Michael Saylor Does A Press Round - Are We Bullish Again?

BBC, Fox, and Newsweek delve into the darker side of Bitcoin, while Bitcoin's significant role in the financial market is underscored by Bloomberg and CNBC.

Bitcoin price: $29,031

Date range: July 31-August 6, 2023

Bitcoin Perception Index (BPI): 56/100 - balanced

Main coverage: Crime, Politics, Economy

This week's spotlight: Fortune

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Weekly snapshot

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Main topics of the week

Bitcoin and Crime

Articles from BBC, Fox, and WSJ discuss cases where Bitcoin was involved in illegal activities, such as money laundering and hacking. These articles highlight the story of the couple that pleaded guilty Thursday to laundering money hacked from cryptocurrency exchange Bitfinex in 2016.

Bitcoin and Politics

An article from AP News discusses RFK Jr.'s announcement to run for president in 2024, mentioning Bitcoin in a broader sense. Another article from Bloomberg discusses US politicians forming their positions on Bitcoin ahead of the 2024 elections. These articles show that Bitcoin is becoming a topic of interest in political discussions.

Bitcoin and the Economy

Michael Saylor did a press run this week, appearing on Bloomberg Markets and CNBC Squawk On The Street discussing the impact of Bitcoin on various aspects of the economy, including the profitability of MicroStrategy, his future outlook of Bitcoin, and the performance of Bitcoin compared to other cryptocurrencies. These mentions highlight the significant role Bitcoin plays in the financial market, an angle financial outlets always are interesting in getting takes from.

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Spotlight on Fortune

The article titled "Future of Finance: Tezos’s Arthur Breitman on how blockchains ‘can improve financial infrastructure’ to help create ‘a wider array of businesses’" is an interview with Arthur Breitman, the co-founder of Tezos.

The interview covers a range of topics, including the role of Tezos in the crypto ecosystem, the evolution of the crypto space, and the future of finance, and, of course; Bitcoin.

In the interview, Breitman's sentiment towards Bitcoin is largely negative, but it's important to note that Breitman, being the co-founder of Tezos, has a vested interest in promoting his own platform, which is why he lauds Tezos for its superior technology, scalability, and robustness compared to Bitcoin.

He criticizes Bitcoin for its technological limitations and its refusal to adapt and innovate. He states,

"Bitcoin I think understood very early on that if you’re willing to fork willy nilly to implement innovation, you risk being captured—you risk social capture of the protocol. And to avoid that, they created these very strong cultural norms against ever changing Bitcoin. They’ve succeeded at that, they’ve gained a lot of stability from that, and there’s absolutely value in stability and predictability. But the tradeoff that they made is that Bitcoin basically doesn’t move anymore."

For anyone in the space who have been following Bitcoin over the years, these arguments are not exactly new.

For example, Breitman points out that Bitcoin's security could be compromised in the future as the block reward decreases, an often-cited critique that doesn't really provide any new discourse.

He also emphasizes the culture of innovation in the Tezos space, facilitated by its governance model, and puts it in contrast to the Bitcoin community, which according to Breitman has created strong cultural norms against innovation.

Based on the content of the article, the sentiment score towards Bitcoin would be negative.

Some interesting quotes from the article include:

"Bitcoin I think understood very early on that if you’re willing to fork willy nilly to implement innovation, you risk being captured—you risk social capture of the protocol. And to avoid that, they created these very strong cultural norms against ever changing Bitcoin."

"Bitcoin wants to maintain a 21 million Bitcoin cap. Unfortunately, without a block reward, you don’t really have a good way to incentivize miners, and as the block reward goes down so does the security budget of Bitcoin."

There’s a lot of real issues, and there’s a refusal to tackle them inside the Bitcoin community.