How Do You Know When To Hate?

I have used ARHAIK.com as a personal blog with the vast majority of writing taking place from 2016 – 2018. The below was from a post on April 7, 2016

The recent spate of state legislatures to enact, or attempt to enact discriminatory laws (North Carolina, Georgia, Mississippi) has me thinking about each of our differences and how it really effects others in your society.  Mississippi voters want to be able to discriminate based on their perception of another person, but what if they are wrong?  How do they know if someone is gay if that person does not specifically convey their sexual orientation?

Each of us has differences, and what can make those differences important is if the difference is visible or not, how deeply the difference effects you, and how deeply it can effects others (if visible or known).  I have come to think of it as a simple (but important), three axis chart.

X-Axis: Is your difference visible to others?  One of my ears is shaped slightly different than my other.  This is a minor difference that has been noticed by a minuscule fraction of a percent of people I have interacted with.  In fact it has never been mentioned to me, but I can see it in the mirror.  But some people’s differences are massively noticeable; an amputee, someone with facial burns, someone who chooses to dress outlandishly (or conservatively), or a gay couple who choose to show their love with public displays of affection.  This matters to the individual as it effects how others in society view each of us.  And that, in turn, has an effect on how we view ourselves.

Y-Axis: How a difference effects ourself.  My slightly and almost imperceptible difference in ear size effects me exactly zero.  I can not think of any event in my life that has been effected by the fact that my ears do not perfectly match.  But for someone who is gay, or of a certain religious belief, or someone who believes aliens reside on Earth…..their daily actions are effected by their difference.  The gay couple may choose not to go to a certain restaurant (or straight people may choose not to go to a certain part of town), the Buddhist may need to take time during the day to pray, and the people who believe aliens walk among us, well, not sure how they are effected but that must effect your day-to-day decision making.

Z-Axis: How other treat you due to any visible difference.  Maybe the alien-believer lives in a community in Northern Arizona where everybody believes aliens inhabit Earth.  That makes life a lot easier for the believers.  But what if the gay couple live in a small beach community in a state that just passed a pro-discrimination law?  Do they now avoid certain stores?  Will other citizens treat the gay couple differently now?  Do they need to uproot their lives and family and move to a different state?

But this raises two important questions….1) How do we know what any person’s difference(s) are unless they purposefully tell others?  If I showed you a picture of a conference I attended and stated that two people are gay and one transgender, I bet you could not pick those three out of the 28 people in the picture.  So for those who support the pro-discrimination laws, how do you who to discriminate against?  And what if you are wrong, are you opening yourself up to civil or legal complaints?

2) Why care what others’ differences are if you can not see them and they do not effect you?  You probably do not see the differences in my ears, and even if you looked real close, would that difference effect how you view and treat me?  What if I was a Buddhist?  What if I had a massive scar on my back (that you can not see unless we are at the beach) because I donated a kidney?  And for my fellow conference attendees who are either gay or transgender, if you can not see they are different than you, you could not purposefully discriminate against them, correct?

So what does it matter what one’s differences are so long as the person is not causing harm to you and your society?  The pro-discrimination crowd will tell you it is about religious liberty.  That their belief of something is so strong, that they can not accept it even in others.  That it is not good enough to live by one’s own creed and beliefs, but that one has the right to force one’s own belief on others.

But can that be the case?  Is that a valid way to view society?  Or do they believe in that only when they are in the majority?  Because those who are pro-discrimination and back laws to allow them to discriminate based on their beliefs are likely to change their tune if those they discriminate against were to gain the majority.

Operation Chokepoint 0.1

I have used ARHAIK.com as a personal blog for a number of years. Much of the writing was from 2016 – 2018. The below post is from Feb 2018. I wish I had coined the term Operation Chokepoint at that time.

In another example of how global regulators are using lessons learned from the retail FX & CFD industry, more and more financial institutions are cutting off crypto exchanges (and all crypto service providers) from banking access.  There seems to be few formal rules that are forcing banks to take these step, but there is clearly a behind-the-scenes push.

Similar to CFD’s being outlawed in the US, but Eligible Contract Participants having access to “Total Return Swaps“, retail investors are being restricted from cryptocurrencies, but ECP’s still have easy access.

But I wonder is it just the volatility of cryptocurency trading that is causing concern to regulators?  Is it the fact that they can not easily point to intrinsic value in many ICO’s?  Is it the Anti-Money Laundering aspect?

Tangentially…..there is a bit of a catch 22 going on.  If and as more merchants start to accept cryptocurrency as a form of payment, volatility will drop and intrinsic value will be easier to define.  But cutting off fiat to crypto conversion will slow this acceptance rate due to reduced supply of buyers who have crypto to use in purchases.

As for the AML…I get it.  Crypto’s are real tough to follow and to identify; they are designed that way.  But so is cash.  So if the regulators overarching goal is control of money flow and knowledge of transaction participant ID’s….then they will keep pushing for fewer and fewer, globally connected institutions.  And that is what I do not want to see.

Strategy vs Planning

I used ARHAIK.com as a personal blog for a time. Some posts from as far back as 2016 seem worth sharing here. The below is from Jan 4 2023

Strategic Planning. Many organizations engage in strategic planning at the end of each calendar year but I dislike the term “strategic planning” because “strategy” and “planning” are very different processes for an organization. Let’s define, differentiate, and get these separate processes sorted.

A “strategy” for an organization is the theory of why the organization should be competing in a certain market, and how this organization will compete in that market space. Strategy is not a guaranteed outcome; it is dependent on your ability to execute as you desire AND the marketplace’s acceptance of your business model to solve their needs. The strategy for a new plumbing service may be to use on-call, independent, licensed plumbers who drive company vans that are fully equipped with every conceivable piece, part and tool that could be used in a home repair. This way the repair job can be guaranteed to be resolved with a single visit by the plumber. The plumbing company drive this value proposition as part of their marketing and processes they implement to win market share.

“Planning” is a process by which an organization controls how it will use resources. The company controls the expenditure of resources to accomplish a demonstrable outcome. In the plumbing case above, the company needs to plan its purchase of vehicles equipped with the ability to carry a wide variety of parts and tools. The company needs to plan its inventory management process so it never runs out of a tool or part by logging each tool and part with a barcode that is scanned when used and automatically restocked when the van returns from the job. The company needs to plan for how to get in touch with the independent contractors each time a service call comes in.

Planning is far more comfortable to do for managers. Planning is a process by which you know in advance what the outcome will be (the vans will be fully stocked each time they leave the lot. Planning is the process to compare radio systems and go through a RFQ process with 4 providers to get the best deal.

Strategy can provoke angst and worry. You can not be sure your chosen strategy will work as you expect. Other plumbing firms may offer a monthly service plan that satisfies the customer base more so that your ability to resolve issues with one visit. Your compensation plan for the independent plumbers may fail to get enough to sign up as part of your labor force.

Determining strategy is critical for organization leaders. And the better they can articulate strategy, the easier they will be able to raise funding, hire talent, and run their business. But strategy is does not have a guaranteed outcome. Planning is what happens after strategy is determined so that the organization can execute the chosen strategy. Let’s not confuse strategy with planning. And let’s skip the “strategic planning”

Blockchain’s Killer Use Case

This report and subsequent interview with Peter Johnson of Brevan Howard Ventures highlights the rise of stablecoins. I work for Circle, the purveyor of USDC, EURC, and our Digital Dollar infrastructure offerings so I may be a bit biased, but the proof is hard to deny. Stablecoins are replacing many forms of transmission of value, especially US Dollars. It reiterates Circle’s mission statement:

Circle is a global financial technology company helping money move at internet speed. Our mission is to raise global economic prosperity through the frictionless exchange of value.

“Canceling” Student Debt

https://x.com/JoeBiden/status/1711126823201919437?s=20

I do not have much faith in the current US political system, or it’s leaders. Republican or Democrat, the parties have reduced US politics to a least common denominator battle for a very slim portion of the electorate.

I am motivated to write this by the “canceled” in recent language from the Biden White House in relation to the Student Loan Forgiveness program. The US Department of Education’s estimates show the Student Loan Forgiveness program will cost US taxpayers $305 Billion dollars over the next 10 years. And the present value of the thirty year cost of this forgiveness is $379 Billion dollars.

Debt is not cancelable. Someone received money from someone else with a promise to pay it back. Then they were told they do not have to. Therefore the original lender is out that money. In this case it is the US taxpayer who is on the hook because the Federal government is absorbing the debt and passing it onto taxpayers. But addressing the whole truth and discussing hard things is not how US politics are done these days. In an world of increasingly short-time-frame attention spans, short tweets and 12 second video clips is what sells American politics.

DeFi is Unstoppable

DeFi is an unstoppable movement to change the way modern finance operates. Since the early 1980’s capital markets have been moving towards frictionless transactions. From price discovery, to order matching, to settlement, most changes to the transactions industry have been to improve efficiency. Decimalization, net settlements, regulatory reporting requirements, etc.

If you believe that the best technology solution ultimately wins, then DeFi is the next major step in the continued march towards frictionless exchange of capital and assets.

This long, and in-depth post by @bunnygeurilla is an excellent analysis of the reasons for DeFi’s ultimate success and the ways we likely get there.