저자: BillMillerIV · 외국인
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결론: 빌 밀러 IV는 비트코인이 금을 대체하는 자본의 분모(denominator)가 될 것이며, 현재 시총 약 2조 달러(금 시총의 약 1/10)에서 장기적으로 계속 상승할 것이라고 주장한다. [발언자 배경] 2013년 비트코인을 처음 접했고, 2015년 'value investor's case for Bitcoin'을 썼으며, 2020년 마이크로스트래티지 전환사채에 초기 투자자로 참여했다. 개인과 펀드 모두 비트코인 비중을 늘려왔고 현재 펀드 내 비중은 역대 최대라고 밝혔다. [핵심 주장 - 가치 저장] 비트코인은 금보다 우월한 디지털 금으로, 물리적으로 도난하기 어렵고 즉시 감사가 가능하며 공급 규칙이 투명하다. 법정화폐는 공급 규칙이 불투명하고 자의적 개입이 가능하다는 점이 문제다. 50~100년 전 집 한 채 값이던 달러가 지금은 몇 달치 월세에 불과하다는 예를 들며, 미국은 나쁜 동네의 최고 집이지만 비트코인은 완전히 다른 동네라고 비유했다. [핵심 주장 - 채택 확대 여지] 전 세계 80억 인구 중 소유자는 수억 명 수준이므로 아직 초기 단계이며 교육과 홍보가 관건이라고 봤다. 2024년 이후 SAB 121 폐지, 전략적 비트코인 비축(SPR) 법제화, 은행의 수탁 허용 등 정책 가속을 긍정적으로 평가했다. 다만 은행과 행정 절차는 느려서 향후 최소 4년간 변곡점이 이어질 수 있다고 전망했다. [경쟁 자산 평가] 이더리움 등 다른 코인은 탈중앙화 거버넌스, 채굴 보안, 선점 우위(first mover) 측면에서 비트코인에 미치지 못하며, 기업 재무제표에 편입될 이유가 없다고 평가했다. 에너지 집약성은 결함이 아니라 보안 기능이라고 주장했다. [리스크 및 조건] 단기 매매나 사이클 예측, 고점·저점 판단은 피하고, 기초 기술과 백서를 이해한 뒤 적립식으로 보유할 것을 권했다. 자산의 약 2%를 비트코인에 배분하는 방식을 제안했으며, 비트코인은 가장 마지막에 팔 자산이라고 말했다. 변동성이 크다는 점도 인정했다. [주제 외 발언] 게임스톱 등 다른 자산 관련 비판에 대해서는 비트코인이 인플레이션이라는 더 큰 문제의 장기 해법이라고 반박했다. [출연자 전망 정리] 단기 가격 예측은 명시하지 않았으며, 장기적으로 상승 추세가 지속될 것이라는 견해와 2025년 Bitcoin 2025 컨퍼런스 참여 가능성을 언급했다.
다듬은 글
You know, the same dollars that would pay for an entire house 50 or 100 years ago now get you a couple months worth of rent. Why? It's because of the systems that we came up with and people just accept it because that's what they've known. And the United States is easily the best house in a bad neighborhood.
But Bitcoin is entirely different neighborhood. You look at the market cap today at around 2 trillion. You look at gold's market cap. Gold has always been the check and balance on fiat behavior. Well, now we got a better check and balance on fiat behavior and it trades at onetenth the value of gold.
So that's why I think it's still going to keep going up for over a long period of time. And if you look at the number of people that own Bitcoin, it's still I think 8 billion people should own it and only what a couple hundred million own it right now. Welcome back to the Culture Bit. I'm your host Alan Helm and on today's show we have Bill Miller IV joining us.
He is the CIO of Miller Value Partners and one of Bitcoin's earliest advocates jumping in all the way back as far as 2013. He's got a deep background in value investing. He's watched Bitcoin evolve from a fringe idea to being a global powerhouse. We unpack everything here today from his Bitcoin journey to pivotal moments like Micro Strategy adopting a corporate Bitcoin strategy and the strategic Bitcoin reserve.
We talk about everything. Let's dive in. Bill, welcome back to the show. You are the chief investment officer at Miller Value Partners. And as I understand from some of the background homework that I did, you've been in the space for quite a long time since like 2013. And one of the things I I like to do is um set up the profile of my guest.
So would love to understand how did you find Bitcoin in 2013? Who are you? What do you do? And why are you such a big voice in the Bitcoin financial circles? Thanks so much for having me on, Alan. Um, at the end of the day, it comes down to a fundamental belief and what money is and what how we should think about it and what sort of vehicles we should use for it.
Um, I found Bitcoin originally in 2013 as I was reading through some uh traditional mainstream media source that I no longer subscribe to for a variety of reasons. The article basically said there's this crazy technology called Bitcoin and people are out there buying it and the value has gone from effectively zero to $300 in very short amount of time and there's no good reason for it and it's just a speculative thing.
And I said, "Okay, well that sounds like fun. I mean, I should I I got the traditional crypto or or speculative gambling gene and said, "Okay, I got to get involved in this at least with a small portion of money that I can afford to lose." um bought it. You know, it was it was actually very hard to buy it back then.
I was I remember sending my ID halfway around the world digitally um to some exchange in Europe and um ended up putting a decent chunk of change on it and then started following it and it was a it was this invest and then investigate situation for me given the volatility the uniqueness of it and the more work I did it on it and the more I actually read the white paper thought about money what it's supposed to be um it it and I thought, "Wow, this really could have very serious legs." And then have just continued buying since 2013 uh personally.
And then as soon as Micro Strategy announced in 2020 that they were getting involved as a public corporation, I said, "Okay, we got to get involved in this one." Um we were one of the first investors institutions in Micro Strategy's original convertible note. Um, and we've incorporated Bitcoin in one way or another into all of our portfolios, both personally and professionally pretty much since it's been a possibility.
Um, you know, I still think it's massively early in the development of the space and the technology. Uh, but but it's continuing to move. So, tons of things to like about it and we're still heavily involved. We own more Bitcoin personally than ever and uh it's a bigger position in our funds than it's ever been.
So 2013 is what I would almost consider OG in the space at least for finding Bitcoin. Um the story that of you sending your idea halfway across the world just to buy definitely resonates um with myself. If I remember, I think it was uh you know, I I got into the space around 20 2015 2016 and Coinbase only had Bitcoin listed at the time, but um you know, small exchange.
I think they were still using like GDAX um as like their their main platform for trading. And I had similar feelings, you know, getting on on to just an exchange as a whole being like, what what is this thing? I know you commonly tout yourself as a a value investor. Many would call you a value investing legend.
Um, so finding Bitcoin in 2013 and I guess identifying that, hey, this is this is a a asset that fits within, you know, my value investing mindset, what were the properties of Bitcoin back then that kind of um, you know, brought that aha moment for you? Yeah, I wrote a piece called the value investors case for Bitcoin in 2015.
uh various parts of that piece have aged uh better than others. But the way I kind of thought about it back then was there's you know two potential use cases for it. One was as a transfer of value around the world, right? And if you looked at uh the market cap of Visa and Mastercard and some of these other payment or value transfer mechanisms and networks that were out there trading hundreds of uh billions of dollars and and Bitcoin was a small fraction of that at the time and it's well this actually catches on and we could it becomes a source of value transfer which some people were using it uh for back then.
it could be much much bigger and um it's very unique and a lot of the protocol is completely innovative and new and so this could get much bigger. So that was one use case for it was actually transferring value. The other was actually as a store of value like a digital gold or or actually as the way I've always thought about it actually was as a denominator.
Right? So if you look at that piece in 2015, um we compared the value the market cap of Bitcoin to the value of monetary networks out there, the dollar or the euro and and where it sat and and and we looked at it and we just okay this is like I think the piece said it's right somewhere around the Fijian, you know, Fiji's uh market cap, which you know that's not going anywhere, right?
So um the Fijian dollar market cap and so we said, okay, it could be a lot bigger. this could be a lot bigger and that's still the framework that I think works right now. Uh it's it's come a massive way since that time in 10 years since we wrote that. But the reality is those frameworks are still incredibly valid.
Uh and and the overall if you look at the way the networks and the infrastructure around Bitcoin have developed, it's a entirely different ballgame than any other crypto, right? And I think there's a variety of reasons for that that we can get into later. But on the value piece still, you know, the digital gold is definitely the right way to think about it, except that it's better than gold.
So it you can't steal it physically like you can gold. Um you can audit it instantly, which you can't do with gold or Fort Knox or anything else. Um the transparency around the capital is unlike anything else that's out there. And if you think about um what money money is supposed to be, right? And you think about the protocol behind Bitcoin, it's much more compelling than what was derived or or what our founding fathers and a lot of other people came up with and that you know it's transparent and that's massively important and the and the you know exactly where it's going to be what the supply protocol is.
You don't know what the supply protocol is for the dollar, right? Massive step function changes for the thing to offset uh changes in economics that were unanticipated. And so what I think is really interesting uh you know United the United States of America is the most popular country in the world for immigrants.
We have more immigrants than I think the next four closest uh destinations combined. And there's a reason for that. I think the reason for that is stability of process right and so why do people come here? Because they can trust the property rights. They can trust the law uh more so than wherever they're coming from.
Why don't we have that with money, right? Well, because technology didn't exist until the white paper. Now it exists where we can have an actual unit of account where values aren't going to change. So, you know, the same dollars that would pay for um an entire house 50 or 100 years ago now get you a couple months worth of rent.
Well, why? It's because of the systems that we came up with. And and people just accept it because that's what they've known. And the United States is easily the best house in a bad neighborhood. But Bitcoin is an entirely different neighborhood in entirely. And so, you know, you look at the market cap today at around two trillion.
You look at gold's market cap. Gold has become the or has always been the check and balance on fiat behavior. Well, now we got a better check and balance on fiat behavior and it trades at onetenth the value of gold. and it's got a lot better functional characteristics to it for for for the actual purpose and context that we need it.
Um, so that's why I think it's still going to keep going up for over a long period of time. If you look at the number of people that own Bitcoin, it's still I think 8 billion people should own it and only what a couple hundred million own it right now. So there's still a massive way to go. I think it's it's a question of learning and education.
So, I certainly appreciate what you guys at Bitcoin Mag are doing and Bitcoin for Corporations, and it's just a matter of getting the word out, which is why I like doing these podcasts, talking about how I think about it. Yeah, advocacy is super critical. It's especially with all the developments in the last year, the passing of the SPR, you know, nation states talking about either integrating Bitcoin directly or Bitcoin derivatives like the ETF.
Um, and we're still only at, you know, 1ifth of the market cap of gold, which is crazy to think about. And that's just gold. And we know, you know, the total addressable market of of people out there that could get access to Bitcoin versus gold is tremendous. So it certainly feels like we're still early on the adoption phase side when when it comes to institutions and governments.
Like they almost don't line up with one another with where the price should be. Or at least that's how I feel about it. And I don't know. Um well, so hold on. I want to go back. Allan, you said five times. So I think it's my my googling says 10 times, you know, five times or 10 times is a big upside, but yeah, I think it's even higher and by the time people come around to it, it could be even higher than than 10 times.
So, you know, this gold market cap's probably going to keep going up too. So, absolutely. So to circle back to um you know some of the points you were making earlier in 2013 you know Bitcoin being not only as a a a technology for money transmission but also a store of value 2013 wasn't too far along post 2008 financial crisis.
Um and so I got to ask you know when I look at Bitcoin there's kind of two big epochs. I know everyone talks about Bitcoin going in four-year cycles, but really there was the crop of Bitcoiners that came up because of the 2008 financial crisis and there was a huge swath of new Bitcoiners that came postcoid era.
You obviously came before the postcoid era. Um, how did that how did the 2008 financial crisis um, you know, shape your your views on the fiat systems and how did that eventually lead you to explore alternatives like Bitcoin? Well, you know, I know a lot of Bitcoiners bash the Fed. You know, end the Fed.
I don't think that ending the Fed immediately is, well, number one, it's not possible. Number two, I think they've actually done a decent job trying to offset all of these crazy swings. So, going back to the whole um immigration analogy, right? It's all about stability of of process, understanding uh what's going on and why, right?
Immigrants come here because they don't want governments trying to engineer outcomes, right? They want the process. This is monetary process is the question that we're talking about here. And so the process has been again the United States has done a pretty good job and it's just a question of whether or not there are better processes out there.
I think there are. You bring up cycles and u big step function changes in Bitcoin prices, you know, whether that's because of huge monetary printing to offset big gaps that were unanticipated in in what's going on whether that was08 or or in other times COVID. Um yeah, it's going to continue to happen because they're trying to engineer outcomes and there are unanticipated events in the system.
And so somebody actually asked me a question at a conference a couple of months ago. They said, you know, people have tried these deflationary currencies. They don't work either. So, like, why are you thinking that Bitcoin is going to work and there's obviously issues with that. And I said, I don't I don't think that uh it's either or.
I think there's a place for both and that um Bitcoin should ultimately be the denominator for true true capital, whether that's anything that has a scarce supply, waterfront property, high-end ARC, other things like that. And then there's another function which is you know money which is spending in in the consumption side and there's room for fiat authority on that side right and if you want to transfer between capital and spending great you can do that at any time but you want to have a pretty good sense that you know your capital is going to buy the same amount that it did five or 10 years ago whereas you can't be the what you fundamentally receive for your work today dollars is a depreciating thing whereas maybe if we are thinking in terms of permanence, Bitcoin, we'll all be better off.
And so, yeah, I I think there's still an immense amount of room for this whole way of thinking to spread around the globe and be the new denominator for true capital and things that are scarce, especially with how much the dollar is devaluating right now. I mean, just from your your everyday person, I mean, they feel they they feel the increase of of or I guess the debasement of the dollar just in the grocery shopping, the rent, um you know, gas prices at at the at the store.
And so I think more than ever now, especially, you know, with with social media being so so influential in the news space um and allowing independent voices like yourself to reach a lot of people, people are taking a huge interest in trying to figure out like, hey, how how do I, you know, your wealth is melting.
How do I stop, you know, this hole in my pocket burning and retain some sort of value so that I, you know, I can plan long term? And I think you know to go back to you know these two swaths of people right postco 19 you know the the adoption curve is definitely on the way up you know one of the one of the things that you know I find particularly intriguing you know post bitcoin 2024 is that we had bitcoin prior to that being this sort of like uh um you know area for ancap and libertarian like-minded people to come who want to separate money from the state to aggate with another and then bitcoin 2024 happens we have all these politicians there.
Corporations are involved and there's a lot of things that happened on that runup, right? We had the the the reversal on some gap accounting. Um, you know, there was uh obviously Trump and RFK talking about instituting a strategic Bitcoin reserve. Um, Trump gets elected in the office. You know, SAB 121 gets repealed and so that opens the door and the floodgates for all these these banks to start custodying Bitcoin.
What is your take on all this with how fast things are accelerating at a policy level both at you know maybe the the federal government level and then what you're seeing around um you know traditional financial circles. Oh things are happening incredibly fast. I mean the news cycle in Bitcoin is unlike any other news cycle out there from my perspective just in terms of the development of the ecosystem in the space.
um what I think you brought up an interesting point uh when you were talking there about investor behavior um and sort of cycles and stuff and I I I think a lot of the people that think about crypto and mess around with it do it in the wrong way and that they think oh crypto I'm going to look at this coin I'm going to trade I think Bitcoin's going up I think Bitcoin's going down when you hear about how if you look at the long-term trend right it's up and to the right very very strong with a lot of volat volatility which is necessitated by something with that level of returns.
But it's important for people to not be the crypto guys, right, that are trading and moving in and out and trying to predict cycles and what's going to happen now. And um understanding the fundamentals and the white papers is critically important. And so I I would advocate for more people to understand what they own and why.
And you know, there's a lot of meme coins and things that are ultimately worth zero going around out there. And so I think it's really important for people to understand the fundamental differences in Bitcoin versus all of these other cryptos. And so from us as a fundamental investor over the long term in it, I think there's a handful of things that separate it from a generalist investor's perspective versus every other potential cryptocurrency out there.
Uh first and foremost is the first mover advantage. Um, I think if you look at the history of technological innovations, uh, it's not always the the greatest or fastest thing that that uh, emerges from a new cycle. It's the one that best fits the need first. And that's what Bitcoin does. And um, so you know, oh, Ethereum can have smart contracts and this can do that and this can do.
Well, the reality is that the fundamental they're not solving any fundamental problem. The fundamental problem being solved by Bitcoin is that those in authority over the units of the ledger just have a permanent incentive to create more regardless of whether it's a a Republican or Democrat or whatever side of the aisle.
They just create more units over time. And that's what causes inflation. They make the most whoever can make the most promises, right? and be at least be the least accountable in their marketing of themselves to the people ends up getting an office and creates more units. And so, um, that's the problem that Bitcoin solves.
None of these other cryptocurrencies solve that. In fact, a lot of them have they're not decentralized. You look at the governance of the things, it's very different. And it, you know, the proof of stake versus proof of work is hugely important. The energy intensivity is a feature, not a bug. So it's it's the first mover advantage with that energy intensivity, right?
So that you have this in incredibly high amount of security now around the network in in terms of being able to crack it or hack it as technology develops Bitcoin more so than anything else out there. And that that advantage is not going away. Uh number two, so you have the you have the first mover advantage with that um with the proof of work, right?
So that actually solves the problem of the unit creation from a unit of account perspective. Number two, I think I think Satoshi the lack of an identity and and overall face behind it is a is what's allowed it to get to where it has today. I think it's probably reached escape velocity with that first mover advantage, another technological proofof work protocol that it ultimately won't matter now if somebody unmasked Satoshi, but that's been an immense uh advantage for for the cryptocurrency.
Um, and the decentralized governance is absolutely massive. So, those make it fundamentally different. You look at the overall infrastructure that's sprung up around Bitcoin versus everything else. No one's going to start an Ethereum strategy on their balance sheet, right? It doesn't make sense. Liquidity is not there and for all the other reasons I just mentioned.
So, the first mover advantage in this thing as the check and balance that will replace gold and is replacing gold as we speak has been over the past 10 years is likely to continue doing that from my perspective at least. Uh gives you very clear visibility into the potential upside of the thing. A huge portion of the number of people that own it haven't sold it in forever, right?
So you got these people trading around it that are all just paying fees and losing money. And then you got the smart people that are holding it and just buying it and letting it accumulate and grow their own purchasing power. So there's a lot of things that make it fundamentally different from a generalist investor's perspective relative to every other crypto out there.
And um that's why we continue to love it and look for companies that are, you know, putting it on their balance sheet. Yeah. And to your point about uh companies not looking at other some of these other digital assets like Ethereum going onto their balance sheet. I mean we just we even saw that with the SPR, right?
Um I think you know January into February was uh um a crazy news cycle to see Trump be like, "Hey, we're going to do all these uh um alternative digital assets into the SPR." and now actually it's only going to be Bitcoin and then flip-flop and then Trumpcoin and then you have Javier Malay doing Libra token and then finally by executive order right we get the SPR and we find out it's Bitcoin only that was a huge signal I think to the market um the SPR is particularly interesting you know in in like a you know through a corporate lens in the sense that it is the nation's own version of a Bitcoin treasury strategy right they're taking Bitcoin that they already have and they're essentially just promising hey we're not going to sell this and also we might look at our gold and offset that sell it in exchange for bitcoin um in the promise of uh u you know maintaining wealth which is very it's a massively mature move for a politician right to say okay maybe this thing is a little better than our current system of capital governance and I think that the politicians that get out in front of that just like the people that have gotten out in front of that trend have done very very well I think the politicians that get out in front of that trend will continue to do very well absolutely same as these corpor oporations and I know you mentioned earlier at the beginning um that you guys were at the ground floor with uh Micro Strategy um you know instituting Bitcoin into their treasury into their treasury and corporate strategy um and this was back heck this must have been 2021 2020 2020 yeah I think um and it's just now 2025 right getting popular we you know first it was with Metanet um then Semler um and then we have just a swath off of um other companies, you know, either with distressed assets or, you know, just high cash balances looking to see what they can do with Bitcoin.
Um, walk me through the walk me through 2020 here and uh you know, talking with Sailor and Micro Strategy and um drumming up this this strategy of you know, using debt to buy Bitcoin. What what drew you to their approach and how do you see it evolving? Um yeah, the micro strategy thing has been incredible.
Um what I think is super interesting about it is I think people conceptualize of it improperly and they say it's huge, you know, valuation premium and and blah blah blah and well, yes, it has a premium because it's solving it was the first to actually solve a real problem, which is how do you get tons of fiat dollars into Bitcoin, right?
I mean, Bitcoin actually has the protocol itself has some limitations, right? But the but the overall idea is so powerful that people are figuring out ways to solve problems to its limitations. One of which is the the amount of transactions it can process in a given amount of time. So uh you know the original Bitcoin ideal is oh everyone's just going to have this thing and it's going to we're going to interact with each other and every tiny payment is going to work out.
But the protocol has some limitations. But the idea is so strong and powerful that people are solving for those limitations. And that what's m that's what Michael Sailor did. And so by figuring out that corporate finance problem, he's he's created an absolute ton of value, right, by using fundamental uh capital allocation strategy and and theories um to get more fiat into Bitcoin.
And so you know that has very powerful building effects and snowballing effects and now that's the entity right for to do that again others are cropping up but he was the first to do it and he continues to find ways to innovate and provide access to capital you know access to Bitcoin in a variety of risk levels right all the way from more senior down to the equity uh for those that want to do it.
And so, you know, people look at it and say, "There's this premium." And I look at it and I say, "Yeah, there's a premium there for a reason." Uh, someone's figuring out a lot of interesting corporate finance problems with regard to a new technology. So, you can say, "Oh, that premium is going to go away because you can always Well, yeah, you can't.
No one's doing it though." And they haven't figured out how to do it as well as micro or strategy has. So, you know, just to look at this and say, "Well, it's at a premium." Yeah, but guess what? he's solving the problem and he's dealing with that that issue by selling more shares and getting more money into Bitcoin.
So, you know, I I'm enormously bullish just in terms of, you know, Michael and what Strategy's doing. And I'm excited for the future for other uh corporations to hop on board. We're obviously seeing a huge acceleration just in in terms of adopting um strategies strategy. And the other interesting thing, right, is the the rebrand going on.
you know, Micro Strategy being a software company rebranding to Strategy as a Bitcoin company. Metaplanet did u while they didn't change their name, uh they did a similar rebrand, integrating like the Bitcoin orange and that sort of thing. And it's obviously, you know, done wonders for shareholder value.
Um I guess my question for you, you Bill being a value investor, can every corporation is does every corporation fit the criteria to integrate a Bitcoin treasury strategy? You know, one of the things I get concerned about is that there might be some of these small cap pubos who are at risk of being delisted that try to capitalize on the Bitcoin narrative.
Um, almost, you know, pardon my French, but to call them kind of like the the shitcoin companies that are, you know, taking the strategy potentially. What should people look out for? Is are all the are is every corporate company, you know, capable of doing this thing? Um well from a value investors perspective I know there are 70 or 80 companies right now around the world that are actually that actually are on publicly traded exchanges that own Bitcoin which is awesome.
You know we only own a handful of them because we try and take a valueoriented approach and contextualize each one a little differently. So, uh, we're we are supportive of any and every company that wants to, um, store value in a better way, right? If that's Bitcoin, do we want to own them all? Maybe not.
And and and maybe not because, um, and the reason there would be because just whatever their core business function is doesn't, you know, it's hard to value or it has uh, not done well in the past or for whatever reason. Again, we're supportive of everyone that wants to do But we don't own them all.
We think very carefully about what the core function that they're serving is and what that's actually worth. So that's sort of our first hurdle, right? But you ask, can can anyone do this? There's a limited amount of room for Bitcoin development companies. No, everyone cannot do what Michael has done.
And the way he's thinking about corporate finance is is on another level. So no, everyone can't do that. He's already got that first mover advantage. He's out there and he's continues to do it. He continues to innovate. So can everyone be that? No. But can others, you know, store value and raise capital and put it into Bitcoin?
Absolutely. You know, not everyone can be a micro strategy, but anyone that wants to tra trans transfer the value of their capital and the excess capital that they have earned or earned into another time period in the future without losing purchasing power or with a very low probability of of uh losing purchasing power, the longer you want to store it.
Um, yeah, we're highly supportive of that and there's room for more to do it. And I think the way that I think the way that it develops is, you know, people start to look around, they say, "Oh, that guy's fund is doing really well. Why? Oh, he's bought Bitcoin. Oh, that company has outperformed every other thing.
Why? Oh, because it's in Bitcoin. Oh, that operating guy had a had a challenge. His core business was declining. He had a bunch of excess cash and he started using his declining cash flow to buy Bitcoin. And his company is still around." and you know ours is going down the tube so maybe we should try and be a little more innovative.
So that's how it works slowly but surely and then people start looking around and going everyone else who's buying Bitcoin is doing better than I am. So and then it just the the snowball rolls downhill. What do you think is preventing some of these giants like Apple um you know Dell and Microsoft are interesting right?
Microsoft was um allowing people to purchase items through their store with Bitcoin for a long time up until I think about a year ago. Um same with Dell. Um you know what's holding some of these larger institutions back from going all in on Bitcoin? I know I think Apple has like what a trillion dollars in cash just sitting on the sidelines or something like that.
You know, why don't they allocate a small small portion of that to Bitcoin? Tesla obviously figured it out, right? I'm still confused as to why they stopped at like 10,000 or whatever they own. Well, for a while it was a was a real political issue, right? And it was there was regulatory lack of regulatory clarity around it.
And now with this administration, that's exactly what's happening. You're getting that regulatory clarity. The frameworks are being put together now as we speak. So, it's just a matter of time now that we've got a friendly administration. I mean, if you just look what one of the things I think is super interesting socially is the way these massive tech companies tones have just changed overnight with regard to all kinds of political issues.
You're like, what what is going on here, right? It's just like an echo chamber now with social media and it uh it's just really interesting. So, um I think that now with this administration change, you now have an opportunity where you're going to see more companies do it. And I think that is what you've seen with the number of companies that have owned Bitcoin over the past, you know, 6 months have just has changed drastically.
So it's again the snowball's rolling downhill. Certainly. I know you and I were were chatting offline earlier. Um, one of the companies you guys just uh got involved with was GameStop and they had a pretty big announcement the other day. Um, walk me through the whole GameStop saga and then uh tell me a little bit about how you guys are getting involved with Ryan and team.
So, we just initiated a starter position. Uh, it's a small weight for us. I think it's about 1% if not a little less. Um, we're very interested in companies that want to have a Bitcoin treasury strategy just because it suggests they're innovative. It suggests they're thinking outside the box. And if you look at Ryan as a pickup for team Bitcoin, I mean, he's a legendary memer, right?
and and memes are a way that this the ideas get around and and get around quickly. So to have him helping with that and and uh adding that level of capital um just coming in I mean what I think they have a few billion of cash on the balance sheet he's issuing 1.3 billion today and converts. So you know will he be an outright Bitcoin development company?
Is there room for it? Can he figure out innovative ways to solve similar problems that Sailor has? I don't know. But um it from a capital allocation perspective having a small small weight in that at least the second it was announced makes a lot of sense. So we're following it closely. Um you know that the power of ideas to travel today is unlike it ever has been.
Uh, and that's why people are that's why these big centralized media platforms are are so important and who owns them and what's going on and the way they're run. So that ability of ideas to spread quickly, you know, it it hasn't been around forever. Prior to social media, Bitcoin would not have been possible, right?
I mean, you you wouldn't have been able to get the word out there. It's now a the world changes, context changes, and so we want to be involved in changing context and uh potential right tales on the investment side. Um again, it's not our largest position, but it's one that we want to be involved in and and follow closely.
And so that's why we just initiated a starter position in it. Yeah, I'm very interested to see, you know, how the narrative continues to progress with GameStop. I think it's going to be a catalyst um for some other other companies that fit the bill um and profile of GameStop to get involved as well.
Um yeah, it's just a really interesting time, right? You know, GameStop historically, you know, a retail store, you know, just like, you know, MetaPlanet was a retail hotel chain. Um and Micro Strategy, now Strategy was a uh um you know, software as a service company. Seeing them all pivot into this is just so so fascinating.
Yeah. Well, to to your point, I mean, they you know, a lot of this a lot of the impetus for companies getting into Bitcoin is they're having real secular challenges, right? So, GameStop selling physical copies of games when they're now being downloaded and uh a whole new way that they haven't been able to be sold before kind of hurts GameStop's business model, right?
And that secular change is going to continue to move in that direction, I think. And so, a lot of the companies that are moving into Bitcoin are going, "Yeah, I have a secular challenge, and here's a way to solve that secular challenge. There's this entirely new way of accounting for things." And the the uh the overall market cap and expectations for it might may be too low.
And this is a better way to store the value that I have created and could eventually create. So, even though it's see what and then more broadly though, everyone's actually got a problem. The world's a competitive place. So, everyone is facing some sort of secular challenge. And I think in most people's lives, Bitcoin can solve that challenge.
And so like one of the ways we conceptualize of it and think it is is important is okay if the if the monetary authorities that that govern your dollars have an explicit policy right to devalue those dollars by 2% a year maybe a little more maybe a little less some years but 2% plus it's been more than that over a long period of time actually.
Why not take that percent of what you have and is denominated in those things that are going away 2%. And stick it in the thing that the goal is for that not to happen and that's Bitcoin. So take 2% of everything you have and if you're not there yet, you need to get to at least 2% because that's going away anyway in everything you have.
So just it makes a lot of sense to do that and then hold it for a long period of time. And I think more people should have that perspective and I think it would suit them very well. For a CFO or corporate treasurer that's listening to this and you know seeing what GameStop's doing, you know, I'm sure there's still some skeptic skeptics out there like, "Hey, this is just a band-aid to a temporary problem.
GameStop is a failing business. This isn't a long-term solution." You're a value investor. So, how would you push back on that critique? uh Bitcoin is a long-term solution to a much bigger problem, right, which is inflation and the fact that monetary authorities are destroying the value of everything you own.
And that's happening every single day. And so again, we need to think more broadly and expansively about technologies and money and what they mean and whether or not there's a better way to do what we've been doing for, you know, thousands of years in the fiat baskets. All of which have gone to zero, by the way.
And uh Bitcoin is certainly showing that that's probably likely to continue. I mean, I think it's really interesting when you look at these financial professionals who get real upset about Bitcoin success and have had no hand in it and still don't and they go, "Oh, in 10 years, Bitcoin is going to be way down." It's like, why?
Well, why is your base case a reversal in a 16-year trend instead of contextualizing that 16-year trend and understanding and maybe trying to explain why it's happening and why it could continue to happen? I mean, I I love when David tweeted out, uh, CEO of Bitcoin, Inc., uh, there is now a Bitcoin white paper hanging in the Oval Office and and you don't own any.
Like, what are you what are you thinking about here, man? I mean, get on board. So, um, yeah, we think there's a long way to go. Yeah. I mean, there's only average going to be 21 million. It's the It's the only outside of what used to be uh.com do domains, it's the only other version of digital property that's actually scarce in a sense.
Um, right. Zooming out a little bit. So, uh, you know, you spoke at Bitcoin 2024, you sat on a panel with, uh, Eric Weiss talking about, you know, billionaire capital allocation. Um, you know, we're heading into Bitcoin 2025, uh, just here in I think it's like 60 days, which is which is crazy. What are some of the major tailwinds you see going into the later stages of 2025?
What are things that are making you excited about, you know, Bitcoin and markets? It's just a whole Well, it's the whole administrative change, right? That takes a long time to to for its changes to percolate through the system, right? So we're still getting the regulatory frameworks put together. Banks are slowm moving entities and so to expect them the day that SAB21 changes to 122 to then go start doing stuff.
I'm sure there's eight gajillion committee meetings at every bank about this change and what do we got to talk about and blah blah. So they're still going through that process, right? the administrative bureaucratic hoops um as the the the legislation changes. So, we're still very very early on in this administrative change.
Um and again, you you hear the tone from the tech execs overnight. So, they change quickly. They're the fastest to change. These other banks are slower to change. They will come around um because there's money to be made and that's that's their fundamental purpose, right? banks are are there to uh facilitate the exchange of value over time and space and so they will eventually adopt the new technology or I think they'll be left in the dust but they need the regulatory frameworks and they need the administrative clarity and they need a lot of this stuff to change.
So, we're still super early into the new administrative turnover and as that clarity emerges, so will the the behavior of the banks and the offerings change. So, it's still really really early uh with regard to the whole new administrative change. And so, we got at least four years of you know inflection point potentially I think of in in growth trajectory here.
How fast do you think some of these banks are going to catch up to Micro Strategy? I've heard Sailor refer to strategy as being the new banks. Um, you know, I mean, he holds 1% of the total total Bitcoin supply and now, you know, with the rise of stable coins and um, you know, lightning and other ways to transfer Bitcoin quickly and efficiency at very low cost.
Um, you know, where does that leave the JP Morgan Chasees, the Bank of Americas, uh, the City Groups? Well, ultimately comes down to human behavior and how quickly humans change too and and change their own desire to to buy Bitcoin. Um, they'll come around. I mean, the way I I always say in Bitcoin is inevitable.
If you just look at the monetary technology and it's you know again a two billionish market cap uh despite having much better technology to solve the core problem of money and what it is and what it was meant to be than the machinations that create new units of dollars and devalue them o over time. So it again it's just time.
It's time and and continued education and and moving ahead and it's going to happen. the hodddling super important. Um, Bill, I know we're kind of coming up on time here. Um, what are some final takeaways? I know we've talked heavily about corporate treasuries, um, big picture at a geopolitical level and a lot of macro, but for the average retail investor that, uh, maybe has just found Bitcoin, is trying to figure out, should I buy Bitcoin, should I buy Micro Strategy stock, what's Ethereum, like what's what is your final takeaways for, for somebody listening in?
Um, my final takeaway I guess would be understand what it is, why you own it, what its core value proposition is, and how it fits into your overall financial situation. You know, I would advise heavily against trying to trade it or call cycles or pick tops and bottoms. Uh, and what you really want to do, and it's just like the stock market, right?
But if you look at historically, just dollar cost averaging and steady constant buy has been the best way to go over a long period of time for most people. Uh and that goes for me too. I have a daily buy on Bitcoin. I buy it every single day. Um and I'll continue to do that. And uh when I when I need to sell something, to finance something, Bitcoin is the last thing I want to sell.
And it's the last thing I I would consider to sell just because I think probability of it continuing up and to the right is very very high. And so understand the fundamental technology, understand why Bitcoin and why not Ethereum or anything else. Um and and get into it, right? Like get involved with the community.
Go to the Bitcoin conference. Go to uh you know read more podcasts. Read more books on it. And so there's there's a lot out there and it's all free and it's really compelling and um it's an exciting thing to be a part of. So I I encourage people more people to understand it and get involved. Just get off zero.
It's what I always say. No, it's that 2% thing. It's it's what I'm it's the if again that is the best framework for me. I mean that if the monetary authorities are explicitly trying to destroy the value of 2% of everything you own, take 2% of what you own and stick it in this and call me in 5 years.
Uh and you know that I think that's an interesting way to think about it and um it's served me well. It served a lot of other people well and uh I think it will continue to do that. Bill, I appreciate all the insights this morning. Um you're a great Twitter follow. love looking at your post and your threads.
Uh where can people find you and um you know, do you know what day you're speaking uh yet at Bitcoin 2025 and what your panel is going to be? I don't know. No, I'm open to suggestions. Um but Bill Lfo is my Twitter handle. Company's Twitter handle is Millervalue. Um I encourage you to follow both of those.
I tweet regularly about Bitcoin and perspectives on it and uh excited to continue down that path. Awesome. Well, Bill, looking forward to uh hearing whatever your panel is going to be at Bitcoin 2025. Hope I get a chance to run into you and say hello. It's been an absolute pleasure and uh looking forward to catching up in the future. Thanks, Alan. Really appreciate it.
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