Topic: Discusions with a Banker...and how to make them really think (Read 710 times)
Interesting discussion. Discussions like that help everyone to hone their information and help to educate. Thanks for sharing.
I have a few bank(st)er friends
I.e. those who work in major banks and deal with core currency issues, swaps, forex etc.
Some of them know I am involved in BTC but I only mention it casually, and in fact avoid talking to them about BTC to much if at all because I don't want to come of as a fundi-btcer....
However, if they choose to raise a BTC issue with me, and have "a go at it", I will critically respond to their position / views.
Talking with bankers is interesting, as some of them can see the implications of BTC even if they don't understand the tech.
A Banker on the weekend raised with BTC specifically me the GOX debacle. This had his back office chattering about BTC for the first time en mass.
One interesting misconception he had that their is some one to shut down, I.e. the US, China or whoever would not allow the BTC protocol and they would get them to shut it down. I explained that short of turning the internet off you likely cant do it. And even if you could, another crypto would come out that could not be shut down or was an order of magnitude harder to shut down.
He raised all sorts of arguments and reasons, some ok eg the FIAT / BTC gateway issue.
He could see that if this think ever gained more traction Banks, his job and the structure of society was in for a lot of change.
Instead of listening to the answers he just kept reverting to "they" wont let it happen, and put great faith in the USD now as proved by the GFC (according to him) as THE reserve currency and maybe RMB as a reserve currency in 10 years.
I finally had had enough and threw down the gauntlet.
BTC has evaluated near 1 million times against the USD in the last 5 years. What do you think the US or USD can do if this happens every 5 years....
now I know how hard it would be to do this due to the total money supply, eg 1 billion a coin is well... not reasonable....even for perma moon bulls but I said it to show that even if I am wrong and it does a fraction of what it already has done, what exactly are you going to do....
that was pretty much the end of any resistance from the Banker.....he couldn't argue that BTC had already done this and had to concede that another 10 x, 100x, 1000x rise was possible, which leaves a huge amount of buying power on the table.
A few notes on his general views.
Banker: How would he not get shot up at the local mall, if there was no police force due to taxation reduction?
My answer, shooting people up is not an economically viable activity when there is nothing to gain.
Banker Governments had failed to tax enough as they could not provide enough services
My answer, Government don't provide services effectively, they are massively inefficient.
How could BTC buy anything if Govs outlawed it.
My answer, jurisdictions would be arbitraged out according to their in efficient laws and holding companies would arise that would buy assets on behalf of BTC holders. Capital outflows would discipline in-efficent jurisdictions (as happens today, but with more speed in BTC) and inflows reward efficient regulations.
Another good point that really stumped the banker was how BTC can be used to transfer x100 million of buying power to some one anywhere or any time....in fact any arbitrary amount. This was something that the current system could not do. The Banker had no recourse on this point, but complained it should be allowed to happen, and the Gov would stop BTC. I asked him who exactly would the stop, and how, there is no one to "stop".
Interestingly the Banker went on to asset registers, eg property title registers and how they are needed. He to his credit sort of indicated that the need for colored coins would exist. I said he was right and this was one of the properties the block chain crypto's has.
I.e. those who work in major banks and deal with core currency issues, swaps, forex etc.
Some of them know I am involved in BTC but I only mention it casually, and in fact avoid talking to them about BTC to much if at all because I don't want to come of as a fundi-btcer....
However, if they choose to raise a BTC issue with me, and have "a go at it", I will critically respond to their position / views.
Talking with bankers is interesting, as some of them can see the implications of BTC even if they don't understand the tech.
A Banker on the weekend raised with BTC specifically me the GOX debacle. This had his back office chattering about BTC for the first time en mass.
One interesting misconception he had that their is some one to shut down, I.e. the US, China or whoever would not allow the BTC protocol and they would get them to shut it down. I explained that short of turning the internet off you likely cant do it. And even if you could, another crypto would come out that could not be shut down or was an order of magnitude harder to shut down.
He raised all sorts of arguments and reasons, some ok eg the FIAT / BTC gateway issue.
He could see that if this think ever gained more traction Banks, his job and the structure of society was in for a lot of change.
Instead of listening to the answers he just kept reverting to "they" wont let it happen, and put great faith in the USD now as proved by the GFC (according to him) as THE reserve currency and maybe RMB as a reserve currency in 10 years.
I finally had had enough and threw down the gauntlet.
BTC has evaluated near 1 million times against the USD in the last 5 years. What do you think the US or USD can do if this happens every 5 years....
now I know how hard it would be to do this due to the total money supply, eg 1 billion a coin is well... not reasonable....even for perma moon bulls but I said it to show that even if I am wrong and it does a fraction of what it already has done, what exactly are you going to do....
that was pretty much the end of any resistance from the Banker.....he couldn't argue that BTC had already done this and had to concede that another 10 x, 100x, 1000x rise was possible, which leaves a huge amount of buying power on the table.
A few notes on his general views.
Banker: How would he not get shot up at the local mall, if there was no police force due to taxation reduction?
My answer, shooting people up is not an economically viable activity when there is nothing to gain.
Banker Governments had failed to tax enough as they could not provide enough services
My answer, Government don't provide services effectively, they are massively inefficient.
How could BTC buy anything if Govs outlawed it.
My answer, jurisdictions would be arbitraged out according to their in efficient laws and holding companies would arise that would buy assets on behalf of BTC holders. Capital outflows would discipline in-efficent jurisdictions (as happens today, but with more speed in BTC) and inflows reward efficient regulations.
Another good point that really stumped the banker was how BTC can be used to transfer x100 million of buying power to some one anywhere or any time....in fact any arbitrary amount. This was something that the current system could not do. The Banker had no recourse on this point, but complained it should be allowed to happen, and the Gov would stop BTC. I asked him who exactly would the stop, and how, there is no one to "stop".
Interestingly the Banker went on to asset registers, eg property title registers and how they are needed. He to his credit sort of indicated that the need for colored coins would exist. I said he was right and this was one of the properties the block chain crypto's has.
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