I can't believe it

I connected my metamask wallet on primal to send some zaps

And now somehow someone stole my monkey and frog NFTs

I put my whole life savings into these...

I'm devastated

I appreciate people across the political spectrum, and have friends in multiple worldview camps. Especially since they are often from different countries with different contexts. My friends do tend to cluster in certain areas due to our shared interests (i.e. I am freedom-oriented in general), but there are people who consider themselves to be anarcho-capitalists and others that consider themselves to be aware progressives, for whom I would invite them to my home and stay in our guest area.

But I have a visceral disgust toward people who I perceive to be playing a role or being consciously fake. I'm not against people playing an actual obvious caricature for satire of course. But in the modern era, there is a tremendous amount of audience capture, gaslighting, fake social media influence that is meant to come off as genuine, and influencers and politicians treating their audience as though they are literally retarded.

Once I perceive someone as fundamentally fake and consciously playing a false role that they pretend is real to their audience, they're done to me. This behavior has been on an enormous uptrend in the past few years, much to my provocation. It's an acceleration of cynicism. Those that do this are intelligent but cynical toward their audience, manipulating them either for personal gain or for their political purpose.

Be aware of this trend.

How many yachts do y’all think Dennis Porter is gonna get this bull market??

Who will print more money: Donald Trump or Kamala Harris?

Be honest, could you pass this 8th grade exam from 1912?

A classic 🍿

Time for The Departed 🍿

I’ll never forget when my parents sold my childhood home for many reasons, but one moment has really stuck with me.

A little background: I grew up on a cul-de-sac. My house had a front porch that was perfect for watching sunsets. As such, I often sat out there and played guitar in the evenings. I usually just messed around, finger-picking some melodies. Think peaceful, relaxing stuff.

So, the family next door didn’t speak much English and mainly kept to themselves, but every night the husband would come outside right around the time when I typically played.

He always did the same thing every time, like clockwork. He would come out, flip out a lawn chair on the side of his garage, sit down, look up, and lit up an unusually long cigarette. Same spot. Every time.

It’s hard to put into words, but I could just tell that this was a moment out of his day that he cherished. A moment of peace and solace away from the stress of work and family life.

He used to take these really long, slow drags on his cigarette and look up at the sky before he slowly exhaled. It was almost like with each breath he was letting go of all his worries.

Despite the fact that we were often only yards away from each other, we never spoke. I knew he was there and he knew I was there. There was this mutual understanding. I would play, he’d smoke his cig, and then he’d go back inside. This went on for YEARS.

There were times when I wondered if he actually cared about my playing at all. He never acknowledged me. Never said a thing. He would just come out for 15 minutes like clockwork and go back inside.

But then came the day when my family moved out…

I was the last of my family to leave the house and when I did, I turned around to look at my childhood home for the last time, taking in all the memories.

Then out came my neighbor, with his usual long cigarette stuck between his lips. But this time, instead of going to his usual spot, he slowly walked up to me, reached out his hand, and in broken English said, “I’ll miss your playing. You very talented. Good luck to you and your family.”

When he shook my hand, I could tell he was genuinely going to miss me, and in that moment, I realized that I was going to miss him too.

You see, my neighbor was a part of what made my home special. He was a part of it, just like my favorite Willow tree, the front porch, and the pond in the backyard. I became overwhelmed with gratitude for the strange little connection we had developed over the years.

There were countless evenings where we shared a few minutes together, watching the sun go down, without ever speaking a word to one another. Nowadays, I think back to those nights playing out on the front porch and smile.

I suppose sometimes that’s all we really need…someone to share a moment with.

GM.

I'm bullish on bitcoin, and I think a lot of people overthink it.

One of my favorite metrics is the market value vs realized value ratio. The realized value is basically just the on-chain cost basis. The value of UTXOs at the dollar price during which they last moved between wallets, which often means the time people pulled them from exchanges or deposited them to exchanges.

A relatively small amount of marginal buying can push up the market value by a lot. Like how if you buy one house on a street, it can boost the estimated price of all houses on that street even though only one of them traded hands. But when market value becomes stretched relative to cost basis, it means that part of the market value is kind of illusory. We don't *really* know what houses on that street are worth if only one of them traded hands recently and thus liquidity was low. Over time, as more houses on that street trade hands and we have more price points, the estimated value of the street becomes more real. The same thing for bitcoin; as more bitcoin trades hands at certain levels, it starts to make that level "real" compared to how real we should consider it when it just touches a certain level for a little while with limited volume.

Right now, bitcoin is at an all-time high in its realized price, i.e. cost basis.

Back when bitcoin was poking over $60k in April 2021, the cost basis for the network was only about $350 billion. Now, at the same market price, the cost basis approaches $650 billion, or more than twice as high. The marginal bitcoin has traded hands and moved between wallets at much higher prices than years ago, even though the market price is about the same. In other words, these levels have been truly liquid and been consummated by the market more than they were back in 2021, and thus the price is more robust at this level than back then.

The launch of the spot ETFs pulled forward some excitement this year, and so we've been in this big consolidation since March. But even in that time period from March to the present, the on-chain cost basis increased from like $520 billion to $640 billion, and so price discovery and progress is being made despite the ongoing price chop.

As the network builds a bigger and more solid base like it has been doing, it can set the stage for the next major breakout. The network looks healthy to me.

If my wife didn’t tell me I look like a bum and I need to update my wardrobe, I’d be wearing everything to rags 😆

Who has time for shopping?! 🛍️

I think AI can be useful but it has such a long way to go. With the impending implosion of OpenAI (it will implode and probably faster than we expect) it'll fall to us to make the thing have utility.

I gave ChatGPT the transcript from today's show. It gets some things just plain wrong and "Dark Crypto Agenda" was not on my bingo card. I also never say "Stay Sovereign". I wonder why it came up with that.

-> Prompt <-: "Using the ingested document please write a 200 word newsletter. Make the Kamala section dark and ominous and keep the rest funny and cheerful."

🖤 Kamala Harris's Dark Crypto Agenda 🖤

Kamala Harris has entered the crypto scene, but not in the way any of us expected—or wanted. She recently announced a race-based policy aimed at "protecting" Black Bitcoin investors. But here’s the twist: this isn’t protection; it’s straight-up pandering. By singling out one group for special treatment, Harris is revealing a deeper, more ominous agenda. She’s willing to sacrifice Bitcoin’s core values of decentralization and equality for political points. This isn’t just misguided—it’s dangerous. Harris’s moves could divide the crypto community and push us further into a world of state control and surveillance. Bitcoiners, beware. The stakes are higher than ever.

😄 On the Lighter Side 😄

Meanwhile, the Bitcoin ETFs are having a monster year with inflows of $556 million! Who’s leading the charge? Fidelity—not BlackRock! 🍾 And let’s not forget, open interest in Bitcoin futures is skyrocketing. Sure, some are betting on the price to drop, but we’re here for the fun. Keep buying and HODLing! 🚀

Until next time, stay sharp and stay sovereign!

It’s not the coin.

D.O.G.E.

Department of Government Efficiency

It’s not the first time I felt like I’ve lived another life. It’s weird and I don’t like it.

One time it was an entire lifetime in one dream.