Susie Violet

The UK is so screwed (as if we didn’t know)! They slashed capital gains allowances to boost revenue. Instead, high earners left the country. Receipts dropped by 18%. That’s a £2.7 billion shortfall! Has no one in government heard of the Laffer Curve? https://www.ft.com/content/8d8e1848-5a24-49a1-a695-2800345ff425

In City AM in August 2023 I warned the Online Safety Bill would threaten encryption, empower unaccountable regulators and create the illusion of safety. Now Labour claims it’s protecting children from harmful content. In reality: - Kids use VPNs - Adults lose privacy - Startups flee the UK You’ve protected no one and compromised everyone. Full article: https://www.cityam.com/i-see-the-online-safety-bill-as-a-digital-double-edged-sword/

No new info, no depth, just sensationalism over substance. The Telegraph just dropped another lazy, clickbait Bitcoin article. It tries to link the UK’s budget deficit to government crypto procurement and floats the idea of selling 61,250 bitcoin right in the middle of a bull market. The UKs bitcoin is still legally contested. Chinese authorities and victims are demanding it back. No sale can happen while that legal process is unresolved. Plenty of time before we repeat Gordon Brown’s devastating decision to sell off the UK’s gold at the bottom. Let’s just hope this doesn’t all conclude in a bear market. When they do sell, it’ll be typical if it ends up happening at the bottom again. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2025/07/19/britain-sitting-billions-bitcoin-can-rescue-reeves/

“I do find this all fascinating. I don't think we have heard the last of it. This is gonna be the thing of the future!” - Ali Miraj, LBC Today I joined Ali on LBC to talk about Bitcoin including the GENIUS Act, Elizabeth Warren’s concerns, and growing interest from pension funds. https://blossom.primal.net/7f164e734406b15213cfb55c73258d521ae0cecca9964ba857fe4f13e9359257.mov

Trump plans to open Bitcoin access to American pensions, unlocking a $9 trillion pool of capital. Just 1% = $90 billion. Then when you look at global AUM which is around $115 trillion you start to see the scale of where this could go. Larry Fink said that 2–5% allocations from sovereign and institutional funds could potentially push Bitcoin to $700K+. Everything’s bleeding into Bitcoin, pensions, ETFs, corporates, even countries. But in the UK? We still can’t buy a spot Bitcoin ETF. And financial advisors still can’t recommend it. 🤨 https://www.ft.com/content/07906211-5ab8-4917-bcad-5397c0bc3170

Is Bitcoin being infiltrated by fiat mindsets? Most come to Bitcoin for number go up, but stay for the revolution. As the number goes up, so do the fiat mindsets entering the space. That’s fine! Bitcoin is a journey. We’ve all been there. But what happens when the same bad incentives that got us here start creeping back in? Tricky. Bitcoin is for everyone. It’s antifragile. But it’s also proof of work, not proof of stake. So when credibility starts being bought instead of earned, it’s worth paying attention. l loved my chat with nostr:npub1g9l80gj3dndlyu9s4ccgn3pyxsykzzrdygv3acmju5ff375067cqypg00f on Think Tank Thursday at nostr:nprofile1qqst7zk4ezljexegw7sqxvpr62x6vap347m2yjpd2tkkkuy9vpglgqspr9mhxue69uhkze3wwp6hyurvv4ex2mrp0yhxxmmd9uqjqamnwvaz7tmjv4kxz7fww4h8xatsv4e8v6tnv4jzummwd35kuef025uf89. https://youtu.be/ZCTRVH9PtXc

The UK is now the second largest government holder of Bitcoin, but the crown will slip. The UK currently holds 61,250 BTC, worth approximately $7.27 billion at today’s price, according to Arkham Intelligence. These coins were seized by UK authorities in connection with an investment fraud targeting Chinese nationals. The assets remain frozen, and legal efforts are ongoing to determine their rightful ownership and whether they will be returned to victims or confiscated under UK law. Until that process concludes, the UK cannot legally forfeit or sell the coins. Once the ruling is made, the coins are likely to be returned or liquidated. In the meantime, those coins are being custodied by Komainu. With the national crypto custody tender now live, that arrangement could change by the end of the year. The risks of state custody are real. Just last week, a UK National Crime Agency officer was jailed for stealing seized bitcoin from a dark web suspect. Bitcoin shines a light on criminals outside the system and those hiding within it. The UK may be the second largest government holder of Bitcoin… for now. But with legal rulings pending and custody contracts in flux, the question is how much longer. H/t nostr:nprofile1qqsd3fhv7rped64g77dyf9l7ndmae9mkxdz37099cc6wyzr9jytxg7cprpmhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuumwdae8gtnnda3kjctvqythwumn8ghj7mn0wd68ytnxd46zuamf0ghxy6t6y7p6aq ⚡️

As bitcoin gains momentum again, so do opportunists. Here's what to watch out for: – pop-up “educators” with no real Bitcoin history – glossy brands built fast, thin on substance – constant self-promotion without contribution – staged visibility – name dropping as validation, not track record – polished humility used to mask control Bitcoin needs time in the trenches, and proof of work (not proof of stake). Be careful who you elevate. Bull markets attract noise. Real builders are forged in the bear. This is a pattern that repeats every cycle, just like the halving.

Two years ago, I warned in City AM that the UK's Online Safety Bill risked undermining privacy and paving the way for government overreach into our digital lives. Today, that concern feels more urgent than ever. Last month, the EU Commission released its ProtectEU roadmap, outlining plans to provide law enforcement with access to encrypted data by 2030. This is not about targeting specific suspects. It is about building the legal and technical infrastructure for mass surveillance. Big Brother Watch have revealed that live facial recognition systems deployed in UK cities are wrong nearly 9 out of 10 times, scanning innocent people without their knowledge or consent. This is already happening in our streets, at stations, even at protests. Now imagine that biometric surveillance linked to a centralised digital currency. Imagine every payment, location, contact and movement tracked, stored and correlated. This is not theoretical. We risk building a society where privacy is gone, autonomy is restricted, and control is centralised in the name of convenience and safety. The combination of decrypted messaging, facial recognition, CBDCs, and mandatory ID checks and full KYC creates a full spectrum surveillance regime. A system where dissent is not crushed by force, but quietly discouraged through constant surveillance. What’s at stake is freedom of thought, movement and expression. We should be defending them, not trading them for the illusion of safety. Once this infrastructure is in place, it is rarely rolled back. https://home-affairs.ec.europa.eu/news/commission-presents-roadmap-effective-and-lawful-access-data-law-enforcement-2025-06-24_en

Big Brother Watch has repeatedly warned that the UK is quietly creeping into a surveillance state. Live facial recognition is being deployed across streets, train stations, shopping centres and even at public protests. But this technology is not just targeting criminals. It is scanning millions of innocent people without their knowledge or consent. False alarms with real consequences Studies show that the vast majority of facial recognition matches are false. According to Big Brother Watch, in 80 deployments across the UK, 89.7% of alerts were false positives. In London alone, 150 out of 173 matches by the Metropolitan Police were incorrect, resulting in an error rate of nearly 87%. In some cases, people were stopped, searched or fingerprinted as a result. These mistakes are not harmless. They are invasive, humiliating and difficult to challenge. https://bigbrotherwatch.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/Biometric-Britain.pdf It is all connected Facial images from passports, CCTV, phones and even social media are increasingly fed into large government and private databases. Big Brother Watch has raised concerns that a digital pound or central bank digital currency would allow the state to track every payment in real time. Combined with facial recognition and phone surveillance, this creates a fullmap of your movements, your spending and your associations. Your phone is not private Every step we take with a smartphone in our pocket feeds data to corporations and authorities. Location, biometrics, browsing history and more. If that is tied to payment systems and real time identity scanning, we move closer to a system where everything we do can be watched, recorded and judged. Know Your Customer (KYC) rules are already mandating identity checks for basic services. This is not theoretical. It is happening now. Where does this lead? The future we are heading toward is one of forced compliance. A world in which you are monitored constantly. In which you are guilty until proven innocent. In which dissent is quietly suppressed by the knowledge that you are being watched. We are at a turning point If we do not push back, we risk building a society where privacy is gone, autonomy is restricted, and control is centralised in the name of convenience and safety. This goes far beyond retail surveillance. It marks the steady build up of a digital infrastructure designed for monitoring and control. It's 1984 George Orwell warned of a future where every move was watched, every word monitored, and every thought shaped by fear. But even he did not imagine a world where your money could be used to control you. With facial recognition and CBDCs combined, we are building something even more invasive than Orwell foresaw, a system where surveillance is not just constant but transactional, embedded into the very fabric of daily life. When every face is scanned, every step tracked, and every payment recorded, we are not living freely. We are living under watch. Thank you to Big Brother Watch for continuing to shine a light on these issues and holding power to account.

My interview with Roxom TV from Bitcoin Vegas 2025 is now live. Nolan & I discuss how Bitcoin challenges the narratives around media, money, and power. We talk censorship, control, and the implications of financial sovereignty. Bitcoin is so much more than a currency; it’s a shift in accountability. https://youtu.be/8uYg9qpc8jI

Russia’s new ruble backed stablecoin A7A5 has quietly moved more than $9.3 billion in just four months. It is being used to convert rubles into USDT, bypassing Western sanctions via offshore rails. It’s an expected workaround. In my 2023 article for City A.M., Can BRICS build something with Bitcoin? I discussed whether countries like Russia, China, and Brazil might one day adopt a neutral, open monetary standard rather than trying to replicate fiat in new digital forms. A7A5 shows the BRICS bloc is exploring alternatives to the dollar. But it is not building on openness, neutrality, or long-term resilience. Bitcoin is all of those things. A7A5 is a centralised digital IOU, processed through intermediaries. This is not true de-dollarisation. It is a centralised workaround that functions like a CBDC in disguise, without transparency or trustlessness. So why does it matter? Because Russia has already signalled interest in using Bitcoin for cross-border trade. Finance Minister Anton Siluanov confirmed in December 2024 that Russia is using Bitcoin in foreign transactions. Putin has said crypto has “a right to exist” and could be useful for settlements. A7A5 might not just be a workaround. It could be a stepping stone. By normalising crypto-based trade and softening public resistance, Russia may be laying the groundwork for broader adoption of digital assets - including Bitcoin. The real solution does not require back doors. How long before Russia is using bitcoin? Full article: https://www.cityam.com/can-brics-build-something-with-bitcoin/

I love ₿itcoin. 🧡

Today, I'm heading into the Roxom studio in London’s Soho to start regular shows on Bitcoin, current affairs, UK policy, and to interview key voices in the space. This is a hugely exciting opportunity and a perfect synergy with my work as CEO of Bitcoin Policy UK and as a journalist. Bitcoin adoption in the UK is happening. ⚡️

What a packed few days from a phenomenal Women of Bitcoin event on KYC and privacy, to Who Wants to Be a Satoshi Millionaire, and talking about the benefits of Bitcoin mining. Thanks nostr:npub167n5w6cj2wseqtmk26zllc7n28uv9c4vw28k2kht206vnghe5a7stgzu3r ! ⚡️