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Worlds Within Worlds: The Story of Nuclear Energy, Volume 3 (of 3), by Isaac Asimov is part of HackerNoon’s Book Blog Post series. You can jump to any chapter in this book here . Volume III: READING LIST READING LIST Basic Laws of Matter (revised edition), Harrie S. W. Massey and Arthur R. Quinton, Herald Books, Bronxville, New York, 1965, 178 pp., $3.75. Grades 7-9. A nontechnical presentation of atoms and the laws governing their behavior. Biography of Physics, George Gamow, Harper & Row, Publishers, New York, 1961, 338 pp., $6.50 (hardback); $2.75 (paperback). Grades 9-12. A history of theoretical physics. Discoverer of X Rays: Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen, Arnulf K. Esterer, Julian Messner, New York, 1968, 191 pp., $3.50. Grades 7-10. This interesting biography includes a brief, but very helpful, pronouncing gazetteer of the German, Swiss, and Dutch names in the text. Ernest Rutherford: Architect of the Atom, Peter Kelman and A. Harris Stone, Prentice-Hall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 1969, 72 pp., $3.95. Grades 5-7. A well-done biography of this famous atomic scientist. Many of the drawings illustrate theoretical ideas very well for the elementary grades. A glossary is included. Enrico Fermi: Atomic Pioneer, Doris Faber, Prentice-Hall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 1966, 86 pp., $3.95. Grades 5-8. A biography of the man who built the first reactor. Giant of the Atom: Ernest Rutherford, Robin McKown, Julian Messner, New York, 1962, 191 pp., $3.50. Grades 7-12. The life and accomplishments of a great physicist. The History of the Atomic Bomb, Michael Blow, American Heritage Publishing Company, Inc., New York, 1968, 150 pp., $5.95. Grades 5-9. This sumptuously illustrated history provides an informative explanation of nuclear physics in addition to comprehensive coverage of the bomb’s development and use. Inside the Atom, Isaac Asimov, Abelard-Schuman, Ltd., New York, 1966, 197 pp., $4.00. Grades 7-10. This comprehensive, well-written text explains nuclear energy and its applications. Madame Curie: A Biography, Eve Curie, translated by Vincent Sheean, Doubleday and Company, Inc., New York, 1937, 385 pp., $5.95 (hardback); $0.95 (paperback). Grades 9-12. This superb biography, which won the 1937 National Book Award for Nonfiction, illustrates dramatically the full spectrum of Marie Curie’s life. Men Who Mastered the Atom, Robert Silverberg, G. P. Putnam’s Sons, New York, 1965, 193 pp., $3.49. Grades 7-9. Atomic energy history is told through the work of pioneer scientists from Thales to present-day researchers. The Neutron Story, Donald J. Hughes, Doubleday and Company, Inc., New York, 1959, 158 pp., out of print. Grades 7-9. A substantial and interesting account of neutron physics. Niels Bohr: The Man Who Mapped the Atom, Robert Silverberg, MacRae Smith Company, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 1965, 189 pp., $3.95. Grades 8-12. An exciting, suspenseful, and humorous biography of one of the pioneers in atomic energy. Includes a glossary and references. The Questioners: Physicists and the Quantum Theory, Barbara Lovett Cline, Crowell Collier and MacMillan, Inc., New York, 1965, 274 pp., $5.00 (hardback); available in paperback with the title Men Who Made A New Physics: Physicists and the Quantum Theory, New American Library, Inc., New York, $0.75. Grades 9-12. An exceptionally well-delineated and personable account of the development of the quantum theory by physicists in the first quarter of this century. The Restless Atom, Alfred Romer, Doubleday and Company, Inc., New York, 1960, 198 pp., $1.25. Grades 9-12. A 167stimulating nonmathematical account of the classic early experiments that advanced knowledge about atomic particles. Roads to Discovery, Ralph E. Lapp, Harper and Row, Publishers, New York, 1960, 191 pp., out of print. Grades 10-12. Historical survey of nuclear physics beginning with Roentgen’s discovery of X rays and concluding with the discoveries of the rare elements. Secret of the Mysterious Rays: The Discovery of Nuclear Energy, Vivian Grey, Basic Books, Inc., Publishers, New York, 1966, 120 pp., $3.95. Grades 4-8. This outstanding history of nuclear research from Roentgen to Fermi is dramatically presented. The uncertainty of the unknown, the accidental discovery and the often lengthy and tedious research are woven in this story of scientists from around the world who pooled their knowledge and experience to unlock “the secrets of the mysterious rays”. Wilhelm Roentgen and the Discovery of X Rays, Bern Dibner, Franklin Watts, Inc., New York, 1968, 149 pp., $2.95. Grades 5-8. This detailed biography, illustrated with line drawings, historical photographs, and papers, is a fine addition to Watts’ “Immortals of Science” Series. Working with Atoms, Otto R. Frisch, Basic Books, Inc., New York, 1965, 96 pp., $4.95. Grades 9-12. Dr. Frisch presents a history of nuclear energy research and provides experiments for the reader. He gives a personal account of the pioneering work in which he and Lise Meitner explained the splitting of uranium and introduced the term “nuclear fission”. Advanced Books An American Genius: The Life of Ernest Orlando Lawrence, Herbert Childs, E. P. Dutton and Company, Inc., New York, 1968, 576 pp., $12.95. This well-written, scientifically accurate, and very interesting biography captures the excitement of Lawrence’s life. Ernest Lawrence was the inventor of the cyclotron, a major member of the wartime atomic energy development, and the director of the Lawrence Radiation Laboratory. The Atom and Its Nucleus, George Gamow, Prentice-Hall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 1961, 153 pp., $1.25. A popular-level discussion of nuclear structure and the applications of nuclear energy. Atomic Energy for Military Purposes, Henry D. Smyth, Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1945, 308 pp., $4.00. A complete account of the wartime project that developed the first nuclear weapons and of the considerations that prompted their use. Atomic Quest, Arthur H. Compton, Oxford University Press, Inc., New York, 1956, 370 pp., $7.95. A personal narrative of the research that led to the release of atomic energy on a useful scale by a scientist who played a principal part in the atomic bomb project during World War II. The Atomists (1805-1933), Basil Schonland, Oxford University Press, Inc., New York, 1968, 198 pp., $5.60. This book, which can be understood by anyone who has had a high school physics course, presents atomic theory development from Dalton through Bohr. It achieves a good balance between popular treatments and highly technical works without slighting the technical aspects. Atoms in the Family: My Life with Enrico Fermi, Laura Fermi, Chicago University Press, Chicago, Illinois, 1954, 267 pp., $5.00 (hardback); $2.45 (paperback). Laura Fermi writes about her husband, Enrico Fermi, the physicist who led the group that built the first nuclear reactor. 169 The Born-Einstein Letters: The Correspondence Between Albert Einstein and Max and Hedwig Born from 1916 to 1955, commentaries by Max Born, translated by Irene Born, Walker and Company, 1971, 240 pp., $8.50. These interesting letters reveal the scientific and personal lives of these two atomic scientists. Einstein: His Life and Times, Philipp Frank, Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., New York, 1953, 298 pp., $6.95. A brilliant biography that reveals the richness of Einstein’s life and work and the tremendous impact he made upon physics. Enrico Fermi, Physicist, Emilio Segrè, Chicago University Press, Chicago, Illinois, 1970, 288 pp., $6.95. This biography tells of Enrico Fermi’s intellectual history, achievements, and his scientific style. The scientific problems faced or solved by Fermi are explained in layman’s terms. Emilio Segrè was a friend and scientific collaborator who worked with Fermi for many years. An Introduction to Physical Science: The World of Atoms (second edition), John J. G. McCue, The Ronald Press Company, New York, 1963, 775 pp., $9.50. This textbook was written for college humanities students. J. J. Thomson: Discoverer of the Electron, George Thomson, Doubleday and Company, Inc., New York, 1966, 240 pp., $1.45. This biography, written by J. J. Thomson’s son, describes his research at the famed Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge, England. John Dalton and the Atom, Frank Greenaway, Cornell University Press, Ithaca, New York, 1966, 256 pp., $7.50. A biography for the general reader and the high school science student. Dalton is famous for his development of chemical combinations based on atomic theory. This provided the basis for modern structural theories of chemistry. John Dalton and the Atomic Theory: The Biography of a Natural Philosopher, Elizabeth C. Patterson, Doubleday and Company, Inc., New York, 1970, 320 pp., $6.95 170(hardback); $1.95 (paperback). The drama of Dalton’s life—his rigorous self-teaching, scientific work, and struggle to overcome class barriers in 19th century England—is well presented. Quotations from letters, diaries, and published works give a clear picture of Dalton’s atomic theory research and his time. Man-made Transuranium Elements, Glenn T. Seaborg, Prentice Hall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 1963, 120 pp., $6.95 (hardback); $2.95 (paperback). The discovery, properties, and applications of elements heavier than uranium are considered in this book, which is designed as an introduction to the subject. Glenn Seaborg was co-discoverer of nine of the twelve transuranium elements. The Nature of Matter: Physical Theory from Thales to Fermi, Ginestra Amaldi, translated by Peter Astbury, Chicago University Press, Chicago, Illinois, 1966, 332 pp., $5.95. A nontechnical history of atomic energy. Niels Bohr: His Life and Work as Seen by His Friends and Colleagues, S. Rozental (Editor), John Wiley and Sons, Inc., New York, 1967, 355 pp., $5.95. An articulate and scholarly biography by the friends and co-workers of this outstanding atomic pioneer. Niels Bohr: The Man, His Science, and the World They Changed, Ruth Moore, Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., New York, 1966, 436 pp., $7.95. An interesting biography of one of the pioneers in the study of the internal structure of the atom. Otto Hahn: My Life, Otto Hahn, translated by Ernest Kaiser and Eithne Wilkins, Herder and Herder, Inc., New York, 1970, 240 pp., $6.50. Autobiography of the man who discovered that the atom could be split. Otto Hahn: A Scientific Autobiography, Otto Hahn, Willy Ley, editor and translator, Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York, 1966, 320 pp., $9.95. Otto Hahn, winner of the 1944 Nobel Prize for his work in atomic fission, reviews the 171pioneer days in which a new science was created, and the role he played in its development. Physics and Beyond: Encounters and Conversations, Werner Heisenberg, translated by Arthur J. Pomerans, Harper and Row, Publishers, New York, 1970, 247 pp., $7.95. Werner Heisenberg, a Nobel Prize physicist, presents his autobiography in the form of conversations with such men as Max Planck, Albert Einstein, Niels Bohr, Ernest Rutherford, Otto Hahn, and Enrico Fermi. Physics for Poets, Robert H. March, McGraw-Hill Book Company, New. York, 1970, 302 pp., $7.50. A physics textbook for nonscience students. The book covers certain developments of classical mechanics, relativity, and atomic and quantum physics. With this book the author won the 1971 American Institute of Physics—U. S. Steel Foundation Science Writing Award in Physics and Astronomy. Sourcebook on Atomic Energy (third edition), Samuel Glasstone, Van Nostrand Reinhold Company, New York, 1967, 883 pp., $15.00. An excellent standard reference work, written for both scientists and the general public. The Swift Years: The Robert Oppenheimer Story, Peter Michelmore, Dodd, Mead and Company, New York, 1969, 273 pp., $6.95. Oppenheimer’s complex personality is delineated in this well-written biography. In the bibliography is a list of books that Oppenheimer felt “had done the most to shape his vocational attitude and philosophy of life”. The World of the Atom, 2 volumes, Henry A. Boorse and Lloyd Motz (Eds.), Basic Books, Inc., Publishers, New York, 1966, 1873 pp., $35.00. Contains the actual text of landmark documents in the history of atomic physics, each preceded by commentary that places it in the context of the discoverer’s personal life and in the conditions prevailing in science and in society in his time. About HackerNoon Book Series: We bring you the most important technical, scientific, and insightful public domain books. This book is part of the public domain. Isaac Asimov. 2015. Worlds Within Worlds: The Story of Nuclear Energy, Volume 3 (of 3). Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved May 2022 from https://www.gutenberg.org/files/49821/49821-h/49821-h.htm#c42 This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org , located at https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html .

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Foreword: My intent for this article is to review recent events in the crypto market, starting with two data points that we encountered in the past week, and then reviewing the past year to understand what began and ended 2017’s parabolic bull run. We’ll then look at what happened to the last wave of crypto speculators, and who — if anyone — will replace them. Lastly, and most importantly, we’ll seek to understand what will need to happen before they enter. ======================================== Two events came to our attention this past week — one that we judge to be very good/bullish, and one that is most assuredly not. Let’s get the bad news out of the way first. First, the Bad News Barring an unexpected and unlikely move, this week is going to mark an occasion that has only two precedents over the past six years, and has not happened since November 2015. Unfortunately, you’re going to have to keep the champagne locked up in the cellar for now as this will be an event we would all just as soon forget. Why? A Halloween horror show, indeed. Assuming that its price remains in the current range, then on November 1st 2018, for the first time in three years, Bitcoin’s 12-month trailing return will move from positive into negative territory. I’ll follow that up with this little gem of a table. I don’t think there’s a better way to illustrate the wild ride that has been crypto for the past five years, than this: As you can see, anyone who bought their first in January 2013 had a very merry Christmas that year. Conversely, those who entered the market in January 2014 ended the year with a big lump of coal (or a lump of something else entirely) in their stockings. Bitcoin You may ask, why am I bringing this up? It’s not because I enjoy dwelling on the negatives. After all, my parents always encouraged me to seek out the positives in any setbacks or disappointments. Maybe that’s because I was raised in the upper Midwest, where the weather is consistently terrible. Nonetheless, the fact remains that we arrived at this milestone amidst a remarkably stagnant period. I didn’t start actively trading crypto because I expected it to be boring. Quite the contrary. After all, one of my favorite crypto quotes comes from Arthur Hayes, founder of BitMex, who recently argued that . Yet, as the charts below demonstrate, here we are. “for crypto, a decline in volume and volatility is deadlier than white wine and painkillers” In fact, Bitcoin’s annualized volatility is now below or on par with that of many of the largest US tech stocks, including Apple (AAPL) and Netflix (NFLX). Source: Kosmos Research, Coinbase, NASDAQ Not surprisingly, this has coincided with: (1) Bitcoin trading in an ever-narrower range over recent months. In fact, when I last checked the price an hour ago, the 24-hour change was precisely 0.0%. We try not to stare at the ticker all day, but that was a first for me. (2) Exchange-traded volumes are falling off a cliff. To take BTC as but one example, see below a table showing the lowest 10 daily volumes of 2018: Yes, you are reading the table correctly: four of the ten slowest days year-to-date occurred last week and nine of the ten came this month. To put this in perspective, over US$ 11 billion traded on January 1 of this year. Great — so the market is stuck in an almighty rut. How does that help us as investors? Hold that thought for a moment. First, let me tell you about a conversation that we had last week that brightened our mood considerably. Now, The Good News Amidst all the crypto doom and gloom (but definitely no boom, sorry Marc Faber) my partner recently caught up with one of his friends, a macro hedge fund manager based in London. The crypto market loves to obsess over when that “institutional wall of money” is going to arrive. Well, this guy is an integral part of that wall. So we’re always interested in hearing his thoughts on crypto, to the extent that he has any. After all, like most macro fund managers he doesn’t have much time for an asset class where the capitalization isn’t measured in trillions of dollars. As recently as the fall of 2017 he had admitted to knowing ‘next to nothing’ about crypto, and lacked the bandwidth or incentives to spend time learning more. But this time the conversation went differently. He told us that he has begun reading up on the space and had questions. And if he is working his way up the learning curve, we strongly suspect that he is not alone. Our friend is not the type to waste time or energy on a topic unless he has identified a compelling opportunity. To us, more than anything we have read on Crypto Twitter, this was a bullish market signal. Most importantly, we found it interesting that this conversation took place just as Bitcoin’s one-year trailing return was about to descend into negative territory. However it’s important to consider these two data points — one good, the other not so much — in the context of what has transpired in the past year. Let’s briefly recap what happened to the crypto market in 2017, and why. Past Is (Not) Prologue Like most greed-driven bubbles, Bitcoin’s historic 2017 move started slowly. BTC traded at less than $1,000 on January 1st, and was worth only a few dollars more at the end of March. But something happened in the second quarter — by the end of June BTC’s value had increased by over 250%. Three months later, it had doubled in value again. And December, of course, is when the frenzy went into full swing. Prices doubled in less than three weeks, and nearly touched $20,000 before finally collapsing. Now, some might argue that initial coin offerings (ICOs) are what sparked the market frenzy. To an extent, we agree with this position. After all, the ICO mania is what initially shone the spotlight on crypto and forced the mainstream investing public to take notice. Looking more closely though, we would argue that a more consequential trend emerged in the second half of 2017. Rumors of — and seeming steps toward — institutional market entry were what ultimately drove Bitcoin into its parabolic end-game. An Annotated (Recent) History of Bitcoin Source: Coinbase/Coinigy Simultaneously, announcements of Bitcoin futures contracts, paired with headlines regarding Wall Street interest and breathless predictions of imminent change, conspired to fuel a self-fulfilling narrative of ever-higher asset prices. CNBC, December 2017. Boo-yah! The hysteria peaked on December 18th, 2017. Bitcoin had just hit an all-time high of $19,783 on Coinbase the day before. Two weeks earlier the Chicago futures exchanges, CME and CBOE, had announced launch dates for their Bitcoin futures contracts. Predictably, the cryptoasset market went ballistic as new entrants flooded in ahead of the ‘wall of institutional capital’ that was widely rumored to be imminent and was going to propel Bitcoin to new heights. The price of Bitcoin doubled in the first two weeks of that month. CBOE futures debuted on December 10th and traded 19% higher on their first day. Trading was halted twice due to exchange ‘circuit breaker’ rules. The market continued to buy, waiting with bated breath for the CME launch a week later. The CME contract opened to much fanfare, and then…traded 2% lower. It was the embodiment of failed expectations. . And this was only the beginning of the pain. The institutional money never arrived in earnest and did not drive this bubble In short, 2017 was almost exclusively a retail-driven train, and the late-arriving punters got crushed in the derailment. The institutional capital has not yet joined the party. Where Is The Proverbial ‘Wall of Money’? Go to any crypto meetup or convention today and the same question will be asked. It will be repeated like a mantra — in the panels, during the keynote, and in the furtive conversations backstage: “When are the institutions coming in???” We’re like teenagers waiting by the phone, staring at it like Luke Skywalker stared at that X-Wing Fighter on Dagobah…just it to ring. willing Come on, Blackrock, show us some love! There are an abundance of different but credible theories to explain what might push Bitcoin below the well-defended price floor of 5,800 that has been maintained since late June. On the other hand, the smart people we talk to in the space as well as the “crypto media” are fairly unanimous in their view that the next bull run will be driven by widespread institutional adoption — the “wall of money” — that in most permutations of this vision arrives on the back of a long-awaited Bitcoin ETF. While we love being contrarians, on this point we wholeheartedly concur. For your average long-term retail HODLer, the initial reaction to this question is likely an eye-roll. Why? For a concrete example, take a guess at the dates when these headlines were published. The first article, from the Financial Times, was written on 12 August 2018. The WSJ story was published a little over a year ago. You see, we’ve been here before and we’re still waiting for the institutions to arrive. We all know what the reaction was to the Journal article — see chart above. And how did the market respond to the more recent FT piece? Source: Coinbase/Coinigy Ironically, the conviction that institutional capital is the rocket fuel needed to ignite another crypto moonshot is, if anything, stronger now than last year. So why did the possibility of institutional entry drive such mania in 2017, and why has it failed to move the needle this year? Really it all comes back to the specific inquiry we received from our friendly British hedge fund mogul: “who is buying Bitcoin here and now?” The Importance of Market Psychology Some of the smartest people I have ever met are working day and night to develop effective valuation approaches for cryptoassets. This is a monumental task, since crypto is unlike any other asset in human history. Market capitalization (sorry, CoinMarketCap) is generally useless. Certain equations that we learned in Economics 101, such as MV=PQ, are better but also have their limitations. So crypto doesn’t yet have a universally accepted valuation metric. But we do have quite a few proxies. One of them is the measurement of how many active users are in a blockchain’s ecosystem at a given point in time. We refer to this as Daily Active Addresses (DAAs), which records the number of Bitcoin (or other token) wallets that engaged in transactions on a given day. DAAs are easy to track on the Bitcoin . blockchain Source: Coinmetrics.io Take a hard look at this chart. Let it sink in. The number of active wallets is — literally — half of what it was just ten months ago. Now, if you’re reading this in late October 2018, you have most likely been in the crypto market for awhile. You probably enjoyed some — maybe even all — of the 2017 bull run and you’re still sitting on top of significant gains, even after this year’s drawdown. You’re in this for the long haul. But now, imagine you’re one of those poor souls who decided to join the Great Crypto Buying Frenzy of December 2017 — right at the top of that chart. Maybe you were smart and just invested a small percentage of your net worth. Or maybe you weren’t so smart, and you mortgaged your house to go ‘all-in’. If you decided to #HODL, like all of those other amateurs on Twitter, you’re staring at an unrealized loss of 61%. What do you suppose your feelings toward crypto are by now? Are you buying more? Averaging down your cost basis? Most likely not. You’re probably cursing the friend who told you to open a Coinbase account, and wondering how you will ever make that money back. And you’re definitely telling anyone who will listen to your rants that they should stay away, too. While we acknowledge this is an imperfect measure, let’s assume that each of those new December 2017 DAAs equates to one late entrant. If so, then over 600,000 people were burned in the latest crypto crash, and have left the market with their portfolio in a smoking ruin. For an asset class with a market cap below $250 billion, that is a LOT of people. And it’s going to take a lot of good news to bring them back — if ever. If anything, we believe this wallet count understates end users as many on-exchange transactions get netted before they are ever recorded on-blockchain. The damage was compounded by the fact that these people could have served as crypto ambassadors to the next tier of risk takers. That misery is now being further exacerbated in real time because, starting this week, people who bought 12 months ago — even before the last parabolic push higher — are now underwater too. In many ways this is an age-old story: an asset collapsed, people lost money and therefore are more cautious this time around. However the scale of the carnage, given the proportion of investors who have been burned, is nearly unprecedented. “ ” we were asked. The answer was immediate and obvious: . Who is buying Bitcoin here? No one The marginal retail buyer — the people who were trying to front-run “big institutional money” in Q4 2017 — do not exist. So who does that leave? The Wall of Money… yet again Are you as tired of this metaphor as we are yet? We’re not talking about Chicago high-frequency traders here, or ‘Mrs Watanabe’ in Japan. This refers to the real allocators. Pension funds. Sovereign wealth funds. Endowments. Powerhouses with asset pools that run to twelve digits, or more. These organizations are managed by inherently risk-averse people who know that investing into new and untested markets implies significant career risk. Portfolio managers rarely get fired for buying German Bunds or T-bills. Any fund managers who went long crypto in December 2017 are probably dusting off their CVs now. With no retail investors and no genuine prospect of them returning again before a big-time upside breakout that reinvigorates the FOMO on which crypto has historically thrived, it is these institutions who will have to carry the water to get things started. There is no crystal ball on my desk, and I won’t pretend to know when this will happen. The timing of this evolution depends on a host of factors that are both endogenous and exogenous to the crypto market. However, we do feel confident in saying that no other spark exists for the next crypto bull run. Are we there yet? Two conditions must be met before that spark can be lit: (1) Institutions must have the to participate in the crypto markets ability (2) Institutions must have the to participate in the crypto markets desire Here’s the irony: in 2017, the desire was certainly there. Having worked on Wall Street, I can confirm that bankers and traders were watching this market intensely, and in many cases they personally participated. But they had no ability to participate professionally because the key building blocks — qualified custodians, trusted trading counterparties, and (in some cases) leverage — were simply not there. (Remember, career risk is one of the most powerful forces in nature.) And now, less than a year later, the conditions have been reversed. Over the past ten months the crypto community has improved its infrastructure by leaps and bounds. From actual, live people answering customer queries ( to fully licensed custody solutions, this market is evolving more rapidly than ever. thanks, Coinbase! and what’s taking you so long, Binance?!?) And yet, even though institutions now have the ability to enter — desire has left the building as volatility, volumes and returns have all evaporated. It’s a sad day when Apple stock carries more vol than crypto… So where does that leave us? We’ve already established that the retail investor will not rescue the crypto market from its current plateau, and that institutional capital will eventually provide that needed boost. However, something needs to get them off the sidelines and into this asset class. And while it’s safe to say that a Bitcoin ETF certainly can help to increase market adoption, we don’t believe this is the that the crypto market really wants — or needs. deus ex machina According to the World Bank, institutional investors in developed economies currently manage over $100 trillion of assets. Think about what just fifty basis points of that capital would do to the crypto market. That capital won’t be allocated overnight — each institution needs to arrive at its own decision to do so. And in order to allocate, an institution must believe that cryptoassets have finally arrived as an asset class that is worthy of investment. But other things are happening out there, far beyond the reach of crypto exchanges. Dark clouds are forming over equity and fixed income markets, for the first time since Satoshi’s white paper was released to the world. What happens if Wall Street loses its appetite for equities or corporate debt? Where does that capital go? In the right circumstances, could Bitcoin even be considered a safe haven? I think it’s very possible, and in our next article we’ll take a close look at how that just might happen. ======================================== I work at Kosmos Capital Management , which actively trades the emergent class of digital assets. Follow me on Twitter @kvirgil ======================================== DISCLAIMER: Nothing in this column is intended as investment advice and you definitely should not interpret it as such. Don’t rely on my advice, or for that matter anyone else’s advice, when making investment decisions. Doing your own research is the key to success in any market. ========================================

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