Bitcoin is a digital currency that facilitates peer to peer payments without the need for an intermediary, like a bank. Bitcoin is not issued by a government, central bank or other central authority, rather Bitcoin works by employing an open source, decentralized, cryptographical Peer-toPeer network, known as The Bitcoin Network. Transactions on the Bitcoin Network are recorded to the Bitcoin blockchain, an immutable, trustworthy and secure ledger that serves as the official record of transactions. The Manager believes that: (i) Bitcoin is provably scarce: the current supply of Bitcoin is known, and the total supply is capped at a pre-defined 21 million Bitcoins; (ii) Bitcoin is permissionless: users do not need permission from a third party to access it; and (iii) Bitcoin is trustworthy: the immutable Bitcoin blockchain is secured by a vast and decentralized network of computers incentivized to keep it secure.

In order to access the Bitcoin Network, users must have a Bitcoin wallet. A Bitcoin wallet is an open source software program that generates a public key or collection of public keys that function, in effect, like a user's account number. To move Bitcoin out of a wallet requires a private key, which when paired with the public key, gives the user the ability to unlock the Bitcoin and move or spend it. This process of combining the private and public key pair is known as "signing" a transaction. However, while a public key can be derived from its corresponding private key pair, a public key cannot be used to discover the private key. In this sense, a private key is akin to a very strong password. If a user loses the private key, they cannot access the Bitcoin held in the wallet until the private key is recovered. There are two main kinds of wallets: hot wallets and cold storage. A hot wallet is connected to the internet. Being connected to the internet makes it generally more convenient to use but can expose the user to risks. Cold storage is generally more secure, however because the wallet is offline, a user can not trade Bitcoin until the wallet is connected to the internet again.

Bitcoin users who have established a Bitcoin wallet can freely enter into a transaction using the process described above. Transactions are batched together approximately every ten minutes into a "block" with other transactions on the network, where they are recorded, time-stamped and added to a "chain" of blocks containing transaction records going all the way back to the beginning of the Bitcoin Network, hence the term "blockchain."

The Bitcoin Network is comprised of thousands of computers, called 'nodes' which synchronize and maintain the blockchain across the world. Certain nodes on the network are called miners, who provide the hardware that helps secure the network. Miners buy specialized hardware, called ASICs (application specific integrated circuits) to conduct computations, also known as "proof of work," to ensure that only verified blocks get added to the blockchain, and prevent fraudulent blocks from being entered. The miners who solve the proof of work first are rewarded with new Bitcoin, known as the block reward. Transactions on the Bitcoin Network only get recorded into the Bitcoin blockchain if the majority of miners accept the block as being valid. This process helps to ensure the security of the network. Moreover, once a block is added, any third party can independently verify the transaction by looking at the blockchain, which is public and transparent. This market-based competition creates a financial incentive to secure the Bitcoin Network.

Additionally, each new block added to the blockchain contains a reference to the preceding block, which acts as an additional confirmation of a transaction recorded in an earlier block. Thus, with every new block that gets added, it becomes much harder to change or erase the entry in an earlier block, because doing so would require rewriting the entire history of commerce on the blockchain, which would require the overwhelming computing force to take over 51% of the network.

Proof of work not only secures the Bitcoin Network, but also adds to the supply of Bitcoin outstanding, as every newly mined block creates new Bitcoin. Like gold, Bitcoin's rate of inflation is gradual. Like gold, Bitcoin takes energy and effort to produce. Moreover, just as new gold is harder to come by as humans extract the easy-to-reach gold from Earth, so too is new Bitcoin: approximately every four years, the block reward is cut in half, so that by 2140 all the Bitcoin that will ever exist will have been mined. The total final supply will equal 21 million Bitcoin, of which approximately 18.6 million already exists. This is very different from traditional government issued currencies which can be created by government fiat, with no theoretical limit to their supply, and are not backed by anything intrinsic such as gold, making them prone to inflation and devaluation. By contrast Bitcoin is deflationary meaning its supply is pre-programmed to have a periodically declining rate of growth until the limit of 21 million Bitcoin is finally reached.

Over a thirty-day period in October and November of 2020, the Bitcoin Network facilitated an average transaction volume of 156,725 Bitcoin per day, or approximately $2.4 billon equivalent based on the thirty-day average price.

In summary, the Manager believes that the core properties of Bitcoin are:

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