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Fernando NikolicWork with me
Fernando Nikolic

Fernando Nikolic

Grew up in Argentina during economic collapse. That’s how I ended up in Bitcoin. Worked at UMG during torrents’ disruption of music. Spent four years as VP Marketing at Blockstream, working on Liquid Network, mining, satellite, and Blockstream App. Now building Perception, a narrative intelligence platform for Bitcoin and digital assets.

Work with meGet the weekly brief@basedlayer on X
Based in
Vancouver, Canada
Before Perception
Blockstream, Xeneta, HP, Universal Music
Quoted by
Tyler Cowen and Javier Milei

Signal

Perception Index: Bitcoin

59Optimism

+7 over 7 days, −1 in 24 hours

  1. 2026-09-03: 64
  2. 2026-09-04: 67
  3. 2026-09-05: 59
  4. 2026-09-06: 49
  5. 2026-09-07: 43
  6. 2026-09-08: 44
  7. 2026-09-09: 43
  8. 2026-09-10: 40
  9. 2026-09-11: 41
  10. 2026-09-12: 42
  11. 2026-09-13: 53
  12. 2026-09-14: 46
  13. 2026-09-15: 35
  14. 2026-09-16: 36
  15. 2026-09-17: 52
  16. 2026-09-18: 66
  17. 2026-09-19: 66
  18. 2026-09-20: 65
  19. 2026-09-21: 70
  20. 2026-09-22: 74
  21. 2026-09-23: 74
  22. 2026-09-24: 63
  23. 2026-09-25: 62
  24. 2026-09-26: 70
  25. 2026-09-27: 65
  26. 2026-09-28: 52
  27. 2026-09-29: 64
  28. 2026-09-30: 64
  29. 2026-10-01: 65
  30. 2026-10-02: 67
  31. 2026-10-03: 59

Sep 3Neutral bandToday

How Bitcoin is being talked about right now, scored from 0 to 100 across 404 articles published in the last 24 hours. It’s one of the signals Perception tracks.

Open the full index on Perception

Work

  1. 2025–now

    Perception

    • FounderSep 2025 – present

    Real-time narrative intelligence for Bitcoin and digital assets. Continuously analyzing thousands of curated sources to surface what matters.

  2. 2021–2025

    Blockstream

    • VP Marketing CommunicationsApr 2025 – Aug 2025
    • Director, Marketing & CommunicationsJul 2022 – Apr 2025
    • Marketing DirectorAug 2021 – Jun 2022, Vancouver

    Four years leading marketing for Bitcoin infrastructure: Liquid Network, mining, satellite, and Blockstream App.

  3. 2016–2021

    Xeneta

    • Director, Demand GenerationFeb 2020 – Mar 2021, Vancouver
    • Performance Marketing LeadOct 2018 – Feb 2020, Vancouver
    • Search Engine AnalystMay 2016 – Oct 2018, Berlin

    First growth hire. Grew the company from 17 to 120 employees across three roles over nearly five years.

  4. 2015–2018

    Growth consultant

    • Self-employedMar 2015 – Oct 2018, Berlin

    GTM strategy for three companies valued at €1.3B entering the Norwegian market. Clients included Zalando, internetstores, synergist.io, QT.io, Xeneta, Cognite, Routific, BitBay, The Specialist Works and 3Xplor.

  5. 2012–2013

    Freelance

    • Digital Media ManagerFeb 2012 – Dec 2013, Oslo

    Digital network file syncing and maintenance for TV shows. Clients: Rakett TV, Monster Entertainment, Strix Television.

  6. 2010–2013

    Hewlett-Packard

    • B2B Portal ManagerJan 2010 – Feb 2013, Barcelona

    Managed HP’s B2B purchasing portal: direct customer maintenance, new setups, UX and UI.

  7. 2008–2009

    Universal Music Group

    • Junior Product ManagerAug 2008 – Dec 2009, Oslo

    Worked at EMI during the torrents era. Witnessed firsthand how Pirate Bay and digital distribution disrupted the music industry.

Work with me

I help Bitcoin and digital-asset companies get their story right and get it heard, using what I learned running marketing at Blockstream and what Perception sees across thousands of sources.

Book a callHow I can help

Reading

The most important driver of anything tied to money is the stories people tell themselves and the preferences they have for goods and services. Those things don’t tend to sit still. They change with culture and generation. They’re always changing and always will.

From The Psychology of Money, Morgan Housel

65 books since 2020, and the 1,153 passages I marked in them. A thicker spine means more highlights.

Browse the library

Podcasts

All 39 appearances

Ideas

I’ve lived through the same pattern three times: a system that seemed permanent collapses under its own information asymmetry. Argentina’s currency in 2001. The music industry at Universal. Now: everything else.

The internet didn’t just connect people. It killed the information scarcity that made institutions feel real. We’re living in the gap between destroying old systems and building new ones.

The Chaos Gap
The space between old systems collapsing and new ones forming.
Glass Towers
Institutions became transparent and fragile at the same time.
Microprophets
Ten million people following ten million specialized authorities.
The Torrent Parallel
Music industry disruption as the template for financial disruption.
Legitimacy Crossover
When a narrative shifts from “crypto people want this” to “here’s why this might happen.”
Read the ideas

Writing

Press

Background

Argentine, remote worker, marketer, life-long unlearner. 10+ years in high-growth B2B SaaS, from strategic growth marketing to senior leadership to owning pipeline generation. Now focused solely on Bitcoin.

Lived and worked in
Buenos Aires, Oslo, Barcelona, Berlin, Vancouver
Speaks
English, Spanish, Norwegian. Some French and German.
Studied
BSc Economics, Management & Innovation, Inland Norway University, 2005–2009
Certifications
Consumer Neuroscience, Mises Institute Boot Camp, Financial Markets, Geneva

Produce value or perish.

Newsletter

Weekly Intelligence Brief

I break down what’s actually happening in Bitcoin narratives, using data from thousands of sources. No hype, no shilling.

Latest

  • Why Your Comms Plan Is Wrong

    The only thing growing in crypto discourse right now is prediction markets.

  • The Bitcoin Canary

    5 things Bitcoin believed on July 21 that came crashing down.

  • My trust in you is broken

    You know what happened and I’m not going to walk you through the timeline. I want to talk about what it says about us, and then about the thing underneath it that I think…

All research from Perception