Twenty million Bitcoin in circulation.

Oil melting up. Bitcoin doesn’t care.

The traditional finance industry has a fascinating incentive problem. Advisors get paid based on AUM. AUM grows when markets go up and when they gather new clients. AUM shrinks when markets go down or clients leave. This creates a subtle bias: advisors are incentivized to keep your money in assets they can manage easily. Stocks, bonds, mutual funds, ETFs. Assets that sit nicely in a brokerage account and generate a predictable fee. Bitcoin in self-custody does not generate advisory fees. A cold storage wallet does not show up on a portfolio report. Keys on a hardware device do not produce quarterly statements. This is why most advisors either ignore Bitcoin or push Bitcoin ETFs exclusively. Not because ETFs are always the best vehicle, but because ETFs are the vehicle they can manage and charge a fee on. I run my practice differently. Some of my clients should hold FBTC (I like Fidelity over BlackRock). Some should hold cold storage. Some should do both. The recommendation depends on the client, not on what generates the most fee income for me. That is what fiduciary actually means. The recommendation serves the client, not the advisor. If your advisor cannot explain the difference between a Bitcoin ETF and self-custody, and when each one makes sense, they are not qualified to advise you on Bitcoin. Period.

10% Bitcoin in a 60/40 portfolio over the last 5 years: Traditional 60/40: ~7% annualized 55/35/10 (with BTC): ~13% annualized This is not about being a Bitcoin maximalist. It is about reading the data. Your advisor should be able to have this conversation.

The Bitcoin advisory space is about to split into two tiers. Tier 1: Advisors who understand Bitcoin at a technical level. Who can explain UTXOs, multisig, cold storage inheritance, and why proof-of-work matters. Who hold Bitcoin personally. Tier 2: Advisors who added "cryptocurrency" to their website last year because their compliance department finally approved IBIT. Tier 2 will capture some clients. But anyone who actually understands Bitcoin will see through them immediately. And Bitcoiners will never trust them. The window for Tier 1 is wide open right now. There are very few of us. Demand is growing fast. And the clients who find us tend to be the best kind: informed, long-term, and serious. If you know someone who needs a fiduciary who actually gets Bitcoin, send them my way. 21stFinancialAdvisors.com

Imagine you’re 70 and you want Bitcoin exposure. The desire makes sense. Bitcoin has been one of the best-performing assets of the last decade. The problem is also obvious: spot Bitcoin can be a rough ride. And when you are retired, a rough ride at the wrong time matters. So the real question is not “Bitcoin or no Bitcoin.” It’s “What kind of Bitcoin exposure can you actually live with?” For some people, that means using listed, liquid instruments that are built to distribute income and aim for a smoother path than spot. One example in the market is Strategy’s preferred stock, STRC. Important caveat: STRC is not Bitcoin, and it is not risk-free. It’s a security issued by a company. The dividend rate can change, and the price can move. There is credit risk. None of this is guaranteed. But it’s a useful example of the bigger point: Bitcoin exposure is not a one-size-fits-all approach. You can dial volatility up or down. You can prioritize cash flow, growth, or a mix. You can structure exposure in a way that fits your life instead of forcing you to “white knuckle” spot. At @21st Financial, that’s what we do. We help clients choose the version of Bitcoin exposure that matches their goals, time horizon, and risk tolerance using listed, liquid tools. Educational only. Not investment, tax, or legal advice. Not a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Past performance does not guarantee future results. Dividends/distributions are not guaranteed and may change.

On a bank holiday, Bitcoin can send any amount of money anywhere on earth in minutes — for just $0.44.

STRC is back at its $100 par. Bitcoin is still about 42.6% off its highs. Same ecosystem. Very different ride. STRC is Strategy’s perpetual preferred stock. It is built to trade around $100 par by adjusting its dividend rate monthly, specifically to encourage the par peg and reduce price volatility. It also pays cash dividends monthly (current stated annualized rate shown as 11.25%, variable). This is the point I keep making. Bitcoin exposure is not one product. It is a design space. Educational only. Not investment, tax, or legal advice. Dividends and trading price are not guaranteed and the rate can change materially.

“Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.” — James 1:2-3 NIV God has called us to great suffering. I pray that we endure it thankfully.

Roughly $2.4T was wiped out of silver today. Bitcoin’s entire market cap is about $1.7T.

Realizing you genuinely have a few more years to accumulate assets before currency debasement and AI reshape the economy.

A quick word of caution if you are thinking about buying or selling gold or silver through Facebook Marketplace or similar platforms. Verifying authenticity, purity, and weight in a private sale is harder than it sounds. Counterfeit or plated bars and coins exist for both gold and silver, and even experienced buyers can get burned. Once money changes hands, there is usually no recourse. There are also safety and legal considerations. Meeting strangers while carrying high value assets, dealing with unclear provenance, and having no formal documentation can create issues. These range from personal security concerns to tax and reporting problems later on. Gold and silver can absolutely have a place in a portfolio. But how you buy or sell them matters just as much as what you are buying. Reputable dealers, transparent pricing, proper receipts, and secure custody exist for a reason. If a deal relies on trust instead of verification, or sounds too good to be true, it usually is. This post is for general educational purposes only and does not constitute individualized investment advice.

Conviction is almost always criticized before it’s understood.

How good and pleasant it is when God’s people live together in unity! — Psalms 133:1

$STRC and $SATA are exchange-traded, perpetual preferred securities issued by companies with Bitcoin on their balance sheets, designed to trade around a $100 par value and pay variable cash distributions. $STRC recently went ex-dividend and is already trading back near $100. $SATA reached $100 for the first time today. Sustained pricing near or above par can allow issuers to raise capital efficiently, which may be used for balance-sheet purposes, including additional Bitcoin purchases. This post is about structure and mechanics, not guarantees or recommendations.

$STRC recovered its ex-dividend adjustment within a day. 🤯

When people say Bitcoin has no real-world use, they are usually speaking from the comfort of a functioning financial system. Organizations like the Human Rights Foundation (HRF) support Bitcoin for a simple reason: access to money is a human rights issue. Around the world, including in countries experiencing currency collapse, capital controls, or political instability, individuals have lost access to bank accounts without committing crimes. Funds are frozen. Transfers are blocked. Inflation erodes savings faster than wages can keep up. In those environments, the question is not about returns or speculation. It is about whether people can preserve the value of their work, receive support from others, or move money safely when traditional systems fail or become inaccessible. Bitcoin offers a neutral alternative. It does not depend on nationality, banking relationships, or institutional permission. It allows individuals to hold and transfer value directly, which can matter profoundly when financial access is restricted or unreliable. Seen through this lens, Bitcoin is not primarily a financial product. It is infrastructure. And for many people globally, access to neutral financial infrastructure is not a luxury. It is a necessity.

There is only one actual innovation in this entire space, and it is not “blockchain.” Blockchains existed long before Bitcoin in the form of append-only ledgers, Merkle trees, hash-chained data structures, and distributed databases. Those tools were already well understood and already in use. On their own, they did not change the world or create a new monetary system. Bitcoin did. Bitcoin solved something no system before it had solved: digital money without a central issuer, administrator, or control point, operating on open rules that cannot be changed by leadership, lobbying, or emergency governance. That combination is the breakthrough. Everything else in this industry is built on top of it or imitates parts of it. Most so-called “cryptos” are centralized systems with mutable rules. Their consensus models change when it becomes inconvenient. Their monetary policies are revised. Their roadmaps are shaped by foundations, companies, or identifiable leadership. Their networks can be paused, upgraded, or redirected through social coordination. Bitcoin does not work that way. Bitcoin has no CEO, no marketing team, no foundation, no admin keys, and no governing body. There is no one to call, no one to persuade, and no one to replace. That is not a weakness. That is the entire point! Money must be stable, neutral, and resistant to capture. Bitcoin’s core rules are intentionally difficult to change, and consensus is earned slowly through voluntary economic alignment, not votes, narratives, or influence. This is why Bitcoin stands alone. If a system can be upgraded by a small group, marketed by a team, or redirected by leadership, it is not new money. It is just software with a token. Bitcoin is not competing with those systems. It is solving a different problem entirely. #BitcoinOnly.

Most people think holding cash is the safe choice. Avoiding risk entirely may introduce different risks over time. Bitcoin’s supply is fixed at 21 million, which makes it fundamentally different from currencies that can be created as needed. For educational purposes only. Not investment advice.

This message was embedded in #Bitcoin’s 666,666th block. “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” — Romans 12:21