

Stephan Livera Podcast
Stephan Livera
Join Stephan as he interviews the sharpest economic and technical minds in Bitcoin & Austrian Economics to help you understand how money is changing and evolving. Leading names in the world of Bitcoin join the show to share their insights, whether they are developers, CEOs, economists, authors, analysts and more.
Episodes
Mentioned books

Aug 16, 2018 • 50min
SLP13 - Bitcoin as Ultimate Asset, with Fernando Ulrich, Austrian Economist
In this episode, we talk through emerging market currency crises, and his new 5 part article series on Bitcoin as Ultimate Asset. We contrast differing monetary views, why it doesn't make sense to spend bitcoin right now, Medium of Exchange vs Method of Payment, and fallacies of 'Medium of Exchange only' cryptocurrencies.

Aug 14, 2018 • 1h 2min
SLP12 - Bitcoin Mining and Energy, with Hass McCook
Hass McCook and I discuss the Bitcoin mining market and his recent research, "The Cost and Sustainability of Bitcoin". We cover key bitcoin mining metrics, bitcoin mining cost price ranges, the Bitcoin Price - Mining Hash Rate relationship, the evolution of bitcoin mining over the past 3 years, and compare Bitcoin mining costs vs Gold mining.

Aug 12, 2018 • 1h 21min
SLP11 - Bitcoin's Decentralised Governance, with Pierre Rochard
Pierre Rochard (co-founder Nakamoto Institute, co-host Noded podcast) and I talk through Bitcoin's Decentralised Governance. This is the process by which Bitcoin's rules are decided, implemented, and enforced without having a central authority.
Some topics covered:
The different parties involved
Network Governance
Bitcoin has no central authority
Process of Research, Proposal, Implementation, Deployment, Enforcement
Schelling Points

Aug 11, 2018 • 53min
SLP10 - Visions of Bitcoin and Transaction Batching with Nic Carter and Hasu
Nic Carter and Hasu join me to discuss the multitude of changing visions of Bitcoin, and also a Transaction Batching analysis they performed. We discuss how the narratives and attitudes in Bitcoin have changed over time as different constraints surfaced. In the second half, we discuss bitcoin transaction batching, and more appropriate ways to think about the number of bitcoin transactions.

Aug 11, 2018 • 58min
SLP9 - Lightning UX and Routing, with Bryan Vu
Bryan Vu, VP of Product at Lightning Labs joins me in this episode to sketch out a vision of what Lightning Network may evolve into. We discuss Lightning User Experience and Routing, and the benefits to users, merchants and exchanges.

Aug 9, 2018 • 53min
SLP8 - Bitcoin Monetary Evolution, with Murad Mahmudov
Murad and I explore a range of economic thought about Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies in a fascinating interview discussing the path to Bitcoin as 'monetary winner'. As a prolific writer and analyst in Bitcoin, Murad is very well read and articulate. We discuss: His articles, how Bitcoin is ushering in an era of unprecedented peace and prosperity, a framework for monetary Store of Value criteria, and more.

Aug 4, 2018 • 48min
SLP7 - Earning Interest on Bitcoin's Lightning Network, with Nik Bhatia
In this episode with Nik Bhatia, we talk about the potential for forming capital markets on top of Bitcoin and the Lightning Network, by calculating an interest rate (LNRR - Lightning Network Reference Rate) based on the routing fees earned in staking BTC to Lightning Network payment channels.

Aug 3, 2018 • 1h 6min
SLP6 - Fiat Money as 'fad diet', with Bitstein
In this episode with Bitstein, we break down Paul Krugman's errors in his NYT "Transaction Costs and Tethers: Why I’m a Crypto Skeptic" column, as well as other topics:
Mischaracterisation of what money's purpose is
Krugman's 'nirvana fallacies' in money
Why fiat money is an aberration and more akin to a 'fad diet' than bitcoin or gold are
Why Everyone Is a Scammer and the Scammer heuristic
Bitcoin Maximalism - is it descriptive or prescriptive?
UNIX philosophy

Aug 2, 2018 • 56min
SLP5 - Bitcoin in Beijing and common errors in 'Crypto', with Neil Woodfine
In this episode with Neil Woodfine, we talk about the changing face of Bitcoin education and common errors in reasoning about Bitcoin and 'token economics'. Some topics we touch on:
Bitcoin in Beijing
Bitcoin education in the early days vs Bitcoin/Crypto education now
Incentives of unnecessary tokens
Bitcoin is not 'backed by' stored energy
Intolerance of bitcoin versus it merely being a superior money
Skin in the game of Bitcoiners versus other projects such as Ethereum

Jul 29, 2018 • 1h 9min
SLP4 - Why Bitcoin and not the others, with JW Weatherman
In this collaboration episode with JW Weatherman, we talk about some of the reasons why Bitcoin is best, versus the altcoins. We also discuss some of the security flaws and problems with the design and execution of altcoins such as: Bcash, EOS, Ethereum, Ripple, Monero, Zcash


