The U.S. has effectively become the first world power to allow Bitcoin to flourish. Here are the strategic moves that the U.S. has made in this chess game with Bitcoin:
The U.S. adopted the internet protocol (TCP-IP) and does not regulate it’s internet companies like China. Bitcoin is the native money of the internet. Inevitably, more U.S. regulations will appear to try to control Bitcoin, but U.S. lawmakers will be “raking leaves in the wind” with their regulations because they will realize that they cannot control an open protocol, just like they can’t control the internet.
The Internal Revenue Service taxes bitcoin as an intangible property, just like tangible real estate.
The CFTC has deemed bitcoin to be a commodity.
The U.S. stock market has allowed mining companies, like Bitfarms, Hut 8 and Marathon, to list as public companies. Core Scientific mining company will likely be next.
Mining companies are quickly propagating in states like Texas , Wyoming , Washington, New York , Kentucky and Georgia. States are fighting among themselves to attract mining companies to their economies.
America has more than 35% of the Bitcoin mining hash rate.
Governors and senators are lobbying for Bitcoin
Bitcoin has become mainstream among stars like Tom Brady , Kevin O’Leary and many other beloved and popular U.S. athletes, celebrities and stars.
Major payment apps like Cash App and PayPal allow for the purchasing of bitcoin.
46 million Americans own bitcoin , or ~17% of the U.S. population.
Intel and Jack Dorsey’s company, Block, are going to start designing Bitcoin mining ASICs, making mining more accessible to everyday Americans.
Regular, everyday Americans will be able to buy bitcoin at 300 local community banks sometime this year.
All of these moves are a part of Bitcoin game theory.
The U.S. will be forced to adopt Bitcoin as a defensive move, otherwise it’s world reserve currency status could be lost. All currencies since the advent of fiat have failed and the U.S. dollar will be no different. U.S. senators, governors, presidents and the military will use bitcoin to win elections, attract Bitcoin companies to their states and the nation and fight the currency wars we currently are in. Bitcoin will serve as a defensive and offensive move to allow the U.S. to retain its status as a superpower. But Bitcoin belongs only to the world.
Russia might adopt Bitcoin before the U.S. in a strategic move to gain a headstart against their age-old rival. If this happens, in the words of Max Keiser , “a global hash race will begin,” and that will start a chain reaction among G7 countries. The capitulation of Russia will be due to the fact that they will understand the correlation between gold and bitcoin, which they have been aggressively buying since the 2008 crisis. Russia has a lot of cheap energy and they will start to mine bitcoin when they realize how much money they can make, given this excess energy.
Another Bitcoin game theory event could occur if Turkey decides to purchase bitcoin with it’s hyperinflated, worthless fiat currency, the lira. This will be the most important strategic move for a country who has a hyperinflated currency. The beauty of this move is that Turkey will be able to print worthless fiat to buy money that is appreciating at around 170% per year. Essentially they will be mimicking what the U.S. has been doing since 1971 — printing fiat to gain economic prosperity. The only difference in Turkey’s case is that they are not invading countries to do this — instead they are just breathing life back into their country’s failed economy by becoming huge beneficiaries of the first mover’s advantage. Turkey will start a chain reaction among all the other inflation-ridden countries to follow suit and the world will look on with utter disbelief as bitcoin rapidly gets adopted. G7 countries will nervously observe these happenings and start their capitulation even earlier.
There will be great dissension during the transition from a fiat world to a Bitcoin world — but this will not be Bitcoin’s fault. Wars may be fought: not necessarily kinetic wars, but maybe even cyber wars. Rulers do not want to allow for Bitcoin. Why would the rulers of the world not desire a world like this? The simple answer is that in the fiat world, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. In a Bitcoin world, all people are treated fairly because the money is:
Open to all
Immutable
Universal
Ungovernable
Fair
Empowering
Bitcoin’s game theory is an elegant, organic, phenomenal and powerful thing to see unfold.
This is a guest post by Jeremy Garcia. Opinions expressed are entirely their own and do not necessarily reflect those of BTC Inc. or Bitcoin Magazine.