Donald Trump has, over the last couple of years, changed his stance publicly on how he feels about crytpo. While in office, Trump and his secretary of Treasury Mnuchin attempted to ban self custody of bitcoin and Trump was generally hostile to bitcoin stating that he likes the dollar instead and privately told Mnuchin to "kill it" referring to bitcoin.
However, he has publicly stated that he now is in favor of crypto broadly, whether it is because of the millions of dollars he received from the industry, because he needs the voters, or because someone genuinely changed his mind. In my opinion, most politicians and Trump in particular, are transactional beings who say what they need to say and do what they need to do to get and stay in power.
When listening to Trump's speech at Bitcoin 2024, I was struck by how he seemed to be genuinely surprised a couple of times while reading off the teleprompter. It seemed like he had not prepped for this speech and was reading/hearing these things for the first time which implies someone (likely Vivek Ramaswamy) wrote the speech for him. That in of itself is no problem, but generally implies no genuine appreciation of Bitcoin (well, crypto as he said dozens of times, not bitcoin) and rather the transactional I am here giving this speech to get your votes.
Additionally, Vivek later spoke, and he also used 'crypto' language dramatically more than Bitcoin. He is someone who seems to have at least some understanding of the industry so, unlike Trump, we can assign meaning to his word choice. Knowing he will likely play a part of a potential Trump administration, his beliefs on bitcoin, crypto, etc... are quite meaningful.
All of this leading to the point that Bitcoin doesn't need politicians. It is distributed, it cannot be shut down by regulators (although on/off ramps can), it cannot be censored (although some mining pools can and do censor transactions). Crypto more broadly is mostly a cesspool of bullshit. Many of these shitcoins that do attempt to actually do something useful (perhaps eth or sol) are clearly unregistered securities per the Howey test.
These shitcoins will greatly benefit from a Trump administration. They will not be deemed unregistered securities, which they are. They will all be allowed to have ETFs. At a time when Fortune 500 companies and nation states are considering dipping their toes in the water, there will be confusion over whether to buy the market leader (bitcoin) or buy a basket of cryptos (which Blackrock/Fidelity/etc... will provide via a "diversified crytpo ETF").
These passive money flows will go into the "crypto ecosystem" instead of into the only thing of value that really exists here, which is Bitcoin. Crypto needs Trump to survive and thrive. NFT jpg grifts need Trump to survive and thrive. Bitcoin does not need Trump and I believe may in fact be better served by not having Trump proliferate the bullshit in the industry and cause mass confusion to the newbs (with tons of money) who will be entering over the next 12-24 months.
The above, in my opinion, is the most nuanced, accurate, and also man-behind-the-curtain take on the current elections, at least as far as Bitcoin and cryptocurrency is concerned.
Trump is not a Bitcoiner. He and those around him literally launched a memecoin, which they named 'liberty financial' (like an infomercial to vulnerable seniors) which is impossible to sell and cannot technically be traded.
They have limited the 'scale' and trade-ability of the token SO MUCH in fact to avoid US securities laws while promising to be 'pro-crypto' - as if memecoins and unregistered-securities help Bitcoin in any way.
Bitcoiners, for the most part, have little angst for Gary Gensler, who taught a full class on Bitcoin at MIT years ago. Instead it's ****coiners and unregistered-securities dealers and their VCs who want to see Gensler gone... so they can pump and dump illegal securities on the retail public. For a time, at least.
This 'pump' won't last forever... All this 'crypto' over a long enough time period goes to zero relative to Proof-of-Work like Bitcoin... but it also exacerbates the situation and delays clarity on what Bitcoin is vs everything else when 'deregulation' occurs only to give legitimacy... to unregistered securities and crypto casinos.
I think it's logical that... everyone really knows that it's a big casino outside of Bitcoin and maybe one other proof-of-work coin. There's just nothing there.
Some Bitcoiners keep saying that Trump 'helps' Bitcoin... but I'm not sure this is the case. The 'cure' obviously is more Bitcoin. The disease however is unregistered-securities and crypto casinos... and 'making a deal' with one to get more of the other I'm not sure is the answer.
GREAT post (my two sats)
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I appreciate the kind words and wholeheartedly agree with you that the crypto goes to zero eventually. It is unfortunate that it confuses people who are new coming to the space as they get bogged down with the thousands of other BS projects. Its so sad when someone new to the space gets burned putting thousands of dollars into a scam coin (whether its shibu inu or Trump's jpg nft or Trump's latest liberty financial scam) and they then tell their friends "I got burned investing in bitcoin" because they conflate all of it.
I'm hopeful we get there eventually but looking at how much profit there is to be made selling unregistered insider premined securities, and how much money those scammers give to politicians, I think its going to take longer than my limited human lifespan may like!
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Bravo.
I agree with you 100%. I believe it only delays the Bitcoin revolution and adds 'confusion' to the space... having unregistered securities alongside Bitcoin. All the NFTs, tokens, and crypto schemes harm the 'sound money' proof-of-work revolution... and confuse people.
Having said that I believe things are starting to turn the corner. The Eth/Btc ratio is the lowest its been in years, and it seems apparent that Wallstreet actually knows the difference between 'this thing' and 'everything else'. Fidelity has some presentations/write-ups about it.
On the bright side, you get to stack Btc at cheaper than it would otherwise be... so while it's a double-edged sword there is Definitely a good side ;)
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The guy launched husband own crypto currency that's going to flop. I think he's contributing to the problem more than he's helping. The average person doesn't see a difference between bitcoin and all the shitcoins.
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Not only that, he launched his own exchange that will make him the most amount of money if shit coin casinos (like coinbase) have lots of volume. And it isn't just him, Elon is literally trying to name a new government agency DOGE (department of government efficiency) so he can continue to pump his (and his kid's) shitcoin of choice.
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Yea, I have a feeling Trump aims to deregulate the crypto space in the worst way possible. I hope not, I could be wrong, but that's the vibes I'm getting.
It does seem like JD Vance understands the space way better than trump, so hopefully he's able to give some decent advice if Trump wins.
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I think JD is also a 'crypto' type guy, not a bitcoiner. Now RFK on the other hand is a hardcore bitcoiner who really seems to get it. I think Trump is going to keep him at arms length though given how big industry does not like RFK (because he fights for less pesticide usage, fights the pharmaceutical industry, etc...). Trump mentioned on Rogan that he needs to keep RFK in his lane...
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Ya Trump is probably talking out his ass when it comes to crypto
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you’re right: Bitcoin thrives regardless, but new, passive investors may initially conflate it with the rest of the industry :)
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Yeah, and I don't blame them.
Were I new to this concept of digital currency and if I didn't have the time to study all the nuances, if someone told me there was a market weighted or equal weighted basket of the top 10 or 20 that would feel safer to me than just picking one.
People would naturally make the assumption that it is similar to buying the s&p 500 instead of individual stock picking. Unfortunately they'd be dead wrong, but the passive flows would certainly keep a lot of the shitcoins boosted in price for a very long time. Similar to how there are so many zombie companies in the s&p
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