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Adam Livingston

Verified account Strive

@AdamBLiv

The Bitcoin Wizard | Vice President, Investments @Strive

Christ. Family. Bitcoin. In that order.
strive.com Joined January 2025
301 Following 89K Followers 33K Posts

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Adam Livingston Verified account @AdamBLiv
I’m absolutely elated to announce that I have joined Strive as Vice President, Investments.

As you can probably tell, I’ve been obsessed with Bitcoin, capital markets, and the extraordinary financial architecture emerging at the intersection of the two.

Now I get to work on that frontier every day.

Strive is building alongside one of the most consequential transformations happening in modern finance. Bitcoin becoming productive collateral for an entirely new generation of capital markets instruments, corporate finance, and digital credit.

The opportunity to help think through these markets, communicate them, and contribute to what comes next is something I could not be more excited about.

Even better, I get to do it alongside an incredible team of talented, ambitious people who are genuinely pushing the frontier forward.

I also understand the responsibility that comes with the role. I intend to work relentlessly on behalf of Strive’s shareholders and do everything I can to contribute to the long-term value we are building for them.

I’m deeply grateful for the opportunity.

Time to build.
Matt Cole Verified account @ColeMacro Sep 15
Strive had gone far too long without hiring a podcaster. As our Bitcoin holdings have grown exponentially through accretive capital formation, our podcasters-per-share metric was beginning to move in the wrong direction. Several astute investors have been calling on us to defend our lead in this critical metric, and I agree with them: now is the time to lean in.

Today, I’m excited to announce that @AdamBLiv has joined @Strive. Adam represents true excellence as a podcaster, but the reason for this hire is rooted in one of Strive’s foundational principles: meritocracy.

Strive has been publicly opposed to DEI from the beginning, but we have also consistently opposed credentialism. Rejecting credentialism has been one of the main reasons we have been able to hire with excellence throughout Strive’s Bitcoin journey.

Credentialism causes institutions to outsource their judgment to resumes, pedigrees, titles, and conventional career paths. It puts too much weight on what someone has previously been permitted to do and not enough on the agency, principles, original thinking, work ethic, and demonstrated ability of the person in front of you.

At Strive, we give people significant responsibility because of how they think and what they have demonstrated they can do. The results speak for themselves. Our board and management team are young by public-company standards because we select for deep, principled belief in Bitcoin and demonstrated track records, not age, pedigree, or the number of boards someone has served on or executive positions they have already held.

When True North was getting started, I publicly supported the “kid analysts” there because they represented the same principle. They were not waiting for an institution to give them permission or a title. They were doing the work, publishing thinking that was better than both traditional media and institutional investment analysis at the time, and allowing the public to judge the quality of it.

Adam is an exceptionally clear example of that principle. Before becoming a Bitcoin analyst and creator, his last full-time role was as a manager at @Target.

A credentialist sees a former Target manager and asks why he should hold an important analytical role at a public financial company. A meritocrat studies Adam’s body of work and asks how quickly he can start.

Adam has consistently published deeply researched, first-principles analysis. He works extraordinarily hard, communicates complex ideas clearly, and has the courage to put contrarian views into the public record where everyone can evaluate them. It also does not hurt that he is freaking hilarious.

Nowhere has that been clearer than in his work on Strive. When Strive was at its weakest point in terms of public perception, Adam was buying and explaining why. What impressed me was not simply that he was bullish. It was that he independently arrived at his view through rigorous, first-principles work when sentiment was terrible and almost nobody else saw what he saw. Without any affiliation with Strive or access to internal information, his work was remarkably consistent with what we were seeing from the inside and, at times, even pushed our own analysis a step further. His analysis of Strive’s future growth has been among the most holistic I have seen anywhere, including internally. Most importantly, he was right.

There was real value in having such a credible and completely independent voice analyzing Strive. But Strive has too many opportunities, too much complexity, and too much work ahead of us not to bring the best talent we can find in-house.

I view Adam as a potential generational talent in financial analysis. The idea that someone could go from being a manager at Target to helping the most ambitious public company in capital markets navigate an extraordinarily complex competitive landscape may seem absurd to a credentialist. To me, it is meritocracy working exactly as intended.

Adam will join Strive as Vice President of Investments, working within our investment function and reporting to our Chief Investment Officer, @Werkman. He will build a systematic research function around the most important companies across the pure-play Bitcoin landscape. He will read every consequential filing, analyze capital structures and capital-markets decisions, and continuously evaluate positioning, valuation, growth rates, competitive dynamics, risks, and forward trajectories.

Adam will apply an even deeper level of that same rigor to Strive, now with full access to our internal data and dashboards. His work will help us pressure-test our assumptions, identify opportunities earlier, and make better long-term decisions for our shareholders. He was able to see Strive with extraordinary clarity from the outside. Imagine what he will be able to do from the inside.

We also intend for Adam to continue publishing through his existing channel under the @TNorth brand, now with the appropriate disclosures and responsibilities that come with working for a public company. His ability to research deeply and communicate complex ideas in an entertaining way is part of what makes him special, and we want him to keep doing it.

The bad news for public markets is that what I consider the best source of independent Strive analysis will no longer be independent. The good news for Strive shareholders is that we are bringing that mind in-house and putting it to work for them.

Adam did not earn this opportunity despite lacking a conventional Wall Street resume. He earned it because his public body of work is better evidence of his ability than any conventional résumé could be. Credentialism would have missed Adam. Meritocracy brought him to Strive.

Welcome to Strive, Adam.

$ASST $SATA
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Adam Livingston Verified account @AdamBLiv
129 days ago, Bitcoin printed its cycle low in premium to realized price: +10% on June 30.

It’s the first cycle bottom that never broke below realized price.

Here’s what BTC did from this same point in every prior cycle:

6M: median +41% (3/4 higher)
12M: median +119% (4/4)
18M: median +169% (4/4)
24M: median +809% (4/4)

The worst 12-month outcome was still +29%.

Higher lows in capitulation each time:
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Adam Livingston Verified account @AdamBLiv
Gross vs. Net Metrics Thoughts

We need to start with two definitions.

Ex ante economic value: PRESENT economic value of a contractual claim, given the possible future outcomes, their probabilities, timing, and risks.

Ex post: What does the contractual waterfall actually distribute once a specified event like a liquidation occurs?

A liquidation preference on a perpetual preferred equity establishes a contractual priority ex ante, but it specifies a settlement entitlement that applies ex post, so by definition it is conditional on the relevant event and available assets.

The mistake I see being made often is treating that contingent settlement amount as though it necessarily equals the claim's present economic value in a going concern. I've made the same mistake.

A perpetual preferred with a $100 liquidation preference has its present value defined by its dividends, redemption provisions, investor protections, probability of liquidation.

Ex ante economic value and an eventual ex post payout can coincide numerically, but they are not conceptually identical, and there is no accounting identity that guarantees their equality.

If CEBE subtracts a hypothetical future liquidation settlement amount and then declares the remainder to be what common shareholders economically own today, it then crosses from describing a contractual settlement convention into making an ex ante economic assertion, but the event (liquidation) hasn't occurred yet. That assertion requires a valuation argument.

Common shareholders are continuously exposed to changes in the economic value of their residual claim on a going concern. That value incorporates the possible consequences of liquidation, but it is not determined solely by a hypothetical liquidation waterfall. The possibility of that event, and the contractual rights that become enforceable under it, influence the economic value of the securities today.

Ex ante. Ex post. The former necessarily considers the possibility of the latter. The latter does not independently determine the former.

Today's market valuation of an equity is observable, while intrinsic economic value remains an estimate. And an actual liquidation may become highly probable, making the waterfall increasingly relevant to present prices.

Therefore, subtracting full liquidation preferences from mark-to-market Bitcoin assets can establish a liquidation-preference-adjusted residual, but it cannot independently establish what common shareholders economically own in a going concern.

You can make a mathematical counterexample to the universal proposition that liquidation-preference-adjusted backing establishes the ex ante economic value belonging to common shareholders.

Consider two hypothetical companies with identical assets, identical common share counts, and perpetual preferred securities carrying identical $100 liquidation preferences.

The only difference is their dividend obligations.

Preferred A pays $8 annually. Preferred B pays $12 annually.

Assume a constant 5% required return, no liquidation or redemption, and sufficient cash flows to fund both securities indefinitely.

The present economic values of the preferred claims are:

Preferred A: $8 / 0.05 = $160.
Preferred B: $12 / 0.05 = $240.

Suppose each company has $350 of assets, comprising $100 of Bitcoin and $250 of cash earning 5%, with the Bitcoin ultimately distributable to common shareholders. The cash interest fully funds either preferred dividend.

Under these assumptions, the respective economic values attributable to common shareholders are $190 and $110.

Yet a metric deducting the identical $100 liquidation preference from identical $350 asset balances reports the same $250 residual for both companies.

Identical liquidation preferences. Identical assets. Identical liquidation-adjusted residuals. Different economic values belonging to common shareholders.

That is a mathematical counterexample to the proposition that liquidation-preference-adjusted backing, by itself, identifies the ex ante economic value of common equity.

And the distinction extends to Bitcoin price exposure.

Suppose a company issues perpetual preferred at par and purchases Bitcoin with the proceeds.

At issuance, the additional Bitcoin assets are exactly offset by the additional liquidation preference. CEBE can remain unchanged.

But the company now holds more Bitcoin against a fixed-dollar senior deduction.

If the Bitcoin price subsequently rises, the additional Bitcoin appreciates while that contractual deduction remains fixed. The dollar sensitivity of the calculated residual to Bitcoin's price has increased, even though CEBE was unchanged at issuance.

This is not necessarily a prediction of the common stock's market beta. Actual common equity sensitivity depends on the economic behavior of the senior claims and the enterprise. But it demonstrates that an unchanged net coverage snapshot does not establish unchanged Bitcoin price exposure.

An important qualification is that CEBE doesn't mathematically assert that ex ante and ex post economic values are identical. But when CEBE is presented as what common shareholders economically "own" today, it implicitly treats a contingent liquidation entitlement as though its full settlement amount is the appropriate deduction from present economic value.

The ex post waterfall is one possible outcome incorporated into ex ante valuation. It is not a substitute for ex ante valuation.

I like CEBE. I think it's a useful tool for comparing liquidation-preference-adjusted Bitcoin backing across companies, and net metrics have an important place alongside gross metrics.

My criticism is specifically about using these measurements to describe what common shareholders economically "own" or are "exposed to" in a going concern. Those claims require accounting for the present economic value of the contractual rights throughout the capital structure.

Ex ante economic value incorporates the possibility of ex post liquidation. The liquidation waterfall alone cannot establish that present value.

That distinction matters when interpreting what these metrics actually measure.
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Adam Livingston Verified account @AdamBLiv
Today was wild.

Nasdaq: -5.5%
S&P 500: -4.4%
Dow: -1,833 points
Semiconductors: -12%
Nvidia: -9%
Bitcoin: -6%

Over $1 BILLION in crypto liquidations.

Trillions in market value evaporated.

AI stocks demolished with tech valuations crushed. Bitcoin dragged into the slaughter, albeit holding up better than expected.

I think the market is beginning to confront something MUCH bigger than a bad earnings season.

The next decade is going to be the most economically disruptive period in modern human history.

Artificial intelligence is coming for white-collar labor.

Robotics is coming for blue-collar labor.

Entire industries built on information asymmetry are going to watch their competitive advantages evaporate.

The cost of intelligence is collapsing, and this just means the value of human labor itself is being repriced.

Governments are drowning in debt, monetary systems are increasingly politicized, and nobody can tell you with confidence what the economy will look like in 2028, let alone 2035.

Think about how insane that is.

Your career might become obsolete, all your investments might be disrupted, and everyone who is entrepreneurial is considering if their business might lose its moat.

Your government also might just decide the solution to its fiscal problems is to dilute your purchasing power.

And the people telling you to prepare for the future can’t even agree on what the future looks like. Isn't that interesting?

This is why I’m so extraordinarily bullish on Bitcoin.

Bitcoin is a way to save for a future you cannot possibly predict.

You don’t need to pick the winning AI company, or pick which industries survive automation.

With Bitcoin, there is zero necessity to forecast the next technological breakthrough, predict the next election, or trust a central banker to preserve the value of your life’s work.

You can own a globally transferable, politically neutral, absolutely scarce monetary asset that doesn’t depend on any company’s business model surviving the next technological revolution.

Of course its market price will fluctuate. Sometimes violently.

But the underlying proposition becomes more compelling as the world becomes more unpredictable.

Everything is being disrupted, and the ability to preserve wealth without having to predict the winners of that disruption may become one of the most valuable things on Earth.

The future is becoming impossible to predict.

Bitcoin is how I intend to save for it anyway.
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