What caught my eye this week.
With the price of Bitcoin surpassing $120,000 and US regulators doing some very crypto-friendly regulating, the digital tokens look on the cusp of becoming fully institutional.
For good or ill, I’ll add – and not just because most of you remain sceptical.
My own feelings over the past decade have gone from somewhat cautious to cautiously accepting. Of Bitcoin, I should stress. Not of the thousands of other ephemeral digital tokens that bloom and die like so many bluebottles above a rubbish dump.1
Yet even as only a soft believer, it’s hard not to be concerned that once again the UK has failed to keep up with the US. This despite us having had a far more advanced fintech ecosystem a decade ago.
In just this week’s news from across The Pond:
- BlackRock’s Bitcoin ETF became the fastest-ever to hit $80bn in assets
- US crypto firms are looking to secure banking licenses, the Financial Times reports
- Polymarket is the latest in a string of crypto-adjacent outfits who’ve seen legal probes dropped by the Trump administration
- Crypto giant Grayscale has filed to go public…
- …and no wonder, when another, Circle Internet, is now valued at more than $50bn – having multiplied six-fold since its IPO less than two months ago
It looks pretty frothy for sure, but who knows? People said the same thing when Bitcoin first breached $10,000 in 2017 and again when screenshots of apes sold for $3m in 2021.
And yet here we in 2025, with the bubble/revolution going stronger than ever.
Slowly does it on British Bitcoin ETFs
Again for good or ill, here in the UK things are spectacularly less vibrant.
The FCA announced in early June that it proposed to lift the ban on crypto exchange-traded products for retail investors. That would pave the way for holding Bitcoin assets in your ISA or SIPP – instead of having to invest in sub-optimal proxies such as the US Bitcoin hoarding company Strategy, or one of the herd of emerging and even more over-valued UK copycats.
However I’ve yet to see a date for when the FCA will do this. Some have speculated 2026.
Why such a long delay? Bitcoin ETFs have been available in the US for 18 months and they already hold over $100bn in assets. What is the FCA going to learn that the US doesn’t know between now and 2026?
I appreciate crypto might be unpalatable to regulators – and many Monevator readers – but if you’re going to do it, get on with it.
This isn’t the sleepy 1970s anymore.
They boom, we bust
Elsewhere, the once-promising UK crypto platform Ziglu has gone into administration.
Coin Telegraph reports:
Thousands of savers face the grim prospect of losing their investments after administrators uncovered a two million pounds ($2.7 million) shortfall at Ziglu, a British cryptocurrency fintech that collapsed earlier this year.
Ziglu customers aren’t the only ones with sad faces. I was one of thousands of small investors who together invested millions when Ziglu crowdfunded on Seedrs a few years ago.
Like most such failures, it looks a terrible investment in hindsight. But at the time there was lots to be hopeful about.
Ziglu was the brainchild of Mark Hipperson, a co-founder of already-successful startup Starling Bank. Its customer count was quadrupling year-over-year by 2021. Even after crypto retraced thereafter, an acquisition of Ziglu was agreed with the US fintech giant Robin Hood.
Alas the takeover collapsed following the 2022 downturn. And so here we are.
Talking of Robin Hood, that 12-year old company is now valued at $93bn!
Sadly the UK equivalent – Freetrade – was sold to IG Group for £160m in January.
A reach for the stars
Perhaps it’s not surprising that the UK fintech winners – including the self same Starling, incidentally – are mulling US stock market listings. It would be yet another blow for UK markets.
Going by the comments on TA’s Revolut review this week, some readers seem to think the likes of Revolut and Monzo are still fly-by-nights in the Ziglu mould.
This is far from the case.
With 12 million customers, Monzo recently raised funds at a valuation of around $5bn and it’s reportedly on-track for a £6bn IPO. (Disclosure: I’m a Monzo shareholder).
And with more than 50m customers, Revolut recently raised money from Schroders at a $48bn valuation.
Such numbers dwarf the equivalents at most investing-only platforms.
To me, the idea that these UK-founded growth stars aren’t automatically looking at an LSE-listing is yet another inditement of how far Britain has fallen since 2016 .
This increasingly-endemic national lack of dynamism will hurt us all.
I know I’m a stuck record on this and it’s not joyous reading. I’m generally an optimistic person and the first ten years of this blog’s life reflected that. I can only call it as I see it.
I did have high hopes this time last year, but so far there’s been little acknowledgement of why we’re in this state, and only pointless conflicts as we fiddle around the margins.
At least the FTSE 100 is hitting all-time highs. Perhaps that’ll spark something.
Personally I just see an ongoing liquidation sale. The family silver being sold to US private equity at a 30% discount.
Still, up is up. And we can all make decisions to improve our own financial situation, whatever the backdrop. Being naughtily active, I’ve been overweight the UK for a couple of years now, simply on account of the value on offer.
This isn’t contradictory. The grim environment is exactly what creates the downbeat pricing and attracts the takeout offers.
My new side, side-hustle: a London property newsletter
Finally and on a completely different note, a quick plug for a new hobby of mine that will interest most of you even less than Bitcoin.
I’ve started a new London-focussed property newsletter – Propegator – over on SubStack.
Propegator is Weekend Reading but for houses. It’s London-centred because I live here, not because I’m a member of the metropolitan elite. And while I won’t totally ignore the reality of Britain’s broken property market, I will lean into a property pornographer’s take on the loveliest listings.
Which is to say: this will not be home-from-home for the frugalistas among you.
What can I say? In the two decades of pushing my nose up against the glass before I finally bought my own flat, I became a property addict. Call it Stockholm Syndrome.
Also, in another life I’d have been an architect. (How’s that for a post-FIRE aspiration?)
I guess I outed myself with my South Kensington speculations the other week anyway.
Like and subscribe
About a quarter of Monevator readers live in and around the capital. Hence why I’m flagging this property newsletter here. I hope some of you enjoy it and subscribe.
Propegator won’t grow into a Monevator 2.0. It’s more that I read so many stories to compile these links each week that I hope I can almost bolt on another almost effortlessly.
Well, that and a newsletter helps me justify all the time I spend on The Modern House.
Have a great weekend.
From Monevator
Is Revolut good for investing? – Monevator
Discretionary trusts: cautious optimism – Monevator [Mogul members]
From the archive-ator: Keep it simple, stupid – Monevator
News
Inflation jumps to 3.6% on fuel and food price pressures – Sky
Savers to be targeted with offers to buy shares under Reeves’ new plans – BBC
Number of UK job hunters rises at fastest rate since pandemic – Guardian
Homes for sale at seven year high as landlords flood the market – This Is Money
New ‘buy now, pay later’ affordability checks to cover even the smallest loans – Guardian
Renters could end up £340,000 worse off than homeowners over 30 years – This Is Money
The 60/40 portfolio: a 150-year stress test [US but relevant] – Morningstar
Products and services
Strangely, the best fixed-rate mortgage deals have gotten cheaper… – This Is Money
…even as Best Buy fixed-rate savings deals rates edge up – Which
Six tricks to turbocharge your Boots Advantage card points – This Is Money
Get up to £2,000 when you switch to an Interactive Investor SIPP. Terms and fees apply. – Interactive Investor
How to get £175 by switching bank account to Barclays – Be Clever With Your Cash
Key features of the Renter’s Rights Bill [Advertorial, but worth a read] – Standard
Get up to £100 as a welcome bonus when you open a new account with InvestEngine via our link. (Minimum deposit of £100, T&Cs apply. Capital at risk) – InvestEngine
Anger over Santander charging for ‘forever free’ business accounts – Guardian
How to save money at Waitrose – Be Clever With Your Cash
Why aren’t more firms signed up to the Death Notification Service? – Which
Homes for sale for summer entertaining, in pictures – Guardian
Comment and opinion
What Reeves’ Mansion House speech means for savers and homebuyers – Which
How large are global financial assets? [Free to read, infographic] – FT
The death of the Amex lounge – Of Dollars and Data
Let’s be honest, £50,000 is no longer a decent salary… – Standard
…oh heck, nor is £100,000 in London apparently – Standard [Again]
Gen Z trades stocks the same way it gambles – Sherwood
Bring the noise – Behavioural Investment
UK house prices are more affordable than 20 years ago – This Is Money
Staying sober in a world without commercial breaks – Root of All
Is this the worst decade ever for bonds? [US but relevant] – A Wealth of Common Sense
What you see is all there is – Klement on Investing
The hidden cost of index replication – Larry Swedroe
Is it worth determining your personal rate of inflation? – Simple Living in Somerset
Stock and ETF tokenisation mini-special
Top advisor predicts tokenised stocks will replace ETFs by 2030… – Investment News
…or maybe not. Innovations take time to earn staying power – Humble Dollar
Naughty corner: Active antics
Value: that was then, this is now [PDF] – GMO
What London’s listed PE stocks tell us about private equity – Verdad
Bad bet: on picking active funds – Morningstar
Volatility is a reliable and convenient proxy for downside risk – Alpha Architect
Good holding companies are more effective allocators than VCs – Investing 101
Omaze house lottery mini-special
Inside the wild phenomenon of house lotteries – Independent
Omaze bids to end planning saga at £6m home – BBC
Kindle book bargains
The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell – £0.99 on Kindle
Chip War: The Fight for the World’s Most Critical Technology by Chris Miller – £0.99 on Kindle
The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon by Brad Stone – £0.99 on Kindle
Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown – £1.99 on Kindle
Or pick up one of the all-time great investing classics – Monevator store
UK environmental factors mini-special
Extreme weather is the UK’s new normal, says Met Office – BBC
In some UK woodlands, every young tree has died – Guardian
UK sea levels rising faster than global average, study finds [Paywall] – FT
Sheep are destroying precious British habitats, and taxpayers are footing the bill – Guardian
Cranes are back in Scotland after 500 years – STV News
Robot overlord roundup
AI is coming for middle management jobs, too – Independent
Anthropic launches Claude version for financial services – Venture Beat
Chain-of-thought is not explainability [Research, PDF] – via Alphaxiv
Worse than MechaHitler – Don’t Worry About The Vase
Some academics have been hiding AI prompts in their papers – Smithsonian
The labour market impact of generative artificial intelligence [Research] – SSRN
Not at the dinner table
A trip to the G7 horror show with Emmanuel Macro – Guardian
Jerome Powell and the authoritarian sirens of Odysseus – G.O.F.P.
The treason of the tech oligarchs – Liberal Currents
How magical thinking came for UK’s net zero critics [Paywall] – FT
Tinpot dictator chic: the Oval Office interior is going heavy on gold – Sherwood
X is now Elon’s personal propaganda platform – Tech Dirt
Trump’s Brazil sanctions are nakedly political and won’t fly anyway – Drezner’s World
Off our beat
The menagerie lurking in rural America – Slate
How well are developing countries, well, developing? – Noahpinion
Ten things learned from a decade of doing one thing – Darius Foroux
Homo crustaceous – Aeon
The other millennium dome: the comeback of Wales’ national garden – Guardian
Darth Vader’s lightsaber to go up for auction for an estimated £2.2m – Independent
And finally…
“Even when the playing field is level, the institutions are weak opponents and, as it happens, there are several areas where the small private investor actually has an advantage.”
– Jim Slater, Beyond the Zulu Principle
Like these links? Subscribe to get them every Saturday. Note this article includes affiliate links, such as from Amazon and Interactive Investor.
- For what it’s worth, like most pundits I think Ethereum and perhaps Solana have a future, and a few stablecoins look like they are going to make it. I have zero conviction about – and presently little interest in – everything else. [↩]
@TI,
Thanks for the shout out by the SLS link. I am intrigued as to how you might answer the question you pose?
Link to the substack pls? Have I missed it?
@Kript — Oh cripes, I ummed and ahhed about plugging it here and then forgot the link!
https://propegator.substack.com/p/weaving-a-dream-from-a-nightmare
I’ll have to add it as a p.s. to next weekend’s WR too.
Apologies for any confusion all.
Can I ask a really stupid question? Why on earth, other than the specific edge case of ISAs and SIPPs, does anybody need to buy crypto through an ETF? And pay more transaction fees and possibly tracking fees.
Crypto is trivially easy to buy it on the open market. Is the point averaging over crypto exchanges to minimise the risk of failure of one? Would a more rational approach be simply to take delivery and hold it in your own hardware wallet or printed on a piece of paper, suitably duplicated and spread out.
With things like gold there’s a decent case for ETFs because gold is a PITA to wrangle, stash etc etc and you can’t duplicate it so if one bar gets pinched you don’t have a doppelganger elsewhere, which when manifested disappears the bar the n’erdowell is speeding off with on his motorbike.
But crypto ETFs? WTAF is up with that?
There is, of course, the philosophical issue of holding it in a ISA anyway. Crypto suffers from the Warren Buffet critique of being non-procreative. I already feel bad about holding gold ETFs in an ISA, though perhaps not as bad as paying CGT on the unwrapped ones 😉 HODLing BTC in an ISA would double down on that.
It’s not like we have GBP cash ETFs. Perhaps money market funds are the closest equivalent, and if BTC ETFs were like Vanguard’s money market fund
then I’d get it, but the impression I get is a crypto ETF is just a proxy with extra fees and extra counterparty risk. What am I missing here?
I’m a bit baffled by this one. On one hand there’s a rush to get bitcoin approved for retail investors whilst on the other there’s a reference to retail bitcoin vehicles going bust. Secondly there’s a desire to get money invested in UK start ups whilst also encouraging directing investment into what appears to be useless computer code.
Looking at my forlorn UK Smaller Companies portfolio which I’ve held for well over 10 years, anything that can be done to help this sector would be appreciated…. Labour seem to be pretty short on ideas across the policy spectrum however.
Is the ETF route for crypto so that the ETF manager has responsibility to safeguard the asset and not us as individuals? I don’t have any crypto but if I did hold it directly I would be concerned someone could hack the system somehow and steal it.
I view crypto like I view commodities, and as a result I don’t hold any. This is probably a terrible error (certainly it is when backtested over 15 years), but I’m just not that interested in things that aren’t productive assets – I include gold in that, at least until I’m retired and want extra protection in my portfolio.
@ermine #4, I think for lots of people ETFs are superior. Holding your wallet physically or dealing with exchange counterparty risk requires and engagement with the crypto ecosystem that the average investor doesn’t want. Crypto ETFs solve that problem for you. My assumption is that compettiton will reduce the costs over time, if you could pay 5 basis points to buy a crypto ETF I think that’s worth it vs the risk that you might lose your wallet key or 25% of your investment if another exchange goes bust. At 1% it’s not worth it. Somewhere inbetween each person will make a different call!
As a middle manager, I’m increasingly realising that AI can do my job, and much better.
I regularly use it process my meeting transcripts to create meeting notes (excellent), and then ask how I could improve – and it’s a far better coach than I am. Unendingly patient, and drawing on the corpus of the entire business web.
The last piece of research and report writing I did took 4-5 hours using AI assist. Previously, it would have taken 2-3 weeks. The end result is the best report I’ve written, or co-written.
Mine is an unusual middle manager role in that it needs a lot of creative thinking and novel solution finding. Again, the AI has emerged over the last couple of years from being a rather vague and obvious intern to a profoundly useful thought companion.
As an early adopter in my company, I’ve realised that all I really have to do is supervise the AI and nursemaid it through some gaps in understanding of the context and help it get its outputs from one place to another. The new agentic features, although like watching baby take their first steps at the moment, will reduce both of those.
Thankfully (or not since I’m involved in AI strategy here) senior leadership are largely unaware or uninterested of its capabilities and the main body of staff (who are mostly curious but cautious) are swayed by a vocal minority who believe it’s utterly evil and must be stopped so I have a few more years before I retire to a comfortable armchair to be waited upon by a robot.
Kindle book – Chip War link now priced @ £6.99
@Al Cam — I don’t even run to a budget* so that will tell you need to know about my likelihood of calculating my personal inflation rate from ten years of receipts etc. 😉 But it was an interesting read and project! Quality work in that you accepted a different conclusion to your initial sense, too. (*This isn’t because I overspend obviously, new readers. I just save an outsized wodge and get by on what’s left, and for most of my life I was naturally more frugal though less so nowadays.)
@Ermine — Because that’s where most people’s money is (or should be). I have a nice seven-figures in tax shelters and a train fare to Edinburgh from London outside of it these days. (Okay, I exaggerate but relatively-speaking). Whether people should own crypto, what it amounts to etc is a fair debate, but I don’t see why a $2trillion asset class that’s got over $100bn in US ETFs is so toxic and obscure it can’t be in an ISA, especially when I can buy shares in a scammy African tinpot miner.
@Vic — Well those are your opinions. If the UK population had bought half of all that useless computer code 10+ years ago en masse we’d be a several hundreds of billions richer. As for the failures, the point is dynamism.
The UK is over-indexing on a heavy regulatory hand and weak outcomes (see for example Freetrade, which had to survive without the payment for order flow that fuelled Robin Hood’s early growth, and which has meaningfully hurt none of its customers and arguably just made markets more efficient.)
Plus we’re just retreating into timidity as a nation, scrapping over a bit of tax revenue as wages continue to fall behind, GDP flatlines, and now inflation curbs our spending power once again.
How many Ziglu-type failures are covered by one Robin Hood success story? I won’t do the maths but the number has many many zeroes in it. 🙂
@DrexL — That is arguably an advantage, yes, though there’d be the question of actually getting the money out of them in a massive failure. But yes, before Bitcoin ETFs hedge funds and the likes often held Strategy so it would have to handle the storage and security AIUI.
@SIMON B — Nobody *needs* to hold crypto in my view. But for Bitcoin — and again I stress I’m only really talking about that, I’m a maximalist in the lingo — I think it’s proving itself out as something that’s very likely to be with us indefinitely now. It has a use, but it’s not money or a productive asset, it’s more like (but not exactly like) gold, with the outside chance still that interesting stuff will be built upon it. (More likely to be Ethereum or Solana that sees that, and I don’t see the asset-like case there as half as strong, however ‘strong’ strong is…)
@all — Keep the comments coming! I’ll be on the road etc today though so may be some delay if any of your comments get stuck in moderation. Cheers!
@The Investor – I understand the argument that crypto should be viewed like gold, particularly as it’s not a productive asset, but correlations suggest people need to be cautious thinking that (https://www.lseg.com/en/ftse-russell/research/digital-assets-evolution-and-correlations-with-other-asset-classes). I’d rather hold equities with a yield in the risk on part of my portfolio. Anyone switching part of their gold allocation to bitcoin is not achieving what they intend… Anyway, I have always been a skeptic and I am happy to admit I’ve been wrong historically, but I remain a skeptic now!
@TI – architecture salary info below, it’s not what you think!
https://jobs.architecture.com/staticpages/10290/architects-salary-report/
The Don’t Worry About the Vase link- I’m not going to pretend I followed the technicalities of all of that but the principle is disturbing enough.
TI, if you’re looking for a post-FIRE aspiration, I’d look elsewhere than architecture! Low pay, high stress, and frustratingly bureaucratic…
My work affects the lives of thousands of people, literally life safety and fire safety, yet I’m paid 1/3 what a doctor or lawyer with the same years of experience does.
But don’t worry, the directors are spending thousands of pounds on AI consultants trying to work out how they can pay us even less. Honestly, it’s scary the bollocks ChatGPT or Google’s search AI comes up with on critical fire safety infrastructure…
I can’t remember where I read once that when you see a financial product advertised on the side of a bus, it’s time to divest. I’d say we’re still a couple of years away before the AI bubble bursts unfortunately. I’m not an AI sceptic, ChatGPT is a fun toy, but LLMs aren’t going to change the world any time soon.
@Larsen @DesignFire — Thanks for the info! But yes I know architects who fled the profession fearing penury… Hence ‘post-FIRE’ 😉
@Simon B — Again I’m only saying *Bitcoin* can be (sort of) treated like gold. Virtually all the others (see footnote) I’d treat like football album stickers.
(Sorry for brevity, on the move!)
As far as I can tell there is nothing special about Buttcoin compared to many other cryptocurrencies. They are all a waste of time. I’m sure Trump is just being paid lots of money to push it by vested interests.
I’m with @Simon B – I don’t see the need to hold Bitcoin. The main appeal seems to be that the price is going up.
I could see you might be able to trade the spread between Bitcoin and something else if you could trade cheap enough and it was liquid enough.
In a former life I traded money markets and FX for a living but crypto doesn’t appeal to me at all.
@Investor 10
Actually, there not “my opinions” but just pointing out the inconsistency in your argument. Something an editor would do. “Dynamism” comes at a cost as the many expensive mis-selling scandals have proved.
It’s also easy to rationalise post facto what good investments/policies are. The manufactured scarcity of bitcoin clearly has its fans. I don’t know enough about it to delineate bitcoin from all the other token coins available.
As someone tied up in the conveyancing process at the moment, I can’t help but think that surely AI and Blockchain should be doing most of the lifting. Obviously the legal community will resist this, but I do wonder how long it will take for this technology to remove ingrained vested interests.
The FCA – imho – seem to have an uncanny knack of ‘protecting the retail investor’ from ….making money.
They used the ‘no KID’ (key information document) line to stop me buying more xhr0 (a Deutschebank physical rhodium etf) right when the rhodium bull run started in 2018. Fortunately I had accumulated some. But now, I can’t participate next time.
And fortunately I still own some of the X trackers Ethereum etf I bought in 2017. But just when I planned to buy more of the BTC one during the 2020 low….the FCA banned that, and Hargreaves Landsdown stopped me buying it immediately – even before the FCA rule kicked in. I was apoplectic.
Anyway, in my fury I bought MSTR (microstrategy / strategy). Hey ho.
Stop protecting us. We don’t need it. I’m not an investment bank and I know I have no recourse to come to you for a bailout. I’ve lost 99% on a stock numerous times and likely will do again, but you don’t stop me buying those. Heck – the retail investors will be up and down on TSLA every other minute.
And to reintroduce the ability to purchase ETFs when you stopped us buying at $12k and now say ‘its fine’ at $120k?
Jokers.
Just to add to my last comment, in case any aspiring built environment professionals are reading this, despite my negativity, architecture and the built environment can be very rewarding industry to work in (though not necessarily financially rewarding), and I do enjoy what I do some of the time… I think part of the problem is working at a top London practice, like many careers in London, it’s a faster pace than elsewhere in the UK, and that isn’t necessarily a good thing for many.
The usual predictable comments from the crypto-hater crowd … I’m torn between irritation, amused eye-rolling and being glad that we’re “still early”.
@ermine like @TI, I don’t view SIPP and ISAs as “edge cases” for an asset that you’re only holding for investment purposes because you think there’s a chance of it dramatically increasing in value. Speaking as someone who went through the hassle of moving my SIPP from HL to IBKR (via the unloved Options Pensions, who have been OK so far actually) so that I could get qualified as a professional investor and invest in crypto ETFs, as well as cheaper US ETFs.
@TI you’ve covered two of my favourite topics today, bitcoin and the UK stock market doldrums. On the first one by the way, the FCA said they’d lift the ban on crypto ETPs as quickly as possible after the consultation period (which has finished) and 8 weeks after final rules were made – I’d expect Q3 this year.
On the stock market, I actually see it the other way around from your comment (splitting hairs as it’s clearly a vicious circle): “The grim environment is exactly what creates the downbeat pricing and attracts the takeout offers.” I think the low valuations (and nosebleed US valuations) are the cause of the huge reluctance to list in London and exodus to the US. If you can get paid more than your company is worth in NY and less than it’s worth in London, it’s a no brainer.
We are seeing signs of a value comeback though (I’m a value investor who loves crypto, go figure) but there is a long way to go. The spate of takeovers should also do something to increase valuations across the board, no? But until there is a catalyst to cause a serious drop in the S&P500 and get people looking for value elsewhere, the UK market will remain dire. Though I too am overweight UK – fingers crossed!
@Vic — This all seems a bit petty but anyway I mean your view of bitcoin as useless computer code. If you saw it as innovative technology worth its market cap of $2 trillion then there’d be less of the inconsistency you note.
No doubt all my articles could be improved, no argument there.
Thanks for writing this.
I’ve been a consistent reader of your blog for close to a decade now, but have always also loved Bitcoin.
The FCAs stance on the Bitcoin ETF makes me so incredibly pessimistic about this country’s future.
Despite trying to protect investors, they are actually doing the exact opposite. Anyone who wants to purchase Bitcoin in their ISA or SIPP is actively being encouraged on various forums to purchase far riskier treasury vehicles which trade at huge multiples to NAV.
Anyone that wants to hold pure bitcoin has a choice to either use a centralised exchange, which have a long history of being hacked, leaking your data, or freezing your funds, or holding your assets in self custody. Which is fine, but does take a lot of sophistication and you still run the risk or user error, a hack, or a wrench attack.
Giving users the option to hold bitcoin in an ETF is a complete no brainer and their aversion to doing this signals to everyone that’s interested that the UK is not a country that is friendly to innovation.
Then when you consider that projects like Polymarket, stablecoin companies like Circle etc are starting to show real adoption and product market fit, we will be further banned from participating in the upcoming ICOs that will soon be legalised in America.
Essentially everyone I know who is interested in crypto, or who has done well from it over the past years (not easy because majority is a scam and super turbulent) has either left the country or is planning to leave, and sadly this is where I find myself now too.
If all opportunity is prevented then why am I here? I don’t mind the high income tax rate if it helps people. I don’t mind the increase in capital gains tax. What I do mind is having every financial opportunity withheld from me because of stupid paternalistic rules that actively increase risk for the uneducated and prevent upside to those that work in the industry.
On the international scene we are a laughing stock and this has to change before it is too late
@moggers — Indeed. Have you tried buying an ARM Holdings ADR in a tax shelter? Also not allowed. Maybe not in a GIA either not sure.
So UK pensions can’t be invested in the UK’s most significant tech company of several generations. Who does this serve?!
Even if there’s a general justification exceptions should be speedily made.
@Investor
I guess beyond its manufactured scarcity as an antidote to fiat currency, I don’t understand Bitcoin’s social utility. Investors seems to see its phenomenal price performance as it performing that role. Could it crowd out productive investment? I’d question it on that basis alone rather than it being “innovative”.
I do note that it comes with huge environnemental costs in terms of energy and computing consumption and I wonder how investors are billed for that? Is it included in the price? No idea. I’d also be keen, if anyone knows, how it is different from other digital tokens?
@DesignFire, I agree with your comments, construction is tough but you do get to see physical evidence of your work. And I can confirm that FIRE from the construction industry is possible…
Hoorah! Some serious Bitcoin discussions. Love to see it! I’m a long-time lurker but rarely speak up due to the frequent hostility towards Bitcoin (although happy to see it against crypto, which as a Bitcoin-maxi I designate as every other cryptocurrency)
Incidentally, there is a lot more to Bitcoin than the number-goes-up side of things. It’s so hard to convince non-believers to invest some real hours in learning about it. People rarely think they would change their mind. There are many other facets to it that provide unique benefits (banking the unbanked, grid balancing, stranded energy avoidance, censorship-resistant transactions, store of value in hyper-inflationary economies to name but a few).
@ermine – ETFs provide a regulated, secure way to gain exposure without the complexities of managed private keys or navigating exchange risks – issues that have led to significant losses in hacks like Mt. Gox in 2014 and FTX in 2022. While holding bitcoin in a hardware wallet offers the ultimate in control and self-sovereignty, it requires technical expertise that many lack, and even then, human error can lead to loss (20% of bitcoin is estimated to be permanently lost due to misplaced keys). ETFs eliminate this while offering tax-advantaged accounts like ISAs and SIPPs, and fees are a small price for convenience and reduced counterparty risk compared to unregulated exchanges. I hold bitcoin (proxies) in my ISA and SIPP accounts, yet still hold my own coins where possible too. The best of both worlds.
@Vic Mackey – Your view of Bitcoin as “useless computer code” overlooks its proven utility and resilience. Bitcoin’s blockchain, operational since 2009, is the most secure decentralised network, processing over $1 trillion in transactions annually with no central authority. The FCA’s potential move to lift the ban on crypto ETNs aims to balance innovation with investor choice, not divert funds from startups. Mis-selling scandals are a valid concern, but Bitcoin’s transparency (every transaction is publicly verifiable) reduces risks compared to opaque financial products. Dynamism in markets drives growth, and Bitcoin’s decade-long track record suggests it’s more than a speculative fad.
@DrexL – I think you are exactly right (see my comment above to @ermine).
@marc1485153 – your dismissal of Bitcoin as indistinguishable from other cryptos ignores its unique fundamentals. Bitcoin, unlike pretty much all other altcoins with centralised governance or unlimited supplies, has a hard-capped 21 million coins, enforced by its decentralised proof-of-work network, which has never been hacked since 2009. Its $2 trillion market cap dwarfs most altcoins, reflecting unmatched adoption and trust. Other cryptos often rely on pre-mines, corporate backing, or unproven tech, making them riskier. The idea that Bitcoin’s rise is driven by vested interests like Trump oversimplifies its global demand – over 50 million addresses hold Bitcoin, and institutions like Fidelity and BlackRock back it. It’s not a waste of time; it’s a censorship-resistant asset with a 15-year track record, offering a hedge against fiat debasement in a way no other cryptos can match.
@Moggers – my sentiments exactly. I’m an adult. Leave me alone to make my own decisions. I understand the risks and do not expect any sort of bailout should my actions backfire.
@c-strong – I’m liking your style. I too would (and have) moved between providers in order to gain exposure to something Bitcoin related (e.g. The Smarter Web Company). I’ve also swapped providers in order to reduce the obscene FX charges that platforms tend to charge for trading in US stocks such as MSTR.
@VicMackey – Bitcoin’s social utility is a hot debate. Beyond its “digital gold” pitch as a hedge against fiat inflation, it offers a decentralised system for secure, borderless transactions without middlemen – appealing for financial freedom or in unstable economies. The miners pay for the energy (they are the ones who run the ASICs that use lots of energy to mine new bitcoin). In terms of how it’s different from other tokens: It’s truly decentralised (no central party controls it, no nation state can stop it), it is secured by energy (i.e. it’s prohibitively expensive to double-spend/re-write the blockchain) and has a fixed supply (there will only ever be 21 million bitcoin). No other crypto can claim those 3 things.
@all thanks, I feel somewhat enlightened. Maybe I am just a bit too tinfoil hat to love the idea of BTC in an ISA. Clearly that’s a minority position.
@Vic Mackey #23 > I wonder how investors are billed for that? Is it included in the price? No idea. I’d also be keen, if anyone knows, how it is different from other digital tokens?
the power consumption is in the cost of production, though I am sure there must be some miners run on the same basis as a dodgy cannabis farm. Come to think of it that could be a good twofer for power thieves using the waste heat from the miners.
BTC is different because it’s the first, I guess. It has 61% market share at the microsecond of writing, obvs that’s a very moveable feast. There’s a winner takes all network effect here
Guess I must lack ‘Dynamism’. I’ve come to feel utterly unimpressed by Billion £ ‘valuations’ , the hype, and all the stuff surrounding outfits heading to the US to make their IPO’s. I’ve learned to stay away from IPO’s.., I have no control over the price that I’m being invited to pay.
I noted mention of Starling Bank. Actually, I’m a long time customer. As of earlier this year, they destroyed their USP. Not that they’re a digital-only bank obv., they’re two a penny. But the interest earning Spaces/Pots feature. It was great, easy and uncomplicated to use. No more interest now. As a commenter on the appropriate Reddit subgroup put it… ‘.. Now they’re just another sh*tbank..’.
I’m not a bitcoin hater. I just don’t see the point, and the whole thing seems emmeshed in ‘The Grift Economy’.
@Ermine
Thanks. So it turns out, it’s manufactured scarcity isn’t actually, well that scarce and that mathematical computer puzzles are easy to construct.
As its “scarcity” increases, then the energy and computing power consumption will increase exponentially, which should increase the demand for both, the cost of which will be borne by everyone, therefore everybody is essentially “farmed at the alter” to mix my metaphors. Will this burden be taxed or regulated?
What clanged for me in the article is that it talks of directing investment to productive opportunities at the same time as heralding bitcoin and for the life of me, I just can’t reconcile the two. I get Bitcoin’s attractiveness, there’s unlimited demand as things currently stand. I just worry about the end game, which seems to be the least of any investors’ concerns.
I have no bitcoin, nor am I interested in holding any. I do think bitcoin (and *only* bitcoin) has one often unconsidered advantage shared by index funds that, for the brave, may elevate bitcoin to an asset that, maybe, just maybe, you could justify investing a little in. The argument of efficient markets etc might justify index investing, but ignoring efficient markets, index investors have the protection/comfort that if their index investment(s) collapsed to zero value, a whole host of very wealthy people who are in only a few select shares of such an index, will be in a much worse position than the people in the whole index. Do I believe the world economies and governments will allow a situation to develop where the current wealthy holding most the shares/assets today, crash to near zero, losing millions or billions? – no. Bitcoin has almost reached that level where a bitcoin crash (to near zero) would cause substantial wealth damage to huge proportions of investors, some of whom are very wealthy and/or powerful people. Further, a lot of the so called “tech visionaries” etc would look like fools if crypto just collapsed to zero, so the damage would be substantial to their image, if not their wealth.
I don’t know really how to describe it, there may even be a name for it, but if an asset going down or even being wiped out would hit the wealthiest or those with a lot of power the hardest, there is a vested interest in it being kept going as long as possible, and it probably reduces the risk of such an asset to the casual low value investor, bitcoin may have reached this place?. I sat in my office and overheard a fairly wealthy colleague discussing with someone how they had quarter of a million pounds in bitcoin, and this was a few years back now prior to more recent increases. More worryingly, he had also convinced his parents to invest in bitcoin. On one hand I felt sad as he had all the traits of a brain washed/converted “tech bro”, but is/was a really nice guy. On the other hand, it points to my view that so many very (otherwise?) sensible and wealthy people are already deep in bitcoin, that a true crash or wipeout now is getting to the stage where it would hit very many people, and I am not sure that it could actually be allowed to readily happen anymore due to too many tech visionaries, disruptive innovators, and even world leaders being at least moderately onboard and already worshipping at the alter of bitcoin.
I personally think block chain is still a vastly under-utilised, powerful tool that has not even seen a tiny fraction of its future use cases. I even would go as far as saying, crypto *currencies* have distracted from the real productive use cases of the underlying blockchain, and the currency side is slowing down the potential gains that could be made from adopting blockchain into more activities and industries.
I now accept that most crypto investors can’t be dissuaded, which is fine, but I will conclude by saying to even the most faithful crypto disciple – please consider liquidating a small but non-negligible proportion of your assets at the next market high and diversify a bit, even if it is into something else that other crypto folk have no interest in or would not support. If you really think crypto is still going to the moon, creaming off some gains at the next market high isn’t going to change your assumed end state.
In the meantime, I will watch on the side lines with no crypto, and just be sad with all the meme tokens and rug pulls I see happening.
@Larsen and DesignFire I work for a tier one contractor and concur with your comments. Construction is tough but so are many other careers. There are niches that aren’t poorly paid, certainly possible to make 2 or 3 times average salary without being director level.
My opinion is construction is a straightforward way for decently intelligent person to earn a much better than average salary. Plus as a sector we are understaffed with a huge skills shortage. Lots of opportunities young people imo certainly in main contracting or delivery roles.
@Ermine – you mention Crypto not being -pro-creative. Assume you are referring to getting no interest on your holdings ? That is incorrect – all the major exchanges allow some sort of staking of your Coins – although not sky high rates (usually <3%) on the major ones, depending on length of staking. Should you wish to go down the more experimental rabbit hole – there are far, far higher rates on less known ones in the defi world but like everything in investing – it's risk/reward. The other bit that isn't covered in the “Crypto is the future”/”it's pointless digital tulips” polarising arguments is the use of StableCoins (pegged to the $) – where you can in essence hold $ for currency hedging purposes and get still 4% interest (at Coinbase at the moment) which is certainly reasonable in my book.
@ c strong #20
what did you have to do at IBKR to get registered as a qualified investor to buy BTC and cheaper us etf’s please??
PF value size or prior industry skills, just ask…or … ??
Thanks in advance
@Moggers: concur! No return without risk. No reward without responsibility. Don’t want FSA choosing investments. Rather take blame for own mistakes. Is AJB less hand-holdy than HL on the platform zealotry front?
@Vic: it’s just code but then so’s most of Mag 7. Utility is found in the eye of the beholder, as any user of MS365 can testify.
@Simon B: agree on correlations. Crypto ain’t gold or commodities.
@ermine: IIRC in comments on BTC previously, we’d estimated 2.5 mn x more energy used/transaction than Visa/Mastercard. Hallucinating digital Shamen Chat GPT now tells me 50,000 x – 1 mn x. PoW is never gonna win over Greta.
I’m Deng Xiaoping-y on BTC these days. He was (pre-1978) a hard line commie but who ended up intro’d capitalism to China. Can’t stand crypto bro ideology but, given deficit spending (esp. under the Orange one), maybe BTC (& BTC treasury co’s and/or miners) are a necessary hedge (with gold/commodities) against risks of future fiscal meltdown?
Given ludicrous NAV premiums for newcomer crypto treasury co’s, only MSTR look investable.
The Unknown Know on BTC, which everyone involved realises, but chooses not to remember, is the future but increasing risk to it’s Elliptic Curve Digital Signature Algo (for previously used private keys, where the associated public address holds BTC) from a quantum computing Shor’s Algo attack.
2,500 logical (error free) qubits will crack ECDSA, which might equate to 1 mn – 25 mn ‘noisy’ physical qubits. We’re at ~1,000 physical qubits now, but it’s going up fast every year.
Whilst on centralised networks it should be easy and quick to implement post-quantum cryptography, BTC has over 10,000 validator nodes, and it took absolutely ages previously just to agree to change the protocol to increase block size from 1Mb to 2Mb.
The attachment to PoW/ECDSA, the degree of decentralisation, and the conservatism (in some sense) of parts of the BTC community (i.e. appealing to the ‘authority’ of Satoshi) might make it hard to push the necessary safeguards through in time.
The worse case, if ECDSA is cracked in a zero day attack using quantum compute, is that a substantial part of the ledger gets rewritten, confidence collapses, and BTC heads towards a 0, if it’s still able to trade.
I like your blog, but you have an unhealthy bias against Trump. Recommend you take a step back and stop parroting US MSM propaganda. Anyway it’s your blog, do what you want, but hope you know it rubs many people the wrong way.
The renters rights bill is another act of self-harm.
I hadn’t realised that tenants could no longer pay more than a month up front.
I’ve had two occasions where I’ve let flats to tenants who have no credit / declarable employment history whatsoever. One had been retired for a long time. The other a recent immigrant. Both paid a year up front and both turned out to be great. In both cases I wouldn’t have let the flat to them otherwise. So in the next situation, I will say no and they’ll be struggling to find anywhere to live.
the court situation is completely unusable. I have a friend whose elderly uncle has a flat. tenant has taken advantage of the situation to not pay the rent. court system, 6m later, has finally got round to an open shut case. Except now there is another 16 week processing delay.
So no surprise then that flats are being removed for rent and put up for sale. Which will lower house prices and be good for buyers. But there are plenty of people who just don’t want to buy or will never have enough credit to do so.
The pet situation is a nightmare. The only way to deal with that is to increase rent and spread the risk across every single tenant as you won’t know who has / hasn’t got a pet.
At the very best we’ll see very large corporate landlords, largely owned offshore renting out blocks and blocks of flats. Which will create its own issues.
@ermine
For info, buying ETF crypto allows you to talk to your law abiding friends who work in the anti-fraud, anti-money-laundering industry about crypto and them not look at you like you are a criminal. I’m joking, but yet, I also am not. The crypto ETFs and wrapping of crypto into more traditional investments is an important stage for at least reducing the perceived criminal elements, and allows casual investors to largely not have to worry about new tax matters that could arise when trading a volatile asset on some dodgy forum/exchange with little paperwork. Ironically, one of the major early stage ‘benefits’ of bitcoin was the perceived lack of traceability and such. Going mainstream and into traditional funds and ETFs etc completely removes theses early ‘benefits’ and assigns them to owners. Many would say the early day crypto trading was too criminal friendly, or at least tax evasion friendly. It is often overlooked, but crypto is probably more clean now in terms of tax handling, than it has ever been, and much of this is due to it becoming part of the normal wealth management system. At least with ETFs etc, everything is in the ‘system’.
Oh no! the B word♂️
the story changes the catchy jargon develops but I see mostly a multi trillion dollar industry that has greed at its core. I have spent an unhealthy amount of time looking into bitcoin and the culture around it, I find it fascinating and depressing. Maybe it will become what the maxis hope for but the world they describe sounds like a dystopia to me. But then that may well be where we are headed.
Grauniad embarrassing itself. How you plant trees is you put in year old seedling “whips” costing about 1p a piece in bulk, and hope it will rain enough for a reasonable percentage to make it. Because what else you gonna do, lay kilometres of leaky hose? Now this system is losing out to dry summers but it would be useful background
As for sheep, the independent Fursdon report of 2023 found that Dartmoor is under not overgrazed (Dartmoors problem is molinia grass which sheep helpfully graze). Also I live on Dartmoor and it doesn’t look destroyed to me
Back in 2020 one could buy BTC ETFs. I still have one, domiciled in Germany of all places. Holding directly seems cheaper and better, but I went for the ETF because this was done in minutes, vs. hours for
– selecting a crypto exchange that isn’t a scam
– the admin of setting up an account (probably easier then; later I read anecdotally that they make it very difficult, if not impossible)
– learning another UI and the crypto jargon
– figuring out which wallet to buy, and how to handle that without erasing all my BTC with a wrong click.
If the process is actually easy as @ermine alludes to, I’d be really interested to read how.
@Sparschwein #40 > If the process is actually easy as @ermine alludes to, I’d be really interested to read how.
OK – I am a retail muppet and I use Coinbase. I did get out a few years ago when it looked like the UK gov would consider them Bad Guys but after they registered a UK arm I decided to experiment again. I have had experience of off-exchange crypto due to messing about with a Helium node (tl;dr it won’t make you rich and probably not cover the cost of entry but I am a sucker for LoraWan spread spectrum radio and sensor networks)
Although I use the advanced Coinbase i/f this is still a retail muppet thing. but I don’t think I’ll be looked on as a Bad Guy –
It’s that easy – transfer wedge from UK bank account (not Starling these days) in Coinbase, buy BTC or sell BTC, job done. Obviously I am taking counterparty risk if CB goes down, I think they are reasonably big fish. I don’t have much in there, this is learning not investment, I am more goldbug than cryptofan. The transfer out to the Helium wallet via SOL went easily enough
@Moggers, couldn’t agree more with that venting frustration. It’s not the downside risk they’re “protecting” us from (as if there is any sentient creature that hasn’t heard the mantra that crypto will lose all your money). But you can buy as much as you can’t afford to lose in a single stock. It’s the possibility that too many people could have made too much in tax free gains in an ISA; we can’t have that. I hold diversified index funds but also hold BTC ETFs outside the restrictions in Blighty.
@ermine, people thought FTX was a big exchange until it went bust, so if you get a substantial amount of Bitcoin I suggest spreading it around. I however have the same attitude with my other investments and have multiple brokers, since I don’t like concentrated credit risk to anything.
I am a fan of distributed ledger technology (which underpins Bitcoin). It has some important usecases, though people often reach for it when a plain old database would do. But for Bitcoin itself it needs a consensus identity to become investable for me. Is it:
1. Store of value (see correlation to gold, seems it’s not this)
2. Currency (this still hasn’t really taken off)
3. Speculative asset (main thing people seem to use it for)
4. “Future Of Everything” (ill defined)
I don’t think there’s any harm having part of your portfolio in something like this – it’s not really any different to buying a pre-revenue speculative biotech or AI venture, and it’s better than buying GameStop or whatever they are pushing on r/WallStreetBets today. I don’t buy those things, so I don’t buy Bitcoin either.
“it offers a decentralised system for secure, borderless transactions without middlemen”
Apart for that sounding like AI generated spiel, it sounds very much like “middle men” are still required. A quick google says that plenty of other etokens are supply constrained as well.
I guess it’s like buying in at the start of Christianity, if you think it’ll develop enough believers in the the faith over time then start buying shares in bible printers. It doesn’t matter what’s written inside, it’ll sell and sell well. An ETF will be very welcome as it should remove some of the middle men due dilligence brain damage.
@mrbatch
It’s the MiFID professional client test – you need at least two of the following:
(a) the client has carried out transactions, in significant size, on the relevant market at an average frequency of 10 per quarter over the previous four quarters;
(b) the size of the client’s financial instrument portfolio exceeds EUR 500,000;
(c) the client works or has worked in the financial sector for at least one year in a professional position, which requires knowledge of the transactions or services envisaged.