Rabbit Hole Recap: Bitcoin Week of 2021.10.25
10/30/2021 · 79 min · transcript via mlx
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Key topics
— FATF releases updated cryptocurrency guidance with vague enforcement language that could enable selective regulation of unhosted wallets, custodial services, and Lightning providers; Coin Center warns the rules are "not as bad as it could have been but still flawed."
— El Salvador now holds 1,120 Bitcoin after President Bukele purchased an additional 420 BTC, continuing sovereign accumulation as the only head of state actively tweeting Bitcoin buys.
— River launches hosted Bitcoin mining service alongside its existing exchange and custody offerings, competing with Compass Mining and Blockware in a differentiated custody model.
— Blockstream sponsors Eric Siryan's Minimint implementation of federated e-cash (Chaumian mints), enabling privacy-preserving custodial Lightning wallets with multi-jurisdictional trust models.
— Multiple software releases advance Lightning and self-custody infrastructure: BTC Pay Server 1.3.0 adds Taproot and Lightning Address support; Umbrel raises $3M seed funding; Voltage launches Flow for easy Lightning Pool integration.
— Bitcoin 2022 conference (April 6–9 in Miami) offers early-bird pricing through Tuesday with code OPENSOURCE for 21% off; agenda features dedicated open-source track.
Market & price signals
— Bitcoin trading at $62,370 according to Clark Moody Dashboard; 1 Bitcoin = 1,603 sats. Total market cap $1.18 trillion. Block height 707,327. Next difficulty adjustment estimated October 31st (13th anniversary of Bitcoin whitepaper) with +8.3% increase; current average block time 9 minutes 14 seconds (46 seconds faster than target). Unspent capacity in Whirlpool at 4,415.35 BTC (~275.5M sats), hovering near all-time highs.
Actionable insights
— Hold your own keys and self-custody sats; avoid leaving coins on exchanges, particularly if regulatory pressure forces sudden KYC requirements or account freezes (e.g., Dropbit seizure, Prime Trust liquidity failures).
— If using hosted mining, verify the operator's jurisdiction and custody model—self-hosting or light-KYC providers (e.g., Compass) may offer better sovereignty than full-KYC exchanges; even older S9s remain profitable at reasonable electricity rates without firmware upgrades.
— Attend or start a local Bitcoin meetup; growing communities in Houston (300+ attendees), Indianapolis, Michigan, and Oklahoma demonstrate grassroots momentum and provide irreplaceable peer learning and network effects.
Episode sponsorships
Paid placements mentioned in this episode. BTC Pods is not sponsored by or affiliated with these advertisers. Links are included so you can find offers mentioned on the show.
— Cash App helps you stack sats and stonks with fractional shares as little as $1, instant withdrawal to personal wallets, and an auto-buy feature for hands-free DCA. Use promo code stackingsats (one word) when you download the app to receive $10, and $10 will be contributed to OWLS Lacrosse; terms apply. Bitcoin services by Block, Inc.—see https://cash.app/legal/podcast for Bitcoin disclosures.
— Unchained Capital provides 2-of-3 multisig vault custody where you control two keys and they hold one, plus Bitcoin-collateralized loans, IRAs, and inheritance solutions. Visit unchained-capital.com/vaults to set up a vault and receive three months free of Saifedean Ammous' The Bitcoin Standard Research Bulletin.
— Compass Mining democratizes Bitcoin's hashrate by providing easy bundles for buying and hosting miners, handling energy costs and miner acquisition so you can mine Bitcoin profitably; visit https://compassmining.io to get started.
— Braiins runs Slush Pool (the oldest mining pool since 2010, with 1.25M BTC mined lifetime), creates free and open-source firmware (Braiins OS+) to give miners more control over ASICs and help them stack more sats, and is leading Stratum V2 to help decentralize the mining pool protocol. The firmware supports Antminer S9/S9i/S9j, S17/S17+/S17 Pro, T17/T17+, S17e, and T17e; zero percent pool fees apply when mining to Slush Pool with the firmware. Check out profitability calculator and updates at https://braiins.com/ and https://insights.braiins.com/profitability-calculator.