Oddbean

https://www.cnbc.com/2024/06/03/bitcoin-billionaire-michael-saylor-settles-dc-tax-fraud-case-for-40-million.html His take is so bizarre given that he had to pay 40 million to DC for unpaid taxes. There are only 2 possibilities: 1) He is a tax cheat and purposefully evaded taxes. 2) The DC government employed lawfare to shake a few million out of him because the cost of defending himself far outweighed the cost of simply settling even though he did not have residency in DC. If case number 2 is correct, there is 0 reason to trust the government. In this case, it was 40 million dollar shakedown that he could pay off. If BTC gets to what we think it will, self custody is absolutely essential. I suspect there is more to the story as to why he is doing a U turn. In his tax case, apparently one of his "friends" snitched that he was bragging about not paying taxes in DC during parties. DC recently employed a bounty system where snitches get x% of the amount paid. Perhaps it is the case that he is trying to avoid further scrutiny since there is a large target on his back now. If he wasn't such a BTC advocate, I doubt the tax claim would have been raised. Central banks are now raising red flags about the threat of BTC. The last thing he wants to do is raise the ire of the multi trillion dollar finance community if he were to advocate their extinction with the proliferation of self-custodial solutions.