🧠 Goodbye, sh*tcoins

GM.

Welcome back to Bitcoin Therapy. A newsletter where we spoon-feed you the tastiest Bitcoin stories of the week.

First, happy and relaxing Sunday to 2,601 patients reading today. 👋 

I enjoyed writing this week’s email. And now you’re going to enjoy reading it (pinky promise).

So, grab a cup of Joe, and take a relaxing position.

Here’s what I got for you this week:

  • SBF’s ex-girlfriend testifies against him (spoiler: it’s bad)

  • New Fidelity report: It’s Bitcoin, not crypto

  • New Bitcoin update potentially obsoletes sh*tcoins 💩

Estimated read time: 4 minutes and 5 seconds

But first, a big thank you to Wasabi Wallet for sponsoring this week’s email and keeping this newsletter free for the reader ❤️

SBF’S EX-GIRLFRIEND TESTIFIES AGAINST HIM

I found a new soap opera I’ve been binging on: Sam Bankman-Fried vs. The United States

The trial has been going on for a week now, and it is getting wilder every day. In case you’ve missed it, here’s the latest on the SBF trial:

  • Ex-co-founder and CTO testified against him

  • Ex-customer testified against him

  • Ex-investor testified against him

  • Ex-employee testified against him

  • Long time friend (ex-friend now, I guess) testified against him

Everyone is ratting everyone out, lol.

But this was nothing compared to the main event: Caroline Ellison's testimony

The courtroom artist had no chill. He must have had his life’s savings on FTX.

Anyways. It gets eeextra spicy because Caroline was both the CEO of Alameda (SBF’s trading firm that traded against FTX customers) AND his ex-girlfriend.

The good part? Caroline wrote down everything during her time at Alameda. Every. Single. Thing.

And it’s PURE ENTERTAINMENT. 🍿

I know your time is scarce, so here are the best bits from the testimony:

  1. Caroline would send fake balance sheets to investors to make Alameda look better

  2. They printed lots of fake money, aka FTT (FTX’s native coin), and used it as collateral to borrow real money. SBF told Caroline to borrow as much as possible.

  3. SBF bribed Chinese officials with $100M to unfreeze his assets and go after Binance (his main competitor). They used Thai prostitutes for this (I can’t believe I’m writing this, lol)

  4. They used FTX user deposits to repay loans, political donations, other investments, and personal loans to friends and family. It’s estimated that they took $14B from FTX customers. Yes, billion.

  5. Caroline told SBF it was risky to create fake balance sheets in case an audit happens. SBF’s reply: “Auditors are stupid and won’t notice lmao”

  6. SBF told Caroline he had a 5% chance of becoming the president of the United States (the only president he can become now is of his prison block)

  7. SBF instructed Caroline to sell customer BTC to keep the price below $20k (thanks for the cheap sats!)

Whew! What a shit show. And I’m loving every bit of it!

They should sell the right to this soap opera to repay the victims

By now, it’s pretty clear Caroline and Sam had a pretty unique relationship. I wonder what they did on date nights…

LIKE TO BE WATCHED WHILE YOU POOP?

If you answered ‘no,’ congratulations: you’re normal.

You know what’s also normal? Not revealing absolutely everything about your financial activity to third parties.

And you do exactly this by not coinjoining your Bitcoin. This blog explains why it’s essential for keeping your Bitcoin private and thus SAFE,

I recommend Wasabi Wallet for this. Here’s why:

  1. Beginner friendly

  2. Privacy by default

  3. No minimum coinjoin amounts

What are you waiting for? Take back control of your privacy and freedom.

Join 500,000+ Wasabi users by downloading it at wasabiwallet.io

NEW FIDELITY REPORT: IT’S BITCOIN, NOT CRYPTO

Meet Fidelity. They manage $4,500,000,000,000. 43,000,000 investors trust them.

They’re your asset manager’s asset manager. When they speak, everyone listens.

And yesterday, they published a new research paper on why investors should own Bitcoin. Here are the most interesting bits:

  1. Bitcoin is compared to the wheel

“The invention of the wheel represented an entirely new technology that, once invented, could never be reinvented. Similarly, never in human history had the problem of peer-to-peer electronic cash been solved until Bitcoin”

  1. Fidelity says Bitcoin is the GOAT of money

“Bitcoin clearly possesses a lot of good qualities of money, combining the scarcity and durability of gold with the ease of use, storage, and transportability of fiat”

  1. Bitcoin is a winner-take-all scenario

“This bitcoin network competition is likely to result in a winner take-all scenario as the network grows and becomes more valuable”

  1. Fidelity is impressed Bitcoin has survived for so long

“Every minute, hour, day, and year that Bitcoin survives increases its chances of continuing into the future...people would probably underestimate all of the negative events that Bitcoin has already endured”

  1. Owning Bitcoin = owning part of the internet

“Owning bitcoin "would be akin to being able to own the base layer of the Internet”

And they concluded the report with this banger:

  1. Bitcoin is not crypto

“Bitcoin should be considered first and separate from all other digital assets that have followed it”

The bottom line: Bitcoin is king. It‘s a unique assets class, and it might make sense to get some. Crypto, not so much.

NEW BITCOIN UPDATE TO OBSOLETE SH*TCOINS?

Goodbye sh*tcoins, hello BitVM.

BitVM (Bitcoin Virtual Machine) is a new proposal to add complex smart contracts to Bitcoin. Think Ethereum…but without Ethereum.

But people have been talking about making Bitcoin ‘smarter’ for 14 years now. So what changed?

Well, the BitVM developers found a way to implement it via a soft fork - an update that doesn’t totally break Bitcoin.

So yes, you should care about BitVM. Let me explain without any nerd talk:

1/ BitVM makes bitcoin Turing complete

“what’s a turing?”

TLDR: Turing completeness is when a programmable system can solve ANY computational problem

And unlike Ethereum, Bitcoin was programmed to do just one thing: process transactions. This update would enable developers to write any program - for any use case.

More use-cases = more value accrues to the network = more pumpy bags for you

2/ Makes altcoins obsolete (in theory)

Altcoins have many shiny and fun features - but not without a cost. They ALWAYS compromise security, censorship resistance, and decentralization to have them.

Well, BitVM enables the same features on Bitcoin without any sacrifices (again, in theory)

Why use centralized altcoins if you can create your program on Bitcoin?

Exactly. You wouldn’t…unless you’re looking to scam some unsuspecting retail investors. Then go ahead and launch an altcoin.

-

Now, let’s not get too excited. BitVM is still in the research phase and will take years to implement.

My favorite part? This would kill the “Bitcoin is old tech, buy my shitcoin” marketing pitch.

Sh*tcoins - it was a pleasure (not) knowing you. You had a good run.

QUICK LINKS ⚡

  • Trezor launched a new bitcoin-only hardware wallet 🧡

  • There's a 90% chance that Bitcoin ETFs are approved - Bloomberg's ETF analyst

  • A Bitcoin services provider, Bitcoin Way, launches no-KYC collaborative custody service for businesses and individuals

THIS WEEK IN A MEME 📅

FROM THE ARCHIVE 📁

BITCONNNEEEEEEEEEECT

Reply to this email if you know what I’m talking about.

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See you next Sunday,

Bitcoin Therapy Team

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