Donald Trump's landslide election has been an absolute blowout for "the markets".
The promise of:
- Deregulation
- Lower taxes and
- the 'Meme-like stardom' of Donald Trump "fixing things"
Has caused "The Markets" to go up, up, up! The trades that were, in particular, supposed to benefit from Trump's election are booming (TRUMP TRADES) and "Crypto" perhaps most of all.
However the "boom" has brought out some really unsavory ideas and arguments that haven't been resolved yet.
- Is XRP a commodity?
- What about the 'Binance Coin'? (BNB) Is that a commodity too? (It was created by the Binance Exchange ;) )
- What about PepeDogCumMoonSnailRocketElon coin? (That will 'safely moon' of course) Is that a commodity too? I mean it's got a Blockchain RIGHT?? Right???
If THESE THINGS are commodities... then any company (of any size) can just... create a token out of thin air, give itself a bunch of the tokens then sell them to the public without any disclosures whatsoever. The tokens are "created out of thin air" (control + P baby!) after which they are sold to the Public based on the performance and marketing of the company. The token-creator-now-company is investing in the value of tokens after all...
But WAIT?! (You say...) Isn't this an:
- Investment of Money in
- A Common Enterprise based on the
- Efforts of Others with the
- Expectation of Profit?
Yes, Yes it is.
But the RIPPLE COMPANY is WORKING WITH THE BANKS BABY.
They've got that SWEET SWEET XRPL LEDGER that's got PARTNERSHIPS BABY and ALL THE BANKS ARE GOING TO USE IT based on the Hard Work of the Ripple Company! :)
Except there's only one problem with this:
- It's outrageous fraud and a clear violation of US securities laws and XRP (along with 99.9% of crypto) should be de-listed from US public exchanges, be recognized as Unregistered Securities and go to Zero.
Except of course if... Solana, XRP, Cardano, BNB, Ethereum (plus many others) are commodities then...
Then they fall under the CFTC (Commodities Futures Trading Commission) and commodities (by definition):
- Don't have an issuer
- Are globally neutral or stale
- Are extremely difficult, if not impossible to fundamentally change and
- Aren't run or controlled by any centralized group of people. They're "for everyone" and "for no-one" equally.
Commodities are like oil, gold, soybeans, pasteurized orange juice, corn, chicken eggs, silver...
And so the 'Ripple Coin' issued by the Ripple company (and only the Ripple company) that mainly runs on Ripple Company servers...
Is now a "commodity"?
?
And therefore so is BNB, ADA, TRX, SHIB, and basically any other 'coin' or 'token' that exchanges want to list?
Well yes...
And it's not a good precedent, in my opinion, and it's what Crypto "Deregulation" may look like.
I put crypto 'de-regulation' into two broad categories: that which is good for Bitcoin, the neutral global Money, and that which probably isn't.
Probably good:
- Reduction of 'Capital Gains' taxes for Spending Bitcoin (in order to use Bitcoin the Money TM)
- Allowing Banks to custody Bitcoin while allowing people to spend from their Bitcoin accounts IF THEY CHOOSE and...
- A US National Bitcoin Reserve in order to legitimize the asset globally. Finally...
- Better accounting for organizations where spot price appreciation is accurately reflected (FASB Accounting)
Almost everything else, in my opinion, is just noise.
It's great that Bitcoin is 'going up' so much and so quickly (84k USD) but most important in my opinion is education as to what Bitcoin is. Otherwise I think it's just a short-term sugar high.
Bitcoin is a global, neutral, decentralized, energy-based, digital money with property-like attributes... that everyone will want to have and has no equal. "Crypto" is not these things.
However education about Bitcoin is a Slow Burn. NgU to the extreme (as interesting as it is!) is more of a sugar rush and sugar left around lying about the house, in my opinion, just invites bugs and pests.
A few more thoughts.
I think it's helpful to think of Bitcoin firstly as a store of value, then medium of exchange and followed by a unit of account...
However this "Store of Value" stage has sub-stages based on price and WHO exactly is saving in Bitcoin.
- Stage 1 is where individuals Save in Bitcoin.
- Stage 2 is where Companies and Institutions Save in Bitcoin (we're at the beginning of this stage IMO with MSTR + ETFs) and
- Stage 3 is for the Nation States and Central Banks to ultimately Save in Bitcoin.
Going from each stage to the next... add a Zero in Exchange Rate.
- Individual: 0 - 40,000 USD
- Companies/Institutions: 40,000 - 400,000 USD
- Nation States/Central Banks: 400,000 - 4,000,000 USD
Per Bitcoin of course.
I thought, initially, it would take another 5 - 10 years to really get into the Company/Institution Stage to see Bitcoin at 300-400,000 USD/BTC. But after this election I'm not so sure I think this process has been greatly accelerated.
Right now there is so much going on and global markets are really really busy digesting the election news which could have far-ranging consequences... apparently anything is possible. There is a lot to cover but this is enough for now.
Thank you.