BWJ 020: Rhythms Of Life; High Quality Conversation; Bitcoin Infrastructure Investment; and more...
This week: What can we learn from the flow of history? Why is it important to focus on the opinion of people you trust? Where can we expect to see exciting equity opportunities?
After a month’s break from writing this newsletter, I am ready to dive back into action, picking apart stories I find particularly powerful. Of course I’ve continued to read and research the Bitcoin space, so working out what I wanted to mention from the last 4 weeks, was a fair bit of work just in itself…!
As always, please reach out if you have any questions at all, I look forward to learning together with you all.
Rhythms Of Life
What can we learn from the flow of history?
For those of you that haven’t yet had the chance to read "The Fourth Turning", I highly recommend the experience, even if you are not interested in our shared passion Bitcoin. Getting a better grasp of history is simply put enlightening, a fact of life I’ve come to appreciate as I’ve aged, having been very happy to drop the subject through school.
The main takeaway for me is the concept of a ‘saeculum’, which is terminology that dates back to Roman times, and represents the duration of a single human life of 80 years. The authors take this one step further, and identify how this timeframe clearly impacts society, with each generations shared experiences resulting in potentially predictable outcomes.
For us interested in the monetary technology phenomenon that is Bitcoin, these cycles are an interesting lens, through which to study the period we are living through today. Safe to say, the process of hyperbitcoinisation ahead of us, is likely to be a very bumpy ride as we live through a fourth turning…
High Quality Conversation
Why is it important to focus on the opinion of people you trust?
Having followed Nic Carter and Preston Pysh extremely closely for some time now, I was excited to get into their latest conversation, which did not disappoint. It’s very rewarding listening and learning, especially when the insights appear not only totally valid, but based in reality.
Nic touches on a range of important topics, but the story I would like to highlight, was the situation he mentioned in Myanmar. There are competing political forces in the country, adopting opposing digital currency strategies, setting the scene for a battle between the digital yuan and a usd stablecoin.
I have no doubt that 2022 will see increasing adoption by nation states, but as this example acknowledges, Bitcoin has plenty of competing alternatives. Personally I feel that there is only one winner long-term, for the base layer of money, in the meantime we have a case of ‘horses for courses’…
Bitcoin Infrastructure Investment
Where can we expect to see exciting equity opportunities?
Grant Gilliam’s latest essay “Investing in Bitcoin Infrastructure“ is well worth a read, laying out his rationale for investing in Bitcoin startups, a strategy I look forward to seeing play out. With an excellent team, packed with all the talent necessary to succeed, one would be hard pushed to bet against Ten31 making some great returns.
Importantly they are confident of outpacing Bitcoin, with a clear vision on the type of companies that will be valuable in the future, namely business’ that generate plenty of cashflow (sats). It’s an impressive vision, clearly reasoned, taking into account of the nuance’s of a Bitcoin standard.
To me this is yet another situation in which Bitcoin is altering the mindset of market participants, with its deflationary characteristics, and ‘low time preference’ mentality. In this case its an investor, already an ardent Bitcoiner, but imagine what happens when this behavioural shift happens on a wider scale…?
We’re So Bloody Early
We had a wonderful chat with Andy Edstrom, the author of one of my favourite books, “Why Buy Bitcoin”: