I.H.141.Bill Miller.Bitcoin

加密是新时代的黄金，有类似于保险的作用，问题是什么样的人需要保险？

1、《2022-05-23 Bill Miller.Investing On Apple, Amazon, Bonds, & Tesla》

William Green (00:45:13):

Can you just explain that for the idiot’s guide to Bitcoin?

能不能用“傻瓜指南”的方式再解释一下 Bitcoin？

Bill Miller (00:45:16):

The supply of Bitcoin, it’s a little bit like, you’ve ever seen that, who was the inventor who just died recently, who invented that black box? You know when you flipped the switch and the lid came up and a hand came out and it turned the switch back off again and went down in the box? So basically, that’s what Bitcoin is. It’s a protocol, and effectively, the number of Bitcoins has a certain feature that it basically goes in half, the new supply goes in half, every four years. And so I think it’s, what is it 12? 12 Bitcoins every 10 minutes, are created. And then all the computers and the miners are solving equations just so they can get those Bitcoins, which are given to them, if they verify that the protocol is functioning properly, and there’s no double counting, and stuff like that. But that’s fixed and it’s 21 million in 2140. That’s when the supply will run out.

Bitcoin 的供给，有点像——你见过那个“黑盒子”吗？是谁来着，最近刚去世的那位发明家做的：你把开关一拨，盒盖弹起，一只手伸出来把开关拨回去，然后又缩回盒子里。Bitcoin 本质上就是一个协议（protocol），它的一个特征是：新增供给基本每四年减半。我记得现在是多少？12？——每 10 分钟产生 12 个 Bitcoin。然后全网的电脑与“矿工”会去解题，好拿到这些 Bitcoin——只要他们验证协议运作正常、没有“重复记账”等等。总量是固定的，到了 2140 年是 21 million，也就是那时挖完为止。

Bill Miller (00:46:02):

And then for Bitcoin, so who’s going to maintain the … What are the minors going to do then? Well, they’re still going to maintain the ledger, and they’re going to do that, they’ll get fees for that, instead of getting Bitcoin. So the same process will be underway unless they go from what’s called proof of work to proof of stake, which I think is a potential risk to Bitcoin right now, but not a big one.

那么等到那时谁来维护……矿工要做什么呢？他们仍然会维护账本（ledger），只不过是收取手续费，而不是再拿到 Bitcoin。这个过程会照常进行——除非从所谓的 proof of work 转到 proof of stake。我认为这对 Bitcoin 算是一个潜在风险，但不算很大。

William Green (00:46:21):

So when you explain the essence of the bull case for Bitcoin, and you have this gift for simplifying things and reducing the complexity to something more graspable, is the essence of the case basically the supply/demand argument that there’s very limited supply, the supply is growing in this paltry way that you just described? And yet there’s enormous potential and growing demand. Is that the simple essence of it?

当你用你那套“化繁为简”的本领来解释 Bitcoin 的多头逻辑时，它的本质是否就是供需关系？——供给极其有限、且按照你刚才描述的那样缓慢增长；而需求潜力巨大、并在增长。核心是不是就这么简单？

Bill Miller (00:46:46):

It is, but let me make it maybe more concrete. And I give two examples, one that everybody will understand, the second one they’ll understand theoretically, but maybe not the details. So the one that everybody will understand is, what Buffett says is that Bitcoin is a non-productive asset. He said, “I wouldn’t give you \$25 for all the Bitcoins in the world.” But if I buy farmland, that I can grow stuff with it. If I buy a company, it can generate dividends and earn some cash for me. Bitcoin doesn’t do any of that stuff. So he says it’s like gold. He can sit there and look at it, or it sits in a place in your portfolio, but it’s not productive, and therefore, he can’t value it. And I think, fair enough. I mean, if the only thing that you think you can value are productive assets, then no one’s making to buy it, so ignore it.

是的，但我试着更具体一点。给两个例子：第一个人人都能理解；第二个从原理上好懂，但细节未必熟。先说人人都懂的：Buffett 认为 Bitcoin 是“非生产性资产”。他讲过，“就算把全世界的 Bitcoin 都给我，我也不会出 25 美元”。买农田能种东西，买公司能分红、能挣钱；Bitcoin 没有这些。所以他说它像 gold，你可以看着它放在投资组合里，但它不产生收益，因此他无法给它估值。我觉得这说得也通——如果你只愿意给“生产性资产”估值，那没人逼你买它，忽略即可。

Bill Miller (00:47:27):

Now, the other, maybe the more mundane thing for most people, would be that, I’ve used this, I think I might have told you, I use this with my good friend, Chris Davis. And I said to Chris who’s been in every major meeting that I’ve been in on Bitcoin, going back to when it was \$200, and he’s never bought it. And his argument is, “Well yes, I understand that could be digital gold. In fact, it probably might be better than gold, but I don’t own gold either. It’s a non-productive asset.” He’s got a Buffett view on that. “So why would I own Bitcoin?” And my first answer to him is, “Well, the objective of investing is not to own productive assets. The objective is to make money. So the question is, can you make money with this thing? Not because it gives you dividends, but if you can make money with it.”

另一个对大多数人也许更贴近日常的例子：我想我跟你说过，我拿它跟我的好友 Chris Davis 讨论过。自从 Bitcoin 还在 200 美元时起，他参加了我所有重要的相关会议，但他从未买过。他的理由是：“我理解它可能是数字黄金，甚至可能比 gold 更好；但我也不持有 gold——那是非生产性资产。”这基本就是 Buffett 的观点。“那我为何要持有 Bitcoin？”我对他的第一反应是：“投资的目标不是拥有生产性资产，而是赚钱。问题在于：这个东西能不能让你赚钱？不是因为它分红，而是看你是否能靠它赚钱。”

Bill Miller (00:48:04):

So what I said to him, I said, “But look, here’s a better way to think of it, Chris. You’re an expert in insurance, right?” And he’s like, “Yes, Miller, I purport to be my grandfather’s insurance commissioner of New York, and my father was a longtime insurance analyst. And I published a newsletter when I was young called The Insurance Analyst Observer or something like that.” And I said, “So how do you evaluate an insurance policy?” And he said, “Well, you can evaluate an insurance company really easily. You can look at the exposures, you can look at the capital. You can look at the experience they’ve had. You can look at the quality of their investment portfolio, on and on.” I said, “I didn’t say an insurance company. I said an insurance policy.” And he paused a second. And I said, “Well here, let me tell you the way I think about that, and you tell me where I’m wrong.”

所以我又对他说：“换个更好的角度想，Chris。你是保险方面的专家，对吧？”他说：“是的，Miller。我祖父当过 New York 的保险监管官，我父亲长期做保险分析。我年轻时还办过一份名为 The Insurance Analyst Observer 的通讯（大概这个名字）。”我说：“那你怎么评估一份保险保单（insurance policy）？”他说：“评估一家保险公司很容易：看风险敞口、看资本、看过往赔付经验、看投资组合质量，等等。”我说：“我问的不是保险公司，而是保险保单。”他愣了一下。我接着说：“我来讲讲我的看法，你指出我哪里错了。”

Bill Miller (00:48:41):

I said, “You owe insurance, right? You have health insurance, you have car insurance, you have homeowners insurance, life insurance, stuff like that. Property insurance.” He’s like, “Yeah.” I said, “What’s the intrinsic value of those policies? You write a check every year for those policies.” And I said, “And what’s the value of those?” And I said, “The way I look at that is, you are paying somebody else, basically, and you for a policy that you hope is worthless. You don’t want to die prematurely, you don’t want to get serious illness, you don’t want have your house broken into. And it’s valuable to you to have something that will pay you if something really bad happens. Except if company goes bad, it’s yours. You own it, and it’s going to solve your problem with that if that happens.” Well, right now, we have something called gold, which could do that. But again, its supply is isn’t fixed. But everything else out there is something that, if you live in Venezuela, you live in Nigeria, live in Lebanon, you live in Ukraine when the war broke out, all of that stuff, Afghanistan when the US pulled out.

我说：“你也买保险，对吧？有 health insurance、car insurance、homeowners insurance、life insurance 之类的，property insurance 也有。”他说：“是的。”我问：“这些保单的内在价值是什么？你每年都要为它们写支票。它们的价值是什么？”我说：“在我看来，你在付钱给别人，买一份你希望它一文不值的保单。你不希望英年早逝，不希望罹患重病，不希望家里被盗。可一旦真有大事发生，有东西会赔你钱——这对你就很有价值。除非保险公司出问题，否则这份保单是你的、归你所有；一旦意外发生，它就会替你解决问题。”现实中我们有 gold 可以承担一部分“兜底”功能，但它的供给并不固定。放眼世界，如果你住在 Venezuela、Nigeria、Lebanon，或 Ukraine（战争爆发时），以及当 US 撤出 Afghanistan 的时候……

Bill Miller (00:49:39):

When the US pulled out of Afghanistan, Western Union stopped sending remittances there or taking them from Afghanistan. But if you had Bitcoin, you were fine. Your Bitcoin is there. You can send it to anybody in the world if you have a phone. And so I consider Bitcoin basically an insurance policy against financial catastrophe of one sort or another. And it doesn’t have to be all or nothing. Doesn’t have to be like, there’s some war in the United States, there’s some kind of thing where the banks are all shut and stuff like that.

当 US 撤出 Afghanistan 时，Western Union 停止了向当地汇款或从当地收款。但如果你有 Bitcoin，你就没问题——你的 Bitcoin 还在；只要有一部手机，就能把它发给全世界任何人。所以我把 Bitcoin 视为一张防范各类“金融灾难”的保险保单。这并非非黑即白，也不一定是发生在 United States 的战争、或者银行全线关门之类的极端情形，才值得持有。

一份保单的比喻看着不错。

William Green (00:50:05):

Look what happened to the money supply when the pandemic hit. When the Fed stepped in in that pandemic and started gunning the money supply and bailing out, in essence, the mortgage rates, and the other people are doing commercial paper and stuff like that, Bitcoin functioned fine. There was no run on Bitcoin. It went down a lot initially, but the system functioned without Fed and without any interference, and everybody got their Bitcoin and the price adjusted, and then when the Bitcoiners and newer Bitcoiners realized, “Wait, we’re going to have inflation down the road, bitcoin went through the roof. So that I think is a … It’s an insurance policy, the way I look at it.

看看疫情来袭时货币供应发生了什么。当时 Fed 介入，开始大幅扩张货币供应量，同时在本质上纾困抵押贷款市场，以及其他从事商业票据等业务的参与者，Bitcoin 运转得很好。没有出现对 Bitcoin 的挤兑。它一开始大跌，但整个系统在没有 Fed、没有任何干预的情况下照常运行，所有人都能拿到自己的 Bitcoin，价格自行调整；等到 Bitcoiners 和新入场的 Bitcoiners 意识到“等等，未来我们会面临通胀”时，bitcoin 便一路飙升。所以在我看来，它是……一种保险保单。

William Green (00:50:37):

You also said something that had a profound impact on me, I think the last time, or the previous time we talked about Bitcoin, where you explained to me that back in about 2014, 2015, when you first started to get fascinated by it, it was because you heard, Wences Casares talking about it, and that he was explaining exactly what you were just saying. That if you came from the US, where you had a functioning legal system and pretty good financial governance and property rights and the rule of law and all of that stuff, it was actually very hard to understand why this would be so valuable. And that he came from Argentina, where he had a totally different perspective, which fits into what I’m trying to talk about in terms of perception. Can you talk about what he said? Because that seems to me, profoundly important, this idea that he just viewed things differently because he wasn’t living in Omaha, for example.

你上次（或上上次）谈到 Bitcoin 时还说过一件对我影响很深的事：大约在 2014、2015 年，你之所以开始对它着迷，是因为听到了 Wences Casares 的阐述；他讲的内容与您刚才所说完全一致。也就是说，如果你来自 US——那里有有效运转的法律体系、相当不错的金融治理、财产权与法治等——那你其实很难理解为什么它会如此有价值。而他来自 Argentina，视角完全不同，这正契合我所说的“认知”主题。你能谈谈他当时说了什么吗？在我看来这非常重要：他之所以看法不同，是因为他不住在 Omaha，比如说。

Bill Miller (00:51:25):

Yeah. I mean, what he said was, his family had been in Argentina for 150 years, and had been wiped out multiple times by the government. Nationalizing the banks and taking the bank accounts away, inflating them away through that. There were three different things. Nationalizing the banks, inflation, and I forget what the third one was. But in any case, the fact is, he said, “We’ve been wiped out several times.” And he said, “But with Bitcoin, we can’t be wiped out by the government.”

是的。他说，他们家族在 Argentina 已有 150 年历史，却多次被政府“清洗”。手段包括将银行国有化、掠夺银行账户、以及通过通胀把资产“通胀掉”。大概有三种方式：银行国有化、通胀，第三个我记不清了。但无论如何，事实是，他说：“我们已经被清洗过好几次。”但他也说：“有了 Bitcoin，我们就不会再被政府清洗。”

William Green (00:51:49):

Yeah. The government just seized your assets at certain points, right?

是的。政府会在某些时点直接没收你的资产，对吧？

Bill Miller (00:51:51):

Yeah. Yeah. And he said, “With Bitcoin, we can’t be wiped out. The government cannot take it away from us.” I might have told you the story of Bob Short. He went to, where was it? Estonia, I guess it was. And had met with the business people there, and he was on his way to Davos, where he was going to be on a panel about Bitcoin. And so he was curious about if anybody, of the business people that he had met, he was in a room with 100 of them, and giving a talk on whatever. And he asked if any of them owned Bitcoin, and everybody raised their hand. And he said he was shocked.

对。对。他说：“有了 Bitcoin，我们就不会被清洗。政府拿不走它。”我可能跟你讲过 Bob Short 的故事。他去了哪儿来着？Estonia，我记得是那里。他在那里会见了当地商界人士；他正要去 Davos 参加一个关于 Bitcoin 的讨论小组。出于好奇，他在一个有 100 人的房间里演讲时，问在座的商界人士中有没有人持有 Bitcoin，结果所有人都举手了。这让他大吃一惊。

Bill Miller (00:52:23):

And I asked him why, and they said, “Well, because when Russia took us over after World War II, what they did is, they nationalized the banks, and they stole all of our money. Not our money, but our grandfather and grandfather’s money. That’s if you’re a regular citizen. But if you actually owned a business, you were sent to Siberia.” And he said, “And we sit right up here against Russia. They can do that again.” And he said, “But they can’t take our money this time, because we got Bitcoin, and we can just send it anywhere we want.”

我问他为什么，得到的回答是：“因为二战后 Russia 接管我们时，做的第一件事就是把银行国有化，把我们的钱都偷走了——不仅是我们的，还包括我们祖父辈的钱。普通公民如此；如果你还拥有企业，就会被发配到 Siberia。”他们说：“我们就挨着 Russia，他们完全可能再来一次。”但“这次他们拿不走我们的钱，因为我们有 Bitcoin，可以把它发到任何我们想去的地方。”

Bill Miller (00:52:48):

That was what happened also with Wittgenstein’s father, who was one of the wealthiest people in the world, and he had money invested outside of Austria. He had the United States and England and everywhere, because he said he couldn’t trust the Austrian government not to steal it. And then when Hitler took over Austria, he did. He basically took all the money from everybody that was Jewish, and then sent them to concentration camps. And the Wittgenstein family actually got some decree where, they weren’t sent to the concentration camps, because they had all this money outside the country and they agreed to give it to Hitler. And then he said, “Okay, well, I’ll count you as only partially Jewish then, and you’ll be spared.”

这与 Wittgenstein 的父亲遭遇的情形也类似。他是当时世界上最富有的人之一，把资金投在 Austria 之外——US、England 等地——因为他说他不信任奥地利政府不会把钱偷走。后来 Hitler 接管 Austria，确实这么干了：他把所有 Jewish 的钱都拿走，然后把他们送进集中营。Wittgenstein 家族最终拿到了一纸“豁免”，没有被送进集中营——因为他们在海外有大量资金，并同意把那些钱交给 Hitler。于是 Hitler 说：“好吧，我就把你们算作‘部分’ Jewish，你们可以获赦。”

Bill Miller (00:53:26):

So that’s one of the things about Bitcoin. That’s not the case with gold. You can’t carry gold around in sacks, trying to get across the border. So that’s another advantage that Bitcoin has. Fidelity had one of the best pieces they wrote recently on Bitcoin, Fidelity Digital Assets. And one of the points they made was that, it was one of the arguments against Bitcoin, one of the perceptions is that, Stan Druckenmiller used to say, I know he still says it, but, “Well somebody’s going to invent something better. There’s thousands of these tokens and coins out there, and technology is always changing in crypto. And so somebody’s going to invent one that’s better. Just like Ethereum was better than Bitcoin according to many people. And Solana is better than Ethereum. And the Fidelity people said, “Well, let’s-”

这正是 Bitcoin 的一个特点。gold 做不到这一点——你无法背着一袋袋 gold 过边境。这是 Bitcoin 的另一项优势。Fidelity Digital Assets 最近发表了一篇关于 Bitcoin 的很好的文章，其中指出，反对 Bitcoin 的一个常见论点/认知来自 Stan Druckenmiller（我知道他现在也这么说）： “总会有人发明更好的东西。外面有成千上万的代币，crypto 技术日新月异，总会出现更好的。就像很多人说 Ethereum 比 Bitcoin 更好，Solana 又比 Ethereum 更好。”而 Fidelity 的观点是，“那么，让我们——”

Bill Miller (00:54:03):

… is better than Ethereum. And the fidelity people said, “Well, that’s actually wrong in our opinion. Because basically, Bitcoin is like the wheel, nobody needed to reinvent the wheel after it was invented.” Now, Ethereum is actually a specialized type of entity, it’s maybe like a wheel for giant tractors, or it’s maybe a wheel that’s a run flat wheel, or it’s got these things that Bitcoin doesn’t have. But it’s basically a wheel, and so Bitcoin is the wheel, it’s the perfect wheel. And therefore if somebody invented it, something that did better, let’s call it a proof of stake Bitcoin. Okay, so I’m going to do a Bitcoin protocol that’s proof of stake now, instead of proof of work. And therefore, it will only use less than 1% of the energy that Bitcoin uses.

……比 Ethereum 更好。”而 Fidelity 的看法是：“在我们看来这其实不对。因为 Bitcoin 就像‘轮子’，一旦轮子被发明出来，就没有必要再去发明‘轮子’。”当然，Ethereum 更像一种“专用型”的轮子——比如用于巨型拖拉机的轮子，或者“防爆轮胎（run flat wheel）”，具备 Bitcoin 不具备的某些特性——但归根结底它还是“轮子”。因此，Bitcoin 就是“轮子”，而且是“完美的轮子”。即便有人发明出一个更好的版本，假设叫“proof of stake Bitcoin”，用 proof of stake 取代 proof of work，这样能耗只需 Bitcoin 的不到 1%。

Bill Miller (00:54:41):

And one of the big arguments against Bitcoin is that it’s a climate catastrophe, and uses as much energy as Argentina does, all this kind of stuff. And proof of stake, which Ethereum is changing to for that very reason, doesn’t do that. Okay, well, if you then invent a proof of stake Bitcoin, what happens? Well, if you would own Bitcoin, if it was proof of stake, you might buy some Bitcoin then. But again, why would you buy Bitcoin when you already have Ethereum, which is proof of stake and it can do stuff Bitcoin can’t do? So, why would you do the Bitcoin proof of stake? The other thing is, with proof of stake one of the big problems that people talk about as a problem in the United States is inequality. Well, proof of stake basically is the most unequal thing you can imagine, because the rich people make all the decisions.

反对 Bitcoin 的一个主要论点是它对气候是场灾难，耗能“和 Argentina 一样多”之类的。为此 Ethereum 正在转向的 proof of stake（权益证明）就不会这样。好的，那么如果你发明一个采用 proof of stake 的 Bitcoin，会发生什么？如果 Bitcoin 变成了 proof of stake，你也许会去买一点 Bitcoin。但问题是，既然你已经有了采用 proof of stake、而且还能做 Bitcoin 做不到之事的 Ethereum，为什么还要买 Bitcoin？又为什么要做“Bitcoin 的 proof of stake”？此外，围绕 proof of stake，还有一个在 United States 被频繁讨论的大问题是“不平等”。而 proof of stake 本质上可能是你能想象到的“最不平等”的机制，因为由富人来做所有决定。

Bill Miller (00:55:19):

And if you have more stakes, if you have more Ethereum at stake, meaning you own more of it than somebody else, you get whatever the votes are. It’s like if you own more shares than… If you own 50% of the shares of Berkshire Hathaway, you can determine what’s going to happen with Berkshire Hathaway. And if you own 50% of the Ethereum, you decide what’s going to happen with it, and nobody else can say it. That’s a problem that Bitcoin doesn’t have, it’s truly democratic.

如果你的质押份额（stake）更多、如果你在 Ethereum 上质押得更多——也就是你持有的份额比别人多——你就能拿到对应的“投票权”。这就像你在一家企业中持股更多……如果你拥有 Berkshire Hathaway 50% 的股份，你就能决定 Berkshire Hathaway 将发生什么；同理，如果你拥有 50% 的 Ethereum，你就能决定它的走向，别人说了不算。这是 Bitcoin 不存在的问题，它在这点上更“民主”。

William Green (00:55:38):

So when you think about the comments that Warren and Charlie made in the last few weeks in Omaha, these guys are… I mean, you’ve said to me before, they’re bona fide geniuses, they’re incredible investors, they’re incredibly thoughtful. Is there some sort of bias, or prejudice, or blind spot that makes it particularly difficult for them to understand Bitcoin?

那么回到最近几周在 Omaha，Warren 和 Charlie 的那些评论——他们是……你之前也对我说过，他们是名副其实的天才、了不起的投资者、思维极其深刻。那么，是否存在某种偏见或盲点，让他们特别难以理解 Bitcoin？

Bill Miller (00:55:59):

Yes, there’s several. I think everybody’s got blind spots in one way or another, and they’re error-prone. But certainly one of them is that they’re old, and they’re not used to new things, and they’re not the type of people who embrace new technologies and different ways of doing things. They look at the tried and true and tested, and they also don’t want to take a lot of risk. Buffet has said many times, I’ve heard him say to me that he’s taken enough risk in the insurance business, and he didn’t even realize how much risk he was taking until like 9/11. Like, “Uh-oh. If we get all this property casualty stuff out, I didn’t think about that.” So it’s not just what your experience is, because we had no experience with somebody flying into buildings before.

是的，有好几个。我认为每个人或多或少都有盲点，也容易出错。其中一个显然的点是：他们年纪大了，不习惯新鲜事物，也不是那种会拥抱新技术、或全新做事方式的人。他们关注的是“经过检验的东西”，而且也不愿承担过多风险。Buffet 多次说过——我亲耳听他说——他在保险业务中承担的风险已经够多了，直到 9/11 才意识到自己承担了多大的风险——“糟糕，如果所有财险事件一起爆发，我还真没想到这一点。”所以，这不仅是“经验”的问题，因为在那之前我们没有“飞机撞楼”这样的经验。

Bill Miller (00:56:36):

It’s also your exposures, and so he had to rethink his sense of exposure there. But I think the analogy that I’ve used on that one, which I think stands up well, is that it’s like the Buffet and Munger and all the traditional finance people, and a lot of people who are just involved in looking at Bitcoin and hating it. They’re like the Sherlock Holmes story Silver Blaze, where Silver Blaze was a famous racehorse, and he’s getting ready to run in the big race, then he was stolen. And so Scotland Yard of course is called in, and they cannot understand how somebody stole this racehorse. And so they called Sherlock Holmes and they say, “Can you figure this out?” And so Sherlock Holmes does some investigation, and he says, “Yes.” He says, “The key to solving the mystery is the guard dogs.”

这同样涉及你的“风险敞口”，因此他不得不重新审视自己的敞口。但我觉得一个类比很贴切：Buffet、Munger，以及一众传统金融人士，和许多只是“看着 Bitcoin 然后厌恶它”的人，有点像 Sherlock Holmes 的故事《Silver Blaze》。Silver Blaze 是匹名马，正准备参加大赛，结果被盗。Scotland Yard 自然被召来，但他们怎么也想不通这马是怎么被偷走的。于是他们请来 Sherlock Holmes：“你能解开这个谜吗？”Holmes 调查后说：“可以。关键在于看门的狗。”

Bill Miller (00:57:18):

And the inspector says, “The guard dogs? Well, the guard dogs didn’t bark.” And he said, “That’s the key, because the guard dogs knew who the thief was. And because it was known to them, they let him go by.” And so, the way that I say this is that all the people who are complaining, or all the people who are dissing crypto and Bitcoin are effectively like the detective in Silver Blaze. And as Marc Andreesen memorably said the first time that Buffet dunked on… It was 2017, that Buffet dunked on Bitcoin. He said, “The record of old white men who don’t understand technology crapping on new technologies they don’t understand is 100%.” Which then, when I heard Marc say that, that that Silver Blaze story jumped out at me because I said, “Aha, there’s guard dogs here that aren’t barking about Bitcoin.

督察说：“看门狗？看门狗没叫啊。”Holmes 说：“这正是关键，因为看门狗认识偷马的人。正因为它们认识，所以才任由他通过。”所以我说，那些抱怨/贬损 crypto 和 Bitcoin 的人，实质上就像《Silver Blaze》里的那位侦探。正如 Marc Andreesen 在 2017 年 Buffet 首次“嘲讽” Bitcoin 时那句著名的话：“那些不懂技术的老白人吐槽他们不理解的新技术，其错误率是 100%。”我听到 Marc 这么说时，立刻联想到《Silver Blaze》的故事——“啊哈，这里也有‘没叫的看门狗’——它们面对 Bitcoin 并没有发出警报。”

Bill Miller (00:58:09):

And they’re called venture capitalists, and venture capitalists’ job is to assess new technologies, and to decide which ones might be worthwhile and which ones aren’t. There is a whole ecology of them out there, and there is not a single one of them that I ever heard dumping on the technology of Bitcoin. Now, they might not have invested in it early, because they weren’t sure about it. But they certainly didn’t dunk on it, and that’s the case where… And now that there’s probably… There’s certainly not a prominent venture firm in the country, if not in the world that doesn’t have exposure to Bitcoin. And in fact, many of them, the biggest ones like Andreessen Horowitz for example, all of them are doing their own dedicated crypto funds. So, last year was, \$27 billion went into crypto venture investments. That’s more than the previous…

这些“看门狗”就是 venture capitalists，他们的工作就是评估新技术，决定哪些值得投、哪些不值得。这个生态很庞大，我从没听说过他们中有人“嘲讽” Bitcoin 的技术。当然，他们可能因为拿不准而没有在很早期就投资；但他们绝不是在“泼冷水”。而且现在，几乎没有哪家在国内（乃至全球）有名的 VC 不涉足 Bitcoin。实际上，很多大机构——比如 Andreessen Horowitz——都在做自己的专门 crypto 基金。仅去年一年，流入 crypto 风险投资的资金是 270 亿美元。这比此前的……

Bill Miller (00:58:53):

All the history of Bitcoin combined, they did that just in one year. This year, in the first quarter, more… Five times as much money went into Bitcoin ventures as did it last year, which is the all-time record. So, the money is pouring into this space, which again is a measure of what the demand is for these sorts of things. So, I conclude… I mean, I just saw Goldman just did their first loan, I believe, backed by Bitcoin. So, I think that you’re going to see… And Goldman wasn’t… I’ve talked to Pete Brieger, and some other people talked to the folks at Goldman and the management team there a couple of years ago, and they had the curiosity but no interest. And now they have a high degree of interest, and fidelity has been all over this stuff from the beginning.

……Bitcoin 发展史上此前累积的总和还要多——而他们只用了一年。今年第一季度，流入 Bitcoin 创投领域的资金又是去年的五倍，创下历史纪录。资金正源源不断涌入这一领域，这再次说明市场对这类事物的需求之强。我也据此作结论——比如我刚看到 Goldman 做了第一笔以 Bitcoin 作为抵押的贷款。我认为你会看到更多类似的事情发生。要知道，Goldman 以前并不是这样的……几年前我与 Pete Brieger 等人、以及 Goldman 的管理团队交流时，他们只有好奇心、没有兴趣；而现在他们兴趣浓厚。与此同时，Fidelity 从一开始就一直深度参与这一切。

William Green (00:59:33):

When I asked people on Twitter to send questions that I could ask you, I was pretty amazed. I think I got over a hundred questions, and as you would imagine a lot of them were about Bitcoin. Some of them insulting, and were like, “What is this guy thinking?” And one person, Bob Flynn, who I promised to send him a signed copy of Richer Wiser Happier to thank him for his question, said, “Could you ask Bill, what disconfirming evidence would make you change your mind about Bitcoin?” And I remember you talking to me before about the importance of the supply/demand dynamic. Could you give a sense of what would have to change for you to start thinking, “Maybe I made a mistake here, maybe I shouldn’t have half my net worth in this, or maybe this was a bad bet.” What disconfirming evidence would change our view?

当我在 Twitter 上征集可以向你提问的问题时，我相当吃惊。我想我收到了超过一百个问题，不出所料，其中很多是关于 Bitcoin 的。有些问题还带着侮辱性，比如：“这家伙在想什么？”有位名叫 Bob Flynn 的人——我答应送他一本签名版《Richer Wiser Happier》以感谢他的提问——他说：“你能不能问问 Bill，什么样的反证会让他改变对 Bitcoin 的看法？”我记得你之前和我谈过“供需动态”的重要性。你能否举例说明，哪些变化会让你开始想：“也许我这次错了，也许我不该把一半净资产押在上面，或者这是一笔糟糕的赌注。”——什么样的反证会改变我们的看法？

Bill Miller (01:00:12):

You know, I was interviewed by Dan Morehead, who’s the founder of Pantera Capital, which is the biggest hedge fund, and one of the biggest investors in Bitcoin and the tokens, and ventures out there, and he interviewed me for their annual summit a couple of months ago, or a month or so ago. And he asked after the interview was over a similar question. He said, “So, have you read anything that you thought was thought-provoking about the case against Bitcoin? Like, anybody written a thoughtful piece on that, that would cause you to say, “Oh, I didn’t think of that before.” And I said, “No,” and he said, “Me either.” And then I read a piece about a few weeks ago, and I’m like, “Oh, okay. That’s the first piece I’ve read.” And it’s pertinent right now, and it’s by… It was a woman who’s interviewed…

你知道吗，前一阵我接受了 Dan Morehead 的采访——他是 Pantera Capital 的创始人，这家机构是最大的对冲基金之一，也是 Bitcoin、各类代币与加密风投领域最大的投资者之一。他在一两个月前的年度峰会上采访了我。采访结束后他问了一个类似的问题：“你有没有读到哪篇反对 Bitcoin 的文章，足够发人深省？有没有谁写过让你读完会说‘哦，我以前没想到这一点’的内容？”我回答：“没有。”他说：“我也没有。”然后几周前我读到一篇，我心想，“哦，好吧——这是我第一次读到像样的。”而且这与当下很相关，作者是……一位女性在接受采访时……

Bill Miller (01:00:56):

You can get it on the internet, and if you look up The Atlantic magazine and Bitcoin, you’ll find it. There’s an interview by a guy who works on these newsletters for The Atlantic, and he’s interviewing this woman law professor named Hillary Allan about crypto. And she had written an article for a law review which kind of explained her concerns about crypto, her expertise is financial crises. And basically, the title of the law article was something to the effect of, Cryptocurrencies are Shadow Banking 2.0.” And her point is that, what set off the collapse in 2008 and nine was the collapse of first the Bear Sterns hedge funds, and then the real one was… I disagree with this, but conventional wisdom is that was reasonably well-contained until Lehman Brothers ran into trouble. And then when the government wouldn’t bail Lehman Brothers out, and did bail Fanny and Freddy out, but that was what led to the whole collapse.

你可以在网上找到它——搜索 The Atlantic（《大西洋》杂志）和 Bitcoin 就能看到。那是 The Atlantic 的一位通讯作者采访一位名叫 Hillary Allan 的女法律教授，话题是加密货币。她在一篇法学评论里阐述了自己对加密的担忧，她的专长是金融危机。那篇文章的标题大意是：“Cryptocurrencies are Shadow Banking 2.0.” 她的观点是：引发 2008–2009 年崩盘的导火索，先是 Bear Sterns 的对冲基金倒下；真正致命的——我不太认同这种说法，但主流观点认为——在此之前局势还算可控，直到 Lehman Brothers 出问题。政府拒绝救助 Lehman Brothers，却救了 Fanny 和 Freddy，于是触发了全面崩溃。

Bill Miller (01:01:50):

Because right after that, then it was AIG, and \[inaudible 01:01:53] to buy country-wide. And then the next one, this is where she drove the point home, was the reserve fund, the big money market fund that broke the buck. And because it wasn’t insured by anybody, like a bank, a bank account. And so when that happened, that’s when the whole commercial paper market froze up, and everything stopped, and the fed then stepped in. And Colson, having no authority to do so, basically guaranteed all the money market funds, and said the government will insure them if they break the buck. And that stopped that thing, and now when Congress didn’t pass the bailout of the banks worth giving a preferred stock, and then there were no more bank failures after that. So, what Hillary Allen said is that the stablecoins are like the reserve fund, there is no backing from them.

因为紧接着就是 AIG，随后是 \[inaudible 01:01:53] 去收购 country-wide。再往下——她在此处强调了自己的论点——是 reserve fund，那只“跌破面值”的大型货币市场基金。它不像银行存款那样有保险。当这事发生时，整个商业票据市场冻结，一切停摆，随后 Fed 介入。Colson 在没有法定权限的情况下，基本上为全部货币基金提供了担保，表示若“跌破面值”，政府将予以承保。事态因此被遏止；而当国会通过向银行注入优先股的救助法案后，随之也没有更多银行倒闭。Hillary Allen 的结论是：稳定币就像 reserve fund，它们没有任何背书。

Bill Miller (01:02:34):

And it’s worse because there’s no fed to bail them out, they’re all decentralized finance on an algorithm. And that’s exactly what happened, and they’re opaque. So, there’s Tether, and there’s… But Terra’s the one that started to collapse over the weekend I guess, and then went to effectively… I don’t know where it is today, as low as 20-some cents yesterday. I guess they halted it today, I saw. So, there’s nobody to bail them out. So now, if you thought that was a stablecoin, well it’s not stable anymore, you lost your money. And I think that’s the risk, and her solution to that in the interview was… They said, “So, what do you do about that?” And she says, “You either regulate it, the same way now that we’re regulating money market funds, a lot of new regulation after the financial crisis.”

更糟的是，它们没有 Fed 来救助——全都是基于算法的去中心化金融（DeFi）。事实也正如此，且极其不透明。比如有 Tether，还有……但我记得上个周末开始崩的是 Terra，随后跌到——我不知道今天多少——昨天低到二十几美分。我看到消息说今天好像暂停了。所以没有人来救。你以为那是“稳定币”？它现在并不稳定，你的钱没了。我认为这就是风险。她在采访中的对策是——有人问：“那怎么办？”她说：“要么纳入监管，就像金融危机后我们对货币基金实施的一系列新规那样；”

Bill Miller (01:03:17):

But the main one being that they had to be totally transparent about what their assets were, and you could verify them. And she said, “Either we do that, or you wall it off so it can’t infect the financial system, and it’ll collapse on its own if it collapses.” And so, I think both those things are right, and I think that it’s one of the reasons I like Silvergate, which is a bank that it basically services the crypto world, they’re the ones that lent the money to MicroStrategy for their latest \$250 million purchase of Bitcoin, secured by Bitcoin itself as collateral. But they’re the ones that… Silvergate bought the DM technology from Facebook, now called Meta, which they were going to use for their own stablecoin. And they were trying to use that payment mechanism on Facebook, but it rendered a buzz saw of regulation. And consequently, they couldn’t get it done because the regulators were all over it.

“但核心在于必须完全透明披露资产构成，并可被核验。否则就把它们隔离开来，避免传染金融体系——若它们自己要崩，就让它们自生自灭。”我认为这两条都对。这也是我喜欢 Silvergate 的原因之一——这是一家主要服务加密世界的银行；他们曾向 MicroStrategy 发放 2.5 亿美元的最新一笔贷款，抵押物就是 Bitcoin。本来他们还……Silvergate 从 Facebook（现 Meta）收购了 DM 技术，打算用来发行自家的稳定币，并尝试把这种支付机制用于 Facebook，但随后遭遇了监管的“电锯式”阻击。结果就是项目无法推进，因为监管者全面介入、严密盯防。

William Green (01:04:30):

I of course temperamentally am now pretty intrigued by Bitcoin, now that it’s more than halved. So, now suddenly it becomes really interesting to me after… Because I couldn’t bear to chase it when it was surging, but now that it’s halving this suits my temperament. But there’s a part of me… Sorry?

当然，就性格而言，现在 Bitcoin 已经腰斩有余，我开始对它挺感兴趣的。于是它突然变得很有意思……因为在它狂涨时我实在受不了去追，但如今腰斩更符合我的性情。不过我内心还有一部分在想……抱歉？

Bill Miller (01:04:44):

Hey, listen, it was up \$700 when we started talking, and now it’s down \$180. So, it’s had a reversal.

嘿，听着，我们刚开始聊的时候它还涨了 700 美元，现在已经跌了 180 美元。所以这已经是反转了。

William Green (01:04:51):

It knows that I’m thinking of buying it, it’s already collapsing. It’s doing an Ali Baba on me. But last time we spoke, I think I asked you what the various ways to play it were. And you were saying, “Well, you could just set up a Coinbase account,” which I think you said your sister had done. You could buy Micro Strategy, you could buy the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust. And now when we look at the news, and we see talk of, well, there are people that… This rumor mongering that Coinbase could go bankrupt, and then what would happen to your assets? Would they get locked up, and nobody really knows what would happen to them. MicroStrategy is getting hit with margin loans. I’m just wondering if your advice on how actually to do it in practical terms has changed at all, what would be sort of the idiot-proof way to invest in this if you wanted to put one or 2% of your portfolio in it?

它知道我在考虑买它，于是就开始崩了。它在对我“Ali Baba”。不过上次我们聊天时，我记得我问过你有哪些参与方式。你当时说，“可以开个 Coinbase 账户”，我记得你说过你姐姐这么做了。也可以买 Micro Strategy，也可以买 Grayscale Bitcoin Trust。可现在看看新闻，就有人在传——比如 Coinbase 可能会破产，那你的资产会怎样？会被锁住吗？没人真的知道会发生什么。MicroStrategy 也在承受追加保证金的压力。我想知道你对于“具体怎么做”的建议有没有变化——如果只想把投资组合的 1% 或 2% 配进去，哪种是最“傻瓜式”的做法？

Bill Miller (01:05:35):

MicroStrategy’s down seven bucks to 160. So, that price, 160 now, is where MicroStrategy’s traded before they started to buy Bitcoin. And so, that’s just the value of their business intelligence software platform, which is profitable and growing, and generates cash. Now, they do have debt, they have convertible debt, they had that secured loan with Silvergate. But Sailor was asked yesterday that question about margin calls on his Bitcoin, and he said, “Well, they’re protected down to about \$3,800 on Bitcoin, so about a 90% or 85% drop from here.” So, I think that’s when you can be sure, if you’re sure of anything, you can be sure that if Bitcoin rallies, it will rally. Because Bitcoin is locked away in cold storage, and Coinbase is a little bit riskier because it’s basically that entire crypto business.

MicroStrategy 下跌了 7 美元到 160 美元。也就是说，现在的 160 美元，是 MicroStrategy 开始买 Bitcoin 之前的交易区间。所以这基本就是它们商业智能软件平台的价值——该业务盈利、在增长、并产生现金。当然它们有债务，有可转债，还有与 Silvergate 的抵押贷款。昨天有人问 Sailor 关于 Bitcoin 的追加保证金问题，他说：“我们在 Bitcoin 跌到大约 3,800 美元之前都有保护，大概是从这里再跌 90% 或 85%。”所以我觉得，如果你能确定什么的话，那就是——如果 Bitcoin 反弹，它会猛涨。至于 Coinbase 风险更高一点，因为它基本上就是整个加密业务的集中体，而 Bitcoin 多数被锁在冷存储里。

Bill Miller (01:06:29):

On the other hand, it’s a very profitable crypto business. So, the whole system would have to collapse for Coinbase to be a problem. Silvergate serves that ecosystem as well, so if that ecosystem goes bad and goes to zero, Silvergate… But it’s still a bank, and so it can shift its business. But it was \$10 before it started doing this stuff, and now it’s \$60. So, that would be a nice drop from there.

另一方面，Coinbase 是个非常赚钱的加密业务。要让 Coinbase 真出问题，恐怕得整个体系都塌。Silvergate 也服务这个生态，所以如果这个生态出问题、归零，Silvergate……但它毕竟是一家银行，可以调整业务结构。它在做这些事之前股价是 10 美元，现在是 60 美元。从这里往下回落的话，空间也不小。

William Green (01:06:52):

And I was looking at the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust, which has fallen from something like 55 to 19 since November. Is that still something that’s an okay way to play Bitcoin?

我还看了 Grayscale Bitcoin Trust，自 11 月以来好像从 55 跌到了 19。它现在还是一种不错的 Bitcoin 参与方式吗？

Bill Miller (01:07:02):

Well, the problem with Grayscale, which is down 6.7% today, and Bitcoin is down .34% today, is that the Bitcoin is worth one Bitcoin. And Grayscale owns Bitcoin, but you own a security, not Bitcoin directly. And so, Grayscale now trades at a whopping 34% discount to the NAV of the Bitcoin that it holds. And actually, I think that’s about as wide a premium as it’s ever had. So, it may not widen from here, but they’ve… I guess Grayscale is having a campaign right now to try and put pressure on the SEC to approve the ETF spot Bitcoin ETF, instead of just a futures-based ETF. But Gary Gensler, the head of the SEC, has said that he’s not going to do that until basically Bitcoin… He can be assured that there are investor protections with respect to the instrument to the ETF, that apply to other ETFs.

这样吧，Grayscale 今天跌了 6.7%，而 Bitcoin 今天跌了 0.34%。问题在于：Bitcoin 就是一枚 Bitcoin；而 Grayscale 虽然持有 Bitcoin，但你买到的是一只证券，而不是直接持有 Bitcoin。因此，Grayscale 目前以其所持 Bitcoin 的 NAV 打了高达 34% 的折。事实上，我觉得这是它历史上最宽的折价区间之一。也许不会再继续扩大，但他们……我估计 Grayscale 现在正发起活动，试图向 SEC 施压，推动批准现货型的 Bitcoin ETF，而不是仅批准基于期货的 ETF。不过 SEC 主席 Gary Gensler 表示，在他能确信与该 ETF 相关的投资者保护条款能像其他 ETF 一样适用之前，他不会批准。

Bill Miller (01:08:02):

And so Grayscale said if he doesn’t approve it this time around, they reject… Because Grayscale has filed to convert their current GBTC into an ETF, and he’s rejected that I think at least two times. And if he rejects it again, they say they’re going to sue the SEC, because they don’t think they have the legal authority to do that. In any case, Canada and Switzerland and Australia and Brazil have all approved Bitcoin ETFs, and why can’t… Why is it good enough for their regulatory authorities but not good enough for ours? The risk of Grayscale is the premium widens.

因此 Grayscale 说，如果这次仍不批准，他们就……因为 Grayscale 已申请把现有的 GBTC 转为 ETF，而我记得至少已被拒过两次。如果再被拒，他们打算起诉 SEC，认为 SEC 没有法律权力一再拒绝。无论如何，Canada、Switzerland、Australia、Brazil 都已批准了 Bitcoin ETF，为什么对他们的监管机构来说“足够好”，对我们这边却“不够好”？持有 Grayscale 的风险在于折价可能扩大。

William Green (01:08:31):

I wanted to ask you a couple of non-cryptocurrency questions, but investing questions before we change the subject totally. One of which is, how do you guard against your own prejudice and bias, and also against this character quirk that I think you have, which is that you are so contrarian by nature that I think when really smart people like Warren and Charlie oppose something, you actually get almost more excited about it. Like, what do you do to kind of, yeah, guard against your own prejudice, and your own personality quirks?

在完全换话题之前，我想问你几个与加密无关、但与投资相关的问题。其中一个是：你如何防范自己的成见和偏见？以及如何克服我认为你身上存在的一个性格特质——你天生很“逆向”，以至于当像 Warren 和 Charlie 这样的聪明人反对某件事时，你反而会更兴奋。也就是说，你具体怎么做，来防范自己的偏见和性格小毛病？

愿意博一博、喜欢刺激、喜欢给自己找一点麻烦的性格，而巴菲特认为那只是时间问题，如果假设是对的、事实是正确的、推理是合理的，那么成功只是时间快慢的问题，巴菲特不赶时间。

Bill Miller (01:08:59):

Oh, I don’t have any. I would actually dispute the first thing, which is to say that I’m a contrarian by nature. So, I would say that in philosophic terms, I’m not a naïve contrarian. If there’s a lot of enthusiasm for something, I don’t immediately say, “Well then, because everybody likes it I don’t like it, or everybody hates it I like it.” What I do is, I try to understand what the prevailing views are, and where… Either there’s a lot of exuberance, or there’s a lot of fear and pessimism, and just see what the evidence is on both sides. And we know from the psychological literature, and from \[inaudible 01:09:33] and Traversi that the coefficient of loss versus gain is two to one. So, losing your dollar is twice as painful as making a dollar, or winning a dollar. And so, in order to get people to bet, you’ve got to give them two to one odds just to basically risk a dollar on each side where the odds were 50-50.

哦，我没有这些。我其实不同意第一个前提——说我“天生”是个逆向者。从哲学上说，我不是那种“天真式逆向”。当某件事被热情追捧时，我不会立刻说“大家都喜欢我就不喜欢，大家都讨厌我就喜欢”。我会先努力理解主流观点是什么、情绪处在“过度亢奋”还是“过度恐惧/悲观”，并查看双方的证据。心理学文献（包括 \[inaudible 01:09:33] 和 Traversi）告诉我们，“损失相对于收益”的效用系数大约是 2:1——亏一美元的痛苦大约是赚一美元的快感的两倍。因此，要让人们下注，你得给他们 2:1 的赔率，哪怕事件本身是 50/50 的概率，否则他们也不愿冒“一手亏一美元”的风险。

Bill Miller (01:09:52):

They don’t take that, because they’re afraid of losing. So, when you have a market that’s got 2,000 52-week loans and six new highs, like we have today, then there’s basically owners of 2,000 of those companies really aren’t happy because they lost money last year, the last 12 weeks. So, as I said before, the only think better than a stockette of 52-week loans is a stockette of a three-year loan, or a five-year loan, or a 10-year loan, or an all-time loan, because everybody hates it, because they lose the money. So, at least there’s a prima facie taste to take the other side, and let’s take a look at really what’s the case here. So again, if you see Warren and Charlie and Jamie Dimon and all these people dumping on some financial thing is our road… And I showed her a letter in 2017, you have to have pretty good evidence on it to take you to the other side of that one.

他们之所以不愿下注，是因为害怕亏钱。所以当市场里有 2,000 只股票处在 52 周新低、却只有 6 只创出新高（就像今天这样）时，意味着这 2,000 只股票的持有者过去 12 个月（或 12 周）都不开心，因为他们亏了钱。正如我之前说的：唯一比“处在 52 周新低的股票”更好的，是“处在 3 年、5 年、10 年甚至历史新低的股票”，因为人人都讨厌它——他们在这上面亏了钱。至少这在表面上就给了你“站到对立面”的动机，接下来要做的就是认真核查事实本身。所以，当你看到 Warren、Charlie、Jamie Dimon 等人一起抨击某个金融事物时……我在 2017 年也展示过一封信件，你若要站到他们对面，得拿出相当过硬的证据才行。

I.H.141.Bill Miller.Bitcoin

I.H.141.Bill Miller.Bitcoin

1、《2022-05-23 Bill Miller.Investing On Apple, Amazon, Bonds, & Tesla》

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