154. Fiat History with Niall Ferguson 

My grandfather lost all his gold, which the Austrian government took from him and gave him paper currency (Schilling) which quickly devalued and was lost. It’s a lesson which my father always reminded me of.

Niall made a great point. I will start DCAing into 16th century houses. 100 euros every Friday no matter what.

absolutely fantastic content....... good to see that Saif doesn't just invite nodding heads on to the show.......

Amazing how little views and likes Saif gets on youtube. So much value. My favorite channel. Clearly shadow banned. Time will show this genius channel. Props

Great conversation . We, as bitcoiners, are VERY early.

Its clear he has not done his homework on the topic of bitcoin.

Ahh so everyone should be a trained financial advisor to maintain their purchasing power, got it.

Thanks Saifedean. Great content you never disappoint

Would be interesting to have a more formal debate about the moentary history of the past few hundred years. Have Saif pick 2 others and Nial also pick 2 others. I'd tune in for that in a heartbeat

I don't know Niall's work but after hearing Saife's praising couldn't help to feel a bit disappointed by some of his arguments or depth in perspective. For example, on the opinion over Bitcoin, Niall picks it up from the perspective of technological developments that is making money change from physical to digital and, as if someone is going to win this competition. Money is already digital and that is not important. What is important is that technology (internet's maturation, SHA-256, etc.. and Satoshi's genius) allowed for the creation of something truly revolutionary, a money that can't be controlled and inflated and that can be easily used by everyone on the planet.

Very instructive talk. Despite being a Bitcoin maxi, I really appreciate hearing different opinions from smart people like Niall.

"That's a great argument to invest in real-estate" yes and then go through the hassle and side job or renting, insurance, maintenance, and property tax. The whole point is to store your money, not start a side business.

Brilliant conversation!

Saif is a true educator, thanks to this pure signal guy, after following him for 5 years even I am smarter than Niel Ferg, haha. Unbelieveable!

Very interesting discussion, love hearing someone who challenges the inevitability of Bitcoin. I believe it is inevitable, but like to challenge my conviction to be sure I’m correct. Naill has some blind spots with regard to the lightening network and it’s efficiency in worldwide remittance. Thank you for putting out this content.

Niall Keynes

Professor is 100% correctly diversification!!

His conviction is rooted in his 20th century education. Outside of his breakdown of history, he is saying a whole lot of nothing. He centered the majority of his dialog on price in a high time preference manner with little focus on purchasing power over time. The simple things will confound the wise.

Would be great to do a post-mortem on this episode. Seems like Nial has some significant blindspots and gaps in his knowledge. And a little too certain about some parts of the stories he spins. Also quite a few times i saw him smuggling in as if it were uncontestable fact some pretty dubious perspectives. Also was pretty astonished to hear him argue against the desirability of the possibility for there existing a safe way to save there near the end of the episode. Wow.

16th century houses in England as an inflation hedge? How do you buy $10, $100, $1000, or even $10k worth of that genius?!

What a disappointment. Didn't realize how much of a mainstream historian he was. Thanks Saifedean, you did really great. It is always so depressing to see people insisting on their views without even knowing or studying the other views, or let alone other academic disciplines. The same is true for economics. The Austrians are always perfectly aware of the arguments and flaws of the economic alchemists, the alchemists, by contrast, never dive into other views. When I read Picetty's "Capital in the 21st century" I couldn't finde ONE reference to Menger, Böhm-Bawerk or Mises, all of which laid out the fundamentals of capital.

The Great Depression was not a consequence of World War II. It was a consequence of the U.S. Government and especially the Fed turning a rather normal market decline into a Depression. Former Fed President, Ben Bernake has written about this in some detail.

This was a really interesting interview. Thanks for sharing this with us. Much respect.

great debate and discussion 👍

Awesome interview. It sounds like he has bought into the notion that we need inflationary money and things should produce yield (definite shitcoiner mentality :-) ). Was waiting for the Lightning Network to come up with the payment discussion. I love his comment that Agreement is Overrated!

Funny how Niall thinks he can understand history just by looking at it without understanding underlying laws.

Interresting interview - glad to see that the guests sometimes aren't all on-board with Bitcoin and its inevitability. However I think it is astounding that Niall doesn't realize that he falls into his own definition when he says that "he isn't a fundamentalist on anything... because when you dive into a subject it becomes multifaceted and complex". It sure does, but that doesn't mean that there is no such thing as "reality" - especially regarding engineered systems! Many people might attribute "bad luck" to the fact that their car broke down - but from a mechanics perspective the fault, and thus the reason for the breakdown is searchable and findable. If you know how a car works, you know how to maintain it for optimal performance, and how to avoid most, if not all breakdowns. The same goes for economics - if you look underneath the hood, you'll see a bunch of stuff happening, and you'll get a better picture of what is going on. Niall for some reason refuses to even entertain the idea of looking further into the mechanism of economics - and acts all "cautious" about entertaining Saifedeans inputs. However he still manages to conclude that the current system works fine because of the historic outputs of the system... compared to what exactly? That's like saying, that a car that only runs on two out of four cylinders is great, because the car eventually got to the destination - you are not acknowledging that the car could have been running on all four cylinders, and thus gotten to where it was going far more effective and reliably. I think his logic is flawed in that regard - but nonetheless an interresting conversation - thanks Saifedean!

Is it me or is btc up 40% already this year!?!

Him practically bullying Saife and saying "that's not even debatable." Yeah, he's a bit arrogant.

Wow, we are so early - stack sats

Not gonna go up this year. BTC up 45% this year lol. Niall NGMI

1:14:58 "I don't think Bitcoin is going to go up in price this year". Famous last words 😂 The video was recorded in the second week of 2023. Bitcoin's price in USD went up approx 155% in 2023 😂.

dude doent know about the lightening network or any developments on layer 2 protocols he should have been called out on it adoption in Nigeria and other countries needs to read check your financial privilege Alex Gladstein other than that his historical analysis was enlightening

disappearance of cash - interesting Especially seeing in my country there is a popular initiative to have cash anchored to the constitution - i.e. not to be possible to remove it...

Great man. Very smart. Amazing signal for bitcoin adoption when he capitulates. I will be watching and still stacking

Once Germany invaded Belgium i feel British involvement was assured. However it is possible the British assistance may have arrived too late, which would of left Britain in a very difficult situation, which mirrors the situation they found themselves in 1795.

The views on Bitcoin were largely balanced. A little western leaning, perhaps unaware of Lightning but that isn't determinable... But the diatribe by Saif straight after that was far from convincing. Anyone slating Niall for being uninformed needs to take a breath and come out of the bubble for a month or two so as to reassess bitcoin with fresh eyes.

Bretton Woods was not a gold standard? Wrong! Britain did not have a gold standard, that is why Britain suffered comparatively.

Niall kept referring to the Bitcoin’s peak as being 2020. Clearly he’s talking out of his rear-end, even casual bitcoiners know the peak was November 2021… weak…

The older I get, the only thing I’m 100% confident of is that it’s a futile effort to try & change a Boomer’s opinion. They argue from their own egos , not the validity of what’s being argued. If you get them cornered, they’ll just resort to their social status / prestige as why they are right.

Saife = Signal, Niall = Noise.

Eminent.

Is the Coinbits exchange good and reliable in Australia? Also, are these books and info therein, up-to-date? This tech is changing very rapidly.

British participation in World War I may have been 'contingent', but if they had not declared war on Germany in 1914. it would have had to fight the Germans a few years later and without allies. Germany in World War I was not the Germany of World War II, but the brutalities of the German Army were not insignificant.

Canada had all Britain's gold in WW 2: Operation Fish.

Ferguson's understanding of money is too rudimentary to really get the points Saifedeen is making.

Dunning Krugerisms

Did he really make the claim that inflation was below the 2% target and when inflation went up Bitcoin fell in price, therefore Bitcoin isnt a hedge? Did I hear that correctly??

This is a good video but I have to say, I will forever be indebted to you Gardner 😇you’ve changed my whole life I’ll continue to preach about your name for the world to hear you’ve saved me from a huge financial debt with just little investment in money market, thanks so much Mrs Rose Gardner

I wonder when this was recordeded. Ferguson says he expects no price rise for BTC this year, but also is referring to the California storms as contemporary.. could have been recorded in January before fh price rise from 16k to 22k

wuf, so well read, so completly clueless about the deeper issues.

You bring up Rothschild and exonerate him right off the bat🙂 Sets my tin foil hat tingling lol

Every one in comments is saying this man and this guy, The most Known Financial Historian appeared like tom dk and harry on your channel.

How do you say WW1 was a central banker war without saying it was a central banker war in 107 minutes?

1:28:18 "if there were some magical asset that you could just save and put aside with 100% confidence that it would generate a real return of let's just say 5%, then there would be a tremendous rush to buy that asset. So you would almost certainly find that for a period the returns went sky high because it would be too easy. And I don't think life can be that easy" 😂🤣

Niall has a very 21st century and British perspective! Germany would have won WW1 fairly easily and dominated the continent starting in 2016 Kaiser then doubles High Seas Fleet nd looks askance at Britain and empire! Germany was ahead technologically even in 1914. Asquith was correct that Germany could not be allowed to win that war!

Niall was proven completely wrong about bitcoins price------about 71,000 dollars today

Agreement is overrated.

Makes sense he lives in California. Prob not on the coast tho

I'm about 98% in Bitcoin 😂. Freedom is ❤

TMI

For a guy who rails against fundamentalists, Niall really is fundamentally against fundamentalists. Crypto ice age? Utter nonsense.

If Germany won the war against Russia and France it would turn against UK as the next step. This is why they built naval to beat UK control of the seas. Germany would turn against UK empire. Yet these kinds of revisionist positions (e legitimate if based on primary historical sources) were fashionable in 2014.

you dont need to consciously asset allocate. You are asset allocating by not even asset allocating.

"It will never be as important as gold" LOL!

Niall is incredibly smug. He somehow completely misses the point about whether we _should_ have to invest instead of being able to just save without losing purchasing power

I liked all his answers except for “saving should be difficult” which makes no sense at all. But what could I expect… Niall is a pro-establishment guy. He is a Hoover Institution fellow. If you listen to him on their show Good Fellows, he is very pro-establishment.

Niall quickly moved from the topic of (inevitable) future adoption by central banks, simply stating it hasn't happened yet. El Salvador doesn't even come up?

1870THE CORPORATE BEGINNING

So his advice is to invest in 16th century British housing? 🤦‍♂️

This guest is a wannabe elitist, thinking bitcoin adoption is dependent upon how many millionaires allocate or have a bitcoin position in their portfolio. This guy is the opposite to what & who bitcoin is for. Has he even read the white paper? How narrowminded of him to believe gold used as money began in England & after being corrected he then goes onto argue semantics about there being a difference between a gold standard & gold being used as money. I’m aware this author is not saifedean’s hero by any means however the expression comes to mind, “never meet your heroes”. For all the history the guest knows he appears to lack foresight, at least regarding bitcoin

I want my central bank to own gold. Not shitty US Treasuries.

The confidante ignorance infuriates me.

"You wouldn't want to be 100% in Bitcoin" lol

what a useless interview. Saifedean Ammous is great. Niall Ferguson is high time preference and short sighted. this interview was borderline useless.

Niall thinks your are going to back to the same pre war gold standard? lol.

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Great debate. Saife normally destroys people so good to see someone with the knowledge and eloquence to do battle. Personally I agree with Niall about convenience, privacy and therefore Bitcoin being marginalised and has made me question my conviction and weighting,

©NOW CRYPTO HAS BECOME DOMINANT, PLEASE HOW CAN I MAKE A PROFITABLE INVESTMENT?

I think he is a keynesian. He thinks that wealth inequality matters for the production of superior goods. Poverty is not reduced by "redistribution" but by raising the standard of living. Which requires capital. He actually thinks inflation is a good thing because it redistribute wealth. What a fiat goober

I do sense some arrogance and some disingenuousness in this guy

Arrogant man. Don’t like his attitude

This guy can't even pronounce his own name

I like both of these gentlemen but I'm surprised the Latin Monetary Union and its variants didn't make it into the histort=y/economics/gold discussion. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_Monetary_Union Only the Anglo view of this was discussed

Bit coin has been diluted to .000025 btc per trade. Tomorrow it will be devalued to .000000025 per trade. How is that disinflationary? Why do you think the valuation of coin has gone to nothing. Because btc is inherently inflationary and inherently unsustainable without global adoption. And when WWW3 comes along and they cut all the internet btc is 0.000000000

It always amazes me how someone could know about bitcoin for so long yet be so damn ignorant