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Taihuttu family in Phuket, Thailand

Didi Taihuttu

LAGOS, PORTUGAL — In the small coastal town of Lagos in the heart of Portugal’s southern Algarve region, Didi Taihuttu begins most days on the rooftop of his villa — an unassuming home with rustic charm set atop a hill that slopes up from the Atlantic Ocean. The Mediterranean sun bounces off the bright white stucco walls of the house, illuminating the orange terracotta roof and casting a glow over Taihuttu, who sits on a plastic chair tucked under a round table of the same make. The Dutch patriarch of the ‘Bitcoin Family’ drinks black coffee and pores over cryptocurrency price charts on his MacBook Pro as he decides which trades will begin his day.

“We just need a few thousand per month to live on so our performance is not really important to us,” Taihuttu tells CNBC from his deck overlooking an expansive stretch of cobalt-colored water, cliff-backed beaches and bougainvillea.

Taihuttu’s family home in Lagos, Portugal

MacKenzie Sigalos

Taihuttu’s self-effacement and modest surroundings belie the 45-year-old’s success. In 2017, Taihuttu, along with his wife and three kids, liquidated all of their assets, trading a 2,500-square-foot house and most of their earthly possessions for bitcoin and a life on the road. This was back when the price of bitcoin was around $900. Bitcoin is currently trading at over $30,000, down from an all-time high of nearly $70,000 in Nov. 2021.

Those extreme price swings have helped grow the Dutch family’s crypto nest egg.

For seven years, the investor has regularly been swapping his bitcoin for U.S. dollar-pegged stablecoins in order to capitalize on the volatility in the price of the world’s largest cryptocurrency. When Taihuttu thinks that bitcoin is reaching a bull market peak, he trades his bitcoin into stablecoins like tether, USDC, and DAI — and when it appears as though bitcoin is touching cycle lows during a bear market, he starts buying it back. So far, Taihuttu says the gamble is working out great thanks to a market indicator he created himself dubbed the “Didi BAM BAM.”

Didi Taihuttu in Lagos, Portugal

MacKenzie Sigalos

Taihuttu’s indicator considers a mix of inputs, including directional trading data and moon cycles. It’s guided all of Taihuttu’s investing decisions since he built it before the pandemic.

“From mid-November to the start of December 2022, we saw the first signs the bear market was completely over,” said Taihuttu. “It was confirmed in January 2023 when the long flag appeared in the model.”

He added, “People should have been buying bitcoin already, because every bitcoin you bought at $16k, it’s at $30k now, so that’s almost 90% upside.”

The father of three says his bitcoin investment is up about 50% since the bottom of the most recent bear market.

The Taihuttus declined to share with CNBC the current dollar amount of their crypto investment in aggregate — but Didi did disclose that they had fully bought back into bitcoin by the time the coin surpassed the $19,000 price threshold, so they’re “not doing so bad.”

It also helps that the nomadic family’s primary domicile is in Portugal — Europe’s ultimate crypto tax haven.

“You don’t pay any capital gains tax or anything else in Portugal on cryptocurrency,” said Taihuttu. “As long as you don’t earn cryptocurrency for providing services in Portugal, you’re in the clear.”

“That’s a very beautiful bitcoin heaven,” he said.

Didi Taihuttu in Lagos, Portugal

Didi Taihuttu

How the ‘BAM BAM’ indicator works

When Taihuttu began day trading tokens, he initially turned to traditional predictive metrics like the stock-to-flow model and the Mayer Multiple — a measure calculated by dividing the current price of bitcoin by the 200-day moving average in order to help identify frothy moments in the market when an asset’s value eclipses its intrinsic value.

But spending the time reading the tea leaves of all these somewhat related measures didn’t seem like a particularly productive use of his time, so Taihuttu decided to create his own proprietary blend of the best indicators on the market.

“It’s not just enough to know which indicators go into a formula,” explained Taihuttu. “What you can’t see is the calculus and the code that implements over the stock conditions. Those calculations display in charts.”

So beginning in 2019, Taihuttu started to incubate and perfect a custom-built predictive trading tool that would weigh multiple technical indicators — plus a bit of astrology — and then spit out real-time insights into potential price swings.

“It’s a combination of Bollinger Bands, Lower and Upper Bands, NMA, Red/Green Ribbon, NormStoch, RSI, Price Oscillator, Plot, MACD, Cross, Chande Momentum Oscillator, RSI-EMA, Full Moon, and New Moon,” explained Taihuttu, naming a dozen of the most popular market signals that crypto traders watch when they make investment decisions.

“Short and long signals and confirmation signals are shown on the charts when it could be a great moment to buy or sell,” continued Taihuttu.

Taihuttu family in Lagos, Portugal

MacKenzie Sigalos

Here is a quick breakdown of the technicals that underly the model:

  • Bollinger Bands focus on price volatility over time. The model consists of a simple moving average line with two standard deviation lines known as the Upper and Lower Bands. Price moves outside those outer bands can indicate whether an asset is oversold — or vice versa.
  • N-day Moving Average (NMA) is a type of moving average that takes the mean of the closing price of an asset over a variable period of time, or “N” days.
  • Red/Green Ribbon indicators depict bullish, or green, and bearish, or red, market conditions.
  • The Normalized Stochastic (NormStoch) looks at price momentum. It is a variation of the Stochastic Oscillator — an indicator which compares the closing price of an asset to its price variation over a designated period of time.
  • Similar to the Bollinger Bands, the Relative Strength Index (RSI) assesses whether an asset is oversold or overbought. The index, which ranges from 0 to 100, measures the speed and the scale of an asset’s recent price swings.
  • Moving Average Convergence Divergence (MACD) compares two moving averages of a cryptocurrency’s price by subtracting the 26-period exponential moving average (EMA) from the 12-period EMA.
  • The Percentage Price Oscillator (PPO) takes the MACD reading and divides it by the 26-period EMA. It is possible to compare the PPO measures of different assets with larger price discrepancies, because it is expressed as a percentage.
  • With bitcoin, when the line charting the 50-day moving average crosses above a rising 200-day moving average, it is read as a bullish indicator known as a Golden Cross. When the 50-day moving average crosses below a falling 200-day moving average, it is known as the Death Cross, signaling a bear market may be imminent.
  • Chande Momentum Oscillator is a technical momentum indicator similar to the Relative Strength Index and the Stochastic Oscillator, except that it reacts faster to price changes.
  • As the name implies, the Relative Strength Index-Exponential Moving Average (RSI-EMA) combines both measures into a single indicator.

Price chart showing the ‘Didi BAM BAM’ market indicator

Didi Taihuttu

And then there are the intangible price influencers — like moon phases.

“I’m not saying it always affects the price of bitcoin, but the moon influences a lot,” said Taihuttu.

Taihuttu has found that when there is a full moon or a half moon, people tend to trade more.

“They tend to buy more, they tend to sell more,” he said. “Maybe it’s a coincidence, but if you look at the chart, you can see that mostly at the full moon, depending on where we are in the cycle, there’s a dump or a pump.”

Taihuttu added that the lunar phases also typically sync with the opening and closing of bitcoin’s monthly puts and options.

“So if we are in the top of the Bollinger Band in combination with a full moon, then you know that we are going to run,” continued Taihuttu, suggesting a market sell-off is imminent.

Losing his edge to ChatGPT

Taihuttu used to sell the Didi Bam Bam indicator to traders, but he says he will soon make give the trading tool away to selected bitcoin evangelists in order to help spur adoption.

But he also admits that his business model is disappearing.

“Anyone in the world can now go into ChatGPT and tell them, ‘Write me an indicator based on the moving averages and this cycle or that cycle. And write me a script that I can implement into TradingView and then they can make their own indicators,'” explained Taihuttu.

“I’m losing business there.”

‘Bitcoin Family’ in Thailand

Didi Taihuttu

Generative AI is a specific form of AI that is able to produce content from scratch. The systems take inputs from the user and feed them into powerful algorithms fueled by large datasets to generate new text, images, and video in a way that can appear almost human-like.

The technology captured the spotlight following widespread public adoption of OpenAI’s GPT language processing technology. ChatGPT, which uses massive language models to create human-sounding responses to questions, has ignited an arms race among some companies over what is seen as the next “paradigm shift” in tech.

While ChatGPT isn’t able to deliver a querent a trading algorithm in Pine Script, which is TradingView’s programming language, the technology does challenge the role of investment advisers.

In March, Goldman Sachs‘ chief information officer, Marco Argenti, told CNBC the bank is experimenting with generative AI tools internally to help its developers automatically generate and test code.

More recently, in May, Goldman spun off the first startup from the bank’s internal incubator — an AI-powered social media company for corporate use called Louisa. The push into AI is part of a larger effort by CEO David Solomon to expedite the bank’s digital makeover.

Morgan Stanley, meanwhile, is using it to inform its financial advisors on queries they may have. The bank has been testing an OpenAI-powered chatbot with 300 advisors so far, with a view to ultimately aid its roughly 16,000 advisors in making use of Morgan Stanley’s repository of research and data, according to Jeff McMillan, head of analytics and data at the firm’s wealth management division.

Taihuttu uses ChatGPT himself — but more for writing articles about subjects like bitcoin and the Lightning Networks. But he notes that while it is a productivity hack, the output doesn’t necessarily rank highly in search results.

“They will still find out that it’s ChatGPT,” he says. “But it’s still saving you a lot of time.”

— CNBC’s Ryan Browne contributed to this report.

It just got harder and less profitable to mine for bitcoin as algorithm adjusts

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This tiny EV that’s selling for under $12,000 in Europe is coming to the US

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December 9, 2025

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This tiny EV that's selling for under ,000 in Europe is coming to the US

Tiny-EV-US-Fiat

Is this the tiny “kei” car everyone is talking about? Not exactly. Jeep maker Stellantis announced plans to bring the tiny Fiat Topolino EV, which sells for under $12,000 in Europe, to the US.

Fiat plans to launch the tiny Topolino EV in the US

Less than a week after President Trump called Japan’s kei cars “really cute” during a White House meeting with Stellantis CEO Antonio Filosa, Ford’s Jim Farley, GM’s Mary Barra, and Tesla CEO Elon Musk in attendance, we might actually get one in the US.

At Miami Art Week, Fiat CEO Olivier Francois announced that the company is planning to launch the ultra-compact Topolino EV in the US.

After a few appearances in the US, including at last month’s LA Auto Show, Francois said the tiny electric car is “creating tremendous excitement among consumers.”

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So much so that the company is actually planning to make it available for US buyers. “I’m happy to share that we’ll be bringing the Fiat Topolino to the US,” Francois said.

Although the company didn’t reveal any other information beyond “more details to come next year,” we have a good idea of what to expect.

Tiny-EV-US-Fiat
The new Fiat Topolino (Source: Stellantis)

The Topolino, which translates to “little mouse” in Italian, is currently sold in Europe and South America. In Europe, it starts at 9,890 euros, or roughly $11,500.

At just 2,530 mm (99.6″) long, the Topolino is classified as an electric “quadricycle,” rather than a standard car. In some EU countries, like Germany, it can be driven by 15-year-olds.

Powered by a 5.4 kWh battery pack and an 8 hp electric motor, the tiny EV delivers up to 75 km (46 miles) of WLTP range. It can also be fully charged in four hours using a 240V outlet. We will find out more details soon, including prices and US specs.

Can Fiat’s tiny EV win over US buyers? With America’s love for bigger trucks and SUVs, it might be a tough sell. Fiat sold just 1,528 vehicles in the US last year, down from nearly 44,000 in 2012, its first full sales year.


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EcoFlow Christmas Sale offers up to 68% power station savings + flash sale, Aventon e-bikes up to $500 off, Anker security lows, more

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December 9, 2025

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EcoFlow Christmas Sale offers up to 68% power station savings + flash sale, Aventon e-bikes up to 0 off, Anker security lows, more


Leading the pack of today’s Green Deals is EcoFlow’s newly launched Christmas Holiday Sale with up to 68% initial discounts, extra savings, FREE gifts, and two segments of giveaways. Among the bunch, we’re seeing the DELTA 2 Max Portable Power Station bundled with two 220W solar panels and getting a FREE Power Hat for its second-ever $1,139 low + there is separate coverage of the event’s first 48-hour flash sale with returning low prices there, too. We also have Aventon’s entire e-bike lineup getting up to $500 discounts – plus, getting orders in by December 10 ensures they’ll be delivered by Christmas – all starting from $999. There’s also a collection of Anker eufy smart security devices – including solar cameras – back at lows starting from $50, and much more waiting for you below. And don’t forget about the hangover deals collected together at the bottom of the page, like yesterday’s Lectric Christmas e-bike sale with a December 15 shipping deadline for the holiday, and more.

Head below for other New Green Deals we’ve found today and, of course, Electrek’s best EV buying and leasing deals. Also, check out the new Electrek Tesla Shop for the best deals on Tesla accessories.

promotional banner for EcoFlow Christmas Holiday Sale

EcoFlow has transitioned from its Cyber Week deals into its newly launched Christmas Holiday Sale with up to 68% discounts, extra savings, FREE gifts, and even two rounds of giveaways that you can be eligible for by giving your email and joining its mailing list. We’re seeing plenty of Black Friday deals returning during this sale, like the DELTA 2 Max Portable Power Station with two 220W solar panels at $1,139.05 shipped, after using the code 25EFXMAFF at checkout for an additional 5% off, which beats out Amazon’s pricing by $160. This bundle carries a large $3,197 MSRP directly from the brand, but at other marketplaces, like Amazon, you’ll often find it only climbing as high as $2,099 these days. We saw this same rate (along with the extra savings) appear during the previous Cyber Week sale event after cutting it from its $1,214 Black Friday pricing, and now its coming back around again, giving you $960 off the going rate ($2,058 off the MSRP) and landing it back at the best price we have tracked – plus, you’ll get a FREE Power Hat ($99 value). Be sure to head below for the rest of EcoFlow’s Christmas Holiday Sale’s lineup.

We’re seeing a much larger spread of bonus savings/gifts during EcoFlow’s Christmas Holiday Sale, starting with the 5% bonus savings you can get on most offers by using the code 25EFXMAFF at checkout. From there, you’ll have four tiers of FREE gifts (aside from free gifts attached to select units): orders of $300 to $499 get a free RIVER series bag, orders from $500 to $2,499 get a free Power Hat, orders of $2,500 to $3,499 get a free refurbished RIVER 2 Max power station, and orders above $3,500 get two free 160W portable solar panels. There are also the two giveaways that you can join on the sale’s main landing page here, with two winners getting select power stations and six getting gift cards – to be drawn/announced on December 18 and 28, 2025.

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One of EcoFlow’s more popular backup power solutions with a well-rounded build, the DELTA 2 Max power station comes housing LiFePO4 battery cells with a starting 2,048Wh capacity, which you can bolster up to 6,144Wh with extra batteries added on. There are 15 versatile output ports to deliver up to 2,400W of steady juice to devices and appliances, while also having the surging power rise as high as 3,400W.

This bundle gives you four ways to recharge the station, starting with the 440W of solar input that puts you closer to its 1,000W maximum – of which, only 800W is needed to fully recharge in 2.3 hours, so expect about double that time with this package. An AC outlet can get it back to 80% in up to 68 minutes, or you can use AC and solar together for faster rates. As it comes, you can use your car’s auxiliary port as you drive, or with the purchase of the brand’s 800W alternator charger, you can recharge in 2.6 hours of driving.

***Note: The prices below have not had the bonus savings factored in, and not all of the offers will be eligible to stack the discount on their initial price cuts, like the DELTA 3 1000 Air, for example. Be sure to still use the code 25EFXMAFF at checkout to ensure you’re getting the best deals!

EcoFlow’s top Christmas Holiday Sale picks:

EcoFlow’s 3-6kWh home backup deals:

EcoFlow’s 1-2kWh essential backup deals:

EcoFlow’s newest arrival deals:

EcoFlow solar panel deals:

EcoFlow’s other accessory deals:

As I mentioned, EcoFlow is having a separate RAPID power bank seasonal promotion that is taking up to 50% off the latest series – including the new 25W MagSafe models – all starting from $55. We also have three exclusive sales from Wellbots that give you much more savings at all new low prices, starting with the DELTA 3 Ultra power station at $879. There’s also the DELTA Pro Ultra station that gets a FREE 400W solar panel at $3,329, as well as up to $13,289 savings across 20 different DELTA Pro Ultra X gear and bundles that start from $174.

man and woman sitting on bench next to lake with Aventon e-bikes

Until December 10, score up to $500 savings on all of Aventon’s e-bikes and get it ahead of Christmas – deals start from $999

Aventon still has its ongoing extended Black Friday Sale offering up to $500 discounts across its e-bike lineup, with a deadline to receive your new ride ahead of Christmas set for December 10. We’re seeing all the newest models join the savings train here, with things starting lowest on the Soltera 2.5 Lightweight Commuter e-bike at $999 shipped. Normally going for $1,199 at full price, we first saw this low rate pop up back in late August, and its back around during this holiday shopping season giving you $200 savings at the best tracked price.

If you want to learn more about this model, or browse the entire lineup of e-bike deals and get your order in before the December 10 shipping deadline, be sure to check out our original coverage of this sale here.

Anker eufy solar security camera mounted to wall outside in rain

Several Anker eufy solar cameras, smart locks, more are seeing up to 50% savings back to lows from $50

Through Anker’s official eufy Amazon storefront, we’re seeing the brand offer several of its smart home security devices back at Black Friday rates or the next-best prices. One such model heading back to its best pricing is the popular Anker eufy SoloCam S220 Wireless Solar Security Camera starting at $49.99 shipped, while its 4-camera bundle is back at $179.99 shipped. These two bundles usually fetch full $100 or $280 prices, with the deals here having first been spotted during Amazon’s full Black Friday sale event. You’re getting 50% and 36% markdowns for the second time here while the deals last, cutting $50 and $100 off the going rates to land them back at their all-time lowest prices.

If you want to browse the entire lineup of Anker eufy smart security devices benefitting from discounts, be sure to check out our original coverage of these deals here.

man powering home office with EcoFlow DELTA 3 Pro power station

EcoFlow’s first 48-hour Christmas Holiday flash sale returns the DELTA Pro 3 power station to $2,099 low, more

As part of its newly launched Christmas Holiday Sale, EcoFlow has also launched the first of this event’s 48-hour flash sales taking up to 65% off four offers, with the sole power station unit in the bunch being the DELTA Pro 3 Portable Power Station with a FREE folding wagon cart at $2,099 shipped. While this unit has a $3,699 MSRP, you’ll find it more often starting around $2,699, particularly at Amazon, where it is priced without the wagon cart $200 higher. Discounts over the year have only seen it come down this low in price once before, during the Black Friday/Cyber Monday sale event, with things otherwise keeping above $2,299. You’re getting another chance at the all-time lowest price here, complete with $600 off the going rate and $1,600 off the MSRP. Head below to check out the full lineup of flash deals while they last through December 10.

You can learn more about this power station, or the other bundles at up to 65% off, be sure to check out our original coverage of these flash deals here.

Segway e-bike and electric scooters with family in garage and driveway

Best Winter EV deals!

Best new Green Deals landing this week

The savings this week are also continuing to a collection of other markdowns. To the same tune as the offers above, these all help you take a more energy-conscious approach to your routine. Winter means you can lock in even better off-season price cuts on electric tools for the lawn while saving on EVs and tons of other gear.


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XCharge NA just launched New England’s fastest charging site

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December 9, 2025

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XCharge NA just launched New England's fastest charging site

XCharge NA New England

Photo: XCharge NA

XCharge NA and Cellerate Power have brought online what they say is New England’s fastest EV charging site in Vermont, right at the base of Stratton Mountain Resort.

The site opened to the public in late October 2025 and offers 400-kilowatt ultra-fast charging to a part of the state that previously topped out at much slower speeds.

The site is powered by XCharge NA’s C7 Ultra-Fast Chargers, which can deliver up to 400 kW — about two to three times faster than most other fast chargers in the region. Cellerate Power says the nearest alternative fast-charging option is about 30 minutes away and limited to 150 kW for CCS-equipped vehicles only.

By contrast, the Winhall site supports both NACS and CCS connectors, meaning it can serve virtually all EV models.

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Cellerate Power, a Vermont-based company focused on expanding equitable access to infrastructure, says the project aims to make EV travel more practical in a state where cold winters and mountainous terrain can amplify range anxiety.

The C7 chargers also feature large 21.5-inch screens, which XCharge NA and Cellerate Power claim can enhance the charging experience while promoting local economic development.

Aatish Patel, cofounder and president of XCharge NA, says the Vermont deployment marks the first North American installation of its C7 Ultra-Fast Chargers. “It will expand access to fast charging in regions where it was previously unavailable and offer drivers a more efficient, reliable charging experience.”

The charging station is located at 40 VT Route 30 in Winhall, Vermont, 05340, at the base of the Stratton Mountain Ski Resort access road, making it a convenient stop for locals and travelers heading to and from southern Vermont’s ski and recreation areas.

Read more: XCharge NA is now leasing DC fast chargers to small businesses

If you’re looking to replace your old HVAC equipment, it’s always a good idea to get quotes from a few installers. To make sure you’re finding a trusted, reliable HVAC installer near you that offers competitive pricing on heat pumps, check out EnergySage. EnergySage is a free service that makes it easy for you to get a heat pump. They have pre-vetted heat pump installers competing for your business, ensuring you get high quality solutions. Plus, it’s free to use!

Your personalized heat pump quotes are easy to compare online and you’ll get access to unbiased Energy Advisors to help you every step of the way. Get started here. – *ad


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