But I think it's important really for anybody out there, whether you're at FHA or just a large institution, to really internalize this concept here and what you guys are building at Hoseki.
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Because it is massive in terms of creating the ability for individuals to store their own wealth, protect it, but then leverage it as capital.
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As you mentioned, being able to lay claim to the capital that they do truly own.
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And there's been this disconnection between Bitcoin and the traditional financial system since it launched.
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And it does feel like we are at this inflection point where it's certainly becoming more and more understood that Bitcoin is here to stay.
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Not only is it here to stay, it is going to be integrated into our economy.
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And I think it is important for us as Bitcoiners who care about being able to leverage the properties of Bitcoin to really highlight this.
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not only that, highlight the advantages that models like this provide, not only for individuals,
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but institutions as well, like being able to easily verify that you own to get out a loan or
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whatever it may be. Yeah. And, you know, the frustration was wanting to be able to use your
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Bitcoin or my Bitcoin without having to sell it first off, but also having to move it. So,
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you know, there's obvious like collateralized Bitcoin lending products, but I wanted an
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experience or I wanted tooling and I wanted the opportunity for sovereign individuals to
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simply be able to do something with that without even having to move it. There's a certain stack
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or a certain amount of your cold storage funds that you probably aren't that comfortable moving
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or you would rather not if you had some tooling or some type of credit product that would enable
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you to do something with it without actually having to move it. So I think this is the first
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step for sure. With mortgages specifically, what's so exciting about this is there's
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three different qualifications for like stock portfolios that are required in order to use them
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in a mortgage agreement. And the main thing is that it has to be considered verified. And so
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there's three points as to what that actually means. One is ownership, proving that you own it.
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Two is that it's not pledged elsewhere, which is really important. And then three is liquidity.
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And what's so exciting is that the platform itself, sort of front running all of this,
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supports all of that today and will still in perpetuity.
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Ownership is done by sign message There cross attestation protection So if someone claims ownership of a certain wallet or a certain amount of Bitcoin no other person can do so We have a timeout period
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There's things like, you know, refresh signatures. So basically proving that you do continue to have
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control throughout the duration of whatever the agreement might be. The not pledged elsewhere
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part is critical. So being able to have almost a clearinghouse of Bitcoin data, your own Bitcoin
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information that is being shared with a different counterparty, categorized for whatever the share
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might be for, allowing other institutions to see that this is pledged or might be pledged elsewhere
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just makes for a much more robust financial system. The liquidity bit is just being able
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to prove that you can actually sell it. So that's where a little bit of the nuance comes in.
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connecting a Coinbase account, for example, and your brokerage account, and also confirming that
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you own your private keys should basically be sufficient for you to show that you can send
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those funds to an exchange or elsewhere and be able to sell them immediately if the terms of the
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agreement call for that. So, you know, I mean, our existing system is built on COBOL. I think
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trying to like monkey patch and rearrange things, you know, legacy system is probably,
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it's probably too late. And what's cool about Bitcoin is all this stuff is natively part of the
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system and the controls that you can have are so, so much better. Um, you know, just understanding
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sort of, um, well, being able to enable people that have held Bitcoin for a long time and giving
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them some sort of benefit for that is really the crux of this. But, um, yeah, being able to monitor
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balances, being notified when something falls below a certain threshold or goes above a certain
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threshold and giving the user, the sovereign individual, all that control. Um, we're just
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really excited. This isn't something we thought would happen this fast, to be honest. So we were
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sort of building in anticipation of this in a few years. But I guess with this new admin,
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it's sort of, you know, mandated and ordered. And now they'll have to comply.
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Yeah, Trump was literally just behind the podium singing the praises of the industry. It's an
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incredible industry. It's going to we're going to dominate it. We're going to beat China.
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And so that's what that's why I'm very thankful for Bitcoin Policy Institute, because that's like
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the one thing I worry about as the administration becomes very favorable towards our industry. And
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You consider the large amounts of money surrounding him.
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Some, I think we definitely agree, are friendlies and others not so friendly, really forcing bad ideas on the administration.
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So the Bitcoin Policy Institute doing things like they did this week with the summit are massively important to getting in front of representatives, senators and people within the executive administration to make sure that we're giving them the correct and right and best information.
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But building what you were just describing, let's dig into pledging funds, making sure that funds are double pledged or rehypothecated on an individual level, if you will.
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How do you guys go about that?
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So we have the data with respect to what wallets or what addresses are being shared with any other counterparty.
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So those are categorized.
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And we'll have to iterate as well based on what the government needs.
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But those are categorized according to what the terms of the sort of we call it a share request.
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But basically what the terms of the of the of the pledge collateral are, if they're used for collateral that can be called upon later, if they're simply data points for them to assess their customer better.
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Those are all different parameters that we have that the institution can see on their end that the customer also voluntarily submits.
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So to sort of having this.
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Well, the network effects are critical.
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So having like this clearinghouse model where you know that certain assets that are being shared with you are already being shared in another location at a very minimum, at a foundational level, gives you some better data as to what the funds are being used for in the first place.
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So I think a lot of this is building from first principles, which frankly, I mean, just on your point with the BPI, that's I think what they're doing so well is merit really does pay off.
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And I think those guys are thinking about having thinking about the space from a first principles perspective that does show and carry on in this case to legislators and regulators.
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And they see that. And I think just sort of staying true to your conviction is really paid dividends.
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So, yeah, can't can't be more thankful to the BPI.
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Yeah. And let's paint the picture for all the politicians and members of the administration, potentially the president that are listening to this episode.
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what does giving an individual the ability to preserve self-custody and do all these things
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what does that open up from like a market perspective and consumer protections perspective
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well i mean we can speculate but i think if you understand bitcoin's ethos and bitcoin's sort of
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fundamental principles then um not building something like this and not sort of going in
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this direction is doing a disservice to the space and i just don't think it'll be something that
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would possibly play out. I mean, the sovereignty you have with holding your own assets just can't
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be understated. I remember, I think one of the things that orange pilled me before I even knew
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about Bitcoin was trying to get money out of an ATM, hitting my max, needing to take more money
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out, calling the bank and being told that the money in my account is mine, but the card that
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I'm using to withdraw those funds, I don't own. And I just realized at that moment, I don't own
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my money uh there's a million different constraints and hurdles between me and the money that i
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am supposed to own or supposed to have access to um self-custody completely turns it on its head
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and i think building very basic um frankly i think in retrospect things that will be very obvious
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tooling that enables you to do things with it which at the most basic simplest levels being
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able to say this is mine and i think the this might sound sort of like vitality but i think the
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I think the things that you can build on top of this will sort of surprise a lot of us.
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I think in a world that's becoming increasingly unstable, not that we want it to go in that direction, but it simply is.
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I think empowering the individual and giving them tooling to do that is going to unlock just a whole new sort of set of financial products.
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Yeah, it's and we discussed this when you're on the podcast last, but I think it's important.
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Like when you look out at the world and how the flourishing economies are actually able to emerge, it all comes back to private property rights, the ability to protect your private property.
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And I think to your point about the world getting more chaotic and more uncertain, that's something that's under attack is private property rights, whether that's via overt extreme taxation or just simply asset forfeiture.
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that was more of a risk under the Biden administration,
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but I think we'd be naive to think that it could not be a risk in the future.
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And Bitcoin as a peer-to-peer distributed network
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that runs on private public key cryptography
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really sort of cements private property rights for money in the 21st century,
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which cannot be understated.
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And to your point, I don't think we have even scratched the surface
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of the types of systems that we can build on top of that primitive.
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Yeah. And I think, I mean, the two main points I emphasize, and if anyone from the admin is
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actually listening or anyone high up, like these are two key takeaways that I hope people just
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take away in general. One is Bitcoin's audit function, which I really do think is probably
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one of the most under-emphasized features of the Bitcoin protocol. The fact that any third party
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you can download a server or download something and audit the entire supply of this money is,
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I mean, it's just completely novel. And also it's unmatched. I mean, you can't do that with
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US dollars. There's no USD server I can just download as Sam. And also no one knows how many
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US dollars exist. Euro dollars makes that worse, obviously. But even with gold, no one knows
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exactly how much gold exists in the world, even just above ground gold. And obviously,
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you're finding gold mines sort of as time goes on. But that function of Bitcoin is so,
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so important as it relates to any economy. But you're talking about a jurisdictionalist global
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economy and the money that powers it. So that point is really, really important,
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which is where the proof of reserves bit comes in. But the other point is the property rights.
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These property rights are baked in. There is no legislative body. There is no regulatory body
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that has to do anything here, the protocol itself can confirm and you can prove and you actually
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have the sovereignty to say that this is my asset. This is what I own. And you don't have
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the legal hurdles in between. I mean, doing that with, I mean, there's a reason why we have title
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insurance for homes. That's a difficult problem, even in our current system with probably the most
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basic asset that most people do own, which is their home. So if you can apply that sort of,
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if you can find a fix for that problem and do that at the level of money, again, I mean,
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And yeah, I just think it's incredible.
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Yeah.
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It's a bit of a tangent, but I'm recalling Alex Gladstein's speech from the summit earlier this week.
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And that's the other thing about this.
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I'm sure you've seen the memes, too, about what FHA put out on Wednesday.
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It's like it's all crypto is encompassing this sort of new guideline.
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and that worries me because like they just bundle in bitcoin with everything else and
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doesn't worry me like and that's the other thing there was a lot of misconceptions people
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thought it was like you can use bitcoin as collateral for loans which you can
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using some services like milo and others that already exist but um in terms of like
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separating bitcoin from crypto i don't want to say it rubbed me the wrong way but it does worry
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me that everything's getting lumped together because as we both know and most people listening
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to this know bitcoin is starkly different from crypto and has a completely different risk profile
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so in terms of creating a precedent of just like lumping them in together via this it's it's a bit
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unnerving too and i think we have to continue to do a good job because i think the last few years
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industry has been really good about drawing a line between bitcoin and broader crypto
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but like when it comes to things like this like proving your actual net worth like i think it's
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safe to say that uh net worth proven because you hold bitcoin versus holding fart coin is probably
23:24
more legitimate and accurate over the long run i mean a lot of this again is is cultural um we see
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this in our conversations with banks all the time. They don't know what Bitcoin is. And by virtue of
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that, they also don't know what anything else in the space is either. So for them, we have to,
23:42
and it's like chewing glass, we have to say crypto and use the term crypto because that's
23:46
just what they know and understand while still advocating and emphasizing Bitcoin as a completely
23:51
different thing in the space. So that's always been a challenge. I think it'll continue to be
23:56
a challenge, not for too long. So I don't really knock Pulte in the FHFA for that too much,
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just because I think they're using language that most other financial institutions also use
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purely because of a lack of familiarity, maybe not even education, but just familiarity in the space.
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But in terms of being worried about it, I mean, Bitcoin is going to prove its merits on its own,
24:19
and it has. And I think over time, that sort of separation is getting stronger and stronger.
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when we talk to banks, I mean, I'll tell you, no one cares about anything else except for Bitcoin.
24:30
And stables is a close second, but that's really it. So I can't ever, I mean, I really don't
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imagine mortgages being underwritten with anything but Bitcoin for now. Maybe also stables, but I
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think that probably would be extensive it because they're very conservative. I mean, traditional
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finance is a very conservative industry. Well, I mean, within a reason, it should be conservative.
24:52
But at least at a policy level, it's conservative. So I don't I'm not too concerned about, you know, things getting muddy too much.
25:00
I think I think over time it'll be it'll be rather obvious if it isn't already.
25:05
Yeah. And I don't want to be the boy you cried wolf because I've been saying this for like two or three cycles now.
25:10
But I do feel like this is the one where it it become abundantly clear that Bitcoin is different If you just look at the pairs of Bitcoin and any other ETH BTC Sol BTC whatever it may be it all going down
25:25
And the signal is with the pristine collateral asset, which is Bitcoin.
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And that's what's really exciting about this cycle is like Bitcoin
25:33
is pristine collateral is beginning to be recognized.
25:37
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
25:38
I mean, the performance itself, obviously, like it's just number go up
25:41
is really what most people, especially outside of space, care about. But culture shouldn't be
25:46
understated either. I mean, you mentioned the BPI. They intentionally called themselves the Bitcoin
25:51
Policy Institute when they could have picked a bunch of different names that were maybe more
25:54
encompassing or more friendly or more familiar to the people that they'll be talking to. But they
25:58
put their stake in the ground. Lucky for us and lucky for the whole space. And if you go to these,
26:04
I mean, I've said this a lot on different panels, but if you compare, this is now kind of dated.
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So this is really like 2019 type of 2018 almost type of conference knowledge.
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But if you go to these different events and you meet different people, there's a clear difference in how they approach the space.
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And not to discredit other communities, but, you know, the Bitcoin space is much more serious.
26:27
I mean, early on, I think that seriousness was more cypherpunk and maybe would have seemed a bit more threatening.
26:32
But I think at the sort of professional level, which is sort of where we're at and where we're going towards, they are just a lot more, I don't have a better word, but legitimate.
26:43
Having conversations with Bitcoiners, with serious Bitcoiners who are trying to promote policy and trying to move the needle, as opposed to having conversations with Ripple folks or with folks that are trying to promote DeFi is categorically different.
26:56
And I think the culture is really just taking care of itself.
27:00
yeah it's like we're not in it to make the money we're in it for the money which is like literally
27:05
changing the money and you see that and i i completely agree and it's i guess it's hard to
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describe to any outsider who hasn't experienced it for themselves but i think what i'd like this
27:16
week when you meet for bitcoin you're like we're thinking 30 40 years down the line thinking about
27:20
our children the world they're going to live in where defi's thinking about like all right what's
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the next token that's going to launch and how are you gonna how are we gonna make a bag on that and
27:28
rug and it's like it's completely unserious to the point where it's becoming laughable or it's
27:34
like you it seems like you don't there's been no consistent principles uh even if i just i think
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ethereum's the great example of the uh caricature of it's like a shit coin that thought it was going
27:48
to compete with bitcoin and just completely changed its principles on the go once every
27:54
other year, it seems. Whereas Bitcoin has been pretty consistent. There'll only be 21 million
27:59
nodes run the network. We're going to mine as much. We're going to get as much hash rate as we can.
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We're going to preserve sovereignty and we're going to integrate it into the financial system.
28:10
Yeah. And I mean, to your point, like everything here is long term. Our perspective is long term.
28:15
We think in decades, which is how empires typically think as well. In the Ethereum space,
28:21
I mean, I think I think the demographic that's been most amenable to Ethereum's like world's computer, world's computing platform narrative has been have been people that made a lot of money in the dotcom boom.
28:32
I think I think that that seems like a parallel if, you know, that was a good outcome for you.
28:40
And I can see why that might be, you know, enticing, too, because it seems like it's that exact same thing, but a little bit more enhanced, a little bit more complicated than necessarily, but a little bit more enhanced.
28:51
And I think Bitcoiners see that that's not really the value here.
28:55
You might be able to do some relatively interesting things on an inferior database with inferior logic.
29:06
But if you're here to fundamentally change the way money works, or if you recognize that money is fundamentally changing, then the answer is pretty obvious.
29:16
So, yeah, I think I think with D.C. and I've spent more time there now that I care to admit.
29:22
But in D.C., it's like I think they're starting to see that the admin has been incredibly helpful as well.
29:27
And we have, you know, crypto czar. So that's so that's helping.
29:32
But, yeah, the culture for me is the big is the big differentiator.
29:37
Yeah. And that's I mean, it's I'm very happy to see that D.C. is waking up and this was discussed.
29:44
And I think we've discussed it before, but you mentioned it to like the early years, Bitcoin, very cypherpunk focus, very serious ideals.
29:51
And I think those ideals still exist at the base layer of Bitcoin, both socially and at the protocol level.
30:00
But as we've seen over the course of years, particularly during the Biden administration, like you may not care about political power, but it cares about you.
30:07
And you have to engage with that understanding in mind.
30:11
And we've done a good job of doing that in the last two years.
30:14
And I think, hearkening back to Trump's comments that I mentioned earlier, I think the administration does realize the opportunity of Bitcoin at a $2 trillion, $2.14 trillion market cap.
30:26
And if it really is going to be the next global reserve currency, it'll be hundreds of trillions of dollars.
30:31
So the opportunity to really win in this market is on the table if you're thinking at a nation state level.
30:37
and it makes sense that if you understand that that you would try to make sure that your country
30:45
is positioned well in terms of the industry being enabled to flourish and again i've said it earlier
30:53
but i think that's what most bitcoiners particularly those of us with the cypherpunk
30:58
ideals that the network really grew up on worry about is like it getting cocked by traditional
31:03
finance and you've been having conversations with banks that's one thing i'm interested to get your
31:07
perspective on is like who influences who more do the banks influence bitcoin more does bitcoin
31:12
influence the banks more over the long run or the financial system because i've been running with
31:17
this mean everybody's saying the financialization of bitcoin i'm saying no it's the bitcoinization
31:22
of finance which isn't a bad thing yeah yeah yeah exactly i mean i think that's what we're seeing
31:27
to be honest that from a from a company perspective as a ceo we've been sort of prepping for either
31:31
outcome because we may have our um assumption that we're not sure which is going to play out
31:35
but I think it is the latter.
31:36
I think I haven't heard,
31:37
I hadn't heard that term,
31:37
but that is, I think what's happening
31:39
is a big quantization of finance,
31:40
which is so exciting to see.
31:42
Just your point about like nation state adoption.
31:44
I mean, the leapfrog effect
31:45
is what I'm most excited about is,
31:47
you know, sort of,
31:49
obviously it's the ones that have the least to lose
31:50
or just getting destroyed by the existing system
31:52
that are going to adopt something that's like,
31:54
I mean, I guess technically unproven
31:56
over a long, over a longer time horizon.
32:00
But, you know, if El Salvador genuinely
32:02
does become the Singapore of the West
32:03
And if Bhutan becomes like Hong Kong, things shift.
32:08
And that's just exciting to watch and sort of live through.
32:12
One thing I'm honestly a little bit apprehensive about and not to be a wet blanket, but just
32:18
to just to be cautious is sort of the apolitical nature of Bitcoin and being too closely aligned
32:24
with one side or the other.
32:26
I think that's important because, you know, administrations change politics itself.
32:30
there's this phrase that politics is like an orphan child
32:34
it sort of goes
32:38
with the wind and you've got to be careful and you've got to be pretty cognizant of what you relate yourself
32:42
to closely too so I'm incredibly thankful
32:46
for now not living in fear that my corporate bank account, my personal bank account
32:50
might get closed, that's nice, it feels less like I'm
32:54
in the Soviet Union but at the same time I think as Bitcoiners we gotta
32:58
you know it's the whole uh don't what is it uh don't don't trust verify eat those including
33:05
the politicians i agree with that uh that last statement but i push back like
33:10
yeah uh i don't know look what's going on in new york city right now like those people will never
33:17
get bitcoin like overt socialists like i'm talking about zo zo ran uh mom donnie whatever
33:22
his name is who just won the democratic primary like that's i agree bitcoin's for anyone it's for
33:29
everyone in one c is at both sides of the aisle but there are and i i tweeted this out i'm not
33:34
sure if you saw the um the email that peter teal sent suck uh mark andreason and a few others in
33:42
2020 asking like the millennial question and basically brought the fact like people our age
33:47
you and i uh most of us uh most of our demo like has student loans can't buy a house
33:55
delaying family formation many still living with their parents and they have this like
34:00
um they have this very negative outlook on the future because they can't build capital
34:06
and they're turning to these socialist ideas which many were forced on us via indoctrination
34:13
via the schooling system but nevertheless they're like identifying the problem which is wealth gap
34:18
inflation can't afford anything and a lot of them are moving to the wrong solution so i i think
34:25
conservatives specifically recognize that obviously socialism isn't isn't the solution but i think
34:31
we should lean into that recognition because of millennials and now gen z specifically sort of
34:41
leaning towards socialist tendencies because they feel like they have no, no other way to,
34:46
to make it in the world. So they're just going to take things from others to really embrace Bitcoin.
34:50
Like a tweet I sent out is like any conservative who really cares about the encroachment of these
34:56
socialist tendencies across the country should be vehemently incorporating Bitcoin into as many
35:03
verticals as possible. Yeah, of course. I mean, I would, I would, I would, I would relate that
35:08
more libertarianism because Bitcoin, I think, is the application of libertarianism.
35:13
I don't think there was any practical way to actually be a libertarian or do anything
35:17
about that until Bitcoin came into play.
35:19
So if you're a libertarian and not a Bitcoiner, you're probably confused.
35:24
Remember, in politics, it's all about power.
35:26
I mean, money is a function of power.
35:28
What's surprising to me is the lack of left-leaning governments and left-leaning even provincial
35:36
governments that are looking at Bitcoin or been thinking about adopting Bitcoin.
35:41
I think technically, Bukele, as a populist, I think he was a little bit more left-leaning
35:44
with respect to El Salvadorian politics.
35:46
But if the game is power consolidation, it should work just as well for them as it does
35:54
for the conservatives.
35:57
And knowing that conservatives and really just any political party that happens to be
36:00
in power is looking to control and maintain power as best as they can.
36:05
And Bitcoin as an asset that's appreciating in value and will have economic influence globally just serves that function.
36:11
So I don't know. I've been thinking about that, too, the sort of conservative and liberal dynamic in which way it sort of goes into.
36:18
And I'm not convinced it's either way. I just think at a governmental level, it's about power consolidation.
36:23
yeah no and i was uh i didn't get to bring that up but i think the the point i was like
36:29
being an opportunist as a bitcoiner like when you see that one party like and that's why i think
36:36
i think having like the human rights foundation in bitcoin like this i won't i won't beat around
36:43
the bush like i definitely have more conservative values i'm i've been married since i was 25 i've
36:48
got children i care about their education i don't want the school system transing my kids
36:53
like i'm very conservative in that regard and it just seems opportunistic right now to really
37:00
lean into the conservative side of the aisle who recognizes these problems and we can
37:04
highlight to them hey bitcoin can help you achieve a lot of the goals that you have and solve a lot
37:10
of the problems that you have but that's why i love the human rights foundation you go like the
37:14
other side like the human rights activists which typically associated with the left like hey bitcoin
37:20
can empower these individuals too that was my favorite track on wednesday was the hour-long
37:25
track of all the activists explaining how they use bitcoin in iran uh in uh gaza in russia in
37:34
ukraine in venezuela you have like all these different sort of problem areas of the world
37:40
that many people feel very passionate about on both sides of each individual problem
37:45
Bitcoin is just there in the middle for anybody who subjected to the horrors of either infringing external army or despotic government internally And so you can like I guess the point I trying to make is like Bitcoin so dynamic
38:03
that you have the ability to sort of like lean into whoever needs it most at any given
38:07
point in time.
38:08
Yeah, exactly.
38:09
That's what I think is so incredible about its flexibility.
38:12
And remember, we're looking at this from the perspective of the US political spectrum and
38:16
it's different globally.
38:17
I mean, Europe generally is just more left leaning.
38:19
So that spectrum just looks different.
38:21
But yeah, I mean, I think the point I'm trying to make here is just that it I still think it's apolitical.
38:26
I know in the U.S. it is being embraced by the conservative side of the political aisle more so.
38:33
And that's a great thing for us. I mean, there's nothing wrong with that. And I'm happy about that.
38:37
But because it's jurisdictionalism, because it really doesn't function any different as it relates to the culture that it implements in and the political nuances,
38:47
whatever that culture might be leaning to at that time period or otherwise.
38:50
um bitcoin's still gonna the blocks are still gonna get mined and transactions are still gonna
38:55
process through and so um i just yeah just just just just being aware of that fact i think is
39:00
something important in sort of this wave of adoption that we're going through and this like
39:04
zeitgeist and this insane amount of dopamine hits that we're getting just watching this thing happen
39:09
that's been a big theme of mine on this show and in the newsletter the last two months is like
39:15
they're hitting you with dopamine matt and i just talked about a rabbit hole recap like
39:19
the u.s bombs iran's nuclear enrichment facilities last friday that feels like a month ago it feels
39:25
like that narrative's already beginning to be swept under the rug we had elon saying that trump
39:30
was on the epstein list like the week before that and there's a number of these dopamine hits that
39:36
i've forgotten that only happened a month ago and you know i've been telling people just blinders on
39:41
stay focused keep building uh if you're working a job make sure you're not you're saving more than
39:47
spending saving that in bitcoin just like that's what i i've been intentionally trying to say out
39:53
of the day-to-day morass of the news cycle because it's just completely distracting and nothing ever
39:59
happens well and that's why it's important to think like and i and i mentioned this earlier like
40:04
um just geopolitically you know iran china russia these old empires and and the remnants of really
40:12
do think in terms of centuries. And they're willing to, you know, people are sort of expendable
40:18
in that pursuit as well. And that is incredibly austere for people living at whatever time they
40:23
may be afflicted by those kind of things. But for the empire itself, it does generate a long
40:28
lasting culture. And I think in the US, you know, we've got a really short memory. And I think a lot
40:33
of that has to do with the fact that we're still so young. You know, Iraq was not long ago, and
40:39
we're getting the exact same pitch deck on going to war again in the Middle East.
40:47
And I haven't seen any comparisons side by side.
40:50
And I was pretty young when we first went into Iraq.
40:52
But from what I remember and what I've researched and what I'm seeing now,
40:56
it's the exact same talking points.
40:57
And frankly, a lot of it's the exact same people as well promoting this.
41:00
And we have that short-term memory, which I think can be destructive in the short term.
41:05
But Bitcoiners, and I think it's important to emphasize this,
41:08
do you think on a longer term perspective obviously you've got your day-to-day stuff
41:12
you've got your bills to pay day-to-day so you have to make sure those are accounted for and
41:15
taken care of but having that decades long you know we're individuals so thinking in centuries
41:20
is a bit ridiculous unless you're michael saylor but for us thinking in decades i think is really
41:24
critical and that will enable our survival um either as sovereign individuals or as a collective
41:29
culture and hopefully it's the latter yeah weapons of mass destruction back on the table hey i
41:33
remember that one i remember i was down in south carolina 9-11 happened in a couple years after and
41:41
i vividly remember being like fourth or fifth grade and like them having like straw polls for
41:46
like going to war and the school was like beating the war drums like we're going to iraq there was
41:50
like what like this is insane uh luckily today we have better communications technology to get
41:57
good messages out there and i do think i think we saw first in syria when obama tried to bomb them
42:02
for the chemical weapons stuff that was very hand wavy social media people got on social media
42:09
like fuck this and i think that's happening with iran right hopefully it is happening
42:13
with iran right now too um but to your point going back to like long-term thinking and
42:18
money is power particularly within politics it reminded me of a presentation turd meester gave
42:25
at bitcoin park austin last year uh during the bitcoin urbanism little event that we had there
42:31
And it's like it is crazy when you think about it.
42:33
Bitcoin continues on this trajectory.
42:35
And I think this is this is manifested in the last two years with the political activists, activism that Bitcoiners have been engaged in.
42:42
Like Bitcoin continues, let's say a 50 percent CAGR over the next decade.
42:47
I guess I think the stats turn throughout there is like one half of the point one percent will be Bitcoiners in 10 years.
42:53
So that continues. And that is a lot of wealth that can be used to affect the change that we want to see in the world.
43:02
Yeah, that's I mean, it's a it's a good thing and a bad thing.
43:04
I think you can get a bit jaded, you know, especially being in your 30s and having seen what's sort of happened live streamed over the last 10 years and continues to be.
43:12
That's a good thing and a bad thing.
43:13
I mean, you know what?
43:15
How are Bitcoin is going to be seen in that world?
43:17
How are Bitcoin is going to be seen in a world where there are generations that never even had the opportunity to look at and own Bitcoin like we did?
43:26
Granted, this wasn't just by accident.
43:28
A lot of us suffered and put in the work.
43:30
But yeah, that's something I think about quite often is if this does play out to scale, which it is, what, yeah, how does the culture change and how are we perceived in that culture?
43:42
And I don't have an answer yet.
43:44
Yeah, I think we had this discussion over coffee a couple of weeks ago.
43:50
That's why I think what you're doing is so important, not only you, but others.
43:53
I completely agree with that sort of thought experiment.
43:58
Like, all right, what do people like? I, in terms of like my next 10 years, like the push I'm making over the next decade is we need to integrate Bitcoin into as many people's lives as possible without having direct exposure so that they experience the benefits of having even like proxy exposure to Bitcoin in their pension plans.
44:17
or if it's dual collateralized with real estate and like in their neighborhoods, if there's enough Bitcoin sort of dual collateralized buildings and houses in a neighborhood that helps keep the neighborhood afloat while inflation continues unabashed like that.
44:36
I think that is something that we don't talk about enough and like why tools like Hoseki are so important because it just normalizes and makes Bitcoin simply another option in the incumbent system.
44:46
Like that's I think I won't speak for everybody, but that's like personally what I think like the number one goal should be is like people aren't going to go on cash app on strike on river and like smash by DCA with their paychecks.
45:01
Like it's incumbent on us to make sure that they have exposure without even knowing it.
45:06
Yeah. And I know you agree with this, but the idea of sort of building and having my own citadel on an island by myself or with my tiny little community, like isn't that enticing?
45:15
what's more enticing is enabling something that can get rid of these forever wars that can get
45:20
rid of this you know that slavery that we live in um that's exciting and that's the world that i
45:25
think a lot of us are building towards so yeah we're starting with hey i'm sam i own this bitcoin
45:31
let me do something with it and um you know i'm obviously speaking in simplistic terms but i think
45:35
that's the building block for an incredible new world yeah but it's like again it's normalizing
45:41
Like that's why we launched opportunity costs to just like normalize pricing
45:44
things in Bitcoin for people,
45:45
like create that memetic power to get out there.
45:48
But like simple things like being able to go to plaid and like,
45:51
Oh,
45:51
there's a Hoseki button.
45:52
What is that?
45:53
Like click that.
45:54
Oh,
45:54
you can,
45:54
you can connect your Hoseki via plaid.
45:57
It's becoming completely normal.
45:58
Like Bitcoin is part of the economy.
46:00
You can go to steak and shake and buy a,
46:02
buy your burger and milkshake with,
46:05
with Bitcoin.
46:06
Like it's,
46:07
it's incredible.
46:09
I'll,
46:09
I'll take that as a win.
46:10
Yeah.
46:11
All right. So let's bring this back to the core subject of why we're here to talk, which is this FHA, FHA, whatever the acronym alphabet soup agency for housing that owns Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac.
46:28
What would you like to see from them moving forward, just engaging with us and recognizing how can we best equip them with the knowledge to understand that people should not only be able to, but can hold Bitcoin in self custody and verify that they own they own Bitcoin?
46:48
Yeah, so we built this from first principles. If we want to see this Bitcoin financial system take place, then this is how it will have to function.
46:57
And so now that FHFA has sort of ordered this and now that it's been approved in a more governmental sense, judicial, not judicial, but in a governmental sense, now it's sort of question and answer time.
47:13
So what I would love to see is engagement is, first of all, understanding from them exactly what the requirements are at a more nuanced level to really get this underwriting process going.
47:24
And it's always hearing from us as well as to what this asset can do.
47:28
Because, again, I think the first push with having to move your funds to exchanges in order to qualify for these types of things is probably just low hanging fruit.
47:38
And it's the most obvious thing, I think, for a much more mature industry, which is where we're at now.
47:44
But really taking the time to understand the asymmetric benefits of what Bitcoin can do is critical.
47:49
So I would just love more engagement from the government.
47:52
Again, folks from the BPI are doing all the live work in terms of providing all the educational resources and providing the resources for these questions.
48:00
But yeah, I'd love engagement.
48:03
That's engaged. Bill Pulte. Logan, we're going to clip this. We're going to clip that last part.
48:08
We're going to get it going on Twitter, Noster, wherever.
48:12
We're going to start the conversation. Bill, I know you're a Bitcoiner.
48:14
I don't know if you remember, he was doing like Bitcoin giveaways during COVID.
48:17
uh he was a he like retweet this and i'll give one random person like ten hundred a thousand
48:23
dollars worth of bitcoin he gets it um at least he had exposure to bitcoin but no i think it's uh
48:30
and again i do want to reiterate it's not perfect but it's a step in the right direction and that
48:35
is incredibly encouraging to see especially considering what we just went through in the
48:40
previous administration um for four years and i'm incredibly bullish uh and let's end it on
48:48
your thoughts like how how were you thinking about i know we're thinking in decades but
48:53
in your mind like what is the highest priority in the next year two years three years
49:00
i mean really just continuing in the direction we're going into i mean it's moving much faster
49:07
than I anticipated or expected.
49:10
I'm writing a piece now that hopefully I can sort of put my thoughts together a little
49:15
bit more succinctly.
49:17
But I think understanding where we are and what we're trying to accomplish is critical.
49:21
So my perspective, where we are is a third world country.
49:26
We are just moving from cars, from horses to cars.
49:29
There's no infrastructure for these cars.
49:31
There are no gas stations.
49:33
There's no traffic lights.
49:35
Roads aren't paved.
49:35
and we're in that exact same spot.
49:38
Now, things are moving quickly.
49:39
Roads pretty much are getting paved.
49:42
We're still missing some gas stations,
49:43
but I would just love to see
49:46
more Bitcoin financial products,
49:48
more interesting Bitcoin financial products,
49:50
hopefully leveraging our platform
49:51
and really expanding this,
49:53
the capability that it can get to.
49:55
But yeah, or the way you put it,
49:57
the Bitcoinization of finance
49:58
is what I really want this next year
50:00
to be focused on.
50:01
We're going to make it happen.
50:02
Where can anybody listening to this
50:04
learn more about Hoseki?
50:05
what you guys are up to and how they can use it.
50:08
Yeah, we're at www.hoseki.app,
50:11
at Hoseki app on X or Twitter,
50:14
and at Sam Abbasi on X or Twitter.
50:18
We'll link to all that in the show notes, Sam.
50:20
I know you've got an event to attend to tonight.
50:22
I hope you enjoy your Friday night,
50:23
and thank you for hopping on quickly this Friday afternoon.
50:27
I think the timing was perfect for this.
50:30
Yeah, no, I appreciate the time.
50:31
Thanks, Marty.
50:32
All right.
50:33
Peace and love, freaks.
50:34
Okay.
50:35
Thank you.