While the world focuses on AI as a tool for productivity, Strive strategist Joe Burnett sees it as something far more disruptive: a **deflationary wrecking ball** that will force central banks into a permanent cycle of monetary expansion.
His "base case" for Q1 2036 isn't just a bull run—it’s a total systemic re-rating. The target? **$11 million per Bitcoin.**
### ⚙️ The AI Deflation Engine
The thesis centers on a paradoxical survival instinct of the fiat system. As AI-driven automation collapses the cost of goods and services, it creates a "debt trap."
* **The Fiat Nightmare:** In a debt-based world, falling prices are a catastrophe. If wages and assets drop while debts stay fixed, the system snaps.
* **The Policy Response:** To prevent a deflationary spiral, central banks will be forced to flood the gates with liquidity.
* **The Scarce Winner:** As the supply of money expands to fight AI-driven efficiency, it will seek refuge in the one thing that cannot be "automated" into abundance: **Bitcoin.**
### 📈 The "Reflexive Loop" of Digital Credit
Burnett isn't just betting on scarcity; he’s betting on a new financial architecture. We are entering the era of **Digital Credit**, pioneered by giants like MicroStrategy.
* **The Flywheel:** Publicly traded securities backed by massive Bitcoin treasuries allow firms to raise capital, buy more BTC, and issue more credit.
* **The New Reserve:** If Bitcoin captures just **12% of global financial assets**, it becomes the dominant global reserve.
* **The Scale:** At $11 million, Bitcoin’s market cap would hit **$230 trillion**—roughly 10x the current US M2 money supply and double the current global GDP.
### ⚖️ The Reality Check: 2026 vs. 2036
As of **March 2026**, Bitcoin currently accounts for roughly **0.2%** of all financial assets. To hit Burnett’s target, we are looking at a **176-fold increase** over the next decade.
While ARK Invest’s 2030 bull case of $1.5 million seemed aggressive just a few months ago, Burnett’s 2036 vision suggests we are still in the "early stage" of a credit system built on verifiably scarce money.
> **The Verdict:** If AI makes everything cheaper, the only thing that gets more expensive is the one thing they can't make more of.
**The question for the next decade: Are you betting on the technology that creates abundance, or the asset that captures its value?** 🌏₿🚀
