Weaver recounts helping friends move about $80,000 in savings from US and Canadian bank accounts to buy an apartment in Istanbul. They bought bitcoin through Swan, held it in BlueWallet, carried it on a phone, and converted it through USDT into nearly three million Turkish lira.
The apartment in the Ümraniye district now hosts a weekly gathering. He reads the trip as a move across three kinds of trust: promised (the banks), held (self-custody), and shared (the local USDT vendor network).
Paul Weaver published this essay on his Substack on May 4, 2026. He is part of the Brilliance Labs network and has given us permission to share his work. This summary is ours; the essay is his.