Crypto & the SVB Banking Crisis with Marty Bent & Michael Krieger

of the outlook for the entire US banking sector. Now, it seems the crisis is spreading the Europe with Credit Suisse shares tumbling earlier this week sparking concerns that another major financial crisis is set to explode in relatively short order. How did we get here and what can we expect? Today, we will be exploring the role of the Federal Reserve and the broader situation with cryptocurrencies that played a

role in SVBs demise. We'll also be taking a look at the aspects of this case that suggests there's something much bigger at play, such as the role of Palantir, co founder and venture capitalist Peter Thiel and stoking the SVB collapse, and some of the connections shared by the already collapsed and currently most troubled banks and the tions. Two major US government overtures regarding cryptocurrency regulation. Joining me today to unpack this complete mess are Marty bent and

Mike Krieger. Marty is the founder of t ftc.io. A media company focused on Bitcoin beauty and freedom in the digital age. He is also a partner at 1031, a leading investment platform focused exclusively on investing in the Bitcoin ecosystem, and he also hosts the Tales from the Crypt or the T FTC podcast. Mike formerly worked on Wall Street as an oil and gas general commodities analysis and equity

research and leader on a trading desk. He left in disgust over the state of the industry and started the website Liberty blitzkrieg. Though he doesn't blog as much anymore, Mike still shares his insights regularly on social media. So great to have you guys back on how are you doing?

Silicon Valley Banks collapse but preceded that collapse. So I'm talking specifically about some events that cause trouble for the USDC stable coin, the company that issues that stable coin, which is circle, as well as some issues at Silver gate bank. So let's start there.

of deposits there. One of those companies was FTX, which we discussed in the previous episode, when FTX collapse that obviously exposed like a big hole and silver gates company, they have this counterparty FTX that people thought had billions of dollars. But it turned out that that money didn't really

exist at the end of the day, they squandered it. And so that that set off a contagion event for silver gate, particularly where a lot of companies in the space started pulling out their deposits and moving it to other banks like Silicon Valley Bank

and signature, which we'll talk about later. But throughout the summer Silvergate had had a run on the bank and actually to give Silvergate some credit, they had their bank set up where they had a lot of liquid reserves, so they were able to actually weather a bank run of $8 billion of all these cryptocurrency companies pulling their deposits out of Silvergate and sending it to other banks. But then, eventually, the flood became too much about a month ago, three, three to four weeks ago, and

Silvergate had to shut down. It was a common day. ation of depositors pulling their their money out. And then you had short sellers like Marco Hotez. And then you had a politician like Elizabeth Warren, really beating the drum on social media, that Silvergate was insolvent, and that people should pull their money out. So essentially, Everybody pulled their money out. But the interesting thing Silvergate Is they were able to process all the withdrawals from their bank,

even after they were officially shut down by the FDIC. So they were actually a very well capitalized bank.

politicians came after it, there's a few other pieces. One is that there was investigations, you know, like, I think from the DOJ, certainly there were in Korea, you know, sort of serious criminal investigations, and then that

was leaked. And so that caused more problems as well. But it seems to from my understanding, it seems that the final nail in the coffin, interestingly enough, was a prepayment of an F h lb loan, which was reasonably recently I think they they actually had, I think, a $4 billion dollar loan from the fhlb. And then they suddenly decided to repay that and in the process of repaying a 4 billion loan, they had to sell the

assets, right. So this is similar to what happened to Silicon Valley Bank, you have all these unrealized losses on their balance sheets with which every bank has, but there was a realized loss was triggered when they pre paid the fhlb loan. And that was the end of it, you know, once they had to realize the losses, and then it just everything accelerated. So that the weird thing about this, and we can tie this into signature

later because that's a big mystery. Still, you know, I've not seen a good explanation for exactly why signature was effectively nationalized. But silvergate is weird, too, because it also has one of these sort of nonsensical timelines, which is no, but the fhlb is claiming that they did not trigger a prepayment and silver gates not saying anything about that. So nobody knows why silver gate felt the need to actually prepay or pay that loan, which was the final nail in the

coffin. So that's weird. Very weird. Very weird. Yeah. So

So Marty, you mentioned Elizabeth Warren. So I think thanks to her and some of this other investigations from the government that were related to the fallout from FTX, because of the FT FTX, having accounts that silvergate They were targeting silvergate But you know, as other people, including myself in ED Berger have reported, there was this very suspect bank that's very small, in Washington state called Farmington, its Farmington state bank that had recently rebranded as Moonstone

bank, and FTX had a lot of suspects, specifically, Alameda had a lot of suspect activity there. And that hasn't been scrutinized at all right. And so that kind of suggests that there was a particular interest in scrutinizing, silvergate relative to other US based institutions that were tied up

with FTX. And it's interesting when you look at what's happened since what we're specifically talking about here now with silvergate, how, you know, with signature gone, and silvergate gone, and that doesn't really leave very many pro crypto, quote unquote, banks in the US anymore, because as I understand it, the only other bank in that sphere until relatively recently was like metropolitan bank or something. And they announced that they were going to get into their work with crypto earlier

this year because of regulatory pressure from the SEC. So

signature in particular is so important here. For one thing, when people sort of read about this in the mainstream, you know, media or just anywhere really, what you keep hearing is like signature and silvergate where crypto banks, right, they were the main crypto banks and it's true that a lot of the companies would hold their their cash there, like let's say Coinbase circle, I think circle was also a Silicon Valley Bank, but you know, a lot of the industry would have their bank

accounts there. But I actually you know, but but but crypto, you know, crypto companies, Bitcoin companies, you know, there are banking relationships with large banks, right, the mega banks, so it's not like they're not involved. I think what separates silver gate and signature and why They were targeted, actually have to do with this the send in network, but silvergate and Signet at signature. So Sen is the silver gate exchange network. And these two things were crucial to the

functioning of a, like 24/7 Fiat to stable coin market. As you know, like if you've ever used a US Bank or any bank, if you want to try to do something over the weekend, good luck, you know, how are you going to send a wire? How are you going to send, you know, dollars from one place to another, using the banking institutions are closed, right? It's outside of ours, but but

the crypto ecosystem operates 24/7. And so if you're running stable coins, and you know, you need that liquidity from USD Fiat into the stable coin, for that, for that market to function 24/7, you need a 24/7 capacity to to make those things happen. And so that's what that's what silvergate was doing with set. And therefore, I think that that is clearly why they were targeted. And in signature was also doing a similar thing.

And so that this This, to me, it was the main reason because if you think about it, a stable a USD stable coin, that's able to function all the time. And effectively, if it could do it, if it can effectively be sort of seen as a 24/7 USD instrument. That's kind of a cbdc. But being run privately. And so if you're going to actually try to roll out a CB DC run by the Fed, you can't have a functioning, I guess, competitor, you could say. Right, that's, that's not in their control.

tie into everything. But yeah, it's definitely very convenient than that these networks of, you know, critical networks of crypto infrastructure have essentially been decimated, right? Or at least they'll be bought up by some big Wall Street bank, right? Because

on a whim. And so these exchanges and companies being able to send money between each other over the weekend was was a crucial function that that silvergate and signature provided the industry, obviously, yes, stable coins. We're using it to but even for Bitcoin exchanges that need to move funds between each other, it was a big value add as well. So this is being taken out, certainly hurt the industry to to a large extent.

of that. So, what are your guys's thoughts about the, the role the Federal Reserve played if, if any, and what we're seeing or what we've seen over the past couple of weeks,

a year and a half. And then essentially, what happened is you had all these banks load up their capital reserves with particular instruments and Silicon Valley Banks case, they bought a lot of mortgage backed securities, which were the crux of the banking crisis of 2008. Essentially, when Silicon Valley Bank bought these mortgage backed securities, put them on the balance sheet, they did that with the assumption that the Fed was likely to keep interest rates low for an extended period

of time. So essentially, what happened is when the Fed started raising rates last year, and pulling dollars out of the system, Silicon Valley Bank, found itself in a very vulnerable position where they had a, what's called a duration mismatch, they had a lot of these MBS is on their book, which are longer dated. And as the Fed began pulling dollars out of the system and Silicon Valley Banks, customers began withdrawing funds that really affected that portion of their

balance sheet. And so when the Fed raises rates, the price of the underlying bonds, or debt instruments has an inverse correlation. So the Fed raises rates very fast, very rapidly and pulls dollars out of the system, the debt instruments, the price of those instruments typically falls as rates go up. And so what we found was Silicon Valley Bank, had these MBS is on

their balance sheet, and they were losing value over time. And so it was essentially just a ticking time bomb, as the Fed has kept raising rates and kept pulling dollars out of the system, the value of that capital on their balance sheet was decreasing. And this is happening to every bank, not just Silicon Valley Bank. It's not just mortgage backed securities, it's treasuries as well. So a lot of banks, instead of buying mortgage backed securities or buying treasuries

find themselves in the same situation. So essentially, what happened last week is the bomb went off, the value of the reserves and their balance sheet fell to such a point that as people began withdrawing cash from Silicon Valley Bank, probably stemming from fears of silvergate going down, and their customers wanting to diversify a bit, they were forced to sell

their mortgage backed securities and realize losses as well. And then that created the cascading event where they were selling these instruments, in just the act of selling was driving the price down even further. And as people were withdrawing money, the value of that part of their balance sheet basically collapsed. And then on top of that, it was really hard to sell mortgage backed securities that are a bit more illiquid than

something like treasuries. And so you had a run on that back, and that was exacerbated by the VC industry, in that part of the country, basically, going to their portfolio companies, Peter Thiel, most notably from founders fun emailing the portfolio companies, and urging them to take their money out of Silicon Valley Bank last week, and that word got out and created a massive run on the bank, and who got out there within 48 hours. Yeah, and, you know, let me sort of added a different

perspective here, too. So anyone that's been in the, you know, financial industry or watches markets or anything like that, will know that there's, you know, sort of an understanding that when the Fed embarks on a aggressive interest rate hike cycle, that they break something, right, and they

usually break something big. And that's sort of the joke. So you know, when the Fed starts raising and keeps raising, everyone's every sort of market participant is just sitting there waiting for like, the dead bodies to start rising to the surface, because it always happens, right? In this case, in particular, you really knew it was going to happen because the cycle of the lowest interest rates and QE in history was so

extended. I mean, it was really about a decade that so much craziness, right so much insane behavior, one of which would be you know, buying, you know, bonds at the or let's say even treasury bonds at the highest price in a 40 year, or actually was What a year yeah, 40 year bull market, you know, you know, with leverage, potentially in some cases. So there's a lot of bodies to float to the surface when the Fed raises rates that's high. And I think everyone needs to remember what happened back

in 2008. And 2009. You know, it wasn't just the, you know, the crisis in the bailouts, there was a huge power consolidation that happened afterwards. Because when you, when the Fed creates a scenario where people are sick, or the system itself is struggling, and on the verge of failure, the Fed convinced the Fed and the government can then step in and play favorites, you know, and say, Okay, well, you can die and you can live and you can get trillions, and then you can buy everything up.

Right. And that's exactly what happened after 2008. I mean, what happened after 2008, the Fed became much more powerful. I mean, effectively, the Fed can do anything at this point, I don't think there's anything the Fed couldn't do if the crisis was scary enough at this point, you know, and they would just be able to do it, and Congress would just say, please, please save us, right. You know, kind of during COVID, they were doing crazy things there too, right? Even more crazy. Right? So, so

that's the world we're in now. And that was because of 2008. Prior to that, that there was this was not the case, you know, and so I remember very clearly, back then there was there was so much uproar over things that now the that people just assume as part of the regular fed duties, that was completely unprecedented back then. So the amount of power that the Fed, consolidated, post 2008 was massive, the amount of power that the big banks consolidated, was massive and is massive.

Beyond that, with the housing market, things happened in the housing market, post 2008, that really changed the fundamentals of how the housing market worked, for example, and I went really, I mean, this was, this was a period of my life where I was just so enraged, raged about what I was seeing this now normal stuff, right. So you know, Americans were getting kicked out of their homes left and right, as everyone remember, right. They were foreclosed on, nobody was saving them, right.

They were just getting kicked to the curb losing their homes, because oh, they were, you know, they were reckless, right. Like, as if they were the ones that created the systemic problems. And then guess what happened up two years later, you had Blackstone in particular, but others as well, using the extraordinarily cheap financing that the Fed was was pumping out there. And they had access to through a subsidiary called invitation homes. And they were buying up all of the houses that

Americans got kicked out of, and then renting it back to them. So I want to make sure that everyone understands here that when the Fed breaks stuff in a big way, which they're in the process of doing, that is always an opportunity for power consolidation. And that's exactly what I think is going to happen, or at least going to be attempted.

Banks is like three banks now. And when you have this kind of stuff, like you're talking about, and what we're seeing right now, it's pretty much inevitable that who, you know, Will some one of these big bigger banks are going to be the ones that buy up a lot of what's left of SVB or signature? I don't know. I mean, it's obviously in consolidation, I

think is definitely in the works. And that just tends to be what happens during any financial crisis, you know, wealth goes up, and the people on the bottom get screwed over and over again. So it doesn't really seem like things happening now or any different than they've been they've been in the past but

why inflation flew 2021 and 2022. So like, not only do they break things when they raise rates really aggressively, but it's true for they're doing policy decisions in the other direction when they're lowering rates, like the Fed is really a pernicious factor throughout our economy that is either really screwing you by adding fuel to the inflation fire, or conversely, the other way, was creating a liquidity crisis that that leads to all this consolidation that that you just described.

was your credit card? Right, you know, was it zero? What was it two? Was it three? Was it four? Was it 5%? No, it was, you know, 19%, you know, and so, you know, there's this, there's this, again, it's important to understand that within that system of the Fed, right, you know, making things too easy pumping liquidity, and then breaking things. A key component to the power consolidation and wealth consolidation is the fact that there there are people and entities that are favored, right

throughout systemically favored. And then And then everyone else who does not have the ability to access and leverage those low rates. In fact, the only, and I think I discussed this on a pod with mighty ones. But the only way the app the average person or you know, a Normie, has has had the ability to essentially leverage in a big way like the banks do. And hedge funds do is

buying homes. Actually, that's, that's always been the one way, because when you buy a home and you take a big mortgage, that's what you're doing. So that other than that, though, I mean, that the average person is paying high rates not, they're not borrowing at zero and just like buying the baskets.

really talked about them too much yet. So as most people probably know, by now, at least people that have looked into this, a lot, at least, the official narrative thus far is that a lot of what happened with Silicon Valley Bank was allegedly triggered by a threat of a downgrade by the credit rating, a rating agency Moody's, and then Goldman Sachs steps in so I guess we'll go from there to talk about some of the stuff that led to the collapse of this bank.

you know, you're about to be downgraded, essentially. And if you remember, again, the 2008 2009 period, you will recall that the ratings agencies played a huge role in in saying that all these junk mortgage securities were triple A, and of course, they were worthless, right. And so the rating agencies are still around, and they're still, you know, doing

things sort of in a crony or arbitrary way. But in any event, with that call Silicon Valley Bank then realized that they needed to do something and part of doing something there was trying to shore up their capital. And so that's when they began trying to raise money, and also sell assets. And again, back to what happened with silvergate. When they had when they essentially had to prepay the or they decided to prepay the fhlb loan. This is when Silicon Valley Banks started

realizing losses. And when you realize losses, then you know, you can't, you have to then take action, more action. So it's sort of like this downward spiral. Once you once you realize a loss, then you then you're gonna have more problems, you have to raise money, and then nobody wants to give you money. And then there's, and then you have the bank run

thing. But the really interesting thing there is that is the role that Peter Thiel seemed to play in that in the sense that he really, I mean, once he came out were once it became public that he was telling all the, you know, the Founders Fund to pull all of their money from SBB. That was it. I mean, that was the end of the back. And so by, by effectively doing that Silicon Valley Bank was was murdered.

You know, and so that's the timeline as I understand it. And yeah, it's it's bizarre, you know, and again, look, Moody's can do that to anyone. And that's the scary thing, you know, Moody's can sort of go but would they do it to JP Morgan? You know what I mean? Like, would they dare do it to JP Morgan? Probably not. But they're going around now looking at other regional banks. You sent that article about that? I think they're looking at like Zion bank and a bunch of others.

make that phone call? Or that downgrade? You know, if and if not, that's exactly how you consolidate everything. And literally, as we're talking right now, first republic, she just mentioned their their shares were halted, ever live limit down as soon as the market open today? So it seems like there it is, is taking that back under as we speak. Right. Right. So So again, I mean, it's, it's to get this is what I think people need to understand. It's like to get the ball

rolling on a total bank run is not that difficult. And so it feels to me as if it's being allowed, you know, sort of, it's sort of being encouraged, perhaps even, you know, to on these on these non Cisco systemically important banks, right, the too big to fails. You know, and so I was just gonna say that's, it's I mean, we've really seen this, again, being somewhat close to companies that are, they're scrambling for bank accounts. In the wake of all

these bank runs and failures. JP Morgan, Bank of America, Wells Fargo are benefiting massively people are flooding to those banks to open accounts, move their deposits there as quickly as possible. Right, because, right, exactly, because of what we said, which is that they're too big to fail. And essentially, in bed with the state completely. I mean, they're just, they're just the

same thing effectively. Oh, and so I looked at the article you sent with me and yeah, so so that was in the title first republic. Moody's puts first Republican five US banks on downgrade launch Western alliance, America. Yeah. So I mean, there you go. I mean, this is this is how you it again, if they were thinking about doing this to JP Morgan, you probably get a phone call, Moody's would get a phone call, and they would be told don't do it. So they're clearly I think, probably being

encouraged to do this. You know, and then for what, for what ends? Yes, second bank on that list, Western alliance, their trades were just halted as well for volatility. So it seems like that going on? Because yeah, it's ongoing. It's ongoing. It seems like a snowball that's intentionally being allowed to happen.

Thiel on startups that we're banking at SVB. Specifically,

Peter signals something, they're probably going to follow him. So it's not as natural as founders funds, portfolio companies, but just the valley or generally as well.

call it the PayPal Mafia. So in that particular company, Brexit is backed by teal and another. Think Pay Pal, not co founder, but one of the early CEOs when teal and musk were both there. And then you have that particular company Brax teaming up with open AI, which is chat GP T's parent company, created to create advanced AI powered tools for CFOs and their teams. So basically turning chat GPT into, you know, something that can be used to probably get rid of a lot of jobs in the finance

sector. Because you know, what I've been talking about in some of my recent workouts that GBT is poised to you know, they're talking about how it's passing bar exams that can replace

lawyers. It'll replace mainstream media journalists so interesting to see some of those connections there and also Musk himself Golf was talking about, who by the way has a sorry, I guess I forgot to mention that Musk has a stake I think or helped co found open AI chat TPTs parent company and in as part of the same Pay Pal Nexus he was going to set he was open to the idea of buying Silicon Valley Bank to turn Twitter into a digital bank. Kind of interesting, huh?

you know, not nonprofit, like, what happened there? Is that legal? So yeah. Right. So yeah, Marty, do you want to add anything there? Because I don't really have too much to say on that. Yeah, I was, like opening eyes like a really weird story. Because like you mentioned, it started as nonprofit, I think Elon pumped a bunch of cash into it, because he was really afraid of AI and said, Alright, if we're, if we're going to go

after AI, we want it to be in a nonprofit way. So it's more open source to an extent, but Sam Altman, who is the CEO of open AI, I think at one point, he realized the potential profits that can be driven from this technology and decided, You know what, we're not going to be nonprofit anymore. We're gonna make this a profit driven business. From what? From what I

understand it's Earth. Elon, irks me, Elon a bit. But one interesting thing to know with open AI, and its founder, Sam Altman, he's also the founder of world coined, which is an attempt to create like a cbdc. Like, global digital currency,

up with companies like this to back Brax company, right? And then use all that data that people are freely giving them to come in and do a whole bunch of, you know, stuff that's automating more and more jobs. Yeah, so I have a lot to say about chat. GPT, but I don't want to get too off topic. So to go back to Peter Thiel for a second. So you guys, I'm sure remember that a couple years ago Peter Thiel made a really

unusual comment about Bitcoin and crypto. He added on a panel with Mike Pompeo, who was either Secretary of State or CIA director at the time, I can't remember which one. He essentially said that, you know, even though he claimed he prefaced the statement by saying that he was pro crypto and a Bitcoin maximalist, he claimed that Bitcoin may also be a

Chinese financial weapon. And this is interesting in the context of what we talked about a little bit ago, like people like Elizabeth Warren, for example, and a lot of other prominent Democrats and also Republicans as well are making the claim that cryptocurrency and specifically Bitcoin are national security threats.

knows what he's saying. It's not difficult. Now, if you're going to come out there and say that Bitcoin could be a Chinese weapon against the United States. While you're standing next to Mike Pompeo. That is a very destructive narrative. Totally putting out there. Yeah. And so he knows that there's no way he doesn't know. He doesn't know that. And so he's sort of

seeding that narrative. And that is a pure, you know, national security Deep State talking point period, and he's also a guy who you If he claims to believe in freedom, you know, to spin Bitcoin in such a way when he knows full well that China has not been encouraging to Bitcoin, you know, has been has

been in many steps of cracking down on Yeah, exactly. It's not like China has been, yeah, let's, let's let's let's really advance the cause of Bitcoin I've been, it's been quite the opposite, in fact, so for him to say that it's just completely

dishonest. So that's a red flag right there. And also, if you actually believe in freedom, you know, as Marty is basically dedicated his life to linking Bitcoin with with freedom and American values, which I completely agree with that view, to to denigrate Bitcoin, in this sort of a way when he clearly understands that it does embody, in so many ways, the ethos of

the Republic of the United States, is a huge red flag. And so, you know, for me, I feel like Peter Thiel is always talking out of both sides of his mouth, I feel like he, whether he's doing it on purpose or not, is is is unknown, but I will say that he is, he's too often completely contradicting himself. And he portrays himself in one way. But then, but then says things that are completely antithetical to what he's

saying. So a very strange character, for sure. Obviously, I know Whitney has done a lot of work on on him, and of course, Palantir and all that stuff in his ties to the national security state. But yeah, this was a weird comment, and I'll never forget it, you know, unless he unless he clears that up. I mean, that was a very concerning, and, in my opinion, huge red flag and destructive narrative to be sitting out there, which is also completely false. Yeah,

financial weapon, he'll call himself a libertarian. And he's only built the most like damaging software for freedom in the hands of every single US intelligence agency that's used a profile of you know, thought crime and is an integral part of this war on domestic terror. And you even had people saying on on websites like Seeking Alpha, that Peter Thiel should use Palantir to rein in Bitcoin, after he made these comments, and that is not someone who is libertarian at all. But you

know, he likes to posture as that for whatever reason. And I think it's a calculated PR move not unlike Elon Musk trying to cater to a very specific audience, you know, through what he puts out publicly, his tweets, his memes, and all of that, while at the same time, it seems like his actions a lot of time he's playing a different game. Yeah,

Yeah, it's, it's very perplexing. It's like, he's one of the hardest people to read, from my perspective, because like, is he trying to take a superposition where I'll talk out of both sides of his mouth, and put money in both directions for freedom with Bitcoin and pro dystopian hellscape with companies like Palantir I don't know if he's,

not just keep people from going to Mexico to the US, right? And that's all surveillance drones weaponized drones and these, you know, surveillance towers. I mean, it's basically the SAR on tower. You know, these guys love they're like, Lord of the Rings, you know, references and all that stuff. But it's, I don't know, he's also put a lot of money in companies like carbine

911, which is all tied up with the Epstein network. I've talked about them before, and they're basically steadily taking over the entire United States 911 emergency services call system right now. And part of that is actually thanks to legislation put through by Congress last year. So anyway, I'll be

circling back to that at some point, hopefully soon. But there's a you know, Founders Fund is invested in all sorts of Orwellian hellish stuff, so I don't know it's really hard for me to see these guys is as Pro freedom Huh, anyway,

banking to effectively rally around it. And so I wonder if part of what's going on here with Silicon Valley Bank is now now the valley feels indebted in some way, perhaps to the, to the state, and maybe more likely to be amenable for participatory and, you know, some sort of panopticon digital currency. I'm just I'm guessing that the the first step along the way to a cbdc will be somehow and I'm not sure exactly how but somehow promoted as a public private partnership, right.

But I do, I do think, and this is why I really wanted to come on and be part of this is that we need to be talking about it now. Because the reason COVID The COVID SIOP was so effective, you know, and it's sigh off the me for a few months completely. And I'm pretty ashamed of that. But I found a learn my lesson was that it was so kind of it was it was just, it was so much at once out of nowhere, that something I personally wasn't

really thinking about. And so yeah, we need to be talking about the stuff ahead of time, even though we don't know exactly what they're up to.

both. So, you know, they could easily be pulled in to build the infrastructure, and it could still be essentially framed as, you know, an entirely Public Sector Project. Right. So,

claim. And Carter's claims specifically come from Barney Frank, who is the guy from the Frank Dodd, you know, Banking Act stuff, post 2008. And he was apparently added to signature banks board, I believe, in 2015. And he essentially said that Signature Bank didn't really have to be shut down when it was shut down. So the question is, why was it shut down? What's the timeline here? What doesn't make sense and what's really going on? So whoever wants to start on packing that be? Go right ahead.

If that is what was happening was was a bit odd. Another thing with the shutdown, is that what it was a bit different than Silicon Valley Bank where the FDIC came in and said, Alright, we're taking over on Sunday, the New York Department Financial Services stepped in and said Secretary are shutting down before market open on Monday. And as Barney Frank mentioned earlier this week, he was pretty confident that the bank was liquid enough, this service withdrawals, so it was a bit odd

that the NY DFS stepped in and shut them down out of nowhere. Yeah, and it was interesting, too. So when I was first, trying to research what happened, I was just looking up Signature Bank, right, and try to read as much as I could about any article about it. And it was really bizarre, because every article was saying the same thing, which was nothing, you know, there were just like, New York Department of Financial Services decided to shut down Signature Bank. That's it, you know, there

was no timeline, there was no rationale. And so the only thing that sticks out here is signature. Again, back to silvergate. I remember, as we discussed earlier, had to send network which was crucial to providing liquidity and the ability to get in and out of exchanges and Fiat to stable coins and all that stuff. And so the other one was Signet. And so it appears to me clearly, that the intention with getting rid of signature was to get rid of Cigna, as well, and, and then

make that sort of ecosystem struggle. Now, again, like New York Department of Financial Services, as Marty mentioned, like New York is, of course, the most dirty place when it comes to stuff like this, because it's the you know, it's the it's the womb of too big to fail, right, it's a womb of like Wall Street. And so you know, that that that state, that city is going to protect that at all costs. And so that was, you know, that,

that that strange in itself. But But I think, yeah, and and the fact that I mentioned earlier that they're now saying the FDIC, apparently is saying that anyone who buys signature has to close down the crypto activities. Well, why? Like,

what is going on here? So yeah, it makes no sense. I mean, the signature, I'm open to other ideas here, but I didn't even see anything about assets as so for example, as we discussed earlier, Silicon Valley Bank and silvergate, were both triggered into selling assets, which created realized losses, for a variety of reasons. I don't I haven't read that about

signature, perhaps they did, but I didn't read that. And so, again, I'm waiting for someone to explain to me, what what exactly triggered Signature Bank what what made it different. There's the end of the day, it's, it's, in my mind, and it's impossible, that the two, the two banks that ran these networks, Sen. And Signet, just are two of the three that ended up dead.

From like, the asset side of things for signature, particularly you think, if they have one of the two senators who wrote the bill that defined the type of capital requirements for these banks was sitting on the board, he he'd actually be very astute to making sure that the bank that he was associated with was, was capitalized the correct way. Yeah, it was. It was all very, very weird how it happened. The fact that it happened on a Sunday sort of out of nowhere, very out.

fail. And this is part of our response tied up with the SVB bailout. I mean, maybe I'm wrong on that. But yeah, but

some sort of cyber, financial cyber crime. You know, I mean, they love pre emptive stuff, whether it's financial stuff, or the war on domestic terrorism or whatever. I mean, pre crime is quickly becoming a major facet of United States government policy. So

up bailing out Silicon Valley Bank depositors. And if they really were worried about contagion risk, like, why would they shut down signature bank that just signals that banks have a similar profile or at similar risk, and so you would have a run on those banks, as well. Like, if they really wanted to stem contagion, they would have every incentive to make it seem like signatures are very well capitalized. try their hardest to keep it open.

tons of money for drug cartels, and whatever. And people like Katherine Austin Fitz, have pointed out that if you know, the drug trade stop tomorrow, a lot of these big banks would collapse, because they're dependent on, you know, you know, the money laundering of a lot of those illicit funds, whether for, you know, cartels or intelligence agencies or whatever, like, when they actually decide to prosecute these kinds of financial crimes, there's usually not always but

you know, sometimes there's an ulterior motive. And I think that's quite probable here, especially when you consider that some of this legislation in the works like Elizabeth Warren's legislation that argues that crypto is a national security threat. It's about terror, financing, terrorism and money laundering are part of the justifications for that right. But it's not like getting rid of crypto is going to stop money laundering, money laundering, of course, preceded Kryptos

existence by many decades. So it's not like it'll go away, even if crypto magically disappears right

can do everything in the shadows. And so yeah, I mean, so if everybody, if everybody sort of transactions are known and tracked, then whoever is in power can say, oh, it's sort of a good blackmail thing, too. Because you can, you can just, you know, what everyone's doing. And then you can go up to someone and say, Hey, by the way, you know, did you do this two years ago, and blah, blah, blah? And then okay, well, you

can either play with us, or you can go to jail, you know? And so it's like, yeah, it's a great this,

just what humans kind of do. But um, or psycho humans do. But what what what they see what they seem to be think they can do is just like, completely own it, you know, just just just have it on a level that is so institutionalized and dominant, that it encompasses everything and there's no sort of black market or way Go rumor freedom. And and I guess to me that it's such a brazen goal, that I sort of think it's doomed to fail. But But yeah, it's certainly what they want. I mean, they're

going just for everything. Well, before

rid of their crypto. So we're going to shut you down. And whoever buys the bank has to give up all the crypto business.

significantly depressed. And so the bailout was essentially, the Fed stepping in and saying, Hey, even though these bonds are worth 85 cents on the dollar, we'll buy them at $1 from you, and we'll hold them on our books. And at some point in the future, you can you can buy them back in full when when the markets settle, and the banking system becomes more stable. So

essentially, QE five is started. It is they won't they won't explicitly say this, but it is quantitative easing, where the Fed steps in buys depressed assets at par value, it's a bit different than past QE, where they're guaranteeing par value. But that's essentially what happened. Yeah, so So one thing I would just add there, I think that the specifics are that they're not actually buying the assets, but they're they're Qalat. Like they're taking them as

collateral at par. And then giving the the institutions the money, right. So like they're giving them par value. But it's like, technically not a purchase, right? Yeah. Yeah. So so that's the, I guess the difference between QE But effectively, it's the same, because because the banks have access to money at par value for assets that clearly are not

trading at par value, which is incredible. Like, think think about again, like 10 years ago, I would have just been nonstop riding poppies after floppies losing my head, because it was so insane. But it's like, people don't even blink an eye now. Whereas that would be the equivalent of let's say, Whitney, has her portfolio at Schwab. And, you know, two months ago, she bought all the high flying tech stocks. And then they crashed 50%. And now oh, you know, I'm 50% less

wealthy. And then then the Fed comes in and says, Oh, don't worry with me. We're gonna pretend that didn't happen. And we're gonna just go back two months ago, and to the value they were at, and we'll just lend you money based on that. And you're going to be fine, right? wouldn't wouldn't that be nice? Right? I mean, it's, it's, it's effectively, it's effectively pausing reality for banks, so that they can get

money and be liquid. And so you can argue that you can argue if you want that that's important at this moment, but the bigger but the bigger point is that? How do you ever get out of stuff like this? Right? I mean, once exactly what started in 2008. Once you go down a path like this, you cannot go back. I mean, you really can't. And the Fed was trying to prove that it could kind of go back to normal by raising rates, but look, look what happens. They raise rates a bunch, and now they're doing

crazy stuff again, right, right away. Right. And so and so, you know, the taxpayer angle, though is interesting, because, you know, JP Morgan this morning is saying that the amount of liquidity that could flow into banks could be up to 2 trillion. And what their that 2 trillion estimate is coming from, they basically took the assets of Have the bonds of maybe the treasury bonds? I'm not sure exactly which fixed income securities have non non too big to fail banks only, and said,

How much do they hold on their balance sheets? And I think their numbers 2 trillion. So JP Morgan's is effectively saying that 2 trillion could just be pumped into banks. If they if they if they want to use this facility very quickly. So just think about that. I mean, just to say that, I mean, yeah, the taxpayer is not not only on the hook, like civilization is

saying like, this is so much bigger than the taxpayer. This is this is, is again, this is just another, another, I guess, salvo in like, a coup, you know, effectively, it's just, it's just a coup.

function of how the Federal Reserve operates. And how the fiat monetary system operates, we've created too much debt, and the fit, there are not enough dollars to service, the interest on the debt level and the principal on the debt as well. So like, functionally, the Fed has to do more dollars, print more dollars to begin trying to service the debt. And so what's

really interesting, we go back to 2008. And then you fast forward to 20 22,008, fed steps and prints a bunch of money, lowers rates, and then 2016 2017 begins to reverse that policy, then we get to 2020. It was actually before 2020, September 2019, we're going to reap a market spasm, which was, which was driven by Fed policy, trying to pull dollars out of the

system, something broke. And then coincidentally, it's pointing 20, COVID happened, and they were able to lower rates print a bunch of money, that fast forward to today, just three years later, a year and a half after they started raising rates and pulling dollars out of the system. It's broke again. So I think what I'm trying to highlight here is just the depression of the time between Fed policy decisions, it's something breaking, it's accelerating. Right rapid pace.

And so right now, the Fed is like if we thought the amount of money that the Fed printed in 2020 was insane, the amount of money that they're gonna have to print after this breakdown of the banking system was going to be unfathomable, or at the print trillions and trillions of dollars, and that is just going to exacerbate inflation terribly. I mean, this the Fed really didn't want to be put in a position right now to lower rates because inflation is still high report.

means. But maybe Blackrock has reason to believe, you know, reasons, we don't know what they are exactly, you know, something they know that we don't know, that leads them to expect that the Fed is going to keep tightening,

but my but my feet, and that is an interesting theory. And I think, I think if they do continue to raise rates, we need to take that more seriously. But I will on a on a just a sort of personal level. If I had to be if I was a betting man, I would say now that they're pretty much done. And the reason I say that is because with the the drop in two year Treasury rates, it's

the fastest drop in the last, I think, this week since 1987. So the two year Treasury yield was has dropped 100 basis points or 1%. Three days, right. And what that what that signals and historically tends to always signal is that the market is saying you're there's no way you're raising rates and in fact, you're gonna compete and that's what people are betting, you know, essentially hundreds of billions of dollars on that,

that. And my my conclusion would be, that's probably correct that the market is accurate on that. Yeah, The banking crisis is becoming abundantly clear this not isolated to the United States. It's spreading to Europe and affecting the global economy. I think they're going to have to lower its Yeah.

investigated, silver gate was being investigated. And I think it was silver gate that was having problems and was going to delay, among other things. The filing of their annual report. And Credit Suisse actually had a lot of those same problems. So from March 2, there were there was a news headline, Credit Suisse breach, spills, personal and foe of high net worth clients all over the place. And then I think, not long after that Credit Suisse delays, and a report after late call from the

SEC. So there seems to be. And the subtext of that from CNN is Credit Suisse just can't catch a break. Right. And this is what they had, you know, their current, those poor guys. Yeah. So anyway, that's interesting, right? Because now, Credit Suisse obviously having a lot of problems. And there's claim, you know, now that like the Swiss central bank is may have to step in, and all this stuff to rescue it. And obviously, there's

there's some problems there. But it's just interesting that it seems like they were having problems before and maybe, you know, if they think they couldn't weather that storm, they see an opportunity to sort of blame something else for their woes. Any thoughts on that?

Suisse. And I do believe that the Swiss National Bank stepped in overnight to provide $54 billion loan to Credit Suisse. But it seems like as US markets open today that they're beginning to price. The probability of a Credit Suisse failure, almost it's almost a certainty now of how their credit default swaps are trading. Yeah. So so yeah. As Marty said, I mean, Credit Suisse has been dying for like decades, kind of like, it's a long time.

we've seen with the cbdc. Because so credits or credits with I mean, what they would have to do, there is it's unimaginable to my mind, you know, how Credit Suisse is, you know, their assets and what they owe, and the counterparties is linked to everything else, you know, I mean, it would be, it would be, it would be, you know, crazy cascades if something was, you know, happen there. So, of course, the Swiss National Bank, I think did, as Marty said, stepped in with 50 billion or

something last night. But, you know, to me, I want to go back to the big point, which is, this system is obviously not sustainable for any long period of time. Because every time you do these giant bailouts or liquidity injections, all you're doing is just kind of keeping it afloat without addressing any of the underlying issues, like, the balance sheet issues are not being solved, none of this stuff is being solved, but they're

just keeping everything sort of floating up with liquidity. And what that does then is, which is what we've seen over the last 10 years, you just build up more, right? You build up more debt, you build up more of a bigger balance sheet, you end up with a bigger problem down the road. And my personal view, is that the powers that be completely understand this, I mean, they they know, this is why there's talking about a great reset, right? Because they know a reset is coming. And so what they're

trying to do is they want to reset it themselves. Instead of allowing the public or even you know, legislative bodies like Congress to have a role in resetting it, they they want to essentially preempt that process and, and create their own reset in their minds. And then once the time is right, you know,

just just push it all in there. And so that's, that's, you know where I think this is going, you know, and I think that we need to really be open to the possibility of anything because to actually attempt the reset in the way they want it, you do need a lot of fear, and you need a lot of people being hurt. And so sort of like the panic that we saw over the weekend, but But times 10. And that's what I think we're gonna see in the next year.

for bail ins to happen and bail ins as opposed to bail out. So bail outs is taxpayer money bailing out the bank, but bail ends is when banks use depositor money to sort themselves out, right. So what do you think, is the likelihood of seeing some of that if things worsen?

United States or in Europe. So I think everything is on the table, they're going to print money. And I would certainly not be surprised that do balance on top of that as well. Yeah, I think. So that would be a huge, I think Cyprus had the balance, right? They were the only example I can kind of think of, and then then Bitcoin actually rallied a ton right

after that. I remember. If they do Baylands, right, which again, is where you depositors take a haircut on their accounts, which is the exact opposite of what just happened over the weekend. In my opinion, that would be part of the cycle effectively, right? I mean, to to have bail ins would be such a scare mongering thing to people, because, you know, in a tweet I wrote a couple of days ago, I said, three things are needed to facilitate the rollout of CBDCs. And the first one I said, is

make holding money and banks feel completely unsafe. And so a bail in would definitely do that, you know, it would it would make people understand that their money is not saved. And that can be haircut at any moment. And therefore, clamor for a solution. And of course, you know, people like myself already have our solution, you know, in Bitcoin, but you know, your average person is going to, is going to is going to say, or even business would say, you know, oh, I need a solution

quick. And there you go, you know, a cbdc could be that solution, just hold your money, you know, in this in this cbdc. And it says, it's not, you know, it's not being loaned out. It's not being leveraged, it's just right here, it's for you at all times. And it's completely safe and guaranteed. And I think you need some sort of fear point like that. And maybe, maybe balance is a trigger, I don't know, there could be a lot of triggers. But that's a potential one.

And I think balance actually interesting in the context CBDCs could be like a normalization tactic, because with the cbdc, we're seeing it in China already. Like, it wouldn't necessarily be a bail in but it would, it would be like a normalization of the money and your wallet has an expiration date, where you can have your cbdc wallet, and the Fed will AirDrop money into it. They'll say, Hey, you have two weeks to spend this and you can only spend it on this, that and the

other goods on this list. Which is like an interesting nudging. That could happen as well. Yeah, that's a good point. I mean, they've been talking about this forever, which is, which is like essentially forcing people to spend money, which which is exactly what that will do. They just AirDrop you money that you have to spend in a month. I mean, we just like rats in an experiment. Totally.

they've decided to have reserves. Now at being why Mellon, which is funny to me because they're really dirty bank and pop up in my books a lot so I don't know I'm when you look at how a lot of the other big stable coins like tether, for example, they have their banks that Deltec that Bahamian bank that was super tied up with FTX and is like insanely shady themselves. It just kind of sticks out to me that a lot of these stable coins seem to have their reserves at some of the, I

don't know, most suspect banks possible. But it also, you know, it seems like there's an effort to sort of clamp down to an extent on stable coins, or at least get them tied up with, you know, certain banks that are friendly to some of these unfortunate agendas that we've been discussing today. So, do you guys have any thoughts about how all of this has been affecting stable coins and sort of the politics between stable coins and a likely cbdc launch?

risk. But if you look at the other side of the coin, they could see it as an incredible opportunity as well, where they can co opt circle, consolidate them into banks that they fully control, and then somewhat takeover circle and control it very, just fully control it, I think, if I were to put my chips on the table and bet on who becomes the private entity in the public private, the cooperation for CB DC circuit

would be high on that list. So I think what we're seeing now is sort of like a coring of circle into these systemically important banks. And at some point in the future, the government or the Federal Reserve could step in and say, Hey, we're gonna need you to create this CB DC pilot for us. Yeah, that's, that's a really good point. So to expand on that I agree with with

everything you said. So if you think about it, and this goes back to my point earlier, which is that there is a decentralized sort of organic way you could reset, which is what I think there's a lot of bitcoins is a huge part of that, for example, right? I mean, that's exactly kind of what Bitcoin is here to do. And then there's the WEF, and others who are taking it upon themselves to reset us into what they want. So there's like these two competing forces that are that are battling

effectively right now. Um, and so the stable coin ecosystem, I'm starting to view as crucial in this in this battle, because thus far you've had, and I'm including, you know, sort of the network Sen and Signet in this as well, right, you have sort of a wild west a little bit of a system that's developed over the last few years with around stable coins and around these 24/7 networks, right, that, that facilitate the cryptocurrency

ecosystem. And that's more or less been a sort, you could put it into this sort of decentralized, organic resetting of things. But I think now the USG and the Fed see that as having gone too far, let's say, right, like, this is this is this is to organic, right, it's to kind of out of our control.

And so I think Marty made a really good point. And that this could be right now, we could be seeing the very beginning stages of, of the government and the Fed starting to sort of CO opt these, and they may have already been, you know, like, circle, I agree. I mean, circle has always kind of been like, it's kind of like red flag to me. Always. Right. But like, even more so.

And so this, this goes back to what we discussed earlier, which is that there could be this transition point where a CV, you know, you get to see certain cbdc Let's I'm sorry, a certain stable coin, let's say it's USDC. That would be the top contender, in my view as well, that becomes sort of state sanctioned in a way right, so circle may be all of a sudden in six months is all at JPMorgan, right? And JP Morgan is doing circle and this USDC and it's all integrated like that, and

then they can just allow it to run that way for a while. And it could sort of effectively be like a proto cbdc That's kind of ostensibly run privately, but then in a future crisis. Right. They could they could create a crisis with that and say, Okay, no, no, now we need to take it fully under our own control. Right. And that's, that's one I think pathway for this to happen.

very interesting. And one of the main guys on it is the guy that claimed to invent CBDCs was, you know, and that was helping lead, you know, this particular tiny bank in the middle of nowhere in Washington state that had all this, this cash come in, from Alameda research, they were leading some of their digital transformation and, you know, financial services stuff. So, you know, maybe, maybe that's what saved them some of their ties to cbdc Architects, or something like that. It honestly

would not surprise me at this point. All right, well, anything else you guys would like to add in? Before we wrap up here, I definitely want to let people listening know, you know, what they can tangibly expect in the coming weeks and months. And, you know, maybe some solutions for people that are worried about having their money in banks and things like that.

system built on Bitcoin. So anybody listening? who is thinking of how to protect themselves against the cbdc? Future? I would highly recommend that you begin educating yourself about Bitcoin and once you're sufficiently educated and confident that you believe Bitcoin makes sense, and is something worthwhile. Acquire Bitcoin, but most importantly, don't normally get bitcoin, do not hold it on an exchange.

Bitcoin has native properties that allow you to control it in a wallet that that only you can access, and no government or company can stop you from accessing it. So it's, if you're getting into Bitcoin, it's not important, only important that you buy it, but that you actually possess it as well. You do not want to hold your Bitcoin on exchanges, because that will be a pressure point that the government will use, I believe in the future, they will shut down these on and off ramps, so

it is very crucial. While we have the time to do so that people acquire Bitcoin and get it into wallets that they control. Because at some point in the future, the government or the Federal Reserve can flip a switch and make it very hard to get bitcoin. Yeah, yeah. From that, from my point of view. I think that I think that, you know, as Marty said, right, it's a binary and I

think that's right. So, you know, you you have to understand, I think everyone needs to understand that, you know, if we're going to have a more decentralized, let's say, networked world, with more freedom, versus the, you know, very rigidly hierarchical centralized, you know, sort of panopticon world, which the West was, had many, many in the United States one as well, intelligence agencies in particular, let's say, you know, there's a responsibility that

comes with the former right, the networked decentralized world with freedom, there's a lot of responsibility that comes along with that. And I think that's one of the key things that Marty was saying about Bitcoin. I mean, there's to do Bitcoin properly, you know, you really, there's, there's a degree of responsibility needs to take, and be willing to take that. And so people need to also be responsible for their emotions.

And this is like the primary trigger, like if we go the wrong way, I firmly believe that it's because too many people were not responsible for their own emotions, and are allowing fear and just programming to get the better of them, which allows these things to push forward. And, you know, so be ready because that is what's going to be triggered your your fear

response, you know, your, your, your just natural reaction. And of course, like the media, you know, like, like these mainstream media, like, seriously, there should be a warning on every single broadcast and CNN because it is so poisonous to your mind. It is such programming. I think, I think the best advice I could give is, when some new thing happens, that's big and scary, you know, try to just chill out

for a second. You know, take a step back, you know, don't just react because I think, particularly, you know, people like us to that. We have social media presences that are reasonably large. You feel the need to kind of Have a conclusion or have a response or have a reaction kind of quickly. And I've found at least personally that the best path is to not do that. Because let it settle out a little bit like see what's, how did it how does the system react? You know, how's

the public reacting? Why are we being triggered in this way. And so that would be my my advice would just be, really guard your mind, really guard your emotions, because that is what that is what's being very intentionally triggered with, with, with every sign up to bring us to that state we all want to be.

collapse, you know, about 20 years ago. And what I heard from them, you know, is the, the best thing you can do in that kind of situation is have is not given to the panic, and the fear, because that's going to lead you to make impulsive decisions you may otherwise have not made, and it's, you're definitely going to be better off if you can keep your cool when things get insane in the economy, and you know, it's not just going to be Argentina, this time, we're just going to be like a certain

sector of the US economy, like all the stuff is woven together. So you know, if too much stuff starts to go, you know, we can definitely see what will happen. But I also want to give advice to some people who aren't necessarily, you know, in crypto or interested in crypto because not all of my audience is. So what would you say? What do you guys say to people who, you know, have accounts at some of the big banks like JP Morgan, Wells, Fargo, etc? You know, Is there money safe there? Should

they think about putting it elsewhere? And if so, where I mean,

very emotional about it. And that's why I urge people to educate themselves about it, I'm not going to tell anybody to just go buy bitcoin, right now, like ape into it, educate yourself about it. If you spend the time to learn about it, I think that you'll come to a logical conclusion that it makes a lot more sense than the incumbent banking system. Me personally, I hold most of my savings in Bitcoin and not in

the banking system. That's what I recommend in terms of like an alternative to the big banks, I really don't think there are many there systemically important. They're the only ones that will get bailed out every time a crisis arises. Maybe a small community bank, but as we're seeing with this regional banking crisis playing out right now, maybe they're not even

safe. It is really weird times in the market for money, because the Federal Reserve has completely destroyed the dollar in any confidence we could have in it moving forward. Yeah, so So from my perspective, and you're kind of asking that to two guys that probably haven't had a banking

significant bank accounts for years. You know, after 2008, nine, I mean, I immediately I haven't touched it too big to fail personally, you know, since you know, and, and I've had whatever money I need in the bank, effectively is just what I, you know, I'll put money in there to pay bills, you know, as I need to do that, or what I need for other things, but yeah, I just been, you know, I tried to stick stay away from the

banking system for over a decade. So, you know, I'm not the best guy to ask about, like, how to navigate the banking system, because I try to stay away from it. But if I don't, if I'm not going to talk about like, you know, Bitcoin or even some precious metals, what I would suggest then, what I would do, like if someone said to me, you know, gun to your head, you can't buy bitcoin, you can't buy any precious metals. You know, those are not your options. So what are you going to do? You

got a bunch of money in the banks. What I would probably do is I would look around and I would say, Okay, how do I make my life more resilient? You know, like, what is it gonna take do I do I start to grow garden? Do I add this to my landscape? Do I get chickens like we did, you know, you know, what, do I stock up on

in 2027 I have no idea. But at some point, you know, the the products that are made in China are just going to somehow not find their way here anymore. You know, and that's a lot of stuff. So, you know, you know, so So what sort of, you know, what sort of things you know, do you need, you know, what sort of things will be important to your resilience? You know, over the coming years out, there's, there's, of course, food is an important one energy is another one, you know, shut, you know,

shut having your shelter your sort of security? I mean, do you need? Do you need certain batteries? Do you need, you know, things like that. So, if you're, if you're not, if you're not wanting to, like, put your money into alternative, let's say, financial assets, I would definitely be investing in having things that you know, you're going to use anyway,

right? Like, don't stockpile stuff that you're not going to use, but if you know that you're going to use this, this and that over the next three years, why not just have a habit now, you know, if you've got the money to burn in the bank, and you're scared of that, you know, the other the other thing that, you know, this is what my wife and I have been, we've been totally dedicating 2023 so far to this. And it's been going really well. It's been busy, but you know, skills, right? Learning skills

that you don't have, that you think would be helpful? And so I would, I would, I would encourage everyone out there to think about that, like, where do you feel like you're lacking. So for me, personally, there have been a few areas, one of them is just my inability, really to DIY, and make things in the physical world at all, you know, I grew up in New York City where like, nobody knows how to do anything, you just call the frickin superintendent, like, come fix everything. So for me,

I felt very, I felt very vulnerable in that regard. So you know, I'm taking a woodworking class, for example, in the carpentry, trying to learn how to do that stuff. And it's a massive learning curve, like it's, it reminds me of Bitcoins, just like drinking from a firehose,

there, every single one of us has a gap, right? Like, yeah, and we probably know what it is. You're just like, I wish I was better at this right? Or I wish I kind of will just just go get better at it. Right? Go learn it.

Yeah, that's, that's something that's been. There's been a big movement within Bitcoin, like with this in mind, which is the concept of going out and shaking your ranchers hands, maybe you can Ranch, maybe you can't farm. But what you can do is get in your car and drive to your local ranch or your local farm, shake

that farmer's hand and figure out how you can support them. So if you're, if you're not going to be able, if you don't think you're gonna be able to be self sufficient, and building a farm or ranch to supply your own food. There are people around you that are and they need to be supported. Just building community and connections locally is extremely important. Please, Yep, totally agree.

there's a ton of stuff there. I mean, if you want to just search any any word you think is interesting, you're gonna find a lot of articles I wrote almost daily for nearly a decade. So I'm sure I'll write again at some point in my life, but just not Not at the moment. So yeah, I'm pretty much public facing on Twitter, and that's effectively.