Join me today for Episode 990 of Bitcoin And . . .
Topics for today:
- Will Other Countries Front-run the US?
- El Salvador and Bhutan Rub Noses in it
- LatAM is So On Deck
- Tether's New Wallet Dev Kit is Out
#Bitcoin #BitcoinAnd
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https://decrypt.co/291103/trumps-crypto-renaissance-could-accelerate-latin-american-adoption-experts-say
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[00:00:00]
David Bennett:
Good morning. This is David Bennett, and this is Bitcoin and, a podcast where I try to find the edge effect between the worlds of Bitcoin, gaming, permaculture, podcasting, and education to gain a better understanding of all. Edge effect is a concept from ecology describing a greater diversity of life where the edges of 2 systems overlap. While species from either system can be found at the edge, it is important to note there are species in the overlap that exist in neither system, and that is what I seek to uncover. So join me in discovering the variety of things being created as Bitcoin rubs up against other systems. It is 9:18 AM Pacific Standard Time. It is the 12th day of November 2024.
This is episode 990. 990 of Bitcoin, and we are 10 away from the big crossover from 3 digits to 4 digits. Yeah, that's right. So, what the hell happened this weekend, and why wasn't I here? Oh, I just took some time off. Yeah. Kids were out of school on Friday, and then again yesterday for veterans day. And I was like, you know, I'm just gonna hang out with the fam, dude. So that's exactly what it did, And it was great. It was it was awesome. I highly recommend just chilling out with your family at all times possible. It's it's gonna be more important than you can possibly imagine for those people that are out there that don't know. And I'm not if you already know what the hell I'm talking about, you get it.
That's fine. But for those people that are out there that may just, like, I don't know, suggest that they just, you know, kinda wanna be alone, you know, kinda wanna have some time for themselves. While that's that is good in some cases, if you find yourself ask yourself the question, do you find yourself doing that a lot? If so, you might wanna kinda rethink about rethink that, especially with the holidays coming up. It's gonna be Thanksgiving and then it's gonna be Christmas. It's going to be the time that you spend the most with your family And there's going to, of course, be the Bitcoin discussion coming up this Thanksgiving.
I'd like to know. I'd like to see a show of hands out there even though I can't see a damn one of y'all. Who is planning on rubbing their noses in it come Thanksgiving? Honestly, don't. Just don't. You know what? Try this. Try saying nothing at all about Bitcoin. God forbid, don't discuss religion or politics either. Find something else. Find something about your family. Ask questions about what did grandpa do during the war? I don't know. Anything. Just, like, just stay away from politics and just hold your nose on Bitcoin. Just just do it. Take it with a grain of salt because you never know what the hell might happen come Thanksgiving Day. I see a lot of people out there glad handing each other because of, you know, a couple of god candles that that occurred over this, this 3 day weekend at least for most, 4 days for us.
I I honestly I kinda think maybe maybe let's just keep that shit in our back pocket for now. Not I'm not suggesting that it's gonna be bad luck or anything. I'm just saying there's a lot of people out there. They're just not going to learn. They're just not going to. It doesn't matter how many times you talk about it. It's just not gonna happen, and you've got to be prepared to let them go. Even if I mean, if they're your own family, I'm not saying that you're gonna let them go, like never talk to them. Again, you're just gonna have to let them do what they do. You're going to have to let them buy the treasury bonds. You're gonna have to let them go their own way.
Some some will listen. Others will not. But in all events, the race is on to front run the United States government for buying Bitcoin. This is Bitcoin Magazine, Pete Rizzo, is writing. And he says, with the 2024 election all but final, it's clear Donald Trump, the soon to be 47th president of the United States, will be the most pro Bitcoin leader in history. Oh, really? Yeah. Well, let's wait and see. The big question remains, however, how effective will he be in operationalizing his strategy? At Bitcoin 2024, Trump, as well as Robert F Kennedy, Jr, and Republican senator Cynthia Lummis, made it clear that they want the United States government to buy Bitcoin.
All would seem to be in a better position to enact this following the election as the Republican Party increased its representation in government quite considerably. Yet, as for how quickly the United States could become active in the market, that's that's a bit more murky. Since announcing the bill, Bitcoin has surged from $60,000 to a high of 86,000. And, of course, then again, we well, I'm adding this in here. We did see 89. Damn near 90. It was, like, 89,938 or something like that on one of my charts. So just keep that shit in mind. Anyway, with the United States government soon to be buying, there's even more incentive for the price to escalate. Be careful with that, guys. Herein lies the problem.
For the United States has essentially telegraphed to the world that it intends to buy an asset that's scarce in supply without the concrete ability to do so. Even with the majority in the house of representatives and the senate, passing the strategic Bitcoin reserve legislation 2024 will still require an act of congress and the agreement of lawmakers, it would seem foolish to expect this won't be complex or time consuming. For example, the bill proposes revaluing the Federal Reserve's gold holdings as well as integrating Bitcoin into government financial systems. Questions will likely abound as will operational challenges. Let's remember just remember that it took all of 3 years for the SEC, the Securities and Exchange Commission staff bulletins to be adjusted just to value Michael Sailor's public market buying or rather Bitcoin buying spree correctly.
This is the nature of government, slow and bureaucratic. Even with Trump, RFK, and other Bitcoin backers in positions of power, the chances that the United States government begins to acquire Bitcoin on January 20, 2025 seems infinitesimal. This is not saying that it won't happen at all, just that it won't be very timely. This is even to admit that there could be a prioritization challenge. Maybe maybe the crypto lobby wants to move quickly on the long delayed market infrastructure bill. If so, congress could become more consumed with guardrails for exchanges and redefining securities law than the question of the strategic reserve.
After all, they helped bankroll Trump's whim. How much could Bitcoin rise in the meantime? Well, with the bull market in full force, I'd argue that institutions and governments have every reason to become active in the market. There are many regimes around the world where the executive branch has enough power to begin begin accumulating Bitcoin today. They'd be foolish not to front run the United States government. Shit. El Salvador started this process back in 2021, and it has amassed over 5,900 Bitcoin, yet it faced 2 to 3 years of market headwinds as traders countered its entries. Lest we forget, El Salvador bought 100 of Bitcoin at $60,000, a move that for years was fuel for its enemies.
Trump may yet do his part to boost Bitcoin, yet in telegraphing his intentions, he's almost certainly created conditions that can be exploited by savvy traders. Time will tell them, among well, time will tell them if among them, we will see other nation states buy Bitcoin. And he ends with this tweet from Daniel Batten who says, today and this is on November 11th. This was yesterday. Today, I received confirmation that another nation state is currently discussing, 1, a bitcoin strategic reserve. And 2, drafting bitcoin mining regulations so they can improve their electrical grid and better monetize stranded energy.
It's happening. And that's from Daniel Batten at dsbatten, b a t t e n, on the Twitters. So it is interesting. There is a telegraph here. It's it was I mean, it's like a flashing stoplight to the world saying, hey. Hey. We're doing this thing over here, but don't do it first. Let us get our ducks in a row, and and then you could no. It doesn't happen. So my question is this. You know, Pete Rizzo, who's writing this, is right. This isn't gonna happen on January 20th. If it does, I'd be shocked. I really would. But I kinda agree with the man. It's gonna take some time to push this through. So now that the United States is you know, Trump telegraphed this before he became president.
It was very clear what what he said he was going to do. Now whether or not he ever meant to do it is another story altogether. It's just all I can think about is what did he say. Right? What he does comes next. But right now, all I got is what did Trump say? And I had no idea that it was gonna be the executive branch and all of the legislative branch that was taken in this in this particular election. I kinda thought the house would at least probably remain firmly divided, but it doesn't it doesn't look that way. There's still some some races out there that are, like, senatorial and, I guess, some house races that have yet to be called, but not that many. So I'm pretty sure that it's pretty much just a huge red wave, like, everywhere.
So Trump said he was gonna do the thing, and now he's the president. And now the house and the senate are both basically red. So what do other nations do? Well, I don't know, but we can take a clue by listening to what El Salvador and Bhutan are seeing in their own reserves. This is Ezra Raguerre from Cointelegraph. And the headline is El Salvador and Bhutan see Bitcoin holding surge amid market rally. Well, duh. Let's see what they see. Bitcoin held by El Salvador and the Kingdom of Bhutan has significantly increased in value. On November 12th, Cointelegraph Markets Pro data shows that Bitcoin reached a new high of 89,700, pushing its overall market capitalization near $2,000,000,000,000 Because of the price increase, the 2 countries BTC holdings made significant gains.
Thanks to Bitcoin's recent price surge, the value of El Salvador's holdings increased by more than $100,000,000 in 1 week. According to blockchain data tracker, Arkem, El Salvador's Bitcoin holdings were worth $402,000,000 on November 5th. It's now soared to $523,000,000 today, probably this morning. Whatever. On September 7, 2021, El Salvador adopted Bitcoin as legal tender. At at the time, the country initially bought about 200 BTC as its first investment in the asset. Since then, the country has gradually increased its holdings. Arcimoto intelligence data shows that they currently hold 5,900 Bitcoin.
In April of 2023, Bhutan's cryptocurrency investments were revealed through bankruptcy proceedings involving companies including Celsius and BlockFi. Druck Holdings and Investments, a commercial arm of Bhutan's royal government, was identified as a customer of the bankrupt firms. In May of 2023, Bhutanese officials confirmed that the kingdom had been mining Bitcoin since April of 2019 when the price of Bitcoin was $5,000. They they've been at it for a while. I'm surprised that that never leaked. I'm really I I'm shocked that it didn't leak. Oh, it's probably only because Bhutan is a very very small country. But regardless, according to ARCIM Intelligence, Bhutan's Bitcoin holdings now total $1,030,000,000, that's billion with a b, and Bhutan owns 12,568 Bitcoin and holds around $2,000,000 in shitcoin number 1. On October 29th, Bhutan moved 66,000,000 in Bitcoin as the price reached 71,000, suggesting that the country may be planning to cash in on its gains.
The funds were transferred to Binance in 2 different transactions, and that's the last that we hear anything out of this article. So I we still don't know what the hell did Bhutan actually sell that? Because that would be ill timed, but, you know, hindsight is 2020. So what about Trump's crypto renaissance? Could it accelerate Latin American adoption? Experts say yes. This is from Jose Antonio Lands out of Decrypt. Donald Trump's election victory and promised crypto friendly policies could accelerate digital asset adoption in Latin America, where stablecoins and bitcoin already serve as inflation shields and remittance channels for 1,000,000.
Regional exchanges are reporting a spike in crypto activity as the president elects pro bitcoin stance resonates in inflation hit economies. The president elects pledge to establish a national bitcoin reserve and ease regulatory burdens arrives as Latin America emerges as a key growth market processing over $85,000,000,000 in crypto transactions annually. Regional players see Trump's win as a political catalyst for increased institutional adoption and cross border flows. Quote, Trump's second term in the White House could further boost the crypto market giving room for further appreciation. We are observing a decisive period for Bitcoin and the cryptocurrency market as a whole, says Sebastian Serrano, CEO of Argentina based exchange, Ripio.
The implications could be particularly for countries battling currency instabilities, like in Argentina, where the poverty rate spiked to over 53% under Malay's libertarian administration. Bitcoin trading volume surged a 160% in October and more than 400% in 2024 as users sought refuge from the devaluation of the currency. Venezuela shows similar patterns with over 92% of crypto activity flowing through centralized exchanges as citizens seek alternatives to the boulevard. Regional crypto firms are already positioning themselves for potential growth. Lemon Cash, which recently expanded to Peru, reported processing over $20,000,000 in local currency transactions in its 1st 3 months.
Quote, clear US regulations could help us accelerate adoption across the Latin American market, said Marcelo Cavazoli, Lemon CEO, in an interview with Decrypt in Espanol, quote, Donald Trump's victory gave crypto an additional boost as his campaign showed clear support for the sector. Cavazoli added, quote, Trump put forward policies to incentivize Bitcoin mining in the United States aligning with the growing interest in the crypto market. This was especially reflected in Argentinian and Peruvian users who began accumulating Bitcoin at the end of October. Cavazoli told Decrypt that Bitcoin trading volume hit a record on November 6th in Argentina with Peru also seeing a 160% increase in trading activity versus the day prior.
Some regional players, however, caution that Trump's campaign promises, while encouraging market sentiment, still need to address the fundamental changes facing Latin America's crypto ecosystem and don't solve the true needs of the crypto industry, quote, the regulatory shift helps, but we still need to solve fundamental infrastructure challenges. Cross border settlement and banking relationships, yeah, they're crucial for our region, noted Matthias Reyes from TrueBit Exchange in an interview with Decrypt. Latin America's unique combination of high crypto awareness, challenging monetary conditions, and significant remittance flows positions it to potentially benefit from crumps to crumps. Trump's crypto agenda.
Regional exchanges report growing institutional interest as regulatory clarity improves. Quote, we're seeing increased inquiries from traditional financial players. US policy shifts could accelerate this trend by providing clearer frameworks for banks and payment providers, said Hong Yi Tang of TrueBit. For a region where centralized exchanges handle over 60% of transaction volume, reduced regulatory friction could unlock new growth. Brazil, Argentina, and Mexico already rank among the top 20 countries globally for crypto adoption. And the prospect of a Bitcoin friendly US administration comes as Latin American countries grapple with their own regulatory frameworks.
Argentina's CNV is finalizing rules for virtual asset service providers while Brazil implemented comprehensive crypto legislation in 2023 and is expected to launch its blockchain based CBDC next year. Yeah. Good luck with that, dude. Quote, regional regulators watch US policy closely. A more accommodating US stance could influence local frameworks, especially around stable coins and exchange operations, explained Alfonso Martell Seward from Lemon Cash. As Trump prepares to take office, the US Latin America crypto market, currently processing $300,000,000 in daily transfers or thereabouts, stands at a potential inflection point.
Whether Trump's campaign promises translates into policies that benefit regional adoption, drifting away from what he did and said on his first mandate remains to be seen, but local players are cautiously optimistic. Yeah. Let's go back. That's the end of the article. Let's go back here to where, I don't know. Yeah. This is it. I want people to really listen to this. You know how I always say the the west is the last to to adopt Bitcoin in mass and it's gonna be Latin America, the continent of Africa, all that shit? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's Latin America, continent of Africa, Far Eastern Europe, the Baltics, the Balkans, some Southeast Asian countries that are really freaking poor.
Those are the ones to watch. But Latin America, especially so. Not that it's not that the people in Africa or these other places that I'm watching don't have the same issue, but Latin America for me is way closer to home and I kinda I have I've been born and raised and lived most of my life in Texas. I feel more connected with Latin America than I do Africa. That's for damn sure. So but I want I want to point this out as to why I keep saying to not dismiss what the hell is going on in Latin America. For all those that just are desperate, desperate to have the west be the guys that always adopt this crap. It needs to really be Latin America because they have a unique combination of high crypto I'm gonna say crypto, but that they say it. So let's just say high crypto awareness, challenging monetary conditions, and significant remittance flows.
Those three things together, that's that shit that shit's a spark. There is dry tender everywhere in Latin America, all countries from Mexico all the way down to the freaking tip of Argentina. It's just dry tender, and it's waiting for a spark, and that's it. The unique combination of bitcoin awareness, They have obvious challenging monetary conditions, which Bitcoin fixes, and they already have significant remittance flows, and Bitcoin fixed that shit. I mean, you just send it directly to your grandma. You'd like you could go go I don't know. Go to Kingdom of Bhutan and start working there. And you can remit all the money and Bitcoin that you made from working in the Bhutan Bitcoin mines and send it directly to your or and and they can just take it directly. They don't need a bank. They don't need Western Union.
Alright. So that's the spark. And that's one of the reasons why I watch Latin America like a hawk because that shit is once that shit sets itself on fire, it may be very very hard to put out. But my question was, earlier during, you know, as this my 4 day weekend started rolling, I started hearing the word gutter. As in, well, other people pronounce it Qatar, but gutter, I think, is the the most reasonably pronounced you know, pronounceable word, so I'm gonna say gutter. But the question was, was gutter buying Bitcoin? And this question has been has gone all the way back to, like, something like 2022.
And we still don't know, but there are some things in this particular article that we should probably be watching out for because we still don't know what the hell happened over this weekend. Why the hell did we get god candles? I can't find any direct explanation. Who the freak is buying? Could it be Gutter? I don't know. But crypto news flash and Mohammed Sayafri are Dayanto is the best pronunciation I can give it, asked the question, is gutter or Saudi Arabia secretly accumulating Bitcoin? Okay. David Bailey, mhmm, ordinal's fame, and the CEO of Bitcoin Magazine, and a prominent figure in Trump's cryptocurrency campaign revealed that a major player in the space of nation states is substantially invested in Bitcoin.
Bailey's comments have prompted a lot of conjecture since he said that at least one nation has been actively buying Bitcoin and has lately positioned itself amongst the top 5 hodlers worldwide. Clearly, outlining which countries are not engaged, He specifically excluded China, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, Finland, and Georgia. Gutter and Saudi Arabia, however, have become most plausible contenders since their activities in the crypto market peak interest regarding their motives and their scope. And let's see. We've got a tweet from Wu Blockchain that says David Bailey, CEO of Bitcoin Magazine and one of Trump's campaign crypto aids, said that at least one country has been actively buying Bitcoin and is now a top five huddler. Okay. So that's one of the things where it came from. But remember, before I before I continue this article, remember the first story that we read today had a tweet from somebody like Daniel Batten.
Had no. Daniel Batten is not David Bailey. Completely different guy. Says that one of the nation states is buying Bitcoin. Alright? So there's 2 different people that are saying that a nation state of apparent consequence, otherwise, who gives a shit, is actively buying Bitcoin. Let's find out more. Although Bailey's remarks are still hypothetical, they fit a recent pattern of growing national interest in large Bitcoin holdings. Emerging nations, especially, show this change as policymakers are investigating bitcoin as a strategic asset asset for diversification and financial resilience. As they go beyond pilot projects to full scale domestic mining facilities with capabilities exceeding 100 megawatts and, in some cases, into the gigawatt level production, bitcoin mining is also gaining momentum among some of these nations.
With nations realizing the value of keeping digital assets as part of their official reserves, this development emphasizes a growing acceptance of Bitcoin's ability to help national financial strategy. Bailey's observation fit a time when governments and businesses all around are progressively embracing bitcoin. This acceptance indicates a major change in national perspectives on digital resources. Actually, some national governments are allegedly getting ready to make significant monthly bitcoin investments, possibly worth 1,000,000,000 of dollars.
Such actions show that one understands bitcoin not only as a speculative tool, but also as a counter against conventional financial volatility. Against this background, it's not shocking that some nations would see owning BTC as a means of reducing reliance on traditional currencies and maybe just maybe stabilizing their economic foundation. 2 countries with great wealth and power, Qatar and Saudi Arabia, would be involved in a new chapter in world Bitcoin acceptance. Given their ongoing exploration of substitutes for oil based income in accordance with their diversification objectives, their probable access to Bitcoin might establish a model for other countries in the region to follow suit.
Bailey's comments have piqued more questions over who nations might be quietly spearheading this trend behind the scenes until the timing is ready for public declarations. Previously, CNF reported that with $12,160,000,000 mostly from law enforcement seizures, the United States had a sizable share of world bitcoin reserves. Bhutan has meanwhile used bitcoin mining as a national revenue source, building reserves of around $782,460,000 in coins at that time. And, of course, as we know, they they have a lot they've got a lot more. So I cannot find out about the gutter news.
This is this is as close as I get. Is somebody else wondering to themselves and writing an article about it, is it gutter? Saudi Arabia, I'm I'm actually more interested if if Gutter actually gets into this because Gutter they're they're sort of a sleeper. And if you don't know what a sleeper is, think of a shitty looking old Chevrolet car, and I'm going to tell you right now that I'm thinking of a Chevelle or no. I'm sorry. A Chevy Chevette. Right? I'm thinking of a Chevette. It is the crappiest looking car ever built. It was like, I'm talking as ugly as a pacer from AMC back in the day. We're talking the late mid to late seventies.
Pacers were god awful ugly looking, but Chavets, that's well, that was an ugly ass car. But you know what it had in it? It had a power plant that would make your jaw drop to the floor, and it would take most cars off the line at a stoplight. It would take them. It's an ugly ass car. It looks like a piece of shit. It's kind of a car that's so ugly you'd be embarrassed being seen in, except by other people who know what kind of power plant came with the Chevette. Right? That, for me, is gutter. Gutter is the of the Middle East.
They got more money than God, not more money than Saudi Arabia, but per capita, we're getting way up there as far as just straight up freaking pools and pools, deep, deep pools of wealth. Gutter is definitely somebody to watch. Clearly, I'm going to need to add the entirety of the Middle East to Latin America, the continent of Africa, the Baltics, the Balkans, certain Far Eastern European nations, and now the Middle East. It's just I mean, they've been flirting with it for a while, but now, I'm calling it Middle East is going all in Bitcoin. We'll see if I'm right. Let's run the numbers.
Trump was bad for oil. Trump was bad for oil. Everybody was thinking that Iran was still gonna attack Israel, and they still might. But there's a hell of a lot less chance of that shit in Ukraine and over there in the Middle East, which we just got finished talking about with Israel and Gaza and all that. I get the feeling that everybody's lost their appetite for continued war because Trump is just is just he's just bad for war, which is good for me because I freaking hate war. But oil is taking a hit because what do you need to persecute a war? Or better yet, when those wars occur in the Middle East, what's in danger? Oil.
1st, we're not gonna burn it. And since we're not burning it, to be able to fire missiles to go blow it up, we have a double whammy. However, oil has kind of recovered a little bit. Point 47 percent to the upside, but chilling out, dude, $68.37 a barrel. Brent Norsee is up a third to $72.10. Natural gas is up half point to almost 3 dollars per 1,000 cubic feet, and gasoline is up 0.84 percent to a buck 97 a gallon. Gold is down half a point today, but it's chilling out at $26103, so nothing to sneeze at. Silver is up a quarter of a point, but platinum is down 2 and a third. Copper is down 2, and palladium is down 4 and 1 5th points.
Ag is pretty much in the red today. Biggest winner, however, is chocolate, and it is swinging for the fences. 6.89% to the upside. Biggest loser today is wheat. 2 a third to the downside. I got live cattle up 4.43%, lean hogs up 0.44, and feeder cattle up a half. The Dow is down 0.6%. The S and P is down 0.42. The Nasdaq is down a third of a point, and the S and P Mini is down just over one full point. What did Bitcoin do? Well, at 87,000 I can't believe I'm saying these numbers. At $87,770, we are staring square in the face at a 1.74,000,000,000,000 market cap. I heard yesterday that we took overtook the entire market cap of silver.
I'm sure that that is switched back over, but for that brief moment in time, the entire world's supply of silver was outshined by something that's barely 16 years old. We can get 34 ounces of shiny metal rocks with our 1 Bitcoin of which there are 19,781,033.61 of, and average fees per block have increased substantially, but still not terrible. 0.14 BTC on average in fees on a per block basis, and there are 85 blocks. You you thought there'd be more, didn't you? No. No. No. No. Only 85 blocks carrying just over 200,000 transactions waiting to confirm at high priority rates of 11 satoshis per vbyte.
Low priority is gonna get you in at 9. And hash rate is chilling out at 734.2 exahashes per second. You can do with that what you will now it's time to honor all the people that decided to throw sats my way and for the episode tower of babble which was last Thursday's episode, I got Lucky Mo Fo with 10 80. 10 80 sat says words are weapons, David. Choose your mantras wisely, folks. The ones you say to others and to yourself. A simple thank you is a good start. No need to learn Sanskrit or Tibetan. I think that that's a jab at, oh, we're gonna go learn Eastern philosophy, and that's gonna make me a calm person. I gotta tell you, I've read a lot of eastern philosophy, and they got the same problems as western philosophy. There is no answer.
But saying please and thank you will go a long way. And you know what else goes a long way? And if you're not used to saying this as an adult, get used to it. Start saying yes, sir, and yes, ma'am, or no, sir, and no, ma'am. Use the honorific. Actually, say it. We say it to each other all the time on Nostra now. Good morning, sir. Howard, I'm I'm pleased to see you, sir. And we have sir sleepy, the magic green frog that's on Nostra. His he spells it s e r, but still, we we've been saying sir to each other for so long. It for years now, in the Bitcoin space, I've actually it it somehow or another, it changed me.
And I I will say yes, sir, and no, sir, to every single guy. If I have to talk to another gentleman, if I have to talk to somebody who's way younger than me, if I talk to, like, one of my children's friends and they ask me a question that I can answer yes or no with, I'll say something like, yes, sir, or no, sir. Do that. Words matter. Lucky mofo is not wrong. The bird with a 1,000 gives me some kind of emoji I can't read because, well, I'm still on Windows XP on this machine. So k. Whatever. God's death with 5:37 says, thank you, sir. No, thank you. Pies to plan. 4:20. Thank you, sir. No. Thank you. Wartime 333 says cheers.
Noster Gang with a 100 says daylight slavings. Slavings. Also, for your information, I am a lady. Well, howdy, ma'am. Kingsecassee? Secassee? Kingsecassee, I guess 100 sat says, well that was a pretty deep last 20 minutes thank you sir see he said it no thank you sir Nikola Tesla with nothing says, is it okay to analyze an event with a 5050 chance to succeed? I was thinking about it while hearing. Wait a minute. Oh, what? Probably what? I was thinking about it while hearing. I couldn't validate in my head this only event as an effective way to validate some system. Nikola or Nico Tesla, I don't exactly know what you're talking about, but as for me being wrong about shit, yeah.
I'm wrong. I'm wrong about all kinds of shit. I it's okay. You can analyze shit, get it wrong, tell people what you think, then they call you out on it 4 days later when you're obviously wrong. And you know what? Nobody died. Nobody's that embarrassed. It's okay. Do your analysis. Fine. It'll be fine. Chris Hartsell says nothing and says or pays me nothing. You gave me nothing, Chris, but still I love you guys chiming in. So says, I've only witnessed one person in real life losing their ever loving mind over the Trump win. Yes. That is one of the things that I wanted to say at the head of the show, and I forgot talking about it. For all of the people that are spreading the TikTok videos around of the quote unquote libs losing their mind.
They're not. They probably were during they were during the first Trump win. That one we know. But this time around, you know what it's for? It's for the clicks. They're doing it for the clicks. They're doing it for the views. They're doing it to pump their own algorithm. I don't think for a second that anywhere close to half of the libs of TikTok videos that I've seen of liberals losing their mind are actually truthful. I think it's all bullshit. I think it's all this time around, it's all for show. It's all for clicks. It's all to prime that algo. That's gonna do it for the weather report.
Welcome to part 2 of the news you can use Bitcoin Fog user, Roman Sterlinggov, gets 12 and a half years for allegedly running it based on junk science. That's a terrible, terrible headline, but let's get into this. By the way, this is no bs bitcoin.com, and they are raising 1 BTC for a news desk Bitcoin. Okay? Or news desk for Bitcoin that or where it says we're raising 1 BTC for a news desk that Bitcoin deserves. Contribute here. And they are running a geyser fund forward slash project forward slash no b s Bitcoin. So, consider them because they do some good work. A dual Russian Swedish national Roman Sterlingoff was sentenced to 12 and a half years in prison and forced to pay a forfeiture money judgment of around 395 and a half $1,000,000 for his alleged operation of the longest running Bitcoin money laundering service on the darknet.
Wow. Roman Sterlingoff, 36, was sentenced to a 150 months in federal prison and ordered to forfeit 395,000,000 and seized assets worth around $1,760,000 on Friday. Additionally, he was ordered to forfeit 1, forfeit oh, man. 1345 BTC from the Bitcoin Fog Wallet valued at over $103,000,000. In March, he was found guilty of money laundering, conspiracy to commit money laundering, operating an unlicensed money transmission business, and money transmission without a license. Prosecutors claim that he ran the Bitcoin Fog Mixer from 2,011 to 2021 and were seeking a prison sentence of 20 to 30 years.
During the trial, Sterling off stated that he used Bitcoin fog but denied being the operator of the platform. His lawyer, Tor Eklund, argued that there was no eyewitness testimonies or service logs to demonstrate that his client managed the service at all. And Sterlingov's defense team requested that the judge impose a prison sentence of no more than 7 and a half years. Quote, most of the evidence at trial was circumstantial, and neither the Bitcoin Fog server, server logs, private keys, or ledger were ever even entered into evidence, stated Sterling Hobbs defense in a sentencing memorandum.
Are you fucking kidding me? The logs? The logs weren't entered as evidence? That striking. Anyway, continuing, Sterlingoff's case is branded as the case that, quote, put cryptocurrency tracing on trial as the prosecutors did not find any smoking gun criminal evidence from his belongings or his devices upon his arrest. And instead, the charges rely on a blend of blockchain tracing, IP address matching, and connections between online accounts as outlined in the statement of facts released when charges were made public in April of 2021. And at the trial, judge Moss defended Chainalysis Reactor Software as sufficiently reliable, adding that it doesn't need to, at least as offered in this case, offer, you know, absolute precision.
This is a direct quote. Let's do this one again. This is what the judge said. Judge Moss actually said this sentence. Quote, it doesn't need to, at least as offered in this case, offer, you know, absolute precision. So if it were right, you know, only 90% of the time or only 80% of the time, I think it would still be value valuable for offering the evidence that the government is seeking to offer it for. The fucker can't even speak. He can't even form sentences. This is clearly something that he said out of his mouth and didn't write in a statement. Otherwise, he would have the grammar would actually be, you know, I don't know, intact. This is ridiculous.
It doesn't need to, you know, offer absolute precision. Yes. It does. When somebody's freedom is on the line, it better fucking a right offer absolute precision. Not this 90%, not this 80%. All that shit, unless you saw that motherfucker push the button on his computer that sent the the commands to Bitcoin Fog to start the server up or close the server down, he's not the operator. This is the United States judicial system at work, ladies and gentlemen. Be afraid of it, but, also, how are we going to destroy it? That's the question that we need to be asking over the next 4 years because we have a very slim window to figure out ways to destroy federal prosecution.
Because that kind of shit, this judge needs to go to jail himself. This judge needs to be put into prison. This judge needs to have all of his money and all of his money, all of his property, stripped away from him so he can feel how it feels to have everything taken away from you. And then we'll just tell him, oh, you know, look, we had a 20% chance that you might have done something wrong. We can't prove it, but fuck it. You're going down for 12 years. Continuing, quote, as proven at trial, Roman Sterlingoff created and used an online tool to process 100 of 1,000,000 in illegal transactions enabling darknet drug dealers and those who sell, of course, child sexual abuse material to operate.
Today's sentence sends an unmistakable message. Those who help criminals with online payments for their illegal activities will face serious penalties. This prosecution also provides more proof that we have the skilled investigators and talented prosecutors needed to hold those who operate these dark net sites accountable, said US attorney Matthew m Graves for the District of Columbia in a press release that you need to go to fucking jail too. You didn't prove shit. You had a 90 or, I don't know, an 80% chance that he did something that you didn't actually see as no.
According to OXT research report, a very disturbing aspect of this case is that the scientific method has been completely ignored while considering that hearsay or anecdotal evidence of past successes are a replacement for tracking false positives and negatives. I just don't stick. Let's see what, Lowell Elites has a tweet out here about this. Says Roman Sterlingoff has been sentenced to 12.5 years. Government is now seizing the little Bitcoin he has left while the 1,000,000,000 of dollars he allegedly made operating Bitcoin FOD continue to remain unaccounted for. This entire case is a grave miscarriage of justice and another stepping stone in the United States government's war on financial privacy. Yeah. I agree with Lola. I don't agree with Lola on everything that she says, but on this one, I definitely agree with. But, honestly, I'm just having I'm having such a problem with what the hell? Where was it?
For God's sakes, I can't find it anymore. Let's see. Do do do do do do do do. Oh, sufficiently reliable. So if it were right, you know, only 90% of the time or only 80% of the time, it'd still be value for offering the evidence that the government is seeking to offer it for. It doesn't need to be have absolute precision. This is the judge talking about Chainalysis Reactor software, which was relied on heavily to, quote, unquote, make these connections, but Chainalysis never opened up their software. They never let the defense actually see the software.
And I mean, I'm talking about the code, but they never even let them play with it. They they couldn't have a copy of it. They would have had to buy a license, like, for it. And I think the license is, like, something ridiculous, like, $50,000 a year or something. It's very whatever it is, it's very expensive and well beyond the means of the defense attorneys and Roman Sterlingoff. So they never even got to see how this thing was working. Everything about this is so wrong. It's not is it it's gonna be up to us to destroy federal prosecutorial evidentiary proceedings and change this entire thing around. You better have actually had a person testifying on the stand that you saw me do x.
And then you need another witness to say, yes. Not only did I see him do the x, I saw that other witness there and he was or she or he, whatever, was looking at the guy doing x too. Without those two pieces of evidence, you got shit. This is ridiculous. 12 and a half years of his life just gone. He he was not the creator of Bitcoin fog. Now to somebody else who makes me kinda mad, this time he's it's it's he's making me mad twice. Oh, you know, at the same time. It's gold bug, Peter Schiff. And why is why am I kinda angry at him? Well, because he's urging traders to buy his ordinals amid Bitcoin's surge. So if you thought for a second that Peter Schiff was something other than a straight up scammer, then like me, you were wrong. I never thought he was a straight up scammer.
I really didn't. I thought there were some things that he did that were really questionable. But a straight up scammer, no. I was not thinking along those lines. Clearly, as usual, I was wrong. Jason Nelson from Decrypt, please tell us why. With Bitcoin surpassing all time highs by the hour, even noted Bitcoin skeptic Peter Schiff is trying to get on the gravy train by selling his ordinals collection. On Sunday, the financial commentator and radio host said on Twitter that the Peter Schiff Ordinals collection, also known as the Golden Triumph Ordinals set, would go up for sale on Magic Eden.
As bitcoin surged past $80,000 on Sunday in the crypto optimistic wake of Donald Trump's election victory last week. It has since passed that to hit 87,000. And as we know, it hit damn near 90,000 not too long ago. Launched in 2023, the golden triumph ordinal set is a collection of 51 ordinal inscriptions on the Bitcoin blockchain. Jesus. The current floor price for just one of the shift NFTs, which is these ordinal things, is point 124 Bitcoin, which is around $10,000. Actually, more like 11. It's $10,774 exactly. For each collectible, according to Magic Eden data, despite having low trading volume, the shift nft rose a 149% last year with an original price of 0.05 BTC or around $1900.
Quote, there's 21,000,000 Bitcoin, but only 50 golden triumph ordinals. It's clear which one is more valuable, Schiff tweeted. You can't argue with math. It's unclear if if Schiff is attempting to profit from Bitcoin mania. The gold bug did not immediately return, request for comment. Crypto Twitter reacted to Schiff's tweet with a mix of surprise and skepticism. Chris Coffee ETH, at Chris Coffee ETH says Peter Schiff promoting ordinals is not something I had on my 2024 bingo card. And let's see. Oh, and and, as a reply to Peter Schiff's announcement of these, you know, buy my ordinals, he gets this reply that says, I'd rather buy a pet rock, and then there's a picture of a pet rock. Another reply is, Peter, it's very clear that your bearish sentiment sentiment about Bitcoin, which has been wrong, is a great engagement farming strategy. I've gotta give it to you, but it's time for you to join us for real.
Despite Schiff announcing the sale of the ordinals collection, he claimed not to own a Bitcoin wallet himself or ownership of the collection. Quote, the ordinals belong to the people who bought them in the original auction. Mhmm. Yeah. When asked why someone would part with their increasingly valuable Bitcoin for one of his NFTs, Schiff said it was because of scarcity. Why is Bitcoin more valuable? The golden triumph ordinals are way more scarce than Bitcoin, end quote. Schiff has consistently argued that gold is better than Bitcoin. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. On Monday, he decried Trump's vow to establish a Bitcoin reserve prognosticating that such a move would cause a massive market meltdown. Of course, Schiff, of course, quote, to maintain the pretense that its Bitcoin reserve has actual value, the United States government would be forced to keep buying, destroying the value of the dollar in the process. Yeah. Well, maybe you should buy some Bitcoin in case it catches on there, Peter. In any case, it appears as though Schiff wants a piece of the action after more than a decade of denial. Welcome aboard. That's not why he's doing it.
It's very clear to me what Schiff is doing. This is all tongue in cheek. And this is the third thing that makes me very very angry. Is that people are not going to know that it's tongue in cheek. And he's what I mean what do I mean by tongue in cheek? He's saying, see, I've only got 50 ordinals. Therefore, it's more scarce than Bitcoin. And since scarcity is the only answer for value, then clearly my shit is more valuable than Bitcoin. But then he flips on that because he's saying that gold is scarce commodity as well. And, therefore, that's why it has value. The man cannot keep his story straight. And this is why I will never trust Peter Schiff in anything that he ever says again.
He says constantly that taxation is theft. I now no longer trust him. I know for myself that taxation is theft. I do not believe that Peter Schiff actually thinks that. I think he has an ulterior motive for saying that, and it has nothing to do with him actually thinking that taxation is theft. Why? Because this man cannot figure out if scarcity matters or if he can make money off of it by turning it into a joke and stealing people's hard earned money because they're too ignorant to understand that Peter Schiff has absolutely no willpower.
He has no ability to think that he might be wrong about Bitcoin. He's still making jokes about it, but this time he's taking people's money. And that pisses me off. It really it really really really does. Tether has unveiled a WDK, simplifying non custodial USDT and Bitcoin integration for developers. It is a wallet development kit by Tether. And all we really need to know is that, yes, it's from Tether. Their announcement is on tether. Io and, like, in their blog post. And it is a wallet development kit, which means that you're going to start seeing Bitcoin wallets around the world start integrating Tether directly alongside Bitcoin holdings, and they're gonna be interoperable.
Now, I'm not going to say whether that's good or bad. For me, I don't give a shit. I don't like Tether. I don't really need it. I don't really well, I've never used it, so I don't need it. I I I don't when I say I don't really need it, I don't need it. There's never been a day when I'm like, gee, I sure coulda used some Tether to fix that problem. No. That's never happened. So but here it comes. And what have I been saying about stablecoin mania? It's going to be another Scambrian explosion. Some of it some of these stable coins, they'll they'll be oh, I mean, when I mean okay, I mean, they're gonna try tether and USDC pretty stable.
They're I mean, as for what they do, they they don't seem to be lying. I I'm not exactly sure. I don't work for either company, so I don't have the internal, so I don't really know. From what I see from the outside, it looks like they're above board. It looks like they're at least trying to actually make this shit stable. They have backing. They've got shit, you know, in in the in in their vaults that back the stuff. But there's going to be 1,000 of stable coins. And if you think that just because they're named stable coin that they aren't going to be 99% pure scam, then you're going to lose your money by buying some stupid ass stable coin. Don't do it.
Just don't do it. But it's coming. And this kind of shit is not going to help because that wallet development kit, it's gonna be cloned. It's gonna be cloned to make anybody's stable coin work with any shit coin under the sun, and it's all a scam. So stay as far as humanly possible away from it. Stick with things like Robosats, who's released version 0.7.2 alpha. Noster order books are here, or at least in their alpha. Robosats is a simple and private way to exchange Bitcoin. It simplifies the peer to peer user experience and and and uses lightning hold invoices, to minimize custody and trust requirements while helping users stick to best privacy practices.
It's available for the web, Androids, Windows, Mac OS, and Linux. But, sadly, it doesn't look like it's available for iOS. Whatever. This release lets users test Nostr Global order books by enabling the option in the configuration tab. For now, the feature is only available on the web and will be bought or brought to mobile apps in upcoming releases. This version also improves robot recovery forms, changes, fast generate robot to fast generate order, and does a couple of other things. But it's the order books that's going to be really interesting. Now remember, this is alpha, so this is just testing. But order books over Nostr as a kind is gonna be really interesting to see what happens.
If any of you guys out there are using, Robosats and and start getting into this, please please please keep us updated on Noster. Meanwhile, Bitcoin Keeper version 1.2.18 and Keeper Desktop version 0.1.3 have been released. Keeper or Bitcoin Keeper is an open source mobile multisig wallet with inheritance features. The desktop is a companion desktop app that allows you to secure, securely use hardware wallets with the Bitcoin Keeper mobile app. So if you are a Keeper user, they have made an upgrade. Zeus version 0.9.2 finishes us out with export transaction history.
VIP 353, bolt 12, and hardware signing improvements. And Zeus is a mobile bitcoin and lightning wallet for Android as well as iOS. You can export transaction history to spreadsheets. That's going to be good for people, that are, you know, really don't wanna get anywhere crossways with the IRS or local tax reporting, around the world. Also, solidified BIP 353 and Bolt 12 support, hardware wallet and external signer improvements are there. Oh, it has a spooky theme. Okay. That you may be a little late. Maybe a little late. That was Halloween. And we're done with that. But, okay, maybe try again with the turkey theme after Thanksgiving. And then somewhere around New Year's, release the Christmas theme. Whatever. Settings, payments add slide to pay threshold, and there are other bug fixes and miscellaneous enhancements.
So that's it. That's it. That's all that's all I got for you. Coming back to you this week, November 12, 2024. And I am sorry that I was gone for 4 straight days. Had to be done. Had to rest my weary little head. I played, starting to learn, badget the gathering with my 12 year old son. I'm looking forward to that. I'm turning into a nerd again. Thank you to my 12 year old son. So so that yes. I guess I'm starting yes. That happened over this 4 day weekend. I'm starting to learn how to play of all things Magic the Gathering. We'll we'll see how that goes. There's really not much left other than I want to caution everybody from rubbing somebody else's nose in it.
Honestly, that's juvenile. It's juvenile behavior and we need to not do that. Okay. Don't do it at Thanksgiving. If somebody at Thanksgiving wants to talk to you about Bitcoin because now their interest is peaked, just tell them the like, whatever it is that you've offered to do for them in the past to try to get them into bitcoin, say, start out the conversation with this. Say, the offer still stands. If you're really interested, then I will help you do this thing. Everything that I've told you that I would have done for you over the last 12 or 15 thanksgivings, I will still do that for you.
So but be respectful, be clear headed, don't engage in the chardonnfruid with your own family and friends. Okay? It's bad juju, it's not gonna get you anywhere, and it could make some some horrendous future family events more likely than less likely. Okay? Be nice to your family. They're the one thing the one thing that represents the real wealth that you have in this world. You can ask American HODL how he knows, and I'll see you on the other side. This has been Bitcoin and and I'm your host, David Bennett. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and hope to see you again real soon. Have a great day.
Good morning. This is David Bennett, and this is Bitcoin and, a podcast where I try to find the edge effect between the worlds of Bitcoin, gaming, permaculture, podcasting, and education to gain a better understanding of all. Edge effect is a concept from ecology describing a greater diversity of life where the edges of 2 systems overlap. While species from either system can be found at the edge, it is important to note there are species in the overlap that exist in neither system, and that is what I seek to uncover. So join me in discovering the variety of things being created as Bitcoin rubs up against other systems. It is 9:18 AM Pacific Standard Time. It is the 12th day of November 2024.
This is episode 990. 990 of Bitcoin, and we are 10 away from the big crossover from 3 digits to 4 digits. Yeah, that's right. So, what the hell happened this weekend, and why wasn't I here? Oh, I just took some time off. Yeah. Kids were out of school on Friday, and then again yesterday for veterans day. And I was like, you know, I'm just gonna hang out with the fam, dude. So that's exactly what it did, And it was great. It was it was awesome. I highly recommend just chilling out with your family at all times possible. It's it's gonna be more important than you can possibly imagine for those people that are out there that don't know. And I'm not if you already know what the hell I'm talking about, you get it.
That's fine. But for those people that are out there that may just, like, I don't know, suggest that they just, you know, kinda wanna be alone, you know, kinda wanna have some time for themselves. While that's that is good in some cases, if you find yourself ask yourself the question, do you find yourself doing that a lot? If so, you might wanna kinda rethink about rethink that, especially with the holidays coming up. It's gonna be Thanksgiving and then it's gonna be Christmas. It's going to be the time that you spend the most with your family And there's going to, of course, be the Bitcoin discussion coming up this Thanksgiving.
I'd like to know. I'd like to see a show of hands out there even though I can't see a damn one of y'all. Who is planning on rubbing their noses in it come Thanksgiving? Honestly, don't. Just don't. You know what? Try this. Try saying nothing at all about Bitcoin. God forbid, don't discuss religion or politics either. Find something else. Find something about your family. Ask questions about what did grandpa do during the war? I don't know. Anything. Just, like, just stay away from politics and just hold your nose on Bitcoin. Just just do it. Take it with a grain of salt because you never know what the hell might happen come Thanksgiving Day. I see a lot of people out there glad handing each other because of, you know, a couple of god candles that that occurred over this, this 3 day weekend at least for most, 4 days for us.
I I honestly I kinda think maybe maybe let's just keep that shit in our back pocket for now. Not I'm not suggesting that it's gonna be bad luck or anything. I'm just saying there's a lot of people out there. They're just not going to learn. They're just not going to. It doesn't matter how many times you talk about it. It's just not gonna happen, and you've got to be prepared to let them go. Even if I mean, if they're your own family, I'm not saying that you're gonna let them go, like never talk to them. Again, you're just gonna have to let them do what they do. You're going to have to let them buy the treasury bonds. You're gonna have to let them go their own way.
Some some will listen. Others will not. But in all events, the race is on to front run the United States government for buying Bitcoin. This is Bitcoin Magazine, Pete Rizzo, is writing. And he says, with the 2024 election all but final, it's clear Donald Trump, the soon to be 47th president of the United States, will be the most pro Bitcoin leader in history. Oh, really? Yeah. Well, let's wait and see. The big question remains, however, how effective will he be in operationalizing his strategy? At Bitcoin 2024, Trump, as well as Robert F Kennedy, Jr, and Republican senator Cynthia Lummis, made it clear that they want the United States government to buy Bitcoin.
All would seem to be in a better position to enact this following the election as the Republican Party increased its representation in government quite considerably. Yet, as for how quickly the United States could become active in the market, that's that's a bit more murky. Since announcing the bill, Bitcoin has surged from $60,000 to a high of 86,000. And, of course, then again, we well, I'm adding this in here. We did see 89. Damn near 90. It was, like, 89,938 or something like that on one of my charts. So just keep that shit in mind. Anyway, with the United States government soon to be buying, there's even more incentive for the price to escalate. Be careful with that, guys. Herein lies the problem.
For the United States has essentially telegraphed to the world that it intends to buy an asset that's scarce in supply without the concrete ability to do so. Even with the majority in the house of representatives and the senate, passing the strategic Bitcoin reserve legislation 2024 will still require an act of congress and the agreement of lawmakers, it would seem foolish to expect this won't be complex or time consuming. For example, the bill proposes revaluing the Federal Reserve's gold holdings as well as integrating Bitcoin into government financial systems. Questions will likely abound as will operational challenges. Let's remember just remember that it took all of 3 years for the SEC, the Securities and Exchange Commission staff bulletins to be adjusted just to value Michael Sailor's public market buying or rather Bitcoin buying spree correctly.
This is the nature of government, slow and bureaucratic. Even with Trump, RFK, and other Bitcoin backers in positions of power, the chances that the United States government begins to acquire Bitcoin on January 20, 2025 seems infinitesimal. This is not saying that it won't happen at all, just that it won't be very timely. This is even to admit that there could be a prioritization challenge. Maybe maybe the crypto lobby wants to move quickly on the long delayed market infrastructure bill. If so, congress could become more consumed with guardrails for exchanges and redefining securities law than the question of the strategic reserve.
After all, they helped bankroll Trump's whim. How much could Bitcoin rise in the meantime? Well, with the bull market in full force, I'd argue that institutions and governments have every reason to become active in the market. There are many regimes around the world where the executive branch has enough power to begin begin accumulating Bitcoin today. They'd be foolish not to front run the United States government. Shit. El Salvador started this process back in 2021, and it has amassed over 5,900 Bitcoin, yet it faced 2 to 3 years of market headwinds as traders countered its entries. Lest we forget, El Salvador bought 100 of Bitcoin at $60,000, a move that for years was fuel for its enemies.
Trump may yet do his part to boost Bitcoin, yet in telegraphing his intentions, he's almost certainly created conditions that can be exploited by savvy traders. Time will tell them, among well, time will tell them if among them, we will see other nation states buy Bitcoin. And he ends with this tweet from Daniel Batten who says, today and this is on November 11th. This was yesterday. Today, I received confirmation that another nation state is currently discussing, 1, a bitcoin strategic reserve. And 2, drafting bitcoin mining regulations so they can improve their electrical grid and better monetize stranded energy.
It's happening. And that's from Daniel Batten at dsbatten, b a t t e n, on the Twitters. So it is interesting. There is a telegraph here. It's it was I mean, it's like a flashing stoplight to the world saying, hey. Hey. We're doing this thing over here, but don't do it first. Let us get our ducks in a row, and and then you could no. It doesn't happen. So my question is this. You know, Pete Rizzo, who's writing this, is right. This isn't gonna happen on January 20th. If it does, I'd be shocked. I really would. But I kinda agree with the man. It's gonna take some time to push this through. So now that the United States is you know, Trump telegraphed this before he became president.
It was very clear what what he said he was going to do. Now whether or not he ever meant to do it is another story altogether. It's just all I can think about is what did he say. Right? What he does comes next. But right now, all I got is what did Trump say? And I had no idea that it was gonna be the executive branch and all of the legislative branch that was taken in this in this particular election. I kinda thought the house would at least probably remain firmly divided, but it doesn't it doesn't look that way. There's still some some races out there that are, like, senatorial and, I guess, some house races that have yet to be called, but not that many. So I'm pretty sure that it's pretty much just a huge red wave, like, everywhere.
So Trump said he was gonna do the thing, and now he's the president. And now the house and the senate are both basically red. So what do other nations do? Well, I don't know, but we can take a clue by listening to what El Salvador and Bhutan are seeing in their own reserves. This is Ezra Raguerre from Cointelegraph. And the headline is El Salvador and Bhutan see Bitcoin holding surge amid market rally. Well, duh. Let's see what they see. Bitcoin held by El Salvador and the Kingdom of Bhutan has significantly increased in value. On November 12th, Cointelegraph Markets Pro data shows that Bitcoin reached a new high of 89,700, pushing its overall market capitalization near $2,000,000,000,000 Because of the price increase, the 2 countries BTC holdings made significant gains.
Thanks to Bitcoin's recent price surge, the value of El Salvador's holdings increased by more than $100,000,000 in 1 week. According to blockchain data tracker, Arkem, El Salvador's Bitcoin holdings were worth $402,000,000 on November 5th. It's now soared to $523,000,000 today, probably this morning. Whatever. On September 7, 2021, El Salvador adopted Bitcoin as legal tender. At at the time, the country initially bought about 200 BTC as its first investment in the asset. Since then, the country has gradually increased its holdings. Arcimoto intelligence data shows that they currently hold 5,900 Bitcoin.
In April of 2023, Bhutan's cryptocurrency investments were revealed through bankruptcy proceedings involving companies including Celsius and BlockFi. Druck Holdings and Investments, a commercial arm of Bhutan's royal government, was identified as a customer of the bankrupt firms. In May of 2023, Bhutanese officials confirmed that the kingdom had been mining Bitcoin since April of 2019 when the price of Bitcoin was $5,000. They they've been at it for a while. I'm surprised that that never leaked. I'm really I I'm shocked that it didn't leak. Oh, it's probably only because Bhutan is a very very small country. But regardless, according to ARCIM Intelligence, Bhutan's Bitcoin holdings now total $1,030,000,000, that's billion with a b, and Bhutan owns 12,568 Bitcoin and holds around $2,000,000 in shitcoin number 1. On October 29th, Bhutan moved 66,000,000 in Bitcoin as the price reached 71,000, suggesting that the country may be planning to cash in on its gains.
The funds were transferred to Binance in 2 different transactions, and that's the last that we hear anything out of this article. So I we still don't know what the hell did Bhutan actually sell that? Because that would be ill timed, but, you know, hindsight is 2020. So what about Trump's crypto renaissance? Could it accelerate Latin American adoption? Experts say yes. This is from Jose Antonio Lands out of Decrypt. Donald Trump's election victory and promised crypto friendly policies could accelerate digital asset adoption in Latin America, where stablecoins and bitcoin already serve as inflation shields and remittance channels for 1,000,000.
Regional exchanges are reporting a spike in crypto activity as the president elects pro bitcoin stance resonates in inflation hit economies. The president elects pledge to establish a national bitcoin reserve and ease regulatory burdens arrives as Latin America emerges as a key growth market processing over $85,000,000,000 in crypto transactions annually. Regional players see Trump's win as a political catalyst for increased institutional adoption and cross border flows. Quote, Trump's second term in the White House could further boost the crypto market giving room for further appreciation. We are observing a decisive period for Bitcoin and the cryptocurrency market as a whole, says Sebastian Serrano, CEO of Argentina based exchange, Ripio.
The implications could be particularly for countries battling currency instabilities, like in Argentina, where the poverty rate spiked to over 53% under Malay's libertarian administration. Bitcoin trading volume surged a 160% in October and more than 400% in 2024 as users sought refuge from the devaluation of the currency. Venezuela shows similar patterns with over 92% of crypto activity flowing through centralized exchanges as citizens seek alternatives to the boulevard. Regional crypto firms are already positioning themselves for potential growth. Lemon Cash, which recently expanded to Peru, reported processing over $20,000,000 in local currency transactions in its 1st 3 months.
Quote, clear US regulations could help us accelerate adoption across the Latin American market, said Marcelo Cavazoli, Lemon CEO, in an interview with Decrypt in Espanol, quote, Donald Trump's victory gave crypto an additional boost as his campaign showed clear support for the sector. Cavazoli added, quote, Trump put forward policies to incentivize Bitcoin mining in the United States aligning with the growing interest in the crypto market. This was especially reflected in Argentinian and Peruvian users who began accumulating Bitcoin at the end of October. Cavazoli told Decrypt that Bitcoin trading volume hit a record on November 6th in Argentina with Peru also seeing a 160% increase in trading activity versus the day prior.
Some regional players, however, caution that Trump's campaign promises, while encouraging market sentiment, still need to address the fundamental changes facing Latin America's crypto ecosystem and don't solve the true needs of the crypto industry, quote, the regulatory shift helps, but we still need to solve fundamental infrastructure challenges. Cross border settlement and banking relationships, yeah, they're crucial for our region, noted Matthias Reyes from TrueBit Exchange in an interview with Decrypt. Latin America's unique combination of high crypto awareness, challenging monetary conditions, and significant remittance flows positions it to potentially benefit from crumps to crumps. Trump's crypto agenda.
Regional exchanges report growing institutional interest as regulatory clarity improves. Quote, we're seeing increased inquiries from traditional financial players. US policy shifts could accelerate this trend by providing clearer frameworks for banks and payment providers, said Hong Yi Tang of TrueBit. For a region where centralized exchanges handle over 60% of transaction volume, reduced regulatory friction could unlock new growth. Brazil, Argentina, and Mexico already rank among the top 20 countries globally for crypto adoption. And the prospect of a Bitcoin friendly US administration comes as Latin American countries grapple with their own regulatory frameworks.
Argentina's CNV is finalizing rules for virtual asset service providers while Brazil implemented comprehensive crypto legislation in 2023 and is expected to launch its blockchain based CBDC next year. Yeah. Good luck with that, dude. Quote, regional regulators watch US policy closely. A more accommodating US stance could influence local frameworks, especially around stable coins and exchange operations, explained Alfonso Martell Seward from Lemon Cash. As Trump prepares to take office, the US Latin America crypto market, currently processing $300,000,000 in daily transfers or thereabouts, stands at a potential inflection point.
Whether Trump's campaign promises translates into policies that benefit regional adoption, drifting away from what he did and said on his first mandate remains to be seen, but local players are cautiously optimistic. Yeah. Let's go back. That's the end of the article. Let's go back here to where, I don't know. Yeah. This is it. I want people to really listen to this. You know how I always say the the west is the last to to adopt Bitcoin in mass and it's gonna be Latin America, the continent of Africa, all that shit? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's Latin America, continent of Africa, Far Eastern Europe, the Baltics, the Balkans, some Southeast Asian countries that are really freaking poor.
Those are the ones to watch. But Latin America, especially so. Not that it's not that the people in Africa or these other places that I'm watching don't have the same issue, but Latin America for me is way closer to home and I kinda I have I've been born and raised and lived most of my life in Texas. I feel more connected with Latin America than I do Africa. That's for damn sure. So but I want I want to point this out as to why I keep saying to not dismiss what the hell is going on in Latin America. For all those that just are desperate, desperate to have the west be the guys that always adopt this crap. It needs to really be Latin America because they have a unique combination of high crypto I'm gonna say crypto, but that they say it. So let's just say high crypto awareness, challenging monetary conditions, and significant remittance flows.
Those three things together, that's that shit that shit's a spark. There is dry tender everywhere in Latin America, all countries from Mexico all the way down to the freaking tip of Argentina. It's just dry tender, and it's waiting for a spark, and that's it. The unique combination of bitcoin awareness, They have obvious challenging monetary conditions, which Bitcoin fixes, and they already have significant remittance flows, and Bitcoin fixed that shit. I mean, you just send it directly to your grandma. You'd like you could go go I don't know. Go to Kingdom of Bhutan and start working there. And you can remit all the money and Bitcoin that you made from working in the Bhutan Bitcoin mines and send it directly to your or and and they can just take it directly. They don't need a bank. They don't need Western Union.
Alright. So that's the spark. And that's one of the reasons why I watch Latin America like a hawk because that shit is once that shit sets itself on fire, it may be very very hard to put out. But my question was, earlier during, you know, as this my 4 day weekend started rolling, I started hearing the word gutter. As in, well, other people pronounce it Qatar, but gutter, I think, is the the most reasonably pronounced you know, pronounceable word, so I'm gonna say gutter. But the question was, was gutter buying Bitcoin? And this question has been has gone all the way back to, like, something like 2022.
And we still don't know, but there are some things in this particular article that we should probably be watching out for because we still don't know what the hell happened over this weekend. Why the hell did we get god candles? I can't find any direct explanation. Who the freak is buying? Could it be Gutter? I don't know. But crypto news flash and Mohammed Sayafri are Dayanto is the best pronunciation I can give it, asked the question, is gutter or Saudi Arabia secretly accumulating Bitcoin? Okay. David Bailey, mhmm, ordinal's fame, and the CEO of Bitcoin Magazine, and a prominent figure in Trump's cryptocurrency campaign revealed that a major player in the space of nation states is substantially invested in Bitcoin.
Bailey's comments have prompted a lot of conjecture since he said that at least one nation has been actively buying Bitcoin and has lately positioned itself amongst the top 5 hodlers worldwide. Clearly, outlining which countries are not engaged, He specifically excluded China, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, Finland, and Georgia. Gutter and Saudi Arabia, however, have become most plausible contenders since their activities in the crypto market peak interest regarding their motives and their scope. And let's see. We've got a tweet from Wu Blockchain that says David Bailey, CEO of Bitcoin Magazine and one of Trump's campaign crypto aids, said that at least one country has been actively buying Bitcoin and is now a top five huddler. Okay. So that's one of the things where it came from. But remember, before I before I continue this article, remember the first story that we read today had a tweet from somebody like Daniel Batten.
Had no. Daniel Batten is not David Bailey. Completely different guy. Says that one of the nation states is buying Bitcoin. Alright? So there's 2 different people that are saying that a nation state of apparent consequence, otherwise, who gives a shit, is actively buying Bitcoin. Let's find out more. Although Bailey's remarks are still hypothetical, they fit a recent pattern of growing national interest in large Bitcoin holdings. Emerging nations, especially, show this change as policymakers are investigating bitcoin as a strategic asset asset for diversification and financial resilience. As they go beyond pilot projects to full scale domestic mining facilities with capabilities exceeding 100 megawatts and, in some cases, into the gigawatt level production, bitcoin mining is also gaining momentum among some of these nations.
With nations realizing the value of keeping digital assets as part of their official reserves, this development emphasizes a growing acceptance of Bitcoin's ability to help national financial strategy. Bailey's observation fit a time when governments and businesses all around are progressively embracing bitcoin. This acceptance indicates a major change in national perspectives on digital resources. Actually, some national governments are allegedly getting ready to make significant monthly bitcoin investments, possibly worth 1,000,000,000 of dollars.
Such actions show that one understands bitcoin not only as a speculative tool, but also as a counter against conventional financial volatility. Against this background, it's not shocking that some nations would see owning BTC as a means of reducing reliance on traditional currencies and maybe just maybe stabilizing their economic foundation. 2 countries with great wealth and power, Qatar and Saudi Arabia, would be involved in a new chapter in world Bitcoin acceptance. Given their ongoing exploration of substitutes for oil based income in accordance with their diversification objectives, their probable access to Bitcoin might establish a model for other countries in the region to follow suit.
Bailey's comments have piqued more questions over who nations might be quietly spearheading this trend behind the scenes until the timing is ready for public declarations. Previously, CNF reported that with $12,160,000,000 mostly from law enforcement seizures, the United States had a sizable share of world bitcoin reserves. Bhutan has meanwhile used bitcoin mining as a national revenue source, building reserves of around $782,460,000 in coins at that time. And, of course, as we know, they they have a lot they've got a lot more. So I cannot find out about the gutter news.
This is this is as close as I get. Is somebody else wondering to themselves and writing an article about it, is it gutter? Saudi Arabia, I'm I'm actually more interested if if Gutter actually gets into this because Gutter they're they're sort of a sleeper. And if you don't know what a sleeper is, think of a shitty looking old Chevrolet car, and I'm going to tell you right now that I'm thinking of a Chevelle or no. I'm sorry. A Chevy Chevette. Right? I'm thinking of a Chevette. It is the crappiest looking car ever built. It was like, I'm talking as ugly as a pacer from AMC back in the day. We're talking the late mid to late seventies.
Pacers were god awful ugly looking, but Chavets, that's well, that was an ugly ass car. But you know what it had in it? It had a power plant that would make your jaw drop to the floor, and it would take most cars off the line at a stoplight. It would take them. It's an ugly ass car. It looks like a piece of shit. It's kind of a car that's so ugly you'd be embarrassed being seen in, except by other people who know what kind of power plant came with the Chevette. Right? That, for me, is gutter. Gutter is the of the Middle East.
They got more money than God, not more money than Saudi Arabia, but per capita, we're getting way up there as far as just straight up freaking pools and pools, deep, deep pools of wealth. Gutter is definitely somebody to watch. Clearly, I'm going to need to add the entirety of the Middle East to Latin America, the continent of Africa, the Baltics, the Balkans, certain Far Eastern European nations, and now the Middle East. It's just I mean, they've been flirting with it for a while, but now, I'm calling it Middle East is going all in Bitcoin. We'll see if I'm right. Let's run the numbers.
Trump was bad for oil. Trump was bad for oil. Everybody was thinking that Iran was still gonna attack Israel, and they still might. But there's a hell of a lot less chance of that shit in Ukraine and over there in the Middle East, which we just got finished talking about with Israel and Gaza and all that. I get the feeling that everybody's lost their appetite for continued war because Trump is just is just he's just bad for war, which is good for me because I freaking hate war. But oil is taking a hit because what do you need to persecute a war? Or better yet, when those wars occur in the Middle East, what's in danger? Oil.
1st, we're not gonna burn it. And since we're not burning it, to be able to fire missiles to go blow it up, we have a double whammy. However, oil has kind of recovered a little bit. Point 47 percent to the upside, but chilling out, dude, $68.37 a barrel. Brent Norsee is up a third to $72.10. Natural gas is up half point to almost 3 dollars per 1,000 cubic feet, and gasoline is up 0.84 percent to a buck 97 a gallon. Gold is down half a point today, but it's chilling out at $26103, so nothing to sneeze at. Silver is up a quarter of a point, but platinum is down 2 and a third. Copper is down 2, and palladium is down 4 and 1 5th points.
Ag is pretty much in the red today. Biggest winner, however, is chocolate, and it is swinging for the fences. 6.89% to the upside. Biggest loser today is wheat. 2 a third to the downside. I got live cattle up 4.43%, lean hogs up 0.44, and feeder cattle up a half. The Dow is down 0.6%. The S and P is down 0.42. The Nasdaq is down a third of a point, and the S and P Mini is down just over one full point. What did Bitcoin do? Well, at 87,000 I can't believe I'm saying these numbers. At $87,770, we are staring square in the face at a 1.74,000,000,000,000 market cap. I heard yesterday that we took overtook the entire market cap of silver.
I'm sure that that is switched back over, but for that brief moment in time, the entire world's supply of silver was outshined by something that's barely 16 years old. We can get 34 ounces of shiny metal rocks with our 1 Bitcoin of which there are 19,781,033.61 of, and average fees per block have increased substantially, but still not terrible. 0.14 BTC on average in fees on a per block basis, and there are 85 blocks. You you thought there'd be more, didn't you? No. No. No. No. Only 85 blocks carrying just over 200,000 transactions waiting to confirm at high priority rates of 11 satoshis per vbyte.
Low priority is gonna get you in at 9. And hash rate is chilling out at 734.2 exahashes per second. You can do with that what you will now it's time to honor all the people that decided to throw sats my way and for the episode tower of babble which was last Thursday's episode, I got Lucky Mo Fo with 10 80. 10 80 sat says words are weapons, David. Choose your mantras wisely, folks. The ones you say to others and to yourself. A simple thank you is a good start. No need to learn Sanskrit or Tibetan. I think that that's a jab at, oh, we're gonna go learn Eastern philosophy, and that's gonna make me a calm person. I gotta tell you, I've read a lot of eastern philosophy, and they got the same problems as western philosophy. There is no answer.
But saying please and thank you will go a long way. And you know what else goes a long way? And if you're not used to saying this as an adult, get used to it. Start saying yes, sir, and yes, ma'am, or no, sir, and no, ma'am. Use the honorific. Actually, say it. We say it to each other all the time on Nostra now. Good morning, sir. Howard, I'm I'm pleased to see you, sir. And we have sir sleepy, the magic green frog that's on Nostra. His he spells it s e r, but still, we we've been saying sir to each other for so long. It for years now, in the Bitcoin space, I've actually it it somehow or another, it changed me.
And I I will say yes, sir, and no, sir, to every single guy. If I have to talk to another gentleman, if I have to talk to somebody who's way younger than me, if I talk to, like, one of my children's friends and they ask me a question that I can answer yes or no with, I'll say something like, yes, sir, or no, sir. Do that. Words matter. Lucky mofo is not wrong. The bird with a 1,000 gives me some kind of emoji I can't read because, well, I'm still on Windows XP on this machine. So k. Whatever. God's death with 5:37 says, thank you, sir. No, thank you. Pies to plan. 4:20. Thank you, sir. No. Thank you. Wartime 333 says cheers.
Noster Gang with a 100 says daylight slavings. Slavings. Also, for your information, I am a lady. Well, howdy, ma'am. Kingsecassee? Secassee? Kingsecassee, I guess 100 sat says, well that was a pretty deep last 20 minutes thank you sir see he said it no thank you sir Nikola Tesla with nothing says, is it okay to analyze an event with a 5050 chance to succeed? I was thinking about it while hearing. Wait a minute. Oh, what? Probably what? I was thinking about it while hearing. I couldn't validate in my head this only event as an effective way to validate some system. Nikola or Nico Tesla, I don't exactly know what you're talking about, but as for me being wrong about shit, yeah.
I'm wrong. I'm wrong about all kinds of shit. I it's okay. You can analyze shit, get it wrong, tell people what you think, then they call you out on it 4 days later when you're obviously wrong. And you know what? Nobody died. Nobody's that embarrassed. It's okay. Do your analysis. Fine. It'll be fine. Chris Hartsell says nothing and says or pays me nothing. You gave me nothing, Chris, but still I love you guys chiming in. So says, I've only witnessed one person in real life losing their ever loving mind over the Trump win. Yes. That is one of the things that I wanted to say at the head of the show, and I forgot talking about it. For all of the people that are spreading the TikTok videos around of the quote unquote libs losing their mind.
They're not. They probably were during they were during the first Trump win. That one we know. But this time around, you know what it's for? It's for the clicks. They're doing it for the clicks. They're doing it for the views. They're doing it to pump their own algorithm. I don't think for a second that anywhere close to half of the libs of TikTok videos that I've seen of liberals losing their mind are actually truthful. I think it's all bullshit. I think it's all this time around, it's all for show. It's all for clicks. It's all to prime that algo. That's gonna do it for the weather report.
Welcome to part 2 of the news you can use Bitcoin Fog user, Roman Sterlinggov, gets 12 and a half years for allegedly running it based on junk science. That's a terrible, terrible headline, but let's get into this. By the way, this is no bs bitcoin.com, and they are raising 1 BTC for a news desk Bitcoin. Okay? Or news desk for Bitcoin that or where it says we're raising 1 BTC for a news desk that Bitcoin deserves. Contribute here. And they are running a geyser fund forward slash project forward slash no b s Bitcoin. So, consider them because they do some good work. A dual Russian Swedish national Roman Sterlingoff was sentenced to 12 and a half years in prison and forced to pay a forfeiture money judgment of around 395 and a half $1,000,000 for his alleged operation of the longest running Bitcoin money laundering service on the darknet.
Wow. Roman Sterlingoff, 36, was sentenced to a 150 months in federal prison and ordered to forfeit 395,000,000 and seized assets worth around $1,760,000 on Friday. Additionally, he was ordered to forfeit 1, forfeit oh, man. 1345 BTC from the Bitcoin Fog Wallet valued at over $103,000,000. In March, he was found guilty of money laundering, conspiracy to commit money laundering, operating an unlicensed money transmission business, and money transmission without a license. Prosecutors claim that he ran the Bitcoin Fog Mixer from 2,011 to 2021 and were seeking a prison sentence of 20 to 30 years.
During the trial, Sterling off stated that he used Bitcoin fog but denied being the operator of the platform. His lawyer, Tor Eklund, argued that there was no eyewitness testimonies or service logs to demonstrate that his client managed the service at all. And Sterlingov's defense team requested that the judge impose a prison sentence of no more than 7 and a half years. Quote, most of the evidence at trial was circumstantial, and neither the Bitcoin Fog server, server logs, private keys, or ledger were ever even entered into evidence, stated Sterling Hobbs defense in a sentencing memorandum.
Are you fucking kidding me? The logs? The logs weren't entered as evidence? That striking. Anyway, continuing, Sterlingoff's case is branded as the case that, quote, put cryptocurrency tracing on trial as the prosecutors did not find any smoking gun criminal evidence from his belongings or his devices upon his arrest. And instead, the charges rely on a blend of blockchain tracing, IP address matching, and connections between online accounts as outlined in the statement of facts released when charges were made public in April of 2021. And at the trial, judge Moss defended Chainalysis Reactor Software as sufficiently reliable, adding that it doesn't need to, at least as offered in this case, offer, you know, absolute precision.
This is a direct quote. Let's do this one again. This is what the judge said. Judge Moss actually said this sentence. Quote, it doesn't need to, at least as offered in this case, offer, you know, absolute precision. So if it were right, you know, only 90% of the time or only 80% of the time, I think it would still be value valuable for offering the evidence that the government is seeking to offer it for. The fucker can't even speak. He can't even form sentences. This is clearly something that he said out of his mouth and didn't write in a statement. Otherwise, he would have the grammar would actually be, you know, I don't know, intact. This is ridiculous.
It doesn't need to, you know, offer absolute precision. Yes. It does. When somebody's freedom is on the line, it better fucking a right offer absolute precision. Not this 90%, not this 80%. All that shit, unless you saw that motherfucker push the button on his computer that sent the the commands to Bitcoin Fog to start the server up or close the server down, he's not the operator. This is the United States judicial system at work, ladies and gentlemen. Be afraid of it, but, also, how are we going to destroy it? That's the question that we need to be asking over the next 4 years because we have a very slim window to figure out ways to destroy federal prosecution.
Because that kind of shit, this judge needs to go to jail himself. This judge needs to be put into prison. This judge needs to have all of his money and all of his money, all of his property, stripped away from him so he can feel how it feels to have everything taken away from you. And then we'll just tell him, oh, you know, look, we had a 20% chance that you might have done something wrong. We can't prove it, but fuck it. You're going down for 12 years. Continuing, quote, as proven at trial, Roman Sterlingoff created and used an online tool to process 100 of 1,000,000 in illegal transactions enabling darknet drug dealers and those who sell, of course, child sexual abuse material to operate.
Today's sentence sends an unmistakable message. Those who help criminals with online payments for their illegal activities will face serious penalties. This prosecution also provides more proof that we have the skilled investigators and talented prosecutors needed to hold those who operate these dark net sites accountable, said US attorney Matthew m Graves for the District of Columbia in a press release that you need to go to fucking jail too. You didn't prove shit. You had a 90 or, I don't know, an 80% chance that he did something that you didn't actually see as no.
According to OXT research report, a very disturbing aspect of this case is that the scientific method has been completely ignored while considering that hearsay or anecdotal evidence of past successes are a replacement for tracking false positives and negatives. I just don't stick. Let's see what, Lowell Elites has a tweet out here about this. Says Roman Sterlingoff has been sentenced to 12.5 years. Government is now seizing the little Bitcoin he has left while the 1,000,000,000 of dollars he allegedly made operating Bitcoin FOD continue to remain unaccounted for. This entire case is a grave miscarriage of justice and another stepping stone in the United States government's war on financial privacy. Yeah. I agree with Lola. I don't agree with Lola on everything that she says, but on this one, I definitely agree with. But, honestly, I'm just having I'm having such a problem with what the hell? Where was it?
For God's sakes, I can't find it anymore. Let's see. Do do do do do do do do. Oh, sufficiently reliable. So if it were right, you know, only 90% of the time or only 80% of the time, it'd still be value for offering the evidence that the government is seeking to offer it for. It doesn't need to be have absolute precision. This is the judge talking about Chainalysis Reactor software, which was relied on heavily to, quote, unquote, make these connections, but Chainalysis never opened up their software. They never let the defense actually see the software.
And I mean, I'm talking about the code, but they never even let them play with it. They they couldn't have a copy of it. They would have had to buy a license, like, for it. And I think the license is, like, something ridiculous, like, $50,000 a year or something. It's very whatever it is, it's very expensive and well beyond the means of the defense attorneys and Roman Sterlingoff. So they never even got to see how this thing was working. Everything about this is so wrong. It's not is it it's gonna be up to us to destroy federal prosecutorial evidentiary proceedings and change this entire thing around. You better have actually had a person testifying on the stand that you saw me do x.
And then you need another witness to say, yes. Not only did I see him do the x, I saw that other witness there and he was or she or he, whatever, was looking at the guy doing x too. Without those two pieces of evidence, you got shit. This is ridiculous. 12 and a half years of his life just gone. He he was not the creator of Bitcoin fog. Now to somebody else who makes me kinda mad, this time he's it's it's he's making me mad twice. Oh, you know, at the same time. It's gold bug, Peter Schiff. And why is why am I kinda angry at him? Well, because he's urging traders to buy his ordinals amid Bitcoin's surge. So if you thought for a second that Peter Schiff was something other than a straight up scammer, then like me, you were wrong. I never thought he was a straight up scammer.
I really didn't. I thought there were some things that he did that were really questionable. But a straight up scammer, no. I was not thinking along those lines. Clearly, as usual, I was wrong. Jason Nelson from Decrypt, please tell us why. With Bitcoin surpassing all time highs by the hour, even noted Bitcoin skeptic Peter Schiff is trying to get on the gravy train by selling his ordinals collection. On Sunday, the financial commentator and radio host said on Twitter that the Peter Schiff Ordinals collection, also known as the Golden Triumph Ordinals set, would go up for sale on Magic Eden.
As bitcoin surged past $80,000 on Sunday in the crypto optimistic wake of Donald Trump's election victory last week. It has since passed that to hit 87,000. And as we know, it hit damn near 90,000 not too long ago. Launched in 2023, the golden triumph ordinal set is a collection of 51 ordinal inscriptions on the Bitcoin blockchain. Jesus. The current floor price for just one of the shift NFTs, which is these ordinal things, is point 124 Bitcoin, which is around $10,000. Actually, more like 11. It's $10,774 exactly. For each collectible, according to Magic Eden data, despite having low trading volume, the shift nft rose a 149% last year with an original price of 0.05 BTC or around $1900.
Quote, there's 21,000,000 Bitcoin, but only 50 golden triumph ordinals. It's clear which one is more valuable, Schiff tweeted. You can't argue with math. It's unclear if if Schiff is attempting to profit from Bitcoin mania. The gold bug did not immediately return, request for comment. Crypto Twitter reacted to Schiff's tweet with a mix of surprise and skepticism. Chris Coffee ETH, at Chris Coffee ETH says Peter Schiff promoting ordinals is not something I had on my 2024 bingo card. And let's see. Oh, and and, as a reply to Peter Schiff's announcement of these, you know, buy my ordinals, he gets this reply that says, I'd rather buy a pet rock, and then there's a picture of a pet rock. Another reply is, Peter, it's very clear that your bearish sentiment sentiment about Bitcoin, which has been wrong, is a great engagement farming strategy. I've gotta give it to you, but it's time for you to join us for real.
Despite Schiff announcing the sale of the ordinals collection, he claimed not to own a Bitcoin wallet himself or ownership of the collection. Quote, the ordinals belong to the people who bought them in the original auction. Mhmm. Yeah. When asked why someone would part with their increasingly valuable Bitcoin for one of his NFTs, Schiff said it was because of scarcity. Why is Bitcoin more valuable? The golden triumph ordinals are way more scarce than Bitcoin, end quote. Schiff has consistently argued that gold is better than Bitcoin. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. On Monday, he decried Trump's vow to establish a Bitcoin reserve prognosticating that such a move would cause a massive market meltdown. Of course, Schiff, of course, quote, to maintain the pretense that its Bitcoin reserve has actual value, the United States government would be forced to keep buying, destroying the value of the dollar in the process. Yeah. Well, maybe you should buy some Bitcoin in case it catches on there, Peter. In any case, it appears as though Schiff wants a piece of the action after more than a decade of denial. Welcome aboard. That's not why he's doing it.
It's very clear to me what Schiff is doing. This is all tongue in cheek. And this is the third thing that makes me very very angry. Is that people are not going to know that it's tongue in cheek. And he's what I mean what do I mean by tongue in cheek? He's saying, see, I've only got 50 ordinals. Therefore, it's more scarce than Bitcoin. And since scarcity is the only answer for value, then clearly my shit is more valuable than Bitcoin. But then he flips on that because he's saying that gold is scarce commodity as well. And, therefore, that's why it has value. The man cannot keep his story straight. And this is why I will never trust Peter Schiff in anything that he ever says again.
He says constantly that taxation is theft. I now no longer trust him. I know for myself that taxation is theft. I do not believe that Peter Schiff actually thinks that. I think he has an ulterior motive for saying that, and it has nothing to do with him actually thinking that taxation is theft. Why? Because this man cannot figure out if scarcity matters or if he can make money off of it by turning it into a joke and stealing people's hard earned money because they're too ignorant to understand that Peter Schiff has absolutely no willpower.
He has no ability to think that he might be wrong about Bitcoin. He's still making jokes about it, but this time he's taking people's money. And that pisses me off. It really it really really really does. Tether has unveiled a WDK, simplifying non custodial USDT and Bitcoin integration for developers. It is a wallet development kit by Tether. And all we really need to know is that, yes, it's from Tether. Their announcement is on tether. Io and, like, in their blog post. And it is a wallet development kit, which means that you're going to start seeing Bitcoin wallets around the world start integrating Tether directly alongside Bitcoin holdings, and they're gonna be interoperable.
Now, I'm not going to say whether that's good or bad. For me, I don't give a shit. I don't like Tether. I don't really need it. I don't really well, I've never used it, so I don't need it. I I I don't when I say I don't really need it, I don't need it. There's never been a day when I'm like, gee, I sure coulda used some Tether to fix that problem. No. That's never happened. So but here it comes. And what have I been saying about stablecoin mania? It's going to be another Scambrian explosion. Some of it some of these stable coins, they'll they'll be oh, I mean, when I mean okay, I mean, they're gonna try tether and USDC pretty stable.
They're I mean, as for what they do, they they don't seem to be lying. I I'm not exactly sure. I don't work for either company, so I don't have the internal, so I don't really know. From what I see from the outside, it looks like they're above board. It looks like they're at least trying to actually make this shit stable. They have backing. They've got shit, you know, in in the in in their vaults that back the stuff. But there's going to be 1,000 of stable coins. And if you think that just because they're named stable coin that they aren't going to be 99% pure scam, then you're going to lose your money by buying some stupid ass stable coin. Don't do it.
Just don't do it. But it's coming. And this kind of shit is not going to help because that wallet development kit, it's gonna be cloned. It's gonna be cloned to make anybody's stable coin work with any shit coin under the sun, and it's all a scam. So stay as far as humanly possible away from it. Stick with things like Robosats, who's released version 0.7.2 alpha. Noster order books are here, or at least in their alpha. Robosats is a simple and private way to exchange Bitcoin. It simplifies the peer to peer user experience and and and uses lightning hold invoices, to minimize custody and trust requirements while helping users stick to best privacy practices.
It's available for the web, Androids, Windows, Mac OS, and Linux. But, sadly, it doesn't look like it's available for iOS. Whatever. This release lets users test Nostr Global order books by enabling the option in the configuration tab. For now, the feature is only available on the web and will be bought or brought to mobile apps in upcoming releases. This version also improves robot recovery forms, changes, fast generate robot to fast generate order, and does a couple of other things. But it's the order books that's going to be really interesting. Now remember, this is alpha, so this is just testing. But order books over Nostr as a kind is gonna be really interesting to see what happens.
If any of you guys out there are using, Robosats and and start getting into this, please please please keep us updated on Noster. Meanwhile, Bitcoin Keeper version 1.2.18 and Keeper Desktop version 0.1.3 have been released. Keeper or Bitcoin Keeper is an open source mobile multisig wallet with inheritance features. The desktop is a companion desktop app that allows you to secure, securely use hardware wallets with the Bitcoin Keeper mobile app. So if you are a Keeper user, they have made an upgrade. Zeus version 0.9.2 finishes us out with export transaction history.
VIP 353, bolt 12, and hardware signing improvements. And Zeus is a mobile bitcoin and lightning wallet for Android as well as iOS. You can export transaction history to spreadsheets. That's going to be good for people, that are, you know, really don't wanna get anywhere crossways with the IRS or local tax reporting, around the world. Also, solidified BIP 353 and Bolt 12 support, hardware wallet and external signer improvements are there. Oh, it has a spooky theme. Okay. That you may be a little late. Maybe a little late. That was Halloween. And we're done with that. But, okay, maybe try again with the turkey theme after Thanksgiving. And then somewhere around New Year's, release the Christmas theme. Whatever. Settings, payments add slide to pay threshold, and there are other bug fixes and miscellaneous enhancements.
So that's it. That's it. That's all that's all I got for you. Coming back to you this week, November 12, 2024. And I am sorry that I was gone for 4 straight days. Had to be done. Had to rest my weary little head. I played, starting to learn, badget the gathering with my 12 year old son. I'm looking forward to that. I'm turning into a nerd again. Thank you to my 12 year old son. So so that yes. I guess I'm starting yes. That happened over this 4 day weekend. I'm starting to learn how to play of all things Magic the Gathering. We'll we'll see how that goes. There's really not much left other than I want to caution everybody from rubbing somebody else's nose in it.
Honestly, that's juvenile. It's juvenile behavior and we need to not do that. Okay. Don't do it at Thanksgiving. If somebody at Thanksgiving wants to talk to you about Bitcoin because now their interest is peaked, just tell them the like, whatever it is that you've offered to do for them in the past to try to get them into bitcoin, say, start out the conversation with this. Say, the offer still stands. If you're really interested, then I will help you do this thing. Everything that I've told you that I would have done for you over the last 12 or 15 thanksgivings, I will still do that for you.
So but be respectful, be clear headed, don't engage in the chardonnfruid with your own family and friends. Okay? It's bad juju, it's not gonna get you anywhere, and it could make some some horrendous future family events more likely than less likely. Okay? Be nice to your family. They're the one thing the one thing that represents the real wealth that you have in this world. You can ask American HODL how he knows, and I'll see you on the other side. This has been Bitcoin and and I'm your host, David Bennett. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and hope to see you again real soon. Have a great day.
Weekend Recap and Family Time
Thanksgiving and Bitcoin Discussions
Bitcoin and US Government Strategy
Global Bitcoin Adoption Trends
Conclusion and Personal Reflections
