You’re probably here today because you have heard of bitcoin (BTC), ether (ETH), or other cryptocurrencies. You’re probably wondering what it all is, why it is here, are curious about it, and want to learn. *You will learn* what it’s all about, how to use it, and how to think about “money”.
Maybe you have bought some bitcoin (BTC) in the past, sold it, and lost dollars on the trade. Perhaps you have disregarded it for some time and feel like it is now too late to get involved and learn. Maybe you think it is worthless, it uses too much energy, it is used exclusively by criminals, that it is a “bubble”, that it is “inefficient” and “too volatile”. Maybe you only trade stocks, or only buy real estate and can’t get over the psychological barrier. You might hear about Elon Musk and Dogecoin and think it’s a big joke, or that Elon controls the price of bitcoin. I am here to educate you on exactly what crypto is, address your questions and get you up to speed.
The title to this substack “Crypto for Boomers”.
Boomer is a mentality. Disregard the generational connotation. This is holding onto “the way things used to be” or “why change what isn’t broken”. This is rooted in comfort and is going to hold you back in life. This is someone who isn’t thinking about things correctly.
You could be 15, 40, 65. It doesn’t matter. The problem is the *major* knowledge gap in this space. I aim to help fix that and make this simple and easier to understand. Everyone knows that cryptocurrency is a complex subject, and is filled with psychological barriers. You hear about mining coins and think “What? You are ‘mining’ coins on the internet?”
You can address and approach this new technology, learn it, and get ahead in life. OR. You can continue to go about things the same way, and eventually, one day, realize you missed a once in a lifetime opportunity. People who were smart enough to put in the time and effort to understand the value, potential, and solutions the internet provided prospered from when it was in it’s early days. The same thing applies here, this time on a larger scale.
The good news…nobody is stuck. You know that and are smart enough to recognize that and subscribe to this. You know that things are rapidly changing. Quicker than most people can realize or interpret. That is okay. We all know the strongest adapt.
Financial Mental Framework
Currency (US Dollars, Euros, etc.) is used every day to purchase goods and services. You might save some in a rainy day fund for your expenses. Invest it to gain wealth. Use it to pay for your Netflix subscription, hopefully you change that to a paid BowTiedScholar subscription. The problem about this money is that it is constantly being inflated away. Ever since 1971 this problem has been persisting. They couldn’t peg the dollar to gold anymore. Ever since 2008 it has simply become worse and worse. Now we’ve gone fully parabolic on money supply.
Maybe you’re aware of this problem, hopefully you are. Below is an image of the most recent piece of information shared on the Consumer Price Index changes from the Bureau of Labor statistics. This shows changes (positive or negative) in each of the following categories.
The problem? Your costs of living are rising, constantly. When Uncle Sam says this is “transitory” they are lying and giving you a term that sounds nice and pleasant. Inflation is never going away. It won’t stay at this rate of course, however, everything has changed. Do you see the price of Apple, Amazon, Facebook, Bitcoin, or Ether on there? College? (See the student loan disaster) Do you see out of network medical expenses? They are not including the things that are more important. Especially not asset prices. As of this writing in the last 2 years you have ~ 178% growth in price of Apple (AAPL) stock, Amazon (AMZN) ~ 78%, Facebook (FB) ~ 96%. The cost in USD to acquire 1 BTC is up ~ 390%, and 1 ETH is up ~ 1,653%.
Anyone who believes Cash is King needs to reassess their thinking. Cash = Trash
Dave Ramsey will get you from Level -1 to Level 0. Which is a position that is tough to get out of and requires hard work. Hard truth, you can’t get rich coupon clipping and cutting your credit cards. You won’t get rich off a “diversified slow growth mutual fund”. Simply stated, you will be cutting yourself short.
Now if you can understand all of that…
Crypto Introduction - Simple Bitcoin Basics
Imagine being able to send money to me, anywhere in the world, without an intermediary, or a middle man. This can happen 24/7/365. You can do this at any point in the day.
bitcoin is an example of a digital currency that can do all of that. It enables instant payments to anybody anywhere in the world because it uses peer to peer (P2P) technology. You can send me 1 BTC right now if you wanted to, you would just need an address - my bitcoin address that you can *only* send bitcoin to.
Bitcoin was created by an anonymous creator Satoshi Nakamoto. The first block on the Bitcoin blockchain was mined Jan 3, 2009.
Bitcoin is decentralized, meaning not in one *central* place. The operations are distributed globally without a central means of power or authority.
It is scarce. The supply now is at ~19 million bitcoins. There are only ~10% left to be mined. There are only ever going to be 21 Million bitcoin (unlike gold or the dollar). Each bitcoin unit is broken up into 100 million sub-units called satoshi’s (sats). So, mathematically a Bitcoin looks like this 1.00000000
The current price in USD is $49,396.31
[Now, stop and think.]
You now have a choice. Look around the way technology is growing and changing. Think down the line.
You can buy this and learn as we go. If you are serious about learning about this and growing, participate. Get off 0% ownership (a.k.a 0% portfolio allocation). By some bitcoin and ether and join the direction the future is moving toward.
***This is not about collecting more USD, this is about owning more BTC & ETH.***
Think long term! I don’t buy more Apple stock to acquire more USD. I acquire more USD to own more Apple stock. You are buying BTC and ETH for similar, yet a different reason. More information to come on that in future publications.
Anyone who is serious will take initiative.
Laughs
Here are some examples of the misunderstandings and lack of knowledge the mainstream media is spewing showing why they don’t understand what they are saying about crypto.
This also does not make sense.
You probably are starting to understand.
Golden rule: the media is mostly garbage in this area.
You don’t buy COIN for crypto exposure. That makes no sense. Will explain more on this later! You buy the BTC and ETH and own it and hold it, directly, yourself. You don’t need them. It’s that simple.
Next Steps and Future Posts:
I am having a lot of fun doing this. Therefore, I can’t wait until next Saturday. I will come out with a special issue this Wednesday. This will cover more on Bitcoin and Ethereum.
Now that we have a broad overview done. I want to know more about what you all want to know.
Leave a comment for what you want me to cover in future posts and I will. I want us all to make it and to help build each other together.
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Disclaimer: None of this is to be deemed legal or financial advice.
Good point about being called a boomer, no matter your actual age! This is a nice general overview. Thanks!