As much as I hate XRP and Brad Garlinghouse, it's good to focus on the situation to prepare ourselves for what is coming next in crypto. Although Ripple has $1.3 billion to fight its case against the government, it's a kangaroo court. You can bet that greedy government officials will collude and use this case to justify moving in on the crypto space. $1.3 billion isn't enough if the entire system is against you, and more importantly, you legitimize that system by submitting to its arbitration.
Garlinghouse got greedy. He wanted to be a public figure and make billions, so he deals with the bed he's made.
As individual investors, we have the major advantages of anonymity and agility. I won't give up these advantages for anything. What does that mean in day to day investing and dev work?
First we should go over the coming shitstorm that Garlinghouse is bringing into the space. Hard to believe all of this may have started because that idiot stole some pencil-necked regulator's ugly girlfriend at a tech conference.
XRP & the Future of American Crypto Innovation
1. The US will fall hopelessly behind Africa and Asia in crypto innovation. The US will use XRP as an excuse to set legal precedents concerning crypto. The government wants a tight grip on crypto revenues even if they stifle those revenues and hurt themselves in the process. Expect to see regulation fallout that smothers small developers with endless paperwork and produces a tiered system with only registered billion dollar companies able to legally produce anything worthwhile.
2. Expect to see exit scams. Developers who see regulation coming won't want to wait around for the audit. You may begin to see exit scams on legitimate projects simply because the risk of legal sanction is prohibitively expensive for small teams.
3. Higher volatility will become the norm. I don't know why the rest of crypto doesn't decouple itself from the United States. As it stands, when the US market is shaken, world markets are shaken. This happens even though most of the innovation and adoption opportunity in crypto happen outside of the United States. The US consumer crypto market is full of speculators — non-essentials to the forward movement of the space. But people want to see US market activity as important, so volatility will increase.
Making STOOPID Gains in the Post-XRP Market
1. Discover and develop projects outside of the US. Make it a point NOW to sever ties with any crypto company or coin that has anything to do with the US. That means Celsius, Energi, Coinbase, etc. The great thing about crypto — there is a 2nd, 3rd and 4th option for any and everything you want to move offshore to find. As you discover new projects on Huobi, Hotbit, etc., start the process of moving your business offshore if you develop. There's no reason your dev company has to be within the reach of the US. Why? If you plan to develop, move HQ offshore.
2. Consolidate your holdings. Smaller projects from the US will begin to wither away on the vine. The big projects, especially those that are not limited by US regulation, will thrive because of the lack of competition. Truly decentralized projects like bitcoin will also thrive. Stuff like Chainlink and Polkadot will be fine. But projects lie. Make sure new projects are decentralizating or decoupling from the US as part of your core investment criteria.
3. Use dumps to diversify into education and development. When volatility drives the market down, now is the time to lean on your stablecoins and invest in your continuing crypto education. The more that intellectual capital is decentralized, the less that foreign entities like the US government can stifle crypto innovation. When shit's dumping, you don't want to look at the market anyway. So start developing your own projects.
Crypto will change after XRP gets spanked, and it will change for the better. If we prepare ourselves, we can turn the challenge of US regulation on its head and create a strong, durable market that rejects antiquated ideas of nanny state governance and centralized gamesmanship over our lives.
