Ten31 Timestamp 929,712
This holiday-shortened week gave the market its latest evidence that we’re indeed going to run it hot (it just depends, to paraphrase a former Arkansas Governor, on what the meaning of “it” is). Right before Christmas, Santa slipped a nice 4-handle GDP print under the White House tree, prompting President Trump to take a victory lap while reiterating that these are just rookie numbers compared to the 20%+ growth we’ll see next year once he gets a Fed Chair who will actually play ball. Based on last week’s non-farm payrolls data, the robust – and, it should be said, much better than expected – headline growth figures don’t seem to have driven commensurate strength in the labor market, but Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent took to the hallowed halls of the All-In Podcast to assure voters that those downstream benefits will become more apparent to the average worker in 2026. Whatever probability you ascribe to the ultimate success of this agenda, it’s getting pretty difficult to ignore the administration’s roadmap for the coming year, and the whole metals complex (both precious and industrial) seems to have gotten the message very clearly with gold, silver, and platinum all trading like altcoins into year-end. As the metals investors who spent more than a decade underperforming long bonds can attest, calling exact timing is no easy feat, but our conviction is stronger than ever that all the trends driving this recent impulse in gold and its cousins will collide – gradually then suddenly – with bitcoin’s absolutely fixed supply and neutral settlement guarantees. With all the fundamental tailwinds and positive signposts that have piled up in bitcoin’s favor this year – sovereign receptivity, new and growing institutional allocations, an increasingly digital world increasingly seeking a new reserve asset – we continue to suspect that the “gradually” part will be much shorter than many recent capitulators seem to fear.
Portfolio Company Spotlight
Satoshi Energy provides market-leading services and analytics for data center development projects bringing together high-performance compute projects, bitcoin mining operators, and power producers. The company offers plug and play power contracts and project monitoring services, as well as cutting edge tools for sites to manage credit exposure and real-time settlement of invoices. With a large pipeline of projects under development and a growing suite of products and services, Satoshi Energy is pioneering the accelerating convergence of power production and advanced data centers.
As the world’s largest investor focused entirely on bitcoin, Ten31 has deployed over $200 million across two funds into more than 30 of the most promising and innovative companies in the ecosystem, and we expect 2025 to be the best year yet for both bitcoin and our portfolio. Visit ten31.xyz/invest to learn more and get in touch to discuss participating.
Selected Portfolio News
Fold was added to the Russell 2000 Index:
Media
Ten31 Managing Partner Matt Odell joined the Last Trade podcast for a wide-ranging year in review discussion.
Market Updates
The third quarter GDP figures – whose release was delayed by complications from October’s government shutdown – came in very strong, with headline growth of 4.3% handily beating consensus forecasts by more than a full point.
In a move that shouldn’t be surprising to longtime denizens of Truth Social, President Trump used the news as an occasion to once again call for a Fed Chair who will lower rates in response to strong economic growth rather than holding them high for fear of inflation. The President also reiterated his comments from a few weeks ago that we could see GDP growth of 20% or more next year, noting that anyone who disagrees will never run the Federal Reserve.
Despite his very nasty public breakup with the President earlier this year, Elon Musk chimed in to support this extremely bullish view of the future. Not to be outdone, Musk argued that advances in AI could even drive triple-digit growth within 5 years. We anxiously await the quadruple-digit call from Tom Lee.
Elsewhere, the President announced he’ll be meeting with various executives from major US defense contractors next week to, uh, encourage the companies to reinvest aggressively in domestic manufacturing rather than funneling cash flows to shareholder returns.
Some sources have suggested the meeting could presage an upcoming executive order to limit stock buybacks by critical defense firms and tie executive compensation more closely to specific system deliveries, which would mark a noteworthy escalation of the President’s foray into sparkling industrial policy (it’s only “State Capitalism” if it comes out of Beijing).
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent made his latest appearance on the All-In Podcast, apparently now the main venue for litigating the finer details of American public policy. Among many notable updates, Bessent repeatedly pointed to a strong setup for the average American in 2026, while indicating – pace the Acela Corridor consensus – that tariffs are primarily a matter of national security rather than economic policy.
Bessent also reiterated skepticism toward QE given its contribution to wealth inequality, noting he wants more credit creation to be pushed to the small and mid-sized bank level, which may provide some hints as to how the upcoming Fed-Treasury merger partnership will play out.
Perhaps most crucially, the Treasury Secretary noted the Fed should start to employ a range – including bounds up to 3% – for its inflation targeting rather than fixating on a precise figure like 2%.
Perhaps not coincidentally given the increasingly clear direction of travel indicated by all these headlines, most members of the metals complex continued to set eye-popping new highs all week, with gold breaking the $4,500/oz level for the first time and silver putting in a +11% move on Friday alone.
While longtime readers of this newsletter may be frustrated that bitcoin continues to stay rangebound just under $90,000 and seems likely to post a slightly red candle for the full year, it may be worth recalling that top-buyers of the last major silver bull market post-2008 are still waiting to double their money, and those who perfectly captured the post-08 bottom tick are looking at an IRR of ~18% for their trouble. We encourage all readers to spend the last week of the year 1) zooming out, 2) staying humble, and 3) stacking sats.
Regulatory Update
Two US Senators introduced a new digital assets bill that would, among other proposals, institute a de minimis capital gains tax exemption…for stablecoins. Pro-tax advocates recoiled in horror at the bill’s potential to deprive the government of tens of tax dollars.
Noteworthy
In a shocking turn of events, the founder of “DeFi” protocol Aave was accused of using his wealth to manipulate a governance vote to his benefit. Perhaps one day we will figure out a distributed consensus mechanism that is resistant to simple vote-buying and manipulation by the richest parties in the system. Alas.
Travel
Nashville Energy & Mining Summit, Jan 2026
Bitcoin Investor Week, Feb 2026