Café Bitcoin | Greg Foss | 50 Days for Freedom, Day 22

But I want to start here, three years ago or so, you turned 60 and you put out this post that I loved. You said that you were going to try to paddle surf until you're 75 and that you're going to spend the next 15 years of your life working on furthering Bitcoin adoption around the world. That Bitcoin is the best hope for a fair future and for a children's future. And here you are kind of back in the arena this week. And we want to welcome you back. And I'm just wondering, you know, how are things going now a few years on from that tweet? What does the work look like for you for the next 15 years? The Harris Greg, come back to us. You may be muted, Foss. Well, while I heard you when you said, when I turned 60, and then you cut out. You decided you decided to leave now. You were, it was a tweet that you put out about dedicating your life to, you said, something like, I'm going to try to be paddling surf until I'm 75. And that you're going to dedicate as well, you know, in addition to surfing your life to furthery Bitcoin adoption and that you wanted to do it for the kids. And I'm just wondering where your head's at, you know, three years on from that. I remember that tweet as well. That was down in Maine, one of my favorite places in the world. But yeah, since that time, I've been to some roller coasters, but I stick to that desire. I think Bitcoin is one of the most important inventions of our generation. And ultimately, it is for the kids. The math is for the kids. Yeah, it is for the kids. That's why I'm here as well. I'm here for my kids. I hope to benefit from a Bitcoin world, a Bitcoin future, Bitcoin standard in my life. And I think that that will probably happen. But for me, it's really about fixing the money for the future and having a hard money that can't be debased mathematically moving forward. Jeff, you're down there in the audience. You're welcome to come up and join us if you want. But you were talking about something yesterday that stuck with me. And you're talking about what brought you back after kind of a couple of years away. I think you were over a noster hanging out, but came back to Twitter recently as well. And you said that I was watching young people reach for socialism. I think you mentioned this yesterday on the show as well. That people are kind of reaching for socialism because life feels hopeless. And that's a fair conclusion given the situation that we're in and the fact that it's hard to understand, at least the lesson, that it's the money that is putting this in this situation. And you said something like, I don't know about FOSS, but this is what it got me to come back. So yeah, FOSS, I just wondered why now? Why are you back on Twitter and here to mix it up with us again? Well, I'm back, not in the same capacity as I was prior. I have to put my life priorities, get them straight. But I'm back because I care. I do, as I said, I think it's one of the most important inventions of our generation. And the world is moving in the direction that concerns me more than ever. We could talk about this if you want, about the AI boom and some of the repercussions that may have to global credit and some of the things that concern me. But as you guys know, I got my training in the credit markets. And the credit markets aren't quite as rosy as the equity markets are right now. And credit tends to lead the cycle, meaning tends to lead for an equity correction. So there could be some times when I believe Bitcoin would be a very valuable component of everybody's portfolio. So I want to go back to something that you posted again in 2023. And this is sort of the clearest version, in my opinion, of your whole thesis. You took the CDS spread on US government debt and CDS is a credit default swap. It's basically insurance that you buy against a bar where not paying you back. And then you multiplied that out over the total US debt, including all the unfunded stuff. And you got a number for what the market says it costs to ensure against US defaults. And then you compared that to Bitcoin's entire market cap. So for those of us who have never priced a credit default swap in our lives, can you take us through this slowly? There's a lot of new people here since 2023. It would love to walk through that CDS comparison or metaphor with you. Sure. I'd be happy to. Thanks for the question. So everybody would say the United States of America will never default on their debt. And that is highly likely to be the case. In fact, if they ever default, they will be the last currency in the world to default. But all sorts of other currencies will default before them. And they do all the time. I frequently say the Canadian dollar would default 10 years before the US government would default. But regardless of the fact that you say never, there is a credit default swap market that exists for government debt on the US government as well, which it means it's a greater than zero premium that you pay to ensure your debt, which means there's people who think there's a chance that the USA will ultimately default. So you take the math and you multiply the credit default swap spread, which let's take 30 as a 30 basis points as a number. I haven't checked it recently. But in that back, in that tweet, I think, Brady, it probably was around 30 basis points if memory serves. And you multiply that by $240 trillion of outstanding US government debt funded and unfunded. And you would get a number that is greater than the market cap of the, that was greater than the current market cap of Bitcoin. So call it $1.4 trillion. What that says is that you are getting default protection on the United States and all the other countries in the world you're getting for free. You're getting default protection on all the other currencies in the world for free, which to me seems like a pretty good deal. Because again, the United States will be the last Fiat currency to fail if it does in fact fail. But there will be other Fiat currencies in the world that fail on a regular basis, 150 odd currencies that are susceptible to greater higher degree or higher likelihood of failure than the US dollar. So that's one way of looking at what Bitcoin is. It's anti-fiat. It is a insurance policy against the continuous printing or the continuous issuance of debt and running of government deficits that ultimately will lead to the inability for the government to raise, to have enough money to pay the interest expense on the debt. And that will lead to a restructuring or a default on the debt. I think yesterday you tweeted something out about Larry Fink being one of the few people kind of in legacy finance, power structure that sees Bitcoin is risk off. Did I get that right? And if so, what do you think is his or why that hasn't really landed broadly at? Oh, Foss got dropped down to the audience. Yeah, but I just set you a request, Foss. Be nice, the space has worked. In the meantime, I got thrown off at the top of the show because I had some echoing issues that were self-inflicted. So welcome everybody back to Cafe Bitcoin. We're here doing 50 days for freedom campaign that we're running to try to spark some new fire in the bellies of Bitcoiners to fight for monetary independence Corey wrote campaign essay at swan.com slash battle. Awesome post. If you haven't read it yet, it's based on Corey's grandfather's war journals and talking about how 250 years ago the United States achieved political independence and that the fight of our generation is monetary independence. And we have the tools to do that with Bitcoin and freedom tech. And so we have cut our buy fee from 1% to 50 bips for 50 days for freedom. So you can grab real Bitcoin, take it straight to self-custody. If you self-custody, if you want, we have a array of custody options that should fit anybody's kind of comfort level or what you're looking for at swan. And we also are doing $250 fee free buys for new accounts. So if you want to share that opportunity with friends and family and you can pair it up with some education from swan at swan.com slash Bitcoin 101 for Corey's hand picked set of resources for learning about Bitcoin. And we also have Jan Pritzker, who is our CTO and co-founder. His book Inventing Bitcoin is available free at swan.com slash free book and a PDF, also Kindle Format and Audio Book. So you can grab that for free. Share those resources and get friends and family on board with fee free $250 buy. And let's spread some Bitcoin adoption in this fight for monetary independence. We have Greg back up. Greg, the question for you was that I think you posted yesterday about Larry Fink being one of the only people in the traditional finance power structure that sees Bitcoin as a risk off asset. First of all, did I get that right? And two, why do you think that hasn't really that mindset or interpretation of Bitcoin is really not spread throughout traditional finance much? Yeah, thanks. It was on your show yesterday. You're excellent show with Larry LaParte that I mentioned Larry Fink seeing Bitcoin as insurance. It's a bit of a hard concept to put your hands around. It's easier for people with a credit market experience. But the reason that it hasn't caught on is because the education as much as anything people view it is a hot money number go up, buy it and trade it, and buy high sell higher. But not as a insurance policy per se, something that belongs in your portfolio through all market cycles. And I would say Brady, it's as much an education process as it is a market reality. Most markets are viewed as being what's called short volatility assets, short volatility meaning when the fall increases, equity markets tend to go down. Credit markets when fall increases, they tend to go down in price. Whereas Bitcoin, if it acted like it was a true insurance policy when volatility increases, the price of Bitcoin should go up as a long volatility asset. So a bit of a long winded explanation, and it's somewhat technical. But when you think about it, Bitcoin is insurance against everything that we're concerned about. So therefore, it should perform when other things are going to understress. So Larry this morning actually tweeted out that Worse is actually going to cut. He said run it hot, baby. He said Worse told us that AI productivity gains give us space to cut rates without increasing inflation. The chances per other predictions about a rate hike are going down again. He posted a chart showing that. So given Larry's post this morning and another dot in the plot, if you will, that Worse might actually end up cutting and that that justification is the AI productivity gains, et cetera, giving him room to do so. And Jeff was asking whether the Fed had the credibility on inflation in the first place. So I guess the question is, is this it? Is this what we're watching this week play out? And is this the kind of thing that says your math? Like your math says has to happen. Even if it doesn't happen in the short term, based on what we're looking at right now in those charts and the predictions of projections of whether or not we're going to actually get rate cuts or not, is this what the math says will happen over the long run? Yes. Now what will happen though is the Fed can.