Building River with Alexander Leishman

— Alexander Leishman's journey from aerospace engineering through Bitcoin discovery in 2013 via a Balaji Srinivasan Coursera assignment, leading to co-founding River Financial.

— River's strategy as a Bitcoin-only financial institution focused on helping clients accumulate Bitcoin wealth through brokerage, mining products, and future services rather than competing as a multi-asset trading platform.

— The 2017 ICO bubble and 2022 contagion (Celsius, Luna, BlockFi) as lessons showing the dangers of under-collateralized lending and information asymmetry, contrasted with the safety of over-collateralized DeFi protocols.

— Lightning Network and Taro protocol as enabling technologies for Bitcoin to function as a global settlement and reserve asset, with potential for multi-currency transactions routed through Bitcoin.

— Monetary history, the dollar's long-term trajectory, and Bitcoin's role as either a reserve asset or eventual global unit of account over decades or centuries.

— Prefer custodial services and financial institutions that focus exclusively on Bitcoin (like River) to avoid the technical debt, security complexity, and conflicts of interest created by supporting multiple assets.

— Recognize the distinction between under-collateralized lending (which caused 2022 contagion) and over-collateralized lending protocols; the latter protects depositors through automatic liquidation and transparent on-chain rules.

— Watch Lightning Network adoption and Taro asset protocol development as early signals of Bitcoin's viability for multi-currency commerce and reserve-asset status in the coming years.