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To investors,
There has been a lot of discussion recently about the bitcoin community’s communication tactics. Insiders believe that bitcoiners are some of the most educated minds on finance, technology, and innovation. They literally can’t believe that so much information is available for free to be consumed by anyone on the internet.
Outsiders see something very different. They see a group of people who appear to be religious zealots that only know how to communicate via memes, laser eyes, and aggressive tweeting. Here is the funny thing — both are correct.
The bitcoin community is filled with people who have dedicated years to understanding the intersection of multiple disciplines, including economics, finance, technology, cryptography, geopolitics, game theory, and many more. Not only have they acquired the knowledge, but they have had those ideas tested in the intellectual arenas of Twitter, Reddit, Telegram, etc.
Simply, bitcoiners have done their homework and they come prepared.
But bitcoiners also have a very unique way of communicating with people. While there are podcasts and email newsletters, much of the information is actually shared through internet culture. Where else will you find someone telling a billionaire to “have fun staying poor!” or someone telling a legend of Wall Street “Ok, boomer!”
To the outsider, this appears to be disrespectful, non-constructive, and a misstep for a group of people who are hoping to gain widespread adoption. These outsiders are put off by the bitcoiner antics at times, while believing the community will be the single point of failure in other situations.
The outsiders don’t understand the genius of the bitcoin community though. Bitcoin, and by proxy the bitcoin community, is competing with the most respected establishments in our society. Whether we are talking about the Federal Reserve, the Treasury, the US government, or large financial institutions, these organizations pride themselves on being the elite. They wear their suits and ties with an air of arrogance that is only acquired after an education at an Ivy League school and enough cocktail parties to fill a lifetime.
So why would bitcoin try to out class the elites? Well, it shouldn’t.
Just as an insurgency increases the odds of prevailing on a combat battlefield by employing non-traditional tactics, the bitcoin community has chosen to play a game that the elite can’t participate in.
Bitcoiners are conducting an information insurgency.
They are quite literally controlling the public narrative through an overwhelming amount of content that has no reliance on traditional distribution methods. Up until recently, the only time that journalists or television shows wanted to speak with bitcoiners was to ridicule, mock, and attack them.
The bitcoin community ignored those short term challenges and instead built a direct relationship with the mass population. Twitter. Reddit. Telegram. Podcasts. Instagram. Facebook. Email. You can’t exist on the internet for 24 hours without coming in contact with content that is created by this community.
So why are things like laser eyes so important? Easy — the memes are the message. You are watching information warfare conducted in a way that can’t be responded to by the elite and the establishment. What is the Federal Reserve going to do? Start firing off memes, gifs, and ALL CAPS BULLISH USD TWEETS??
No chance. The incumbents, from the government to the Fed to the banks, can only sit by passively and get bombarded day in and day out with the content. If they choose to acknowledge it and respond, they will only legitimize bitcoin and the surrounding community. If they continue to ignore it, bitcoiners will control the public narrative and continue recruiting more and more people to see their world view.
This is fascinating to watch because this information insurgency will likely be analyzed in retrospect as one of the most important psychological operations in human history. Millions of strangers on the internet are coordinating to meme a financial asset into retail investors’ portfolios, corporate balance sheets, financial institutions’ product roadmaps, and eventually central bank reserves.
Wait, what? Yes, read that again. The bitcoin community is using internet culture and speaking the language of digital natives to gain traction against the stuffy elites. Half the people running these establishments don’t know what a meme is, let alone have a coherent response on how to deal with what is happening. In fact, many of the older folks in the bitcoin community are against these tactics as well.
They constantly tell bitcoiners that they will have to wear suits and ties to meetings. They explain that bitcoin won’t be accepted until the laser eyes and memes go away. The alleged toxicity is seen as a bug, not a feature. But regardless of what insiders or outsiders say, bitcoin continues to gain traction through the information insurgency.
This is because ultimately institutions, regardless of how elite or traditional they are, will always be made up of humans. Those humans are susceptible to human psychology. Everyone wants to be accepted by the cool kids. They want to have fun. It pains them to see young people running laps around them, while their bosses are telling them to remain calm and stay above it all.
That isn’t how the internet works. The young people inside these organizations and establishments know that. Go talk to the interns and entry level positions at Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, the Federal Reserve, or any political office. They’ll all tell you the same thing when the door closes — they’re bitcoiners and they have a pseudonymous account on Twitter. They’ll explain how they are trying to get their bosses or older colleagues to see the future. To see the bitcoin way.
So what the institutions don’t understand is that the bitcoin community has already won. Bitcoiners have infiltrated their ranks. They are the trojan horse. Each bitcoiner is rising in the ranks. They’re gaining power and influence. The institution may not know it, but there are wolves in the hen house and the institutions let them in!
We have bitcoiners who have infiltrated the Senate. We have bitcoiners who have infiltrated Congress. We have bitcoiners everywhere.
Regardless of their role, they are participants in the information insurgency. For example, we have Senators and Congressmen who have laser eyes on their Twitter profile pictures. We have people reading the terminology “shitcoin” into the Congressional record.
Have fun staying poor. Drop gold, buy bitcoin. Pay me in bitcoin. No keys, no cheese. Long Bitcoin, Short the Bankers. The virus is spreading.
Each meme carries a psychological impact that continues to recruit new bitcoiners. The establishment can’t respond. They can only complain, which makes them look even more archaic and out of touch. Who cares what they say, right? If they step out of line and take an anti-bitcoin stance, there are millions of bitcoiners there ready to pounce with a barrage of information, examples, memes, and gifs.
Frankly, it is unfair. No one should be asked to fight against this insurgency. Bitcoiners are too powerful. They don’t rely on gatekeepers. They don’t need the media’s permission to speak. Bitcoiners control the narrative. Bitcoiners have bigger audiences. Bitcoiners grow bigger, stronger, and more decentralized every day.
You can’t kill an idea, especially one who’s time has come. The information insurgency is upon us and the legacy institutions, and their leadership, are outmatched on the battlefield. Good luck to them. They’re going to need every ounce of it as they continue to be beaten down by the intellectually and creatively superior challengers.
Nobody has more fun than bitcoiners on the internet. I’m just proud to be a small part of this amazing community. Hope each of you has a great weekend. Talk to you on Monday.
-Pomp
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THE RUNDOWN:
Robinhood’s Vlad Tenev Talks Crypto Growth in ‘Fireside’ Chat: Robinhood is working to expand the capabilities of its crypto trading platform and repair the reputational damage it suffered in the wake of the retail trading frenzy over GameStop, the online brokerage’s CEO Vlad Tenev said in a video of what the company called a “fireside chat” posted on YouTube Thursday. Sitting in front of virtual backdrop featuring a fireplace, Tenev said the company has plans for growth in the crypto space and is working to ensure that an oft-requested “wallet” feature is safe before introducing it. Read more.
Powell Says Central Bank Digital Currency Must Coexist With Cash: Potential central bank digital currencies would need to be integrated into existing payment systems alongside cash and other forms of money, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said. “A recent report from the Bank for International Settlements and a group of seven central banks, which includes the Fed, assessed the feasibility of CBDCs in helping central banks deliver their public policy objectives,” Powell said Thursday in prerecorded video remarks delivered to a payments conference in Basel, Switzerland. Read more.
NFT Frenzy Buoys Stocks, Lifting Auction Houses and Game Makers: A grab bag of obscure stocks are soaring after unveiling plans to get involved in the exploding digital-art scene being powered by NFTs. Non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, are cryptographic assets used on computer ledgers referred to as blockchains, similar to the network that powers Bitcoin. They make it possible to track ownership and sales prices, as well as the number of copies in existence through each unique identifying code. They burst onto the mainstream consciousness last week when the artist Beeple’s “Everydays: the First 5,000 Days” sold for a record $69 million. Read more.
SEC Publishes VanEck’s Bitcoin ETF Application, Kicking Off Decision Clock: The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) acknowledged VanEck’s 19b-4 Form for its bitcoin exchange-traded fund application on Monday, formally kicking off its 45-day window to make an initial decision on the proposal. If approved, the ETF would be the first open bitcoin exchange-traded product in the U.S., though there has long been demand for such a product from the crypto community. Historically, the SEC has rejected every bitcoin ETF application, including VanEck’s past efforts, citing the potential for market manipulation and a host of other concerns. Read more.
The US Government Sold Some Bitcoin – And the Winning Bidder Got a Bargain: A key reason bitcoin‘s price has doubled this year, according to many analysts, is so few holders want to part with the cryptocurrency: “more buyers than sellers,” as the old Wall Street adage goes. Unless you’re the U.S. government, which this week sold some bitcoin for dollars. The amount was tiny in relative terms – not even an entire bitcoin, just 0.7501 BTC, worth a little over $40,000. Compare that to the current federal budget deficit, projected during the current fiscal year to exceed the record $3.1 trillion reported for 2020. A veritable drop in the bucket. Read more.
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Narek Gevorgyan is the founder of Coin Stats, a cryptocurrency research and portfolio management app available for iOS, Android and Desktop with over 500,000 active portfolios tracked worldwide.
In this conversation, Narek and I discuss:
Crypto portfolios
Importance of user experience
Decentralized finance
Coin Stats growth
Where Narek sees the market going in the next few years
I really enjoyed this conversation with Narek. Hopefully you enjoy it too.
LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE OF THE POMP PODCAST HERE
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