14th January 2022 > > House of Lords.
tl;dr
The House of Lords and why they are a force for good.
Market Snap (at time of writing)
Market Wrap
Perpetual futures funding rates have turned negative, suggesting that leveraged shorts are getting a little over excited. This increases the probability of a short squeeze higher if we get some positive price action news. If you know anyone who is currently short through futures, you should advise them to carefully weigh the pros and cons of such a position.
Curious Cryptos’ Occasional Series – Political hypocrisy
The CCC has always maintained an entirely apolitical stance.
The CCC has often poked fun at politician’s hypocrisy, regardless of their political affiliations.
But it is easy to do that. It isn’t particularly clever, or particularly original to do so.
I do it because I do get upset at the political elite’s sense of entitlement.
If ordinary people like us pay your wages, you should listen to us.
For clarity, readers of the CCC will have to continue to endure this peculiar frustration of mine. Sorry, that is just the way it is.
…
It is even easier to point the finger of hypocrisy at the ruling party.
Perhaps I have fallen into that trap, and I have been more prone to point out the failures of the Conservative Party rather than the Labour Party. But please do not assume – as some people clearly do – that this means I am a Labour supporter.
My personal political affiliations are between me and the ballot box, and long may that continue (spoiler alert: unlikely to be the Communist Party of Great Britain.)
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We are now in an extraordinary position of extreme political hypocrisy, with two Downing Street parties the night before the Queen was photo’d sitting alone at her husband’s funeral, an image that resonates with everyone except for revolutionary republicans, whose opinions can be safely ignored.
I can find no better description than this one from Allister Heath of the Telegraph:
“Boris was put in power to confront the elites but he did nothing of the sort. His voters are seething at his broken promises, his massive tax increases, his inability to gain control of the borders, his failure to tackle crime, his apparent unwillingness to leverage Brexit to truly change Britain, his lack of interest in economics, entrepreneurship and the cost of living, and his failure to prevent the woke revolutionaries from taking over every British institution and workplace.”
Who knew that voting for BJ would give us JC max?
Curious Cryptos’ Commentary – House of Lords
The Lords Economic Affairs Committee have been contemplating the UK government’s plan to introduce their own Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC), nicknamed “Britcoin”.
As a very quick reminder the CCC has in the past taken a strong stance against CBDCs.
The first and most relevant criticism is that CBDCs are not, and never will be, cryptos in any sense of the word. However, most commentators are too lazy to understand this fact, and it does rather suit governments around the globe to convince people otherwise.
That is my philosophical objection to CBDCs, and in a better world, that would mean the exclusion of any mention of this subject from the CCC.
On a practical level, my concerns reflect what should be the concerns of any right-minded citizen.
CBDCs will give unprecedented control to governments over what we earn, and what we spend our earnings on. It will give governments unprecedented access to our life choices, to our detriment.
It will allow governments to legitimise stealing from our own pockets, in addition to the outrageous and egregious tax demands they have already forced upon us.
Now it seems I have an unlikely ally in the aforementioned Economic Affairs Committee.
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Here are some choice quotes from this committee that have been widely reported in the mainstream broadsheet press:
“No convincing case for digital Bank of England currency”.
“… the introduction of a UK CBDC would have far-reaching consequences for households, businesses, and the monetary system for decades to come and may pose significant risks depending on how it is designed.”
“These risks include state surveillance of people’s spending choices, financial instability as people convert bank deposits to CBDC during periods of economic stress, an increase in central bank power without sufficient scrutiny, and the creation of a centralised point of failure that would be a target for hostile nation state or criminal actors.”
“While a CBDC may provide some advantages, it could present significant challenges for financial stability and the protection of privacy.”
And most pleasingly of all, despite testimony from such august figures as BoE Governor Andrew Bailey and his deputy Sir John Cunliffe, and other members of the UK’s bureaucratic elite, the peers stated that “none of the witnesses who came before it were able to make a convincing case for why the UK needs a retail central bank digital currency.”
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Who said the House of Lords is past its sell-by date?
This is truly independent and innovative thinking that breaks the standard groupthink that dominates discourse of all subject matters in all state sponsored bodies.
Reserve Treasury Protocols (before they all go to zero)
Reminder – Olympus and Wonderland are, to the best of my knowledge, live viable projects. XEUS, FORT and JADE turned out to be scams, though they are still live scams. Scams are not uncommon in these Wild West fringes of Decentralised Finance (DeFi).
Photon appears to have won the prize for being the most extraordinary scam. In under 18 hours it went to zero. An`d as far as I can tell – and I am no blockchain analytics expert – they walked away with less than $30k.
It is very upsetting we have scumbags like that around.
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