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Saifedean Ammous—best known in the Bitcoin community as the author of The Bitcoin Standard—has attacked Argentine President Javier Milei’s stabilization program as a bond-fueled “fiat fraud,” arguing that the policy mix flatters official statistics while deepening the country’s dependence on multilateral lenders and peso-denominated carry trades.

In a lengthy X post on August 20, Ammous framed last week’s bond rollover as a reality check: “Argentina’s Javier Milei regime tried to roll over bonds by offering investors an insane 69% interest rate, and only succeeded in rolling over 61% of them. Even a 69% annual interest rate isn’t enough to tempt investors to risk lending to the Milei ponzi.” He punctuated the thread with a line he says Milei himself used after a memecoin debacle: “No Crying in the Casino!”

Bitcoin Vs. Fiat: Milei Picks His Side

Ammous’ critique is explicitly Bitcoin-versus-fiat. He claims the administration “reneged on [its] campaign promise to shut down the central bank,” chose to expand money-supply measures instead of “stop[ping] creating money,” and raised taxes while seeking an IMF rescue—moves he calls “the same old fiat banksterism.” The Bitcoin author’s monetary prescription is unambiguous: “After almost two years in office, it would have been absolutely trivial for Milei to bring price inflation down to close to zero with the one simple trick… stop creating money.” In Ammous’ telling, anything short of extinguishing discretionary money creation cannot be sold to Bitcoiners as sound policy.

On debt and multilateral financing, Ammous alleges that the latest arrangements amount to record-breaking exposure to official creditors and a mortgaging of future fiscal space. “With this new $20b in IMF loans, Argentina now has the highest outstanding debt to the IMF in IMF history… borrowing is now at 1,352% of its IMF quota,” he writes, adding that the World Bank and Inter-American Development Bank “also” committed roughly $12 billion and $10 billion, respectively, bringing “a total of $42 billion borrowed from international institutions.” He characterizes the show of support, celebrated by local officials, as a pyrrhic victory for fiat: “Point 5 is not a win, it is an L.”

The Bitcoin-versus-fiat framing extends to prices, exchange rates, and data quality. Ammous argues that government statistics understate the erosion of purchasing power, but says even the official numbers are damning. “After year-on-year price inflation rates rose to almost 300% in the first few months of his presidency, it has declined to the 30–40% range in recent months, and the cumulative price inflation since Milei has taken office is 155%,” he writes. He underscores pressure on the peso by citing both the black-market and official rates: “The black market peso exchange rate has dropped 30% against the dollar in just 21 months… The official rate… has dropped by around 70%, from 400 pesos per dollar to 1,300 pesos per dollar. Just in the last month of July, both rates dropped around 13%.”

Bitcoin Doesn’t Default—Fiat Always Does

Ammous, speaking from a hard-money and Bitcoin perspective, insists that free markets cannot coexist with monetary discretion: “All talk of a free market is empty rhetoric as long as the government manipulates the money.” He links this to the high-yield peso bond complex—what he dubs a “shitcoin casino”—arguing that “the central bank is imposing an interest rate of 65%, making speculation on the government’s bonds the only possibly profitable industry.” In Bitcoin circles, that argument resonates with a longstanding critique: fiat incentives manufacture yield-chasing behavior that collapses when confidence wobbles, while Bitcoin’s fixed issuance schedule avoids that cycle by design.

His post also alleges problematic asset management and bank risk. “Milei shipped off the little that remained of Argentina’s once significant gold reserves to London in search for a quick yield buck,” Ammous claims, before warning that new regulations could again funnel household savings into sovereign risk: “Milei and Caputo are currently trying to force the banks to buy more government bonds, yet again using the savings of Argentinians to prop up the government’s unsustainable debt… bringing back painful memories of the Corralón of 2001.” The Bitcoin author’s broader contention is that fiat systems externalize crisis risk onto depositors and domestic savers, while Bitcoin self-custody avoids those channels.

The administration’s supporters—some of them Bitcoiners—push back. Fernando Nikolić, founder of Perception responded point-by-point that “inflation has dramatically declined,” “GDP growth is projected at 5.5%,” “currency controls were successfully eliminated without crisis,” and “the budget achieved [a] historic surplus.” He framed the outcome as proof that markets and institutions “rewarded Milei’s more gradual approach,” even if it falls short of an immediate central-bank shutdown favored by Austrian economists and many Bitcoin advocates. Ammous dismissed the rebuttal: “You either didn’t read what I wrote or you’re incapable of comprehending what you read… Point 5 is not a win, it is an L. Muted for wasting my time with stupidity.”

Beyond the clash of tone, the substantive disagreement is philosophical and monetary. Ammous’ benchmark is Bitcoin-standard discipline: close the central bank, anchor money supply, let relative prices reset, and rebuild on hard money—painful initially, in his view, but durable.

The government’s approach is classic fiat stabilization: disinflate with tight policy, widen financing buffers with IMF/WB/IDB lines, normalize the FX regime, and nurse domestic markets back to depth—politically survivable if growth returns, but reliant on confidence, rollover capacity, and high local-currency rates that Bitcoiners see as the hallmark of fiat fragility.

For now, both narratives point to the same hinge variables: peso rollover capacity at “insane” yields, the pace of disinflation, the behavior of parallel exchange rates, and whether multilateral support remains politically and financially sustainable. If those levers tighten simultaneously, Bitcoin’s critique will look prescient; if they hold, the case for a fiat stabilization hardens. In Ammous’ words, however, Bitcoin is the only durable exit: “It would have been absolutely trivial… stop creating money.”

At press time, Bitcoin traded at $113,612.

Featured image created with DALL.E, chart from TradingView.com

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If you work in a nine-to-five for diminishing wages and dwindling self-respect, the author of The Bitcoin Age (Amazon affiliate link), Adam Livingston, says Bitcoin can help you break the chains of ‘wage slavery’. Let’s take a closer look.

Wage slavery: you are not employed, you are monetized

In today’s economy, most people like to think of themselves as “employed.” Working hard, building a career, and moving up the ladder. Well, it’s time to wake up and smell the coffee, as Livingston bluntly warns:

“You sell your time for melting tokens that depreciate while you sit in traffic and rehearse what you’re going to say to HR after another Pizza Party raise.”

This cycle is what he calls wage slavery. You exchange hours of your life for currency that loses value by the day. The “grind” isn’t just a figure of speech; it’s real.

Livingston points to the rigged system we’re living in as prices rise, wages stagnate, and the retirement dream fades further into the background. Rents are up by more than 40%, eggs have become a luxury item, and salaries are frozen in time.

“The money printer goes brrr. Your paycheck goes missing. The system isn’t broken. It’s just not for you.”

The purchasing power of the U.S. dollar has fallen by about 95% since the 1970s. Imagine leaving your hard-earned wages in a bank for fifty years.

That’s not all: In 1970, the average UK house cost less than three times the average annual wage; by 2025, it’s more than seven times the average wage. Buying a home has become dramatically less affordable for the average worker over the past 55 years.

On the ‘fiat farm’, you get milked for your labor, sheared by taxes and inflation, and harvested for “productivity metrics” and Slack messages.

“They call it ‘the grind’ because you’re getting ground into paste.”

It’s a rigged, extractive machine, and opting out isn’t about protest or riot. It’s about quietly walking away from dependence on the system.

All is not lost: Bitcoin as a time machine

If you’re ready to get off the sinking ship, Bitcoin is your liferaft. Livingston describes Bitcoin not as a speculative gamble, but as a time machine for poor people:

“It doesn’t inflate. It doesn’t lie. It doesn’t ask permission. You’re not buying magic internet money. You’re buying back your future. One sat at a time.”

Where fiat is designed to decay, Bitcoin offers a fixed supply, enforced by code rather than political whim. Compounding the problem of wage slavery is the fact that you’ve been given poor investment advice all your life, according to Livingston. Traditional financial advice sounds safe on the surface:

“Buy bonds.”

“Diversify.”

“Mutual funds are safe.”

But diversification is just managed poverty, he argues. The point isn’t to mindlessly spray money across asset classes that all sink with inflation; it’s to escape the system driving that decline.

“But I’m broke!” you argue, I can’t even save for my vacation, let alone put money aside for my financial future. That’s a good thing, Livingston argues, flipping the usual fear on its head:

“That means you’re paying attention.”

Stacking Bitcoin isn’t about being rich. “It’s about not disappearing.” Even $5 a day matters. So, cut Netflix. Cancel the aimless brunches, and start reclaiming your sovereignty one sat at a time.

Bitcoin has outpaced traditional benchmarks since 2020, registering gains exceeding 1,500%, while gold advanced roughly 115% and the U.S. Dollar Index remained nearly flat.

The divergence in asset performance reflects a period of monetary expansion, persistent inflation concerns, and evolving perceptions of scarce, non-sovereign assets as institutional investors and sovereign entities re-evaluate reserves and portfolio allocations.

Bitcoin climbed from price levels near $7,700 in early 2020 to intraday highs around $123,164 today, driven partly by a weak dollar and spot exchange-traded funds in the United States that removed barriers to institutional participation.

As BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust exceeded 700,000 BTC in holdings and surpassed $88 billion in assets under management, the asset class has been increasingly woven into regulated investment products. Institutional access is regarded as creating a price floor while mitigating the volatility traditionally associated with digital assets.

Gold’s upward trajectory continued through the same period, rising from around $1,550 per ounce to over $3,300, as geopolitical tensions and inflation protection strategies preserved demand for physical assets.

Meanwhile, the dollar’s relative value against other currencies remains flat after substantial volatility. Still, its purchasing power has eroded by an estimated 20% cumulatively from 2020 to 2025 due to inflation, according to data from U.S. government sources and CPI indexes.

The COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent economic policy responses in 2020 fueled an expansion of monetary supply and fiscal interventions unprecedented in modern history, prompting market participants to seek stores of value beyond fiat.

We are now walking the path toward Hyperbitcoinization

Bitcoin’s fixed supply and decentralized nature positioned it as both a speculative vehicle and a potential hedge, capturing capital from investors diversifying away from sovereign currency exposure.

Bitcoin’s acceleration has led many to explore the thesis of Hyperbitcoinization, where it might replace fiat currencies as a primary medium of exchange and store of value. While the prevailing analyses maintain this scenario remains improbable in the near term, today’s environment mirrors how fiat currencies’ fall would start.

Bitcoin has become a macro asset comparable to gold rather than an imminent replacement for the dollar. Regulatory frameworks, taxation requirements mandating fiat settlement, and the economic risk of deflation inherent in fixed-supply monetary systems remain substantial hurdles to Bitcoin fully supplanting traditional currencies.

Institutions and governments have nonetheless integrated Bitcoin into treasury strategies. As CryptoSlate has reported, the Emirate of Abu Dhabi disclosed a $439 million position in Bitcoin ETFs. In the United States, President Trump signed an executive order initiating a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve, signaling official sector interest in holding Bitcoin alongside traditional reserves.

Further complicating the outlook, U.S. trade policy in 2025 has introduced tariffs on major trading partners, contributing to inflationary pressures and leading to a decline of around 10% in the dollar index year-to-date. BlackRock CEO Larry Fink cautioned in public statements that persistent fiscal deficits and the risk of dollar debasement could elevate digital assets like Bitcoin as alternatives, reflecting sentiment from parts of the financial establishment that Bitcoin’s role is shifting from speculative asset to strategic reserve.

Currently, the total US debt stands at $37 trillion and rising, while the dollar is in a precarious position.

Surging institutional adoption has coincided with declining evidence of grassroots activity. On-chain throughput broke above 500,000 transfers a day several times in 2025, though Lightning Network capacity has remained relatively flat around 5,000 BTC since mid-2022.

However, the past few months have seen a drop in capacity to around 4,300 BTC, according to mempool.space.

Transfers below $1,000 do make up more than half of the total on-chain Bitcoin volume, pointing to peer-to-peer settlement rather than exchange consolidation.

Those metrics, paired with ETF inflows, corporate treasury adoption, Abu Dhabi’s allocation, and the U.S. strategic reserve order, create a picture that matches the early stage of Hyperbitcoinization: fiat dilution, a stronger Bitcoin price, and the first migration of day-to-day transactions onto a rival monetary rail. Further, the Lightning Network is not the only way to move Bitcoin on-chain cheaply, numerous layer-1s host forms of wrapped Bitcoin which are used regularly across multiple chains.

If throughput on Lightning and other layers widens further, the framework for mass transactional adoption will be in place, and Bitcoin’s role will move from balance-sheet hedge to usable money.

That transition is underway, but the focus remains on acquiring Bitcoin rather than integrating Bitcoin as a technological tool to revolutionize TradFi.

Still, if the corporate world relies on Bitcoin for its store of value, placing that value in Lightning Channels to earn yield or staking it to secure other blockchains becomes an enticing offer.

From there, using Bitcoin to secure critical infrastructure and building tech stacks around Bitcoin’s immutable global timestamping service is a logical next step.

At that point, Bitcoin becomes not only the best store of value but the catalyst to secure and integrate that value into the entire digital world.

Mentioned in this article

Cryptocurrency exchange Kraken unveiled Krak, a new mobile payment app that allows users to send digital assets and fiat currencies to recipients in more than 110 countries.

The app supports over 300 currencies and aims to usurp the dominance of established financial apps such as PayPal, Venmo, and Cash App.

Developed to offer a faster and more flexible alternative to traditional finance tools, Krak enables users to transfer money using a unique identifier called a “Kraktag,” eliminating the need to link a bank account for transactions. The app handles both crypto and fiat transfers internally, streamlining cross-border payments.

Kraken co-CEO Arjun Sethi in a statement:

“We believe moving money should be as simple and borderless as sending a message,. With Krak, we’re offering a next-generation tool that challenges outdated financial rails and brings crypto and fiat into a single experience.”

The launch marks a significant step in Kraken’s broader strategy to evolve into a multi-asset financial platform. The San Francisco-based firm has historically focused on crypto trading but is now pushing into areas traditionally dominated by legacy institutions.

The company said users will also be able to earn returns through stablecoin-based yield products within the app, beginning with Paxos’ USDG.

Earlier this year, Kraken moved into traditional markets by offering equities and ETF trading in select U.S. states. The firm also completed a $1.5 billion acquisition of futures trading platform NinjaTrader in March, deepening its footprint in derivatives and traditional finance.

Kraken’s expansion comes after a period of legal uncertainty. In March, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission dropped a lawsuit against the company that alleged it was operating as an unregistered securities exchange.

The resolution paved the way for new product development and cleared a major hurdle ahead of Kraken’s planned public listing. Founded in 2011, Kraken is one of the longest-operating digital asset exchanges and has consistently expanded its services to a global user base.

With the launch of Krak, the firm aims to provide a unified interface for money movement, whether users are sending dollars, euros, or Bitcoin, without relying on traditional intermediaries.

Krak is now available to users in eligible jurisdictions, and the company says it intends to roll out additional features in the coming months, including integration with other financial products and enhanced identity tools for enterprise payments.

Mentioned in this article