July 2022 - cypherpunks - lists.cpunks.org

Gramps friends face financial as well as intellectual bankruptcy
by professor rat 05 Jul '22

05 Jul '22

LUNAR RIGHT-WINGNUT MORON Fox News, OAN and Newsmax could be found liable in cases brought by voting machine company Dominion https://www.theguardian.com/media/2022/jul/04/fox-oan-newsmax-lawsuits-elec… The KKK went out the same way. Good riddance to bad rubbish.

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IEEE Spectrum: Quantum Computing for Dummies
by jim bell 05 Jul '22

05 Jul '22

IEEE Spectrum: Quantum Computing for Dummies. https://spectrum.ieee.org/quantum-computing-for-dummies Quantum computers may one day rapidly find solutions to problems no regular computer might ever hope to solve, but there are vanishingly few quantum programmers when compared with the number of conventional programmers in the world. Now a new beginner's guide aims to walk would-be quantum programmers through the implementation of quantum algorithms over the cloud on IBM's publicly available quantum computers. Whereas classical computers switch transistors either on or off to symbolize data as ones or zeroes, quantum computers use quantum bits, or "qubits," which because of the peculiar nature of quantum physics can exist in a state called superposition where they are both 1 and 0 at the same time. This essentially lets each qubit perform two calculations at once. The more qubits are quantum-mechanically linked, or entangled (see our explainer), within a quantum computer, the greater its computational power can grow, in an exponential fashion. Currently quantum computers are noisy intermediate-scale quantum (NISQ) platforms, meaning their qubits number up to a few hundred at most and are error-ridden as well. Still, quantum processors are widely expected to grow in terms of qubit count and quality, with the aim of achieving a quantum advantage that enables them to find the answers to problems no classical computers could ever solve. Although the field of quantum programming started in the 1990s, it has to date only drawn a small community. "Programming quantum computers may seem like a great challenge, requiring years of training in quantum mechanics and related disciplines," says the guide's senior author Andrey Lokhov, a theoretical physicist at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. "Additionally, the field is dominated by physics and algebraic notations that at times present unnecessary entry barriers for mainstream computer and mathematically trained scientists." Now, with their new guide, Lokhov and his colleagues hope their new guide will help pave the way "for the upcoming quantum computing revolution," he says. "We believe that our guide fills a missing space in the field of quantum computation, introducing non-expert computer scientists, physicists, and engineers to quantum algorithms and their implementations on real-world quantum computers." The new guide explains the basics of quantum computing and quantum programming, including quantum algorithms. "Very much like how classical algorithms describe a sequence of instructions that need to be executed on a classical computer, a quantum algorithm represents a step-by-step procedure, where each of the steps needs to be performed on a quantum computer," Lokhov says. "However, the term 'quantum algorithm' is usually reserved for algorithms that contain inherently quantum operations, such as quantum superposition or quantum entanglement, which turn out to be computationally powerful."

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God Emperor of the MIT Review
by professor rat 05 Jul '22

05 Jul '22

Much like God, Big Tech remains silent on questions about data privacy in a post-Roe US https://www.technologyreview.com/2022/06/28/1055044/big-tech-data-privacy-s… Reposts not endorsements of any Theocracy

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Cryptocurrency: Libertarian Party Partners With BTC Maxi's, Declares Independence From FED
by grarpamp 05 Jul '22

05 Jul '22

Live call-in show... Of course with Maxi's in control, and excepting a rogue call-in, there's likely to be no mention of Bitcoin_BTC's biggest failed narratives... no coin privacy, no Peer-To-Peer Electronic Cash via real onchain txrate scaling, storage bloat, nor anything else that is embarrassing to Bitcoin_BTC such as some of the many petulent and silly anti-competition Monocult Maxi's in it's midst... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=My2qF-Np7Ls Libertarian Bitcoin End The Fed Live Join the Libertarian Chair Angela McArdle and Vice Chair Joshua Smith July 3 at 2:00 PM EST with the Bitcoin experts Saifedean Ammous, Marty Bent, Stephan Livera, Jameson Lopp and Guy Swann. We Need To Declare Our Independence From The Federal Reserve https://bitcoinmagazine.com/culture/we-need-to-declare-independence-from-th… https://keepingstock.net/support-your-country-buy-bitcoin-da22fb21659f https://www.mail-archive.com/cryptography@metzdowd.com/msg09971.html https://www.lp.org/platform/ https://twitter.com/WallStreetSilv/status/1542214066218774528 https://twitter.com/PeterSchiff/status/1243545652195450882 https://www.heinzhistorycenter.org/blog/from-the-desk-of-andy-masich/real-r… https://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/emails/cryptography/12/ https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/56972/speech-once-more-unto-the-brea… The Democrat and Republican parties have been wielding social movements as weapons in a culture war. Is it time the Libertarian Party wields the Bitcoin hammer in the battle against the Federal Reserve? In the cypherpunk mailing list, Satoshi Nakamoto had a back-and-forth exchange with an unknown cryptographer: “You will not find a solution to political problems in cryptography.” — Unknown cryptographer “Yes, but we can win a major battle in the arms race and gain a new territory of freedom for several years. “Governments are good at cutting off the heads of a centrally controlled networks like Napster, but pure P2P networks like Gnutella and Tor seem to be holding their own.” — Satoshi Nakamoto Between Nakamoto’s emails, the Bitcoin white paper and the source code, there was probably nothing they said with a more aloof tone than this quote. I have to imagine they understood the economic ramifications that would come with developing such a system and this was likely why they remained anonymous. Then again, maybe they were blissfully unaware that there is no more dangerous enemy to the power of the state than economically free people. Many early adopters of bitcoin were more likely software and tech gurus than they were economists or libertarians, but this comment by Nakamoto was profoundly libertarian. After all, if the government can wage war on poverty, drugs, crime and terror, why can’t libertarians and Bitcoiners alike wage war on money printing? It’s hard to overstate the phrasing here: “[W]e can win a major battle in the arms race and gain a new territory of freedom.” The Libertarian Party, under new management, recognizes just how important Bitcoin is in this battle. Angela McArdle, chair of the Libertarian National Committee, embraces the importance of bitcoin’s scarcity, self-sovereignty, and censorship resistance. On a phone interview, McArdle shared: “Inflation is being reported at 8.6%, but if you fill up the gas in your car, you know that it must be higher than that. No one knows the real rate of inflation, but what I do know is you cannot print more bitcoin. You can print dollars perpetually until it’s worthless like Venezuela, but you can’t print more bitcoin.” Sure, the Libertarian Party is using the language, “Declare your independence from the Fed,” in a metaphorical way, but we can never forget that our country was founded on a very real Declaration of Independence that led to something very tangible. “We, the members of the Libertarian Party, challenge the cult of the omnipotent state and defend the rights of the individual.” — The Libertarian Party’s Statement of Principles Today more than ever, the enforcement tool of the so-called “omnipotent state” and those in power is their monetary policy. The monopolization of fiat currency and the burden of taxes have become weapons of the state to empower Washington and disenfranchise the people. Libertarians and Austrian economists have been sounding the alarms for decades, but as Ron Paul has attributed to George Orwell, “Truth is treason in the empire of lies.” At a certain point however, the truth comes out. Jerome Powell: "I think we now understand better how little we understand about inflation." Host: "That's not very reassuring" Jerome : "This was unpredicted" Only the "experts" and the media didn't see this coming. Just about everyone else did. Sound ON pic.twitter.com/6Gv35rXPrW — Wall Street Silver (@WallStreetSilv) June 29, 2022 This inflation was either due to incompetence or deliberate debasing of the U.S. dollar, but Jerome Powell, chair of the Federal Reserve Board, admitted that he doesn’t understand basic economics. I would have preferred him to come out and admit he lied. Our favorite Bitcoiner, Peter “Gold” Schiff, along with every Austrian economist, pointed out how inflation works when the money printer started in March 2020 (when Schiff comes to the same realization as Bitcoiners, we will welcome him with open arms), As the Fed will create all this money out of thin air the people will pay the cost through inflation. Consumer prices are about to soar, wiping out the savings of millions of Americans, and destroying the purchasing power of wages for millions more. — Peter Schiff (@PeterSchiff) March 27, 2020 So here we are, July Fourth is coming up and we, the people, are in a quandary. Our leaders lie, our media covers for them, our financial institutions are corrupt and consent of the governed sounds more like a brand slogan than the foundation of our government. So what options do we have? Fix the money, fix the world. Bitcoin is the greatest peaceful revolution the world may ever know. Back to that seemingly innocuous Nakamoto quote, “[W]e can win a major battle in the arms race and gain a new territory of freedom for several years.” The arms race they must be referring to is power — political and economic — of governments versus economic power in the hands of individuals. Maybe it’s time to turn Rosie the Riveter into Dolores the Diamond Hands. (Painting/J. Howard Miller) Libertarians and Bitcoiners are allies in the fight for sound monetary policy. Speaking of a Bitcoiner and Libertarian alliance, McArdle said, “It’s important for us to build a parallel economy, so in the event the dollar collapses completely, or some kind of financial crash, we have something to shift over to laterally. The more people that have Bitcoin and understand it, the better.” Nakamoto had this revelation when they said, “It’s very attractive to the libertarian viewpoint if we can explain it properly. I’m better with code than with words though.” Clearly, they weren’t wrong. Nakamoto’s creation spawned a movement without a speech or catchy slogan, just code and believers. Some of us libertarians may have been a bit late to bitcoin, myself included, but the troops are coming. “Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more” — King Henry in “Henry V” by William Shakespeare The Libertarian Party is hosting a livestream event at 2:00PM EST on July 3, 2022. Join the call and declare your independence from the Fed. Declare your independence from the Fed Join the Libertarian Chair Angela McArdle and Vice Chair Joshua Smith July 3 at 2:00 PM EST with the Bitcoin experts Saifedean Ammous, Marty Bent, Stephan Livera, Jameson Lopp and Guy Swann. Think about doing three things in preparation for Independence Day: Watch the livestream and donate some sats (bitcoin) for liberty Stack some sats for yourself Help one friend or family member stack their first sats I want you… to buy bitcoin.

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Cryptocurrency: Bitcoin_Cash-BCH Legal Tender Hearing StMaarten, Adoption Moving Fast Across Caribbean
by grarpamp 04 Jul '22

04 Jul '22

https://www.bitcoin.com/bitcoin-cash-projects/ Bitcoin Cash being proposed as legal tender in St Martin Parliament https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a08adQpadf4 https://twitter.com/SheriUcar/status/1533530897605365760 https://www.thecoinrepublic.com/2022/03/20/entire-salary-paid-via-bitcoin-c… https://apps.apple.com/us/app/bitcoin-cash-register/id1460652887 https://republicnewsindia.com/bitcoincash-is-the-real-p2p-electronic-cash-b… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWthVteSqCw BCH Doers! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w6g8OM1hVoA https://medium.com/hackernoon/the-great-bitcoin-scaling-debate-a-timeline-6… https://twitter.com/jessquit2/status/1544004398820515840 BTC is "Bitcoin" only because a group of centralized exchanges gave it that ticker. In other words, it was fixed. A few dozen people decided that the Segwit fork would be "BTC" and the version that worked the way Bitcoin had always worked would become an "altcoin." There was no level playing field. There was no hashwar. The market did not decide. The market was not given a choice. It was fixed. Remember when Faketoshi split BCH? Even though he was a total fraud with a completely bogus motivation for causing a split only two weeks before code freeze, exchanges still gave that bozo a level playing field, renaming BCH into "BCHABC" and "BCHSV". Remember when the Taxman split BCH? Even though THE ENTIRE BCH ECOSYSTEM rejected the "miner tax" the exchanges still gave the Taxcoin a level playing field, renaming BCH to "BCHABC" and "BCHN". But when - after YEARS of debate - Bitcoin Core failed to get consensus on Segwit, and big blockers mounted a defensive UAHF, did the exchanges rename Bitcoin into "BTCORE" and "BTCASH" so that there would be a level playing field and a market decision? No. THE FIX WAS IN. So despite years of good faith efforts to reach consensus the exchanges didn't even offer the same decency to us early adopters of Bitcoin: a Peer-to-peer Electronic Cash System that they offered to an obvious scoundrel and a rogue dev who pissed off an entire ecosystem. What's the point of this? The point is simple: Now that we've seen the failure of the #Bitcoin #Segwit scaling plan and the abysmal <0.02% adoption of the #LightningNetwork it's a good time to remind everyone that the market NEVER PERFORMED BASIC PRICE DISCOVERY ON THE PLAN. The original plan was always the better plan, but in the post-2017 rush to "buy Bitcoin" investors were sold a bait-and-switch product. The original #Bitcoin is still available at an absurd discount. It's called #BCH #BitcoinCash and it works the way Bitcoin was supposed to work [...]

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Sexstortion
by professor rat 04 Jul '22

04 Jul '22

Florida should be held probably accountable? No. Florida should be held definitely accountable - starting with sending in the National Guard https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Rock_Nine A house divided cannot stand, man. Fuck this neo-confederate bullshit,

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Cryptocurrency: Peter Schiff's Bank CensorBanned by Regulators
by grarpamp 04 Jul '22

04 Jul '22

Peter Schiff, persistent critic of Monetary Policy, advocate for Gold, fund manager, and entrepreneur, gets shut by policy. Will cryptos come to his aid... https://twitter.com/PeterSchiff/status/1544001330242543621 Criminal investigations are supposed to be kept secret to protect the innocent in case no evidence is found to bring charges. In my case the IRS illegally leaked the investigation to the media, which then convicted me of crimes there was no evidence to charge me with committing. Here's another headline you won't read. Peter Schiff's bank falsely accused by the media of facilitating tax evasion and money laundering is being closed, because even though it's innocent, it's premature conviction by the media ruined its reputation and crippled it financially. Despite no evidence of crimes, Puerto Rico regulators closed my bank anyway for net capital issues, rather than allow a sale to a highly qualified buyer promising to inject capital far in excess of regulatory minimums. As a result accounts are frozen and customers may lose money. The reason regulators gave for tuning down the sale is that post sale I would own 4% of the company buying the bank. They said that due to the bad press about me, they did not want me owning 4% of a bank, even though the know first hand the allegations in the media are false. They never let me know they objected. I found out in C&D order to shut down the bank. Had they ever told the 4% stake was a problem I would have restructured the deal. I just wanted out. I had to put in $7 million in the last 2 years to cover operating losses due to bad press. Also it costs a fortune to run a small bank. That's why I never really made any money. The compliance costs are outrageous. Where are these news headlines? Peter Schiff vindicated. After a 2.5 year investigation authorities of 5 nations found absolutely no evidence that Euro Pacific Bank or Peter Schiff facilitated tax evasion or money laundering. Those who reported guilt prior to charges were wrong. https://twitter.com/PeterSchiff/status/1280257955787661315 America was founded by rugged individuals who created government to secure their rights and leave them alone. Americans today want government to violate other people's rights, steal their stuff, and give it to them. The home of the free has become the land of the freeloader. https://schiffradio.com/atlanta-fed-finally-forecasts-recession/ https://www.newsweek.com/us-economy-recession-joe-biden-peter-schiff-1720372 Chief Economist & Global Strategist: Europac.com, Founder: SchiffGold.com, Owner and Founder: EpacFunds.com, Host: SchiffRadio.com, Owner: Europacbank.com Puerto Rico amzn.to/1nDylDr Joined July 2009 Tweets 22,217 Following 269 Followers 776,998 Likes 193 If the U.S. economy is already in a #recession with historically low unemployment, imagine how much worse this recession will become once employers react to the recession with mass layoffs. Plus, as #unemployment surges, consumer prices, rents and interest rates will keep rising. The #Fed hiking rates too much, causing a #recession isn't a policy error. The errors were thinking it could hike without causing a severe recession, waiting too long to hike, not hiking enough, lowering rates too much in the first place, and leaving rates too low for too long. The Atlanta #Fed lowered its Q2 GDP forecast to -1%. If they're right, all year as #Powell insisted the strong economy could easily withstand rate hikes, it was already in a #recession. Without rate cuts and QE5 the recession gets much worse. With them #inflation gets much worse. Everyone is counting on consumers to keep the #economy out of #recession. But everyone is also counting on the #Fed to successfully fight #inflation by reducing demand. Since 70% of #GDP is consumer spending, unless investment increases substantially, this necessitates recession. If @Sonnenshein really wanted to close $GBTC's 30% discount to NAV he would't file a doomed lawsuit against the SEC, he'd sell #Bitcoin owned by #GBTC and use the proceeds to buy-back shares. That would reduce his AUM and lower his fees. Fees are more important than shareholders. Biden will have to admit the economy is in a recession: Economist Economist Peter Schiff said the economic turmoil in the U.S. is worse than what is being described, saying it will hurt much more than the Great Recession. It's a huge mistake for U.S retailers stuck with inventory they can't sell to slash prices to clear the shelves, only to restock with more expensive products their customers will be even less able to afford. Better not to buy new merchandise and sell current stock at full price. The final read on Q1 GDP is now minus 1.6%. Since Q2 will likely be negative too, the #Fed and @JoeBiden will soon be forced to admit that Amercia's red hot economy has actually been in a #recession all year, which will only get far worse with high #inflation and more rate hikes. Today's outside reversal day likely means the bear-market rally is over and that #stocks will soon hit new lows. Investors are bracing for #recession and higher short-term interest rates than previously expected. But they're not bracing for #inflation remaining high despite both. Every time the economy enters #recession it takes a larger dose of monetary stimulus to get it out. That's because the stimulus prevents real solutions from taking place and sows the seeds of a worse recession to come. This recession will now require a fatal overdose of stimulus. Actually, current real rates are closer to negative 6.5%. If Williams is correct, then to reduce #inflation the #Fed needs to immediately raise interest rates to 9.5%. Since it's not even close, inflation in 2023 is likely to rise from its current 8.6%, not collapse down to 2.5%.

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Sexstortion
by Gunnar Larson 04 Jul '22

04 Jul '22

FBI, is Dont Say Gay a form of Sexstortion? What about little girls? Seems like Florida should be held probably accountable to the FBI's new Sexstortion video here: https://fb.watch/e32i10cKJ1/

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Cryptocurrency: Collapse of UK govt
by grarpamp 04 Jul '22

04 Jul '22

On 6/20/22, professor rat <pro2rat(a)yahoo.com.au> wrote: > Dying downward from the head [...] > the King is dead - long live the Queen [...] > https://cointelegraph.com/news/hm-treasury-changes-course-on-collecting-dat… Expect more chaos and bizarre in the world after the Queen dies. Best prepare not only your wallets, but your people and life.

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Cryptocurrency: The Resurgence Of The Bearer Asset
by grarpamp 04 Jul '22

04 Jul '22

Bitcoin and the Resurgence of the Bearer Asset Scott Hill June 23, 2022 https://bombthrower.com/bitcoin-and-the-resurgence-of-the-bearer-asset/ If you’ve seen the film “Die Hard” you’ll notice the villain is trying to steal strange assets called Bearer Bonds. Why did this entire asset class disappear from the modern financial landscape? Which properties of these long forgotten assets are important for the future the Crypto industry is trying to build? Why did governments around the world outlaw the Bearer Asset in the first place? History of the Bearer Asset Until the 1980s, bearer assets were very common. Bonds would be issued on paper and bondholders would present the instruments physically to receive payment. In fact the paper certificates would often have small tear off sections that were redeemable for interest payments. This record keeping mechanism is why we still call the interest payments from Bonds, “coupons”. In the pre-digital era assets could be represented in two ways: Registered instruments, where every owner was recorded in a centralized registry. Transfers would be executed by a contract that was then “stamped” by the registrar. This would enable a verifiable list of owners to be kept and checked as necessary. Usually for taxation purposes or so that banks could be aware of who the true owners of a company seeking financial services were. Then there were bearer assets. Bearer assets were owned by whoever held them. They could be bought and sold by physically transferring the document. There was no registry of owners. This wasn’t some niche quirky asset class. Some of the most important companies in history issued bearer stock, like the Mississippi company, formed in 1717 and responsible for the infamous “Mississippi bubble”. Most governments issued bearer bonds to fund themselves. In the United States for example if you wanted to claim an interest payment on your government bonds you would need to physically present the certificates at your local Federal Reserve building. Bearer assets haven’t completely disappeared. Chances are if you open your wallet you still have some bearer assets in the form of your banknotes. They aren’t even from such a long time ago. The last US Government issued bearer bond only matured in 2016. The Problems with Bearer Assets Starting in the 1980s there was a concerted effort to eradicate bearer assets from the world. In a combined effort from FATF, the global anti-money laundering organization, and the US government, an agenda was pursued where all assets would become registered instruments. This would ensure that the owners of all assets could be known, taxed and tracked. The problems for governments are fairly obvious. Assets that you can hold privately and anonymously are difficult to tax. Transfers that can occur between two people without any authority being notified can be used to launder money or evade capital controls. There’s also the issue of counterfeiting. In 2009, over $130 billion in US government bearer bonds were uncovered by Italian customs officials. Without a central register modern printing techniques had made bearer instruments far too easy to counterfeit. The practical issues are possibly more important for this analysis. Without a centralized authority to record ownership it’s difficult to develop the trust required to exchange assets between entities who don’t already have a business relationship. Transfers are also slow compared with changing an entry in a computer database if you’re not in the same place as your counter-party. This problem is particularly noticeable if there isn’t a ready market for assets nearby. For example, in the 1900s it would be difficult to exchange bearer assets in Nebraska where there was no market, but relatively easy to do so in New York. The Benefits of Bearer Assets The need for a physical marketplace for bearer assets is a large part of the reason why financial hubs like New York, London and Amsterdam arose. Bearer assets could simply be handed over in exchange for cash so traders would congregate around the largest markets. Traders could exchange bearer assets as quickly as necessary without needing to stop and register each transaction. This ease of transfer was a significant financial innovation in earlier eras and could be credited for pushing forward capitalism itself by making corporate shares and bonds easily tradable assets. Portability and usability were also significant features. In this previous era you might take a loan on your stock or bonds by physically depositing the certificates as collateral with a bank. If you needed to relocate countries your assets could easily move with you and be used in your new country without requiring any verification from the institutions in your previous homeland. Bearer assets opened up the ability to perform global capitalism in a way that simply wasn’t possible before their invention. A stock certificate could be issued in Paris then transported to Amsterdam and traded at their stock exchange with ease. This did open up some strange issues with corporate governance however. Shareholders scattered throughout the globe are not easy to contact and gather for a shareholders meeting. The Modern System Now that bearer assets are all but wiped out, the modern asset system functions using a string of registries and a plethora of intermediaries. A modern stock certificate might be held digitally with the DTCC in New York, on trust for a German Holding company who then fractionalizes the share and sells those fractions to Robinhood who then sells those fractions to an investor. Complicated, huh? But it all works seamlessly thanks to digital communications systems and trust. The trust part is important. This entire system is held up by trust in other countries’ regulatory authorities. In the solvency of their financial institutions. In their systems. It could all go away very quickly if that were no longer the case. We already see what this world would look like by examining how emerging markets operate. Would you trust an Argentine stock registry to record your assets? How about an Iranian one? Bitcoin Fixes This If we are heading into a fractured world as many analysts are predicting, we’ll need the return of bearer assets to keep capital markets functioning. Cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin represent the return of the bearer asset in the form of digital shared ledgers. Just like old paper bearer assets, an individual can prove they own their digital assets directly, without the assistance and trust of intermediaries. They can simply sign using their wallet to confirm ownership of the assets held within. People can transfer digital assets directly, globally, at near instant speeds. This financial innovation is both extremely powerful but also extremely risky for the current institutions that exist primarily to provide trust and custody to assets. Most people who haven’t gone down the Bitcoin rabbithole yet don’t really understand the paradigm shift that has happened with the invention of digital bearer assets. They can type an order into their stock trading app and to them that’s as good as Bitcoin’s near instant global settlement. They fail to see the fundamental difference. Trading a stock on an online exchange relies on a huge number of intermediaries to execute the trade, to store the assets and to verify the existence of assets. If you hold a share of a company in the modern system it’s impossible to prove this fact directly. The best you can do is present a brokerage account statement and ask that your brokerage is trusted. This system of trust works fine in the functional modern world we have lived in for decades, but in a world where trust is fragmented and scarce, the ability to secure and prove your ownership of assets without asking permission may become invaluable. Benefits of Digital Bearer Assets Digital assets don’t have to only be useful assets for the end of the world. The ability to trade assets globally without the involvement of authorities and institutions means that unlike stocks, digital assets can tap global liquidity and allow capital formation to know no borders or class divides. It’s relatively easy for a rural Kenyan farmer to purchase a dollar worth of Bitcoin. It’s nearly impossible for the same person to acquire a dollar worth of Amazon stock. There’s also the nature of blockchain infrastructure to consider. The entire premise of token based blockchains is that they are financial ecosystems that utilize tokens to represent ownership. This allows blockchain systems to achieve near instant financial functions with final settlement. A fundamentally different experience to using something like the Visa network which can take days to settle. A merchant would then need to ask permission from their bank to utilize those funds again after that long lag time. Ensuring that ownership of tokens is directly verifiable and transferable by users is fundamental to using blockchains to power finance. Blockchains would not be a useful innovation with bloated middlemen getting in between transactions and adding the same delays that we currently experience. The design of cryptocurrencies with open ledgers that are verifiable by anyone also removes some of the issues with old paper bearer assets. Tokenholders can be identified and contacted significantly more easily than the holders of paper assets. It would even be easier than the methods used under the current system of share registries and chains of intermediaries holding assets on behalf of others. This tangled web of ownership often leads to shareholder voting being an impossible to coordinate task. Instead asset holding mega-firms like Blackrock vote on behalf of all of their clients. Digital bearer assets could be a path back to functional shareholder coordination and governance. Return to Capitalism Digital assets fundamentally change the nature of assets back to something that looks more like traditional capitalism, where individual asset owners can pool capital directly and efficiently. Where people can truly own assets, not just be granted access to asset markets by intermediaries. The ramifications of this increase of speed and global access to finance are staggering. We’ve really only seen the first stages of what this technology can enable. There will be growing pains along the way. Governments and institutions will need to adapt to this paradigm shift. Just like bearer instruments unlocked the power of capitalism in the 18th century, digital bearer instruments could do the same for the 21st century. Scott Hill Scott Hill Scott Hill is a lawyer turned macroeconomics researcher in the cryptocurrency media space. He holds a BSc in mathematics with minors in cryptography and physics. He currently advises Coindesk and is a contributing analyst to Bombthrower Media 4 Responses Avatar Bill says: June 23, 2022 at 4:56 pm Great analogy to showcase use of bearer assets. I Home school my grand kids and will use this to help them learn the power of capitalism in modern day terms. They will be fascinated by the comparison to bitcoin. Every Kid that plays video games, has a distinct understanding of cryptocurrency. This should be interesting to begin the discussion. The grand kids will be 13 in august and they will get it! Then, after test drive on the Kids who will pick it up quickly, I will try it on all my friends over 60. Wish me luck! Thanks B Reply Avatar Ken says: June 26, 2022 at 3:09 pm Much luck regarding your aged 60+ friends. Their world views are hard wired and neural pathways of their physical brains generally are too ossified to allow the perspectival flexibility to explore beyond the boundaries of their security. The West’s debt-based Fiat system is their hard wired God and that won’t change. As an aged 60+ member myself with 35 years of banking/finance experience and as an early adapter to crypto, I recommend you restrain your enthusiasm and energy with them, if for no better reason than the continuance of your friendships. They may have the great bulk of the world’s assets, but time is not on their side and their assets that survive the many changes ahead will all be absorbed into the emergent new ecosystems in due course anyway, so there’s no reason to push them beyond the limits of their personal security, especially with crypto’s volatility in its present stage of development. Especially with its challenges ahead, and particularly from the emergence quantum computing and its greatly elevated cybersecurity risks and safety requirements. Reply Avatar S Stackmore says: June 23, 2022 at 7:29 pm We talked about and imagined Digital Bearer Assets/Instruments back in the late 90’s. Now we have them. While I am not an “everything on the blockchain” kind of guy–more of a maxi– in principle messaging via public/private keys tied to UTXOs should allow for some kind of voting structure. Maybe that is what the proof of stake guys are working on? I haven’t really paid attention to them. I mean if you wanted replicate some form of the capital structure with rights attached digitally to facilitate pooling of capital for actual enterprises, ownership of which could be traded on unregulated markets…. Reply Avatar David Tea says: June 23, 2022 at 10:26 pm Great article. One could even issue promissory notes against the value of the digital bearer bonds…to help discharge the current debt created by those fools/tools purportedly actiing as public servants…in name only

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