How Elon Musk's Twitter benefits Crypto, but could be bad for society.
Is the new Twitter free speech & crypto payments, or social credit scores waiting to happen?
A lot of change has happened at Twitter recently. Elon Musk’s $44 Billion dollar acquisition, firing of the CEO, CTO, change in major policies and discussion of a paywall of $8/month for all which is set to remove bots & spam. New updates continue to roll-out as Elon spontaneously tweets about what he plans to do.
This acquisition could have very well been the catalyst for a mini bull run in cryptocurrencies. Ethereum rose over 20% on the week, Bitcoin up slightly, and most importantly of course, Dogecoin gained over 100%.
For those following trends and capitalizing on short term plays, traders anticipated Elon Musk’s twitter takeover with his love for DOGE and bought at the recent lows of $0.06, with DOGE rising up to as high as $0.15 this week, following with price rises in SHIBA Inu and other meme coins that have little to no value. However, both crypto and stocks markets are rising, with the S&P 500 up 9% since mid-October. I guess Uptober/Pumptober really was going to happen, just not until the end of the month.
So what does Elon plan to do with Twitter? is it good for free speech and cryptocurrency? and how can long term investors capitalize on the upcoming changes?
On the surface, it appears Elon Musk is just bringing free speech to a platform ridden with political bias and censorship. ie. Trump, Alex Jones, and many right wing players having their accounts deleted and blocked.
His tweet on Twitter now having free speech (to an extent) has become one the top 10 tweets ever on the site, with 2.4M likes this week alone.
However, there has to be more to the plan. Elon has discussed recently about the everything app, called “X”, where he plans to have all different types of functions in one application. Analysts have compared it to WeChat in China which has a widely used payment system, messenger, identity, and more. We know Elon has been looking to make another payments play since he founded PayPal, and PayPal was actually called X.com before it was acquired over 20 years ago.
The potential problem with “X” turning it into a WeChat for the west, is that WeChat is also tied into a digital identity and social credit score in China. You may have seen videos from china recently where people can’t use the subway or basic government services if they scan their QR code and their social credit score is too low. They become exiled from society.
Longer term, Twitter could turn into the platform of WEF digital identity and social credit score that is actually the opposite of free speech. So please keep this in mind.
However, in the immediate short term, this appears to be a major positive for cryptocurrency. If Elon is making a payments play it’s very likely he will add cryptocurrencies as the payment method. But which cryptocurrencies?
Well, Bitcoin sounds like an obvious first choice. Tesla was holding Bitcoin on its balance sheet, and through the layer 2 lightning network payments can be made quick and cheap.
Secondly, how could you rule out DOGE when Elon can’t stop tweeting about it. He recently tweeted a Doge dog wearing a twitter shirt for halloween, and it’s mainly the only crypto he mentions. Short term traders who bought doge are anticipating DOGE to be integrated into Twitter somehow, hence the price of DOGE doubling this week, but DOGE is still far off its ATH last year of $0.69, so long term investors are smart to diversify into it.
Thirdly, there could be other cryptocurrencies as options. If you followed the Twitter acquisition negotiations back in April, you’d know that many crypto companies like a16z and Binance also became part owners of the new Twitter, now that is has gone private. For that reason, it’s likely CZ will try his hardest to make BNB coin and BUSD stablecoin a part of the payment options for Twitter.
FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried tried to invest $10 Billion into the new Twitter deal, but Elon rejected that offer. FTX would own too much of the company and it would not be decentralized enough. However, with a bunch of VC firms and crypto companies all having a stake in the new Twitter, we will see how Decentralized Twitter actually becomes.
Speaking of globalization and digital finance, I recently spoke with Structure Fi (for the 2nd time) about their platform for investing in tokenized stocks, ETF’s, and crypto. Derivatives are growing in cryptocurrency and tokenized stocks allow people outside of the US to easily invest in major blue-chip US stocks and ETFs. We are already seeing this trend on FTX and major cryptocurrency exchanges as well. I dream of the day the entire Nasdaq and S&P500 is on the blockchain (and doesn’t close for the weekend). All hail 24/7 digital asset markets.
In my latest interview I speak with Wes Cecil about the growth of global investing in emerging markets, and how emerging markets could be a major catalyst for the next bull cycle in Web3.
If you’re subscribed to the YouTube channel you would also have seen our video with the founder of LaBitConf Bitcoin conference, the longest standing Bitcoin conference in the world, coming up Nov 10-13 in Buenos Aires, and the release of our interview with Jeff Schumacher, Founder of BCG Digital Ventures, on his new confidential startup NAX working on merging ESG with Web3.
Other Crypto News:
Elon Musk dissolves the Twitter Board, consisting of nine members, and now serves as the sole director.
FTX is now available in the UAE.
CZ of Binance says he wants to help Elon Musk bring Twitter into Web3.
India's central bank plans to launch its digital rupee (CBDC) pilot on November 1st.
The 29-yr old co-founder of MakerDAO, Nikolai Muchgian has been found dead in in San Juan Puerto Rico, just three days after tweeting about exposing a Pedo ring in Puerto Rico
This year on October 31st the Bitcoin Whitepaper reaches its 14th year of existence.
Toronto's stock exchange halts all trading temporarily due to technical issues.
Deribit’s exchange hot wallet was hacked for USD 28m just before midnight UTC on 1 November 2022.
Mark Zuckerberg has spent $32 Billion on the metaverse, with very little results so far.
Technical Analysis:
ETH:
Ethereum made massive gains this week, rising over 20% and bringing life back into the altcoins. my TA friends who anticipated #Uptober were right, it just took until the final days of the month for the markets to break up. There’s still influencers like Bitboy crypto saying they don’t think the bottom is in though.
My prediction is we continue up, but with a few more slight dips to happen first. Expect ETH to touch the green line around $1500, and the next target is the dark red line around $1700.
BTC:
Bitcoin showing a bullish signal on the chart on all timeframes again, I expect a dip back to the green line to build support, and then gradually moving back up. Target would be the last high around $22,800 and then the top. green line of $24,600. Let’s go Bitcoin!
DOGE:
Dogecoin is up 166% since October 24th, though mainly off speculation from Twitter and day trading. This is great news for those trading that there could be more volatility moving into November. However, if I were buying DOGE I would wait a little for a drop down to the 0.38 or 0.5 fibonacci retracement level.
I am seeing short term SHORT calls across Technical channels, a perfect opportunity to look at dip buying on all of these coins mentioned today.
And that’s all for this episode!
Ashton Addison
-CEO, Crypto Coin Show