S02E08 Trey Sellers – Power Without Permission

Trust Revolution

"If you go into a local community bank and ask for $50,000 in cash, you're going to get a lot of questions—and very likely they're going to say, 'Come back in a week, we need to order that.' The cash doesn't exist." Former Goldman Sachs risk manager Trey Sellers spent 15 years inside the machine before realizing the wealth you think you control is just a ledger entry someone else manages.

Episode Summary

Trust is breaking where it matters most: at your bank. Trey Sellers ran risk models at Truist and Goldman Sachs, managing billions in a system built on permission structures most people never question. Then Bitcoin showed him the alternative—wealth you actually own, not just exposure to. This conversation cuts through the why: institutions hold leverage through licensure and ledger control, creating money when they issue loans while your "savings" evaporates at 7% annually through inflation. Bitcoin inverts this—cryptographic ownership that requires no permission, no institution, no government blessing. Sellers walks through the Silicon Valley Bank collapse as a case study in why sovereignty matters, explaining how business owners couldn't make payroll because their cash was trapped in an insolvent bank. The path forward isn't abandoning the system overnight—it's understanding the power shift when money becomes a bearer asset you control. For executives and founders, this is strategic: Bitcoin on your balance sheet isn't speculation, it's a hedge against the trust failures already playing out in traditional finance.

About the Guest

Trey Sellers is Vice President of Sales at Unchained and author of FireBTC, a newsletter on financial independence through Bitcoin. He spent 15 years in traditional finance at Goldman Sachs and Truist (formerly BB&T), running risk models and managing institutional portfolios. After achieving financial independence in five years, he left Wall Street to focus exclusively on Bitcoin. Sellers writes weekly on how Bitcoin enables true financial sovereignty beyond traditional FIRE (Financial Independence Retire Early) frameworks. He lives with his wife and two daughters, applying low time preference principles to family wealth building.

Key Quotes

"When you take out a mortgage, there is new money that is created. It will be extinguished over time, but for a 30-year mortgage, that's 30 years of new money in the economy. You can't do that as an individual—but as a bank, you have special licensure from the state that allows you to just conjure up new money." — Trey Sellers

"What does it mean to achieve financial independence if you don't have sovereignty over the money you've saved going forward into retirement? The political environment is really weird right now, and it would make a lot of sense to at least have a little bit of a hedge there." — Trey Sellers

"Bitcoin is so much more real than the dollars you see in your bank account. Sure, you can pull out a $20 bill, but it actually just represents a spot on some amorphous ledger. When you're holding Bitcoin with private keys, it's digital but physical in the way you actually interact with it." — Trey Sellers

"If you are holding your own keys and using a financial advisor, they've got to actively ask you for their fee. It's a push, not a pull—and that keeps them in check because they have to be very nice to you and treat you well." — Trey Sellers

"Number go up technology is the number one recruiter for Bitcoin. That has always been the case. And I think that's perfectly fine—people are focused on Bitcoin for the narrow purpose of making more money. But when you take control of your personal finances and adopt Bitcoin, you take that power back." — Trey Sellers

Key Takeaways

• Fractional reserve is a myth in modern banking: With unlimited Fed backstops, banks operate with infinite reserves created through printing. Bitcoin can't be conjured—scarcity creates real accountability and forces institutions to prove solvency, not promise it.
• Your "cash balance" is trapped during crises: Silicon Valley Bank proved business owners couldn't access deposits to make payroll when regulators shut down the bank over a weekend. Holding Bitcoin with private keys means treasury you control 24/7, eliminating single-point-of-failure risk in banking relationships.
• Information asymmetry disappears with self-custody: Traditional finance obscures fees through expense ratios and advisor arrangements that pull from your accounts. Bitcoin forces push transactions—you must actively send fees, making costs explicit and shifting negotiating leverage back to you.
• Corporate treasuries are melting ice cubes: A $500 million cash balance loses 7% purchasing power annually through M2 expansion—meaning it halves in value over 10 years. Allocating even a portion to Bitcoin offsets erosion while maintaining liquidity, turning retained earnings into competitive advantage rather than shareholder value destruction.

Timestamps

[04:38] Why traditional banking is a permission structure—and what happens when you can't access your own money [07:37] The ledger illusion: How fiat currency is less real than Bitcoin despite being "tangible" [11:13] Fractional reserve banking is dead—banks now operate with infinite reserves through Fed intervention [14:28] How banks create new money through loans: The special licensure that gives institutions monetary superpowers [18:37] Why holding a Bitcoin ETF isn't sovereignty—and what financial independence actually requires [22:16] Information asymmetry and fee extraction: How custody models hide what you're really paying [28:11] Mathematical certainty vs. institutional reputation—when cryptography beats brand credibility [35:05] Silicon Valley Bank collapse decoded: Interest rate risk, balance sheet mismanagement, and payroll crises [38:46] Bitcoin treasury strategies demystified—why buying corporate shares to own Bitcoin usually underperforms [44:00] The $500 million melting ice cube: How S&P 500 companies destroy shareholder value by holding cash [47:38] From Wall Street to sovereignty: Trey's five-year path to financial independence through Bitcoin [56:14] Raising kids in a Bitcoin world—teaching autonomy when institutions demand compliance

Resources & Links

Guest Links:

• Newsletter: FireBTC
• X: @TreyBSellers
• Company: Unchained

Episode Links:

• Subscribe: https://podcast.trustrevolution.co
• Show website: trustrevolution.co
• Music: More Ghost Than Man

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