17 Comments

So cheeky, so spot on!!! Traders are the best!. Most of the volatility in the market is due to traders and even more so the ones using leverage. It's partly why whales and exchanges have such an easy task manipulating the market, a little massage here and there and the greedy leverage traders positions cascade into liquidation. Great for us who wait for the dips and eat them up. Good article, cheers mate

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"Trade our government’s money for a stake in the financial networks of the future."

Well, this kind of states who wins and who loses well.

If you were in Russia or China or some other auto/kleptocratic state or totalitarian regime this would be a truly positive statement to cheer about and promote.

However, if you were in the declining number of liberal democracies, well, you'd be doing China and Russia and their FaF a great favor.

Can you please list the governments whose currency you are seeking to undermine and why?

(I will bet there will be no response)

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Not sure what the question is. I don't seek to undermine any government currency. I like my government's money and want to use it to have a better life. That includes owning a stake in the financial networks of the future. I also trade my government's money for food and foreign goods, including food and goods from China. I trade my government's money for a lot of things.

Can you explain your response a little more?

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Maybe you missed this quote in your writing:

"Our goal? Trade our government’s money for a stake in the financial networks of the future."

True, it doesn't state that the project is to "undermine USD, EU, etc". But I have to assume you are an informed denizen of the space and are familiar with the more explicit versions of moving to "the financial networks of the future": undermine the dollar reserve system the world runs on. Never mind it has resulted in more people lifting themselves out of poverty and underdevelopment than in any other era of history.

Maybe you could be more explicit of about your view of the future/future networks. Does it envision the (however imperfect) capabilities of the World Bank, IMF, WTO, BIS, SWIFT, etc.? Will it largely be driven by the Western Liberal Democracies and their views and principles?

Money is not just money. Money is power. If you propose creating power (money) that is beyond the reach of control by the liberal democratic order, where will the power shift?

I can't believe you have not given any thought to this, I hope.

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I thought about it but it’s just too many variables to consider. There are so many nuances that are beyond my capacity to explore in a thoughtful way. It’s also way beyond the scope of this article. There’s no reason any of those institutions can’t adapt, survive, and flourish. I guess it’s really up to them to decide how they want to navigate this new world, where protocols move money and communities can build all the instruments of finance without depending on any government or international organization.

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So many nuances beyond your capacity? It is frankly astonishing that someone with your background to make such a step back yet be so otherwise “unimpaired” to write this piece. Oh well. The money’s good and that’s what really matters in this space and time.

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I still don’t understand the question or the promise. This is an article about traders. I didn’t step forward or back, I didn’t step at all. You’re asking about a different topic and one that I am not writing about, haven’t wrote about, and probably won’t write about. Can you write an article about the impact of cryptocurrency on international financial institutions and the modern Western monetary system? Then we can have a conversation about it.

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Or...you could read Matt Levine... He has great stuff on the nonsense world of crypto. But also the somewhat less nefarious ordinary world of investing.

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I have a lot of writing on almost every facet of the crypto world that makes clear what is happening. But here’s a quickie intro:

Until China suppressed mining on its territory, it accounted for almost 70% of the hash rates for both BTC and ETH. China still has 97% of the ASIC, rig and mining operations technology production and sales. Before China pulled out of controlling mining, I pointed out what might happen if the private and institutional holdings in the USA grew much more the Chinese could just pull the plug on all this supply and create havoc in our financial system.

But that changed. China finally enforced the laws that were on their books for the last 5 years and suppressed all crypto transaction for Chinese citizens and then suppressed the mining. The latter largely was done because it was a wasteful drain on their electrical supply which was more needed for the leverage on more essential goods for export. Now China has the Digital Renminbi and is moving all the Belt and Road debt and payments to it and exiting use of the USD.

Russia, as we all know, is the world’s center for Ransomware and Kompromat. This is all entirely driven off of crypto. Similarly, every transaction on the DarkWeb (I can help you visit and navigate if you like) and larger and larger transactions for “blood” resources are moving entirely to crypto. Large illegal transactions for oil in Africa are now almost entirely transacted in crypto.

There are a handful of “whales’ that have somewhere between 15% and 20% of BTC. ETH is another interesting can of worms, but that is for another learning session. This is an acute tail-wag-of-dog that if you really are a numerate crypto trader, you can observe the effects.

As for crypto’s impact on international financial institutions, etc…. I am certainly hoping you understand what the World Bank, IMF, BIS, SWIFT, and the individual regulatory agencies in the western liberal democracies do. I also have to hope that you have some sense of what your fellow crypto-fans give as a reason for promoting crypto and the similar ones that were advanced by the CypherPunks and “Satoshi” him/her-self: It is all about disintermediating the aforementioned infrastructure.

Both Russia and China are at the head of a movement of kleptocrats, oligarchs, authoritarian and other such to undermine the control of the dollar and the aforementioned financial and regulatory infrastructure. China has it “digital renmin bi” DRMB and Belt and Road. Russia is less sophisticated, but is also moving to de-couple from the dollar, etc. There is interesting chatter out on corners of the darknet about what it is planning to do next in the light of Ukraine.

You can read what I have written on Medium to better understand what is going on. Scott Galloway’s writings, among others, too: https://medium.com/@profgalloway

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Interesting how over time crypto is becoming more and more like stocks as institutional traders pile in. In a way - it should make it more predictable as to what happens from a macro level. Alt coins are a different beast but BTC and maybe even ETH are now following the trends much more of the general stock market. Once a spot ETF is finally approved for BTC, this trend for institutional trading is going to explode I think. In terms of leverage, it’s been had a volatile impact on the market. Look at the Wonderland TIME rebasing token for a classic example. Cascading liquidations were brutal and have me questioning whether some kind of regulation is needed on that front to prevent the repeat of those kind of events.

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You are not alone!

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The bitcoin trader price effect.......interesting

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Uuhhhmm, you're welcome!!

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When i read Reminiscences of a Stock Operator i changed my mind. İ was thinking trade is everything. İn this book first part will agree. But just keep reading. İ dont need trade anymore. Hodl hodl.

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I realized some facts. I used to be mad at these people. But I realize that there is no harm in these people. They're just blowing new investors' minds. Frankly, I liken the crypto market to a gym. Just like those who think that they will improve with Split training, and real athletes.

Thank you for the nice article.

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Sure. To your point, it's hard for new investors to get used to

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Yea bitcoin is just outta my comfort zone can't make money with it seems pointless kinda

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