1/ The #Bitcoin bear case has two two components:

The macro, and the miners.

THREAD 👇

2/ On the macro side, if the dollar reverses its major downtrend and/or real rates turn positive, that will hurt $BTC considerably.

I don't expect either to happen in 2021, but have to pay attention to these.
3/ On the miners side, one has to consider the miners' cycle.

It works like this 👇
4/ Miners' hashrate (the aggregated bitcoin computing capacity) is directly tied to mining difficulty, which is the main variable in the bitcoin cost of production

=> the more capacity installed, the higher the difficulty, and the higher the cost.
5/ In a bull-run, miners' hashrate lags price, so as price takes off and moves higher, miners' profitability explodes (as price goes up but production costs don't as much).

These are the happy times.
6/ Higher profitability drives miners to increase capacity, and attracts new miners.
7/ Around major tops you will see people who don't understand bitcoin pull online calculators --which ignore other costs such as cooling, pool fees, warehousing, security, and personnel-- and imagine they are going to become wealthy mining bitcoin. Then go buy overpriced miners.
8/ It's important to understand that Bitcoin mining presents a perfect Prisoner's Dilemma.

Here's an old thread on that topic. Mind that the bitcoin produced a month is now 27,375, or about 900 a day. This quantity halved in May.

https://t.co/PPPtXM6hOB
9/ Higher profitability drives increasing mining capacity, but this new capacity can take months to install.

That's why hashrate increases lag price increases.
10/ Currently, and due to chip shortages related to technological changes and covid supply chain disruptions, delays are in the order of 6-10 months.
11/ While miner profitability moons, miners are capable of hodling more: they can reduce sales to take advantage of rising prices in a bull market.

This adds to reflexivity and helps prices further up.
12/ Eventually hashrate catches up with price. Happy times end, and miners have to increase their selling volumes to pay the bills.
13/ There's another game theory component: if you are a miner and know that other miners will soon be forced to increase their selling volumes, you may want to sell before and front-run them to get better prices.
14/ This increase in selling can be augmented by prior hodling, resulting in a perfect storm.

Miners did hold inventories back late 2020, but their selling volumes have already increased in 2021, with price in the 30s-40s.
15/ Finally, consider that at current prices the dollar amount for new bitcoin produced is considerably larger than it was prior to the halving.

1800 bitcoin/day * $10,000 = $18,000,000/day

900 bitcoin/day * 35,000 = $31,500,000/day
I remain bullish, but it's important to keep the bear case in mind. Miner flows make sure price can't move in straight up lines for too long, and are the reason one should not be too bullish later in the year. At some point miner excesses must be rinsed out.
For those asking where to find miner data, there are three main sources:

@cryptoquant_com
@glassnode
@thetokenanalyst

All require a subscription unfortunately.

I mostly use CryptoQuant: https://t.co/AaOPJjxt7h

Their founder @ki_young_ju shares very useful data on Twitter.

More from Bitcoin

1/9 Bitcoin has performed remarkably these past few weeks despite:
-Most of DeFi falling 50-80%
-CFTC charging BitMEX
-POTUS contracting Covid
-Delayed stimulus talks
-FCA announcing a derivative ban for retail

Why? Let’s see what we can find on-chain

2/9 Bitcoin’s Realized Cap has been steadily increasing just as it did before the 2017 bull market took off. If it continues as it did in 2017, 2021 should be an interesting year.

https://t.co/nqgX7vTMDV


3/9 Bitcoin MVRV, whilst more volatile this market cycle, is also is holding the same trajectory it did during the 2016/17 bull market

https://t.co/jadbn6nCOB


4/9 Looking at the supply of Bitcoin on exchanges is a good indication as to whether or not users are increasing trading activity, or increasing hodl activity. With supply reducing it looks like the tendency recently has been driven by hodlers


5/9 Despite the recent volatility, the number of Bitcoin whales continues to increase, indicating the growing number of large holders that have positive expectations for the future of Bitcoin

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Oh my Goodness!!!

I might have a panic attack due to excitement!!

Read this thread to the end...I just had an epiphany and my mind is blown. Actually, more than blown. More like OBLITERATED! This is the thing! This is the thing that will blow the entire thing out of the water!


Has this man been concealing his true identity?

Is this man a supposed 'dead' Seal Team Six soldier?

Witness protection to be kept safe until the right moment when all will be revealed?!

Who ELSE is alive that may have faked their death/gone into witness protection?


Were "golden tickets" inside the envelopes??


Are these "golden tickets" going to lead to their ultimate undoing?

Review crumbs on the board re: 'gold'.


#SEALTeam6 Trump re-tweeted this.
I just finished Eric Adler's The Battle of the Classics, and wanted to say something about Joel Christiansen's review linked below. I am not sure what motivates the review (I speculate a bit below), but it gives a very misleading impression of the book. 1/x


The meat of the criticism is that the history Adler gives is insufficiently critical. Adler describes a few figures who had a great influence on how the modern US university was formed. It's certainly critical: it focuses on the social Darwinism of these figures. 2/x

Other insinuations and suggestions in the review seem wildly off the mark, distorted, or inappropriate-- for example, that the book is clickbaity (it is scholarly) or conservative (hardly) or connected to the events at the Capitol (give me a break). 3/x

The core question: in what sense is classics inherently racist? Classics is old. On Adler's account, it begins in ancient Rome and is revived in the Renaissance. Slavery (Christiansen's primary concern) is also very old. Let's say classics is an education for slaveowners. 4/x

It's worth remembering that literacy itself is elite throughout most of this history. Literacy is, then, also the education of slaveowners. We can honor oral and musical traditions without denying that literacy is, generally, good. 5/x