Thanks for the self deprecating humor and the post QTR.
I have never understood Bitcoin. It seems like a horrific waste of precious electric power with pretty much no tangible value once created.
I could imagine Bitcoin would be incredibly valuable if it was capable of storing all of the power it required for creation, much like a battery, and held that value in a form factor about the size of a box of marlboro cigarettes which you could then use to power your car, toaster, house, boat, lawnmower then that would indeed be an instrument of value that i would be crazy to now own in size.
As it stands however, Bitcoin does not attract my interest simply because it has a limited issuance anymore than a 1907 High Relief Saint Gauden for which there were only 11,250 ever minted.
I have only one position where i think value is being overlooked. Halozyme (HALO) has a PEG below 1, Earnings for the last couple of years has been reliably growing at 23-30% with a PE below 15. My son discovered the business so i can't claim credit for discovery, however, i read every quarterly report and i attend the earnings calls to ensure i understand the business.
Pretty much every other equity feels rich. My main focus is to make sure my equity returns exceed the S&P 500 index. As long as i'm doing that i count that as a win.
Real Estate looks ready to turn over, agree on that as well.
Oil looks to have been repressed, so i've been building a modest position there anticipating reversion to the mean. Still waiting on that to happen.
Value if you can find it seems like the right place to search.
and Gold is much less horrific? Tell me what all that effort and expense to dig an inert metal out from 1/2 mile deep in some S.A. mine run by zama zamas is?
No asset has a longer history as a store of value than gold. Genesis 2:11-12 mentions an exceptionally pure gold mine. That is the earliest recorded mention of gold in human history sometime 5000-3000 BC.
No other store of value has that long a history.
None, not one.
And you don't need to leave the shores of the USA to find gold. It exists in the crust of the earth everywhere. In the 1799 a large amount of gold was discovered in the East coast Carolina's. Then in 1850 the California gold rush started. That was followed by the massive Alaska gold rush of the late 1890's.
Today gold is mined throughout the America's so you don't have to go far to discover it.
Between 5,000 years of human history and the limited availability in the earth's crust combined with the fact that gold is virtually indestructible, malleable, it's scarcity and beauty have resulted in gold being a first class story of value.
I do not doubt any of that and I am a gold holder myself.
Point remains.... expending massive amounts of energy to dig up an inert metal just so it sits in a vault doing exactly nothing...is no different or less horrific than BTC mining. That's the point. No full history of gold is needed.
Large amounts of energy are needed to do most things but that does not mean we should not do them. Building a house, stone or wood, takes a ton of energy. Planting crops to feed the nation, lots of energy.
I have a gold coin that dates to 426 BC. The energy needed to dig that up was mostly human energy and the gold once recovered need not demand additional energy for use in commerce.
Bitcoin is different.
A single Bitcoin transaction to purchase something requires a large amount of energy to verify the proof of work in the blockchain. Substantially more energy than a traditional financial transaction.
Chris could certainly be right, as he usually is, but this article makes me consider adding to my small position. There are many CNBC videos from years ago, where Tom Lee was shamed, live on air, for recommending people put 1% of their worth in Bitcoin. The public mockery quickly turned into a 100x return. More often than not, the "spike the football" commentary marks the bottom of a move, all due respect to QTR.
You mean if you forget your password you can't just click a box and they send you a link via email to change it? F that, I'm canceling all my crypto plans.
What’s crazy to me (and furthers my belief that BTC was created, at least in part, by a govt is this)…if any other CEO or Fund Mgr went on TV and said the stuff they say the SEC would be calling.
But they are allowed to spout their BS, talk about all sorts of forward looking guidance, without calling it that, and nobody seems to care.
It’s because people are desperate for some investment that will keep them ahead of actual “inflation” and provide the purchasing power to maintain a semblance of what used to be a middle-class life. Their salaries don’t do it; interest rates are so repressed that savings can’t do it - the only things left are speculative manias.
I wouldn’t say rash, more like a bad case of herpes. Between quantum computing and the decreasing profitability of mining, bitcoin will be hacked and go to zero. As miners leave there’s less security of the blockchain chain until someone can corner 51 % then he'll controls the blockchain chain. It’s happened with other crypto.
So after 15+ yrs and counting and not hacked ...with tremendous and increasing incentives to do so.... you feel now it's hackable?
I imagine you don't know about BIPs and how BTC network evolves over time.
Or that if/when quantum computing "hacks" BTC that the entire world won't have bigger security issues. SHA256 encryption also being the basis of pretty much all credit card transactions and internet commerce....
Y2K computer world wide collapse anyone ?
Humans tend to evolve and adjust and fix security holes over time to prevent things like what you predict above.
You twist my words. I didn’t say the bitcoin was currently hackable, I said it will be hackable in the future.
I don’t disagree that the world networks will be in big trouble when quantum computing becomes viable but thats not pertinent to the discussion regarding hacking bitcoin. Don’t think someone holding millions in bitcoin we’ll be worrying about the rest of the world when a hacker modifies the blockchain and their bitcoins go to zero even in cold storage.
The M&M will make this pop once they've squeezed everyone out. They need to post gains for their ETF's which have been opened in everyone's 401K's. I don't think we're far from the bottom.
As crazy as it sounds, as well as the ride it provided while I owned it, I think we're approaching a bottom. The M&M need to make some quick and easy money and get their ETF's to show a gain this year.
Raven Right On!!! Bitchcoin has been a ponzi from the beginning in a virtual store of nothing, in a coin that does not exist existentially and therefore is NOT a storehouse of any value except the value created by a herd of speculators hoping to foist their nothing coin onto someone else for more fiat than they paid for their nothing coin and its many imitators. To add to their duplicity, they want to step out of Bitchcoin for a profit in fiat, which sensible folks realize fiat is headed for zero value very shortly so "Bitchcoin investors" think that they will wind up with big Bitchcoin gains which they convert to ZERO $$. Game over. Gold and Silver are real and store houses of value when fiat goes to zero. Ponzi's always end this way, ALWAYS!!!!
Thanks for the self deprecating humor and the post QTR.
I have never understood Bitcoin. It seems like a horrific waste of precious electric power with pretty much no tangible value once created.
I could imagine Bitcoin would be incredibly valuable if it was capable of storing all of the power it required for creation, much like a battery, and held that value in a form factor about the size of a box of marlboro cigarettes which you could then use to power your car, toaster, house, boat, lawnmower then that would indeed be an instrument of value that i would be crazy to now own in size.
As it stands however, Bitcoin does not attract my interest simply because it has a limited issuance anymore than a 1907 High Relief Saint Gauden for which there were only 11,250 ever minted.
Bitcoin is just another machine in the Casino. It should offer all-you-can-eat buffets :)
It's like the stock market, and probably housing: fundamentals and intrinsic value have taken a backseat to the casino mentality.
No doubt, "value" has become much harder to find.
I have only one position where i think value is being overlooked. Halozyme (HALO) has a PEG below 1, Earnings for the last couple of years has been reliably growing at 23-30% with a PE below 15. My son discovered the business so i can't claim credit for discovery, however, i read every quarterly report and i attend the earnings calls to ensure i understand the business.
Pretty much every other equity feels rich. My main focus is to make sure my equity returns exceed the S&P 500 index. As long as i'm doing that i count that as a win.
Real Estate looks ready to turn over, agree on that as well.
Oil looks to have been repressed, so i've been building a modest position there anticipating reversion to the mean. Still waiting on that to happen.
Value if you can find it seems like the right place to search.
Good luck!
and Gold is much less horrific? Tell me what all that effort and expense to dig an inert metal out from 1/2 mile deep in some S.A. mine run by zama zamas is?
No asset has a longer history as a store of value than gold. Genesis 2:11-12 mentions an exceptionally pure gold mine. That is the earliest recorded mention of gold in human history sometime 5000-3000 BC.
No other store of value has that long a history.
None, not one.
And you don't need to leave the shores of the USA to find gold. It exists in the crust of the earth everywhere. In the 1799 a large amount of gold was discovered in the East coast Carolina's. Then in 1850 the California gold rush started. That was followed by the massive Alaska gold rush of the late 1890's.
Today gold is mined throughout the America's so you don't have to go far to discover it.
Between 5,000 years of human history and the limited availability in the earth's crust combined with the fact that gold is virtually indestructible, malleable, it's scarcity and beauty have resulted in gold being a first class story of value.
Your mileage may vary, and that's perfectly fine.
I do not doubt any of that and I am a gold holder myself.
Point remains.... expending massive amounts of energy to dig up an inert metal just so it sits in a vault doing exactly nothing...is no different or less horrific than BTC mining. That's the point. No full history of gold is needed.
Large amounts of energy are needed to do most things but that does not mean we should not do them. Building a house, stone or wood, takes a ton of energy. Planting crops to feed the nation, lots of energy.
I have a gold coin that dates to 426 BC. The energy needed to dig that up was mostly human energy and the gold once recovered need not demand additional energy for use in commerce.
Bitcoin is different.
A single Bitcoin transaction to purchase something requires a large amount of energy to verify the proof of work in the blockchain. Substantially more energy than a traditional financial transaction.
Just like the 1720s Dutch tulip craze.
Chris could certainly be right, as he usually is, but this article makes me consider adding to my small position. There are many CNBC videos from years ago, where Tom Lee was shamed, live on air, for recommending people put 1% of their worth in Bitcoin. The public mockery quickly turned into a 100x return. More often than not, the "spike the football" commentary marks the bottom of a move, all due respect to QTR.
Good points for sure.
Lee: BTC Schiff:Gold
both always double down, are stubborn as hell...and WAY early if even correct.
'I've lost my BTC key, who do I contact for a new one?'
Great column Chris.
You mean if you forget your password you can't just click a box and they send you a link via email to change it? F that, I'm canceling all my crypto plans.
A shame substack don't have smiley face options!
I lost my gold eagles. Who can I call ?
Beautifully articulated.
The irony is if he had have accumulated $6B of bitcoin instead of the ETH token, it might be a bit closer to his target.
“This is like calling a heart attack a wellness retreat.” I will be using this Chris. Thanks in advance.
What’s crazy to me (and furthers my belief that BTC was created, at least in part, by a govt is this)…if any other CEO or Fund Mgr went on TV and said the stuff they say the SEC would be calling.
But they are allowed to spout their BS, talk about all sorts of forward looking guidance, without calling it that, and nobody seems to care.
It’s because people are desperate for some investment that will keep them ahead of actual “inflation” and provide the purchasing power to maintain a semblance of what used to be a middle-class life. Their salaries don’t do it; interest rates are so repressed that savings can’t do it - the only things left are speculative manias.
Fleck: CNBC= Bubblevision. Cramer on Shearson Lehman before crash: "Buy buy buy!" Dick Fuld and Repo 105 Fuckery included h/t Ben Hunt
I wouldn’t say rash, more like a bad case of herpes. Between quantum computing and the decreasing profitability of mining, bitcoin will be hacked and go to zero. As miners leave there’s less security of the blockchain chain until someone can corner 51 % then he'll controls the blockchain chain. It’s happened with other crypto.
https://open.substack.com/pub/hrmt/p/why-bitcoin-is-going-to-zero?r=l7ty3&utm_medium=ios&shareImageVariant=overlay
So after 15+ yrs and counting and not hacked ...with tremendous and increasing incentives to do so.... you feel now it's hackable?
I imagine you don't know about BIPs and how BTC network evolves over time.
Or that if/when quantum computing "hacks" BTC that the entire world won't have bigger security issues. SHA256 encryption also being the basis of pretty much all credit card transactions and internet commerce....
Y2K computer world wide collapse anyone ?
Humans tend to evolve and adjust and fix security holes over time to prevent things like what you predict above.
You twist my words. I didn’t say the bitcoin was currently hackable, I said it will be hackable in the future.
I don’t disagree that the world networks will be in big trouble when quantum computing becomes viable but thats not pertinent to the discussion regarding hacking bitcoin. Don’t think someone holding millions in bitcoin we’ll be worrying about the rest of the world when a hacker modifies the blockchain and their bitcoins go to zero even in cold storage.
As they say things change and pass performance may not be an indication of future returns
I thought this guy was like an AI Max Headroom meme....
Doesn't Tom Lee have something to sell you, for examples BMNR stock? Loving the comparison with Krugman.
The M&M will make this pop once they've squeezed everyone out. They need to post gains for their ETF's which have been opened in everyone's 401K's. I don't think we're far from the bottom.
The Michael Saylor memes are absolutely priceless.
As crazy as it sounds, as well as the ride it provided while I owned it, I think we're approaching a bottom. The M&M need to make some quick and easy money and get their ETF's to show a gain this year.
Raven Right On!!! Bitchcoin has been a ponzi from the beginning in a virtual store of nothing, in a coin that does not exist existentially and therefore is NOT a storehouse of any value except the value created by a herd of speculators hoping to foist their nothing coin onto someone else for more fiat than they paid for their nothing coin and its many imitators. To add to their duplicity, they want to step out of Bitchcoin for a profit in fiat, which sensible folks realize fiat is headed for zero value very shortly so "Bitchcoin investors" think that they will wind up with big Bitchcoin gains which they convert to ZERO $$. Game over. Gold and Silver are real and store houses of value when fiat goes to zero. Ponzi's always end this way, ALWAYS!!!!