Thread

Letter from a student. Rewards of leaving a life on the trading desk to research and teach. It doesn't get better than this. Makes me realize how much I am blessed. Showing my wife these is an equally special moment because of proof-of-work. "Good morning/evening Professor Nik, I just wanted to take some time to thank you for everything I learned in your Bitcoin program. Honestly, when I first read "AI and Finance," I thought you were going to teach quantitative finance with AI as some new algorithm. I applied because it was literally the only class that interested me, and I'm pretty sure I put it as all three of my choices on the application. When I found out later that it was mainly about finance fundamentals, I thought I was going to have a horrible time. Boy, was I wrong—I accidentally discovered that besides computer science, finance might actually be my thing. I didn't realize how important the stuff we covered (especially credit creation and layered money) was until I started my recent internship at <REMOVED FOR PRIVACY>. The foundation you built for understanding markets—especially that class where you talked about credit creation and what happens to stocks and treasuries when more loans get taken out—has been incredibly helpful. The knowledge from your class has actually let me start conversations about crypto and stablecoins with some of my colleagues who've been in high finance for over two decades. I've been able to explain where Bitcoin gets its value and what stablecoins actually are. When they asked questions like what Bitcoin's market cap really means, I could talk about UTXOs and explain concepts like Bitcoin's realized value. This class really inspired me and honestly might even change the career path I end up taking. But above everything else, being able to actually transact Bitcoin in class was lowkey cool (not gonna lie, best thing ever)—it felt so much different than just reading the tech docs for the protocol. Thanks again for such an eye-opening semester!"