How Bitcoin Can Save Your Business w/ Stephen Cole

The "What is Money?" Show

Robert Breedlove

Bitcoin, Breedlove, What Is Money, Investing, Rabbit Hole, Cryptocurrency, Money, Finance, Education, Robert Breedlove, History

4.8 • 710 Ratings

🗓️ 22 July 2025

⏱️ 138 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Stephen Cole joins me to talk about his journey from Silicon Valley angel investor to full-time Bitcoin builder. We discuss what it was like discovering Bitcoin in 2013, lessons from the Blocksize Wars, why he went all-in on BTC, and how to evaluate Bitcoin startups with Bitcoin as your hurdle rate. We also dive into his work at Castle, the risks of Bitcoin treasury companies, and whether state adoption is bullish or a trap. Stephen Cole is an angel investor in over 50 startups and founder of Exit Capital and Castle.

Transcript

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0:00.0	I ended up being in the room when PayPal leadership was like ordering engineers to block
0:06.8	WikiLeaks accounts.
0:08.8	And then the more you learn about journalistic freedom and some of what WikiLeaks was
0:12.9	doing, the more you start to wonder, were we the good guys?
0:16.5	And how did you come across Bitcoin in 2013?
0:19.2	I've just never felt more confident in the future of some tech than this Bitcoin thing
0:24.6	that I'm quickly becoming obsessed with because it feels like a huge deal.
0:28.6	This is a monumental threat to the powers of be.
0:31.6	And these are potentially some bloodlines that have had control over the world for a long, long time.
0:36.6	And I was already interested in Austrian econ and money and the separation of money and state.
0:41.8	I just felt this despair, I suppose, because I didn't think we would ever be able to achieve that.
0:49.2	What do you say to people who are considering investing in these Bitcoin treasury companies? Oh, man, yeah. A lot of people are in these Bitcoin treasury companies.
0:54.6	Oh, man, yeah.
0:55.7	A lot of people are seeing these Bitcoin treasury companies scoop up Bitcoin aggressively,
1:00.1	and they're worried that this is some unsustainable bubble.
1:02.2	We're in the midst potentially of changing the direction of our civilization forever.
1:07.4	Can we just knock it up?
1:09.0	Totally. Yeah. so much is at stake
1:11.2	all right step all right stephen cole very grateful to have you here we were connected by a friend. And I don't know much about you.
1:30.8	I know a bit about Bitcoin and the way we would like to see the world change. It's my understanding that you are now investing in Bitcoin startups.
1:40.1	Right. Yes. So since I don't know much about you, tell me a little bit about how you got here today. I know you have, to my understanding, you have a tech background. You were in Silicon Valley. Yep. Ten years in Silicon Valley. Yes. So what were you doing there? Yeah, man. Excited for the convo. Thanks for having me. I think these types of discovery convos are especially cool,
2:03.8	too, where you kind of go in with minimal context. Totally. I don't want to see a synopsis for a movie
	...

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