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"The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks"

“The Chancellor is on the brink of a second bailout for banks.” — Satoshi Nakamoto, Genesis Block

Introduction: Two Eras, One Question

On October 31, 2008, as the global financial system teetered on the brink due to the aftershocks of the subprime crisis, a cryptographer named Satoshi Nakamoto sent a white paper to a niche cryptography mailing list. The title was very simple: "Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System."

Seventeen years later, on November 1, 2025, as we revisit this document, the date on the calendar is drastically different, but the state of the world is surprisingly similar.

The collapse of Lehman Brothers and the $2.7 trillion bank bailout plan have been replaced by $38 trillion in U.S. national debt and $1.2 trillion in annual interest payments. The prophecy inscribed by Satoshi Nakamoto in the Genesis Block, "The Chancellor is on the brink of a second bailout for banks," has not only not become outdated but has become even more glaring in 2025.

Seventeen years ago, Bitcoin was born out of skepticism towards the centralized financial system; seventeen years later, this skepticism has not only gone unresolved but has become more urgent.

The question is: In the seemingly "all under control" 2025, when Wall Street has embraced Bitcoin, the government is beginning to discuss strategic reserves, and prices have reached historic highs, why do we still need Bitcoin?

2008 VS 2025: A Comparison of Two Crises

2008: The Collapse of the Old World

In the early hours of September 15, 2008, Lehman Brothers, a 158-year-old investment bank, declared bankruptcy, becoming the largest bankruptcy in U.S. history, with total liabilities reaching $613 billion.

Let’s understand how that crisis happened with a simple story:

Imagine you are a restaurant server with an unstable income, earning only $30,000 a year. By traditional standards, you wouldn’t be able to get a loan to buy a house. But in the early 2000s, banks approached you, saying, "No problem! We can lend you $500,000 to buy a house; for the first two years, you only need to pay a small amount of interest, and house prices will rise, allowing you to flip it for profit!"

Bank employees care about their KPIs, upper management cares about whether they can sell the loans to financial institutions, and you care about owning a house. In this system, no one is wrong, as long as house prices keep rising, this game can go on forever.

This is the "subprime mortgage" — high-risk loans issued to individuals with poor credit and low repayment ability. From 2000 to 2007, such loans surged in the U.S., skyrocketing from about $130 billion to $600 billion.

After issuing these loans, banks did not hold them (due to high risk) but performed a "magic trick":

1. They bundled thousands of loans together
2. They sliced them into different grades of "bonds" (this is called MBS - Mortgage-Backed Securities)
3. They then packaged these bonds into more complex products (CDO - Collateralized Debt Obligations)
4. They sought ratings agencies to rate these products as "AAA" (the safest rating, equivalent to U.S. Treasury bonds)

It’s like mixing a bunch of bad apples with good ones, repackaging them, and labeling them as "premium fruit."

Lehman Brothers heavily invested in these "AAA-rated" securitized products, using borrowed money (leverage). By 2007, Lehman Brothers had a leverage ratio of 31:1 — meaning it had only $1 of its own capital but managed $31 of assets.

Until 2006, U.S. housing prices began to decline. Those who bought homes relying on subprime loans suddenly found themselves in trouble — housing prices fell, home values shrank; interest rates rose, repayment pressure multiplied; wanting to sell their homes, they found no buyers and ultimately had to default.

As the chain reaction spread, the default rate on subprime loans rapidly climbed: from about 13% in 2006 to over 25% by 2008.

This also meant that those securities once rated "AAA" were actually filled with risk, and the so-called premium assets turned into "toxic assets" in an instant. The hundreds of billions of dollars in such assets held by Lehman Brothers thus lost value overnight.

On September 15, 2008, Lehman Brothers declared bankruptcy, with $613 billion in liabilities and 25,000 employees losing their jobs.

After Lehman Brothers' bankruptcy, the entire financial system plunged into unprecedented panic. Banks no longer trusted each other (no one knew if the other held those "toxic assets"), and interbank lending nearly ceased. The credit market froze, businesses could not obtain loans; the stock market continued to plummet, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropping about 2,000 points in just one week, a decline of up to 14%; the unemployment rate also rose from 5% to over 10% by October 2009.

Faced with this systemic collapse, the U.S. government had to intervene. It first launched the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), deploying $700 billion to purchase toxic assets from banks; subsequently, the Federal Reserve initiated quantitative easing (QE), massively printing money to buy bonds, expanding its balance sheet from $800 billion in 2008 to $4.5 trillion in 2014.

However, who ultimately bears the cost of the bailout? Taxpayer money was used to save the banks, and the Federal Reserve's money printing led to currency devaluation, continuously eroding the purchasing power of ordinary people's savings. Ironically, the Wall Street banks that received bailouts in 2009 still distributed bonuses totaling $18.4 billion.

The Paradox Seen by Satoshi Nakamoto

This is the background behind Satoshi Nakamoto's inscription in the Genesis Block: "The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks."

The paradox he saw was:

• When banks make money, profits go to private individuals; when they lose, losses are borne by the public
• Central banks can print unlimited money, while savers cannot protect their purchasing power
• The entire system is built on "trust," but this trust has been systematically betrayed

The white paper was born in this context, with Satoshi proposing a solution: no longer needing trust, using a fixed supply to completely eliminate currency over-issuance, allowing decentralized consensus to replace the credit endorsement of a once-authoritative institution.

2025: A New World, Yet Familiar

Fast forward to 2025, on the surface, everything seems different. Cryptocurrency market values are at new highs, 60% of global stock markets are at new highs, Bitcoin has been included in ETFs, and traditional financial giants like BlackRock and Fidelity have become the largest holders.

Even the big A has warmed up.

But what about the underlying logic? Let’s understand the U.S. debt crisis in 2025 in the same straightforward way.

What is U.S. national debt? Why is there a crisis?

You can think of the U.S. government as a family with huge income and expenses. By 2025, this family's "annual income" (tax revenue) is about $5.2 trillion, while "annual expenses" reach $7 trillion, leaving a gap of $1.8 trillion, which is the fiscal deficit. To cover the deficit, the government can only borrow money, which means issuing national debt. National debt is like a "IOU" issued by the government, promising to repay the principal and pay interest in the future.

As of October 23, 2025, the total U.S. national debt has surpassed $38 trillion. What does this mean? If repaid at a rate of $1 per second, it would take a full 1.2 million years to pay off; averaged across every American (including infants), it amounts to about $114,000 per person. This figure has reached 123% of the U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP, approximately $31 trillion).

Even more concerning is the speed at which the debt is growing. In 2000, U.S. national debt was only $5.7 trillion, accounting for 55% of GDP; by the eve of the 2008 subprime crisis, it had risen to $10 trillion, accounting for 65% of GDP; in 2020, due to pandemic relief measures, it soared to $28 trillion, accounting for 98% of GDP; and by 2025, the debt level had reached $38 trillion, accounting for 123% of GDP.

In other words, in just the past five years, U.S. debt has increased by a full $10 trillion.

Borrowing money always comes at a cost. By 2025, the amount the U.S. government spends annually on interest payments for national debt has reached $1.2 trillion, surpassing the country's major expenditure items: the defense budget of about $842 billion, Medicare spending of about $830 billion, and the education budget of $101 billion.

In other words, the largest expenditure item for the U.S. government today is not defense, not healthcare, and not education, but — interest.

Even more concerning is that interest rates themselves are rising. In 2021, the average interest rate on U.S. national debt was 1.61%; by 2025, this figure had risen to 3.36%.

What does doubling the interest rate mean?

Assuming you owe $1 million:

• At a 1.61% interest rate, you pay $16,100 in interest each year;
• At a 3.36% interest rate, you pay $33,600 in interest each year;
• Interest payments have doubled, while the principal remains unchanged.

For the U.S. government, every time interest rates rise by 1 percentage point, it means an additional annual interest payment of about $380 billion. This is like a self-accelerating "debt snowball" — getting bigger and harder to stop.

The U.S. fiscal situation has fallen into a vicious cycle: government spending always exceeds income, forcing it to continuously borrow to cover the gap. The more debt there is, the heavier the interest burden; to pay the interest, government spending rises further, necessitating more borrowing — and so on, the cycle accelerates.

According to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projections, this trend will become increasingly severe: by 2025, debt will be equivalent to 100% of GDP, reaching 106% by 2027 (exceeding the historical peak during World War II), expected to rise to 118% by 2035, and potentially climb to 200% of GDP by 2047. In other words, the U.S. debt snowball is expanding at an exponential rate.

Some may ask: The U.S. is the world's largest economy and holds the issuance rights of the global reserve currency, the dollar; why can’t it keep borrowing indefinitely? On the surface, it seems limitless, but in reality, there are three fatal risks.

Risk One: Debt Ceiling Crisis

The U.S. Congress has a statutory debt ceiling. In July 2025, Congress just raised the ceiling to $41.1 trillion, but at the current borrowing rate, it is expected to hit the ceiling again in 2026. If Congress cannot reach a consensus on raising the ceiling, the U.S. government will be unable to issue new debt, potentially leading to a "technical default." The debt ceiling standoff in 2023 already led to a downgrade of the U.S. credit rating by Standard & Poor's (from AAA to AA+), causing severe turbulence in the financial markets and putting the government at risk of a shutdown.

Risk Two: Erosion of Dollar Credibility

The dollar's status as the global reserve currency is built on the world's trust in U.S. credit — the belief that the U.S. can repay its debts and that the dollar can retain its value. However, this trust is being eroded. BRICS+ countries are promoting de-dollarization, the proportion of oil trade settled in renminbi is rising, and more and more central banks are beginning to reduce their holdings of U.S. Treasuries while increasing their gold reserves. Data from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) shows that in 2000, the dollar accounted for as much as 71% of global foreign exchange reserves, but by 2025, it had dropped to 58%. If the dollar further loses its status as a reserve currency, the U.S. government will be unable to borrow at low interest rates, and the debt crisis will escalate more rapidly.

Risk Three: The Demon of Inflation

When the debt level becomes so large that it cannot be repaid, the government has three options: cut spending, raise taxes, or print money to repay the debt. The first two options are politically nearly impossible — no politician wants to cut benefits or raise taxes; therefore, the most realistic choice is often the third: debt monetization, which involves the Federal Reserve printing money to purchase government bonds, indirectly financing the government.

However, the cost of this approach is inflation. An increase in the money supply means a decrease in the purchasing power of each dollar. Based on 2008, the purchasing power of $1 will only be about $0.73 by 2025, with cumulative inflation exceeding 27%. If debt monetization continues to accelerate, inflationary pressures will worsen, and this time, the burden will fall on the savings and living costs of ordinary people.

Essentially the Same, Scale Upgraded

When we look at the two crises side by side, we find astonishing similarities:

During the 2008 subprime crisis, the total U.S. national debt was about $10 trillion, accounting for 65% of GDP; by 2025, U.S. debt has soared to $38 trillion, equivalent to 123% of GDP. The annual fiscal deficit back then was $450 billion (3.2% of GDP), which has now expanded to $1.8 trillion (6.2% of GDP). The Federal Reserve's balance sheet expanded from $800 billion to $4.5 trillion, and it currently stands at about $7 trillion. In 2008, the U.S. paid $250 billion in debt interest annually; by 2025, this figure has risen to $1.2 trillion, an increase of about 380%. Back then, the U.S. government launched TARP and QE1, with a total bailout scale of about $2.7 trillion; now it is unable to implement interventions of the same scale. The peak unemployment rate in 2009 was 10%, and while there has not yet been a significant wave of unemployment, warning signs are already present. In terms of credit ratings, the U.S. maintained an AAA rating in 2008, but it has now been downgraded to AA+ by S&P and Fitch.

The essence of both crises is completely consistent: both are systemic risks caused by excessive credit expansion, both require "printing money" to shift costs, and both are eroding the wealth storage capacity of ordinary people.

So why Bitcoin?

When the 2008 financial crisis broke out, Bitcoin was still just a concept. The Genesis Block was only created on January 3, 2009, with no exchanges, no price, no ecosystem, and only a handful of cryptographers discussing this experimental electronic cash system. Its total market value was zero, with no real influence.

By 2025, the situation is drastically different. Bitcoin has been operating steadily for 17 years without a single outage; there are hundreds of thousands of nodes globally, with a hash rate of 650 EH/s, providing unprecedented security. Its total market value is approximately $2.4 trillion, surpassing silver and becoming the seventh-largest asset globally.

At the institutional level, BlackRock's spot Bitcoin ETF has managed $89 billion in assets; at the sovereign level, countries like El Salvador and Bhutan have included Bitcoin in their national reserves; at the corporate level, MicroStrategy holds 640,808 Bitcoins, worth about $69 billion at current prices. From "zero price" to $126,200 per coin, Bitcoin has completed a long-term price validation across the entire market.

More importantly, Bitcoin has not only withstood the test of time but has also survived several "catastrophic" crises:

• In the 2018 bear market, the price plummeted 84%, yet the network remained robust;
• During the pandemic in 2020, it dropped 50% within 24 hours but quickly recovered;
• In the 2022 crypto winter, with the bankruptcy of FTX and the collapse of Luna, Bitcoin still maintained a price above $10,000;

This means that when the next systemic crisis arrives, people will have an alternative that has been validated through 17 years of real-world experience:

A decentralized system that has never defaulted, never inflated, and has never been shut down.

In 2008, Satoshi Nakamoto asked a question: "If we cannot trust banks, what can we trust?"

In 2025, this question escalates to: "If we cannot trust sovereign credit, what can we trust?"

The answer in 2008 was an experiment, an idea, a nine-page white paper.

The answer in 2025 is a validated system, a $2.4 trillion asset class, a network that has been running for 17 years.

Reconstructing the Identity of Holders: From Utopia to Wall Street

Satoshi Nakamoto envisioned Bitcoin in the white paper as a pure peer-to-peer electronic cash system. No intermediaries, no censorship, no inflation — this is a declaration of technological utopia against the financial leviathan.

The early Bitcoin community consisted of a group of cypherpunks, hackers, and libertarians. They discussed code on forums, used Bitcoin to buy pizza (on May 22, 2010, Laszlo Hanyecz bought two pizzas for 10,000 BTC, worth over $1.2 billion at today's prices), and validated censorship-resistant payments on the "Silk Road."

But history never unfolds according to the script of idealists. The evolutionary path of Bitcoin has been filled with compromises, controversies, and unexpected twists.

2017: Chicago Mercantile Exchange Launches BTC Futures: Wall Street officially recognized Bitcoin as a financial asset for the first time. Although this sparked controversy over "betraying the spirit of decentralization," it also marked Bitcoin's transition from the margins to the mainstream.

2021: Tesla and MicroStrategy's Gamble: Michael Saylor fully Bitcoinized MicroStrategy's balance sheet, pioneering the "corporate treasury strategy." In February 2021, Tesla purchased $1.5 billion in Bitcoin. The participation of these traditional companies transformed Bitcoin from a "speculative asset" into an "asset allocation option."

September 2021: El Salvador's National Experiment: Under President Nayib Bukele, El Salvador became the first country in the world to adopt Bitcoin as legal tender. Despite strong opposition from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and a controversial implementation process, this was the first recognition of Bitcoin at the sovereign level. As of September 2025, El Salvador holds 6,313 BTC, worth over $700 million, with unrealized gains exceeding $400 million.

January 2024: Milestone for ETFs: The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) approved 11 spot Bitcoin ETFs, including those from BlackRock, Fidelity, and Ark Invest. This is one of the most significant turning points in Bitcoin's history.

So who is buying?

Today, Bitcoin is no longer just a game for retail investors and geeks; it has been officially incorporated into the asset allocation landscape by mainstream institutions. An increasing amount of institutional capital is entering the Bitcoin market through compliant channels like ETFs.

The State of Wisconsin Investment Board (SWIB), which manages approximately $156 billion in assets, purchased $164 million in Bitcoin ETFs in the second quarter of 2024, holding about 99,000 shares of IBIT and 71,000 shares of FBTC, becoming one of the first publicly disclosed state pension funds in the U.S. with Bitcoin exposure.

Harvard University Endowment Fund (Harvard Management Company) also made allocations in the second quarter of 2024, investing approximately $116 million in Bitcoin ETFs, holding about 1.9 million shares of IBIT. This marks the formal inclusion of Bitcoin in the long-term asset pool of one of the most influential educational endowments globally.

Morgan Stanley's 15 million clients are purchasing Bitcoin ETFs through wealth management accounts, with a minimum investment threshold of $100,000 account size. This means traditional financial clients are accessing Bitcoin assets in a compliant manner.

Broader data shows that over 937 institutions have disclosed Bitcoin ETF holdings in the SEC's 13F quarterly reports, covering a range of long-term capital, including pension funds, endowment funds, hedge funds, and family offices.

Philosophical Reflection: Compromise or Maturity?

This evolution has sparked intense debate.

Critics say: Wall Street's embrace is a form of "co-optation." When BlackRock holds a large amount of Bitcoin and ETFs become the primary entry point, Bitcoin loses its decentralized soul and becomes just another asset controlled by financial elites and "old money."

Supporters argue: Broader adoption is an inevitable evolution. The core values of Bitcoin — fixed supply, decentralization, and censorship resistance — remain unchanged. Even if Wall Street buys Bitcoin, they cannot change the protocol rules or print new Bitcoins.

In fact, the compromise in form has achieved an uncompromising core.

Bitcoin has not changed itself to cater to Wall Street; rather, Wall Street has had to accept the rules of Bitcoin. When BlackRock wants to hold Bitcoin, they must learn to manage private keys, accept the decentralized network, and acknowledge the supply cap of 21,000,000 coins.

For the first time, traditional finance has yielded to Bitcoin.

When Satoshi designed Bitcoin, the goal was not to make it a tool for a small circle but to create a currency system that everyone can use, everyone can verify, and no one can control. From this perspective, Wall Street's institutional adoption is a necessary path.

Bitcoin is an asset that will always benefit from the increase of entropy in the real world.

"Entropy Increase": The Key to Understanding Chaos

In the second law of thermodynamics, entropy is a measure of the disorder of a system. The entropy of a closed system always tends to increase — this is "entropy increase." Coffee cools down, rooms become messy, and order always evolves into disorder.

But this physical concept is precisely the best metaphor for understanding the value of Bitcoin.

In economic and social systems, "entropy increase" is not an abstract metaphor; it occurs in every complex system we inhabit.

Imagine a company that has just been established, small in scale, with clear goals and simple processes; everyone knows what they should do, information flows efficiently, and decision-making is clear, resulting in low "entropy" in the system.

However, as the company continues to expand, hierarchies increase, personnel turnover occurs, inter-departmental conflicts arise, information delays, and institutional rigidity gradually appear. The initially clear order begins to be replaced by noise: more and more meetings, longer documents, increasingly blurred responsibilities, and managers spend more time "coordinating" rather than "acting." At some point, the company seems to lose its original sense of direction.

This is a typical case of "organizational entropy increase."

The same applies to economic systems. The more currency is issued, the more complex the debt becomes, and the more entangled the relationship between politics and finance, the harder it is for the system to maintain its original order. Every crisis is a natural manifestation of entropy increase.

Bitcoin, on the other hand, is a mechanism of anti-entropy.

The "Negative Entropy" Attributes of Bitcoin

1. Supply Rigidity: The Iron Law of 21,000,000 Coins

In fiat currency systems, the supply of money is elastic and arbitrary. Central banks can freely adjust liquidity based on economic conditions, and this "adjustment" often means printing more money. For example, in 2008, the Federal Reserve's balance sheet was about $800 billion, and the M2 money supply was $7.5 trillion; by 2020, these figures had expanded to $4.5 trillion and $15.5 trillion, respectively; and by 2025, the Federal Reserve's balance sheet had reached $7 trillion, with the M2 money supply soaring to $21 trillion. In just 17 years, the money supply of the dollar grew by 180%, diluting the purchasing power of ordinary people's savings by nearly two-thirds.

This trend is not unique to the United States. The Bank of Japan's balance sheet is equivalent to 130% of GDP, the highest in the world; the European Central Bank launched a bond-buying program totaling €1.85 trillion during the pandemic; and China's M2 grew from ¥47 trillion in 2008 to ¥280 trillion in 2025, nearly a sixfold increase.

We can understand it this way: suppose there are originally 100 apples in the world, and you own 10 of them, accounting for 10% of the total. But if the central bank suddenly "prints" 900 new apples, the total becomes 1,000, and your 10 remain unchanged, now accounting for only 1%. Your absolute wealth hasn't decreased, but your relative wealth has been diluted by 90%.

Bitcoin's supply mechanism is completely the opposite. Its issuance rules are written into the code, with a total supply fixed at 21 million coins, halving automatically every four years, and no one can change it.

As of November 2025, the Bitcoin supply curve is nearing its end. Approximately 19,580,000 Bitcoins have been mined, accounting for 93.2% of the total, with about 1,420,000 coins (6.8%) to be gradually released over 115 years through the halving cycles.

This means Bitcoin is entering an unprecedented "scarcity era." First, its inflation rate continues to decline, with the annual inflation rate around 1.7% in 2024, and it will drop to about 0.85% after the next halving (in 2028), far below the Federal Reserve's long-term inflation target of 2%.

Second, Bitcoin also faces a natural deflationary effect. It is estimated that about 1 million Bitcoins are permanently lost each year due to lost private keys, the death of holders, or operational errors. This means the actual circulating supply is continuously decreasing.

2. Decentralization: No Single Point of Failure

When a system is overly centralized, it becomes susceptible to corruption, manipulation, and abuse. Concentrating power in the hands of a few means that risks and decision-making are also concentrated; once an error occurs, the cost will be borne by the entire system.

In the traditional financial system, this centralization is particularly evident.

The power to issue currency is held by a very small number of people — the Federal Reserve Board has only seven members, yet they can determine the direction of trillions of dollars in monetary policy. Payment systems are controlled by a few giants like SWIFT, Visa, and Mastercard, who have the authority to freeze any individual's or institution's transactions. Bank accounts do not truly belong to individuals; an administrative order can freeze assets — the 2022 Canadian truckers' protest is a typical example.

In stark contrast is the decentralized reality of the Bitcoin network. As of 2025, there are approximately 180,000 full nodes operating globally, distributed across the world: 35% in North America, 40% in Europe, 20% in Asia, and the remaining 5% spread worldwide. Anyone can run a node — all it takes is a regular computer and a 2TB hard drive, costing about $500. The existence of nodes means that rules are verified collectively by all participants, rather than dictated by a central authority.

At the computational level, the security of the Bitcoin network is maintained by globally distributed miners. The total network hash rate is about 650 EH/s, with the top five mining pools accounting for about 55%, but no single entity controls more than 25%. The geographical distribution is also broad: the U.S. accounts for 38%, Canada 7%, Russia 5%, Kazakhstan 4%, with the rest scattered across Latin America, Europe, and Southeast Asia. This distribution ensures that no country, institution, or company can unilaterally control or shut down the network.

3. Transparency

Additionally, Bitcoin's transparency eliminates the information black box found in traditional financial systems. In the fiat world, the public is often excluded from key data — the flow of funds in the 2008 bailout was unclear, the details of the Federal Reserve's QE asset purchases were opaque, and parts of currency swaps with foreign central banks were kept secret. Even in the 2023 Silicon Valley Bank collapse, customers were completely unaware that the bank's balance sheet hid a large number of long-term bonds with significant losses.

In the Bitcoin system, this asymmetry is almost nonexistent. Every transaction, every block, and every transfer is publicly recorded on the blockchain, and anyone can independently verify it.

Historical Validation: The Positive Correlation Between Entropy Increase and BTC Price

Let's look at the data.

March 2020: Outbreak of COVID-19

Global central banks initiated unprecedented quantitative easing, with the Federal Reserve's balance sheet swelling from $4.2 trillion to $7.4 trillion within a year. Bitcoin's response? It skyrocketed from $3,800 (the low in March 2020) to $69,000 (in November 2021) — an increase of over 1,700%.

2022: Russia-Ukraine Conflict and Financial Sanctions

Western countries froze approximately $300 billion of Russia's foreign exchange reserves. This unprecedented financial weaponization prompted many countries worldwide to rethink the safety of reserve assets.

2024-2025: ETF Approvals and U.S. Debt Crisis

As U.S. debt surpassed $35 trillion, interest payments exceeded defense spending, and the CBO predicted that debt would reach 135% of GDP by 2035, Bitcoin broke through to a historic high of $126,200.

Future Projections: Accelerating Entropy Increase

Looking ahead, three trends will further accelerate the entropy increase in the real world:

1. The Impact of Artificial Intelligence

The rise of artificial intelligence is profoundly reshaping the global labor market. As AI gradually replaces a large number of repetitive jobs, structural unemployment may become a long-term phenomenon. At that point, governments may have to implement "Universal Basic Income" (UBI) to maintain social stability. The funding source for UBI is almost certain — printing money. New currency issuance means new inflationary pressures, leading to another round of "monetary entropy increase."

At the same time, the explosive growth of AI-generated content is making "truth" increasingly ambiguous. Images, sounds, and texts can all be algorithmically fabricated, and the reliability of information is rapidly declining — this is a manifestation of "information entropy increase." In such a world where distinguishing truth from falsehood is challenging, a tamper-proof, verifiable ledger system will be particularly important.

2. Resource Competition

Frequent extreme weather, energy and food shortages, and supply chain conflicts are exacerbating global inequalities in resource distribution. The failure of international cooperation mechanisms is leading to a fragmented world order — this is another manifestation of "order entropy increase."

As trust systems between countries continue to break down, a neutral, decentralized settlement layer becomes essential. Bitcoin has no borders and no political stance; in a fragmented world, it can serve as the minimal consensus for maintaining global value exchange.

3. Intergenerational Wealth Gap

Generation Z and Millennials are a generation that grew up under the shadow of the financial crisis. They witnessed the bursting of the housing bubble that affected their parents, the heavy burden of student loans, and the gradual collapse of pension systems. For them, distrust of the traditional financial system is not an emotional rebellion but a reality-based, structural understanding.

According to a VanEck 2025 survey, young consumers in emerging markets are more inclined to choose Bitcoin over gold as a means of storing value. They grew up in the digital age, believing in algorithms over institutions, and trusting code more than authority.

As long as the "chaos index" of the real world continues to rise — excessive currency issuance, uncontrolled debt, geopolitical fragmentation, and information pollution — the value of Bitcoin as an "anchor of order" will continue to strengthen.

"Satoshis" Seventeen Years Later

Satoshi Nakamoto disappeared in 2011, leaving behind code and a question: "Can this experiment continue?"

Seventeen years have passed, and the answer is affirmative. But this answer is not provided by Satoshi alone; it is co-written by countless "Satoshis" — those who continue his spirit, redefine its meaning, and expand its boundaries.

Guardians at the Technical Level: Code as Constitution

The Core developer community (such as Wladimir van der Laan and Pieter Wuille) are the "anonymous guardians" of Bitcoin. During the SegWit2x battle in 2017, large mining pools and exchanges united to push for block expansion, attempting to change Bitcoin's fundamental rules. Core developers refused to compromise, insisting that "the value of Bitcoin lies in the immutability of its rules." Ultimately, the community sided with them, proving a principle: code is constitution; no one can unilaterally modify it.

Lightning Network developers (such as Elizabeth Stark) built a Layer 2 payment network on top of Bitcoin, enabling small, high-frequency payments. El Salvador is utilizing the Lightning Network to facilitate everyday payment scenarios — making the original vision of "peer-to-peer electronic cash" possible again without compromising the security of the base layer.

Pioneers at the Application Level: From Ideals to Reality

Nayib Bukele, the President of El Salvador, is the boldest national-level experimenter. On September 7, 2021, El Salvador became the first country in the world to adopt Bitcoin as legal tender. Bukele launched the Chivo wallet (based on the Lightning Network), offering a $30 Bitcoin reward to every citizen, installing 200 Bitcoin ATMs, and starting a strategy of "buying 1 Bitcoin daily" from November 2022. He also did something unprecedented: in March 2024, he publicly disclosed the national Bitcoin wallet address, allowing the world to view El Salvador's holdings in real-time.

As of September 2025, El Salvador holds 6,313 Bitcoins, having invested about $300 million, with unrealized gains exceeding $400 million (a return of 133%). The actual effects are significant: tourism increased by 55% ("Bitcoin pilgrimage"), remittance costs dropped from 10% to 1% (saving a total of $2.4 billion), and 3 million people use the Chivo wallet (47% of the population). Despite strong opposition from the IMF, which demanded the removal of Bitcoin's legal tender status as a condition for a $1.3 billion loan, Bukele ultimately agreed to make Bitcoin acceptance by merchants "voluntary," while retaining its legal tender status and continuing to purchase.

Bukele's vision is clear: "When the dollar eventually loses its status as the reserve currency, the countries that are prepared in advance will be the winners. El Salvador will be one of them." Regardless of whether this experiment ultimately succeeds, this small country of 6.4 million people is writing the boldest national-level experiment in Bitcoin history, the results of which will influence other countries' attitudes toward Bitcoin in the future.

Michael Saylor, Executive Chairman of Strategy, has taken "corporate Bitcoinization" to the extreme. In August 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic led to the devaluation of corporate cash, Saylor made a radical decision: to fully Bitcoinize MicroStrategy's balance sheet. He financed the continuous purchase of Bitcoin through issuing convertible bonds and stock, creating the "Bitcoin barbell strategy": using debt and equity financing to buy Bitcoin, leveraging Bitcoin appreciation to repay debt, achieving a positive feedback loop.

As of October 30, 2025, Strategy holds 640,808 Bitcoins (about 3% of the total supply), with a total cost of approximately $42.4 billion and a current value of about $69 billion, resulting in unrealized gains of $26.6 billion. The company's stock price has risen 3,300% over the past five years, far exceeding Bitcoin's own increase of 1,100%. Saylor's strategy is now being emulated by dozens of publicly traded companies (such as Metaplanet, Marathon Holdings, etc.), forming a new category of "Bitcoin financial companies."

Saylor's philosophy is simple: "Bitcoin is the highest form of property in human history. We will not sell Bitcoin, ever. The one who acquires the most Bitcoin wins." He transformed a traditional software company valued at $1 billion into a Bitcoin development company valued at over $121 billion through Bitcoin strategy. This is one of the boldest balance sheet restructurings in corporate financial history.

Evangelists of Thought: Connecting Two Worlds

Lyn Alden, a macroeconomic analyst, explains Bitcoin's monetary attributes using the language of traditional finance. Her research reports are widely read by Wall Street fund managers and pension fund managers. The core argument is that Bitcoin is not a "digital tulip," but an "upgrade of monetary technology" — the path of monetary evolution is from "hard to counterfeit" to "easy to carry," and Bitcoin satisfies both conditions (more difficult to counterfeit than gold, easier to carry than paper money). She serves as a bridge connecting traditional finance and the crypto world.

Nic Carter, a partner at Castle Island Ventures, reinterprets the energy issues surrounding Bitcoin mining. In response to criticisms that "Bitcoin consumes too much energy," he proposed a new framework: energy consumption itself is not the problem; the issue is whether the energy is wasted. He pointed out that 52% of Bitcoin mining uses renewable energy, and many miners utilize "stranded electricity" (excess power from hydropower plants), with mining also serving as a "grid stabilizer." This work has changed ESG investors' perceptions of Bitcoin, allowing more institutional funds to be allocated compliantly.

Builders of Infrastructure: Lowering Barriers

Brian Armstrong, CEO of Coinbase, established a compliant exchange that allows ordinary people to safely access Bitcoin. Coinbase is the custodian for 7 out of 11 Bitcoin ETFs, demonstrating a reality: the vast majority of people need a regulated, user-friendly entry point.

Jack Dorsey, founder of Block (formerly Square), integrated Bitcoin payments into mainstream applications through Cash App. In 2018, Cash App became the first mainstream payment application to support Bitcoin buying and selling, and by 2024, over 13 million Americans had purchased Bitcoin through Cash App — this is the most concrete manifestation of Bitcoin's "mass adoption." Dorsey also funded the Bitcoin Development Kit open-source toolkit, helping developers easily build Bitcoin applications.

Satoshi Nakamoto designed the engine, and these individuals built the roads. The success of Bitcoin is not just the success of Satoshi alone, but a collective achievement of countless individuals willing to inherit his spirit.

What is the Contemporary Spirit of Bitcoin?

When AI can forge any voice or face, we need a tamper-proof ledger;

When regulators say "innovation must occur within the boundaries we define," we need a permissionless space for innovation;

When everyone is celebrating that "crypto has finally been accepted by the mainstream," we need someone to remember that Bitcoin was never meant to be accepted, but to exist even when it is not accepted.

In an increasingly centralized world, retaining a decentralized option — this is the contemporary significance of the Bitcoin spirit.

Conclusion

Let me return to the question at the beginning of the article: 17 years later, why do we still need Bitcoin?

Bitcoin itself has provided four answers:

1. Historical Aspect: The problems of 2008 have not been solved; in fact, they have become more severe by 2025.
2. Functional Aspect: Bitcoin has evolved from a payment tool to a store of value.
3. Philosophical Aspect: Bitcoin is a negative entropy mechanism against entropy increase.
4. Spiritual Aspect: In the triple siege of AI, regulation, and institutionalization, the spirit of Bitcoin is the courage to continue questioning and creating.

But the most genuine answer may be simpler:

17 years later, we still need Bitcoin —

not because it is perfect,

but because the world is not good enough.

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