The Goodwill Investing Journal
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The Goodwill Investing Journal - Issue #80

The Goodwill Investing Journal - Issue #80

The Ultimate Bitcoin Argument. Plus, if you could simulate one financial life decision, what would it be?

Eddie Gudewill
July 25, 2025

Today a poll, and a discussion on Bitcoin.

Be interested in your thoughts.

Thank you, Eddie

Personal Finance

If you could simulate just one life decision to see how it affects your finances over time, which would you pick?

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Stock Markets

With Bitcoin hitting an all time high of US$120,000 in recent days, more people are starting to notice, and so I thought it would be helpful to re-share the following podcast.

Originally released in November 2018, The Ultimate Bitcoin Argument with Anthony Pompliano and Murad Mahmudov remains one of the best overviews of Bitcoin I’ve ever heard to this day.

This was the pod that originally sent me down the Bitcoin rabbit hole. Aside from a brilliant Q&A session that addresses all the positives—and counterarguments—about Bitcoin, the word “prolific” comes to mind; you’ll quickly be nodding your head in amazement at how things have turned out.

A few excerpts from the transcript, Murad answers the question, What is Bitcoin?

“Bitcoin is something that can be described with more than 100 different definitions…Bitcoin first and foremost is a new form of money. It’s a new form of thinking about money, storing money, transferring money, and just dealing, organizing, and understanding money.

When something is centralized, it is very easy to shut down. A privilege of creating and controlling your own money, let alone a monopoly on it [government fiat], is something that gives the controllers of that system a tremendous amount of power, arguably more than anything else in the world. With Bitcoin, proof of work allows the system to be secure and decentralized at scale, as well as allows us to time-stamp transactions on the ledger in a decentralized, trust-minimized manner.

Bitcoin is an unimaginably new phenomena, where for the first time, nobody can seize your wealth. Not just directly, like they did with Gold in the 30s, but just like they do with stealth inflation in fiat. Nobody can print more.

The fact nobody can print beyond 21 million, that is by far the strongest and most important innovation here.

In the current system, because the money is constantly getting diluted, people like surgeons, artisans, dentists, engineers, etc., they have to play part-time investors on the side, or they have to outsource those services to registered investment advisors and brokers. That’s part of the reason why the financial system is much bigger than it has to be, and why Wall Street is a ginormous part of the world’s economy.

It’s actually quite crazy how today, I’m not even talking about the second or third world where this isn’t even an option, even in the first, developed, civilized Western world, you have to create a diversified portfolio of equities, bonds, small caps, commodities, FX, derivatives, just to preserve your wealth. I’m not even talking about making some tremendous outsized returns. I’m talking about just to save your wealth. This is crazy.

Bitcoin will not be inhibited by inflation, it will not be inhibited by borders, it will not be inhibited by centralized control.

The Genie is out of the bottle, and the idea is here to stay forever.”

What’s the word again? Prolific?

Many newcomers argue that what Donald Trump is doing around crypto regulation is the reason Bitcoin is where it is today. It is not; Donald Trump’s attention is a natural game theory reaction to the Bitcoin project. Like I’ve said before, Bitcoin will do what it does independent of the sitting president. Not the other way around.

Anyway, I’ve listened to this podcast about 10 times over the 7 years since 2018 (including this past week) and each time I’m quite amazed at how potent the argument then was in the context of where we are now. Wowza.

For some casual performance reference, since November 2018:

S&P500 including dividends has returned 3x.
Gold has returned 2x.
Copper has returned 2x.
Bitcoin has returned 17x.
**past results are not indicative of future performance

Obviously, in hindsight, wish I bought more when I first heard the podcast. But this is relatively normal for the average Bitcoiner’s journey. You dip your toe in, and as the years go by, you experience the violent ups AND the violent corrections (they are called crypto winters, after all). As you learn more, you start to buy more, but at far higher prices than when you may have made your first purchase.

My first purchase I bought $6,500 worth. That is up 1200%.

Over the years I’ve accumulated what for me is a significant amount, but at far higher prices. In total, the market value of my BTC is up 2.5x vs the overall cost. As an aside, my personal investment allocations are 25% Bitcoin, 25% S&P500, 50% private real estate—this is not a recommendation for you to match my exposures, just being transparent.

I’m comfortably at the point that Bitcoin to me is as important as the internet, phone, email, or global WhatsApp group chat. Call me a believer. Call me incentivized. Just don’t call me to explain how the plumbing actually works. I don’t ask Bill Gates how the internet and cross-globe face time calls works - they just do.

IF you were to consider storing some of your wealth in Bitcoin, do so at your own risk. My biggest piece of advice is to understand in advance how quickly the price can collapse. Overtime, the volatility is upward (see chart at the bottom), but if you zoom in on short term periods, the inter-cycle crashes will test even the most emotionless person’s resolve.

Trick is to learn the cycle and then ignore the greed and fear as best you can. Start with what you can that won’t implode you mentally when it inevitable collapses, and add in measured ways throughout your time horizon.

A question to end, where are you at with BTC overall? Would love to compare thoughts.

Prior journal entries on Bitcoin if you’re interested: