当我的信用合作社和银行业务同行紧张地问比特币是否是庞氏骗局

因为如果我们说实话，比特币的最大罪可能是，它对价值在金融体系中的工作方式太透明了

Credit union and banking peers often ask me nervously if Bitcoin is a Ponzi scheme. I usually pause, smile, and say: “Are you sure that’s the right question? It’s not whether Bitcoin is a Ponzi scheme—it’s whether you’ve ever encountered something that isn’t.”

信用合作社和银行同行经常问我是否紧张地问比特币是否是庞氏骗局。我通常会停下来，微笑，说：“您确定这是正确的问题吗？不是比特币是否是庞氏骗局，而是您是否曾经遇到过没有的东西。”

Because if we’re being honest, Bitcoin’s greatest sin might be that it’s too transparent about how value works in a financial system built on speculation, belief, and a growth mentality.

因为如果我们诚实，比特币的最大罪可能是，它对价值在基于投机，信念和成长心态的金融体系中的工作方式太透明了。

Let’s also set some context. The majority of our modern economy isn’t built on hard assets, production output, or even tangible value. It’s built on confidence and credit expansion, a system largely shaped by the thinking of John Maynard Keynes. And to be clear, Keynes wasn’t hiding the ball. His famous quote “In the long run, we’re all dead” was a direct nod to the reality that these systems are inherently unstable over time—and yet, we build anyway.

我们还设置一些上下文。我们的大部分现代经济不是建立在硬资产，生产产出甚至有形价值之上的。它建立在信心和信用扩张的基础上，这是约翰·梅纳德·凯恩斯（John Maynard Keynes）的思想所塑造的系统。需要明确的是，凯恩斯并没有隐藏球。他著名的名言“从长远来看，我们都死了”是对这些系统天生不稳定的现实的直接点头，但无论如何，我们还是建造的。

Don’t believe me? Just look at Tesla or Nvidia’s price to earnings ratios over the past 12 months. Take Tesla; approximately 1.5 trillion in market cap at EOY 2024, with a little over 7 billion in profit. For those of you whose calculators have a hard time with 10 and 13 digit numbers, that’s a measly 0.46% ROI, or about 150 years for your investment to double, if looking strictly at the production value of the P&L. And yet it remains one of the most valuable companies on planet earth.

不相信我吗？只需查看过去12个月中的特斯拉或Nvidia的价格比率即可。带特斯拉； 2024年EOY的市值约为1.5万亿美元，利润超过70亿。对于那些计算器遇到艰难时期和13位数字的人来说，这是ROI的0.46％，或者您的投资大约150年，即使您严格了解损益的生产价值。然而，它仍然是地球上最有价值的公司之一。

Governments, businesses, even small-town Main Street operations all depend on borrowing against future productivity. And if the inflows stop? Well, that’s someone else’s problem . . . right?

政府，企业，甚至小镇大街运营都取决于借款，以抵制未来的生产力。如果流入停止？好吧，那是别人的问题。 。 。正确的？

OK, back to the topic at hand, is Bitcoin an actual Ponzi scheme? Let’s take some Ponzi accusations and reframe the conversation a bit:

好的，回到手头的主题，比特币是实际的庞氏骗局吗？让我们采取一些庞氏骗局的指控，并重新构架对话：

Claim: “The gains to early participants are paid directly from new participants’ principal.”

主张：“早期参与者的收益直接从新参与者的校长那里支付。”

Reality: Yep. Welcome to literally every financial market. No one who made money on Apple stock did so without a new buyer showing up to pay a higher price. Same with Tesla. Same with real estate. Same with fine art. Same with anything speculative (even if classified as ‘securities’). What may be hard to stomach is that Bitcoin doesn’t pretend otherwise.

现实：是的。欢迎来到每个金融市场。没有人在苹果股票上赚钱的人这样做，没有新的买家出现以支付更高的价格。与特斯拉一样。与房地产一样。与美术一样。与任何投机性相同（即使分类为“证券”）。可能难以忍受的是比特币并没有假装。

Claim: “There’s no actual asset being traded—it’s just money in, money out, until the thing collapses.”

主张：“没有实际的资产交易了，这只是金钱，钱，直到东西崩溃为止。”

Reality: Sounds a lot like the S&P 500 in 1999 (remember the dot-com boom and bust?). Or U.S. housing in 2008. Or NFTs in 2021. Every market—every market—is money in, money out . . . until it isn’t. Some things create value, sure. But most of what we call “investing” is just placing bets on hype cycles and hoping you’re not the last one in the pool when the music stops.

现实：听起来很像1999年的标准普尔500指数（还记得Dot-Com的繁荣和胸围吗？）。或2008年的美国住房。或2021年的NFTS。每个市场（每个市场）都是金钱，金钱。 。 。直到不是。当然，有些事情会创造价值。但是，我们所谓的“投资”只是在炒作周期上下注，并希望当音乐停止时，您不是游泳池中的最后一个。

Claim: “The whole (pyramidic) structure depends on a constant inflow of new money.”

主张：“整体（金字塔）结构取决于不断的新资金流入。”

Reality: Show me a business that doesn’t. Show me a government that doesn’t. Show me a multi-level org chart—corporate, nonprofit, or military—that doesn’t have a few at the top and many at the bottom supporting it all. Our entire economy is built on inflows, expansion, leverage, and belief. So maybe the problem isn’t what some have described as the speculative nature of Bitcoin . . . maybe the problem is the very structure of modern economies themselves.

现实：向我展示一个没有的业务。告诉我一个没有的政府。向我展示一个多层次的组织图（公司，非营利组织或军事图表），其中最高的几个，底部没有任何支持。我们的整个经济基于流入，扩张，杠杆和信念。因此，也许问题不是一些人所说的比特币的投机性质。 。 。也许问题是现代经济本身的结构。

Let’s talk about the U.S. Dollar for a minute. The dollar is backed by one thing: trust in the U.S. government. Given everything DOGE has turned up in the past couple of months, are we still 'sure' that trusting the government as a fiduciary is really the 'best' idea?

让我们谈谈美元一分钟。美元得到一件事的支持：对美国政府的信任。考虑到过去几个月中，Doge出现的一切，我们是否仍然“确定”相信政府作为受托人确实是“最好的”主意？

And even if we squint past the headlines, the numbers don’t lie: the federal government runs an annual deficit north of $2 trillion, while its own currency steadily loses 2–3% of purchasing power per year on a good day. You’d be hard-pressed to find a business owner or credit union CFO who’d call that a sustainable model. There’s no need to dive into conspiracy theories or fraud scandals to see the problem. A Dollar General calculator should suffice.

即使我们拒绝了头条新闻，数字也不会说谎：联邦政府的年度赤字在2万亿美元以北，而其自身货币在美好的一天中稳步降低了每年购买力的2-3％。您很难找到一个企业主或信用合作社CFO，他将该可持续模式称为可持续模型。无需潜入阴谋理论或欺诈丑闻即可查看问题。一美元的一般计算器就足够了。

The dollar isn’t redeemable for gold. It’s not collateralized by anything. It’s a token backed by debt, printed in theoretically (actually?) infinite quantities, and absolutely dependent on continuous belief (faith

美元不可赎回黄金。它没有任何东西。这是一个由债务支持的代币，理论上（实际上是？）无限的数量印刷，并且绝对取决于连续的信念（信仰