Is it Mathematically Over for Fiat?



For a certain large group of people, Bitcoin has won as long term savings, and it has won this bucket for a decent amount of years now.For another smaller but growing group of people, Bitcoin is their default liquid money in a long term and short term sense.I’ve done over 300 interviews with Bitcoiners that run the spectrum from hard stance long term savings only users all the way to those by any means necessary want to limit dollar exposure as much as physically possible.I’ve heard basically every question about fintech logistics, volatility, and taxes.The question I like the most is: “Wait, does the math actually work on this?”There’s then normally two camps in response to this, those that accept a loose form of napkin math or gut feeling that yeah bitcoin is better to hold than usd most likely.The second camp wants to prove it, they want to see the math, or want someone to show them the math.@Humblepleb21m looked at the math. These are two threads that are long but worth reading.Part OneEver since @BrainHarrington started discussing living off Bitcoin on X and y/t, it really got me wondering how much fiat slippage I might be experiencing by not being 100% Bitcoin, so I worked on a script to simulate what it would look like. 🧵 Stack & chill (@Humblepleb21m) June 7, 2024
Part TwoThis is Part 2 of living on Bitcoin vs fiat:RECAPLiving on Bitcoin means getting paid in sats and paying your bills in sats. You hold 0 fiat.Living on fiat (as a Bitcoiner) means getting paid in fiat and paying bills in fiat. Then, putting the rest into stacking sats. Stack & chill (@Humblepleb21m) June 12, 2024
TLDR on the math threads from Humblepleb21m – On the time frame they simulated with the income/bills they simulated, using Bitcoin as the main money beat dollar cost averaging by 0.1 BTC.I was going over these results with Fold CEO Will Reeves and Will asked a great question related to the math.”So this analysis is between a Bitcoiner that uses fiat for bills and a Bitcoiner that uses Bitcoin for bills, but what about the math on either of these scenarios vs the person that still uses full dollars?”It’s hard to tackle all of the evidence for fiat debasement in a short blog post so again I’m going to outsource to Twitter.While CPI inflation is at 3.3%, inflation is much higher in many basic necessities:1. Car Insurance Inflation: 20.3%2. Transportation Inflation: 10.5%3. Hospital Services Inflation: 7.2%4. Car Repair Inflation: 7.2%5. Electricity Inflation: 5.9%6. Homeowner Inflation: 5.7%…— The Kobeissi Letter (@KobeissiLetter) June 12, 2024
There’s so many ways to slice it and it all basically points to the math is becoming hard to disagree with that holding full USD as money is not a great option.The things listed above are things that stick out to me as general items that you would think about an emergency fund for.In the example above the simulation has a really healthy savings rate. The net income to the household was $8,600/mo and the outgoing bills are $6,000/mo, so a savings rate of $2,600/mo.Live on Bitcoin/hold emergency fund in Bitcoin scenario and live on fiat/hold emergency fund in Bitcoin scenario both beat the holding emergency fund in USD by a lot.Fold serves both these strategies really well and I would argue serves them both at the highest level of any method out there because of the built in account and routing number.This convenient access to account and routing makes it even easier for that $2,600/mo of surplus to be liquid to your household needs while still sitting in the currency you prefer.Here’s one last graphic from Humblepleb21m that perfectly sums it up. pic.twitter.com/Wv8dI97k8C— Stack & chill (@Humblepleb21m) June 26, 2024