How to Buy, Store and Live on Bitcoin in Canada with BTC Sessions

[00:00:01] This is The Canadian Investor, where you take control of your own portfolio and gain the confidence you need to succeed in the markets. Hosted by Braden Dennis and Simon Belanger Welcome back to The Canadian Investor Podcast. I have a special episode today. I am here with the one and only BTC Sessions, also known as Ben. But Ben, welcome to the podcast. We should have done this a long time ago. You're a fellow Canadian.

[00:00:29] And well recognized and anchored in the Bitcoin space. So I'm happy to have you on. Welcome to The Canadian Investor Podcast. Thanks for having me. I'm very excited to be there. And I love what you guys do over here. So yeah, I'm glad to finally be able to grace the airwaves here. Yeah, exactly. And I think it's great. Like I've been into Bitcoin for a long time. So people have been listening to podcasts. I started back in 2013.

[00:00:59] Got the classic rug pull from an exchange, not being super great. Cripsy, if you're familiar with that one. I remember.

[00:01:08] Yeah, yeah. So and then I got back into it in 2018. After the 2017 bull market, I figured I just start a dollar cost averaging after a buddy of mine kept bugging me about it. So I started and then I feel like a lot of people you kind of see number go up, you get more and more interest into it. So that's how I got into it. But for you, like, what was your journey?

[00:01:30] How did you get into that? I mean, you've grown with a massive following of a really good YouTube channel where you do some live episodes, but also some tidbits for people to learn. So I think it would be great for people just to understand how you got started with Bitcoin. Yeah. So I prior to being in Bitcoin, I actually used to teach little kids how to breakdance for like a decade. My wife will probably want you to teach me some dancing. There we go. Next time we get together, it's head spins all the way.

[00:02:01] Yeah. So no, I was doing that and, you know, the paycheck wasn't that great. So I had a bit of a side hustle and I was, I was funny enough, I learned how to teleport MacBooks and like upgrade hard drives and RAM and stuff like that. And I was reselling them all just on the side. But through that, I was looking at tech blogs and things like that. And so naturally, Bitcoin came across my purview a few times, just like everybody, you know, the number go up was enticing.

[00:02:31] But I saw it multiple times and every time I thought, oh, geez, as it added another zero, I missed the boat. I missed the boat. And you can only do that so many times before you come to the conclusion that this is either a giant Ponzi scheme or there's something else going on. And so I dove in, started learning and, you know, kind of came to understand the general proposition of what Bitcoin is and what it's trying to achieve and just kind of stuck with it.

[00:02:58] I started trying to learn as much as I could myself. But in and around 2014, there were no good learning resources. I'm a very visual learner. So I spent the better part of two years tearing my hair out, trying to figure out how to actually use Bitcoin in a self-sovereign manner, hold it myself. And so on the other side of that, I realized, hey, I mean, maybe some people would appreciate some actual video resources on this.

[00:03:24] So I started making weekly Bitcoin tutorials on various tools and ways to use it and obtain it and secure it and all of these things. And I just haven't stopped. So it's been nine years of the BTC Sessions channel. And, yeah, we've educated. I think we've had north of 13 million views on on the tutorials and the education.

[00:03:50] Yeah, congratulations. That's a lot. Yeah. Thanks, man. Yeah. I mean, who would have guessed? It seemed pretty niche at the time, but here we are. And yeah, so that's kind of my journey. I went from dance teacher to educator in and around teaching adults how to use technology, which actually is not that much of a leap, believe it or not. Yeah. And I saw one of your videos. You said you hosting like a art gallery one.

[00:04:17] You kind of started where you gave people who attended like $10 worth of Bitcoin and then they could use it to donate to whichever artist they like the most or kind of split it up, right? That was kind of it was pre YouTube days for me. And it was my first foray. So, again, coming from the performing arts realm, I was trying to figure out a way to somehow plug my way into this community.

[00:04:43] And given that I wasn't super technical, I thought maybe, you know, I was a performer. So it was actually a performing show that we had. We had a whole bunch of local acoustic artists and I was in an acapella group. And we so we had everybody kind of come together and do an evening of entertainment. But in between, we did a little bit of Bitcoin education and we gave anybody who bought a ticket to the event, 10 bucks worth of Bitcoin.

[00:05:10] And then we had QR codes on the wall overlaid with each artist's image and people could use the Bitcoin they got to tip the performers over the course of the night. That's great. And the 10 bucks is probably worth a thousand dollars now, but it's it's definitely not worth 10 bucks anymore. It's definitely if anybody held on to those tips, then they're pretty happy about it.

[00:05:34] OK, no, that's a great introduction. I think it's great because I'm the least artistic person that you can find. Like, I know my strengths and one of them, but I think that's great. And for those not watching, Ben also has a great set of hair, which I'm very jealous because I would be I would trade a lot to have a bit more hair. But having said that, you're in Calgary. I'm in Ottawa. So I'm kind of slightly different time zones and obviously different parts of the country.

[00:06:00] We have Canadians listening. Our audience is like 95 percent Canadians across Canada. And, you know, I get a lot of people that reach out to me. They're very interested. They want to learn more about Bitcoin. There are some people that still it's the same thing. Right. Bitcoin is used by criminals. It's for money laundering, uses too much energy. It's not good for the environment. What can you buy with Bitcoin?

[00:06:25] That's kind of those are kind of the things that I get as the most often or people point out. So can you go over some of the reasons you think Canadians should own some actual Bitcoin and not other cryptocurrencies as well? Because obviously, you know, there's so many out there aside from Bitcoin. Yeah. Yeah. So there's there's a lot to unpack there, but I'll kind of I'll break it up into a couple of sections here.

[00:06:52] So, of course, there's going to be people that watch and listen to this that have those common misconceptions about Bitcoin and around. Hey, it's it's it's just for criminals and it's going to boil the oceans and you can't buy anything with it. And so just kind of dispelling some of that. And again, if people are listening, thinking those things, I don't fault anybody at all for thinking those things,

[00:07:17] because that's pretty much what you've heard in the news verbatim for 10, 15 years now. It's gradually getting better. But, you know, it's just like any new technology. There's going to be a lot of misconceptions around it.

[00:07:30] So, I mean, in terms of it's only used by criminals, the former CIA director actually came out and said that less than 0.5 percent of all Bitcoin and broader cryptocurrency transactions are explicitly linked to illicit activity. And when you compare that to traditional financial means, it's anywhere from two to five percent of global GDP is illicit activity.

[00:07:59] And I've seen those stats. That's actually from the UN for people like who are wondering where you're getting that data. It's actually from the UN. So it's it's massive. And, you know, can always if you want some tip on money laundering, you can always go to TD. I'm sure that exactly, exactly. Yeah, there's there's plenty of banks that can help you out in that department. Yeah. In terms of environmental worries, does Bitcoin use energy?

[00:08:25] Absolutely. As a mechanism to secure the network and make sure that transactions are censorship resistant and irreversible and all the important things that we want out of Bitcoin. However, it's important to ask, where is that energy coming from? What are the sources? And it's expensive to the energy that's required to run Bitcoin. And so what ends up happening is who people are known as Bitcoin miners.

[00:08:53] These are the people responsible for kind of securing the network and giving it that censorship resistant and irreversible nature to transactions. What they'll often do is they'll seek out very cheap power. And most of the time that power is wasted.

[00:09:11] So in general, if you look at a city, if you want to power a city, you have to have 100 percent capacity at all times, regardless of what's actually being consumed so that you don't risk blackouts and brownouts. And when there's not 100 percent usage, then the excess, it's not stored. We don't have battery capacity to do that. It'd be so expensive to do it. So it's just wasted.

[00:09:37] And so what miners often do is they come in and they plug into an existing grid and they say, hey, when you're not using 100 percent, we'll pay for the excess that you were literally just getting rid of. And we can help actually subsidize the grid. And so for those that are listening that are big into renewables and things like that, that can actually subsidize the creation of the infrastructure before the grid lines are created. So it may be interesting to people in that way.

[00:10:05] And then in terms of the can't buy anything with Bitcoin, I'm living proof that that is completely untrue. I have been living more or less exclusively on Bitcoin since mid 2020. And I do that through a variety of mechanisms here in Canada. We're lucky enough to have some resources where you're able to actually pay your bills with Bitcoin. So I can pay like my Telus bill or my NMAX or whatever I need to pay.

[00:10:30] I also use resources where I can buy gift cards so I can go and get gas and groceries or shop online or whatever. But then I think the most interesting thing in that realm is I actually helped spearhead a local circular economy here in Calgary where a group of us get together semi-regularly and have each other kind of all our phone numbers and everything.

[00:10:54] But we basically got together with farmers and tradesmen and local artists and all these different people that create goods and services. And we all kind of already recognize Bitcoin as interesting and better money. And so we now kind of linked up and created this circular thing where I now I have a dentist that accepts Bitcoin. I have a plumber because my kids like to shove things in the toilet so I can pay him. Kids will do that. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:11:22] And I mean, farmers, I got I've got a guy that drives up from Lethbridge that I get beef regularly and stock my freezer, chicken, eggs, all this stuff. So, I mean, you can absolutely buy things on Bitcoin. It's just if you walk into your average corner store, no, you're not going to be able to spend Bitcoin there, but you can do it. And this currency has only been around for 15 years and it's bootstrapped from the ground up in a grassroots manner. So it's pretty astounding how far it's come already.

[00:11:52] Yeah. No, I think this is great. I mean, I'm going to have to learn a little bit from you because for me, it's been mostly used just as a store or value. I just don't want to. I've acquired a decent amount of Bitcoin. I just don't want to sell it. And I just kind of keep it in self-custody. Right. And I just don't really touch it. So that's kind of the way I've been approaching it. So I think that's great because that's usually a question I have. And I know there are ways to do it, but you clearly have way more experience than I would on that. It took some time. It took some time.

[00:12:22] I didn't answer the other part of your question, but why should Canadians be interested in Bitcoin in the first place? The main part of the question, yeah. Yeah, yeah. And so this is a question where, you know, when you're specific to Canadians, it's going to be a very different answer than for somebody on the other side of the planet in a different country. Why somebody might be interested in Bitcoin can really vary.

[00:12:46] And so in Canada in general, most people are going to approach this as an investment. A lot of people will be thinking of it in that manner. That doesn't quite reflect how I view it, but that's how a lot of people will approach it. And so from that perspective, you know, why does anybody invest in anything? Well, to preserve your purchasing power and to build wealth towards, you know, your retirement so that you can live comfortably.

[00:13:15] And, you know, there's there's you're basically trying to escape the devaluation of your dollars. If if your dollars just held their value in perpetuity, a lot of people would just save their be good at something and then save their money. And so one of the things Bitcoin is trying to address is the fact that that this podcast has to exist in the first place. Right.

[00:13:39] Like the whole idea that people have to not only master a skill in a job that they do for 40 hours a week, but they also have to become a full time professional investor or pay somebody else to do that for them in order to just hope that one day they can make it to retirement and be comfortable.

[00:14:01] And so Bitcoin, one of the goals of it is to address that in that we can get back to I'm going to be good at something. I'm going to create value for others and I'm going to save in a money that nobody else can print. And so to me, that's incredibly compelling that I could just have a skill set and save the money that I earn and just be OK.

[00:14:24] And so when you have a money that is in fixed supply, that especially at this point in time, that is in its is in such early stages that we basically just had to spend 10 minutes dispelling common misconceptions about it. So it's just in its very infantile stages of adoption.

[00:14:46] And with that limited supply and with population as it is, as it you know, as the population of the world grows, hopefully, and as we become more efficient. We're doing our part, man. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We got to get more kids out there. So have your families, everybody. But, you know, it's it's it's a way of escaping that rat race in a way.

[00:15:14] It's people don't realize how insidious inflation truly is because effectively at the touch of a digital button, you're undoing the blood, sweat and tears of an entire population and reallocating those resources. Just because money is created doesn't mean value is created.

[00:15:34] It means it's extracted from those that are actually doing the work and you're able to, you know, if your bank account showed a percentage and that percentage was the percentage of total Canadian dollars in circulation, everybody would be forever angry. Because even even in the midst of us getting stimmy checks on the regular, it appeared that those on the receiving end of those were were getting more rich. But just nominally, just the number in the account was going up.

[00:16:03] But if you thought the percentage of Canadian dollars that you held, even with those regular couple thousand dollar checks, your your number would be going down and people would have been in an outrage because the numbers of a certain subset of society was going up. So those are the most assets, right? Yeah, those are the most assets and the most connected ended up benefiting the most.

[00:16:27] And I think for me, I think it's a hybrid for me where it's yes, it's an investment on one hand, but I love the properties that it can't be controlled or very unlikely. I guess in theory it could be controlled, but very, very unlikely that it could be controlled by anyone. And there are set playing rules. And I think that's one of the big things for me is, as I think I like to think people have good intentions in general. However, you know, sometimes their actions lead to some bad consequences.

[00:16:55] And I know people are critical of central banks and I've been critical myself, but I'd like to think that they are trying their best. Like they're not trying to necessarily screw people over, although their policies end up having that result. And yeah, and at the end of the day, you never really know what they're going to do, right? And how that's going to impact your purchasing power. And that's what I love about Bitcoin is you have that certainty behind the protocol and these specific rules.

[00:17:25] Imagine in the future, people looking back and we've got, you know, in Bitcoin, we've got a monetary system where everything is completely transparent, where it's, hey, here's the issue and schedule. And I can say in near certainty, hey, at this point, a hundred years from now, this is how many Bitcoin will exist down to one 100 millionth of a Bitcoin.

[00:17:49] And right now, nobody could definitively tell me exactly how many Canadian dollars exist at this moment in time. And we regularly sit and wait for addresses from the governor of the Bank of Canada.

[00:18:04] And people will sit and pontificate and try and interpret the vernacular that is like, people are going to look back at this and say, these people were trying to read the tea leaves and figure out how their money might be working in the next few months. Instead of just having a system where they just knew and you could actually make economic calculation based on a solid foundation.

[00:18:31] And to your third part of the overarching question, why Bitcoin and not other things, it's because Bitcoin is so difficult to change. And this is counterintuitive because people equate it with tech. But it's the technology of Bitcoin was the major leap forward was to create a money that nobody has control over and can change.

[00:19:00] So the lack of being able to move fast and break things is actually the strongest point of Bitcoin. I know the guarantee on the cap of the supply. I know the censorship resistant properties. And I know that those underlying fundamental rules cannot be changed. And when you talk about altcoins, if you look across the aisle to what... Thank you for not using the other term. Yeah, we all know what it is. Yeah.

[00:19:30] But when you look at them, inherently, number one, they've made massive trade-offs in some of these fundamental properties to get minimalistic gains in additional features. But number two is that they can much more easily change. Even you look at the second in line, the second highest market cap cryptocurrency Ethereum.

[00:19:54] Regularly, they do fundamental shifts in the foundational rules of the protocol. And they're able to do that because it's not decentralized enough for people to say, we're not going to change with you. And they can easily get consensus because it's still centralized despite being that high on the list. And I know I'm going to hear pushback from some people. But, you know, I was working at an online exchange in late 2019.

[00:20:24] And there was a major fundamental change to the consensus rules that happened that was planned. But then they had forgotten to add a feature. And then they completely they're like, oh, we'll pump out another change to the entire consensus of the network a week later. And so I was having to prep emails and stuff like that to let people on the exchange know what was going on.

[00:20:50] But the fact that they on a dime could be able to do not one, but two changes to the underlying rules of the protocol inside of a couple of weeks means that not enough people are actually participating in the consensus to make it decentralized. Yeah. And even more so now that they have proof of stake, right? Like it's even more centralized. Yeah. Because proof of stake is just those who have the money make the decisions. That's all it is. That's it's our current system. OK. Yeah.

[00:21:20] So I'm going to shift gears a little bit. So I know I've seen your videos. I know obviously you're well aware. It's hard not to. But the U.S. announced a Bitcoin strategic reserve. How much of a game changer do you think that could be? And do you think Canada could follow suit maybe as a result of the election? I'm not quite sure. Obviously, we're recording that and it's suppose it's on March 21st. And from what I've seen, election is going to be called on Sunday, this upcoming Sunday and I think end of April in terms of election date.

[00:21:49] Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, in terms of the U.S., it's kind of wild to see how quickly things have shifted because just. Everything is wild coming out of the U.S. Yeah. So, I mean, like if I focus in on we'll call it the Bitcoin realm, but I guess the greater cryptocurrency ecosystem.

[00:22:12] This time last year you had a you had an administration that was quite overtly hostile to Bitcoin and everything tangential to it. And they had there was something called Operation Chokepoint where any sort of banking would basically shut down bank accounts of anybody that was in that industry. They just say, no, we're not doing it.

[00:22:39] And so it was actually pretty difficult to to deal with that as as companies in and around the U.S. And now, you know, a year later, we're looking at they're they're talking about actually, you know, they have they have a strategic reserve and they're trying to find budget neutral ways to add to their Bitcoin holdings and all of these these things.

[00:23:03] And it's wild. I mean, unfortunately, with that has come all of the cryptocurrency degeneracy and gambling that comes along with it. We've got meme coins coming at us left, right and center.

[00:23:15] And so, you know, I think. I think it's a precarious situation because what I worry is, you know, the right thing to do and maybe to a degree they're going to do this, but the right thing to do probably would have been just, hey, we're going to do a budget neutral Bitcoin reserve. And we're just going to be putting some stuff away on the side.

[00:23:40] Everything else, we're just going to kind of, you know, put put put put the brakes on a little bit or at least, you know, treat it appropriately within the confines of how the U.S. views things. It seems that a lot of these scammy projects have just been given a green light at this point and everybody is going to be the Wild West again. I worry about the regulatory whipsaw that could take place in four years at the next election because I worry about the fallout that could happen over the next four years.

[00:24:10] People equating Bitcoin with everything else and everything else becoming just an absolute just just misery. People, people getting rug pulled and stuff like that. In terms of Canada and how I'm looking at it, I mean, Pierre Polyev previously came out, you know, supportive of Bitcoin and he did specify Bitcoin when he was talking about it.

[00:24:33] But then when the market kind of took a downturn for a while and that was all of the ammo that that the other side of the aisle had to throw at him for an extended period of time, he kind of just stopped talking about it. And I've noticed that as well, too. Yeah. Yeah. And he didn't even take his victory lap on the other side of it. You know, he didn't even take a moment to be like, hey, everybody was saying like, first of all, he never told anybody to buy Bitcoin.

[00:25:02] But everybody was saying, like, if you had listened to Pierre, you would have lost half your money. Well, now the story is if you had listened to Pierre, even though he didn't advise you to buy anything. If you had listened to him, you'd be up 150 percent or something like that. So, like, the narrative is completely different. I think, though, it may have scared him off talking about it at all. Well, I mean, I guess the proof is in the pudding.

[00:25:24] I am surprised that he hasn't realized that this is actually a voting block that that is is helpful. And I'm surprised that he hasn't courted them more because I think it would actually be probably helpful to him at this point in time. I think the worry is he's trying to maybe not align himself with the current administration of the U.S. I was going to say, I feel like that is probably playing a big role there. Yeah.

[00:25:53] Yeah. Yeah. So it's unfortunate. I think it's a huge missed opportunity. And I think one of the main things people need to realize listening to this, regardless of any sort of political, you know, commentary I'm making is that Bitcoin is is for everyone or can be for everyone. And just because you don't like somebody else that's using Bitcoin doesn't mean it's not useful for yourself.

[00:26:18] In fact, one of the people that I appreciate their their commentary the most, his name is Jeff Booth. And he wrote an excellent book called The Price of Tomorrow. One of my favorite quotes from him is he was asked, what's the what's the worst thing about Bitcoin? And he said, the worst thing about Bitcoin is that your enemy being able to use Bitcoin makes it better and stronger for yourself. And that's a very hard thing to mentally grapple with. So, yeah, that's that's a good point.

[00:26:47] I love listening to Jeff. So I definitely agree with that. And I think The Price of Tomorrow, right, is his book, if I remember correctly. It is. It is well worth reading. It's not a Bitcoin book. It mentions Bitcoin near the tail end of it. But it's more an examination of how we've handled money as a whole and kind of the the inevitable unwind of what that system looks like over extended periods of time.

[00:27:15] And then obviously, we like we don't want to get too political, but I was doing some research because the election is coming. So I think everyone should do their research, look at every option out there and make up their own mind. The way I usually vote is I have a list of items that are most important on my list. And then I'll kind of look at the party that, you know, checks marks the most because you'll never agree with any single party. If you agree 100 percent with a single party, I mean, you're probably not being critical.

[00:27:44] So that's the that's the way I see things. And I looked up for Mark Carney and I saw obviously his background as a central banker. He's been critical in the past of Bitcoin, a bit more supportive of CBDCs. Have you found anything else? And I'm very, I would say, like a better or scared of CBDCs. I'll just be right up front. But have you found anything else that Mark Carney would have mentioned? And can you also give your views on CBDCs?

[00:28:12] I feel like you kind of aligned with me on that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So in terms of Mark Carney, again, I'm going to just say I don't I don't know enough. I'm not, you know, when I hear former central banker that already is like it doesn't give me the warm fuzzies. We'll just say that. And, you know, such is life. Again, make your own decisions. I'm not telling anyone how to vote. That said, central bank digital currencies.

[00:28:41] I can tell you beyond a shadow of a doubt, you do not want a central bank digital currency. These are so insidious in their nature. If you think that there's in any way too much control over the existing banking system as it is, get ready to ramp that dial up to 11 with a CBDC. Like this is one of the worst things that you could possibly do. And I know this is it sounds insane.

[00:29:11] But as soon as you have a digital currency that can be linked to your behaviors, it's a recipe for government overreach. And this is already that this exists currently in parts of China where their money is linked to social credit score.

[00:29:30] And so if you if you hold a view, if you oppose, if you have an opinion that opposes the existing government, if you're in the wrong place at the wrong time and there's a protest going on, even if you're not part of it, then what happens? Well, you have your phone. It tracks where you are. It says, hey, you can no longer buy anything in this area. Go home.

[00:29:54] If you continue to be there or continue to hold the wrong views, hey, you're no longer allowed to buy transit tickets. You're no longer allowed allowed to buy flights. You're only allowed to buy food within a 10 mile radius of your home, that kind of thing. And it gets very draconian very quickly.

[00:30:14] I regularly work with the Human Rights Foundation and we teach human rights defenders and political dissidents around the globe how to use Bitcoin as a mechanism to escape financial repression and censorship. We just finished a three day webinar that we run quarterly just this past week.

[00:30:36] And we had 100 to 150 people in the room at all times from dozens of countries around the globe trying to learn this stuff. And part of it in preparation to make sure that they can get around CBDCs. So you do not want a CBDC. If you're curious where we're at in terms of CBDCs, there is a website called CBDC Tracker. And I can't remember if it's .org or .com.

[00:31:06] I'll have to take a look at that afterwards, but maybe in the show notes you can plunk it in there afterwards. Yeah, and I mean for me, I always come back to the example of the trucker protests that we saw in Ottawa. And I tell people, look, whatever your thoughts were on the protests, whether you agreed with it or not, doesn't matter. Because at the end of the day, whether you were pro or against, you know, 5, 10 years down the line, let's say you were against a protest.

[00:31:30] And you're like, oh, it's good that they froze the accounts with the Emergencies Act because I didn't agree with it. Well, what if there is a cause in 10 years from now, completely different government, completely different government in place. And you have that cause dear to your heart. You go protest. Same kind of thing happens, but then reverse. And I think sometimes people are a bit too kind of focused on the issues that they like or not. And they might agree with an action taken by the government, but not thinking of the future implications of that.

[00:32:00] Yeah, you need the ability to zoom out. The same tactic that can be used against the protest that you don't like can be used by an opposing government against the protest that you do like. And it was kind of mind boggling to me seeing people cheering on the fact that Canadian bank accounts were being shut down. That is absolutely insane to me.

[00:32:24] We need to realize that we need a medium of exchange and a mechanism of wealth transfer that cannot be controlled by anybody. And that's why Bitcoin is here. And to that point, 10 plus million dollars worth of donations that were independently given by individuals that meant to go to a specific group of protesters here in Canada were frozen.

[00:32:49] The only digital donation mechanism that actually got to the intended recipients was Bitcoin. No, that's a good point. And I guess on the geopolitical front, one thing that I've said from the beginning, and I don't like to take victory laps too much, but that was one that I've highlighted is after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, when the U.S. decided to freeze U.S. assets that were held by the Russian government, whether it was U.S. Treasury bills.

[00:33:19] For example, I said like this is the biggest mistake that the U.S. has done because it's served notice to other countries that look, if you're not on the good side of the U.S., you may be on the good side right now. And that's the same kind of logic, right? You may be on the good side right now. You may agree with the U.S. action. But what if five, 10 years down the line, you are no longer aligned with the U.S.? You may not be enemies. You just don't fully align with them.

[00:33:47] Then this has definitely given you some food for thought, whether you want to diversify away from U.S. Treasuries and into gold. We've seen a lot of countries, central banks actually ramping up their gold purchases because I'm sure they're more comfortable with the asset because it has a historical history behind it. But I think you could see Bitcoin too, especially with the U.S. Strategic Reserve having some central banks. You know what? Let's start diversifying, even if it's just a small percentage.

[00:34:15] Why not use that? It's going to play a role. Again, I like that you pointed out that action by the U.S. It was an unprecedented action where they effectively weaponized the global monetary system for political means.

[00:34:31] And it was the first major shot across the bow that showed exactly that, hey, we can no longer trust these institutions that were previously, at least from country to country, apolitical. And now, like you said, people are ramping up gold reserves, things like that.

[00:34:55] The main and gold has been a fantastic long term physical store of value with a proven track record. The tricky bit is when you try to abstract it in a way that is easily auditable because then you have to trust who's doing the audits. If you can be in the room, then that's great. If you can involve many different parties in the audit, then that's better.

[00:35:24] But when it comes down to it, something like backing a currency with it. I mean, Nixon is the perfect example, like the gradual and then sudden rug pull for a temporary period of time and then it's gone. You know, when it comes to auditability, that's incredibly important.

[00:35:44] And so with something like Bitcoin, I think the reason that it's going to begin to play more of a role initially, even just in small part, is that you can fully audit it at all times. And that's not just the, you know, the higher ups can audit it. Like a couple of weeks ago, I ran a live stream with just me and another guy and anybody in the audience can join in. And we did a global audit of the entire supply of Bitcoin in a couple of minutes.

[00:36:12] And again, down to the one 100 millionth of a Bitcoin. And everybody in the chat was getting the same answer as they're running the software as well. So it's that degree of certainty that you can get is beyond anything we've ever had. OK, no, that's great. So I'm going to shift gears a little bit because you're great at educations, right? BTC sessions make a whole lot of sense. How can someone get started on their Bitcoin journey, some resources where they can learn?

[00:36:40] I mean, some of the feedback I got from people that are that might be interested, but they're reluctant is, first of all, they're not sure how to do it. So I think that's why a lot of people will go to the ETF form just because they want exposure and they're comfortable with their brokerage. They've done that before. It's easy for them. Obviously, there are a lot of downsides to owning the ETFs. Some upsides, too. You can have it in a TFS in Canada tax-free. But ways to get started.

[00:37:07] And the other reason I would say that people are reluctant is the volatility. And on that part, I've been pretty consistent on saying, look, I don't think it's going to zero. But if you want to sleep well at night, put a percentage of your portfolio that you're comfortable going to zero. And then if it drops 50%, 80%, whatever it is, then you won't lose sleep at night. Yeah. In general, you mentioned the ETF and everything like that.

[00:37:33] If a person's only reason, if they are listening to this and they're like, I don't care, I just want price exposure, then maybe that's your mechanism. There's trade-offs, though. But if you're listening to any part of this and you're like, that has value because it's censorship resistant, because it can't be debased, because of all of those sovereignty principles that are baked into the core protocol, then you're going to want to learn how to actually enjoy those things.

[00:38:01] Because when you get the ETF, you're basically just saying, I want somebody else to have sovereignty over my money. You want the price exposure. That's basically it. Yeah, exactly. So if that's all you're after, then maybe that's the route for you. But if you're looking to actually utilize Bitcoin yourself and hold it yourself, you don't want a honeypot of Bitcoin sitting for someone somewhere else that can get rug pulled, which I think is a very real possibility. Hacks happen.

[00:38:30] We've seen the largest, most lauded exchanges collapse in the past. I'm not putting it past banks to have the exact same thing happen to them. So anyways. No, I mean, we've seen it time and time again, right? Like, I'm sure there's going to be some this cycle to some major ones like it's just what we saw the North Korean hack, right? Yeah. Not too long ago. Yeah. If you look, if you look back in history, you said you started looking at Bitcoin in 2013. What happened in 2013?

[00:38:59] The largest, 2014 rather, the largest exchange on the planet at the time, Mt. Gox imploded. They lost people's Bitcoin. They got hacked, whatever. Money gone. Okay. Fast forward to the next cycle. The largest exchange in Canada. There's literally a Netflix documentary on it. Quadriga CX went down. All the money gone, gone, gone. Jump forward the next cycle, 2021. Oh, the industry has matured.

[00:39:26] FTX is the glowing example of the perfect Bitcoin exchange. And what happens? It completely blows up. We're now in the next cycle. Hey, we've got ETFs. I mean, what do you think is going to happen? It's all just other people holding your money. And counterintuitive to what we've been taught before, it was, you know, be responsible for every other part of your life, but don't dare be responsible for your own money. Let somebody else handle that for you. They'll keep it safe.

[00:39:53] Bitcoin is quite the opposite because those transactions are irreversible. When you leave a large honeypot of funds all together in one place, it's very, very attractive to hackers. The same amount of effort that goes into hacking exchange would go into hacking an individual for a minimal amount of money. And so these are, there's just a giant target on their back. When you put your money in an exchange, just don't come back and scream and whine when,

[00:40:22] you know, you heard this. Okay. So what do people actually do? In Canada, we're lucky that we have some great places where you can first obtain Bitcoin. And these places actually, they never hold the Bitcoin for you by design. The second that you hit buy, it sends to a wallet that you yourself own. So again, I'm going to mention a bunch of things that I use or have used personally.

[00:40:50] Some of these I've courted as sponsors on my show and I'll let you know when they are. And others are just ones that I think are awesome that I'll also mention. But regardless of whether or not they've sponsored my show, it's all stuff that they, that I use day to day. So one partner of my show, Bitcoin Well, they are Alberta based. And the way it works is you can send an e-transfer.

[00:41:15] And the second you send an e-transfer, it will auto send Bitcoin to your own Bitcoin wallet. They never hold your Bitcoin for you. You can also use it to pay your bills. Tons of awesome. You can actually pay any Canadian in an e-transfer with Bitcoin through them. Do they charge a fee or is it a spread? Yes. They have a spread on the amount there. So, you know, that's how they make their money. Yeah. Yeah. Which is fine, right? At the end of the day. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. You have to make some money. Yeah. It's a business. That's how they make their money.

[00:41:45] Right. And so another company, they're not partnered with the show, but I know the guys there. I think they're great. And similar thing, bull Bitcoin. You're able to, again, e-transfer money over to them and they never hold your Bitcoin. They send it directly out to you. So just to kind of show a couple other options, there's another one called Beaver Bitcoin. But I like the ones that are Bitcoin specific because when you get into the realm of companies that are showing you all these different coins, their business model is different and their

[00:42:14] business model is to get you to trade. So you're going to see scrolling marquees. This went up this much today. This one dropped. Maybe you should buy this one. Stay away from the gambling. Just if you see value in Bitcoin. You have to be pretty. If you're going to use those, you have to have a lot of discipline. I have used some of those in the past, but I've like I'm very disciplined when it comes to my investment. So for me, there's no attraction, but I know that's not most people. Yeah. Yeah. So you got to be you got to be cautious, cautious there. So number one is how are you going to obtain Bitcoin?

[00:42:44] Again, Bitcoin, well, Bitcoin, Beaver Bitcoin, places like that. These are options. Number two, you're going to want to at the very basic level, just understand how to get a Bitcoin wallet. And so this on its on its face can be very simple. You can just simply download an app onto your phone to start to learn. And that's free. And so some examples of wallets that are simple to use. Blue Wallet. This is a very simple, easy to use.

[00:43:14] I have no affiliation with them whatsoever. It's just a simple to use Bitcoin wallet on your phone. You download it, you back it up by writing down 12 English words. And if you ever delete the app, even if there's money in it, if you smash your phone, whatever, as long as you go back and you have those 12 words, you have access to your money again. That's all you need. OK, another example of a phone wallet that is partnered with a show Aqua. I quite like them.

[00:43:41] They've got a lot of different options for how to use it and everything. But it also allows for really quick and cheap transfers. Yeah. They have like savings accounts and spending account, that kind of thing. Nunchuck is another great option. But these are all just like phone wallets. So you can download for free. Which is a good option if you have smaller amounts of Bitcoin, right? Because you don't want to be getting and I know you'll get to it like you don't want to get cold storage when it's costing you $150, $200 plus for a device and you only have $200 worth of Bitcoin.

[00:44:10] It probably doesn't make sense until you have a certain value. Exactly. Exactly. So all the ones I just mentioned, those are known as hot wallets. And the reason they're called hot wallets is the hot refers to the fact that they are the keys to your money. That's what basically what a Bitcoin wallet is. The keys to your money reside on an internet connected device. And so the keys to your money are only as secure as the device itself. So a phone or a computer, you can get malware.

[00:44:38] You're likely it's very unlikely that your phone is going to get hacked and you're going to get that stolen, but it's still more sensitive than you might want it to be. I would consider a hot wallet best for day to day cash that you might be comfortable carrying in your pocket. So if you're comfortable carrying a few hundred bucks in your pocket, that's fine for hot wallet. But if you get into the realm of thousands, this is where you might want to start exploring the final piece of the puzzle that I'll mention that you mentioned, which is cold storage or

[00:45:08] cold wallets. So do you have like a rule of thumb for people like over a thousand or it's more like kind of a personal comfort type of thing? What I would say is as you begin to, if you are thinking you're going to start accumulating some Bitcoin over time and you have a threshold where in your head, you think I would feel uncomfortable with this amount of cash in my pocket, just walking down the street.

[00:45:37] I want you to treat whatever you have, like it's worth five to 10 times as much. And the reason I say that is because there's a very real possibility that it could be worth that much in, you know, a four or five year time span. And then all of a sudden, if you're looking at it and you're then trying to catch up with proper security for that amount of money at that time, you're much more panicky and finicky. And it's, it's a lot less pleasant of an experience.

[00:46:07] Whereas you get to a thousand bucks and you start saying, okay, I'm going to start learning this. And you calmly go through and you learn how to properly use this stuff, much more pleasant. So, and use small amounts the first time you try it. I think that's probably, I mean, that's always what I've done it. Cause I was, there was less resources when I started in the first few times I used it. I was so scared of messing it up. So I would use like, you know, you've ended up paying a decent amount of fees for a smaller amount, but it's better off than losing the whole thing.

[00:46:37] Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And so you, you learn over time and yeah, you just, and, and you can kind of think of it. It's, it's like the cost of tuition. You can, you can pay for the education now, or you can pay for the education through making a major mistake later on. That's much more expensive. So it's a good way to put it. Yeah. Yeah. And so, so yeah, that last piece of the puzzle, cold storage, this is basically, I said

[00:47:03] that a hot wallet is where the keys to your money reside on a phone or a computer. A cold wallet is a dedicated device where the keys to your money are held explicitly offline so that nobody can remotely access or hack your account. And so there's lots of examples of this. A couple that I'm not in any way affiliated. I've got some, you know, some people will be listening, but some will watch. And so I'm going to hold up some show and tell here.

[00:47:32] So this is this little shiny thing here is called a Trezor. Again, you just plug it into a computer. This one is called a Blockstream Jade, and it's just like a little funky device that can plug in or it can scan QR codes. You can actually build your own device. If you don't trust any companies, you can literally build your own hardware device. Did you build that one? Yeah. I did. Yes. Oh, wow. Looks good. It's called Crux. That one, there's another one called Seed Signer. You can build.

[00:48:03] You can go for very simplistic. This is called a BitKey. It just looks like a little rock and it has a fingerprint scanner on it and it's NFC and you tap it to your phone. The ones I use the most, and I'll caveat this by saying, again, they're partnered with my show, but they're partnered with my show because I bugged the hell out of them to spot for me because I like it. Yeah. So these are the two that I use the most. This is the cold card, a cold card queue specifically. It looks like an old school BlackBerry. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:48:33] But the way it works is you pair it with your phone and you scan QR codes to communicate back and forth. And then they make them. Please tell me you don't have like that belt strap back in the day. Oh, no, no, no, no. So this stays in a safe at home. Yeah. It's for a larger transfer. No, no, I was just kidding. But this is something that I would bring with me all the time. It's just called a tap signer and it looks like a little, it's a little tap card.

[00:48:59] And so what that, what that does is you download say nunchuck wallet and you pair this with your phone. And so then on your phone at all times, you can see your balance. You can add to your balance, but if you want to spend, you need the key to unlock your money, which is this card. So the wallet on your phone will say, type in your pin and then you'll tap the card NFC to the back of

[00:49:24] your phone and the pin in combination with the card unlocks your money so you can spend. And so that way, if somebody steals your phone, they can't access your money. If somebody steals the card, they still need the pin to access the money. Okay. Yeah. So there you have it. Those are a ton of different, I know I just threw a lot at you right there, but. No, no, that's okay. I mean, I've used a cold, a cold storage for a long time. I guess the last one you didn't really touch on. Do you want to give a quick overview of multi-sig for people?

[00:49:54] Yes. Yes. So. For those who really have a good sums of money. No, this is a great point. I wasn't sure if we're going to touch on it, but this is a very important thing to look at. So a lot of people will worry, well, okay, I've got this one device. And so, yeah, that protects me from hackers remotely. But what if somebody kicks in my door and starts threatening me? A lot of Bitcoiners will say the $5 wrench attack. You can have all the security in the world, but somebody threatens you the $5 wrench and you're done.

[00:50:24] With inflation, it's 10 though. But nonetheless, either way, how do you guard against that? And this is something called multi-sig or multi-signature. Yeah. And when you think of a regular Bitcoin wallet, you can think of it as a digital vault and you hold a key to that vault. And so you take your key, whether it be a piece of hardware or whether it be sitting on your phone and you unlock the vault and you take out as much money as you want and send it wherever you like.

[00:50:52] With a multi-sig vault, you can picture a digital vault and it has multiple keyholes. So maybe you have a vault that has three keyholes. There are three possible keys you can use and it requires at least two of those keys to open simultaneously. And you can set this up in any configuration. Maybe it's a vault with five keyholes and you need at least three of them. But the main point being, if somebody kicks in your door and you've got one of the keys

[00:51:20] in your home, but the rest of them are geographically dispersed, then they don't have enough of a threshold to access your money and you cannot comply with them in any way, shape or form. You can give them the key, but they can't get anything. Furthermore, there's actually no indication that the key that's there is part of a multi-sig. You could load it with a decoy amount that they think they're getting your Bitcoin and it's a thousand bucks or something.

[00:51:48] But unbeknownst to them, you've got other keys that are part of the same setup that have a hidden vault somewhere else that have your real savings. Yeah. In terms of, do you have like a few options for people interested? I know, I think Nunchuck has some CASA Unchained, which is, I think, a bit more regulated, my understanding. Yeah. Offers other services. I know. So obviously there was trade-offs there too. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:52:14] There's so, you know, you can do multi-sig entirely on your own so you can build it and just kind of, you know, use your own hardware and do that. But the ones we're talking about here when it comes to something like Nunchuck or Unchained or CASA, these are known as assisted multi-sig, which means they hold a key. And what their job is, is one with one key again, they can't take your money. They have no control over it.

[00:52:41] But what they can do is if you start misplacing things, say you've got a two of three, you have two keys and they have one. You can at all times move your money without them. You have two keys and that's the threshold. But if you lose one and the backup to it, you can go to the company and say, I screwed up. I would like to move my money to a new vault and make it safe again. And they can help you with their other key.

[00:53:07] So it's just like, it's like this insurance against you screwing up pretty much. No, that's good. Yeah. I mean, and I know like some of them, I think have KYC, some are non-KYC. And for those who are not familiar, it's no, your customer. So just your personal information. So whether you, you know, you want to be more private or a bit less, obviously Unchained I think offers all different kinds of services.

[00:53:33] And I think some, which I think is an attractive option for people is they have succession or succession planning in case you were to pass away, right? Like a baked in inheritance planning and depending on who you go with, some of that will be more traditional, like, Hey, bring your proof that you're next of kin kind of thing. And they can help with that. Or in something like Nunchuck, that's a non-KYC.

[00:53:58] It's just like an email address and everything is automated and your next of kin gets an email and it says, Hey, you're part of your, this recipient follow these steps. You would have been given the way that Nunchuck does it is it's three English words and then a password. And you get that and, and pretty much the person needs to know nothing. They get an email that tells them to download the app and put in those bits of information and they get the money. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:54:27] And I think I read and correct me if I'm wrong. Casa is something where the person will get an email and then we'll claim it. And you have like six months to deny the claim. And then if you don't, they're able to retrieve it. Something like that. Am I correct? All of these have these different cool setups where you can be like, okay, here's my threshold of time for this. And I have time to rescind all that stuff. Okay. No. Well, this has been great, Ben. I want to be respectful of your time.

[00:54:56] Is there anything else that parting words? Also don't be shy and let people know where they can find you. Fantastic material. I really enjoyed this discussion. So I'll let you just inform our listeners. Yeah. Yeah. Thanks a lot. So again, if you're looking to learn, there's a few places you can go. And number one, if you find me on YouTube, BTC Sessions, there's just a plethora of completely free step-by-step tutorials to walk you through everything.

[00:55:26] Just look through the playlist section and you'll find its basics on wallets and where to buy and how to secure all that kind of stuff. I also do have a website, btcsessions.ca. And I believe by the time that this hits the airwaves, that will be a fresh new website with plenty of new resources. So if it doesn't look new yet, then check it out again in a couple of days. And then finally, if you do need some additional handholding, of course, check out the free

[00:55:56] tutorials first. If you can string yourself along easily through that, then great. But if you do need like one-on-one help, I have a company based here in Alberta called Bitcoin Mentor. And what we do is basically you can book one-on-one calls with, I've got a team of 16 and they will walk you through anything from obtaining Bitcoin, learning how to use it, securing it, multi-sig

[00:56:22] and some of the nerdier down the rabbit hole things like running a node or hobbyist home mining or all that fun stuff. Hey, and it's based in Canada. So might as well buy Canadian, right? Yeah. You can find us at bitcoinmentor.io. I forgot to mention. Okay, perfect. I'll put all the links in the show notes. So for people looking for those resources, well, Ben, it's been a pleasure having you. Thanks again for coming on and we'll definitely have to do this again. Awesome. Thanks so much, Simon.

[00:56:51] The Canadian Investor Podcast should not be construed as investment or financial advice. The hosts and guests featured may own securities or assets discussed on this podcast. Always do your own due diligence or consult with a financial professional before making any financial or investment decisions.