Michael Saylor, the CEO of MicroStrategy, who became the king of the Bitcoin treasuries, urged his colleagues on Wednesday to avoid the path of financial “serfdom” at his virtual WORLD.NOW conference on the subject of Bitcoin.
In his solo address, Saylor described the cryptocurrency playbook that brought his three-decade-old data company to new relevance in less than a year.
Saylor largely eschewed the near-mystical rhetoric that has shaped his public crypto deliberations since August, focusing in a calibrated appeal to corporations on tough business strategies, processes, and dollar-sensed language.
“There’s a macro wind – big – it’s going to affect $ 400 trillion in capital. This capital is in fiat instruments that are being mined. That capital will want to be turned into strong money, ”said Saylor.
Saylor’s goal remained to trigger the currency revolution. For months he has been preaching the gospel of a tougher, faster, and stronger “money network,” Bitcoin, which Saylor fell in love with at the height of the COVID-19 shutdowns and a student when Fiat printers were in full swing.
While the CEO’s notoriously brazen declamations in support of Bitcoin in the past were significant to retailers, his sermon at the conference targeted a far greater force on the buy side: corporations. MicroStrategy was the first US company to invest its dollar treasury in Bitcoin. With a bitcoin reserve of 71,079, Saylor seemed determined that his company won’t be the last.
Accountants, attorneys, and company executives joined Saylor’s efforts. Her attempts to run corporate what-abouter from the beginning explained the practical why and how of BTC accumulation, sometimes down to the smallest detail. But even in the pro-bitcoin moments, lawyers reminded viewers to beware of violating OFAC sanctions.
MicroStrategy’s show could not be separated from its ringmaster’s CEO. Saylor’s anchoring lesson set the tone for countless subsequent Bitcoin programming.
“Every company has to make one of two decisions,” said Saylor, when it comes to a world of martial money printing. “Either you have to decapitalize, which is kind of self-destructive … or you have to recapitalize yourself with an asset that is growing in value faster than the rate at which the money supply expands. This is where Bitcoin comes in. “
And here the dollar goes out. In Saylor’s worldview, there is no scenario in which the dollar maintains its global reserve status. For the man who guarded over $ 1 billion of MicroStrategy’s reserve dollar in Bitcoin, this cryptocurrency is the only viable route for companies to survive the impending devaluation apocalypse.
Listen: Michael Saylor’s mission to bring 1,400 businesses to Bitcoin
The Shepherd said “fiat derivatives” offer treasures a false break from the “road to serfdom”. Bonds, stocks and real estate are just a placeholder for Fiat, he said. You will see increasingly diluted returns as long as the underlying fiat continues to decline. The answer: convert them all to bitcoin.
Saylor offered debt increases, stock issues, and cash flow conversions as alternative balance sheet strategies for starting a Bitcoin company.
“Any company on earth can do that. Law? Every company has some level of treasury assets, ”said Saylor.
ARK Investment Management believes that if each S&P 500 company invested 1% of its assets in Bitcoin, the price of crypto would rise by $ 40,000.
Saylor also offered a playbook to companies approaching BTC as a company. He said companies could start developing bitcoin tools, developing bitcoin software, and offering bitcoin services that provide bitcoin infrastructure. “All of these things will increase sales and cash flow.”
“If you want to maximize shareholder value, maintain or create shareholder wealth, you can either work on a balance sheet strategy for bitcoin or a profit and loss strategy for bitcoin,” he said.
MicroStrategy corporate representatives followed Saylor’s presentation, point by point, of the challenges companies might face when adopting Bitcoin. Referring to MicroStrategy’s own path, President Phong Le and Chief Financial Officer Jeremy Price laid out the missions and methods to get your business on board.
Continue reading: Cathie Wood: More tech companies will introduce bitcoin treasury reserves
For “some it takes minutes, some takes hours, some takes days, some takes weeks, usually not months, but when that switch flips you have a team of advocates ready to move forward and really just change as you see your business strategy, ”Price said.
Then it was the legal department’s turn. MicroStrategy’s legal advisor addressed the governance, regulatory concerns, and policy issues that underpin every decision in Corporate America. The admittedly dry presentation outlined a concrete timetable for implementation.
Policies to curb insider trading support the company’s ethical front, they said. For example, MSTR employees are prohibited from making Bitcoin purchases with their own assignments.
Le then returned on stage with two tax experts to study Bitcoin’s financial implications.
Taken together, the successive conversations were the strongest argument for MicroStrategy that flirting with Bitcoin in 2020 is not a fad. With over $ 1 billion in Bitcoin and almost certainly more bets, the company is now positioning itself to lead a massive corporate exposure.
The conference program (which also included panels on the real business: Building Data Intelligence Products) had a blunt aim. On Thursday, WORLD.NOW will track 10 crypto service providers in a marathon industry roadshow of companies vying for the Bitcoin allocation from companies that Saylor is aiming for.
“All the vendors you hear about tomorrow want you as customers,” said Le.
The crew of Bitcoin makers at MicroStrategy on Wednesday publicly outlined the backroom instructions for a strategy that has made Saylor one of the most influential Bitcoiners to emerge from the American company.
“We are at the beginning of a very long trend here,” said Saylor. “And with that I have more to say, I don’t have time to say it, but you know, follow me on Twitter and stay tuned.”
