Oddbean

Banks worldwide are making it more and more difficult for money to enter the exchanges. They are turning it into a totally asymmetric relationship. For 1000 dollars of shit they ask you more explanations than 100 million dollars to the politicians. The small user is being treated like a criminal, and decentralized or p2p exchanges are useless because the receiver ends up having his account closed or the sender ends up being asked the same questions. My unpleasant theory has always been that bitcoin will only partially succeed, they will only let bitcoin be used by the powerful, and since the approval of the ETF it is more than evident.

The small user is being treated like a criminal, and decentralized or p2p exchanges are useless because the receiver ends up having his account closed or the sender ends up being asked the same questions. 👆 That's why we need better and more private payment methods. I consider the p2p purchase of sats with revolut or bank transfer to be impractical

I never understood the "non-kyc" part of exchanges like robosats or bisq for this exact reason. Ok, the exchange does not ask you to verify your identity and doesn't hold your fucking passport on their servers but... there's a huge but. You are still using your bank account to send or receive money from someone. The bank might (and probably will) start asking questions. You leave the paper trail. And if you are unlucky, the person on the other side of that transaction might be on a watch list. Doesn't that immediatelly make your bank account flagged? The whole scheme seems way too risky. Am I overlooking some important piece of this puzzle?

I don't know what one could learn from it other than use the best tools. Make them known. Stretch yourself into only accepting and using Bitcoin or Monero for all transactions. Path the way for others that don't have theforesight, yet. The hard way (creating real adoption) is what will guarantee success. The ETF in that regard is a false victory. It's a Trojan horse that corrupted the minds of many maxis. Also stop treating Monero as a shitcoin. It's the most decentralised coin out there second only to Bitcoin. It's one of the best weapons of self-defense and in combination with Bitcoin it can bring separation of money and state. Know your allies.

Yep, but dependent on location, the supply may be limited. Also, you can still try to go with KYC, but go through foreign exchanges and banks, any gap that allows to slip out into owning your keys, no matter the KYC and who is left unhappy and chasing you for whatever explanations. And if you have even more fiat than that, then I am afraid mining is the only way - buy electricity and convert it into bitcoin and own the keys. If you break laws and get arrested, they will still not be able to take the keys out of your head. And well, with that much money, don't get cought. I don't know if El Salvador could also be a solution. Perhaps you can open a bank account there, wire your funds, and convert to bitcoin. Go to conferences where Max is presenting, and ask him how to escape.

This is more reason to start getting paid in sats and to encourage local businesses to start accepting bitcoin as payment. This idea of "purchasing" bitcoin as an "investment" is getting old and as you've said won't continue to work if the ones in charge have their way.

Exactly. That is why I say bitcoin alone is not enough, and that is why "Q" invented bitcoin and not vice versa. That is why bitcoin is moving ahead in El Salvador, and that is why Bukele, despite being nowhere near as powerful as such as Gaddafi or Saddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti, is still walking this earth and setting a "bad" example of success in the fiat world.

Also, we do not want our normie friends, who are: - socialist lovers and fascists - weak - believe their jobs of counting their own money while consuming products of lower grade foreigners are useful and necessary - believe that those who produce real things deserve to work more and get paid less We do not want these people to end up owning more bitcoin than those who see the world clearer and actually produce something usable. Money is power. So if we want anything to change, we need different people to get the power. Those who do not know ways to get bitcoin without paying taxes to their banks and states, fo not deserve to get more bitcoin.

Monero circular economy is more powerful than you can imagine. While BTC gets an ETF and is embraced by TradFi that will close all gates for anybody but us to own on-chain UTXO's, Monero is shunned gets banned and its name slandered. If maxis think BTC is enough a tool to fight the enemy that is in control for millennia, good riddance. This fight has many facets. One is going through the front door (BTC). One is going completely dark, through a Monero circular economy. Build your net of trusted vendors now. Others will rely on it to be able to follow in your foot steps.