You won't believe that it's TIME ALREADY

In exactly 24 hours — 10 am Finnish time, be here (at the Cable Factory) or be square — Giacomo Zucco will open BTCHEL 2026 with a keynote, kicking off the largest Nordic Bitcoin conference and Bitcoin event of the year. Sjukt jävla häftigt!

We obviously gotta have an extra Nordic Node dispatch on the week of our main Nordic event. As a last-minute reminder and FOMO for all yous hesitating whether Helsinki was a good idea for you this week (still is!); as an introspective navel-gazing for the six-seven-hundred-ish of us who are here; as a general observation of Nordic awesomeness.

Second story reporting from yesterday's EMS. Great event!

Here’s a quote dump of excellent power statements I caught:

• “The Nordics is the most interesting place in Europe for Bitcoin mining” -Rachel Geyer, EBEA
• “‘Mining’ has negative connotation to the public… What’s your value-add for society?” -Aoife Foley, University of Manchester
• European bureaucrats “legislated our reality into existence” -Harald Rauter, 21 Energy
• “My biggest pet peeve is that there is no ‘complex mathematical problem’ in Bitcoin mining” -Jesse Pielke, HashrateUp
• “Who is mismanaging the energy market so badly that I’m paying these high prices?” -Julie Landrum, OpenNode
• The renewables’ intermittency is “the perfect primordial soup for Bitcoin mining” -Javier Martin, Braiins
• Bitcoin mining is “God’s gift to utility operators,” -Mark Artymko, Ocean

Also, “Europe is ideal for mining,” said Nacho Pauls from Ocean, a statement that sounds insane (green regulation, dysfunctional grid, high taxes, high electricity prices) until you realize — which Daniel Batten, an energy investigator and coach at CH4 Capital, hammered home at length — the pockets of inefficiencies that exists everywhere across Europe: stranded energy, small-scale decommissioned hydro plants, landfills emitting methane, wind and solar at times dumping unmanageable amounts of electricity to the grid. 

"Someone’s gotta take that excess power and, in Javier Martin’s words, Bitcoin is “the best flexible load that exists.” Or, even sexier: Bitcoin mining is “an interoperable energy sink that monetizes” (per Harald Rauter)."

Also, a short shoutout to Ioni and his great book (check out my book review: #1579572)

What We're Reading:

What Bad Guys™ Really Use for Money Laundering: You won’t believe this, but the Kremlin laundered almost $7 billion not via bitcoin or some shady, ingenious cypherpunk tool but via large, well-known fiat banks! Crazy, huh. 

Shameless Self-Promotion: I’m out in The Daily Economy writing about how the college premium has finally turned sharply south. Going to uni might be a worse deal than it has been in generations. (I’ve written about this before, e.g., for the Mises Institute.) #1580187

Disagree But Worth Reading: Trey Walsh reflects on the struggles of running TPB, “The Progressive Bitcoiner” — an organization without an audience, since Bitcoin isn’t naturally, organically progressive nor intellectually consistent with progressivism (unless you redefine the terms, motte-and-bailey-style). Both sad and glad to see them go (or not??)

Disagree but (Not) Worth Reading: Nathaniel Moore for the American left-wing magazine Slate reflects, freakin’ five months(!) late, on the Bitcoin 2026 conference in Vegas. We’re all a bunch of credulous, lost men in awe of Mr. Michael Saylor’s unpersuasive oration. If it took you that long to investigate (“investigate”) and come up with nothing more impressive than this article, perhaps crawl back the progressive hole whence you came…?

The Nordic Node #10: "KYC Is Dangerous"

The Nordic Node #9: "The Rich Europooreans Don't Want the EU"

The Nordic Node #8: "Suitcoiner Phoenix, Pokémon, and Blockchains"

The Nordic Node #7: "The Day the Token Wars Came"

The Nordic Node #6: "A Dilution a Week Keeps the Saylorbois Weak"

The Nordic Node #5: "EU Overlords, Decaying Cultures, & Treasury Companies Dying"

The Nordic Node #4: "Satoshi Talks, Mining Controversy, and some Suitcoinery"

The Nordic Node #3: "Two Suitcoiners and a Bitcoin Bodyguard Walk into a Bar..."

The Nordic Node #2: "Lambs, Bitcoin Adoption, and Criminals"

The Nordic Node #1: "Welcome to the Nordic Node!"

Subscribe to The Nordic Node over at BTCHEL.com, the coolest(!) place on the Bitcoin scene.