Nic Puckrin is the CEO of Coin Bureau.
Bitcoin, the great experiment in decentralization that started with its creation, is gradually being domesticated. It’s been tagged, collared and housed within the architecture to which it was designed.
Wall Street and government rules are transforming a P2P monetary system into a full-fledged product. Anyone who cares for the original philosophy should be concerned by this rapid redomestication. It is not something that can be overlooked.
For years, the establishment laughed at Bitcoin…now it lists it.
This shift has only one motive: financial gain. The cypherpunk money and its philosophy are now being used to generate fees for large managers in traditional finance pipelines such as spot exchange traded funds (ETFs).
The United States Bitcoin exchange-traded funds absorbed around $9 billionIt is now clear that wallets are no longer the main driver of growth. On the surface, this appears as validation. However, in reality and over the long term, the process is closer to capture.
Chop points, wrappers and gatekeepers
Buying a share of a trust is not acquiring a bearer asset, and since shareholders don’t hold keys…they don’t hold claims. These claims are handled by a select group of market makers and custodians whose decisions become the de facto policies for millions of investors.
Then, when a single company sits at the center of most of the sector’s spot-ETF custody, the network’s practical censorship-resistance is functionally outsourced to one compliance program. You can look to centralized exchanges, like Coinbase. serves Custodian of over 80% US Crypto ETF Issuers
The price discovery is moved from closed auctions to self-custodianed markets. The US spot Bitcoin ETFs are now a major player in the market. spot Trading on active days
Through prospectuses the influence of governance moves from users to attorneys, while risks move from small, operational domains like wallets and nodes to larger, more complex ones.
The math is not based on a sinister motive, but rather the convenience of accumulating over time. Consider Europe, where the Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) regulation was sold as clarity — and in many ways is — yet the stablecoin regime exposes The truth behind cross-border fungibility, regulatory arbitrage.
Tokens with a distinctive brand can be sloshed across different jurisdictions, even if the reserve standards are not uniform. This allows narratives to preach. “safety” After scale is achieved, there will be a new, centralized dependency on the policy makers to fill in any gaps.
Related: Strategy adds $18M in Bitcoin on fifth anniversary of BTC strategy
The ETF onslaught is defended by those who say that it is the way every asset class develops. But Bitcoin is in its own class; it is a settlement system with monetary characteristics.
Bitcoin’s role as a counterweight to centralized control is eroding. This trend challenges Bitcoin’s roots in self-custody, and “number go up” The trade-off for a good deal is not enough. “rights go away.”
Use ETFs as a bridge and not as a cage
Do not be afraid. You can choose a different path.
Imagine that the same millions of dollars are poured into envelopes, but this time with an added self-custody standard. The norm would be that brokers could directly access wallets while institutions held native assets, published detailed proofs-of-reserves(PoRs), or plan administrators used multisig distributions.
The idea isn’t that crazy. What this would achieve is maturation consistent with the original ethos of Bitcoin — scaling without the need to surrender.
Bitcoins are currently being translated by Wall Street to maximize profits while minimising friction with old gatekeepers who no longer have a real purpose.
The decentralization of the Bitcoin ecosystem is annihilated when one ETF complex controls the flow and holds the key, while a regulator can rewrite the terms in the middle of the cycle. The ashes are a Service-Level Agreement that domesticates Bitcoin, and all it is meant to do.
It is important to treat ETFs like bridges and not as cages. The flow of money should be advertised in the media and through word-of mouth only if it funds infrastructure to expand P2P liquidity. Disclosures quantifying custodial risk and concentration would be made by default.
It is now time to let go of the domestication that TradFi has imposed and to gently (but persistently) free Bitcoin from a centralization within the institutions which it was originally designed to overcome. It is time to decentralize Bitcoin.
Nic Puckrin is the CEO of Coin Bureau.
This article was written for general informational purposes only and does not constitute legal or investment advice. This article is solely for informational purposes. It does not represent or reflect Cointelegraph’s views.
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Source: cointelegraph.com
