Bitcoin Bull Market Diaries Volume 5 Interview with Matt Odell

For more background and history on the Bitcoin Bull Market Diaries check out Bitcoin Bull Market Diaries Volume 1 Interview with Hodlonaut.

Most people know Matt Odell from the Tales From the Crypt podcast he co-hosts with Marty Bent. He is also cofounder of Final Message, Bitcoin Citadel and an advisor for Bottlepay and givebitcoin.

I met Matt over the last year and really appreciate his Bitcoin perspective and his authentic personality. He may not have invented the saying,

"Stay humble. Stack sats,"

- but I give him credit for making it commonly used saying among Bitcoiners.

Name

Matt Odell

Country

USA

How do people know you?

Destroyed my Op-Sec on Twitter and then I doubled down by hosting a podcast with Marty Bent. You may have read my previous interview in the bear market version of this series, my views have not changed much so make sure you check that one out too.

How long have you been into Bitcoin?

~360000 blocks

Best Bitcoin experience?

Bitcoiners are awesome.

Worst Bitcoin experience?

Didn't buy enough.

How did you get involved in the Tales From the Crypt podcast?

Marty seduced me on twitter and after a couple of weeks finally got me to come on the show as a guest. The episode went great, we hit it off, and quickly became friends. When he later approached me to join him for a weekly news show, I said yes immediately.

What do you think is Bitcoin's biggest threat?

Governments. Specifically the US Gov. Expect laws that require routine disclosure of bitcoin holdings and moves to restrict self custody altogether.

What are your thoughts on the various Bitcoin forks?

Minority forks tend to zero.

What are you optimistic about in this space?

Btcpayserver, bisq, lightning, hardware nodes, hardware wallets, multisig tools, and using all of those in combination easily.

Biggest regret during the last Bear market and what did you learn?

No regrets. We will see the same narratives play out every bear market.

What is the biggest fail you observed during the last bear market?

Generally speaking, insecure shitcoiners attacking bitcoiners as their bags continue to lose value when measured in bitcoin. Specific instance, Fred Wilson straight up lying about Kin usage.

What do you think help turn things around to the current Bull market?

Millions of bitcoiners stacking sats and the builders who have made it easier than ever.

Who are the heroes of the last Bear market?

Too many to list. I love you all.

Why do you think alt-coins are still struggling?

The key value prop has always been censorship resistance, specifically State resistance, but most altcoins failed to prioritize that. They often prefer vanity metrics that can pump the price short term which results in their networks getting more centralized rather than less.

Bitcoin is still too centralized in my opinion, but it's by far the most distributed and censorship resistant network in the space – it's not even close.

Everything ultimately trends to zero when priced in bitcoin.

What do you have to say to those who claim alt-season is coming?

Lol altseason isn't a real thing, the 2017 pump was unprecedented and fueled by dumb money after the eth pump.

Do you hold any alts? If not, why?

Holding alts isn't diversification, it's high risk leverage. Trading is brutal. The overwhelming majority of people are better off stacking sats than trading.

Long term everything tends to zero when priced in bitcoin.

What do you think about the upcoming Bitcoin halving and what it will do to the price of Bitcoin?

It's not priced in. We heard the same thing before the last halving. Halvings are a strange beast, they are the first time in history where there is a known supply shock. Usually supply shocks are a surprise, hence the name shock, but with bitcoin that's not the case.

That said, even though it is known ahead of time, people aren't capable of fully appreciating how much that reduced supply will impact price.

Most miners are professionals who have to sell their earned bitcoin to pay for their expenses – electricity, rent, labor, taxes, etc – that selling pressure will be reduced by half while buying pressure will continue to increase with adoption. TL;DR Number go up.

What do you think makes Bitcoin superior to anything else out there?

Bitcoin is a new type of money that is digital and independent of world governments or corporations. It is hard to seize, block, or inflate and easy to send around the world. It is the best money we have ever had. As more people realize this, the price should rise.

Do you think central banks are or will be accumulating Bitcoin?

Yes. It's the only smart move. Smaller countries - especially those that are sanctioned - will be the first movers. Some may have already started but it is in their best interest not to admit it until they have accumulated a substantial amount.

How do you feel about the current state and future of lightning network?

Bullish. Huge improvements in usability over the last year and we should see even bigger improvements over the next few years. Next step, make it easy enough for grandma to use.

What are your thoughts on HODLing Bitcoin? 

Slow and steady constant accumulation is the most conservative investment move you can make when it comes to bitcoin. Short term bitcoin is highly volatile, but long term the price should rise with adoption. Dollar cost averaging with money you are willing to lose – stacking sats – allows you to average out that short term volatility while gaining exposure to the long term upside.

Trading is brutal and most people will lose more money than if they had avoided it in the first place.

If you started stacking sats at any time in bitcoin history you would be in profit right now. You can check the numbers yourself at stackingsats.com.

What are your thoughts on Bitcoin Maximalism?

Bitcoin maximalism is a straw man argument created by Vitalik to sell his token ICO. “The only reason you don't like ethereum is because it's not bitcoin.”

Thoughts on the notion of bitcoinization?

Gradually, then suddenly. There are few things more powerful than free speech and sound money.

Where do you think Bitcoin dominance will do as the price increases?

Bitcoin dominance is a flawed metric and we shouldn't focus on it. It is extremely easy to inflate market caps of altchains through large supplies and low wash traded volumes.

What will someone have to do to prove they are the real Satoshi Nakamoto?

Anyone who claims they are Satoshi should first prove ownership of early keys, either through a signed message or by moving them. If they don't do that then you can safely ignore their claims, it is a waste of time.

That said, doing that alone would still not be definitive proof, other supplemental evidence would need to be presented if a credible claim is ever made.

I would prefer if Satoshi remains anonymous and I expect that to be the case. He/she/they pulled off an extremely impressive level of opsec over the last 10 years so I find it hard to believe Satoshi would throw that all away now.

What Bitcoin startups are you excited about?

ZkSnacks, Samourai, Nodl, Casa, Unchained Cap, Zap, Lightning Labs, ACINQ, Blockstream, OpenNode, Coinkite, Trezor, Ledger, Zap, Joule, Bitrefill, Satoshi Games, GoTenna, HodlHodl, Bitmex, Chaincode, Kraken, Bottlepay, Breez, Bittr, BullBitcoin, Foldapp, Lolli. Special mention to Square, although no longer a startup, their bitcoin push is a big deal. Another special mention to the teams at btcpayserver and bisq, they aren't companies but are arguably more important projects than any of the companies I listed above.

What “crypto influencers” do you think get it wrong and why?

90%. Some are legitimately confused, but there’s a special place in hell for the ones who know what they are doing and intentionally mislead their followers. Here's a list of people who have blocked me on twitter after I called them out on their bullshit: Vinny Lingham, Kyle Samani, Preethi Kasireddy, Tiffany Hayden, Ari Paul, Emin Gun Sirer, Erim Finman, Bitfinexed, George Kikvadze, Nouriel Roubini.

What “crypto influencers” do you think get it right and why?

This is a pretty good place to start: https://hive.one/bitcoin/

Nobody is perfect, myself included, but if you follow me on twitter, it should become pretty obvious who has earned my respect. Also the term “crypto influencer” should die.

Where do you envision the market heading in the next 5 years?

Moon. Just not sure which one.

What is Bitcoin Citadel and Final Message, and where do you see them going?

Bitcoin Citadel is an educational effort that I started with Evan Kaloudis, Joshua Stokes, and a handful of other NYC bitcoiners with the goal of running bitcoin focused workshops. It is not being run for profit but rather is our way to give back to the community. The first workshop is tomorrow and we are very excited.

Final Message is a privacy focused dead man's switch service that is ideal for use with multisig and shamir secret schemes but can be used for any text based delivery need. When you stop renewing your subscription your encrypted message is automatically sent to your desired recipients. We have plans to improve upon our base design with additional features and delivery options.

Best tips for storing Bitcoin?

Buy a coldcard. Consider using it with multisig. There's at least two user friendly multisig tools in development currently: Junction and Spectre. If you haven't already moved to multisig I would wait a month or two for them to be tested and released fully. They will make it much easier than the current standard process using electrum.

Any tips you want to give to people new to Bitcoin?

This community is extremely welcoming and many of us are happy to help. Stay humble and don’t overextend yourself. You have to look out for yourself or you will get burned.

Name some of your favorite information sources and/or podcasts in the space.

Twitter can be extremely useful. The hard part is learning how to cut out useless noise.

Publications: Bitcoin Magazine

Newsletters: Marty's Bent, Coinmetrics, Bitcoin Optech

Podcasts: TFTC, Stephan Livera, Noded, Block Digest, What Bitcoin Did

Resources: bitcoin.page, coinmetrics.io, bitcoinacks.com, onchainfx.com, oxt.me, blockstream.info, fork.lol, mempool.space, jochen-hoenicke.de/queue/#0,30d, coin.dance, 1ml.com, bitcoin-only.com

Sites you should avoid: bitcoin.com, ccn.com, bitcoinist.com, newsbtc.com, blockchain.com

Any last words of wisdom?

Stay humble. Stack sats.

Stay tuned for the next Bitcoin Bull Market Diaries. I have some awesome interviews in the queue and will be dropping new volumes regularly. Special thanks to Matt Odell and all of our fellow Taco Carnivore Bitcoin Plebs out there!