I just read something quite clever that Adam Back did some time ago. The CEO of Blockstream, who was mentioned in Bitcoin's original whitepaper, placed a limit order on an exchange to buy the entire supply of BTC if it reached $0.02. The idea was simple but brilliant: if Bitcoin plummeted near zero, he would be there to absorb all the available liquidity.

What’s interesting is that Adam Back apparently did this to outdo a similar bet by Alistair Milne, who had placed an order at 1 cent. Back was more aggressive and set his at 2 cents per BTC for 21 million Bitcoin. Both did this around 2020, although Back later canceled his order and used that liquidity to buy BTC for real. So it was a genuine order while it was active.

What makes this even more interesting is the context: Michael Saylor, CEO of MicroStrategy and one of the largest institutional accumulators of Bitcoin, has been saying that BTC will go to $1 million. His argument is quite simple: either Bitcoin goes to zero, or it goes to a million. There’s no middle ground. Adam Back responded to this with his classic sense of humor, recalling his old limit order as a sort of guarantee that Bitcoin will never reach zero.

But here’s the real catch: although someone like Adam Back would want to buy all the Bitcoin supply at a ridiculously low price, the reality is that most BTC is already off the market. About 2 million BTC have not yet been mined, but of the 19 million already generated, most are in cold storage or held by spot Bitcoin ETFs. MicroStrategy, for example, owns over 580,000 BTC, valued at tens of billions of dollars.

Regarding the current price, Bitcoin has been experiencing volatility. It recently dropped nearly 4%, but quickly recovered, gaining more than 2%. The market continues to show strong institutional demand, especially with Bitcoin ETFs that have been accumulating week after week since their launch just over a year ago.

The narrative that Adam Back and Saylor are promoting is interesting because it reflects the confidence they have in the asset. It’s not just speculation: it’s a bet on the very structure of the Bitcoin market and who controls the liquidity. If large corporations keep accumulating as they are, it could effectively reach a point where there’s no Bitcoin available to buy at low prices. That would be the true “zero or a million” scenario Saylor mentions.