{ "episodeId": "SLP650", "speakers": { "stephan": { "name": "Stephan Livera", "role": "host", "tag": "STEPHAN" }, "matyas_kuchar": { "name": "Matyas Kuchar", "role": "guest", "tag": "MATYAS" } }, "segments": [ { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "00:12", "start": 11.79, "text": "Hi everyone, and welcome back to Stephan Livera podcast, brought to you by Bold. For American listeners, you can buy Bitcoin over at getbold.io. Now, rejoining me on the show today is Matyas Kuchar. Matyas is one of the two, brothers who are organizing BTC Prague, or let's say the lead organizers. And so, excited to get you back on the show. Welcome back. Thank you, Stefan. Thrilled to be here. And greetings from Czech Republic to all your listeners. Fantastic. Well, yeah, look, I think, the event has been great so far. The, you know, I, I think I've had a great time at, you know, both of the ones that I've been to. I guess, yeah, I guess let's, let's talk a little bit about what's happening in twenty twenty-five. There's lots of things going on in the What's the latest with BTC Prague? but, yeah, just, I guess let's start with BTC Prague. Give us a little bit of an overview, what's, what's the latest there?" }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "01:09", "start": 69.05, "text": "Yeah, well, you know, BTC Prague has been always reflecting the changes of the sentiment of Bitcoin. We've been organizing Bitcoin events since 2020, and, it used to be very hardcore, it used to be very underground from the beginning, because that was the market, but now we can see that the sentiment really changed. And, we are again reflecting, the changes. So, BTC Pro is always, building on the same, foundation, and it's for people who kind of feel that the system is rigged, that something isn't right, and they are looking for, tools how to leverage in the, in, in, in, in the time we are living now. So it's for people who, who just don't- go with the flow. The, its BTC project has been always on the forefront of, self-sovereignty, freedom and, and money. We are, building this place, this event for, people like us, like me and Martin, who like to meet in the real world to, get the good connections and to, to speed up the process of their understanding of Bitcoin, because you can spend hundreds of hours on the internet internet, but you don't get that much conviction and information like when you go to the conference and talk to the real people and, build the real trust and real relationships." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "02:42", "start": 162.31, "text": "Yeah, and I, I've long been a fan of, community meetups and conferences, right? Just any kind of Bitcoin events, generally. So I've, you know, I've spent time as an organizer in a meetup, kind of more, more at the meetup level, not at the conference level, but, so I guess let me ask you this qu- ask you the question this way. When we were new to Bitcoin, many of us got overexuberant. We thought, \"Oh, it's all gonna happen so soon, right?\" Like it's, it's a common experience we go through, right? We're shouting from the rooftops and we, we think it's, it's so obvious, why won't people come and join us? But it's, it's almost like it, it, it, it just takes more time than we think. but then at the same time, as Coming in. So what does that look like with this whole new wave of people coming?" }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "03:34", "start": 214.22, "text": "Yeah, good question. it's, I, I think that the new wave of people won't be very similar to the last wave of, newcomers in, in, in the last bull market. And it's b-because we are crossing the chasm, we are moving into a new stage of Bitcoin adoption, on the bell curve, and I think it's late adop- adopters or perhaps yearly, majority, and those people are coming for, different reasons, and they're coming to Bitcoin because it's finally legitimized in their own eyes. So, Bitcoin has been underground, but now you can hear, some news in mainstream media every other week. It's, either, politicians talking about it or nation state, buying bits Bitcoin or considering some, some strategic reserve, it's some new law or some institution jumping in, BlackRock's, Bitwise and, there, there are more than one hundred, publicly traded companies who are somehow, doing the Bitcoin treasury playbook. So those Informations, and those arguments are really playing into this mainstream, hype, and people who, who might not really feel confident to jumping in five years ago, because it was full of, techies and, geeky enthusiasts and crypto anarchists and, cypherpunks, now they feel confident and they feel like it's not taboo anymore. They can, they can come in and they feel The opportunity, because they might be the go-to guy in their own company, they may be recognize Bitcoin as a similar opportunity like internet in early nineties, so they are feeling the, Again, the opportunity and it's playing on their ambitions, to be the Bitcoin guy in their company, to, to-- and maybe they were Bitcoiners, but they finally now, feel that it's okay to go to their boss and, and start talking about Bitcoin because it's finally okay. I feel the, the, the big change is that, Bitcoin is really here and- No one would argue that it's, it's not here to stay, that it would go away. yeah. We di- We don't- Let me ask you the question this way as well." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "06:14", "start": 374.03, "text": "Like, I think, I think you're, you're touching on something interesting there around the, the kind of person is changing. And so let's compare back to past years, right? So BTC Prague, now I know you started another, like, a Czech-based conference earlier, but BTC Prague was in 2023, it started, last year 2024, If, if you had to talk about like what is the percentage of, let's say, sort of cypherpunk, libertarian people versus like people who are coming and they're kind of a bit new, how would you say that has changed over, you know, twenty-three, twenty-four and coming up to this year," }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "06:51", "start": 411.08, "text": "twenty-five? it's hard to say because we don't collect any information. We, if you buy a ticket to be, oh, I just mean like" }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "07:00", "start": 420.34, "text": "subjective feel, you know, like when you talk to people, yeah," }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "07:04", "start": 423.7, "text": "my subjective feel is that we had many freedom-loving folks, libertarians, because it's a part of Czech culture, and we have many, people who, who are," }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "07:19", "start": 439.13, "text": "Who are, like towards this thinking. So I would say majority of them are cypherpunks and freedom-loving, people who, understand Bitcoin because of this part of the movement. and it's slowly changing, and I think this year we will experience a rapid change. And, some might not like it, the culture has been set, as a, as, as, as really, really geeky and, perhaps this isn't Natural way of evolving Bitcoin, and I think the opportunity here, and maybe I, I would use this moment to encourage people who have been in Bitcoin for some time to, to help others who are new to Bitcoin to transition in, into Bitcoin in a smooth way and let them understand the other prospects of Bitcoin, not only the money, because, you know, we, we like to say, you come for money and stay for technology, or stay for- For freedom or stay for community. I've been traveling to many conferences, not only Bitcoin conferences, and I have to, have to tell you, and it's not only, those words aren't from, only from my mouth, because everyone says that. The Bitcoin conferences are absolutely amazing because of the vibe and the community, the people are just friendly, happy and sharing, sharing interesting stuff with each other And it's because we have similar values. We might come from different countries, but, from ten points we share eight, and, those two points which we don't share, we like to talk, talk about and. and I think that this, this, this is a, this is an interesting part for any, any newcomer. So, because I think Bitcoin tend to, attract people who are Nature of the curious, they are open-minded, so we are welcoming new wave of, people. Those are, regular people from mid-class, maybe middle management, maybe even suit-wearing newbies, who, will soon, Recognize Bitcoin's potential and, and help us with the next wave of, of adoption. So, that, that was my, my rant. I, I'm, I don't know if I answered your question, yeah, sure. Yeah, and I think it's, it's" }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "09:56", "start": 595.56, "text": "fair to say that, it, it, it is, it is going to change. I think there are all kinds of- Subtopics inside of that. So as an example, people might argue about, you know, custodial versus non-custodial or KYC centralized exchanges and products versus decentralized and peer-to-peer things. and there's always this sort of tension in the community in some ways because there are some people who are like, \"Hey, we want the maximum adoption, just be permissive as possible,\" and then there are, on the other side, you have the people who are more like, \"No, gotta stay hardcore, gotta keep it sort of keep stick, stay to the roots.\" so I think these are some of the questions that are, that are going to come naturally, and I think a big one nowadays is, ever since the US Bitcoin ETFs were launched in January of 2024, that's been a big shift, right? And then now the rise of the Bitcoin Treasury companies, right? Michael Saylor will be there as well, but, and, Eric Sembler, so That's another thing that's really changing, and so arguably there are a lot of people coming in in a custodial fashion or using some kind of IOU layer. And so the more hardcore people, hardcore Bitcoiners might look at them and say, \"Hey, you know, you're doing it the wrong way,\" or some people are, getting the wrong idea. I'm curious how, how do you see that tension?" }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "11:22", "start": 682.38, "text": "good question. I, I personally think that, it's about education If you come to Bitcoin as a newcomer, you don't see the difference between self custody and ATF, so it takes time and we, we've all been there. So I feel compassion, with, with newcomers and, and simply we need to teach them about the, the real values and the core mission of BTCBrak is still the same. We teach people about self sovereignty, about how to be, how to leverage Bitcoin for your individual freedom, and for this you need to use Bitcoin as it was intended. It's a peer-to-peer cash, electronic cash, and self-custody is a big part of that. If you own ATF, you aren't, sovereign with your money. Your money is very easily censorable. So, some people will get it soon, some people will get it later when they won't be able to move their money or- who knows when, when, will this new wave of adoption get us? But, the history tend to not repeat, but it often rhymes. So we had a problem with centralized, centralized custodians like FTX. So, I don't want to give a big predictions here, but I guess that we will see some big problem, during maybe next bear market, and it might be one of the ATFs, and it will again for a, for a next phase, change how the, how the people think about self custody." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "13:06", "start": 785.85, "text": "Yeah, often it is when, things go wrong that people actually s-- sit up and listen, because until then there might have been people saying, \"Hey, get your cold card, or get your whatever, get your Trezor, get your ledger, whatever, and, you know, get your node, run your node, and connect your wallet with your own node, and all these things.\" But these, these, messages might fall on deaf ears at the start, or, or in, in fairness, there may be some more, let's say, Their coins in their hardware wallet or their multisig setup, but maybe they do wanna pla- put some into some kind of centralized platform, whether that's the ETFs or the, or the Bitcoin treasury companies, because maybe they wanna-- maybe they wanna borrow against their coins, or maybe they wanna do like some of these options and trading strategies and things like that. Now, I'm more of a hodler myself, but just recognizing that there, there are people, doing that. So- Yeah, there, what do you make of those? There are many" }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "14:01", "start": 841.41, "text": "options, there are many options and many products Which are like, getting traction, yeah, the landing and, people really, can, can use it and, and learn. I would encourage everyone to, to really try most of the products, so because if you don't, if you don't try, you don't really, know how they perform and you don't get the experience only by, by reading. But talking about BTC Prague, we really try to stay, Focus on the core mission and, without compromising the Bitcoin values. So educating about, Bitcoin and self-custody is a very important part of, of, of our agenda. and on the other side, we, we, we are happy that someone is coming for BTC Prague because they recognize that the Fiat experiment is over, like Who, who knew that, fifteen years ago, that the Fiat experiment would just disappeared? It's like my parents, they, they always thought that they would be living in communism until end of their life, and suddenly the communism, ended, the Berlin Wall fell down. So this is something so excited, exciting that, we can give a slack to newcomers that they are using Bitcoin in maybe a different fashion that we hardcore Bitcoiners are. are used to. It's really just about, time you spend, in Bitcoin and, and doing your own research. And someone might need a ATF for investing, on a company behalf, but as an individual, they are investing in self-custody." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "15:53", "start": 952.87, "text": "Yeah, and it's a good point you make about individuals versus companies, because in many cases, before the company could start doing things at the company level on the company balance sheet, individuals inside that company had to do that. And so many of those individuals might come to an event like this BTC Prague or other, you know, any Bitcoin meetup or conference, right? and so I see these events as a crucial way to sort of help on- board some of those people and at least have the ability for them to hear different views, and that's actually why I think it's good, you know, for sometimes there are panels where there's a lot of disagreement or some conferences now are doing debates, so I think these are interesting ways for them to kind of, oh, okay, I can hear different perspectives on whether it's, I don't know, should Bitcoiners engage in debt or not, or should Bitcoiners use custodial things or not, or what counts as a layer two, or, you know, what are we gonna You know, these kinds of, questions are, are probably interesting for people, and I think they help-- they, they give people an opportunity to understand different views, whereas if you're just kind of a normie in corporate world, you're just gonna look at, \"Oh, what does the BBC say?\" Or \"What does the typical, like, you know, corporate media say?\"" }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "17:14", "start": 1034.05, "text": "Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, it's, there are thousands of interesting questions, and, we try to explore, questions which give, people a power to act on that. We like to encourage our speakers to come up with some action call always, so it's not only interesting, but it's also something what you can really take and use for your own, individual empowerment. And, this year, I think it's ideal for PLAPS to recognize that they They might be the future social economic leaders. So, if you are in a company as, as a pleb, and I maybe give an example for me, I used to work in hospitality before I, I fell down to the rabbit hole. So, if I would still work in hotels, so I, I would definitely go to my boss now and tell, tell him, \"Hey, there is a Bitcoin and we can start accepting it. It might bring some co- customers, and I will be happy to, to do the work behind it, to do the research, to, to, to acquire the, the, the point of sale, to set everything up. And this would give me something what I love, what I'm passionate about, and I would infuse it in my regular fiat job. I think the year two thousand twenty-five is perfect for this, and the main stage will be full of encouragement and, and guides on how to do that, how to position yourself in the bull market, and how to leverage Bitcoin, before, The most of the world, jump in." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "19:09", "start": 1149.26, "text": "Back to the show in a moment. This show brought to you by CoinKite dot com, the creators of the best Bitcoin hardware security devices, such as the Coldcard Mark IV and the new Coldcard Q. Now, we use Bitcoin hardware security devices to keep our keys offline, our private keys offline. Now, the way these work is you can do that setup, write down your twelve or twenty-four words on those, the seed word cards, and Keep that secure. Now you can use this device to interact with the Bitcoin network using software such as Sparrow Wallet, Electrum, or Bep20 or Nunchuk as a few examples. Now you have a range of security features that you can use with these devices, such as passphrases. You can use seed x or, or my favorite is multi-signature. Now if you're starting in a basic way, just start with the device and the USB-C cable, plug it directly to the computer and use it that way, and then later improve your- Your setup, but I believe these devices are great at helping secure your coins, especially as you start to migrate up into multi-signature security. But don't be disheartened or don't be, scared away. They are accessible, and I think you actually do learn about Bitcoin in the process. So to get yours, go to coinkite dot com, use code Livera to get a discount on your cold card. This episode brought to you by Galloy. They are building banking software for the Bitcoin age. So if you are with a bank, a fintech, or a startup looking to To offer some kind of Bitcoin product, whether that is a Bitcoin collateralized loan, deposit accounts, or payments, Galloy can help you. Their latest product is called Lana. It is a loans management platform, and you can use this to come to market quickly and offer a loans, Bitcoin collateralized lending product for your customers. Now, Galloy have a lot of experience in the space. They started with Blink Wallet in twenty twenty, and they've since grown this to become a community favorite over time, and so they have a lot of experience making things work in a secure, reliable, and scalable way. So if you need assistance coming to market quickly with a Bitcoin banking product such as lending or deposits or payments, talk to the team at Galloy. You can email them, the email is biz at galloy dot io, or go to the website galloy dot io. And now back to the show. Yeah. A few interesting questions for me there. as you said, one aspect of Bitcoin is accepting and making payments, and another aspect of it is the treasury strategy, right? Should, should the company hoddle Bitcoin in their reserve, and then beyond that, if they choose, right, are they gonna do like strategy and Metaplanet and these other companies who are actually issuing equity and debt to buy more, a quote-unquote Bitcoin financial engineering, or I don't know the exact, whatever term people are using for that, but that's an interesting question also because then it's- It's sort of like, okay, if the company's gonna do something with Bitcoin, what is it gonna do? And what is a natural first step, in your view?" }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "22:04", "start": 1323.99, "text": "well, yeah, there, there is no one, one playbook for all, I would say. and this is a topic what I, I'm starting to be very interested about. And, we as BTC Prague, we, we hold Bitcoin on our balance sheet, so we are playing this playbook in, in a sense. And I would highly encourage everyone to do that. It's, it's just, it's just another way of holding, yeah. It doesn't matter if you are individual or company, you just need to find a way how to acquire more Bitcoin. It's, i-i-it's, it's not easy, but it's simple. And at BTC Prague, we will, of course, discover those, those, Those topics. And one of the topic I think I can give a sneak peek to the program of Thursday of the business day, it will be you, Stephan, doing a fireside chat with Eric Simler, the, from Simler Scientific, the, The company on, on the, on the Bitcoin Treasury standard. So I think that Eric, is, is great speaker and he has, He, he knows how to talk about it very eloquently, and, I, I've been listening to, to the podcast with you and Eric, and it, it instantly clicked in my mind few things, and so I think that people really need to, need to hear that and just apply this for their own company and for their own life." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "23:41", "start": 1420.72, "text": "Right, yeah, as you said, more companies looking to do something with Bitcoin, whether that's holding it or accepting it for payment or making payments with it. the other question that came to my mind from what you were saying is the fiat job versus Bitcoin job question, because for some people, they've been stacking Bitcoin for a while and maybe they're in their fiat job and they're really over it and they want a Bitcoin job, but on the other hand, there are some people who maybe they are actually just better off staying in That fiat job and just using it to, let's say, fiat mine and then stack Bitcoin or, you know, work inside the company that they're already in to, help turn that more Bitcoin friendly. So how are you seeing that aspect of it, whether you stay in the fiat job or actually try to work in the industry directly?" }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "24:31", "start": 1470.53, "text": "I think, I think people should do what they, what they really like. If you're a doctor and you love what you're doing, why would you ever quit your job, yeah? And we need doctors, we need engineers, we need people with different kind of expertise. If you can, if you can fit your expertise in Bitcoin job, it's great, and you should go for it. But other than that, I think, it's- It's, it's fine to stay where you are and, and just stack sets and, and, and, and learn about Bitcoin and s- and spread, spread the adoption wave" }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "25:09", "start": 1508.94, "text": "Yeah, and it's also fair to say, it's kind of like the question of, do you go work for a large established company or do you work for this scrappy startup? Because in that scrappy startup You, they might not be able to pay you as well, just being honest, right? Like you might earn more in a big established job versus in that scrappy startup, but maybe there's a little bit more, you have like some equity or there's some other thing that you're getting out of that. So maybe it's sort of like that, if you are working in, let's say, a, a traditional fiat job versus going to work in the industry per se, in the Bitcoin industry." }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "25:42", "start": 1542.32, "text": "Well, the, the sure thing is that Bitcoin will help you always, wherever you In a fiat job, and maybe you look for a way how to escape, you should start stacking SATs, and maybe in a few years you will be, wealthy enough or independent to actually start something for yourself or, or just move without, without threatening, finan-financial situation of your family. So it's, it's a, it's a long run, right? And that's something what Bitcoin teaches us to, to lower our time pressure Friends and, and, and be more, think, think more about our" }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "26:24", "start": 1584.29, "text": "long term future. Yeah. And I'm also, it is also a useful thing when people go to Bitcoin events, they have a chance to find a Bitcoin job, right? Because they might make a connection or they may be looking to hire. Maybe they have a Bitcoin company and they're looking for Bitcoiners to hire because they want someone who already knows kind of the ethos and the, the technical jargon and the aspects of the industry. so I guess there's different components To that, because sometimes people wanna hire a bitcoiner and they would rather train them up on whatever other technical things, or if they find the, the perfect candidate who's like a bitcoiner in the specialty that they want, that's obviously ideal. Or in other cases, maybe they have to hire someone who has like the technical specialty and they kinda have to coach them the bitcoin aspects." }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "27:09", "start": 1629.04, "text": "Definitely. I can, I can tell from, from my part, we are hiring only bitcoiners to our company, and I have dozens Of success stories, people who came to BTC Prague or our previous conference, ChainCamp, and now they are working full time in Bitcoin, because most of the Bitcoin companies, they rather, teach the, the, the missing skill, rather than teach people about Bitcoin. The Bitcoiners are just like different kind of creatures and, and they, if, if they get the job, they can learn anything else, but teaching someone Bitcoin takes a long, long time and companies, Just can't afford it." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "27:57", "start": 1676.92, "text": "Yeah, interesting, because it's like there is an element of culture, understanding, mindset, some of these shifts that are, let's say, unusual in the Gen Pop population, that are sort of typical in the Bitcoin world. maybe that's also because it's, it is still early in one sense, right? It is early in the sense that the people who would work in this industry or the people who would really go hard Early, that's a special kind of person, and at over-obviously over time as Bitcoin grows, then that selection effect will go away, right? Because they'll just become more and more like the normies." }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "28:34", "start": 1714.36, "text": "Well, who knows when the, where, where the ecosystem will, will lead us, but yeah, perhaps you're right." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "28:44", "start": 1723.86, "text": "Okay, so, Let's talk a little bit about what's happening in the Czech Republic. So, I think, the big one, or at least the kind of noteworthy one, was that a central banker from the Czech National Bank Is came out and said, \"We're gonna actually consider holding Bitcoin on the balance sheet.\" I'm curious your reaction on that." }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "29:06", "start": 1746.24, "text": "Yeah, well, it was surprising, to be honest. Aleš Michal, the governor of Czech National Bank, he, he," }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "29:17", "start": 1756.6, "text": "he used to be, he used to be an investor banker, used to run funds. So He likes profits, so in this sense, it's not surprising, but hearing something like this from, from Czech National Bank, of course, it, it surprised the whole, Czech and, and even the, the, The global Bitcoin community, and, it will probably, it will probably happen. So now they bought just a little tiny piece of Bitcoin to, so-so-called test how is it performing? because right after, Alex Michel announced that, there was a statement from, Christine Lagarde, from, from, from Brussels, and, and she said that no- To check people, check, our Czech friends, they will, they will never, buy this very risky asset, yeah? So it's funny how, how, how is, how is it playing out and, and for, for me personally, it, it, it only confirms the the game theory, and we are very lucky in Czech Republic that we don't have euro, especially now with even, the, the ECB launching the digital, the, the CBDC, the central bank digital currency, for, for euro. So we are, we will be stacking sats, and we will be, we ha-- we are having very friendly, Bitcoin, rules, new legisla-- new legis- Legislative and, and, and we don't, we don't have the, the CBDC in Czech Republic, so I guess, Prague and Czech Republic will be really a hub for Bitcoin and, with, with the strong individualist and, anarcho-capitalistic and libertarian roots from the communist era, I think, I feel really hopeful to be, to be honest with you, I feel Hope, more hopeful than five years ago when I was actually thinking and living abroad and thinking if I would ever, choose Czech Republic as my, as my home country, and now I feel proud, finally, and I, I've never been nationalistic, so it's, it, it's really good and, and you can feel it, through the whole Bitcoin community that even though it's kind of, it's not a really grassroots movement, it's, it, it, it, it sounds good and it gives people, something to be, to be proud of." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "32:04", "start": 1924.5, "text": "The lead sponsor of this show is Bold, the best place to buy, sell and save Bitcoin. For listeners in the US, Bold lets you secure your financial future with complete peace of mind by integrating a low fee Bitcoin only brokerage with next gen multisig vaults. With Bold, you can smash buy Bitcoin or set a DCA plan for only zero point nine nine percent fees and seamlessly deposit the Bitcoin direct to your Bold vault. The Bold Vault is a two or three collaborative multisig where you hold two keys and Bold holds one as a redundant backup protecting against loss or theft. You can use Trezor, Ledger or cold card hardware wallets to spin up a Bold Vault in just a few minutes, and the Bold Vault is the only collaborative custody vault available with zero monthly fees. They're also offering zero fees on your first ten thousand dollars of Bitcoin buys and twenty five dollars of free Bitcoin when you buy a hundred dollars of Bitcoin or more. Try Bold today and upgrade your stacking experience over a Getbold dot io. And now back to the show. Yeah, I find it fascinating because this is arguably the-- In, you could argue that Bitcoin is designed to take away this, you know, money from the state and the central bank in most countries is quite literally one of the instruments implementing the state's monetary control. And so it is so, let's say, paradoxical and kind of- kind of a real curveball, let's say, that the central bank is actually thinking about it. And it is interesting because central banks hold reserves, right? Historically, they hold foreign currency, they hold gold reserves, and now the, this question of- Would and could central banks actually hold Bitcoin as part of their reserve? And I think I could understand people might be conflicted on one sense, right? Because if you're a libertarian, you might be like, \"Hey, I don't want the state to hold Bitcoin.\" and so- On one angle, you could say, \"Well, it's more like we're-- you're just neutrally recognizing, and if they are just neutrally recognizing it on their own, and you can't stop them hot-buying Bitcoin, well, okay.\" now, I guess as a libertarian, I guess you have, you have, I guess, three main stances, right? You could sort of be like, \"Okay, you support them doing it,\" maybe, maybe you wouldn't, or maybe you would, because you think for some other reason it's gonna bring about" }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "34:24", "start": 2063.69, "text": "Bitcoin. so I guess that's, yeah, but I mean, we will see what happens, whether, whether they actually do end up buying a serious amount of Bitcoin and what they do with it." }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "34:35", "start": 2075.3, "text": "Yeah, well, I think that the reason why, there are people who are fond of Bitcoin even in central bank is, the history and because, the, the Austrian economics has been really rooted in, in- Check, banking system, and there are many Austrian economists in the central banks, so there are still people, they're not stupid, and they play with the cards they have. So now it's just, I think that the big question is, to let them, to do this research and, and, and talk to the big boss in a central, in the European Central Bank, because, I think that we as a nor-normal people, we don't really know what is happening behind the curtains and, what are the big rules, And, and, and how, how they can overcome the, the hands, and of the puppet" }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "35:40", "start": 2139.81, "text": "masters. And I think the other interesting question is If, you know, if we are just trying to, you know, a bunch of, we're all fans of Bitcoin here, we all think Bitcoin is good, so obviously we think it's a good asset, and it might make sense, in a loose sense, to say The assets, the banking system is, at least in the fiat fractional reserve world, it is, it to some extent, backstopped by the reserves held by the central bank. And I guess if you are looking at a comparative analysis, so not endorsing or disendorsing or whatever, but the idea is, let's say you've got one fiat system that's fully fiat, there's no-- and the central bank holds zero reserves versus another system, and that central bank actually does hold maybe some gold, and they hold some Bitcoin, and just- Objectively speaking, which, which banking system is more fragile? Well, the one with zero reserves, right? The one with at least something, there's at least a conceivable way in which people can be made whole if a bank fails. So there is an interesting, I guess kind of economic aspect to it and a reason why it might actually make sense for them to do it from their perspective. Of course, I think the principled libertarian view is, you know, abolish the central bank, but, so long as it's going to exist, then people inside the bank- You can, you can understand why they would, they would see it as something to hold, I guess. Yeah," }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "37:05", "start": 2225.45, "text": "yeah, yeah, definitely. And this, this news, came after our president, signed the new law, w- Where he granted, a time, and, and value tax thresholds for individuals. So that means that, the hodlers don't have to pay tax after three years of holding Bitcoin. This is, this is big, yeah. And he also granted the, the corporate account rights, the, the, the right to have bank account, if you are dealing with cryptocurrency as a company. So I think that it's just a next- Next step for, Czech Republic, being, being so smart, to actually do this to attract outside investors and first and foremost not lose the Bitcoiners because they're like with, with, with, like now, now it's not very difficult to move away, yeah? If you, if you want, you can, you can acquire new passports and you can, you can pretty much live any, anywhere in, in the world So, the, the states who do these steps before the, the others will benefit greatly, and I think that the, the leadership of Czech Republic recognized this because they had time for this. Czech Republic has been leading the Bitcoin, development since the very beginning, yeah? We had the, the first, mining pool, slash pool, now brains pool since two thousand and ten, then the first ever hard- Where, wallet, Trezor, two thousand twelve, with Bip thirty nine, then, General Bytes, the, the biggest eight Bitcoin ATM manufacturer, is also based in Prague and other companies, and they all have been, advocating for some changes to, to, to be able to stay in check and be competitive. so it, it wasn't like that, like from, from outside, you can- You can think that it just happened, but it, it took, it took few people, at least like three years of really hard work to make, make this little change, happening. And I was there when, when those people met for the first time and they, they put those, little notes, those bullet points on the piece of paper, and, I couldn't believe, if you ask me, if, if, if I, if I- Think that it's possible, I would tell you no, this is just like you, you are wasting your time. And, and suddenly after three years, it happened and, and, and it's amazing how, how, Czech Republic is really leading the way in Europe." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "40:01", "start": 2401.4, "text": "Yeah, that's fascinating that, there's no capital gains after holding for three years, because it really enables now if you are a long-term holder. I mean, a common thing people are doing is they're borrowing against their coins in many other jurisdictions because they don't wanna pay capital gains tax. Now, it might still make sense to do it even without capital gains tax, but I guess it's-- it, that was, that's one of the reasons, but I guess, now it's, it seems like they are, let's say, opening the doors for Bitcoin companies in a way, especially the corporate bank accounts thing. So in the US conversation, there's the whole Operation Chokepoint two point oh, which I think the Trump administration is moving against that, they've said that. I'm curious, do you think this was a similar thing, y-y-you know, the, the Czech equivalent of granting the possibility for corporate bank accounts?" }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "40:55", "start": 2454.73, "text": "Well, I, I, I'm, I'm not a lawyer, I don't think I can, I can give you a really, educated answer on this, and we will probably still need to wait a little bit longer. if we see that those foreign banks are respecting this Czech law, because it's still very fresh, so perhaps in, in six months or a year, we will see how, how big difference this law, really brought." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "41:30", "start": 2489.76, "text": "Yeah, okay. well, yeah, so let's, close up then. Let's talk a bit about, you know, kind of the details. What are the dates? What can people, look forward to, with BTC Prague?" }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "41:43", "start": 2503.32, "text": "Yeah, for sure. So the dates are, 19th to 21st June. If you want to come, the early, there's a DevHack Day for all those, geeky, techie, curious minds. It's a, it's a conference on its own. So it's a 40-long conference, almost ten thousand people, two hundred speakers from all, all the, all over the world, hundred plus companies in the expo hall. we explore topics like money Freedom, technology, open source technology and, and community, so everyone can find, what they like. And the conference itself is, is big, it's the biggest Bitcoin conference in Europe. So, the, I would say that the umbrella, of, of the, of the whole European Bitcoin community. And if you manage to bring any newbies with you, you can be sure that they just fall right into the rabbit hole. they get the conviction, they get all the basic information, and you, if you are a newbie or seasonal Bitcoiner, you will always get, something what you can leverage for yourself. So, this year, two thousand twenty-five is the year of Bitcoin, and we are making a history here. so, I would love to, just invite everyone to come, enjoy the great- Cultural, conference. It's not only about money, it's really about, building relationships, making new friendships, learning how to be, healthy individual, family, how to take your sovereignty into your own hands, how to be responsible and how to keep the values so we create the future we, we want. We aren't, we are exiting this experiment, of fiat- And, we are moving to new age where everyone needs to be responsible for their own life. So if you are one of this person, I think the BTC Pro is exactly the place for you." }, { "speaker": "stephan", "time": "43:56", "start": 2635.72, "text": "Excellent. Well, yeah, listeners, links will be in the show notes, btcprague dot com, I believe co- we have code Livera as well for listeners, to get a discount there. And, yeah, otherwise, thanks for joining me, and I look forward to seeing you in June." }, { "speaker": "matyas_kuchar", "time": "44:09", "start": 2648.98, "text": "Yeah, thanks Stefan for inviting. It's always pleasure to, to talk to you because most of the time you are just whispering to my, to my ear on, on my daily, dog walks." } ] }