Haha, thanks mate!
👀 long.. TLDR:
I am trying to be less of a "gloom and doomer"... but stuff like ‘this’ (segment Traditional Finance & Macro Economics) isn't helping my optimism.
Ergo: that's why we Bitcoin!🧡
🧠Quote(s) of the week:
“Money is the barometer of a society’s virtue. When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion–when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing–when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors–when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don’t protect you against them, but protect them against you–when you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice–you may know that your society is doomed.”—Ayn Rand
"If you’re new to Bitcoin you may have heard the term “cycle theory” thrown around. Put simply, cycle theory suggests that Bitcoiners in proximity to each other will get their period at the same time. This group menstrual phenomenon is colloquially referred to as the bear market and lasts on average 3 years."- Hodl
🧡Bitcoin news:
➡️Last week I attended the Bitcoin Conference in Amsterdam, and together with my fellow Noderunners, we represented the Dutch and Belgian Bitcoin communities.
At the conference in Amsterdam, Adam Back @adam3us and Giacomo Zucco @giacomozucco, Seed Signer @SeedSigner were knighted as honorary members of the Noderunners.
Now what are Noderunners? Well, that's easy:
-Run a node
-Be a Bitcoin maximalist
-Being toxic is much appreciated
We started Dutch maximalist meetings (shitcoining=ban).
This blew up, legendary meetings followed, and the group was getting bigger and bigger.
The cult within a cult is growing and becoming a household name in the space. Value-based communities are the new organization model. Dutch Noderunners show the way. I am happy I am part of the group.
https://twitter.com/onthebrinkie/status/1713160088981004569
https://twitter.com/onthebrinkie/status/1713264646159831316
Although I enjoyed the conference I have some criticisms.
A blasphemy that people are buying full-price tickets just to witness and hear the same talk you already can find on YouTube, Github, or even on my IG page.
There is no groundbreaking news coming out of these conferences, nor is there any revolutionary knowledge transfer taking place.
More of my critics are in line with @starbuilder on stacker.news: https://stacker.news/items/283541
For example, the level of shit-coiners on the panels and sponsors.
Do you want to attend next year's conference? Great! For newbies, the conference is something people should experience at least once so that they appreciate the smaller conferences. Even someone on a budget could skip the conference ticket and just lobby / offsite parties in the area.
➡️ Here are the stats for the side events
https://twitter.com/BitKassaNL/status/1713571733368664416/photo/1
➡️ HODLers are stronger than ever! Long-term holders now own 76% of the circulating supply (14.859M Bitcoin), and they're accumulating at a rate of over 50k BTC per month, suggesting that Bitcoin's supply is tightening.
➡️Great write-up by Sam Callahan. So many questions about "Project Atlas" and curious to see that the DNB (Dutch Central Bank) is involved.
TLDR: Project Atlas would provide regulators with a global overview of Bitcoin flows, and what entities are involved with what transaction, and their magnitude and concentration.
"It's notable that CoinJoin is on the reader of these regulators. I expect it will only be a matter of time before they attempt to ban CoinJoins. So if you want to CoinJoin your stack, it might be smart to do it sooner rather than later."
https://twitter.com/samcallah/status/1712128988611563803
Full paper: https://bis.org/publ/othp76.pdf
Coinjoin is an optional tool that enhances privacy in Bitcoin transactions: when Bitcoin users conduct transactions with one another using Coinjoin, they obscure the origins and destinations of the funds, greatly enhancing their privacy.
If you have no clue what a Coinjoin is, study/learn here: https://bitcoinmagazine.com/technical/a-comprehensive-bitcoin-coinjoin-guide
➡️Caroline Ellison testified that SBF instructed her to “keep selling BTC if it's over $20K.” The Bitcoin they sold were stolen customer funds. FTX sold customers' Bitcoin without their consent. Likely, at least in part, to support the price of FTT and stave off margin calls.
People will lose their shit when they realize that Bitvavo (EU), Binance and other centralized exchanges are doing the exact same thing, right now.
Stop using these platforms!
Use nostr:npub15369wu3wzzar5fclhecyqfv683x69n6nhlg7rxqnsg2dydgxflpq3apswl
nostr:npub1sqzr42dj8vx32yd5jcvvl3ytux45kl0etgf6y2ymjvmd7lqmuwmqk9vk7v
or 21bitcoinapp.
➡️ More craptostuff, Solana:
https://twitter.com/icebergy_/status/1712587637754560915
HFSP if you still want to invest in shitcoins.
➡️There's a 90% chance that Bitcoin ETFs will be approved by the January 10 deadline for ARK's application - Bloomberg's ETF analysts Eric Balchunas and James Seyffart
➡️ "The SEC has decided not to appeal Grayscale’s court victory in the battle to convert its trust into a Bitcoin ETF. The SEC will now have to approve Grayscale's Bitcoin ETF bid if it can't find new reasons to delay or deny it."
It looks like the SEC has held back on a Bitcoin ETF as long as they could. January 2024 will be interesting.
➡️ Today, Monday the 16th of October 2023, many traders were caught off guard over $50M in Bitcoin shorts were liquidated on the fake BlackRock spot ETF approval news. Put your Bitcoin in cold storage to sit back and relax until the real pump begins.
➡️Madeira's President announces the creation of a Bitcoin business hub for innovation at Bitcoin Amsterdam 2023. Emphasizing tech development and collaboration, this autonomous region is embracing Bitcoin with open arms!
➡️New record Bitcoin hashrate! The global Bitcoin network calculates ~440,000,000,000,000,000,000 algorithms every second protecting the blockchain. Strength of the Bitcoin network since launch.
https://twitter.com/DocumentingBTC/status/1713304315991925000
➡️ "Whales are accumulating! On Oct. 14th, 16 new wallets joined the crowd of Bitcoin whales holding between 100 and 1K Bitcoin. This is the greatest daily increase since February 2022."
➡️ Bitcoin on exchanges continues to decline as we enter less than 200 days until the halving. Currently at levels not seen since early 2018
💸Traditional Finance / Macro:
👉🏽7 stocks are holding up the entire stock market. Never has market direction been so driven by just a few stocks that are all technology-focused.
The S&P 7, now reflects a record 29.7% of the entire index by market cap. This is up sharply from 20% at the beginning of 2023 and above the 29.1% high in 2021. Meanwhile, the S&P 7 is up over 50% and continues to drive market direction. The remaining 493 stocks in the S&P 500 are currently up just 3% in 2023.
Put another way, when you invest $1 in the S&P 500, almost 30 cents of that dollar goes to just 7 stocks. The rest of that dollar goes to ... 493 other stocks. Amazing.
Personally, I think this is unsustainable, but who am I? Please ask your favorite stockpicker about his/her view on this matter.
🏦Banks:
👉🏽Realtors, banks, and home builders associations begging the Fed to stop raising rates. Not a good look.
They wrote a letter to Fed Chair Jerome Powell and are asking for…
1. No more rate hikes
2. The Fed to “not sell off any of its MBS holdings until and unless the housing finance market has stabilized”.
👉🏽World's banks earned $1.3tn in 2022, in the best period for global banking overall since at least 2007, according to McKinsey. The estimate for 2023 profits, at $1.4tn, is even higher. The spike in global interest rates has broadly been great for banks, which are not passing those higher rates on to their depositors.
Say what... 'earned'? Anyway,...bankers gonna bank!
🌎Macro/Geopolitics:
👉🏽Chinese property developer, Country Garden, failed to make a debt payment after apartment sales dropped in September. Country Garden said its sales have come under “remarkable pressure" and are down 44% this year. In September, Country Garden’s sales plummeted 81% to just $846 million. Country Garden is one of China's largest developers with $187 billion in liabilities. This comes just 2 months after China's largest property developer, Evergrande, filed Chapter 15 bankruptcy. Meanwhile, the Chinese HY Real Estate index is down ~85% from its high. - The Kobeissi Letter
This isn't going to end well and NO the world economy is NOT strong. A big part of China's growth was/is connected to its real estate market. Housing alone accounts for 25% of China's entire GDP.
"A bank run has begun in China at the Bank of Cangzhou on fears that the collapse of Evergrande made them insolvent. Just a couple of months ago, China's largest property developer, Evergrande, filed for Chapter 15 bankruptcy. This week, Country Garden, another major Chinese developer, missed a debt payment." - TKL
👉🏽Once again higher for longer. "In September PPI inflation unexpectedly rose to 2.2%, above expectations of 1.6%. Core PPI inflation rose to 2.7%, above expectations of 2.3%. This is the first jump in Core PPI since April 2022. PPI inflation is now up 3 consecutive months. And if we take into account the revision that will come next month, core PPI could rise to 3%."
Why? "There were just major revisions higher in the August PPI inflation data. Headline and core PPI inflation was revised higher by 0.4% and 0.3%, respectively. Data revisions continue to favor higher for longer." - TKL
"All the headlines say that inflation is now 3.7%. But, what they fail to mention is that this is building on YEARS of inflation. 3.7% inflation is building on 8.2% in September 2022 and 5.4% in September 2021. That means that inflation since September 2021 has been nearly 20%. Furthermore, even if the rate of inflation is falling, prices are still RISING. Many people confuse disinflation with deflation. Even with disinflation, which we have now, prices are still rising" - TKL
1. That number is misleading as it leaves out gasoline, shelter, used cars, and food prices in the calculation. Sure inflation has come down, now that they removed from the metric everything that human beings need to live:
food, energy, shelter, and transportation.
2. Remember ladies & gentlemen: Few understand the following and I quote James Lavish:
"If you work 40 hrs/wk: at 5% inflation and after 5 years, you need a 28% pay raise or to work 44 more hours (*one full extra week* per month+) to make up the difference. This is inflation." Now check that number again.
3. "While CPI inflation is at 3.7%, inflation is much higher in many basic necessities:
1. Car Insurance Inflation: 18.9%
2. Car Repair Inflation: 10.2%
3. Transportation Inflation: 9.1%
4. Rent Inflation: 7.4%
5. Homeowner Inflation: 7.1%
6. Food Away From Home Inflation: 6.0%
7. Meat & Poultry Inflation: 4.8%
While headline inflation is down from its highs, many basic necessities are still seeing 5%+ inflation. It's also worth noting that we do NOT have deflation, we have disinflation.'
👉🏽"French nuclear production in September was ~50% higher than September last year. 2023 production (so far) is 11% higher than Jan-Sept production in 2022. France is putting the recent difficult times behind it. That will reduce EU air pollution and CO2 emissions and will reduce power costs. Hopefully, it will also mean that cherry-picked arguments by nuclear opponents will fade."
France is interconnected with 6 European countries: the UK, Belgium, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, and ......Germany.
In my view, nuclear must be part of the energy mix and every country should embrace it.
👉🏽Ray Dalio now believes there is a 50% chance of World War 3 erupting. From a global pandemic and lockdown to World War 3 possibilities in just 3 years. Classic!
Some of you know that I am a big fan of Dalio's books. I am not going to say that I agree with Dalio, but it's worth internalizing a lesson from history now and then.
👉🏽If you made it this far, I salud you.
Lyn Alden's October newsletter is worth the read. She discusses the US fiscal situation in the context of recent events, and how history can be a guide for navigating this current environment.
https://www.lynalden.com/october-2023-newsletter/
👉🏽Argentina is currently experiencing 138% annual inflation. Their central bank has hiked to 133% in an attempt to reduce demand. Argentine Peso crashes as Presidential Candidate Calls it “Excrement”.
Milei has a 74.2% chance of winning the upcoming elections. Interestingly, Milei favors the dollarization of the Argentine economy and considers the local peso worthless. With Javier Milei surging in the polls, the current administration abolished the income tax a week before the Argentine presidential elections.
Now I want you to read that again.. "abolishes the income tax".
Imagine you are 60 years old and your government does this.
"The obvious question should be:
What the fuck have I been doing paying income tax all this time if it's this easy to get rid of it?
There's no reason to believe that this won't happen in other countries. And there's only one way to pay for something like this:
More debt, money printing, inflation, and the destruction of your time and energy.
But they're willing to do that (and more) to save their own asses.
Taxes are extortion, inflation is theft.
That's why we Bitcoin.🧡
I am trying to be less of a "gloom and doomer"... but stuff like this (segment Traditional Finance & Macro Economics) isn't helping my optimism.
Credit: I have used multiple sources!
My savings account: Bitcoin
The tool I recommend for setting up a Bitcoin savings plan: nostr:npub1sqzr42dj8vx32yd5jcvvl3ytux45kl0etgf6y2ymjvmd7lqmuwmqk9vk7vis especially suited for beginners or people that want to invest in Bitcoin with an automated investment plan once a week or monthly. Hence a DCA, Dollar cost Average Strategy. Check out my tutorial post (Instagram) & video (YouTube) for more info.
⠀⠀⠀⠀
Get your Bitcoin out of exchanges. Save them on a hardware wallet, run your own node...be your own bank. Not your keys, not your coins. It's that simple.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
Is this post helpful to you? If so, please share it and support my work with sats. #zap 🧡 #weeklyrecap #nostr #plebchain #grownostr #stacksats
Good morning / good evening!🧡
Stay sovereign fam
Hence the bleeding!🤣🤣
Never change nostr:npub1rtlqca8r6auyaw5n5h3l5422dm4sry5dzfee4696fqe8s6qgudks7djtfs 
We are Noderunners!🧡
#zapathon #bitcoin #nostr #plebchain #grownostr #zap #pleb #bitcoinamsterdam #noderunners 
Connect the world meetup this evening in the Braai! See y’all there?
#zapathon #bitcoin #nostr #plebchain #grownostr #zap #pleb #bitcoinamsterdam #braai 
Bitcoin Amsterdam 🧡
Here we go!!
#zapathon #bitcoin #nostr #plebchain #grownostr #zap #pleb #bitcoinamsterdam 
Bitcoin Amsterdam 2023
Here we go!🧡
#zapathon #bitcoin #nostr #plebchain #grownostr #zap #pleb #bitcoinamsterdam
🧠Quote(s) of the week:
“Buying Bitcoin during Cyprus bank bail-ins was smart.
Buying Bitcoin during the Mt.mart.
Buying Bitcoin during the Gox collapse was smart.
Buying Bitcoin during March 2020 during peak “pandemic” panic was s FTX collapse was smart.
Buying Bitcoin during the SVB collapse was smart.
Buying Bitcoin during “a recession is looming” is smart. Bitcoin is the most resilient money ever created.
Act accordingly.” –
80IQmindset
“Next year Bitcoin is going to have the *exact* same monetary policy as it does right now. You don’t have the *slightest* guarantee or even know what the monetary policy of $USD $JPY $CNY $GBP $CAD $EUR will be *Next Week.* Even worse, you don’t even know why TF they keep drastically changing it. You just have to blindly swallow whatever reason they say, accepting the hilarious notion that they would never lie to us. Bitcoin is my money. We are not the same.” – Guy Swan
🧡Bitcoin news:
➡️ The more things change, the more they stay the same. 14yrs ago Satoshi Nakamoto changed the world, but some things never change. Bitcoin is the way to escape the doom loop. My hope is that Bitcoin will prevent further violations once it has become the standard.
➡️New record Bitcoin hashrate! 420,000,000,000,000,000,000x per second.
➡️ca. 1,500,000 Bitcoin remaining to be mined.
➡️Release of white paper on BitVM – a computing paradigm for smart contracts on Bitcoin. These more expressive smart contracts enable functionality that was previously believed to require a soft fork. Is this an altcoin killer?
“Any computable function can be verified on Bitcoin”
Full paper: https://bitvm.org/bitvm.pdf
Personally, I love seeing more developments like these. Hopefully it ends up in something tangible, but for now 20% of the paper is fugazi to me.
TLDR: Basically, write and execute Bitcoin contracts with much lower costs. This is pretty cool!
➡️SEC has been sending feedback and holding private meetings with applicants regarding their spot Bitcoin ETF filings – Bloomberg The SEC is finally engaging. A big change from the contemptuous silence, delays, and eventual rejection.
Bloomberg Intelligence calls for a US recession by year-end with Bitcoin price risks “tilted toward $10,000”
If this happens, great I will buy the shit out of that dip.
more on the Bitcoin ETF topic:
➡️ex-BlackRock director says SEC will approve ALL spot bitcoin ETFs within 3-6 months!
➡️ Investment bank Jefferies calls Bitcoin a “critical hedge” against the potential for monetary policy that reduces the value of currency, as well as the return of inflation
➡️Jack Dorsey’s Block has released their new Bitcoin wallet. Bitkey Beta is an open-source mobile app & hardware wallet.
➡️Bitcoin cross-border payments are more “substantial” than public data shows – Reuters Bank of International Settlements has developed a prototype Bitcoin monitoring system.
➡️Despite an 11.1% decline in Q3, Bitcoin is still the top-performing asset of the year, with a +63.3% YTD.
➡️The biggest podcaster in the world Joe Rogan says Bitcoin has the best chance of “becoming a universal currency”.
➡️”Bitcoin miners continue to provide ‘mission critical’ services to grid operators in the middle of extreme weather events. Miners are so good at in fact that grid operators pay millions to miners to provide this important service.
Electricity prices have gone parabolic in Texas due to sunset. Bitcoin miners are curtailing to offset the loss of solar generation.” ERCOT paid a Bitcoin miner over $13 million to curtail electric use in the summer heatwave.
➡️Even JPMorgan understands that proof of stake is an inherently centralizing consensus mechanism.
“The rise in ether (ETH) staking since the Merge and Shanghai upgrades has come at a cost to Ethereum as the network has become more centralized and the overall staking yield has fallen, JPMorgan (JPM) said in a research report on Thursday last week.”
It’s just the fiat system rebuilt on blockchain rails. Proof of stake is the legacy system. Proof of work is the innovation. Bitcoin only.
➡️ An Argentinian barber has been jotting the price of every haircut for over 20 years, providing a unique glimpse into the country’s decades of inflation. In 1991, a haircut cost 15 pesos. Today, it costs 3000 pesos, an increase of 19,000%. Bitcoin fixes this.
Traditional Finance & Macro/Geopolitics:
🏦Banks:
👉🏽Metro Bank suspended trading after a 29%+ plunge on Thursday, due to an attempt to raise £600M ($727M) in debt and equity, per CNBC.
🌎Macro/Geopolitics:
👉🏽Kevin McCarthy has been removed as US Speaker of the House. This makes him the shortest-serving Speaker of the House since 1876. He is also the first ever Speaker of the House to be removed.
👉🏽FED’S POWELL: THE FED’S FOCUS IS ON A HEALTHY ECONOMY.
Healthy economy:
Net worth top 0.1%: $18.6 trillion
Net worth bottom 50%: $3.6 trillion
Household count in the top 0.1%: 132,262
Household count in the bottom 50%: 66,050,020
A healthy economy, right? Look how skewed that number is toward the top .1%.
So yeah healthy economy for the top 0.1%
Example:
Dianne Feinstein had +$100m in assets when she died.
– $60 million private jet
– $21 million mansion in San Francisco
– $7.4 million house in Washington
– $5 million house in Hawaii
– $70 million in CASH
She made $200k a year in salary.
Who was Feinstein? Dianne Goldman Berman Feinstein was an American politician who served as a United States senator from California from 1992 until her death in 2023. Remember she made $200k a year in salary. See the system works? Healthy economy!
👉🏽US National Debt jumps $275 BILLION in a single day. It has increased by 448B in the last two weeks alone.
A SINGLE DAY, that’s more than half of Bitcoin’s entire market cap in debt. That’s something like 10 million
BTC. And yet there are still people who are unsure if $27k is a good price to buy.
Total US debt is now $33.513 trillion, hit $33 trillion just 3 weeks ago. That’s $28.5 billion in new debt per day, and on pace to add another trillion in 1.5 months.
“US national debt has been growing faster than GDP for nearly 10 years. However, US national debt is now growing faster than GDP by its largest margin in history. As of 2 weeks ago, the national debt crossed $33 trillion, nearly 124 times as big as it was 70 years ago.”- The Kobeissi Letter
👉🏽Treasury 30-year yield rises to 4.856%. Highest since 2007.
The long bond yield is now up 55 bps in 13 trading days. “Something is breaking in financial markets. 10y yields have jumped by 150bps in the US and 80bps in Germany. The yield curve has bear-steepened to a more normal level. Getting used to a more typical rate structure doesn’t sound like such a terrible thing. But after 15 years of living in an unnaturally low rate regime, normal sounds, well, abnormal.” – Holger Zschaepitz
As yields continue spiking, losses on US Treasuries have reached $1.619 trillion.
Sven Henrich: Perfect doom loop:
https://twitter.com/NorthmanTrader/status/1709254206379454938
👉🏽”Job openings in August just unexpectedly jumped from 8.92 million to 9.61 million. This jump of 690,000 job openings is the biggest since July 2021. Not to mention, July 2023 job openings were revised HIGHER from 8.81 to 8.92 million. The beat on expectations of job openings is the biggest beat since September 2022. This is the last thing the Fed wanted to see. Higher for longer is alive and well.” – The Kobeissi Letter
👉🏽’Credit card debt exploded by $14.68 billion last month. This happens at the end of every cycle—when personal savings are drained, and people take out new credit cards they don’t intend to pay back. A classic blow-off top in consumer credit is underway, you know what happens next” Joe Consorti
So what happens next? Recession
👉🏽Last week I mentioned that “the Canadian government, armed with one of the world’s most repressive online censorship schemes, announced that all “online streaming services that offer podcasts” must formally register with the government to permit regulatory controls. Basically, Trudeau is trying to crush free speech in Canada. May I remind you that Canada is a G7 nation.”
New laws in Canada are affecting what news outlets and news stories are allowed to be consumed. For example, Bloomberg is considered controversial and the Canadiens are unable to view it. WTF!
👉🏽Turkey’s inflation tops 60% despite massive interest rate hikes as oil surge worsens outlook. Turkey’s inflation is the result of previous broad money expansion. And yet the people are still voting for Erdogan.
👉🏽In Germany, the construction sector is really crashing. The German PMI Construction Index fell to 39.3 in Sep from 41.5 in Aug, the lowest level since statistics began.
👉🏽”As geopolitical tensions now spread across the Middle East, oil prices are likely to spike even further. Meanwhile, the US Strategic Petroleum Reserves (SPR) have 17 days of supply remaining, their lowest in history. This is roughly half the historical average of ~33 days dating back to 1990. Furthermore, this week OPEC reaffirmed their commitment to over 1.5 million barrels per day of voluntary production cuts. All while Russian exports of crude oil are being limited and the world’s largest oil producers are at war. There has never been a worse time to have a depleted SPR.”- The Kobeissi Letter
So what is the SPR? The U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) is the world’s largest emergency oil stockpile. Established in 1975 after the oil embargo.
👉🏽 Meanwhile here in Europe, Lagarde is in Lalaland. ECB President Lagarde says she is positive about the ECB meeting the 2% inflation target and Europe’s gas reserves, per Reuters.
👉🏽 “Average interest rate on a 30-year mortgage rises to 7.93%, its highest since July 2000. Since January 2021, less than 3 years ago, interest rates have gone from 2.65% to 7.93%. This means that homebuyers just 3 years ago would see their interest rate TRIPLE if they decided to move. This is exactly why existing home sales are at their lowest since 2010. The average new home is about to cost LESS than the average existing home for the first time since 2005. You know something is wrong when old costs more than new.” – TKL
The median monthly home payment in the US rises to an all-time high of $2,839/month. According to Reventure Consulting, the median home payment has now gone from $1,035/month to $2,839/month in just 10 years. Sjeezzz! :S
I end this Weekly Recap with the following tweet by Pierre Rochard:
“The $33 trillion national debt and $2 trillion annual deficits are odiously immoral and economically unsound. They represent a multi-generational and bipartisan failure of leadership. But they’re also inevitable with a fiat system. Only Bitcoin fixes this, not politics.”
“The remarkable thing about Bitcoin is that despite the internal disagreements, it continues to work flawlessly. That, in essence, is the crux of it. I am 99.9% confident that within my lifetime, Bitcoin will be recognized as one of the most significant discoveries in human history. Bitcoin maximalists have been consistently right in their predictions.”
Credit: I have used multiple sources!
#zap #weeklyrecap #nostr #plebchain #grownostr #stacksats
Bitcoin Amsterdam will be (for now) my last major conference.
Noderunners / some freaks will be represented, but we can channel our energy to the most important ones -> Small, high-signal meetups and really orange-pill people. Teach & guide people.
Good morning Nostr!
https://x.com/excellion/status/1709383373205205446?s=46&t=F791BMa98sP9DJoLz_JvoA
nostr:npub1excellx58e497gan6fcsdnseujkjm7ym5yp3m4rp0ud4j8ss39js2pn72a
Let that sink in for a minute! Fam, you don’t stack hard enough!🧡
#zapathon #bitcoin #nostr #plebchain #grownostr #zap #pleb
Can I say that Bitcoin incentivizes peace and fiat incentivizes war? Just a thought.
#zapathon #bitcoin #nostr #plebchain #grownostr #zap #pleb #peace #fiatwar 
🧠Quote(s) of the week:
"The HIGHER interest rates go.
The HIGHER inflation will go. That's because the HIGHER interest rates go, the LARGER the DEFICIT.
The LARGER the DEFICIT the FASTER the currency printer goes BRRR
The FASTER the currency printer goes #BRRR the FASTER inflation rises.
Debt Death Spiral
The HIGHER interest rates go.
The HIGHER costs go for businesses.
The HIGHER interest rates go.
The MORE people can spend yield Based on:
-> The exponentially rising cost to finance gov's massive deficit budget
-> The increasing cost structure for businesses
-> The increased amount of yield that can be spent into the economy.
I don't think we are correctly "fighting" inflation. The results will be devastating
Opt out of with Bitcoin" - CJKonstantinos
🧡Bitcoin news:
➡️ Historically, we are now entering the two most bullish months for Bitcoin, October and November.
➡️ America's 13th largest city mines Bitcoin. The mayor of Fort Worth, Texas says, "We want to be a city that’s at the forefront of technology innovation, energy security, and the future". The machines are plugged into City Hall.
Texas is now the top US Bitcoin mining state with 28.5% of the national hash-rate - Foundry
➡️ The largest Bitcoin mine in America. Riot Blockchain in Texas computes 10,500,000,000,000,000,000 mathematical algorithms every second in a global race to secure the next block of the blockchain.
➡️Bitcoin mining can reduce GLOBAL emissions by up to 8% by 2030 - Institute of Risk Management
➡️ Remember what I said awhile on politicians: "My personal opinion. Be wary of politicians who promise to give you exactly what you want. Politicians are just politicians! Bitcoin doesn't need politicians, politicians need Bitcoin (and votes). Don't lose the plot. And stop larping! Stay humble & stack sats."
RFK Jr.: "30-year fixed mortgages now over 8%. No one can afford to buy now. Rents shooting up too. Time to implement my plan of tax-free, government-backed 3% mortgage bonds to make homeownership accessible again."
Can’t fix a broken system from within the broken system.
Rule #1 of government subsidies: The thing being subsidized just gets more expensive.
RFK wants to end the Fed's interest rate manipulation but also wants a government-backed mortgage bond fixed at 3% which will... manipulate interest rates.
➡️ Japanese car giant Honda now accepts Bitcoin. Honda enters into a significant partnership with the blockchain payment system FCF Pay to accept Bitcoin as payment for vehicles.
➡️Microsoft is building a Bitcoin and crypto wallet into XBox according to a leaked roadmap. Xbox has +120 million monthly active users.
➡️$33 Trillion U.S. ‘Debt Death Spiral’ could boost Bitcoin's price suddenly - Forbes
➡️The murder rate in El Salvador falls from the world's highest to the lowest in the Western Hemisphere — at 2.3 per 100k in 2023. Bitcoin + Bukele = booming economy.
Santander Bank's research to institutional investors profiles El Salvador's booming economy thanks to Bitcoin, falling crime, and increasing tourism.
The murder rate in El Salvador has fallen from being the world's highest—103 per 100k in 2015—to the lowest in the Western Hemisphere, at 2.3 per 100k in 2023.
Can I say that Bitcoin incentivizes peace and fiat incentivizes war? Just a thought.
➡️Chase Bank tells customers in the UK it will decline payments for Bitcoin and crypto.
Bankwest makes new conditions for credit card users Your account may be cancelled if you make a payment to a cryptocurrency exchange. Just use Peach Bitcoin or try out Relai.
➡️ Bitcoin miner Core Scientific buys 27,000 Bitcoin mining rigs for $23 million in cash and a $53.9m equity investment.
💸Traditional Finance / Macro:
🏦Banks:
👉🏽Two weeks ago, previous Weekly Recap, I mentioned that US banks are between a rock and a hard place. But gladly we have the BFTP. Using that program banks can get unsecured lending from the Fed.
Last week we received the news that the losses on US Treasuries have surpassed $1.5 trillion—now $1.527 trillion.
Risk-free! *unless you have to sell. Good thing the Fed has created facilities so that banks never have to sell. BTFP is just a zero percent 12/mo credit card roll.
The losses on older US Treasuries are immense for pension funds, bond fund managers, banks, and insurance companies
Bank deposits are contracting faster and more aggressively than at any time in the last 50 years. Down 3.73% since last year and falling for 10 months in a row.
On the other hand, the unrealized losses on investment securities for banks are skyrocketing. For Q2 2023, there are nearly $550 billion in unrealized losses. To put this in perspective, that’s nearly 25% of all banks’ equity capital.
🌎Macro/Geopolitics:
👉🏽 "The 10-year Note Yield's leap to 4.70% - a peak not seen since 2007 - is turning heads. From its low in March 2020, it's skyrocketed by a whopping 430 basis points. And while treasury yields seem to be breaking records daily, an additional rate hike now seems less likely. Yet, with the expected hiatus until July 2024 and the influx of US Treasury bonds (thanks to deficit spending), bond markets are feeling the pressure, causing yields to soar. Could we be bracing for 8% mortgages soon? It's a game-changer, and it's vital for everyone to stay informed and prepared." The Kobeissi Letter / DisruptiveBytes
👉🏽First, let's talk about mortgages. Here is a 'fun' stat:
"US housing market affordability is, by far, at its lowest point in history. Even in the worst part of the 2008 financial crisis, affordability was ~15% BETTER than its current levels. With the recent move higher in treasury yields, we should see 8%+ mortgages within a week or so. This also means that the median home payment will soon cross $3,000/month for the first time ever. Homebuyers are now spending 50% of median PRE-TAX household income on house payments." - The Kobeissi Letter
👉🏽 Second, yields. A 'golden rule' in monetary policy says that when US real yields rise above 2%, economic activity is severely impacted, and the odds of a recession increase accordingly.
As of Friday:
5-year US real yield: 2.38%
10-year US real yield 2.20%
20-year US real yield 2.27%
30-year US real yield 2.33%
and please brace yourself...
👉🏽Because the Bank of Japan is planning another bond-buying operation. But “the additional operations could accelerate the speed of the yen’s weakening” by preventing debt yields from rising. “It will eventually become impossible to continue with these operations” https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-10-02/boj-to-conduct-additional-bond-purchasing-operation-on-oct-4
The Bank of Japan (BoJ) currently holds approximately 50% of the total outstanding Japanese Government Debt.
The Japanese Yield curve is now the steepest in history. This is also the fastest move in the Japanese yield curve's history.
When debt is issued, the underlying economy operates on the assumption that it will eventually be repaid. Removing this assumption can lead to significant alterations in the behavior of economic participants.
👉🏽 The US will hit $40 trillion in total debt by the end of 2025 at the rate it's issuing debt every quarter.
The debt ceiling was eliminated in June under the... "Fiscal Responsibility Act"
On Saturday it passed a motion for MORE funding in the next 45 days. With even more US Treasuries set to be issued, the selloff and rate spike aren't slowing down anytime soon. - Joe Consorti
👉🏽 "Nearly one-third of all outstanding US debt is set to mature over the next 12 months. 52% is set to mature over the next 36 months, meaning this debt needs to be refinanced. However, since this debt was last financed, debt service costs have doubled from 1.5% to 3.0%. This means that maintaining this debt is now 2x as expensive and it will soon be 3x as expensive as rates rise. Headlines of US interest expense hitting $1 trillion will be gone soon. $2 trillion in annual interest expense is coming quickly." - The Kobeissi Letter
I was shocked to learn that the US government is now spending more to pay interest on its $33 trillion national debt than it does on national defense. The US Bond Market has now been in a drawdown for 38 months, by far the longest bond bear market in history.
"Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projections show US Federal debt rising by $5.2 billion per day for the next 10 years. However, since the debt ceiling “crisis” came to an end, US debt has jumped by $30 billion per day. We have added roughly $1 trillion per month in US debt since then. Interest expense alone is on track to hit $3 billion per day. That means EVERY HOUR the US is borrowing $1.3 billion and paying $125 million in interest." - The Kobeissie Letter
JPMorgan's Lebovitz: “If rates continue to rise the way they’ve been rising, there will be a financial accident. Something will break and that will get the Fed moving in the other direction."
The following article by Jesse Myers summarizes the USA debt spiral and the (limited) options available.
https://www.onceinaspecies.com/p/643-april-2023-market-update-on-bitcoin
👉🏽And it's not only the US or Japan but also Germany:
"From the US to Germany to Japan, once unthinkable bond yields now new normal. Selloff has been so extreme it’s forced bullish investors to capitulate & Wall St banks to tear up their forecasts. Yields on 10y German debt close to 3%, a level not reached since 2011. Their US equivalent back in line w/avg from before GFC, within striking distance of 5%." Bloomberg
👉🏽M2 money supply in the US fell 3.7% in August. The longest, deepest streak of money supply contraction in 90 years continues. Although that alone is alarming we should be a bit cautious, why? It is following the largest expansion, by far, so it's not overly surprising we now have a money supply contraction. The main question should be: What are the effects?
👉🏽August PCE inflation, the Fed's preferred inflation metric, RISES to 3.5%, in line with expectations of 3.5%. Core PCE inflation fell to 3.9%, in line with expectations.
👉🏽The Canadian government, armed with one of the world's most repressive online censorship schemes, announces that all "online streaming services that offer podcasts" must formally register with the government to permit regulatory controls. Basically, Trudeau is trying to crush free speech in Canada. May I remind you that Canada is a G7 nation.
👉🏽The Bank of England is in the process of designing lending tools that allow it to give directly to insurance firms and pension funds, after the near-death experience of the Liability-Driven Investment (LDI) crisis in 2022.
It's a bailout, but we are not calling it a bailout. They can just throw money at this issue caused by throwing money at this issue. Classic!
Credit: I have used multiple sources!
My savings account: Bitcoin
The tool I recommend for setting up a Bitcoin savings plan: nostr:npub1sqzr42dj8vx32yd5jcvvl3ytux45kl0etgf6y2ymjvmd7lqmuwmqk9vk7vis especially suited for beginners or people that want to invest in Bitcoin with an automated investment plan once a week or monthly. Hence a DCA, Dollar cost Average Strategy. Check out my tutorial post (Instagram) & video (YouTube) for more info.
⠀⠀⠀⠀
Get your Bitcoin out of exchanges. Save them on a hardware wallet, run your own node...be your own bank. Not your keys, not your coins. It's that simple.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
Is this post helpful to you? If so, please share it and support my work with sats. #zap 🧡 #weeklyrecap #nostr #plebchain #grownostr #stacksats
Not sure. I can not find any other information.
Enjoy your weekend!🧡
Bitmain has launched its new series of Antminer Bitcoin mining devices.
They’re a huge improvement in hashrate and efficiency over existing devices.
The S21 Hydro Model has a hashrate of 335T and an energy efficiency ratio of 16J/T; numerically, it is the most powerful Bitcoin mining machine currently.
The S21 Air Cooled Model: is 200T and a 17.5J/T.
Bitmain revealed the Antminer S21 at its World Digital Mining Summit in Hong Kong this week, the latest, most powerful, and most efficient Bitcoin ASIC miner yet from the Bitcoin mining ASIC manufacturer.
"According to a Bitmain representative, the company expects to manufacture at least 50,000 units per month (50/50 air-cooled and hydro-cooled) for the next 8 months, but the company may produce as many as 100,000 per month if there is sufficient demand.
Bitmain expects to begin shipping the first round of Antminer S21 units in December, but it will ship the bulk of its new S21 inventory in Q1 and Q2 of 2024."
This all while Bitcoin hashrate continues to rise, and smashes through a new ATH!
For more info read the following article:
#zapathon #bitcoin #nostr #plebchain #grownostr #zap #bitcoinmining #pleb #antminer 
https://video.nostr.build/6f3cad3757070a61b26a116a7907e558049454129d230ec738188eb304ea1798.mov
Better mine Bitcoin!🧡
https://x.com/dsbatten/status/1704394499538247757?s=46&t=F791BMa98sP9DJoLz_JvoA
#zapathon #bitcoin #nostr #plebchain #grownostr #zap #bitcoinmining #pleb
🧠Quote(s) of the week:
"I am a Bitcoin maxi because:
1. Economic systems converge on one monetary tool.
2. Bitcoin is immutably scarce.
3. Bitcoin has the least future uncertainty.
4. Altcoin monetary policy is more mutable than BTC.
5. Altcoins decay against BTC in the long run." - Joe Burnett
"All of the relentless plebs who've been daily DCAing Bitcoin since the ATH are once again in profit and the fiat maxis are still completely clueless about how saving in hard money works" - Wicked
🧡Bitcoin news:
➡️ The number of long-term Bitcoin Hodlers continues to hit new all-time highs. It seems like they are accumulating for the next bull run. Over 57% of Bitcoin in the network have not moved their capital in over 2 years.
The number of Bitcoin Addresses Holding 0.1+ Coins just reached an ATH of 4,486,752.
➡️$1.5 Trillion Asset Manager Franklin Templeton has filed for a spot Bitcoin ETF.
After the news came out CNBC had an item on Bitcoin:
Bitcoin “outperformed every asset on the 1 year, 5 year, and 10 year.” “BlackRock and all the folks we thought were never going to do this are doing it” “It’s becoming institutionalised”
"The pressure is now firmly on the SEC to approve a Bitcoin ETF.
-Wall Street wants it (BlackRock, Fidelity, et al)
-Court rules against SEC rejection as illogical, capricious, and arbitrary.
-CNBC has pro-Bitcoin panelists openly advocating for Bitcoin" - Bitcoin Archive
➡️Last week we had the former President of PayPal talking on CNBC about Bitcoin to make the $7.5 trillion daily foreign exchange market a much more efficient and profitable place.
For me, the two things that got me excited are:
1. The former President of PayPal and creator of the Libra project at Meta is focusing his time and energy on Bitcoin & and lightning.
2. A conversation about lightning is being held in mainstream media.
"We're trying to turn Bitcoin into a global payment network. There's no universal protocol for money on the internet that enables value to be transported," says @lightspark CEO David Marcus
➡️ Last week the team of 21Bitcoinapp released a new update.
Features at a glance:
⚡️ Bitcoin 24/7 instant purchase & savings plan
🏦Free real-time transfers up to €100,000.00 (SEPA Instant)
📈Graphic price orders – trade on your terms
🔒Non-custodial mode – full control & security of your Bitcoin
✨ Redesigned user interface for an even more intuitive user experience
Easy integration with tax software
This Bitcoin investment app (KYC) is especially suited for beginners or people who want to invest in Bitcoin with an automated investment plan once a week or monthly, and limit orders (24/7). With our code CRYPTOFRIDAY, you permanently pay 20 basis points less in fees.
You can download the app here: 21bitcoin.app/download
➡️ Coinbase finally will integrate Lightning on their platform. Brian Amstrong, CEO of Coinbase, confirmed the US's largest (shitcoin casino) crypto exchange will integrate Lightning. The implementation date remains undisclosed.
I can say a lot of things, end of the day Bitcoin is getting more and more traction.
Ok...let me say one thing. Still, Coinbase needs to drop all the shitcoins whose narratives eventually will be destroyed.
➡️ $1.4 trillion giant Deutsche Bank to hold Bitcoin and crypto for institutional clients. The largest bank in Germany, Deutsche Bank, is officially partnering with Taurus to provide crypto custody and tokenization services. Indeed, the bank has tabbed the Swiss firm after participating in its $65 million Series B funding Round. - Reuters (hyperlink->
➡️ Bitcoin mining uses 58% clean energy - Bitcoin Mining Council
Today Bloomberg Intelligence reported that Bitcoin Mining uses energy that is +50% from sustainable sources.
The data above attest to the Bitcoin industry’s reputation as one of the most sustainable industries worldwide.
It is impressive to see Bitcoin mining using more and more clean energy. The narrative around Bitcoin and Bitcoin mining is shifting. Who would have thought Bloomberg would publish something positive about Bitcoin (mining)?
➡️ Money sent on the Bitcoin blockchain this year has surpassed PayPal and is nearing Visa.
➡️ "Bitcoin nodes are now one step closer to being able to sync in seconds. This is game-changing. Light clients can now sync instantly, and full nodes will soon be able to do so as well! Don’t know what I’m talking about?" Great article by Namcios. He is a features writer and reporter at Bitcoin Magazine covering relevant news and developments in Bitcoin.
Read the article here: https://bitcoinmagazine.com/technical/bitcoin-nodes-now-one-step-closer-to-instant-sync
💸Traditional Finance / Macro:
🏦Banks:
👉🏽 "US commercial banks lost $71.2 billion in deposits last week. If this was 2008, that would've been the 3rd largest outflow during the entire Great Financial Crisis. Since the March 2023 banking panic... it's only the 8th largest." Joe Consorti
When banks lose deposits they can:
1. Increase deposit rates (bad for margins)
2. Leverage assets via repos (collateral worth less so less funding)
3. Sell bonds (realizing losses)
4. Issue shares (time-consuming)
Banks are between a rock and a hard place, and the above sure puts it in perspective. But gladly we have the BFTP. Using that program banks can get unsecured lending from the Fed.
We all know that the US economy runs on debt. Debt comes from banks via loans. Now read the above again and the bit below on the US debt & and deficit.
👉🏽A bank liquidity indicator sounds the alarm! Emergency loans from the Fed's BTFP facility rose to $108bn this week – a new high – as long-term US govt bond yields keep rising. Growth has been flat for 15 weeks, acute regional bank stress hasn't faded though. Banks are just selling securities instead of going to the Fed — banks' UST & MBS holdings are down $158 billion since March.
"2023 has been the biggest bank run in a very long time. US banks have lost roughly $633.85 billion in deposits since January.
-Deposit flight
-Credit contraction
-E-conomic contraction
Not great for the US economy." - Joe Consorti
Macro/Geopolitics:
👉🏽 In Germany, where long-term interest rates keep rising, this makes debt more and more expensive. 30y Bund yields recently rose to 2.82%, the highest level since 2012.
👉🏽 US childhood poverty more than doubled from 5.2% in 2021 to 12.4% in 2022
👉🏽 August CPI inflation data shows the US inflation rate rose to 3.7%, above expectations of 3.6%. Core CPI inflation fell to 4.3%, in line with expectations of 4.3%.
This week we will see what the Fed will do. Given two months of rising inflation will the Fed raise the rates once more on Wednesday?
👉🏽Last week I mentioned that in the US corporate bankruptcies are rising at the fastest pace since 2010 (barring the pandemic), and are double the level seen this time last year.
On the 13th of September we found out that in Germany, the number of corporate insolvencies is rising sharply. In June 1548 comps went bankrupt, +36% YoY. In H1 2023, German district courts reported 8,571 corporate insolvencies filed. That was 20.5% more than in the 1st half of 2022.
Germany is not alone in its current problems. But Germany's leadership on specific energy and trade policies - overly lauded until recently - put the whole of Europe in a vulnerable position. This is a structural weakness now. Not easy to fix.
👉🏽 The U.S. is spending 100% of current tax receipts on social programs and entitlement benefits, and then an additional 33% equivalent of tax receipts each on interest expense and the defense budget. - Dylan LeClair
How I see it, boomers are going to die then will leave everyone else holding the bag. 100% of tax receipts are just a total pyramid scheme to fleece the young to pay the old.
In general, the US has a spending problem. "It is now running a deficit that equals 8% of GDP, slightly above 2008 lows. Furthermore, deficit spending as a percentage of GDP is roughly DOUBLE the historical average of 4%. While the Fed is no longer forecasting a recession, deficit spending is at 2008 levels. This is another major reason why interest rates continue to rise. Deficit spending is so large that over $1.9 trillion of US Treasury bonds are being issued over 2 quarters."
👉🏽 In Canada, all of a sudden price controls are on the table. You can't make this shit up. Trudeau says the heads of large grocery stores need to come up with a plan to stabilize food prices: "Let me be very clear: If their plan doesn't provide real relief ... then we will take further action and we are not ruling anything out, including tax measures."
Socialists have zero understanding of how the economy works. ZERO! Price controls won't work, never has been.
Want to learn more on this topic and why I say this: read the book 'Forty Centuries of Wage and Price Controls: How Not to Fight Inflation: https://amzn.to/3r71ak4
May I remind you that Canada is a G7 nation.
👉🏽 The US government posted an unexpected $89 billion surplus to their budget in August. Why did this happen? Due to a $319 BILLION reversal of the student loan forgiveness plan after the Supreme Court ruled it unconstitutional. Had student loan forgiveness been approved, the US would have posted a $230 billion DEFICIT for August. Still, the US deficit YTD is at $1.5 trillion and up 61% compared to last year.- The Kobeissi Letter
👉🏽 "American workers are now striking at some of the highest levels on record. Last month alone, large stoppages from strikes resulted in 4.1 million missed days of work. This is, by far, the largest volume of work stoppages since August 2000. As the UAW strike kicks off, we are on track for a record of workdays lost to strikes in 2023. People are feeling the pain of inflation and want higher wages." -The Kobeissi Letter
👉🏽 Remember the below statement from last week's Weekly Recap: (and I encourage you to read the full statement)
"Germany's utopian energy fantasies are getting wrecked on the sharp rocks of reality. A solar industry magazine reports that 15% of Germany’s solar panels could be defective." Here is the article: https://t.co/kyuJx9rmiU
Here is some fun fact / additional data:
In 2009 there were about 35.000 people employed in the nuclear industry in Germany, which at that time produced 135 TWh of electricity.
In 2016 there were 160,000 people employed in the German wind-turbine industry which produced a total of 80 TWh of electricity.
Increased employment, jippieeee!
For more in-depth info on this topic read the following tweet:
https://twitter.com/E_R_Sepulveda/status/1701570630473183384
TLDR: German electricity consumers paid €320 billion to help subsidize wind, solar, and biomass operators.
Credit: I have used multiple sources!
#zap #weeklyrecap #nostr #plebchain #grownostr #stacksats
