The Berkshires of Bitcoin | True North Podcast | Ep. 80 Featuring @PunterJeff, @IIICapital, and @AdamBLiv. Timestamps: 00:00 Intro 03:27 Episode Overview: Market close, balance sheets, Berkshire, derivatives 05:47 Meet the Crew: Adam Livingston joins Strive 11:29 Strategy $MSTR Balance Sheet: $BTC holdings, cash, converts, $STRC buybacks 15:23 Strive Balance Sheet: $ASST $SATA, dividend coverage, warrants, amplification 26:13 Risk Management and Volatility: Four-year cycle, drawdowns, credit flows 29:09 Traditional Credit vs. Digital Credit: Probability of outcomes, tail risk 40:35 Berkshire Hathaway Parallels: Capital, insurance float, risk taking 51:39 Strategy vs. Berkshire: Float growth, digital credit engine 58:55 Derivatives Market: ASST warrants, options open interest 1:04:26 MSTR and $IBIT Options: Open interest, hedging, liquidity 1:08:02 STRC Options Market: Puts, strikes, yield enhancement 1:15:01 Final Thoughts

The bond market is putting its pressure on the next 2 years, not the next 30. Roughly one month of change in yields: • 2 year: up 48 basis points • 5 year: up 41 • 10 year: up 23 • 30 year: up 1 Bear flattening. Short rates rising faster than long ones. Policy response = money printer. $BTC "That means increased liquidity. That means Bitcoin, historically, NGU." @AdamBLiv

BITCOIN DIMINISHING RETURNS? THINK AGAIN. I have never been more bullish on Bitcoin. No bad news is tanking the price. Absorbing demand in the worst conditions. We're goin' higher. FULL BREAKDOWN:

He probably bought 10 $BTC while walking home from a park. He started seeing Bitcoin as a commodity instead of a security. The panic that everyone else would figure it out within 30 minutes. "Of course you realize it takes people a long time to figure it out." - @BritishHodl

The U.S. dollar comes before the average person. @BritishHodl Control of the money printer is why he dismisses fears about higher interest rates. "We're talking about the survival of the United States dollar here." - @BritishHodl $BTC

Himes vs Bessent on the $10B buyback. Rep. Himes pressed Treasury Secretary Bessent on 10-year buybacks that were followed by a higher 10-year yield. - About $10 billion spent - 4.8% on the 10-year when the operation started - 5.04% today, a 20-year high - 20 basis point rise "You can ask me a question. You can't tell me how to answer it."

Brian Harrington says Bitcoin $BTC is starting to replace the S&P 500 as the benchmark for growth. The index has too much dead weight, while AI is making the gap between strong and weak companies even wider. For a company to earn investor capital, the choice becomes simpler: grow faster than the benchmark or return cash through dividends. “Bitcoin is becoming the new standard growth index of the world.” - @BrainHarrington

Brian Harrington sees Bitcoin adoption happening in stages. Most people can’t handle Bitcoin’s volatility, so Bitcoin-related income products may be the easier entry point. After getting paid for 18 months and watching Bitcoin rise, owning the underlying starts to feel more normal. From there, perks for Bitcoin holders could make direct ownership even more attractive. “I definitely think that path will happen.” - @BrainHarrington $STRC $SATA $BTC

Brian Harrington says digital credit starts with a simple premise: Bitcoin is better money than fiat. Bitcoin $BTC has a fixed supply. Dollars do not. The bigger test is whether Bitcoin-backed companies can earn more trust to meet their obligations than Treasuries, the asset traditionally treated as risk-free. “That battle, that decision is taking the guts out of fiat money.” - @BrainHarrington $STRC $SATA

Jeff Walton explains why capital quality matters so much for insurance companies. The amount of leverage an insurer can take on depends heavily on how rating agencies treat the assets on its balance sheet. - AAA investment-grade debt: ~95% capital credit - Equity: ~45% capital credit - Insurance portfolios: roughly 85% bonds and 15% equities That gap helps explain why assets get structured and tranched to unlock different pools of capital. “It all comes into capital construction... and that’s why there’s a focus on structuring and unlocking different pools of capital.” - @PunterJeff

Strategy $MSTR sold $BTC into the market, and the price didn’t move lower. Brian says that was one of the clearest signals that the bear market may already be over. Unlike prior cycles, there wasn’t one company or brand that blew up the market. Even through the downturn, major Bitcoin companies remained visible and active. “I think Strategy selling that much and not making the price go lower was actually really bullish.” - @BrainHarrington

Some credit investors need a willingness to sell Bitcoin. @phongle's mortgage example: • A $1M house • An $800K loan • Another $1M in the bank that you refuse to touch The banks wanted liquidity and a willingness to sell Bitcoin if needed. Money you've ruled out using doesn't help them. $MSTR $STRC $BTC

Bitcoin’s 4-year CAGR was roughly 41% as of September 8. Jeff breaks down what different growth rates could imply by Sept. 2030: - 41% CAGR: ~$308,000 - 30% CAGR: ~$222,000 - 20% CAGR: ~$161,000 Even the 20% scenario puts $BTC only about 27% above its previous all-time high. His view is that if you’re underwriting Bitcoin to a high long-term CAGR, periods near the 200-week moving average are where you want the most exposure your risk framework allows. “You would want to be maximally long, maximally amplified to the extent that the market allowed.” - @PunterJeff

$100 of required capital can become $34 without changing the underlying loans. Jeff explains how insurers can hold B-rated private credit directly, or package those same assets into CLOs and tranche the risk from AAA down to equity. Even if they buy back 100% of the same underlying exposure, the capital requirement can fall from $100 to roughly $34. That difference is where the arbitrage comes in. “There’s capital arbitrage, rating agency arbitrage within this marketplace.” - @PunterJeff

Strive $ASST has roughly $718 million of warrants outstanding at a $27 exercise price. If exercised, that capital comes directly onto Strive’s balance sheet and creates another opportunity to acquire Bitcoin. At roughly $80,000-$85,000 per Bitcoin, full exercise could translate to more than 8,000 additional $BTC. The tradeoff is amplification: more common shares are issued, but Strive receives hundreds of millions in new capital to put to work. The “warrant wall” could become a major source of capital for the next stage of Strive’s Bitcoin strategy.

Jeff Walton says growing private credit exposure in the life insurance industry is worth watching, but comparing the risk directly to a bank run misses how insurance actually works. Life insurance policies have contractual terms that make the liabilities behave very differently from bank deposits, especially during periods of stress. At the same time, private credit exposure across the life insurance industry has roughly doubled since 2007. “The life insurance industry itself literally can’t have a bank run. It’s like, not everybody is going to go to the life insurance industry at the same time and pull out their life insurance policy.” - @PunterJeff