Owning a Bitcoin ETF is like owning gold shares in a trading account.
You don't actually own any physical gold. You're trusting the bank when they tell you that share represents a certain amount of gold.
We don't have to look far back in history to see the problem with that (hint hint 1971).
If you have gold bars in your safe, you own gold.
If you have sats in a non-custodial wallet, you own Bitcoin.
Trading accounts, like all bank accounts, can be frozen at any time for any reason.
Nobody really owns gold. Nobody really owns property. Nobody really owns the clothes on their back.
You can defend these things, but all it takes is two or three people to take them from you.
The only thing you truly own is knowledge.
You can truly own bitcoin.
You can defend your bitcoin with a secret.
Bitcoin requires no individual to defend a thing.
No number of people can force you to give up your bitcoin, you have to do it voluntarily.
Someone might ask you: What good is your bitcoin if you're dead?
Your answer should be: My bitcoin is no good to you if I'm dead.
Someone might ask you: What good is your bitcoin to you if your children are dead?
Your answer could be: What good am I to my children if I give up our bitcoin?
Thanks to Bitcoin, fiat debt is obsolete.
Thanks to Bitcoin, government is obsolete.
Soon nostr will render big tech and big media obsolete
This is all true but it's a different point to the one I'm making.
Absolutely physical theft of gold is much easier than Bitcoin theft, and in the past governments have confiscated (stolen) gold from their citizens.
You correctly point out that if you setup your non-custodial wallet correctly, there's no way for the state to even know how much you have (assuming you use non-KYC exchanges) let alone tax it or take it from you unless you willingly submit.
Which comes back around to highlighting the importance of self-custody. Because if it's in an ETF or an exchange it isn't really there, it's an IOU that can be digitally frozen at the click of a button.
The bitcoin ETF or bitcoin-backed-dollar is the same thing. Third party custody. It makes sense for Gold where you need your physical property protected, but for bitcoin, there is no need. The bitcoin ETF is only a temporary measure to meet the demand for bitcoin exposure from funds that are locked up in highly regulated (and highly manipulated) retirement accounts.
Exactly.
