Source: Bitcoin Magazine; Translated by: Wuzhu, Golden Finance

Michael Sailer, you are forced to realize that all store of value assets are defective and force you to focus on the only assets that are not defective. This does not mean that you are immune to the situation in the medium of transactions. When you look at the real estate market from one perspective, you will find how huge it is, and how scary it is from another perspective. But if you're going through pain that forces you to maintain your billions of dollars in purchasing power, housing is a great tool.

Your obsession with SoV is completely off the mark. The biggest aspect of Bitcoin is the medium of transaction. Although fiat currency systems increasingly separate the functions of currency, this does not mean it should do so. I understand that saying Bitcoin is a medium of transaction is to stab the hornet's nest, and all other currency lords will try to stop Bitcoin. It would be great if they join rather than fight it. This will convince all billionaires that they can put money into it, but just using bitcoin to store value is attacking it. This method will turn it into digital gold 2.0, and be captured.

No media of transactions will have no store of value! The medium of transaction is the first priority. You receive the transaction and then store the Bitcoin. If store of value is the point, imagine announcing that you lost the key to the Bitcoin stack – you can still store it perfectly, but without the medium of transaction functionality, the market will erase the fictitious fiat value of the top layer. This value is precisely because it can be liquid and can still be used as a medium of transactions.

Oxygen tanks are crucial for reserve, but breathing is more important. Store of value is secondary and depends on trading capabilities. Without trading capabilities, store of value is meaningless. Michael, you experience this firsthand when your million dollar assets in Argentina are diluted 90%. You strive to preserve value not because you did not foresee it, but because you cannot use it as a medium of transaction. Indeed, a bad store of value can weaken the medium of transactions, but why does the latter take precedence? Because trading ability is the key to making you react.

The majority of people who have been exposed to Bitcoin so far know the charts of Jesse Meyers you promote. You claim there is no better idea than a $900 trillion clean value store, and then immediately call Bitcoin one of the most liquid markets in the world, running around the clock. Guess what? Liquidity means the medium of trading.

Now, let's break down Jesse's charts and start with the real estate market. It is worth $330 trillion, but it is a very poor medium of transactions, with transactions of just $1.3 trillion a year. Regulations and taxes make real estate transactions more difficult. Nevertheless, as it is more than 100 times better as a means of value storage, billionaires are favoring it, increasingly dominating the market and excluding the younger generation.

The house may be valuable, but its value growsNot only from itself, but also from its connection to nearby utilities. Build a road to it and the value will rise. Add a supermarket or gas station, or connect it to the grid, and the value will rise again. The network creates opportunities for energy flowing into the region, increasing the opportunity to convert energy into economic value (such as money). Therefore, transactions occurring in the network are factors that increase the value of a house. But I see the other side: If you're a billionaire and everyone is coveting your resources, you won't want to build a large network around your house. You will prioritize privacy. The house may depreciate, but the goal will turn to increase the cost of others reaching you, thus reducing the chances of being attacked.

What about the bond market? Bonds, as a store of value, are worth $300 trillion, traded annually, and new bonds are worth $25 trillion. This means that the value as a medium of exchange accounts for about 50% of its total value each year. It's better than a house in this sense, but the numbers still show that people use it primarily as a means of store of value.

The next is stocks. They are worth $115 trillion and traded at about $175 trillion. This shows that their advantages as media of transactions outweigh their store of value. Take MicroStrategy stock as an example – you know it better than anyone else. How much value did it store last year and how much value was traded through it?

The next two parts are interesting. The annual transaction volume in the art industry is very small and is not even shown on the chart. Meanwhile, the automotive and collectibles industry trades close to $4 trillion per year. This highlights how they are primarily seen as a store of value each year, but also reveals how poor the real estate market performs as a medium of transactions – even worse than the auto market.

Oh, gold! Gold enthusiasts fanaticly claim that gold has existed for more than 5,000 years, calling it the ultimate store of value, for whatever reason – but it only accounts for 1.78% of the store of value market. This shows that once its trading media role is deprived, it is easily captured and manipulated. Sorry, gold lovers, that elf will not return to the lights. Gold has a value of $16 trillion, and gold enthusiasts claim it can store $120 trillion in it. They were desperate to make a lot of money, but the market disagreed, believing that flawed fiat currency is ten times higher than shiny, lifeless rocks. So, is gold a better medium for trading? It trades at $54 trillion per year, and its media usage is 3.5 times its value store role driven by derivatives.

Currency may not be dominant in asset value storage, but it is the leading medium of trading to date. Other store of value assets cannot even compare with it. What if the US dollar (the top currency) becomes a means of store of value? It willDestroy the dollar network, and the value of non-U.S. assets will rise as non-U.S. assets intervene to meet demand. Over time, their store of value assets will rise, while dollar assets will plummet. The global currency total is about $120 trillion, but look at the trading volumes of top central banks: Fedwire is about $1,182 trillion, TARGET2 is about $765 trillion, CHAPS is about $145 trillion, and others (partially) is about $500 trillion (conservative estimates due to incomplete data). So while the store of value is $120 trillion (according to the Jesse chart), these networks have more than 20 times the utility of the media, about $2.5 trillion. What would the value of the transaction medium if 2 billion people without bank accounts were included? How many transactions will this trigger? What if microtransactions become possible?

Where is Bitcoin in all of this? The mainstream argument is to urge holders to never sell, positioning Bitcoin as a means of store of value. However, the market tells a different story. In 2024, Bitcoin’s market capitalization reached $2 trillion, while transactions on its first layer—the blockchain—have reached $3.4 trillion. Given the Lightning Network (though its exact figures remain elusive), the total could be close to $4 trillion. This shows that Bitcoin acts as a medium of transactions twice as much as its store of value function. So, what happens if the long-standing “forever holding” propaganda narrative begins to fade?

Bonds and stocks are financial "tools" that pretend to be money due to defects in fiat currencies. This created a market that prevented most people from protecting their wealth and further splitting the value store of money. But how inclusive are these tools? Or are they just tools to suck value from the statutory medium of transactions and direct it to the hands of privileged individuals, billionaires and others who need to hoard?

On a global scale, only 10-20% of people are exposed to bonds, mainly through pensions or investment funds, rather than direct contact. For stocks, 15-25% of the population can be accessed. This means that up to 80% of humans do not have these tools to protect themselves and make them vulnerable to exploitation. Separating the store of value from the medium of transactions will form a dynamic between the extractor and the extractor. This amplifies the “Cantillion effect”: those who can print the media of transactions buy store of value assets, marginalizing 80% or more. It is a feedback loop that weakens the system and widens the gap between the rich and the poor. The more money is printed, the weaker the value store of money will be.

Another very important part of the entire system is the cost. Sending USD through the banking system requires a fee, which is a service, but how much is the fee when you want to convert from a medium of transactions to a store of value tool? Much more. This isSo much friction is created throughout the system and it is causing the poor to not store their value. At this time, the trading medium is increasingly becoming a extraction medium rather than a trading medium. This is also why the store of value cases are more attractive in statutory systems.

Bitcoin doesn't pretend to be money like anything else; it's the first artificial currency that won't corrode and not discriminate like melted ice. It is the money for those who choose it. Since there is no printer, no one wants to trade it for a "better" store of value—no second best. Even people without Bitcoin can use it to shape the life they want. Instead of chasing money to store something, they build anything on the basis of Bitcoin that can enrich their lives.

The most important idea is not to store value, but to transfer value. But to transfer value, you first need to store some. Again, to store some, someone needs to transfer some of them as you do first. This is why the rich prefer assets that don’t lose like melted ice. Meanwhile, those who are just starting their careers focus more on getting value than storing what they don’t have.

Why does the store of value cause so much attention? One reason may be the efforts involved. With a store of value, you can buy and hold—no work required to improve your life. With a medium of transactions, you must work hard to increase your savings and convince others to pay for your goods or services in Bitcoin. Another factor: For most people, their fiat portfolio still outweighs their Bitcoin portfolio. They will only consider using it to improve their lives if Bitcoin exceeds their fiat holdings. This transformation is not difficult for most of the world's population that lacks savings or assets. This may explain why the current system refuses to let them exit, but instead drives dependencies by providing Bitcoin custody - exchanging one dependency for another.

Even rigidity is related to the need for more transaction media. Michael, you strongly support rigidity, but if Bitcoin is not used to reach more people, you are just dragging it down. Unlike you, the United States knows that to make the dollar a world reserve currency, they have to distribute it widely to lock in the network effect. They believe that the network is key to rigidity and that it can easily work due to the low cost of printing and sharing bills. For Bitcoin, its absolute scarcity requires a balance of the amount of propagation and storage. That doesn't mean you shouldn't spend a penny, though.

The metaphor of storing fat in the body is the key to long-term survival. Yes, but it ignores the need for a steady income of food to sustain life before storing fat. Without income, there is nothing to store - so transactions come first. However, for someone who is not worried about hunger, the focus shifts to storing food to prevent spoilage. I've always emphasized this to emphasize your bias towards store of value, which can distort your judgment and mislead others.

In my BitcoinAt this stage of the journey, I am sure of this: chasing money will corrupt you. Bitcoin changes that—it stops you from pursuing money endlessly, allowing you to live the life you want with it. What happens when you have enough of what you want? Then what? With Bitcoin, it's entirely possible that every bitcoin user should be prepared for the answer to this situation. However, chasing money is a bottomless pit that you can't fill. The Bible says that greed for money is the source of all evil. I agree, but how does it work? What is the mechanism? Chasing money – making it a priority and making other things secondary – is a mechanism.

You are not building Bitcoin standards-you are stacking up a deck of cards. Just like gold in the past, this time you are hoarding Bitcoin from individuals and institutions to further consolidate the statutory standards. Sail, you are not attacking the dollar as some people think – you are supporting it by boosting your stock and its ecosystem. Instead, you speculatively hit those who fund your purchase of Bitcoin. Not only do you hurt them; by strengthening the dollar, you also aggravate the pain of other currencies holders. Hoard Bitcoin under the gaze of the whole world? This is not an online city—it is a closed estate funded with their own money.

I wonder if people are willing to invest their bitcoin in your securities. How many people will actually do this? I'm sure that true Bitcoin extremists won't swap their perfect store of value assets for fiat "tools". Ask yourself: At this point, would you buy Apple stock with your Bitcoin? After all, you did invest in them before. It makes no sense – I give you bitcoin just to make you turn it into something legal, pay statutory fees, support statutory custodians and third parties, just to make you buy bitcoin again on the other end.

In the end, I have no proof, but I'm pretty sure you already know everything I've said in this post/information. While this is written for you, Michael, it is aimed at those who see you as the new Bitcoin Jesus, who blindly follow you without questioning your behavior. They make reckless bets in their lives—those bets that may turn their bitcoin into vanish—lack of the financial security and interest rates you have. The message they convey does not apply to most people.

Bitcoin is not just another asset or financial instrument—it is a borderless, licenseless currency. Treating it otherwise reduces its true value. Storing it alone will not bring freedom. Let Sats flow build a network. Let Sats flow promote cooperation and create a better future together. Let Sats flow strengthen the ecosystem. Save some for tomorrow, but don't be the richest people in the grave - save them as a plan to continue using them later.