Transcript for:
Exploring Bitcoin's Role in Finance

I don't believe it's being suppressed that's not my belief is it possible sure of course it is but I do believe that institutions are now in here and taking advantage of this volatility and once it does get an over 100,000 stays over 100,000 and that mental level is gone that's just that becomes a support level but we're not there yet at least not today [Music] so hey everyone we're in New New York City at my favorite podcast studio and here with me is James lavish for those of you tuning in who just watched him on what Bitcoin did thank you for being a DieHard James lavish fan what's up James you have to be watch this thing by the way what do you think of the criticism from some in the community that are like it's the same guests on every podcast over and over you know uh actually I I when I started watching podcasts in in Bitcoin in particular um I liked seeing people um over and over again and hearing their message even if it was the bulk of it was the same message yeah it it started to sink in a little bit better so it took like two three four five times to really get it so um I mean you know what it's like I I would uh I would search for Michael sailor and see how many podcasts I could listen to in one day you know um or Preston pish or you know all of the the the big names in the space that uh they would have a message that that every single time they gave it was just maybe a little bit different or different context and then it would give me a little bit more understanding just a better Dimension around it and solidify that understanding so I actually didn't mind it it it uh it was good for me I agree every conversation is a touch point and I think that maybe someone's binging this maybe they're on a James lavish kick um all right so I will try to make this a little bit more Evergreen because I think that you're someone who does such a good job breaking things down that's what you do in the informationist newsletter you break down complicated Financial system topics into something that everyone can understand so let's kind of zoom out for a little bit and just talk about Bitcoin and the Trad five value proposition because most people are familiar with the sort of 6040 portfolio some people have done really well on that over the last few decades and the traditional allocation to equities and the S&P index and a little bit of bonds it's performed well for a lot of people but things are changing and now Bitcoin is seen as a legitimate Global macro asset you have to get off zero and have at least a little bit can you speak to that and how people should evaluate their portfolios to add Bitcoin yeah so uh it's a great question and I get asked this a lot um from from just the traditional world is how how does this really fit into our space and uh especially being with the Bitcoin opportunity fund with uh having family offices that are interested now and they want to know what how does it affect my portfolio what's the right allocation for me how should I I be approaching this and is Bitcoin really different from everything else and so the answer the first answer is you know the the only wrong answer is uh is zero the 0% allocation is the wrong answer and it really depends on what your portfolio is and what you just said that 6040 portfolio is kind of that classic 60% um stocks 40% bonds over the history um of investing in in my lifetime that has been a great portfolio uh until the last number of years when we had that big draw down in bonds and so um we went from zero interest rate policy to uh over 5% fed funds rate and it destroyed a lot of people's Bond portfolios and hence uh impacted their overall portfolios because they they were not set up in a way that could weather that storm so um what I tell people is well first of all we got to back all the way up and Bitcoin right now if you look at the whole investment universe and you've seen this uh chart from Jesse Meyers um and uh cus and we he he uh he and I ran these numbers and we came pretty close to the almost the exact same investable universe uh Michael sailor's been using this in his presentations the $900 trillion doll of investable assets well bitcoin's only $2 trillion of that right now is and so uh if you look at that as as Bitcoin is like you said becoming a separate investable asset class and just like gold so people think of gold they don't think of gold as um you know well I'm gold would be part of my stock or overall uh risk uh portfolio allocation gold is a separate assets just like that the digital kind of digital store value ultimate Digital Store value and people are waking up to that even Powell has said it even Powell has said it that's right so and we've got some people in our Administration now who are uh who are pro crypto and are actually bitcoiners and they understand that it's a store of value and so um just looking at that and as Bitcoin grows in and gathers more assets and and it that that market value of Bitcoin grows that volatility will dampen and uh and the institutions will get more and more comfortable coming into the space we've talked ad nauseum about how important the ETFs have been how um in one Fell Swoop they took care of all those operational legal challenges that would be difficult for institutions to come in and buy Bitcoin themselves now they can coin stories is brought to you by genius group a Bitcoin treasury company listed on nysse American ticker gns genius is on its way to huddling 1,000 Bitcoin in its treasury while educating the world on a Bitcoin first future genius is also launching the Bitcoin Academy with courses from the likes of safine amuse author of the Bitcoin standard join the launch weight list via the QR code on the screen or the link in my show notes and receive the weekly Bitcoin treasury newsletter plus a chance to win a whale pass to bitcoin 2025 in Vegas this may genius group genius isn't measured in IQ it's measured in Bitcoin coin stories is also brought to you by bit Deere a global leader in disruptive technology for Bitcoin mining and high performance Computing for AI as a publicly traded leader bit deer boasts a mass of 2.5 gwatt of electrical capacity and infrastructure across three continents positioning bit deer as one of the most Diversified and power-dense Computing companies in the world learn more at fit deer.com and I'm seeing institutions come in come into the space and start buying and uh and it's and it's interesting because uh you hear of the the big big big players um and uh and some of the the big Banks who are buying micro strategy and some of the big Banks who are buying some ibit and whatever but and some sovereigns but just talking about institutions and ones that you would never even heard of um like for instance I um I was talking about this the other day that uh when you look at the the ETFs and the Holdings of ETFs sometimes you have massive players in there that people would not even recognize and so uh one of those players is um is HBK and this is a Dallas uh investment firm it's a it's a Dallas huge hedge fund um managing partner uh J actar is kind of one of one of my colleagues from back in the day when I was in uh Fort Worth Dallas Fort Worth in hedge funds there when I was at Carlson Capital well J is uh is one of the big um he's he's a managing director there so um a managing um um partner there and so but this is a a hedge fund that's got over 20 billion dollars of assets and they're one of the one of the largest holders of the ETFs hundreds of millions of dollars of these what percentage of their well I don't know what the percentage of the portfolios because it's not public what what their total assets are and I haven't talked to them in a long time but this is just one example of somebody that nobody would have heard of but these are very smart people like J is one of the smartest investors I know in the entire world and uh and he is allocating to it that's a really big deal now I don't want to you know don't mean to call him out particularly but that's just an example of one person that I know is extremely intelligent and is now in this space and so that's important um how are they how are they investing around it I don't know the options are likely a very big deal to them because they can manage risk around it and now you've got that ability to do that so the point is though is that now we're starting to see players come into space that may not have come in before because of those operational issues even hedge funds but forget about Pension funds and endowments they they couldn't come in before the ETFs now they can so but as Bitcoin does uh solidify itself as a as an asset in that total investable Universe um and that volatility does dampen a little bit it's I believe it's going to continue to be volatile for weeks and weeks or months and months maybe some years here um likely years here but once it does that then it starts to draw from the rest of that investable Universe not just from stocks and risk assets but now it's going to draw from bonds and from Real Estate because it's an easier asset to get a hold of for Real Estate then you know you you don't have to have management and oversight and uh uh maintenance fees and and all those costs involved super simple it's just a store value rather than have an illiquid store value of real estate you have a very liquid store value in in Bitcoin I believe that that would be one of the buckets it starts to draw from and then obviously bonds with everything we're seeing that's going on The Sovereign level and how all of that debt and all that all that risk in the great financial crisis was kicked up to the Sovereign level now we have um a problem there and we have necessary debasement of our currencies of our Fiat currencies that you talk about all the time that Bond investors are waking up to and they're realize and they need a they need a better return on their on their longer uh dated Bonds in order to get a real return against actual inflation not the CPI inflation but real inflation right and so that's a kind of a big picture overview of where we're at and where Bitcoin kind of fits in but it will eventually start to draw from those other asset classes I believe well now that we have the ETFs and other vehicles like options where the market can express their views one way or another on bitcoin does that create an opportunity for any price suppression um I would say well look we don't we don't we don't know exactly what's going on with uh with the custodians of of Bitcoin we don't know if um if they're fractionalizing it at all I we don't truly know until coinbase releases exactly what all the addresses are and exactly how they're holding them and and verifies that we have audits I I don't know uh do I expect it no um do I believe that there's manipulation going on no I don't believe that I just think there's no I just think that truly I think look $100,000 has been a massive mental level for people you know it it it it jumped over it came back jumped over it came back jumped it's it's done it like four or five times and um I believe that there are there are some the ogs people have been holding on to this thing for a very very very long time and they've made life-changing wealth and they're going to enjoy it now and they're and they're cashing in a little bit and you know that's okay they they have way more than you and I do and they're just cashing in and that's okay you know um and but I I I don't believe it's being suppressed that's not my belief um is it possible sure of course it is um you know but I do believe that institutions are now in here and take taking advantage of this volatility and and uh once it does get and over 100,000 stays over 100,000 and that mental level is gone that's then that's just that becomes a support level and that but we're not there yet at least not today so when you're evaluating a portfolio's performance can you break down simply what a sharp ratio is yeah so um the basically in in basic terms the the sharp ratio is just a man it's just it's a measurement of the of the return of your Vol the return of your portfolio and it includes the volatility in that return so um if you have a massive return but you have massive volatility it may hurt your sharp ratio right so but if you have great returns and you just have slightly higher um volatility then your then your sharp ratio goes up and so you want a higher sharp ratio you want your sharp ratio over 1.0 that's like that's that's what you really want and so when you look at portfolios you look at uh institutional portfolios professional portfolios you're looking at that sharp ratio to see how is this performing um on a risk adjusted basis and so what I mean by that is that if it's very volatile then it seems it's riskier right um as a portfolio but if you have volatility but it's it's that volatility is still is adding massive returns then that's okay which is a kind of a teup to your initial question about the 6040 portfolio and so you can um you can look at this you can go on to Nakamoto portfolio um uh.com and you can create portfolios and and uh and look at what those uh what the impact is to your portfolio if you added Bitcoin to it and so uh what institutions are starting to wake up to uh slowly but they're starting to and we're explaining it to them we're teaching them this is that if you look back over the period of the last 10 years and you just look at the classic 60/40 portfolio and you added any allocation to bitcoin to it it enhance your returns dramatically it only raised your volatility a little bit and so it raised your sharp ratio it made your portfolio a better risk adjusted return than without Bitcoin and that blows investors minds they can't believe it they think that's just not possible but it's because that it is volatile but it's it's a volatility in a rising asset over time and so if you hold on to that for a few years it will enhance your portfolio undoubtedly at least if you look back over the last teade so if you pull up like we can pull up the um the 6040 portfolio and uh and you can see how those sharp ratios uh they're affected so so I I um I analyze this for one of my newsletters and if you if you look back the last 10 years uh through December through 202 4 and you had a 6040 portfolio your return over those 10 years would have been 8.5% annualized okay over that over that period if you added just 1% of Bitcoin just one then your return would have gone up to 99.7% annually so that's that's another 1.2% annually so your entire return goes from 132% over those 10 years to 159% okay but here's the here's the crazy thing your volatility is very similar it's still a 57% Ann or daily and annualized it went from 10.86% annualized volatility to 10.9% that's it just four basis points higher which took your sharp ratio from 63 to 73 okay so we know that the bonds were volatile so your sharp ratio was not that great over the over the course of that uh period of 2021 to 23 so we know that and it was but if you added Bitcoin it enhanced it if you if you added 5% of Bitcoin to your portfolio your and your total return went from 132% to 290% wow this episode is brought to you by Casa the leader in Bitcoin self- custody Solutions helping people like me secure their wealth with simple powerful multi-key vaults and now Kasa is here to help businesses and governments do the same introducing Casa business a secure easyto use 3 key volt designed specifically for small businesses with Team signing capabilities and a web dashboard regardless of the size of your business start your Bitcoin treasury the secure way take control and protect your assets get 10% off your casap plan at ca. 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and grab 5% off with promo code coin stories all right back to the show okay and your your annualized return went from 88.5% to 14.2% like insane right sweetener what a sweetener your volatility only went up to 11.7% so it's less than 1% volatility rise which took your sharp ratio up to 1.06 so now you're now you're better sharp ratio so now you're over that 1.0 kind of threshold for your sharp ratio and then if you took if you added 10% of Bitcoin to your portfolio your your total return would have gone from 132% to 520 per. and your your annualize return went to 19.5% your volatility only went up to 13.75% from from 10.86 yeah it's more volatile definitely you know it's it's 3% more volatility annually but your sharp ratio went to 1.29 so it still went up yeah so that's why people say the volatility is a feature not not a bug but when you're talking about the 60% portfolio if that's equities are you measuring just the S&P 500 yeah the S&P like that's the Benchmark your benchmark is the S&P 500 so this is actually something that I've wondered because um when I was writing my book I was looking at Monetary inflation and how to calculate that and annualize the the money supply is growing about six to 7% I think I think I came out to like 6.8% yeah it's somewhere between 6.8 and 7.2 depending on how you measure it yeah yeah so um but when I watch like Michael sailor's talks and when he puts up those charts he actually puts monetary inflation at the S&P 500 um index why is that because that increases it all the way to like 10 to 13% and that's sort of the hurdle rate that you have to beat yeah I think what he what he's saying is that that captures that expansion of the money supply the S&P efficiently captures it and uh the other measures may not efficiently efficiently capture it it would make sense that well that would capture because that's your that's your that's your economy in a market oh and so uh and so that would that would make perfect sense so it's you know you can use all kinds of different measures and we talked Michael how and I talked about it he's a a master Glo Global liquidity he has different measures that he uses he includes uh volatility in the bond markets as part of the measure because it affects the collateral that you need in order to grow uh grow the debt and so um there's a lot of different ways you can look at it but the bottom line is CPI is flawed yeah it's not accurate and you have to look at the expansion of the money supply definitely and you know it's I I believe it's somewhere around 7% um and that's a pretty that's a pretty solid number as far as just a pure expansion of the money supply it's crazy yeah it's crazy when you actually realize that so it's like if you're not getting a 7% raise you're basically losing money correct you're your your wages are lagging and you're and you're being stolen from by the central banks it's it's wild um I actually heard a statistic and I don't know if it's accurate but I think it was from Preston that you could have held 98% cash and just 2% Bitcoin and you would have beat the S&P 500 have you heard something like that I Haven I've not but we could run the numbers at some point I mean I might have to and if if that's accurate I'll I'll put the I'll put the chart up but I it's crazy how a little bit goes a long way so but I mean look trafi I'm assuming is running the numbers every single day they can see what you're talking about so why isn't everyone allocating five 10% or more to they're not they're not running the numbers that's the crazy thing is that look I come from that world and it's very difficult to change your mindset around away from something that has worked so well for you for so long and so part of the issue is just the messaging around Bitcoin we have a lot of people who talk about Bitcoin saving the world and how it's it it Bitcoin fixes this is the is the saying right and it does fix a lot of things but when you talk about that all the tra traditional institutional investors here is this is disruptive is it really disruptive can I believe that it's really disruptive is it going to really disrupt the payment systems is it going to really disrupt gold as the ultimate store value and that's where you get into that question that um you and I had chatted about very briefly a couple days ago which is well Bitcoin doesn't have any cash flows like how does like how do you value it there's nothing there and that's why Buffett called it rat poison squared because it doesn't have it doesn't have any inherent value um and there's nothing you can hang it on and gold had suffered this for a long time you know that there's not it doesn't create there no no dividends there's no cash flow from it you're not creating anything from it you're just storing things into it and hoping that somebody will buy it from you at a better price later and that's all you're hoping for but if you think about it the gold is very I mean Gold's a base metal so you know it it it can't be destroyed basically so um you know it's going to be there um the only the question is um how much money is going to be chasing after that then that's what gold investors or that's what they anchor themselves to is the expansion of the money supply means that there's going to be more dollars chasing after that so of course it's going to be you know and so but what's the great utility I there's definitely some some utility from for gold but you know the big utility for it is jewelry I mean you have some on you you know so um that's just the that's the base utility for and people can't get their heads around what's the utility of Bitcoin and so when we see things like um what's going on in the in the Doge commission and how dollars just seem to disappear out of the government and into hands of wherever and there untraceable well we think well if they had it in Bitcoin you'd see where every single transaction was you could see it all and it would be verifiable easily and you don't have to verify who the other counterparty is and so now we're seeing that with gold today with the run on the on the uh the London exchange and how uh the bank of England is struggling to get the gold that that people have deposited in their vault well they fractionalize it out they've lent it out and they you know now they're struggling to go get it well you don't have to worry about that counterparty with with Bitcoin these are this is a really difficult concept for institutions get around I mean we store our our uh we have a custodian that holds all of our assets we don't have to worry about it they you know they they hold all of our certificates all of our stocks and bonds It's All Digital but they they manage all of that the banks hold our cash you know as as hedge funds they manage all of that and so it's hard to get your head around of wait wait a minute going to manage I'm going to like self- sovereignty of my own money how does that work yeah then can I trust it's really there even if I have these keys or these words and so it is a big hurdle to get over and get past as an Institutional Investor because of just those things it's it's difficult to conceptualize that there's something here that is truly trustless that is truly decentralized that I don't have to worry about um that it's going to be stolen or it's going to be lost or it's there as long as I've got my you know ex my my keys to that portion of the the the time chain then I know it's there so it's immutable but we are seeing some of the smartest players in the space get over that the answer your question though by and large they're still not there it's just it's taking time it's taking a long time to get around um that get that get that conversation up to the the top of the list to become an allocation at this point it's still only been a risk asset it's something to go out on the risk curve it's something that's different that could enhance your portfolio they have seen some of these things but they believe that it's because it's a risk asset and they're taking risk by adding it to the portfolio rather than understanding that they're actually adjusting their overall risk at adjust adjusted return down over a long period of time and it takes a minute to get there and they're not there yet this is sort of why I asked you that price suppression question because I wonder how many people actually get it and if there could be some sort of manipulation because I mean our our country is so far in debt and there have to be people in leadership roles that understand that this ship is going to sink and so we need some sort of peaceful alternative but we can't we can't just start buying Bitcoin I I disagree with um the bitcoiners that think that the Bitcoin Act is imminent where we're just going to be purchasing a million Bitcoin and flooding the market with demand I don't I wish but I just don't see it happening right now and I don't even know what that would do to this two trillion doll asset class but do you think there could be some I don't know I guess greater plan that's in motion and now when the price is suppressed the they can come scoop it in scoop it up at a lower valuation or something I don't put anything past the government but no I don't think that's happening I don't but um I don't I can't say it's definitely not I don't know but uh I actually think that I was up there uh last year with the um and and trying to help uh educate some of the uh Senator and Congressman staff about what there's a lot of just um ignorance there's a lot of disinformation there's a lot of confusion they don't know the difference between Bitcoin and all the other things oh yeah we know about Bitcoin we we've been looking at the ethereum one you know it's like they just don't get it um it's not that they're dumb they're just there's a lot of misinformation out there and then you've got um so the but the point is I I think that a lot fewer people in DC understand it and I think the vast majority of them are not worried about at all and I don't think they care about it they just think it's some speculative asset for you know a small portion of the constituent that is is very focal vocal about it but it's not that big of a deal it's just little2 trillion doll asset it's smaller than Apple you know so um but uh by and large I I think that there they will come around to it eventually and they're having the conversation and that's probably the most important part so if you want to talk about you know this Administration how positive it is it's that we're now having the conversations sure do we do I think that we're going to have a Bitcoin um strategic Reserve this year no I think it that there's just it has to run through a gauntlet of uh legislation and committees and it's just take forever yeah um so uh nothing happens quickly in in DC or at least not in Congress maybe it does in the executive office now but not in Congress so um yeah I think that it's it's going to take time uh I don't think we're just going to rush out there and start buying it uh could we have some sort of uh NGO that's doing it well we've seen that that's possible we could um I just don't think this Administration is going to do that especially after cracking down on all of them they're not going to go and then and uh you know uh put a black mark on their record by doing that that just doesn't make any sense to me well bitcoiners had such high hopes that there was going to be some big Bitcoin announcement on day one and it really didn't come and then we had the meme coin launches and you know tweets about other cryptocurrencies but it's been interesting to see um the stablecoin regulation and the sort of um the fact that they really want that P because it provides such demand for us treasuries right I mean how do you see that all playing out yeah I mean they're realizing very quickly and even last year when we were in DC uh we were talking about that that's one thing they really did realize that it's it's important uh tether is a a huge buyer of of uh us treasuries so it used to be back in the day um before I was even involved in this space how I understand it it used to be that uh people bought big coin and then Bitcoin was kind of like the stable coin that they would go from there to buy the other coins and they would move out of Bitcoin into other things but then came along the stable coins and now they're buying stable coins and that's kind of their holding place in order to get other currencies cryptocurrencies or um or Bitcoin um or you know uh it's important for people who want dollars who don't have access to dollars they can buy stable coin instead uh and internationally so that's been a really big deal and they're seeing this there and us the the US government and DC um and the treasury are realizing that this is a very big deal and this is going to provide liquidity we have got to get um legislation around this and we we've got to um we've got to embrace it and I think that's what's happening and that's the that really is actually naturally the first St um so do I think that Bitcoin is going to disrupt the treasuries or disrupt the dollar no not today and I think it just could enhance it and that's the whole point is that if you do put Bitcoin on your balance sheet it could um enhance the the uh the backing of the treasuries over a long period of time not in two years but I'm talking about five seven 10 12 years that would be a great asset to to have on the balance sheet well we've heard uh treasury secretary Scott bessent Echo Trump saying they're focused on the tene they want to they want to get that down um do you think that that will be possible or do you see yields Rising I actually talked just before this with uh Larry leapard about are we going to go back to zerp and we both don't think so at least not in the near term um I think rates are actually going to go higher yeah they very well could the thing is that you saw the over the last uh number of months when the FED lowered rates by 1% the tenure Rose by one full percent um it's not buying it the Market's not buying it so you've got two things going on there you've got the market that's some some investors are concerned about long-term inflation and just what you said that you you're they're concerned that they're not going to have a real rate of return if they buy the 10-year at three and a half% that's not going to give them a real return over the inflation that's already at three and a half percent that's what's being quoted um so and then the other side of it is that they know that with all of the uh deficits we're running we're just going to have to keep issuing more and more and more and more and more and more bonds yeah borrowing more money and there's going to be a deluge of bonds that come to the market and another thing is bestant said it himself that we've got to move out on the on the yield curve we've got to be we've got to get away from issuing T bills and start issuing longer term debt but how do you do that when it's not doing it well the debts at four and a half percent still so there was a period there where where Yellen could have done it before the FED raise rate so quickly um I mean she was the chair of the FED before she yeah she must have understood that all that that printing $5 trillion was going to be inflationary they were going to have to raise rates I don't understand why she didn't get out ahead of that and and issue more uh longer dated bonds they didn't and that is the criticism that bent is uh has been making but now what you can't you can't get out there and start issuing you know 10 year 4 and a half% treasuries that that would be that would only make the deficit worse wor because now you've got 4 and half% yields that you've locked or or um interest rates you've locked in on this debt that uh it's going to be for 10 years Y and so um that only raises your interest uh cost so he's kind of in a pickle and now what we're seeing is uh the the market is trying to decide are we getting into a period of stagflation where the the economy is stagnating but you still have have inflation because of all the assets and because of the high interest rates is that is that kind of what we're are we following that perfect um that perfect graph of of inflation from the 1970s into the 80s where it's got that one H comes down kind of stalls out and goes back up again we're kind of following it perfectly is that is that where we're at and so um yeah they want to get the 10-year down but it just lowering rates from the FED is not going to do it like that's not the way yeah I saw in Luke Roman's recent newsletter he quoted Scott bessent talking about how there needs to be a reordering of sort of the global economic system and this is why I'm like do they know that they have to transition to something else are they thinking maybe about Bitcoin um but I guess they'll never tell us until they do something um okay as we start to wrap up give me your 30 second to 60c pitch of why Bitcoin over let's start with real estate well Ian they're different assets right so um if you're if I was going to measure them up against each other and arguing for Bitcoin well real estate uh it it it's problematic for a number of reasons uh it you know it's ill liquid um it has a lot of Maintenance and and fees associated with it uh often uh and taxes associated with it often if you're doing like multif family units you've got to get tenants in there you've got to deal with that oversight you've got to deal with with a management company or pay a management company or deal with that yourself you do get cash flows it has been a good store of value especially in areas where it's uh where there only certain number of units like ocean front property for instance there's only so many that are ever going to be there and so um that's good but if you if you're trying to use it as a store of value um bitcoin's so much easier because you just buy it and hold it that's it you don't have to deal with any of the stuff yeah you don't get cash flows from it but you don't have to deal with any of the headache of it you just buy it hold it put it away and so that's a very simple one what what's the argument for Bitcoin over the S&P 500 well I mean S&P 500 um if you buy the whole S&P 500 well you're you're just buying 500 companies um and uh and you're riding out that risk you you're you're locked into the the risk on Market um and so the economy has to be expanding it has to be expanding in real terms in order to to make a real return on that um not just with inflation and so um if you're going to be investing in in companies in the S&P 500 well then you've got operational risk you've got execution risk you've got all kinds of um single name risk that you that could be uh that could bite you uh when you're when you're an investor and even if you you have 10 names if you have one name blow up then that's a single name you know risk and you you have to understand that so um my argument for Bitcoin on that is that over the long period of time I believe that Bitcoin is going to separate it's it's going to become uncorrelated to the the S&P it's not going to have that correlation to especially with the tech sector that we've seen where it's a tip of the wrist beer I think it's going to it's going to decouple from that once once we get to a certain size I believe it decouples and then it never um it doesn't follow it like that anymore and this should be the easiest one what's the argument for Bitcoin over bonds yeah well bonds don't give you a real rate of return over the long time you know that we've discussed it half the show um and you know Bitcoin is just the ultimate store value if you want to store your money in something and know that it's there and if the money supply expands there will be more dollars chasing it and that means um that or whatever currency you're in and dollar is the best one that you know that over the long period of time that it'll appreciate meaning that whatever currency that you're valuing in will debase against it will depreciate against it and you'll get more of those to use in exchange for whatever you want to do in life great answers all right where I want to end this is we always talk about the debt spiral together can we grow our way out of it because a lot of the focus has been on the debt but what about the growth side can we actually grow our way out of it I I personally think Bitcoin could help us um but there are all these new technologies there's AI um new policies in place do you think we could actually grow our way out of the debt well you're talking about real growth right because um you the the technology you're talking about are deflationary like AI is deflationary it takes a it I don't have to hire an assistant to um do my newsletter because I can I can use the different AI uh language models uh language learning models to help research for me you know um there there are all kinds of applications are coming from it that are they're not I don't believe they're replacing people as quickly as people are worried about but um it's definitely on that path to replacing certain functions and cons validating it so that means that there's that in and of itself is a definition of of of a deflationary effect right so that's one thing that is very difficult to get your head around is like as we as technology expands and it enables us to do more with less that's a deflationary thing and this is where exactly what the the central Bankers have had to battle against all these years and continue to they have to expand the money supply and at a faster rate at a faster rate than this is being debased and so um can we grow in real terms I think that the central bank has already set it's already set the stage where it's it's it's very difficult but there is a narrow path that you just said there's a narrow path that we can we can turn around we can if the US government bought Bitcoin put it on the balance sheet and held it for a long period of time that Bitcoin would end up stabilizing that underlying like you know that that base asset and that so then you would have that against your debt you could event you could use to pay it down you could you know um you could just use it as uh it's it it would be pegged to it or something whatever you need to do that um but it would stabilize it and so you wouldn't have to be debasing the dollar like you are anymore and that's the important part I don't think that it's I I don't think that in the next seven years that s 10 years bitcoin's going to replace the US dollar but it can enhance it and that that that's kind of the path it's a narrow path to get there but it is there we can have a strong asset as opposed to all these liabilities exactly um well James it's always so great to have you especially in person I remember when we were at a Christmas party in 2021 James had only a couple thousand followers and look at you now one of the most popular newsletters so many gu you're one of my most popular guests too so James it's always great to have you thanks for joining me well it's always good to be here Natalie I look forward to the next time uh his work Linked In the show notes thanks so much thank you thank you so much for checking out this episode of coin stories make sure you're subscribed to the show so you don't miss any new episodes if you can turn on those notifications and leave us a positive review it really helps the show grow organically with new listeners we have a free Weekly Newsletter you can sign up at the newws block. substack do.com and remember this show is for educational and entertainment purposes only nothing should constitute as official investment advice and you should always do your own research I'm always open to feedback and guest suggestions so please feel free to reach out at info@ talking bitcoin.com I'll see you next time