The Pomp Letter

This installment of The Pomp Letter is free for everyone. I send this email to our investors daily. If you would also like to receive it every morning, join the 95,000 other investors today.

To investors,

News broke yesterday that a foreign government has been sponsoring an elaborate scheme to gain access to some of the most sensitive government communication and information. While some of the details are still unknown, it is clear that this activity should cause concern for every American citizen.

David Sanger of the New York Times summarized the situation with the following:

“The Trump administration acknowledged on Sunday that hackers acting on behalf of a foreign government — almost certainly a Russian intelligence agency, according to federal and private experts — broke into a range of key government networks, including in the Treasury and Commerce Departments, and had free access to their email systems.

Officials said a hunt was on to determine if other parts of the government had been affected by what looked to be one of the most sophisticated, and perhaps among the largest, attacks on federal systems in the past five years. Several said national security-related agencies were also targeted, though it was not clear whether the systems contained highly classified material.”

Sanger later went on to explain that this cyber attack could have been underway for a number of months before it was detected:

“The motive for the attack on the agency and the Treasury Department remains elusive, two people familiar with the matter said. One government official said it was too soon to tell how damaging the attacks were and how much material was lost, but according to several corporate officials, the attacks had been underway as early as this spring, meaning they continued undetected through months of the pandemic and the election season.”

This development reminded me of an incredibly detailed investigative report that I read back in September 2020. The report was titled The FinCen Files and was put together by Jason Leopold and his colleagues at BuzzFeed News. The explosive article starts with the following:

“A huge trove of secret government documents reveals for the first time how the giants of Western banking move trillions of dollars in suspicious transactions, enriching themselves and their shareholders while facilitating the work of terrorists, kleptocrats, and drug kingpins.

And the US government, despite its vast powers, fails to stop it.”

This may not be a complete surprise to many people, but the next part is even more damning.

“Laws that were meant to stop financial crime have instead allowed it to flourish. So long as a bank files a notice that it may be facilitating criminal activity, it all but immunizes itself and its executives from criminal prosecution. The suspicious activity alert effectively gives them a free pass to keep moving the money and collecting the fees.

The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, or FinCEN, is the agency within the Treasury Department charged with combating money laundering, terrorist financing, and other financial crimes. It collects millions of these suspicious activity reports, known as SARs. It makes them available to US law enforcement agencies and other nations’ financial intelligence operations. It even compiles a report called “Kleptocracy Weekly” that summarizes the dealings of foreign leaders such as Russian President Vladimir Putin.”

So whether you are talking about the US Treasury and Commerce departments, or FinCEN, it is becoming abundantly clear that the US government is creating honeypots of data that are acting as prizes for malicious actors.

The thought process goes like this — government organizations are collecting billions of data points on people and organizations in an effort to prevent or solve crimes. The problem is that they are doing a fantastic job of collecting the information, but they’re not doing a good job of stopping majority of the illegal activity. In fact, you could easily argue that governments are collecting so much data that it is actually making them more ineffective, rather than more effective.

The Institute of International Finance and Deloitte LLP actually wrote a white paper on this exact topic, including the following:

“It is a truism to state that that the SARs (Suspicious Activity Report) regime presents challenges to both financial institutions and law enforcement. A significant number of SAR disclosures made to law enforcement are assessed to be of limited intelligence value or are of poor quality. Processing high numbers of low-quality reports which do not improve the investigation of criminal activity diverts already limited FIU resource and is ineffective in driving law enforcement outcomes.”

Think about this for a second. The US government, along with financial institutions and other nation states, have been gathering so much information that they can’t find the high quality information because it is buried in a plethora of low quality information. Pretty scary to think about.

Now many of you are probably wondering why I am writing about cyber attacks and Suspicious Activity Reports, right?

These interconnected situations are directly related to the recent rumor that the US Treasury Department is going to pursue regulation that would require “financial institutions to verify identities of recipients and senders for transactions involving self-hosted crypto wallets or wallets that are not provided by a financial institution or service. Examples of such wallets include hardware wallets or a wallet running on a user's computer.”

If this legislation was to be adopted, governments around the world would be collecting more and more data, but not actually becoming anymore effective at stopping illegal activities. I’m not the only one who believes this either. Jai Ramaswamy, who was previously Chief of the Asset Forfeiture & Money Laundering Section of the Department of Justice’s Criminal Division and the Global Head of AML Compliance at Bank of America/Merrill Lynch and the Head of Enterprise Risk Management at Capital One, wrote in an op-ed for Coin Center:

“Personal crypto transactions seem to marry the benefits of cash with the convenience of an electronic payment, but without either the physical constraints of the former or the risk controls imposed on the latter. This has led some to describe unhosted wallets as a personal Swiss bank account enhanced by the global reach of the internet—the very same danger which the global standards created by FATF over the past 5 decades was intended to address. Policymakers fear that full maturity of these decentralized protocols could foreshadow a future without financial intermediaries, which would significantly inhibit law enforcement’s ability to identify, prosecute and otherwise disrupt illicit financial networks in an environment when the effectiveness of these tools is already being challenged.

There are however strong reasons to believe that the opposite is true—that personal crypto transactions pose less illicit finance risk than commonly believed. Unhosted wallets are more like a personal billfold than a Swiss bank account; and unlike cash, crypto-assets are not legal tender, and thus still not universally accepted for goods and services in the real economy. While there are some exceptional circumstances such as hyperinflation or severe currency devaluations that allow crypto-assets to take on some of these attributes in specific regions, or “darknet” markets where illicit goods and services are priced and paid for in crypto-assets, these are unlikely to lead to wholesale and global changes in consumer behavior. Practically speaking, even illicit actors—much like legitimate businesses or individuals—must eventually convert between crypto assets and local fiat currencies to meet basic needs and run their operations. One could theoretically imagine a world where crypto assets serve this purpose, however that future remains uncertain and remote—a reality that is all too apparent to entrepreneurs launching crypto-projects, who daily contend with the challenge of achieving organic growth without deep and liquid fiat on and off ramps. Indeed, an important reason for Bitcoin’s continuing market dominance despite proliferation of other crypto-assets over the past decade, as well as the increasing market share of fiat-backed stablecoins, is ready convertibility to fiat currency through regulated intermediaries.”

Ramaswamy went on to then summarize his point beautifully when he said:

“Perhaps most importantly, policymakers must come to terms with a technological shift that is driving the rise of decentralized blockchain protocols. Those changes have the potential to transform the architecture of the internet, collapse the distinction between communication and settlement of value on networks, and rewire some of the ways we think about financial services, particular in driving financial inclusion. Critically, these are primarily technological advances that give rise to financial innovations, and thus policymakers seeking to prohibit or restrict their development and use would be wise to heed King Canute’s warning about the futility of stopping the ocean’s tides from rising. A sober review of the technology explains why such efforts are bound to fail and will only serve to undermine rather than enhance efforts to detect and disrupt illicit financial activity.”

It may be counterintuitive at first glance, but the United States and their peers would be better off resisting the urge to regulate Bitcoin and cryptocurrency transactions. We have already seen the ineffectiveness that exists when we collect as much information as possible, while also drastically violating the financial privacy of hundreds of millions of people. Additionally, governments will merely be creating new honeypots of information that will likely get stolen by nefarious adversaries.

There is a balance between stopping illegal activity and conducting security theater. Just as the TSA practices at an airport are proven to be rather ineffective, the KYC/AML practices of legacy organizations leave much to be desired as well. Instead, our government should be focused on embracing this technology, driving innovation further so we can be the greatest beneficiary, and working intimately with industry leaders to create an environment that allows for financial inclusion, while also deterring malicious behavior.

Let’s hope we have people in positions of power and influence with the courage to do the right thing. Hope each of you has a great start to your week. I’ll talk to you tomorrow morning.

-Pomp

This installment of The Pomp Letter is free for everyone. I send this email to our investors daily. If you would also like to receive it every morning, join the 95,000 other investors today.

THE RUNDOWN:

Fidelity’s Custody Business Around Bitcoin ‘Incredibly Successful’: Fidelity Investments CEO Abby Johnson says the mutual fund giant’s custody business around bitcoin has been “incredibly successful” and has a “tremendous pipeline.” In an interview with Barron’s, Johnson noted that developments in the sector are moving so rapidly it’s hard to keep track of them all and said that things that have long been talked about in the sector are now starting to become reality. Read more.

Bitwise Crypto Trust Jumps 72% Since Debut While Market Sags: The Bitwise 10 Crypto Index Fund has vaulted more than 70% since its debut Wednesday, the latest sign of an insatiable appetite for risk assets in global financial markets. The fund, which is listed under the ticker BITW, jumped about 23% to $44.75 on Friday, bringing gains since its over-the-counter trading kick-off to 72%. About 565,000 shares have changed hands daily on average over that period. Meanwhile, the Bloomberg Galaxy Crypto Index slipped about 3% during the same timespan. Read more.

Sweden Explores Moving to a Digital Currency: Sweden’s government will start exploring the feasibility of having the country move to a digital currency, marking another step into the unknown for the world’s most cashless society. Per Bolund, financial markets minister, said a review launched on Friday is expected to be completed by the end of November in 2022. Anna Kinberg Batra, a former chairwoman of the Riksbank’s finance committee, will lead the inquiry. Read more.

Saylor Hits Back at Claims MicroStrategy’s Bitcoin Trove Makes It an ETF: No matter how it looks, swims or quacks, if the law says it ain’t a duck, then it ain’t one – The Michael Saylor Guide to Waterfowl Identification. No, to our knowledge, Saylor, CEO of business intelligence firm MicroStrategy, has not written any such guide. However, if he did so, one can imagine an entry like this upending the famous “duck test” of observed reality that the poet James Whitcomb Riley is believed to have coined. Read more.

Roblox Delays I.P.O. Until Next Year: Roblox, a gaming company that had been preparing to go public this month, has decided to delay its initial public offering until next year, in a sign that the enthusiastic market for I.P.O.s by DoorDash and Airbnb this past week has made it difficult to price shares accurately.Read more.

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE

Christian Angermayer is the founder and CEO of Apeiron Investment Group, which serves as his family office. Christian has previously built and invested in numerous multi-billion dollar companies.

In this conversation, Christian and I discuss:

* Investing in innovation

* Biotech

* Longevity

* Psychedelics

* Cannabis

* Fintech

* Bitcoin

* Crypto

* Deep tech

I really enjoyed this conversation with Christian. Hopefully you enjoy it too.

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE

Podcast Sponsors

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* OKCoin.com is the leading crypto exchange for both beginners and experienced users. You can fund your account in under 2 minutes, and get access to the most advanced trading engine, all while paying the lowest trading fees in the industry (0.1%). Visit www.okcoin.com/pomp and open your account today. 

* Want to sell your wonderful internet business? Tiny partners with founders to give them quick, straightforward exits that protect their team and culture. We’ll make an offer within a week, close the deal within a month, and keep your business operating for the long term. Get in touch at tinycapital.com, and we’ll let you know within a couple of days.

* Athletic Brewing is re-imagining beer for the modern adult. They love beer. But they also love being healthy, active and at their best. The non-alcoholic beers are fully flavored, clean ingredient, and a fraction of the calories of full strength beer - they fit in any occasion. Check out www.athleticbrewing.com for more details and free shipping nationwide.

* Choice is a new self-directed IRA product that allows you to buy Bitcoin with tax-advantaged dollars, while still holding your private keys. You can go to retirewithchoice.com/pomp to sign up today.

* Unstoppable Domains is working to make the internet operate how it was originally intended, which means anyone can publish anything from anywhere. You can go to unstoppabledomains.com and claim your censorship resistant domain today.

* BlockFi provides financial products for crypto investors. Products include high-yield interest accounts, USD loans, and no fee trading. To start earning today visit: http://www.blockfi.com/Pomp

* Crypto.com allows you to buy, sell, store, earn, loan, and invest various cryptocurrencies in an user friendly mobile app. Join over one million users today. You can download and earn $50 USD with my code “pomp2020” when you sign up for one of their metal cards today.

* Coinlist — Smart investors know being early is critical to success in crypto. CoinList is where early adopters invest in, earn, and trade the best new crypto assets before they list on other exchanges. Sign up via coinlist.co/pomp and earn $10 in BTC after you trade $100.

* Nifty Gateway is the premium NFT platform. They release content from the best NFT artists in the world twice weekly, and have featured many world famous artists including Kenny Scharf, Trevor Jones and WhIsBe. Sign up for an account in advance to participate in the drops: http://www.niftygateway.com

You are receiving The Pomp Letter because you either signed up or you attended one of the events that I spoke at. Feel free to unsubscribe if you aren’t finding this valuable.

Nothing in this email is intended to serve as financial advice. Do your own research.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pomp.substack.com/subscribe

This installment of The Pomp Letter is free for everyone. I send this email to our investors daily. If you would also like to receive it every morning, join the 93,000 other investors today.

To investors,

Graham Duncan, the co-founder of East Rock Capital, appeared on the Tim Ferris podcast in March 2019. He spoke of a concept during that conversation that I can’t stop thinking about — the idea of “time billionaires.”

This insight was flagged by my friend Blake Robbins who described it as “truly profound.” I actually think Blake may be understating how incredible this idea is. Here is the transcript from the podcast conversation:

Tim Ferriss: So time billionaires. What does that refer to?

Graham Duncan: I was listening to a guy introduced a speaker a while ago. And he was saying people don’t really understand the difference between billionaires and millionaires. He said a million seconds is like 11 days. A billion seconds is 31 years. And I remember that …

Tim Ferriss: Oh, s**t. That’s a hell of a way to think about it.

Graham Duncan: Right?

Tim Ferriss: Wait. Can you say that one more time?

Graham Duncan: A million seconds is 11 days. A billion seconds is slightly over 31 years. And I was thinking about – Tyler Cowen has a thing about cultural billionaires –

Tim Ferriss: Marginal Revolution?

Graham Duncan: Yeah. In one of his books, he talks about cultural billionaires. I feel like in our culture, we’re so obsessed, as a culture, with money. And we deify dollar billionaires in a way that – it’d be nice to co-opt that term the way Tyler Cowen did with cultural billionaires. And I was thinking of time billionaires that when I see, sometimes, 20-year-olds – the thought I had was they probably have two billion seconds left. But they aren’t relating to themselves as time billionaires. And I was thinking about how if you could – what would Rupert Murdoch, who’s worth $20 billion – he’s 87 years old. What would he pay if he could take the next five years of someone’s 20-year-old healthy body, mind, etc.? And for that 20-year-old, how would they price it? Because I was thinking at various points of my career, I might have sold the next five years for something.

And over time, my pricing has gone vertical because the next five years, if I were to lose – and the key to this question is that you can’t sell the five at the end of your life. You gotta sell them right now. I don’t know how I’d price it because my kids are of a certain age that they’ll never be again. But I don’t know that I live every day that way. But I aspire to. So I was trying to capture – I heard Tim Urban on your podcast. And I started reading his stuff. And I find his writing style and the topics he is interested in just amazing. He has this concept of life calendar. And I bought his life calendar. He sells it as a poster. And what he does is he puts a week – he does a circle for each week. So he has 52 circles on the horizontal and then 90 rows so that you can see a 90-year life in weeks. And what’s startling about the picture – again, to this question of how long is a billion seconds – is how short it actually is.

I have read this excerpt of the transcript too many times to count at this point. It perfectly breaks down the difference between a time billionaire and a dollar billionaire. One has financial resources and the other has life resources. Our society overvalues the former, but undervalues the latter.

This concept of a time billionaire really hits home for me, because one of my favorite movies is the 2011 movie In Time starring Justin Timberlake. Ignore the Timberlake detail. The premise of the movie is that everyone is paid in time, rather than money. You live until you are 25 years old and then the clock on your forearm starts ticking down towards 00:00:00. If all of your time expires, you die young. If you have accumulated enough time, you can effectively live forever.

The metaphors are deep in this one. From rich and poor to young and old, the idea of time as money is a powerful one. Which brings me to a question that someone tweeted at me recently (wish I could credit them but can’t find the reply this morning):

If you had the opportunity to switch places with Warren Buffett, would you do it? You could be one of the richest people in the world. But you would also have to be 90 years old.

Majority of people think they want money until they are forced to evaluate the lack of time that comes with it in this scenario. Quickly, the value of time becomes evident and people opt for being younger, rather than richer.

So what exactly does this have to do with investing?

Well, frankly everything. We constantly think of billionaires as having significant advantages in financial markets. They have enormous resources. They have experience. They have a network. And they can use their resources to buy leverage (employees, more capital, etc) to accomplish their goals. Maybe this is the wrong way to think about it though?

Having a billion dollars is great, but having a billion seconds is priceless. There is no amount of money in the world that can purchase immortality. Every human eventually runs out of time. So what would it look like if young investors started to think of themselves as wealthier than their older, historically richer, investing colleagues?

This idea of being a time billionaire immediately creates an opportunity to lean into your greatest resource — time. The time billionaire can have a time horizon that is counted in decades. The time billionaire can afford to be patient. The time billionaire can slowly compound money over time. There is no rush. There is no compressed timeline that clouds the judgement of a time billionaire. The time billionaire has a significant advantage when it comes to controlling their emotional state.

They have so much abundance of their resource — time — that they can recover from almost any mistake. The time billionaire is unshakeable in a sense.

Every great investor understands that they should find their advantage and then leverage the advantage to profit in the marketplace. Some investors have incredible experience. Others have incredible wealth. And the youngest investors have incredible time.

Many of you reading these letter aspire to be a dollar billionaire, but you fail to recognize that each of those financial titans would gladly switch seats with those who have more time. The time billionaires are the wealthiest among us, yet they fail to recognize the wealth that they enjoy.

With modern technology, the average human will likely live into their early 80s. A billion seconds is just over 31 years. The 20 year old has two billion seconds. The 50 year old has one billion seconds. Take a step back today and ask yourself — do I invest my capital based on the greatest resources that I have access to?

For some of you, that resource is money. But for most of you, that resource is time. Press your advantage. Start thinking in terms of decades. Use your status as a time billionaire to become a dollar billionaire, but remember — the time billionaire always dies with zero.

Have a great start to your week. I’ll talk to everyone tomorrow.

-Pomp

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THE RUNDOWN:

Swiss Say They Were Successful With Digital Currency Experiment: The Swiss National Bank and partner organizations said they successfully conducted experiments to push forward understanding of how digital currencies could work within the country’s financial system. In ‘Project Helvetia’ the SNB, the Bank for International Settlements and the financial infrastructure operator SIX linked the existing interbank payment system to a distributed ledger, according to a joint press release Thursday. They also tested issuing digital currency onto a blockchain-like platform. Read more.

Apple Co-Founder Wozniak’s New Venture Lists Token to Help Fund Energy Efficiency Projects: Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak has launched Efforce, a company that facilitates investments in energy efficiency projects via cryptocurrency and blockchain technology. The company aims to be a marketplace to streamline the process of financing and undertaking such projects by enabling them to receive crowd contributions from investors via its token, WOZX, which was listed on Thursday through HBTC. Read more.

JD.Com Says It’s Accepting China’s Digital Yuan for Latest Lottery: Chinese e-commerce firm JD.Com says it’s become the first online platform to accept the nation’s central bank digital currency. As reported by Reuters on Saturday, JD Digits – the company's digital technology arm – will accept the digital yuan at its online shopping center during the second mass giveaway of the token in the city of Suzhou. Read more.

MicroStrategy Buys Additional $50M in Bitcoin: MicroStrategy CEO Michael Saylor announced his company’s third bitcoin purchase on Twitter Friday evening, per SEC filings the same day. Saylor purchased 2,574 bitcoins for $50.0 million in cash bringing the business intelligence company's treasury holdings to approximately 40,824 bitcoins. Read more.

Binance Expects to Earn From $800M to $1B This Year, CEO Says: Cryptocurrency exchange Binance will likely earn between $800 million and $1 billion this year, as market uncertainty drives interest – and trading – in cryptos, CEO Changpeng Zhao told Bloomberg. That’s up from about $570 million in 2019, according to the report.Read more.

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE

Lyn Alden is the founder of Lyn Alden Investment Strategy, which provides market research to hundreds of thousands of individual investors and financial professionals. Lyn’s focus is on value investing with a global macro overlay, including currency differentials, shifts in monetary policy, and equity valuations.

In this conversation, Lyn and I discuss:

* Long term debt cycle

* Government finance

* Sovereign debt problems

* Trade deficits

* Petro dollar system

* 60/40 portfolios

* Emerging markets

* Bitcoin

* Value stocks vs value traps

I really enjoyed this conversation with Lyn. Hopefully you enjoy it too.

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE

Podcast Sponsors

These companies make the podcast possible, so go check them out and thank them for their support!

* OKCoin.com is the leading crypto exchange for both beginners and experienced users. You can fund your account in under 2 minutes, and get access to the most advanced trading engine, all while paying the lowest trading fees in the industry (0.1%). Visit www.okcoin.com/pomp and open your account today. 

* Want to sell your wonderful internet business? Tiny partners with founders to give them quick, straightforward exits that protect their team and culture. We’ll make an offer within a week, close the deal within a month, and keep your business operating for the long term. Get in touch at tinycapital.com, and we’ll let you know within a couple of days.

* Athletic Brewing is re-imagining beer for the modern adult. They love beer. But they also love being healthy, active and at their best. The non-alcoholic beers are fully flavored, clean ingredient, and a fraction of the calories of full strength beer - they fit in any occasion. Check out www.athleticbrewing.com for more details and free shipping nationwide.

* Choice is a new self-directed IRA product that allows you to buy Bitcoin with tax-advantaged dollars, while still holding your private keys. You can go to retirewithchoice.com/pomp to sign up today.

* Unstoppable Domains is working to make the internet operate how it was originally intended, which means anyone can publish anything from anywhere. You can go to unstoppabledomains.com and claim your censorship resistant domain today.

* BlockFi provides financial products for crypto investors. Products include high-yield interest accounts, USD loans, and no fee trading. To start earning today visit: http://www.blockfi.com/Pomp

* Crypto.com allows you to buy, sell, store, earn, loan, and invest various cryptocurrencies in an user friendly mobile app. Join over one million users today. You can download and earn $50 USD with my code “pomp2020” when you sign up for one of their metal cards today.

* Coinlist — Smart investors know being early is critical to success in crypto. CoinList is where early adopters invest in, earn, and trade the best new crypto assets before they list on other exchanges. Sign up via coinlist.co/pomp and earn $10 in BTC after you trade $100.

* Nifty Gateway is the premium NFT platform. They release content from the best NFT artists in the world twice weekly, and have featured many world famous artists including Kenny Scharf, Trevor Jones and WhIsBe. Sign up for an account in advance to participate in the drops: http://www.niftygateway.com

You are receiving The Pomp Letter because you either signed up or you attended one of the events that I spoke at. Feel free to unsubscribe if you aren’t finding this valuable.

Nothing in this email is intended to serve as financial advice. Do your own research.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pomp.substack.com/subscribe

This installment of The Pomp Letter is free for everyone. I send this email to our investors daily. If you would also like to receive it every morning, join the 92,000 other investors today.

To investors,

Niall Ferguson, the famous historian, published an important op-ed in the Bloomberg Opinion section yesterday. The piece was titled “Bitcoin Is Winning the Covid-19 Monetary Revolution” and the sub-header read “The virtual currency is scarce, sovereign and a great place for the rich to store their wealth.”

The argument laid out by Ferguson is noteworthy not only for what was written, but also because of who is writing it. For those that don’t know, Niall Ferguson is currently the Milbank Family Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. He was previously a professor of history at Harvard, New York University and Oxford. Ferguson was named one of Time magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world in 2004 and has written a handful of books, including the The Ascent of Money, which was published in 2008 and examines the history of money, credit, and banking.

In the Bloomberg piece, Ferguson makes a strong argument that “We are living through a monetary revolution so multifaceted that few of us comprehend its full extent. The technological transformation of the internet is driving this revolution. The pandemic of 2020 has accelerated it.” He goes on to compare the price movements of US dollars, gold, and Bitcoin. This analysis has been done over and over again by investors, so it isn’t novel or overly interesting at this point.

However, I found Ferguson’s historical context around monetary evolution to be very interesting. He wrote:

“First, we should not be surprised that a pandemic has quickened the pace of monetary evolution. In the wake of the Black Death, as the historian Mark Bailey noted in his masterful 2019 Oxford Ford lectures, there was an increased monetization of the English economy. Prior to the ravages of bubonic plague, the feudal system had bound peasants to the land and required them to pay rent in kind, handing over a share of all produce to their lord. With chronic labor shortages came a shift toward  fixed, yearly tenant rents paid in cash. In Italy, too, the economy after the 1340s became more monetized: It was no accident that the most powerful Italian family of the 15th and 16th centuries were the Medici, who made their fortune as Florentine moneychangers.

In a similar way, Covid-19 has been good for Bitcoin and for cryptocurrency generally. First, the pandemic accelerated our advance into a more digital word: What might have taken 10 years has been achieved in 10 months. People who had never before risked an online transaction were forced to try, for the simple reason that banks were closed. Second, and as a result, the pandemic significantly increased our exposure to financial surveillance as well as financial fraud. Both these trends have been good for Bitcoin.”

This historical context is important as we think through what is happening at the moment. Ferguson’s argument is that Bitcoin is quickly taking the lead position as a viable store-of-value for individuals and organizations around the world. He isn’t a blind believer by any means, because he dedicated a good portion of the article to some of the “defects” of Bitcoin from his perspective (slow, high cost, energy consumption). It is good to see a healthy amount of skepticism or detraction in the same piece that ultimately concludes a positive outlook for the digital currency.

Regardless of the accuracy of Ferguson’s defect analysis, he goes on by saying:

“But these disadvantages are outweighed by two unique features. First, as we have seen, Bitcoin offers built-in scarcity in a virtual world characterized by boundless abundance. Second, Bitcoin is sovereign.”

This is interesting because Bitcoin is not the only digital currency trying to capture global adoption. Ferguson dedicates a section of his article to central bank digital currencies:

“At the same time, the People’s Bank of China has accelerated the rollout of its digital currency. The potential for a digital yuan to be adopted for remittance payments or cross-border trade settlements is substantial, especially if — as seems likely — countries participating in the One Belt One Road program are encouraged to use it. Even governments that are resisting Chinese financial penetration, such as India, are essentially building their own versions of China’s electronic payments systems.

Some economists, such as my friend Ken Rogoff, welcome the demise of cash because it will make the management of monetary policy easier and organized crime harder. But it will be a fundamentally different world when all our payments are recorded, centrally stored, and scrutinized by artificial intelligence — regardless of whether it is Amazon’s Jeff Bezos or China’s Xi Jinping who can access our data.”

This excerpt comes simultaneous to Christine Lagarde, President of the ECB, writing an article titled “The future of money – innovating while retaining trust.” In her piece, Lagarde hits on many of the same historical points as Ferguson:

“Throughout history, the nature of money has evolved in response to socioeconomic changes. But the functions of money – as a means of exchange, a unit of account and a store of value – have remained the same for centuries.

One reason why money first emerged was to overcome the limitations and inefficiencies of bartering. As economies became more specialised, trade became all the more essential, and a universal medium of exchange was needed to facilitate it. Coins made from (precious) metals fulfilled that purpose for centuries.

But with the development of international trade, coins became increasingly impractical because they are difficult to store and transport in large volumes.

This led to the next phase in the evolution of money through medieval times into the late middle ages and early modern times. Developments included the advent of Templar’s credit notes in France, private giro banking in Italy, bills of exchange and promissory notes, and the first predecessors of paper money.”

Lagarde then goes on to talk about the potential creation of a central bank digital euro:

“The ECB wants to ensure the euro remains fit for the digital era. Early this year, the Governing Council decided to explore the possibility of issuing of a digital euro – digital central bank money for retail payments, in other words.

The Eurosystem is assessing the implications of the potential introduction of a digital euro, which in legal terms would be a liability of the central bank. In October the ECB published the Report on a digital euro and launched a public consultation.

But why issue a digital euro, if other forms of (private) digital money are already available?

Central bank money is unique. It provides people with unrestricted access to a simple, essentially risk-free and trusted means of payment they can use for any basic transaction. But for retail use it is currently only offered physically in the form of cash.

A digital euro would complement cash and ensure that consumers continue to have unrestricted access to central bank money in a form that meets their evolving digital payment needs.

It could be important in a range of future scenarios, from a decline in the use of cash to pre-empting the uptake of foreign digital currencies in the euro area. Issuing a digital euro might become necessary to ensure both continued access to central bank money and monetary sovereignty.”

It is essential that you pay attention to what Lagarde is highlighting here. She mentions co-existence of digital and legacy money, while also talking about preventing the uptake of foreign digital currencies by citizens of the Eurozone. This is the talk track of someone who is thinking about the offensive and defensive advantages that can be captured by issuing a digital currency.

The ECB is not the only central bank that is thinking about this. The Saudi Central Bank (SAMA) and the Central Bank of the United Arab Emirates (CBUAE) published the results of their joint central bank digital currency study yesterday. These two central banks essentially found that using a digital currency on a distributed ledger would drive costs lower and increase settlement times. This won’t be a surprise to anyone who is watching this space, but it is important that the central banks are going through the steps necessary to reach the foregone conclusion.

So with everyone, from China to Europe to the Middle East, working on central bank digital currencies, what exactly does Niall Ferguson conclude with? A specific call-to-action for President Elect Joe Biden and his administration to embrace Bitcoin.

“Rather than seeking to create a Chinese-style digital dollar, Joe Biden’s nascent administration should recognize the benefits of integrating Bitcoin into the U.S. financial system — which, after all, was originally designed to be less centralized and more respectful of individual privacy than the systems of less-free societies.”

This is a major step in the right direction to have one of the world’s most respected historians and monetary experts calling for Bitcoin’s eventual adoption. Ferguson clearly understands the pros and cons, along with the potential competition from legacy technology and forward-thinking central banks, yet he arrives at the powerful conclusion that Bitcoin will be the final solution.

Time will tell whether Ferguson is correct here, but it sure feels good to have him sharing these thoughts in a Bloomberg Opinion piece as we move towards a new Bitcoin all-time high in US dollar price.

Have a great start to your week. Talk to everyone tomorrow.

-Pomp

This installment of The Pomp Letter is free for everyone. I send this email to our investors daily. If you would also like to receive it every morning, join the 92,000 other investors today.

THE RUNDOWN:

Former Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh Has Died at 46: Tony Hsieh, the retired CEO of Las Vegas-based online shoe retailer Zappos.com who spent years working to transform the city’s downtown area, has died. He was 46. Hsieh was with family when he died Friday, according to a statement from DTP Companies, which he founded. Downtown Partnership spokesperson Megan Fazio said Hsieh passed away in Connecticut. Read more.

Guggenheim Fund Reserves Right to Put Up to 10% in Bitcoin Trust: Count Guggenheim Partners LLC among those institutional investors casting an eye on cryptocurrencies. Guggenheim is reserving the right for its $5.3 billion Macro Opportunities Fund -- which aims for total return via fixed income and other debt and equity securities -- to invest in the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust. The trust’s shares are solely invested in Bitcoin, and track the digital asset’s price less fees and expenses. Read more.

Ripple Is Cashing Out a Third of Its Stake in Surging MoneyGram: Blockchain payments firm Ripple is selling roughly one-third of its stake in MoneyGram, in its first such sale of company stock since the startup invested in the remittance giant in 2019. According to a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing on Friday, Ripple owns 6.22 million shares of MoneyGram, or 8.6% of shares outstanding, plus a warrant to buy up to another 5.95 million shares, for a total equity position of 12.2 million shares, or 17% of MoneyGram’s shares outstanding. Read more.

Salesforce Buying Slack Would Mark the First Big Software Deal In a Boom Year for the Cloud: The tech industry has seen some hefty deals announced during the 2020 pandemic, including several in the tens of billions of dollars. But not in software. That could change soon. Salesforce, which has been one of tech’s biggest acquirers in recent years, has been in talks to buy Slack, CNBC and other media outlets reported on Wednesday. Slack shares surged almost 38% after the initial report, lifting its market cap to $23 billion. Read more.

TikTok Owner Gets Another Week to Sell Its US Business: TikTok's deadline to finalize a US buyer has been extended for the second time in less than a month. The Trump administration on Wednesday gave the short-form video app's Chinese owner, ByteDance, until December 4 to conclude a proposed takeover deal by Oracle and Walmart, according to a spokesperson for the Treasury department. Read more.

Podcast Sponsors

These companies make the podcast possible, so go check them out and thank them for their support!

* OKCoin.com is the leading crypto exchange for both beginners and experienced users. You can fund your account in under 2 minutes, and get access to the most advanced trading engine, all while paying the lowest trading fees in the industry (0.1%). Visit www.okcoin.com/pomp and open your account today. 

* Want to sell your wonderful internet business? Tiny partners with founders to give them quick, straightforward exits that protect their team and culture. We’ll make an offer within a week, close the deal within a month, and keep your business operating for the long term. Get in touch at tinycapital.com, and we’ll let you know within a couple of days.

* Athletic Brewing is re-imagining beer for the modern adult. They love beer. But they also love being healthy, active and at their best. The non-alcoholic beers are fully flavored, clean ingredient, and a fraction of the calories of full strength beer - they fit in any occasion. Check out www.athleticbrewing.com for more details and free shipping nationwide.

* Choice is a new self-directed IRA product that allows you to buy Bitcoin with tax-advantaged dollars, while still holding your private keys. You can go to retirewithchoice.com/pomp to sign up today.

* Unstoppable Domains is working to make the internet operate how it was originally intended, which means anyone can publish anything from anywhere. You can go to unstoppabledomains.com and claim your censorship resistant domain today.

* BlockFi provides financial products for crypto investors. Products include high-yield interest accounts, USD loans, and no fee trading. To start earning today visit: http://www.blockfi.com/Pomp

* Crypto.com allows you to buy, sell, store, earn, loan, and invest various cryptocurrencies in an user friendly mobile app. Join over one million users today. You can download and earn $50 USD with my code “pomp2020” when you sign up for one of their metal cards today.

* Coinlist — Smart investors know being early is critical to success in crypto. CoinList is where early adopters invest in, earn, and trade the best new crypto assets before they list on other exchanges. Sign up via coinlist.co/pomp and earn $10 in BTC after you trade $100.

* Nifty Gateway is the premium NFT platform. They release content from the best NFT artists in the world twice weekly, and have featured many world famous artists including Kenny Scharf, Trevor Jones and WhIsBe. Sign up for an account in advance to participate in the drops: http://www.niftygateway.com

You are receiving The Pomp Letter because you either signed up or you attended one of the events that I spoke at. Feel free to unsubscribe if you aren’t finding this valuable.

Nothing in this email is intended to serve as financial advice. Do your own research.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pomp.substack.com/subscribe

This installment of The Pomp Letter is free for everyone. I send this email to our investors daily. If you would also like to receive it every morning, join the 90,000 other investors today.

To investors,

The news broke yesterday that Janet Yellen will be Joe Biden’s selection for Treasury Secretary in his new administration. This nomination will have a significant impact on asset prices over the coming years, so it is worth digging deeper on Yellen and her perspective on various policies.

Janet Yellen is one of the ultimate trail blazers in American history. She is a classically trained economist who became the first woman to Chair the Federal Reserve in 2014. She served in that role for 4 years. Before that, Yellen was the Vice Chair of the Federal Reserve, President of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, and served two stints as a Federal Reserve Board Governor. Simply, Janet Yellen has been around for a long time and served in some of the most important economic roles our country has to offer.

If you want to learn more about Janet Yellen, you can read her Wikipedia page. There are a few things that I find very interesting about her nomination in the current environment:

* Yellen has previously shown a bias to allow bubbles to continue much longer than her peers. One example is “In a 2005 speech in San Francisco, Yellen argued against deflating the housing bubble because "arguments against trying to deflate a bubble outweigh those in favor of it" and predicted that the housing bubble "could be large enough to feel like a good-sized bump in the road, but the economy would likely be able to absorb the shock."

* Yellen is known to have an “inflationary bias.” One of the elected officials who voted against her 2010 nomination to Vice Chair of the Federal Reserve actually used that exact phrase as rationale for his vote against her. Additionally, “Yellen has been an outspoken advocate for using the powers of the Federal Reserve to reduce unemployment, and has seemed more willing than other economists to risk slightly higher inflation to accomplish this goal.”

* In 2013, during the confirmation hearing for Yellen to take over as the Federal Reserve Chair, she defended the $3 trillion of monetary stimulus that was used during the housing crisis. This was followed in 2017 when she stated that she did not believe we would see another financial crisis “in our lifetime.” A year later though, “Yellen later warned of the possibility of a financial crisis by citing "gigantic holes in the system" after her departure from the Federal Reserve.”

The key thing you need to know is that Yellen is a classic Keynesian economists who believes that an economy can only operate properly with the intervention of a central bank. She is widely considered a “dove,” which means that she is more likely to focus on unemployment and other metrics, rather than ensure that we keep low levels of inflation.

Essentially, Janet Yellen is likely to be Bitcoin’s greatest ally over the coming 4-8 years. She has never seen an opportunity to print money that she didn’t like. She has never seen a situation of high inflation that scared her. Given that we are currently living during a period of high unemployment due to the coronavirus, it would be my expectation that Janet Yellen will begin pulling out every tool of monetary stimulus to get unemployment lower.

This perspective is identical to the Federal Reserve’s current stance that they would like to see inflation hit 2%+ for a sustained period of time. You don’t have to be a genius to see what we are being set up for — high levels of inflation that will be disguised as “normal” by career economists who believe they are omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient.

As we have discussed previously, Bitcoin will benefit from the fear of high inflation, regardless of whether it actually occurs or not. When people think high levels of inflation are coming, they will move their capital to be positioned in inflation-hedge assets. If the inflation comes, great. If the inflation never happens, the capital flows will drive asset prices higher anyways. This concept is counter-intuitive, but we have seen it play out numerous times in the past.

Janet Yellen will solidify the narrative that higher inflation is coming. She will drive home the point that monetary stimulus bombs are always right around the corner. This will be an even stronger tailwind for Bitcoin in the coming 12 months. With Bitcoin poised to hit an all-time high in the coming days, you can’t help but smile.

Have a great day. I’ll talk to everyone tomorrow.

-Pomp

SPONSORED: Withum is a forward-thinking, technology-driven advisory and accounting firm committed to helping our clients be more profitable, efficient and productive in today's complex business environment. Our Digital Currency group is proud to partner with members of the cryptocurrency community. Get to know us at withum.com/crypto.

THE RUNDOWN:

PayPal CEO Schulman Say He’s Bullish on Bitcoin as a Currency: PayPal CEO Dan Schulman said bitcoin’s usefulness as a currency will ultimately prevail over the buy-and-hold ethos, in an interview with CNBC Squawk Box on Monday. "I think that there'll be more and more use cases for cryptocurrencies," that make bitcoin more widely accepted, more stable and probably "more valuable" over time. Read more.

More Institutions Are Buying Bitcoin, Say JPMorgan Analysts: In their “Flows & Liquidity” report, JPMorgan analysts say institutions are piling into bitcoin at a stronger pace this quarter than they were in Q3, and may have a bigger role in price movement than commodity trading advisors, or CTA. Read more.

Biden to Tap Former Fed Chair Janet Yellen as Treasury Secretary: Former Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen is set to become the next head of the U.S. Treasury Department. President-elect Joe Biden intends to nominate the longtime economist to succeed Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin when Biden takes office next year, the Wall Street Journal reported Monday. Any nominee would have to be confirmed by the U.S. Senate. Read more.

John Lennon’s Son Says Bitcoin ‘Empowers’ People Like Never Before: The younger son of Beatles legend John Lennon has praised bitcoin for its ability to help individuals transcend politics and world events. Sean Ono Lennon, speaking on the Orange Pill Podcast on Sunday, said bitcoin “empowers people in a way they’ve never been empowered before.” He noted that, the world’s first cryptocurrency is “one of the only things” that gives him more optimism about “the future and humanity in general” amid the tribulations of 2020. Read more.

Restaurant Tech Startup Toast Soars to $8 Billion Valuation: Last week, Toast closed a secondary sale that allowed current and former employees to sell up to 25% of their vested shares for $75 a piece, according to CNBC. The deal values Toast at about $8 billion. The company last raised a primary round in February, just before the coronavirus hit the U.S., reeling in $400 million at a $4.9 billion valuation. The share price at that time was reportedly $45.45. Read more.

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE

Nic Carter is a Partner at Castle Island Ventures and a Co-Founder of CoinMetrics.

In this conversation, Nic and I discuss:

* Bitcoin’s market cap all-time high

* GBTC’s premium

* DeFi

* Satoshi’s coins

* Ray Dalio

* What metrics Nic checks every morning when he wakes up

I really enjoyed this conversation with Nic. Hopefully you enjoy it too.

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE

Podcast Sponsors

These companies make the podcast possible, so go check them out and thank them for their support!

* OKCoin.com is the leading crypto exchange for both beginners and experienced users. You can fund your account in under 2 minutes, and get access to the most advanced trading engine, all while paying the lowest trading fees in the industry (0.1%). Visit www.okcoin.com/pomp and open your account today. 

* Want to sell your wonderful internet business? Tiny partners with founders to give them quick, straightforward exits that protect their team and culture. We’ll make an offer within a week, close the deal within a month, and keep your business operating for the long term. Get in touch at tinycapital.com, and we’ll let you know within a couple of days.

* Athletic Brewing is re-imagining beer for the modern adult. They love beer. But they also love being healthy, active and at their best. The non-alcoholic beers are fully flavored, clean ingredient, and a fraction of the calories of full strength beer - they fit in any occasion. Check out www.athleticbrewing.com for more details and free shipping nationwide.

* Choice is a new self-directed IRA product that allows you to buy Bitcoin with tax-advantaged dollars, while still holding your private keys. You can go to retirewithchoice.com/pomp to sign up today.

* Unstoppable Domains is working to make the internet operate how it was originally intended, which means anyone can publish anything from anywhere. You can go to unstoppabledomains.com and claim your censorship resistant domain today.

* BlockFi provides financial products for crypto investors. Products include high-yield interest accounts, USD loans, and no fee trading. To start earning today visit: http://www.blockfi.com/Pomp

* Crypto.com allows you to buy, sell, store, earn, loan, and invest various cryptocurrencies in an user friendly mobile app. Join over one million users today. You can download and earn $50 USD with my code “pomp2020” when you sign up for one of their metal cards today.

* Coinlist — Smart investors know being early is critical to success in crypto. CoinList is where early adopters invest in, earn, and trade the best new crypto assets before they list on other exchanges. Sign up via coinlist.co/pomp and earn $10 in BTC after you trade $100.

* Nifty Gateway is the premium NFT platform. They release content from the best NFT artists in the world twice weekly, and have featured many world famous artists including Kenny Scharf, Trevor Jones and WhIsBe. Sign up for an account in advance to participate in the drops: http://www.niftygateway.com

You are receiving The Pomp Letter because you either signed up or you attended one of the events that I spoke at. Feel free to unsubscribe if you aren’t finding this valuable.

Nothing in this email is intended to serve as financial advice. Do your own research.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pomp.substack.com/subscribe

This installment of The Pomp Letter is free for everyone. I send this email to our investors daily. If you would also like to receive it every morning, join the 85,000 other investors today.

To investors,

Bitcoin has continued a breathtaking run and eclipsed $17,000 per bitcoin this morning. This puts the year-to-date appreciation of the digital currency at more than 135% against the dollar, while also being up 88% since the halving in May 2020.

All eyes are now on the all-time high price of $20,000. As a reminder, bitcoin moved from $10,000 to $20,000 in only 10 days in 2017. The digital currency spent less than 72 hours at that level before experiencing a nasty 80%+ drawdown that took almost an entire year to play out. The bears were out in full force during this entire drawdown. They were screaming that bitcoin was going to $0. They were telling everyone bitcoin was nothing more than Chuck E. Cheese tokens.

Well, in a wild twist of fate, oil futures went negative and Chuck E. Cheese went bankrupt, yet bitcoin still didn’t go to $0. In fact, it has come back with a vengeance. We are now sitting at $17,000 in price, which is leading many people to start the countdown to a new all-time high. The milestone they are waiting for is $20,000, but I’m not convinced that is the best way to evaluate an all-time high in price.

Nic Carter, from Castle Island Ventures, has been all over this for weeks:

Additionally, if we take a look at the new www.casebitcoin.com site, we can see a few other great data points:

This is important because I believe the market cap metric is much more important than the price of a single bitcoin. The supply slowly increases, so total market cap better represents where the market is over time. We are currently sitting at just over $315 billion — only 3 days in the history of bitcoin have ever been higher.

Price is not the only metric to watch either. Nic Carter put out a piece that hit on a bunch of other metrics that are at an all-time high, including wallet addresses with at least $10 in them, open CME futures interest, realized capitalization, bitcoin options open interest, bitcoin priced in various currencies other than USD, bitcoin held by Grayscale, and stablecoin free float. I highly recommend reading his write up here.

While the price, and many other metrics, are aggressively accelerating, there is much less discussion about bitcoin in the mainstream media and on social media platforms. Yesterday, Bloomberg wrote an article saying that no one is talking about it — the irony is awesome when one of the largest financial media companies writing an article claiming that no one is talking about something.

Additionally, we saw Bitcoin trending on Twitter in the United States this morning as well.

The momentum we are seeing is really strong. I have no clue where short term price movements will go. Bitcoin is a beast — it can increase and decrease in price rapidly. My thesis for the next 12-14 months continues to remain intact. If the mainstream conversation shifts at some point and people start talking about bitcoin like they did in 2017, we could see price movements even larger than I previously anticipated.

It is crucial during euphoric times like this to remember a few simple rules:

* Don’t get cocky. The market is the ultimate referee.

* Information and data can change quickly. Make sure you’re paying attention.

* Be open to changing your mind if you get new information.

* The best investors press their winners harder than anyone else.

* It is our responsibility to educate and welcome everyone who shows interest in bitcoin, regardless of whether they were previously bearish or not.

Bitcoin will hit a new all-time high in market cap at some point and then eventually hit an all-time high in price. The bears will be proven wrong. The bulls will be vindicated. I’m just not convinced that this will be the end of the story. It still sounds crazy to many, but I believe we are watching the rise of the next global reserve currency. If that happens, we are all still so early.

Have a great day. I’ll talk to everyone tomorrow.

BONUS: I wrote a piece for Polina’s The Profile this weekend on the importance of focusing on HOW to think, rather than WHAT to think. Click here to read.

-Pomp

This Fintech Startup Just Returned 32% to Its Investors: New York-based art investment platform Masterworks reported a sale of their Banksy masterpiece resulting in a 32% annual return (net of fees) to investors in a little over 12 months. This successful exit represents nearly twice the S&P 500 total return over the same period, reaffirming the company’s mission of providing access to outperforming non-correlated assets to investors of all types. Bitcoin has been en fuego this year and if you're looking for another asset that's not correlated to the stock market, then check out Masterworks. Their art experts will help you create a custom portfolio of artworks to round out your portfolio - from artists like KAWS, Banksy and Monet.

SPONSORED: To learn how investing in art can improve your portfolio visit Masterworks and skip the 32,000 waitlist.*

THE RUNDOWN:

Jay Clayton Says He Will Step Down Early as Head of the SEC at the End of 2020: Jay Clayton, who has led the Securities and Exchange Commission for the past 3½ years that included a number of major changes in financial markets, said Monday he will step down at the end of the year. “Working alongside the incredibly talented and driven women and men of the SEC has been the highlight of my career,” Clayton said in a statement. His term would have expired in June 2021. Read more.

Airbnb Files to Go Public, Turned a Profit Last Quarter: Airbnb on Monday released its prospectus to debut on public markets. The company allows users to book short-term rentals and experiences while traveling. The company made $219 million in net income on revenues of $1.34 billion last quarter. That was down nearly 19% from $1.65 billion in revenue a year prior. Despite primarily turning net losses, the company has had other occasional quarters of profitability, including the second and third quarters of 2018 and the third quarter of 2019. Read more.

Scaramucci’s $9.2B SkyBridge ‘May Seek Exposure to Digital Assets:’ Anthony Scaramucci’s mega hedge fund, SkyBridge Capital, just gave itself the ability to bet on cryptocurrencies from afar. In a series of filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission published Friday and Monday, the $9.2 billion asset manager helmed by the one-time spokesman of U.S. President Trump signaled that two of its funds “may seek exposure to digital assets.” The documents are meant to give SkyBridge the green light to invest in other funds that have money in the crypto markets or in the companies supporting the ecosystem. Read more.

IBM Scores Patent on Proposed Blockchain Consensus for Transactions in Multiplayer Games: Tech giant IBM has been granted a patent on a blockchain-based consensus model envisioned for use in handling transactions within multiplayer games with a large user base. The U.S. patent, titled “Gaming consensus protocol for blockchain,” was awarded last week and proposes the model of electing a subset of any game’s users to verify transactions, and then from within that subset choosing a leader to generate a block and broadcast it to the blockchain network.Read more.

Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway makes Big Bets on Drug Stocks: Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway is making a big bet on the health care sector at a time when the Covid-19 pandemic continues to be a major crisis in the United States. Berkshire Hathaway bought new shares in pharmaceutical companies AbbVie, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Merck and Pfizer during the third quarter. Pfizer has a promising coronavirus vaccine in the works, but the company's stock fell Monday after Moderna announced progress for its own vaccine. Read more.

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE

Yoni Assia is the founder and CEO of eToro, the largest social trading platform in the world. He has been a Bitcoin proponent for almost a decade and was part of the team that built the original colored coins too.

In this conversation, Yoni and I discuss:

* Institutional services

* Rise of millennial investor

* Staking

* SPACs

* Renewable energy, sustainable meat, and gene editing

* Retail investor behavior during recent crypto boom

I really enjoyed this conversation with Yoni. Hopefully you enjoy it too.

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE

Podcast Sponsors

These companies make the podcast possible, so go check them out and thank them for their support!

* OKCoin.com is the leading crypto exchange for both beginners and experienced users. You can fund your account in under 2 minutes, and get access to the most advanced trading engine, all while paying the lowest trading fees in the industry (0.1%). Visit www.okcoin.com/pomp and open your account today. 

* Want to sell your wonderful internet business? Tiny partners with founders to give them quick, straightforward exits that protect their team and culture. We’ll make an offer within a week, close the deal within a month, and keep your business operating for the long term. Get in touch at tinycapital.com, and we’ll let you know within a couple of days.

* Athletic Brewing is re-imagining beer for the modern adult. They love beer. But they also love being healthy, active and at their best. The non-alcoholic beers are fully flavored, clean ingredient, and a fraction of the calories of full strength beer - they fit in any occasion. Check out www.athleticbrewing.com for more details and free shipping nationwide.

* Choice is a new self-directed IRA product that allows you to buy Bitcoin with tax-advantaged dollars, while still holding your private keys. You can go to retirewithchoice.com/pomp to sign up today.

* Unstoppable Domains is working to make the internet operate how it was originally intended, which means anyone can publish anything from anywhere. You can go to unstoppabledomains.com and claim your censorship resistant domain today.

* BlockFi provides financial products for crypto investors. Products include high-yield interest accounts, USD loans, and no fee trading. To start earning today visit: http://www.blockfi.com/Pomp

* Crypto.com allows you to buy, sell, store, earn, loan, and invest various cryptocurrencies in an user friendly mobile app. Join over one million users today. You can download and earn $50 USD with my code “pomp2020” when you sign up for one of their metal cards today.

* Coinlist — Smart investors know being early is critical to success in crypto. CoinList is where early adopters invest in, earn, and trade the best new crypto assets before they list on other exchanges. Sign up via coinlist.co/pomp and earn $10 in BTC after you trade $100.

* Nifty Gateway is the premium NFT platform. They release content from the best NFT artists in the world twice weekly, and have featured many world famous artists including Kenny Scharf, Trevor Jones and WhIsBe. Sign up for an account in advance to participate in the drops: http://www.niftygateway.com

You are receiving The Pomp Letter because you either signed up or you attended one of the events that I spoke at. Feel free to unsubscribe if you aren’t finding this valuable.

Nothing in this email is intended to serve as financial advice. Do your own research.

*See important information

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pomp.substack.com/subscribe

This installment of The Pomp Letter is free for everyone. I send this email to our investors daily. If you would also like to receive it every morning, join the 85,000 other investors today.

To investors,

I’ve spent the last few days talking with many of the smartest investors I know. My goal was to get an understanding of how they are thinking about various markets and assets, while also identifying what they are excited or worried about. Here are a few takeaways that I found interesting and/or worth sharing:

First, many investors feel that COVID-19 and any impending stimulus packages will have a much greater impact on markets than who wins the Presidential election. The thought process is that the President could create long-term systemic environment changes, but most of the short-term changes are going to be related to whether businesses are impacted by government-mandated shut downs, along with how much liquidity is being injected into the market by the Federal Reserve.

The general consensus is that the United States is unlikely to experience another shelter-in-place order. This doesn’t absolve the markets from reacting to negative headlines or lockdown orders in other countries. As the virus continues to run its course, the Federal Reserve and our elected officials are going to have to introduce more stimulus. The size of this stimulus package appears to fall along party lines — Democrat investors see $2B+ on the horizon and Republican investors see less than $2B in the next package. My guess is that we will end up somewhere in between at approximately $2B.

Second, every single investor I talked with brought up concerns related to taxes. There appears to be a strong fear of significant increases in various taxes — from income taxes to capital gains to inheritance taxes — under a Joe Biden administration. As one Democrat investor put it to me, “I’m a Democrat but I don’t like giving more of my money to the government.”

It is unclear what every investor is doing to mitigate these risks, but it does appear that some investors are positioning themselves to accelerate estate planning if Biden wins. There was also a recent article in Bloomberg that highlighted Ken Griffin’s recent comments about potentially moving Citadel to Florida or Texas. This article reflected something else I heard a few times — the President is important, but it may be more important to see how significant the Democrats control of lower levels of government are (House, Senate, Governors, etc).

Third, investors are definitely prepared for high levels of volatility over the coming months. Each person is positioning themselves to deal with the volatility differently, but they are all anticipating it. Some people are considering holding more cash in the short term. Others want to play the VIX. And others are acknowledging the higher probability for volatility, but claim that it won’t change their investment strategy over the medium to long-term.

Fourth, if every investor brought up tax considerations, then inflation was the second most popular topic. Majority of the investors I spoke with feel that inflation is a foregone conclusion at this point — they pointed to the Federal Reserve’s public commitment to get to 2%+ inflation or they commented about the unlikely scenario of printing trillions of dollars without inflation ever occurring. When I asked investors what they were doing to protect themselves, the answers varied drastically. Some investors are buying up precious metals and mining stocks (more stocks than the metals themselves is my feeling), while others are seeking refuge in real estate and luxury art.

It was interesting that majority of the investors I spoke with did not volunteer the fact that they held bitcoin. I would have to specifically ask and then the investors would admit that bitcoin was a part of the inflation hedge strategy. It was weird. Almost like we were talking about a dirty secret, but then once the topic was broached, investors seemed very bullish on the asset’s outlook over the next 12-24 months.

Lastly, most of the investors I spoke with brought up some version of the following — Presidential elections create opportunities for entries to new investment positions, but they rarely lead to mass selling or position exits. The general thought process is that it would be really short-sighted to bet against the United States, regardless of who is the President of the country. Almost every single investor had a feeling that the long-term impact of this election, along with all elections, is minimal at best.

I reminded one of the more bearish investors that we live in the safest, most prosperous time in human history. His response was “Yes, that is definitely not a trend that I see changing any time soon.” So with a long-term tailwind, investors appear to be paying attention to the election but they aren’t making significant investment decisions around the event. However, they are definitely making decisions based on tax and estate planning implications.

As the saying goes, “the more things change, the more they stay the same.” This election appears to be no different. Stay safe out there my friends. Have a great election day and I’ll talk to everyone tomorrow.

-Pomp

This installment of The Pomp Letter is free for everyone. I send this email to our investors daily. If you would also like to receive it every morning, join the 85,000 other investors today.

THE RUNDOWN:

PBOC Governor Says 4 Million Transactions so Far in Digital Yuan: Yi Gang, governor of the People’s Bank of China, said a pilot program on the rollout of a digital currency in four cities has been smooth. There have been more than 4 million transactions, totaling over 2 billion yuan ($299 million) in the digital currency so far, Yi said at the Hong Kong Fintech Week conference on Monday. Read more.

PayPal Raises Crypto Buying Limit to $15K/Week for ‘Eager’ Customers: PayPal’s cryptocurrency service is going to expand rapidly in 2021, executives said on the payments giant’s third-quarter earnings call Monday evening. That includes crypto services coming to Venmo and international customers in the first half of 2021, PayPal CEO Dan Schulman said. Read more.

Mastercard President Says Crypto Patents Will Pay Off When Central Bank Digital Currencies Arrive: Mastercard President Michael Miebach said the payments processor’s massive trove of cryptocurrency patents will give it an edge once central bank digital currencies debut. Mastercard's cryptocurrency intellectual property "puts us in a good position" for a CBDC future, Miebach told analysts during the firm's Oct. 28 Q3 earnings call. Read more.

Cybersecurity Threats to Corporate America Are Present Now ‘More Than Ever:’ Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Jay Clayton is telling corporate America it needs to get much more vigilant on security. In an interview Monday on CNBC’s “Power Lunch,” stressed that significant cybersecurity threats remain, despite the ongoing coronavirus pandemic and election season. “Cyber risks have not gone away with the unfortunate, unforeseen risks we’ve faced with Covid and other uncertainties in our economy,” he said. “They’re still there, and they’re there more than ever.” Read more.

Uber and Lyft Rise as Investors Expect California Voters to Pass Prop 22: Uber and Lyft shares rose 4.2% and 7.3%, respectively, as investors expect California voters on Tuesday to pass Proposition 22, which would allow the ride-sharing companies to maintain their current business model. If it passes, Proposition 22 would exempt ride-sharing and delivery companies from a new California law that forces such gig economy companies to reclassify their workers as employees rather than contractors, and offer benefits such as sick leave and unemployment protection. Read more.

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE

Mario Gabriele is the Founder and Writer at The Generalist, a new publication that covers the technology industry from idea to IPO. He previously worked at a number of venture capital firms, including Charge Ventures and Red Sea Ventures.

In this conversation, Mario and I discuss:

* How Mario built The Generalist so far

* Why he enjoys writing so much

* How he has handled a hedge fund bully who is threatening him

* His stories on Ant Group and Audience + Wealth

I really enjoyed this conversation with Mario. Hopefully you enjoy it too.

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE

Podcast Sponsors

These companies make the podcast possible, so go check them out and thank them for their support!

* Want to sell your wonderful internet business? Tiny partners with founders to give them quick, straightforward exits that protect their team and culture. We’ll make an offer within a week, close the deal within a month, and keep your business operating for the long term. Get in touch at tinycapital.com, and we’ll let you know within a couple of days.

* Athletic Brewing is re-imagining beer for the modern adult. They love beer. But they also love being healthy, active and at their best. The non-alcoholic beers are fully flavored, clean ingredient, and a fraction of the calories of full strength beer - they fit in any occasion. Check out www.athleticbrewing.com for more details and free shipping nationwide.

* Choice is a new self-directed IRA product that allows you to buy Bitcoin with tax-advantaged dollars, while still holding your private keys. You can go to retirewithchoice.com/pomp to sign up today.

* Unstoppable Domains is working to make the internet operate how it was originally intended, which means anyone can publish anything from anywhere. You can go to unstoppabledomains.com and claim your censorship resistant domain today.

* BlockFi provides financial products for crypto investors. Products include high-yield interest accounts, USD loans, and no fee trading. To start earning today visit: http://www.blockfi.com/Pomp

* Crypto.com allows you to buy, sell, store, earn, loan, and invest various cryptocurrencies in an user friendly mobile app. Join over one million users today. You can download and earn $50 USD with my code “pomp2020” when you sign up for one of their metal cards today.

* Coinlist — Smart investors know being early is critical to success in crypto. CoinList is where early adopters invest in, earn, and trade the best new crypto assets before they list on other exchanges. Sign up via coinlist.co/pomp and earn $10 in BTC after you trade $100.

* Nifty Gateway is the premium NFT platform. They release content from the best NFT artists in the world twice weekly, and have featured many world famous artists including Kenny Scharf, Trevor Jones and WhIsBe. Sign up for an account in advance to participate in the drops: http://www.niftygateway.com

* OKCoin.com is the leading crypto exchange for both beginners and experienced users. You can fund your account in under 2 minutes, and get access to the most advanced trading engine, all while paying the lowest trading fees in the industry (0.1%). Visit www.okcoin.com/pomp and open your account today. 

You are receiving The Pomp Letter because you either signed up or you attended one of the events that I spoke at. Feel free to unsubscribe if you aren’t finding this valuable.

Nothing in this email is intended to serve as financial advice. Do your own research.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pomp.substack.com/subscribe

This installment of The Pomp Letter is free for everyone. I send this email to our investors daily. If you would also like to receive it every morning, join the 80,000 other investors today.

To investors,

I am announcing the first investor endorsement deal in the crypto industry today.

I’ve always been fascinated by the way that brands work with world-class athletes in an endorsement model. These brands aren’t paying for impressions, nor are they seeking direct response measurement of how many people convert to customers. Endorsement deals aren’t advertising deals. They are something much more pervasive than that. The brand is choosing to align themselves with someone they feel embodies the ethos of the brand and the athlete is choosing to align themselves with a brand and product that they believe in.

The most famous example of an athlete endorsement deal is Michael Jordan and Nike, but there are countless others. So why exactly does this only happen in sports if it is such a win-win for the brand, the athlete, and the customer? My hypothesis has always been that the endorsement model would eventually find its way to business and finance. Investors and founders are the new athletes. They have an audience. They have influence. They have opinions. And they have perspectives on which products are good and which ones aren’t.

So why should we wait around for this trend to happen? I’m not a patient guy and I prefer to create the world I want to live in.

So today I am announcing the first investor endorsement deal in Bitcoin and crypto — I have partnered with Kingdom Trust, an independent qualified custodian with more than $15 billion in assets under management, who powers over 100,000 retirement accounts and currently custodies more than 20,000 alternative assets.

The number one question I get from people is “how can I buy Bitcoin in my retirement account?” This was a big problem for me as well. Not anymore though. Kingdom Trust recently launched a new product, Choice by Kingdom Trust, that solves this in a unique way that remains true to the Bitcoin ethos. Here is how it works:

* You open an account with Choice (click here)

* You contribute new funds to your account or roll over existing retirement funds

* You purchase Bitcoin and can hold your own private keys

This is a really big deal. There are millions of people who currently hold Bitcoin, yet don’t have any Bitcoin in their retirement accounts. That is going to change very quickly with Choice. The best part though? You get to hold your private keys. As every Bitcoin investor knows, “not your keys, not your coins.”

Personally, I’ve opened a Choice account and put 100% of my retirement funds in the product. The team has been advertising on the podcast for awhile and over time it became very obvious that we were aligned on a lot of things. Most importantly, we wanted to work together in a more meaningful way to get Bitcoin in every retirement account in America.

So here we are — Choice by Kingdom Trust is the first company to be forward thinking enough to sign an investor endorsement deal.

With this deal, they are aligning themselves with me and I’m publicly stating that they are the best solution on the market for buying Bitcoin in your retirement account. I’m not saying this because of the endorsement deal, I’m doing the endorsement deal because I believe in them enough to put all of my retirement money with them. We are planning a lot of cool things under this endorsement deal — events, appearances, merchandise, content, and much more.

This should be a lot of fun and I anticipate many other brands will follow suit. The founders and investors across industries have too much audience and influence to be ignored moving forward. The investor endorsement deal will become an industry staple over time.

If you want to sign up for a Choice account and put Bitcoin in your retirement account, you can sign up here.

Have a great day and I’ll talk to everyone tomorrow.

-Pomp

THE RUNDOWN:

Bitcoin Approaches Highest Level Since Post-Bubble Crash in 2018: Bitcoin is approaching levels not seen since just after the burst of the cryptocurrency market bubble almost three years ago. The biggest digital token by market value rose as much as 4.8% to $13,638 on Tuesday, just below the high of $13,851 set on June 26, 2019. If it surpasses that level, it would be highest since Bitcoin traded at $16,932 in January 2018, or just weeks after the token reached an all-time level of around $20,000. It dipped to $3,136 in December 2018. Read more.

JPMorgan Creates New Unit for Blockchain Projects: At JPMorgan Chase, the firm’s digital currency JPM Coin is being used commercially for the first time this week by a large technology client to send payments around the world, said Takis Georgakopoulos, the bank’s global head of wholesale payments. Read more.

MicroStrategy Is Looking to Buy More Bitcoin, President Says: MicroStrategy is looking to add to its $521 million stash of bitcoin, the company’s president said Tuesday during the business intelligence firm’s earnings conference call. MicroStrategy President Phong LiBesides the 22% return on its BTC investment, the company has seen another benefit from its foray into cryptocurrency – increased visibility. “We’ve seen a notable and unexpected benefit from our investment in bitcoin in elevating the profile of the company in the broader market, Li said. “This is benefitting our reputation overall, raising our mindshare among prospective customers.” Read more.

More Than Half of US Investors Interested in Bitcoin, Grayscale Survey Finds: A survey conducted by digital asset manager Grayscale Investments suggests investor interest in bitcoin is on the rise and the top cryptocurrency by market cap is well on its way toward mainstream adoption. Released Tuesday, Grayscale’s “Bitcoin Investor Study” revealed more than half (55%) of U.S. investors who responded are interested in buying bitcoin (BTC) in 2020. Compared to the previous year, the results mark a “significant increase,” the company said, with a rise of 19%. Read more.

Coinbase Goes Down as Bitcoin Approaches 2019 Highs: U.S. cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase has disabled trading due to feed issues amid bitcoin’s ascension towards 2019 highs near $13,880. According to a company update on Wednesday, Coinbase said they were "currently investigating the issue," while no further comment was provided. Read more.

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE

Chris Herd is the Founder and CEO of Firstbase, which provides remote teams with all the tools they need to be as safe, comfortable, and productive at home as they could be in office.

In this conversation, Chris and I discuss:

* The emerging trends of remote work

* How companies are changing their operations

* What employees need to know as corporations transition to a remote-first world

I really enjoyed this conversation with Chris. Hopefully you enjoy it too.

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE

Podcast Sponsors

These companies make the podcast possible, so go check them out and thank them for their support!

* Want to sell your wonderful internet business? Tiny partners with founders to give them quick, straightforward exits that protect their team and culture. We’ll make an offer within a week, close the deal within a month, and keep your business operating for the long term. Get in touch at tinycapital.com, and we’ll let you know within a couple of days.

* Athletic Brewing is re-imagining beer for the modern adult. They love beer. But they also love being healthy, active and at their best. The non-alcoholic beers are fully flavored, clean ingredient, and a fraction of the calories of full strength beer - they fit in any occasion. Check out www.athleticbrewing.com for more details and free shipping nationwide.

* Choice is a new self-directed IRA product that allows you to buy Bitcoin with tax-advantaged dollars, while still holding your private keys. You can go to retirewithchoice.com/pomp to sign up today.

* Unstoppable Domains is working to make the internet operate how it was originally intended, which means anyone can publish anything from anywhere. You can go to unstoppabledomains.com and claim your censorship resistant domain today.

* BlockFi provides financial products for crypto investors. Products include high-yield interest accounts, USD loans, and no fee trading. To start earning today visit: http://www.blockfi.com/Pomp

* Crypto.com allows you to buy, sell, store, earn, loan, and invest various cryptocurrencies in an user friendly mobile app. Join over one million users today. You can download and earn $50 USD with my code “pomp2020” when you sign up for one of their metal cards today.

* Coinlist — Smart investors know being early is critical to success in crypto. CoinList is where early adopters invest in, earn, and trade the best new crypto assets before they list on other exchanges. Sign up via coinlist.co/pomp and earn $10 in BTC after you trade $100.

* Nifty Gateway is the premium NFT platform. They release content from the best NFT artists in the world twice weekly, and have featured many world famous artists including Kenny Scharf, Trevor Jones and WhIsBe. Sign up for an account in advance to participate in the drops: http://www.niftygateway.com

You are receiving The Pomp Letter because you either signed up or you attended one of the events that I spoke at. Feel free to unsubscribe if you aren’t finding this valuable.

Nothing in this email is intended to serve as financial advice. Do your own research.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pomp.substack.com/subscribe

To investors,

The United States financial system has long enjoyed a position of global leadership due to the clear regulatory environment, deep liquidity, strong economy, large asset management firms, and advanced technology. You can see the leadership highlighted in the US dollar’s global reserve status, the US stock exchanges, and the flow of capital to US investors and companies.

These country-specific advantages made a lot of sense in a world where companies and products were tied to a geography. The NASDAQ or New York Stock Exchange are both based in New York. A US financial firm is based in an American city. The Federal Reserve is based in Washington, DC. You get the picture.

We are transitioning to a world where physical geography doesn’t matter anymore though. This transition started under the current system when traders didn’t have to go the stock exchange floor and computers could execute transactions. You then started to see the transition continue during COVID-19 when the Federal Reserve was holding remote meetings. But this is all small evolution type change — there is a tidal wave of disruption that is about to occur and the US financial system is not ready for it.

The most important economy in the world is not tied to a single geography. It is instead the digital world that we all live in when we get on our computers and smartphones. In order to thrive in the digital world, you have to become proficient in the native currency (Bitcoin), native communication (asynchronous), and native customs (memes/gifs). But there has been one thing missing from this digital world over the last few decades — a native financial system.

We have merely been using the legacy financial system (that was built for the physical, geographic-based world) with a few tweaks in the digital world. It is becoming clear that this old system is holding back progress though. It takes too long to send money around the world. The power is still concentrated too heavily in the hands of the politically connected, powerful people of the past. There are antiquated regulations that allow incumbents the ability to slow down, or even stop, progress so that they can continue to profit. Simply, the bandaid solution was to evolve the legacy financial system to appear effective in the digital world, but we are now beginning to understand that this won’t be sufficient.

A new digitally-native financial system is being built from scratch to serve digital citizens globally. We had to start with the creation of a native currency for this economy and we now have Bitcoin. No one controls it. No one has an outsized advantage in acquiring it. No one can use it to hurt anyone else. It is fair, equitable, and the embodiment of the internet ethos that digital citizens have come to know and love.

The next step is for digital citizens to build fully decentralized financial applications. These products and services will serve the same purpose as the centralized versions, but they will follow the same principles as Bitcoin. No one will own them. No one will have an outsized advantage in using them. And no one can use them to hurt anyone else. There are lots of teams trying to build these decentralized applications now, but so far there have been very few that adequately fulfill the necessary elements of what will make one of these products sustainable.

If we can have fully decentralized money and fully decentralized financial applications, we will achieve the impossible — a new, fully functioning financial system that is native to the digital world. The incumbents of yesterday will be on the same level playing field as everyone else. Technology will serve as the great equalizer. It won’t be about who has the most money, is the most connected, or can capture gains based on regulatory arbitrage. Instead, the system will reward those who are the most intelligent, those who have the courage and conviction to act earliest, and those who show a proficiency in the skills necessary for the digital world.

Governments and incumbents are not oblivious to what is going on here. They are watching closely. Whether it is the Chairman of the CFTC talking positively about Bitcoin and Ethereum, or it is China trying to build a centralized digital currency, they are all paying attention. One of the most interesting developments to watch will be who remains a passive onlooker compared to who becomes an active participant. We are seeing most of the innovation come from the private sector (as you would expect), but eventually these governments are going to start jumping in the game.

An easy first step would be to begin putting Bitcoin in their central bank reserves. If that happens in a major country, it will set off a global game of FOMO. There are countries that will also start to embrace the decentralized applications as well. They will realize that it is ineffective to fight the transition and those who lead the way will be rewarded nicely. It appears that Dubai is getting ready to make a major leap in that direction — they have put forward new legislation drafts that would usher in a digital financial system/assets within the country. China and other countries in Asia are jumping in head first. Unfortunately, the United States is the laggard here. Hopefully that will change.

The playbook is simple. We live in a digital world. Physical geographies don’t matter nearly as much as they once did. There will be a new currency and financial system built native to this digital world. We already have the currency and it is gaining global adoption at an incredible rate. The decentralized financial applications are in the experimental phase right now. Majority (95%+) of the current iterations won’t survive, nor will they ever gain any significant traction. The next iteration will be the ones to watch (we saw this in the internet too — most ideas in late ‘90s were great, but too early….they all became successful when tried again about a decade later).

The disruption that is underway will take a long time to play out. I’m more convinced now than ever that Bitcoiners are right. The future is clear. We will have the digitally native financial system that leverages decentralization and internet ethos to take back power from the incumbents. The legacy system built a world of inequality. It is about time technologists swung the pendulum back in the direction of the people.

-Pomp

SPONSORED: Did you know that 97% of outstanding bonds yield less than 5%? The average savings account earns a measly 0.5%. With the stock market trading at a lofty 26x P/E, investors are desperate for an alternative asset class (other than BTC!) to put their hard-earned wealth. Stocks and bonds just aren't cutting it: that’s where Masterworks comes in. 

Masterworks lets you buy and sell investments in blue-chip art by artists like Banksy, KAWS and Monet. Art is a $1.7T asset class that outperformed the S&P by 180% between 2000 and 2018 with almost no correlation to the stock market. Here’s how it works: Masterworks qualifies paintings with the SEC, takes them public, and makes shares available to their 95,000+ investors. Run, don't walk: Pomp subscribers can skip the 22,000 person waitlist today.*

THE RUNDOWN:

Quibi Is Shutting Down Barely Six Months After Going Live: Quibi Holdings LLC is shutting down a mere six months after launching its streaming service, a crash landing for a once highly touted startup that attracted some of the biggest names in Hollywood and had looked to revolutionize how people consume entertainment. The streaming service, which served up shows in 5- to 10-minute “chapters” formatted to fit a smartphone screen, has been plagued with problems since its April debut, facing lower-than-expected viewership and a lawsuit from a well-capitalized foe. Read more.

CasperLabs Raises $14M From Launch-Day Node Runners: Blockchain startup CasperLabs has banked $14 million from investors who pledged to secure its proof-of-stake Casper network at launch. CasperLabs CEO Mrinal Manohar confirmed the private CLX token presale to CoinDesk and further revealed that Digital Strategies had led the investment, with headline participation from HashKey Capital and Blockchange Ventures, as well as 52 others. Nearly half of subscribers already held CasperLabs equity, he said. Read more.

Villanova University to Send Private Ethereum Blockchain Into Space to Test Inter-Satellite Communication: Villanova University’s College of Engineering is sending a private Ethereum blockchain into space to test whether distributed ledger technology can help satellites exchange data. Read more.

Tesla Reports Fifth Consecutive Quarter of Profits: Elon Musk’s electric car and renewable energy company, Tesla, reported third-quarter results after the bell on Wednesday. The stock rose about 3% after hours as the company beat expectations on EPS and revenue, and reported its fifth consecutive quarter of profit. Read more.

The Dollar Remains Vulnerable to ‘Significant Depreciation:’ One Standard Chartered Bank analyst warns that the greenback is vulnerable to a “significant depreciation” as sovereign fundamentals appear to be “pointing south.” “You have the twin deficits in the U.S. getting worse, you have the trade balance at the worst in 15 years,” said Eric Robertsen, global head of research at Standard Chartered Bank. Read more.

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE

Peter Doyle is a Managing Director and co-founder of Horizon Kinetics. He is a senior member of the research team, along with being a member of the Investment Committee and the Board of Directors. This was a master class in investing and global macro analysis, so definitely worth listening.

In this conversation, Peter and I discuss:

* Inflation

* How technology is deflationary

* Why capitalism is broken in the US

* Saturation of tech companies

* How Peter currently views the global macro environment

I really enjoyed this conversation with Peter. Hopefully you enjoy it too.

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE

Podcast Sponsors

These companies make the podcast possible, so go check them out and thank them for their support!

* Want to sell your wonderful internet business? Tiny partners with founders to give them quick, straightforward exits that protect their team and culture. We’ll make an offer within a week, close the deal within a month, and keep your business operating for the long term. Get in touch at tinycapital.com, and we’ll let you know within a couple of days.

* Athletic Brewing is re-imagining beer for the modern adult. They love beer. But they also love being healthy, active and at their best. The non-alcoholic beers are fully flavored, clean ingredient, and a fraction of the calories of full strength beer - they fit in any occasion. Check out www.athleticbrewing.com for more details and free shipping nationwide.

* Choice is a new self-directed IRA product that allows you to buy Bitcoin with tax-advantaged dollars, while still holding your private keys. You can go to retirewithchoice.com/pomp to sign up today.

* Unstoppable Domains is working to make the internet operate how it was originally intended, which means anyone can publish anything from anywhere. You can go to unstoppabledomains.com and claim your censorship resistant domain today.

* BlockFi provides financial products for crypto investors. Products include high-yield interest accounts, USD loans, and no fee trading. To start earning today visit: http://www.blockfi.com/Pomp

* Crypto.com allows you to buy, sell, store, earn, loan, and invest various cryptocurrencies in an user friendly mobile app. Join over one million users today. You can download and earn $50 USD with my code “pomp2020” when you sign up for one of their metal cards today.

* Coinlist — Smart investors know being early is critical to success in crypto. CoinList is where early adopters invest in, earn, and trade the best new crypto assets before they list on other exchanges. Sign up via coinlist.co/pomp and earn $10 in BTC after you trade $100.

* Nifty Gateway is the premium NFT platform. They release content from the best NFT artists in the world twice weekly, and have featured many world famous artists including Kenny Scharf, Trevor Jones and WhIsBe. Sign up for an account in advance to participate in the drops: http://www.niftygateway.com

You are receiving The Pomp Letter because you either signed up or you attended one of the events that I spoke at. Feel free to unsubscribe if you aren’t finding this valuable.

Nothing in this email is intended to serve as financial advice. Do your own research.

*See important information

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pomp.substack.com/subscribe

This installment of The Pomp Letter is free for everyone. I send this email to our investors daily. If you would also like to receive it every morning, join the 80,000 other investors today.

To investors,

I have been advocating for the United States to digitize/tokenize the dollar for almost a full year at this point. We are finally starting to see some movement on the issue from our elected officials or the Federal Reserve, but they are not doing nearly enough to address the dire situation they will find themselves in.

We saw a Democrat stimulus bill include reference to a digital dollar system being leveraged for delivering stimulus checks earlier this year. Ultimately this section of the bill was removed, but it was a positive development to at least see elected officials considering the possibility. As for the Federal Reserve, there was an IMF press conference this morning where Chairman Powell shared his thoughts on central bank digital currencies.

Powell’s general perspective appears to be the following:

* Central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) provide some value

* CBDCs will not be a replacement for physical cash, but rather a compliment

* There are many challenges with implementing a CBDC, including cyber security, proof of no counterfeiting, potential monetary policy changes, etc.

* The Fed has been working on a faster/cheaper payment system (FedNow), but that won’t be implemented and operational for a number of years.

* The CBDC idea is merely an idea that is being explored right now and there won’t be any work done on it until the Fed fully understands the pros/cons.

To be fair to Chairman Powell, we don’t have too much information from him to go off of at the moment. With that said, it appears the Fed is intrigued by the idea of a central bank digital currencies but not taking it nearly as seriously as they should.

I laid out the condensed argument for the immediate US action the last time I discussed CBDCs on CNBC.

The argument has two key elements — accessibility and monetary policy competition. Let’s tackle accessibility first. We know that China has been working on a digital currency for a number of years now. They are actively piloting the technology within certain cities and geographic regions within their country. The early reports are suggesting that people are adopting the digital currency and more than willing to use it as a replacement for the legacy system.

This is important to keep an eye on because if China is able to digitize their currency before the United States, the renminbi will be more accessible to people around the world than the US dollar. Here is an example that I use to show this — imagine if you are in a country like Venezuela where the national currency has failed due to hyperinflation. You know you need to get out of Bolivars and you definitely desire to hold US dollars. The dollar is deemed “safe,” but the problem is that it is hard to acquire dollars.

The black market can be marked up hundreds of percent and is physically dangerous to interact with. Your bank and government have put significant capital controls in place, plus you have to worry about the bank confiscating your dollars if you leave them in your account. So you begin to look for alternative currencies to hold. Gold is an option but it is also hard to acquire and difficult to transport, especially if you need to leave quickly. So what are your options? You essentially are going to turn to the internet and ask yourself “what currency can I get my wealth into that only requires an internet connection?”

The answer today is Bitcoin. The problem with Bitcoin for short term holders is that it is highly volatile. There are not many people that like the idea of putting their life savings into something that could be up or down 20% in a matter of days. But if you’re optimizing for security, Bitcoin is a great option. That is until a nation state gets their currency fully digitized. So now you are in a situation where you can buy digital renminbi, but you can’t buy US dollars. Of course, the renminbi is going to be more attractive for short term use than the non-existent digital dollar.

This difference in accessibility may not sound like a big deal right now, but if China has a 2-3 year head start on the US, it is possible that the US dollar’s reserve status comes under immense pressure as renminbi gains adoption. This is the Chinese government’s dream scenario and the US is playing right into it.

But before we all start to believe that the world is ending and China will be the sole superpower, there is a big catch to this entire theory — the monetary policy competition. I personally believe that every fiat currency in the world will eventually be digitized or tokenized. There may be slight differences in the technology stack that each nation state uses, but each currency will end up being leveraged via digital wallets and have similar functionality.

When you get feature parity on the technology competition, the only thing left for nation states to compete on is the monetary policy. The issue with this for nation states is that they all operate fiat currencies. The central banks can only manipulate interest rates or expand/contract the money supply. They don’t have any other levers to pull, nor aspects to compete on. The differences between each nation state fiat currency is just too small to ultimately matter when facing Bitcoin.

People are going to be face a choice — every currency in the world, both CBDCs and non-government currencies, will be digitized. The average citizen will have access to anything they want. Rather than choosing between the lesser of two evils with fiat currencies, they will ultimately choose Bitcoin. The fiat currencies are unlimited in supply, controlled by human decision making, lack transparency, drastically increase government surveillance capabilities, and provide an incredible amount of cybersecurity risk.

Bitcoin is artificially capped in supply, boasts a programmatic monetary supply, has full transparency, decreases government surveillance capabilities, and is the most secure computing network in the world. The choice that will be made by the digitally native generation is so obvious. People are going to choose the digitally native currency, rather than the fiat currency that is merely lipstick on a pig.

You can see this difference playing out in various central banker comments around the world. They continue to say that the CBDCs will be compliments to physical cash, rather than replacements. The central banks are being forced into the innovator’s dilemma. They can’t replace the existing system, because that would require them to relinquishing their power and control. Instead, they will ride the legacy system for as long as possible, but ultimately it will fail and be replaced by the superior Bitcoin system.

This entire transition scares the hell out of me and everyone else I know. It is littered with unknown scenarios and will put governments around the world in difficult positions. Whether we like it or not though, every currency is going to be digitized and the monetary policy competition is going to be insane. This is not a question of if, but rather when.

My suggestion is to start reading up on this stuff. You need to be educated on what is starting to happen. It will likely be the largest shift to global macro markets over the coming decade. It will force central bankers to make wild changes to policy in an attempt to avoid falling behind. They will ultimately be unsuccessful, but they will definitely have an impact across your portfolio in the meantime.

My friend Raoul Pal had a great Twitter thread on these CBDCs over the weekend. I’ll be writing more about them in the coming weeks as well. We are living through extraordinary times. Your best defense is to educate yourself and remember that no one is going to look out for you like you look out for yourself.

Hope your week is off to a fast start. Talk tomorrow.

-Pomp

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THE RUNDOWN:

50,000 Shoppers Give China’s Digital Yuan Its Biggest Test Yet: Tens of thousands of Chinese this week spent digital yuan at Walmart, gas stations and convenience stores across the southern tech hub of Shenzhen. The experiment -- unprecedented in scope and size -- went off without a hitch, catapulting the world’s No. 2 economy to the forefront of a race to develop virtual money. The real-world test is thus far the largest in terms of users and money involved since the Chinese central bank kicked off testing of its digital cash in a handful of cities in April. Read more.

E-Krona or Bust, Says Sweden’s Chief Central Banker, Trying to Drag Swedish Govt Into Digital Age: Sweden’s top central banker Stefan Ingves has gone all-in on sovereign digital currency, and on Thursday the Riksbank governor called upon the Swedish Parliament to do the same. "There shall be digital state money as legal tender, an e-krona, issued by the Riksbank," Ingves wrote in a Thursday economic note that amounts to his strongest statement yet in favor of a Swedish central bank digital currency. Read more.

Digital Euro Within Decade ‘Very Likely,’ Says Finland’s Chief Central Banker: Bank of Finland Governor Olli Rehn told Reuters Friday he believes a digital euro is “very likely” to debut in Europe in the next 10 years. He was less certain on the European central bank digital currency’s eventual design, saying the European Central Bank “will first analyse and experiment.” Read more.

Bank of Spain to Weigh Digital Currency Design Proposals, ‘Implications’ Through 2021: Spain’s central bank is fast-tracking research on digital currency ‘s design and the economic implications of central bank digital currency introduction as per a four-year strategic plan released Friday. CBDC researchers will "consider different design proposals" and analyze digital currency's financial and systemic risks for Spain. Read more.

Senate to vote on $500 billion GOP coronavirus stimulus bill Wednesday: The Senate will vote on a $500 billion coronavirus stimulus bill on Wednesday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Saturday, as a larger bipartisan deal remains elusive despite continued talks between top Democrats and the Trump administration. McConnell blamed his opponents across the political aisle for the current stalemate, arguing that the Senate has enough time to pass the GOP stimulus package and confirm Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barret if “Democrats do not obstruct this legislation.” Read more.

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE

Jeff Richards is a Managing Partner at GGV Capital. He has been at the firm since 2008 and previously spent 13 years as an entrepreneur and operating executive in the US and Asia. Jeff founded two technology startups, including R4 which was acquired by VeriSign.

In this conversation, Jeff and I discuss:

* Jeff's investment strategy

* Investments like Wish, Coinbase, Lambda School, and Slice

* His biggest winners & losers

* The advantages to being a public company

* The resiliency in Silicon Valley

* Various geographic investment markets around the world

I really enjoyed this conversation with Jeff. Hopefully you enjoy it too.

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE

Podcast Sponsors

These companies make the podcast possible, so go check them out and thank them for their support!

* Want to sell your wonderful internet business? Tiny partners with founders to give them quick, straightforward exits that protect their team and culture. We’ll make an offer within a week, close the deal within a month, and keep your business operating for the long term. Get in touch at tinycapital.com, and we’ll let you know within a couple of days.

* Athletic Brewing is re-imagining beer for the modern adult. They love beer. But they also love being healthy, active and at their best. The non-alcoholic beers are fully flavored, clean ingredient, and a fraction of the calories of full strength beer - they fit in any occasion. Check out www.athleticbrewing.com for more details and free shipping nationwide.

* Choice is a new self-directed IRA product that allows you to buy Bitcoin with tax-advantaged dollars, while still holding your private keys. You can go to retirewithchoice.com/pomp to sign up today.

* Unstoppable Domains is working to make the internet operate how it was originally intended, which means anyone can publish anything from anywhere. You can go to unstoppabledomains.com and claim your censorship resistant domain today.

* BlockFi provides financial products for crypto investors. Products include high-yield interest accounts, USD loans, and no fee trading. To start earning today visit: http://www.blockfi.com/Pomp

* Crypto.com allows you to buy, sell, store, earn, loan, and invest various cryptocurrencies in an user friendly mobile app. Join over one million users today. You can download and earn $50 USD with my code “pomp2020” when you sign up for one of their metal cards today.

* Coinlist — Smart investors know being early is critical to success in crypto. CoinList is where early adopters invest in, earn, and trade the best new crypto assets before they list on other exchanges. Sign up via coinlist.co/pomp and earn $10 in BTC after you trade $100.

* Nifty Gateway is the premium NFT platform. They release content from the best NFT artists in the world twice weekly, and have featured many world famous artists including Kenny Scharf, Trevor Jones and WhIsBe. Sign up for an account in advance to participate in the drops: http://www.niftygateway.com

You are receiving The Pomp Letter because you either signed up or you attended one of the events that I spoke at. Feel free to unsubscribe if you aren’t finding this valuable.

Nothing in this email is intended to serve as financial advice. Do your own research.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pomp.substack.com/subscribe

This installment of The Pomp Letter is free for everyone. I send this email to our investors daily. If you would also like to receive it every morning, join the 80,000 other investors today.

To investors,

I sent an email last night to a group of friends. These individuals are across industries, but they all share a common interest in investing. I thought it would be worth sharing with each of you as well. This is not investment advice, so do your own research. Hope you enjoy it.

We sit at an unprecedented time in the macro-economy, so I wanted to send you a message with my “best idea.” 

The Federal Reserve has cut interest rates to 0%. They plan to keep us in a zero-rate environment for the foreseeable future. Multiple stimulus packages in 2020 now total more than $3 trillion in QE. We have another $2 trillion on the way. The Fed’s balance sheet has expanded by 75% since the start of the year. While there is a strong argument that this QE won’t lead to higher inflation because of the current deflationary environment, the Fed has publicly committed to sustaining a 2%+ inflation level. 

The average investor fears inflation right now, regardless of whether we actually see that inflation or not. This fear has driven significant capital flows into inflation-hedge assets (Gold, Bitcoin, Real estate, etc). The combination of the Fed’s asset price manipulation and inflation fears has driven gold and Bitcoin to drastically outperform equities and other commodities. 

I’m writing this specifically to call out my thesis for the next 15 months of Bitcoin’s performance. Many investors will look at the historical price increase of the digital asset and believe they “missed it.” That couldn’t be further from the truth in my opinion. I believe we are at the start of another boom cycle in Bitcoin, which is likely to drive us 10-20x higher in the 15 month window.

Let’s first look at the demand side of the equation. The macro environment is serving as a tailwind. Bitcoin is up more than 50% year-to-date. The continued 0 rate environment and QE will continue to drive demand. Additionally, we are seeing traditional asset management firms start to make the leap into owning Bitcoin. Fidelity Investments recently published a paper showing positive impact for 1%-5% Bitcoin allocation in clients’ portfolios. Stone Ridge ($10B asset manager) now owns $115M in Bitcoin. Paul Tudor Jones publicly revealed that he has put 2% of assets into Bitcoin. Multiple public pensions in the US have now gained exposure to Bitcoin via fund managers. Grayscale, the largest digital asset investment manager, saw record inflows of $1B+ in 3Q20 and now has almost $6B in total AUM. 

The list goes on and on. Wall Street has woken up to the Bitcoin trade. But the increase in demand is not only happening with traditional asset managers. We are also seeing a new trend emerge where corporations are using Bitcoin as a reserve asset for part or majority of their treasury. It started with publicly traded digital asset focused firms like Galaxy Digital and others. Then we saw MicroStrategy ($1.2B+ market cap on NASDAQ) put 85% of their $500M balance sheet ($425M) into Bitcoin. And most recently, financial technology company Square announced that it had purchased about $50M of Bitcoin for their balance sheet (approximately 1% of assets). 

This increase in demand is just starting in my opinion. We can list all of the leading, forward-thinking firms in only two paragraphs. Eventually their peers will join them. The demand outlook is strong, and it shows signs of actually accelerating into the first half of 2021.

This brings us to the supply side of the price discussion. 

Bitcoin only has 21 million total Bitcoin that will ever be available. There are approximately 18.4 million currently in circulation. New Bitcoin enters the market on a pre-determined schedule that is coded into software and cannot be changed without agreement from 51% or more people (highly unlikely it will ever change). That programmatic monetary supply schedule started in 2009 with 7,200 Bitcoin entering circulation every day. That continued for 4 years, before the 7,200 daily Bitcoin was cut to 3,600 Bitcoin each day. 4 years later it was cut to 1,800 Bitcoin per day. Most recently, in May 2020, we experienced the latest “Bitcoin halving” which now has 900 Bitcoin per day entering the circulating supply. 

Historically, these supply shocks have led to significant price increases of 20X+ in the following 18 months post-halving. So to recap, we have significant increases in demand and a material supply shock that has historically led to price increase. Just those two factors alone should be compelling enough to ensure that you have some exposure (1-10% of your portfolio) to Bitcoin. The asymmetric risk-reward scenario is unlikely to be present in any other asset you are currently invested in.

There is a third factor that you should understand, which further cements the bullish argument for Bitcoin over the next 15 months or so. More than 60% of all Bitcoin in circulation today have not changed hands in the last 12 months. This means that majority of Bitcoin investors stomached multiple double-digit price movements, both up and down, and continued to hold the asset. They even weathered a 50% drop in price during a single day of the liquidity crisis in March 2020 without selling. So the likelihood that the 11M+ Bitcoin that is currently being held by strong hands will trade in the short term is very low.

You could evaluate this situation as (a) demand is increasing significantly, (b) the supply shock is making Bitcoin more scarce, and (c) the available float is much smaller than people actually realize. This framework leads me to believe that we are going to see a violent upward movement in the Bitcoin price by the end of 2021. My base case is approximately 10x to $100,000 and the bull case is around $250,000 per Bitcoin.

The asset is volatile, and it won’t be a straight line up. There will be many 15-30% drawdowns along the way, but I remain convicted that these price levels are attainable in the next 15 months. Lastly, if we take a longer outlook at Bitcoin, it becomes even more interesting.

Both gold and Bitcoin are currently serving as applications of sound money principles. Gold is the analog application and Bitcoin is the digital application. Gold’s market cap is $8+ trillion and Bitcoin’s is only $200+ billion. It is likely that Bitcoin’s market cap will eventually match, and then eclipse, gold’s over time. When this happens, Bitcoin will have experienced a 40x increase in price. If the historical market cycles continue playing out, there will be a significant double-digit price increase over the next 15 months or so, followed by a nasty 50%+ decline in price and multi-year bear market, and finally another significant price increase that would push us closer to gold’s market cap. 

My reason for writing to you today is not to convince you of the 10-year outlook for Bitcoin. That is complex and requires multiple inputs/assumptions to be correct. Instead, I am urging you to take another look at Bitcoin as a potential 1-10% allocation in your portfolio over the next 15 months. I personally have made a highly-concentrated investment (90%) and believe it is imperative that I share this view with you. I’d be happy to jump on a call with you or your team to discuss the asset and market further, while also answering any questions you may have.

The market is the ultimate referee in the game of investing, and it is emphatically telling us that Bitcoin is worth holding. Talk soon. 

Hope each of you enjoyed this one. Stay safe out there. Talk tomorrow.

-Pomp

This installment of The Pomp Letter is free for everyone. I send this email to our investors daily. If you would also like to receive it every morning, join the 80,000 other investors today.

THE RUNDOWN:

JPMorgan Strategists See ‘Modest’ Headwind for Bitcoin Price: Bitcoin faces a “modest headwind” in the short term based on an analysis of bets in the futures market and an estimate of the cryptocurrency’s intrinsic value, according to JPMorgan Chase & Co. A positioning indicator derived from futures shows that “there still appears to be an overhang of net long positions,” strategists including Nikolaos Panigirtzoglou wrote in a note Tuesday. A drop in Bitcoin in September eliminated much “froth” but it remains about 13% higher than an estimate of intrinsic value, they said. Read more.

Grayscale Announces Best Ever Quarter With Over $1B Raised: Digital asset manager Grayscale Investments has posted its best quarterly results to date, having brought in just over $1 billion in investment across all of its cryptocurrency products. In its financial report for Q3 2020, the company – which is owned by CoinDesk's parent firm Digital Currency Group – said it had seen inflows of $1.05 billion across all products. Read more.

WEF Releases Report Assessing Global Blockchain Standards: The World Economic Forum has teamed up with the Global Blockchain Business Council, an advocacy group, to assess the current state of blockchain technology. The Global Standards Mapping Initiative (GSMI), released Wednesday, is the most "comprehensive" attempt so far to survey blockchain technical standards, according to the organizations. Read more.

Coinbase Chief Compliance Officer Departs Amid Wider Exodus: Coinbase’s chief compliance officer, Jeff Horowitz, is leaving the firm after two years. First reported by The Block, Horowitz joins at least 60 other employees in leaving the exchange – roughly 5% of the company's headcount. The majority of those departures come in response to Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong recently declaring an "apolitical" non-activist stance against social issues at the company. It was not immediately clear if Horowitz is leaving for the same reason. Read more.

Gate.io Unveils Hardware Crypto Wallet With Fingerprint Authorization: Gate.io, a cryptocurrency exchange, has unveiled a pocket-sized solution for crypto holders concerned over the security of their assets. The company announced the launch of a new hardware storage device, dubbed the Wallet S1, initially for the China market. Read more.

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE

Heath Tarbert is Chairman and Chief Executive of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). The mission of the CFTC is to promote the integrity, resilience, and vibrancy of the U.S. derivatives markets through sound regulation. This conversation was recorded during the LA Blockchain Summit.

In this conversation, Chairman Tarbert and I discuss:

* The CFTC's role in financial markets

* The importance of US leadership on crypto

* The Digital Commodity Exchange Act of 2020

* Decentralized exchanges

* Central bank digital currencies

I really enjoyed this conversation with Chairman Tarbert. Hopefully you enjoy it too.

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE

Podcast Sponsors

These companies make the podcast possible, so go check them out and thank them for their support!

* Want to sell your wonderful internet business? Tiny partners with founders to give them quick, straightforward exits that protect their team and culture. We’ll make an offer within a week, close the deal within a month, and keep your business operating for the long term. Get in touch at tinycapital.com, and we’ll let you know within a couple of days.

* Athletic Brewing is re-imagining beer for the modern adult. They love beer. But they also love being healthy, active and at their best. The non-alcoholic beers are fully flavored, clean ingredient, and a fraction of the calories of full strength beer - they fit in any occasion. Check out www.athleticbrewing.com for more details and free shipping nationwide.

* Choice is a new self-directed IRA product that allows you to buy Bitcoin with tax-advantaged dollars, while still holding your private keys. You can go to retirewithchoice.com/pomp to sign up today.

* Unstoppable Domains is working to make the internet operate how it was originally intended, which means anyone can publish anything from anywhere. You can go to unstoppabledomains.com and claim your censorship resistant domain today.

* BlockFi provides financial products for crypto investors. Products include high-yield interest accounts, USD loans, and no fee trading. To start earning today visit: http://www.blockfi.com/Pomp

* Crypto.com allows you to buy, sell, store, earn, loan, and invest various cryptocurrencies in an user friendly mobile app. Join over one million users today. You can download and earn $50 USD with my code “pomp2020” when you sign up for one of their metal cards today.

* Coinlist — Smart investors know being early is critical to success in crypto. CoinList is where early adopters invest in, earn, and trade the best new crypto assets before they list on other exchanges. Sign up via coinlist.co/pomp and earn $10 in BTC after you trade $100.

* Nifty Gateway is the premium NFT platform. They release content from the best NFT artists in the world twice weekly, and have featured many world famous artists including Kenny Scharf, Trevor Jones and WhIsBe. Sign up for an account in advance to participate in the drops: http://www.niftygateway.com

If you enjoy reading “The Pomp Letter,” click here to tweet to tell others about it.

Nothing in this email is intended to serve as financial advice. Do your own research.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit pomp.substack.com/subscribe