It’s uncommon for it to be true—but patio does go on to supply third-party blurbs to support the idea, and as far as I understand his reputation, I believe his claim is probably accurate.

In context it strikes me less as stroking his own ego and more as contextualizing the bank CEO’s claim.

no, but like with paul graham's essays, people have an unhealthy obsession with both their writing (which is irrelevant outside of the ycombinator/sv bubble) to the point where it seems to signal to be part of an insider club more than provide actual value, which may lead to fuel one's ego a bit too much.

turning this into another overly verbose blog post doesn't really help my thinking on the matter (which, to be fair, is even less relevant than his musings)

I interpreted that to imply the subsequent phrase "within the Bits about Money universe." As in, the article you're currently reading is not going to be explaining the topic again.

But a whole paragraph of this piece is analyzing the use of the term "retraction," so I guess we could expect him to be a bit more careful with the word "definitive".

When you’re Patrick McKenzie, it’s just the truth.