Bankless - ROLLUP: Top 5 Biggest Crypto Events Of 2024

Starting point is 00:00:03 Bankless Nation, welcome to the yearly roll-up, where we recap the entire year of crypto into the five biggest events that defined the 20-24 year in crypto, which was a very good year, I will say. That was an incredible year for crypto. I think one of the biggest years that we've had so far, and we're going to go through all the events that made it such. First, though, however, we are going to speed run through the five biggest news items of the week, because, of course, this is also the weekly roll-up and recap the week in crypto like we all. always do. But since it's Christmas week, of course, it's a slow week, not too much to talk about here. So once we do the five biggest things of the last week, we're going to do the five biggest things of the whole year to help us reflect on 2024 as we all prepare to enter 2025. Just remind us, what happened this year? Why was this year such a good year? Before we get

Starting point is 00:00:54 into all of that, first, a message from our friends and sponsors over at Rodman Law Group. We usually in the sponsored segment have a protocol, a wallet, or a layer two as a sponsor here. This one is a little different. Today, our friends and our lawyers, our lawyers at Bankless, the Rodman Law Group, want to say that they are the best damn lawyers in crypto. And those are my words, but perhaps also their words. Dave Rodman and Rodman Law are crypto-native lawyers. I was hanging around with Dave at DevCon.

Starting point is 00:01:23 And he was rocking the T-Shash t-shirt because he's a Chad lawyer. Dave Rodman and Rodman Law helped us at Bankless actually tell Justin Sun's lawyers to buzz off when they sent us a cease and desist about a bearish-tron article that we published. And then they just left us alone, which was pretty cool. Many law firms in crypto are not always aligned with the projects that they represent, being overly restrictive, unpragmatically risk-averse. Rodman Law, on the other hand, they get it. They know what being in the trenches means. He has a D-Gen in the crypto world. And they know how to navigate the trade-off space.

Starting point is 00:01:57 they have been some of our best allies in the industry. Not just Bankless, CoinShift, co-founder of NIR, Portal Ventures, a bunch of other crypto people in this base all use Rodman Law as their lawyer. So if you want the best damn lawyer in crypto, bankless.cd.c.c.c.c.c.c.c.org. Rodman Law to schedule a free consultation with them right now. You may have noticed that my other half, Ryan, he is out for the holidays because it's a slow week.

Starting point is 00:02:21 I think I can take this episode by myself. So he is playing with his AI wife, AI kids. So you guys just got me on this episode. We have never done this before. Usually there's both of us. But Ryan wanted a little break and the show must go on. And so you boys doing the weekly roll-up solo, which is why you're going to be hearing a lot of my voice.

Starting point is 00:02:40 we're going to see how much you guys really like hearing my voice because you're going to get only that for the next hour or so. So let's go ahead and get right into the market's Bitcoin price starting the week at $101,000, down 5.5% to where we are now at $96,300. We've been kind of kind of shaking around below the $100,000 mark. But I think people are just realizing that this is a pretty normal, healthy pullback in the grand scheme of things. Last week, Federal Reserve signal that they were not going to come. rate as much as we thought that they were into 2025, and people are dealing with that reality. But in my personal opinion, this is just a speed bump onto higher and higher prices. It'll just take us a little bit longer to get there.

Starting point is 00:03:24 ETH price, doing something similar down a little bit more than Bitcoin, started the week at $3,600, ending the week where we are now at $3,350 down about 8.5% on the week. Some interesting activity happening in the ETF flows world. there are some big outflow days out of Bitcoin. $670 million flew out of the Bitcoin ETFs on the 19th, 277 out on the 20th, $226 million out on the 23rd, and 240 out on the 24th.

Starting point is 00:03:55 So painting some pretty big outflow numbers, four days in a row. But nonetheless, the 10 days prior to that were some very big inflows days. So we're just seeing a small exiting out of the Bitcoin ETFs. ETH, ETH outflow is showing something a little bit different. Some mixed results, I would say. ETH had a couple of medium days of outflows on the 19th and 20th, but otherwise dwarfed by a couple very large 100 million days,

Starting point is 00:04:22 a dollar days of inflows on the 17th and the 23rd, and then the day before Christmas, Christmas Eve, a $50 million inflow day. So actually a divergence in the Bitcoin and Ether ETF inflows, where Ether is seeing a lot more of inflows and Bitcoin is seeing some kind of large outflows. Nonetheless, this did not do anything to assist the ETH-BTC ratio. We are currently at 0.048 on the ratio, which is down from Ether's recent strength that it had.

Starting point is 00:04:52 It got, when it hit the low in November 21st of 0.032, that was the low. It got up above 0.04, and everyone was saying, oh, Ether's back, baby, let's go. but then we are back down to 0.0348. But nonetheless, that is a higher low. So there's still room for strength continuing into January of 2025. We will see what the ratio does. Total crypto market cap, we are below $3.5 trillion.

Starting point is 00:05:21 We got above it almost touched $4 trillion, but it's looking like we might not hit $4 trillion in the year, $2024. We are currently at $3.456 trillion dollars, waiting to get right above that that 3.5 trillion dollar number. And a quick layer two update brought to by a mantle a layer two that we enjoy. Layer two B, I want to kind of do a check-in on the yearly scaling growth of layer two's in Ethereum. We started the year of scaling the scaling factor of Ethereum, which is, of course, if you are cumulative to all of the layer two's of Ethereum,

Starting point is 00:05:58 how many Ethereums they represent in scaling factor. We started the year at 4x. So all of the layer two's cumulatively had 4x the capacity of Ethereum at the one year mark, one year ago, January 2020, 2024. We are ending the year with a 15x scaling factor. So over the year, the Ethereum layer two went from a 4x scaling factor to a 15x scaling factor. And if you just look at that pink chart, that is just a really nice pink upwards line. Pretty strong, pretty healthy, just continuing. Not too fast, not too slow.

Starting point is 00:06:32 I think I definitely want to see like a 100x scaling factor. But if we were at 4x in January and we're at 15X in December, it won't take us too long to get to 100x because that is going to grow exponentially. Also, let's check in on ultrasound money and the issuance of ETH over the year. Over the last year, 276,000 ether was issued net. Net issuance over the year. Ether in the year 2024 was net inflationary. We burned over half that amount, so very rough terms. I couldn't get these perfect numbers, but roughly, we issued 900,000 ether, and then we burned 600,000 ether, leading to the aggregate net issuance that we had over the year, about 276,000 ether.

Starting point is 00:07:17 So we are still burning in the year 2024. We burned two ether for every three ether that we issued, leading to a net aggregate issuance of 276,000 ether. Move the week, three tokens that I think stood out to me. Movement, the move-based layer two, up 48% on the week. Pudgy's, the new Pudgy token, up 25% on the week. And then Virtual's Protocol, the AI Agent Platform, up 18% on the week. 18% on the week, not terribly crazy in crypto terms, but we do have to remind ourselves that the Virtual's Protocol is on a 320% tear over the 30-day period.

Starting point is 00:07:57 And so it is crossing $3 billion, a huge signal of strength in the AI agent world. Virtual's is an AI agent platform to easily create an AI agent using their virtual's tokens. They've managed to create value capture into their token very, very well. And this has been one of the leading AI agent platforms on base. And we actually did an episode, Ryan did an episode while I was out hiking in the world of the Patagonia. ran in an episode with our AI expert co-host EJaz with EtherMage Jason Tang, who's one of the co-founders of the Virtual's Protocol.

Starting point is 00:08:33 This episode is doing numbers on YouTube and around. And so if you guys are paying attention to these AI episodes that we are doing, definitely watch this one is probably one of the bigger AI episodes that we've recorded recently. So that's the markets. Man, it goes a lot faster when there's just one of me. Coming up next, we're going to do the weekly roll-up.

Starting point is 00:08:52 El Salvador strikes a deal with the I. to limit their Bitcoin activities. North Korea is trading on hyperliquid, giving the other traders the hebi-Geebies. President-elect Donald Trump continues the pro-crypto appointees and micro-strategy. They did what they always do. They bought some more Bitcoin. So we're going to get to all of this and more. But first, a moment to talk about some of these fantastic sponsors that make this show possible. Want to know the exchange we at bankless use to buy, sell, and trade crypto? It's Crackin, one of the longest standing in most secure crypto platforms in the world with tools for every type of trader to get started. Over 13 million users trust crack.

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Starting point is 00:11:56 It was a quiet week. Not too much happened. And then after we do the weekly roll-up, we are going to do the yearly roll-up, the five biggest things that define the year 2024. But nonetheless, here we go into the weekly roll-up, starting with number one. El Salvador to limit Bitcoin activities for a $1.4 billion deal with the IMF. El Salvador has agreed to scale back its Bitcoin-related initiatives in order to secure a $1.4 billion loan from the international monetary fund. I would say the IMF is like just opposed, almost diametrically opposed to Bitcoin. IMF kind of just represents the incumbent entrenched global world order of like the Fiat system and dollar hegemony. And so yeah, I would say it's pretty antagonistic to Bitcoin.

Starting point is 00:12:42 and the IMF has been very unhappy with El Salvador and other countries flirtations with Bitcoin. El Salvador's honestly commitments to Bitcoin. But in order to secure a $1.4 billion loan, the El Salvador has made some concessions. And so they made optional acceptance of Bitcoin. Bitcoin's are no longer mandated to accept Bitcoin as payment, which was shifting from the previous legal requirement. Now, I've talked to people from El Salvador and in El Salvador and foreigners who have traveled to El Salvador. this mandate to accept Bitcoin was mostly just on paper. This was not something that I think anyone truly experienced while being in El Salvador.

Starting point is 00:13:22 There's no one forcing people to take Bitcoin. And honestly, there's not a lot of actual commerce in El Salvador. That is Bitcoin denominated. People are mostly just doing what they've always been doing before Bitcoin. There are Bitcoin sectors. There's probably Bitcoin corners of El Salvador. But from what I have heard, this is not like a very large part. So this was kind of like a free space that El Salvador was just able to give the IMF because it was already like this.

Starting point is 00:13:47 So that was the first concession. The second concession, public sector limitations. The government will reduce its involvement in Bitcoin activities, further limiting Bitcoin purchases and transactions. That might be kind of big. They might not be able to buy any more Bitcoin. We will see tax payments. Tax payments will be payable exclusively in the U.S. dollar, discontinuing the acceptance of Bitcoin's for tax obligations. So once again, enshrining the dollar as the de facto currency of El Salvador.

Starting point is 00:14:16 This is kind of how the IMF works. If you want our loans, if you want our money, you have to use our dollar. It's basically the fight of the U.S. dollar empire versus Bitcoin. And then the Chivo, Chivo wallet phase out. The El Salvadorian government has this Bitcoin wallet, this E wallet, Chivo, introduced in 2021 to facilitate Bitcoin transactions. The government plans to gradually withdraw. from this initiative. So those were the four things. This deal is not inked. This is not done. This is the discussions. These are the terms. We will see if this actually goes through.

Starting point is 00:14:51 But I mean, I don't think these are very large concessions from what I can tell other than the ability to buy future Bitcoin. That one's kind of big. But I think El Salvador is kind of playing hardball, I think, with the IMF to get a $1.4 billion loan. Moving on to our second news item of the week, Hyper Liquid and the DPRK Hyper Liquid and North Korea. Hyper Liquid is a crypto derivatives trading platform. It had its very large air drop recently with no VC investment, so it paid out a bunch of tokens to its users, earning itself a very loyal fan base. It has been recently facing some scrutiny that emerged as wallets connected to the Lazarus group,

Starting point is 00:15:29 connected to North Korean hackers, were discovered trading on Hyper Liquid. These wallets were actually emerged from Taylor Monaghan, one of the, probably the, one of the, foremost security experts in this space who works at Metamask. She reported that these wallets were active on hyperliquid since at least October. And I think they're not just trading, through the lines here, they're not just trading on hyperliquid. What does North Korea do? They exploit protocols. They try to find weaknesses in protocols. And so the existence of North Korea's capital on hyperliquid is not to say that they are just being DGEN's trading on hyperliquid. They are trying to use that capital to find economic exploits, exploits of some kind, probably is the assumption here.

Starting point is 00:16:13 So this is what Taylor Monaghan kind of alluded to, suggesting that the activity might be testing for vulnerabilities rather than just regular trading. As a result of this raising of the alarm, over $250 million of outflows came out of hyperliquid about fears of security. Like if you are a user with capital on hyperliquid, and then you discover that North Korea is also trading there. That would give you the heby-jubis. I don't, I wouldn't want my capital there. And so as a result, $256 million in net outflows, net withdrawals, and just 30 hours

Starting point is 00:16:47 happened. Hyperliquid said in its discord that is aware of reports circulating regarding activity of supposed DPRK addresses. There has been no DPRK exploit or any exploit for that matter of hyperliquered. All user funds are accounted for. The response has been mixed from the crypto community. there was of course a denial of any breach there was not a breach but others have criticized the platform's centralized infrastructure there are just four nodes of hyperliquid if i recall so you know

Starting point is 00:17:18 the nasdaq has one node and hyperliquid has four uh so you know decentralization is a spectrum but i wouldn't call four meaningfully decentralized uh that's just my take so there is a debate on whether the activity was indeed even attest by north green hackers are just regular trading um but nonetheless, this is probably an ongoing situation. If you are a platform with four nodes and you have North Korea on you, that is an interesting place to be. So that's probably going to be something to keep an eye on as time goes on. On to the third news of the week, one of the co-founders and the CEO of Aptos Labs announced his resignation on December 19th. Notably, after people have noticed that his compensation package vested, his departure was described in several sources at him

Starting point is 00:18:02 stepping down to start a new chapter with Aptos's lab's co-founder Avery Ching taking over as CEO. Mo said his plans to continue to have involvement with Aptos Labs as a strategic advisor while taking time to reflect on the broader industry trends and the future of blockchain tech. Mo tweeted out today, I am stepping away from Aptos Labs to start a new chapter. One of my true passions lies in building companies from the ground up and we have done that at Aptos Labs by building a world-class team. I leave Aptos Labs with a new chapter. I leave Aptos Labs with a new chapter. with the utmost confidence in the team and strongly believe that the talent

Starting point is 00:18:35 and drive of Aptos Labs will continue our collective vision to life in the near future. Avery will be stepping in as Aptoslav CEO to drive the company into the next phase of growth. And then a bunch of more things. And then he says, I will always remain a champion of Aptos

Starting point is 00:18:47 in his mission. As such, I'll say on as a strategic advisor and look forward to continue to helping Aptos maintain its role as the world's leading blockchain. Posts on Twitter, other people commenting on this, reflected a mixture of sentiment, mainly talking about the timing of the vesting of his package,

Starting point is 00:19:05 his vesting package suggesting that the resignation also might have been done to internal politics or his personal views rather than a straightforward business decision. But mainly I think this is natural for crypto-twitter. If somebody is making money, that is where people point their attention in their eye or two. And so the dubious timing of his departure along with the vesting of his equity and tokens being able to sell them, It did not sit well with many, many people. I resonate with my co-founder Ryan's take where he says, no disrespect to anyone,

Starting point is 00:19:36 but you can't build the property rights layer on the internet on a three-year vesting schedule. Give me founders willing to dedicate decades to the project. Give me true believers. And I think that's also just a good reminder of what we are trying to do here. We are building the property rights layer of the internet, this property rights layer. That's what bankless is here for.

Starting point is 00:19:55 That's what I'm here for. That's what I think is the true North Star. of the industry. Property rights on the internet, decentralized property rights on the internet. And a three-year investing schedule is something else, something different than what those goals are. But those goals are just my goals.

Starting point is 00:20:11 So to each their own. Moving on to our favorite subject on the Bankless Weekly Roll-up, meme coins. The Hawk Tua girl, Haley Welch said on Friday that she is fully cooperating with lawyers, representing people who lost money investing in her crypto token, Hawk, which flopped in early December and amid allegations of malfeasions.

Starting point is 00:20:29 since. On a Twitter post, she posted, she said, I take this situation extremely seriously. The viral TikTok star, Haley, encouraged victims of the hawk coin, victims of the hawk coin, to reach out to the law firm suing Hawks creators as she works to uncover the truth about the token. The token, when it launched, kind of imploded right at the moment of creation because people observed that insiders had pocketed massive sums of money at the extent of people who purchased the token. There was just a bunch of insider trading. There was like a 97.5% concentration of the token and just like a few handfuls of wallets. And I think the message here is that Haley is positioning herself as also an unknown, unknowing victim of people who influenced her to create this

Starting point is 00:21:19 meme coin. Because honestly, it's kind of a complicated thing to do and like understanding that there are very important things to get right and things to get wrong. And you also really have to trust the people that are creating your meme coin. She probably didn't understand that. She was like, probably was just, I'm guessing, without looking into this too much, she was just approached by people. It's like, hey, we're going to make you a meme coin, and it's going to be fun and great. Meanwhile, not understanding that there are like terrible incentive, dubious incentives that needs to be controlled for. And it sounds like the creators of this meme coin who understood how to, you know, launch a meme coin, operate a blockchain,

Starting point is 00:21:54 pocket money is being pointed at by Haley and being accused of using Haley's brand to create a meme coin. The collapse of this coin sparked lawsuit allegations of securities violations against the creators of Hock to a coin. Burwick Law is the law firm suing them on behalf of people who lost money on Hock. Accus the creators of leveraging wealth's internet fames to unlawfully peddle an unregistered investment. Also, one thing to note is just a just kind of look at the media organizations reporting on this. When I typed in just looking for articles about this for this episode, the New York Post, NBC News, Newsweek, Fox, all reporting on this.

Starting point is 00:22:40 So this is why I've always kind of been resistant to specifically celebrity meme coins. They don't give, they don't particularly give the industry the best name. And there's just a lot of things to get right and a lot of things that can go wrong. and a lot of things went wrong on this one. Moving on to the world of politics, Stephen Mirren has been nominated to the Council of Economic Advisors to the incoming Trump campaign, Trump administration, excuse me. So Stephen Mirren, who is he? He is a senior strategist at Hudson Bay Capital Management and also previously served as an economic policy advisor

Starting point is 00:23:12 at the U.S. Department of the Treasury from 2020 to 2021. So he's no stranger to the Trump campaign, Trump administration. He, Miran, just for context, expressed skepticism. about large stimulus packages and critiqued the Federal Reserve's policies, particularly regarding their impact on inflation. In July 2024, he co-authored a paper with our BFF, Neuriel Robini, who's like one of the most famous Bitcoin haters out there, like who's got a big name for himself, who's a Bitcoin hater,

Starting point is 00:23:43 arguing that the Treasury's reduction in long-term bond issuance contributed to prolonged inflation by bringing forward liquidity from the future into the present. to the present. I thought that was interesting. Overall, this nomination aligns with Trump's recent appointments of individuals supportive of cryptocurrency and digital assets. Mierin's appointment is, of course, pending a Senate confirmation. If he is confirmed, he will succeed Jared Bernstein as the CEA chair. But overall, this is good for crypto. He is a pro-crypto, pro-marketes, pro-free markets individual. And so this is just yet another pro-crypto person joining the the Trump cabinet. And bringing up the rear, of course, micro strategy joined the NASDAQ 100 and also

Starting point is 00:24:27 acquired 5,265 more Bitcoins. So to talk about the acquisition first, between December 16th and the 22nd, Micro Strategy purchased 5,262 Bitcoins for $561 million, averaging $106,000 per Bitcoin, buying the top of Bitcoin, as Michael Saylor loves to do. As of today, at the end of the year, the company holds $44,260 Bitcoins. That is $27.7 billion, averaging $62,000 about per Bitcoin. At current market prices, these holdings are valued at $42 billion. So he has spent $27.7 billion and now holds, with all those purchases, he now holds $42 billion, or excuse me, micro strategy holds $42 billion of Bitcoin. Because of the very strong performance of the micro strategy, stock. talk, Micros Strategy was added to the NASDAQ 100 index on the 23rd. So the inclusion of

Starting point is 00:25:26 micro strategy into the index, basically driven by its Bitcoin investment, all of its Bitcoin assets. It tends to attract additional investment because it is now in the league, the cool league of the NASDAQ 100. And so indices, ETFs are now also buying microstrategy. So there's a little bit of like a valuation bump when you get into the NASDAQ 100. So any funds that track the NASDAQ 100 will now automatically incorporate micro strategy stock. So that's kind of the big news of the week. But there's also one more. I thought it was worth including here. Over 30% of Ethereum validators are signaling to raise the Ethereum layer one gas. This is a tweet out of Anthony Sizzano. And this is just how Ethereum layer one gas works. This is actually a number that is up to

Starting point is 00:26:17 validators. This is a number that is a parameter that can be adjusted on a per validator basis. And when a sufficient number of validators signal to increase the gas limit, then the Ethereum layer one gas limit does does increase. And so this number has been growing steadily for a number of weeks now, number of months actually, to where it is now at 30%. And this is up from just 10% on December 19th. So yes, this is a week long phenomenon. 30% today, which is the 26th of December, and it's just up from 10% on December 19th. So we could be seeing some increased layer one capacity coming soon to Ethereum, which is pretty cool.

Starting point is 00:26:58 All right, that is the news of the week of Christmas. Hope you guys all enjoyed. We got still the week. We got still the yearly roll-up coming up next. I'll recap the five biggest events and movements of 2024 to all get ourselves grounded and prepped for what is probably going to be quite insane 2025. I think we all feel it. So let's go ahead and get into the sponsors that make the show possible.

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Starting point is 00:30:28 In my opinion, these are all David's opinions. I'm sure other people would create a different list. Number five, May 23rd, the spot Ethereum ETFs were approved. But first, going back in time to November 15th, 2023, when BlackRock filed its initial S-1 registrations. for a spot Ethereum ETF with the SEC that was a little bit of a surprise

Starting point is 00:30:52 I think everyone in Ethereum is like oh yeah we're totally getting one of these when the Black Rock filed its S1, filed for an Ethereum ETF ETH was $2,000 at the time and post the announcement a couple weeks later it ran all the way up to $2,500

Starting point is 00:31:08 two weeks later if you remember it actually became pretty consensus in the industry that this ETF was going to get disapproved. Everyone thought that the Gensler campaign had it out for ETH, so the market priced in, started to price in a disapproval by the SEC. But again, if guys remember, in a last minute turn of events in May of 2023, we got an approval. We got an unexpected approval announcement, and ETH pumped from $3,000 to $3,800. That would unfortunately be a local high for the year, as ETH would

Starting point is 00:31:43 follow a broader market correction and slump all the way back down to $2,225. Pretty bad, pretty bad way to celebrate going from $3,800 down to $2,250. But nonetheless, the ETH ETFs went live on July 23rd, 2024. It saw $300 million in trading volume within their first month. And to date, the Ethereum ETFs had pulled in $2.5 billion in net aggregate inflows. Black Rock has attracted 3.5 billion in inflows, Fidelity 1.5, and bitwise at 400 million, with gray scale experiencing $3.6 billion of outflows. And I think the second order effects of the Ethereum ETF are worth rehashing. ETH at the time had always had this regulatory uncertainty about its status as an asset. Was ETH a commodity? Was it a security? Nothing that the CFTC or

Starting point is 00:32:35 SEC had ever officially done had given any sort of clarity to the nature of ETH. ether the asset. But with the approval of the EETF, a huge precedent was established that ETH was, in fact, a commodity. But not only that, things like proof of stake, fee burn mechanisms, and decentralized protocol coordination were all given this regulatory shield as things like EIP-1559, Ethereum's all-core dev calls were all things that apparently did not turn ether into a security. This is important for Ethereum, of course, but it also signals green flashing lights and down the market cap stack that other networks also have the same potential to become a commodity and get an ETF even while having things like core developers and a roadmap. So I think that was probably just not just

Starting point is 00:33:23 for Ethereum, but the significance for the crypto industry as a whole is that you can be, have centralized-ish elements of your system. Coordination is something about centralization, but you can still get an ETF. So it's starting to move the Overton window of what a crypto asset is away from a security and towards a commodity. Bitcoin really didn't set that precedent. Bitcoin is Bitcoin, but Ethereum is a lot more like other assets in the overall crypto market.

Starting point is 00:33:52 I'd also say today there's still debate as to whether this was the Biden administration frantically trying to score political points with the crypto industry or whether it was always the plan to approve the Ethereum. and they just wanted to hide it until the final yard line. To remember this context, this was when Donald Trump started heavily flirting with the crypto industry and started to receive an outpouring of donations and support from crypto. And the narrative at the time was that when there was this surprise pivot by the Biden administration or at least the Gensler administration to approve the Ethereum ETFs,

Starting point is 00:34:25 which again, everyone in crypto thought that it was going to get denied. The narrative was that this was crypto and Donald Trump forcing the hand of the, the Democrats to turn more crypto-favorable. Personally speaking, as time has gone on, I've actually turned more favorable to the argument that it was always the plan to approve the Ethereum ETFs and the political game of chess that was being perceived by the crypto industry was actually more of a narrative illusion. It's just coincidence of timing. Judge by the fact that the Democrats never really followed through on any further pro-crypto stances, the eth-et-f approval was the last thing that they really did for us. We got the Bitcoin ETF. We got the Ether ETF.

Starting point is 00:35:04 And that was it. And the argument that the courts ultimately forced their hand like they did in the Bitcoin ETF and the Gensler just didn't want to fight that same fight again. I actually think it's pretty strong. But that's neither here there. I think that's just commentary and reflection as we wrap up this year. So that is the fifth biggest thing that happened in 2025. The fourth biggest thing, of course, is this spot Bitcoin ETFs being approved.

Starting point is 00:35:29 But it once again, going back in time to June 6th, 20203, when Black, Rock files the paperwork for their iShare's spot Bitcoin ETF. This was, if y'all were here, I'm sure you were, the bottom, the depths of the bear market in 2023. Bitcoin was $26,000 at the time. And with the filing of the iShare's paperwork, saw an immediate price drum to $30,000 following the news. This is when the ETF meta really stepped in because this planted a huge flag at the very depth of the ball of the bear market, that there is light at the end of the tunnel. This was insanely optimistic. It was when the times were darkest, this was the fire that kept the industry going, just ETS, the Black Rock filed, the ETF. They're like 351 approvals to one disapproval. The

Starting point is 00:36:21 odds are in our favor. We're going to get an ETF. And so in January 10th of 2024, just a little over six months later, they spot ETFs for Bitcoin were approved. And And I thought this was pretty funny, coming from the word, the mouth of Gary Gensler, who had to write this statement on the SEC website, justifying why he had to approve it. He said, we are now faced with a new set of filing similar to those we have disapproved in the past. Circumstances, however, have changed. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia held that the commission failed to adequately explain its reasoning in disapproving the listing and trading of Grayscale's proposed ETP, the Grayscale order. The court therefore vacated the gray scale order and remanded the matter to the commission. Based on these circumstances and those discussed more fully in the approval order,

Starting point is 00:37:11 I feel the most sustainable path forward is to approve the listing and trading of the spot Bitcoin ETF shares. Though we are merit neutral, I'll note that the underlying asset in the metals ETP like gold has consumer and industrial uses. While in contrast, Bitcoin is primarily speculative, a volatile asset. And that's also used for illicit activity, including ransomware, money laundering, sanction invasion, and terrorist financing. Wow, we approve the listing and trading of certain Bitcoin ETF shares today. We do not approve or endorse Bitcoin. Investors should remain cautious about the myriad risks associated with Bitcoin and whose

Starting point is 00:37:51 products and whose value is tied to crypto. Thank you for the commentary, Mr. Gary Gensler. the price of Bitcoin at the time of the approval was $46,600. Post-approval, it fell to $39,000 on January 22nd, which caused everyone to have a bunch of angst because we thought we were going to the moon. But when the ETFs actually went live and started trading on February 15th, just in time for some post-valentine's Day romance, Bitcoin would later run straight to $73,000,

Starting point is 00:38:24 breaking all-time highs on March 13th as volumes started poor. into the ETFs, unexpectedly high volumes, massive volumes, into the ETFs. They attracted, the Bitcoin ETFs attracted $15 billion in net new inflows during the first quarter after approval. Spot Bitcoin ETFs have recorded over $500 million in daily trading volume in their first month. And to date, the Bitcoin ETFs have absorbed $35 billion of Bitcoin with BlackRock eye shares holding $37 billion.

Starting point is 00:38:55 And of course, Grayscale Trust now comprehended. inverted to an ETF, lost $31 billion of AEOM, which bled into the other ETFs. So, that's number four. Fourth biggest thing that happened in 2024. Coming in at number three, we got Donald, the crypto president, Trump's reelection and formal alliance with the crypto industry. I think it's kind of hard to state the magnitude of this, especially when we zoom out and remember that Bitcoin is a 15-year-old project, and we have an incoming president

Starting point is 00:39:24 actively branding himself as the crypto president. The Biden administration represent probably one of the hardest possible regulatory swings against crypto, which I think many forget actually started with the OG Trump administration, with Treasury Secretary Mnuchin's attack on self-hosted wallets. But once the Biden administration stepped in, he really turned up the regulatory oppression to 11, giving Donald Trump the opportunity to correct course and become the pro-crypto president with the help of some very key players in the crypto industry to make this happen, including David Bailey from Bitcoin Media, probably Ryan Salkis too somehow,

Starting point is 00:39:56 Here is Donald Trump at the Bitcoin conference in July, which I think is worth replaying. So let's go hear from him right now. Hello, Bitcoiners. Thank you very much. Hello. It's good to be with you. It's good to be with you. If crypto is going to define the future, I want to be mined and made in the USA.

Starting point is 00:40:19 It's going to be. It's not going to be made anywhere else. And if Bitcoin is going to the moon, as we say, it's going to the moon. I want America to be the nation that leads the way, and that's what's going to happen. No, you're going to be very happy with me. Bitcoin is not threatening the dollar. The behavior of the current U.S. government is really threatening the dollar. So on day one, I will fire Gary Gensler and appoint a new SEC chairman.

Starting point is 00:40:50 No, is that unpopular? Oh, that was great. Okay, so he made some pretty bold promises, pretty big promises. Four ones that I'll emphasize here. Of course, a pro-Bitcoin agenda, Donald Trump pledged to make the United States the crypto capital of the planet and a Bitcoin superpower, emphasizing the importance of embracing crypto innovation to maintain global technology leadership. Regulatory changes, of course, as you just heard, he promised to dismiss SEC Chairman Gary Gensler. A strategic Bitcoin Reserve, he proposed on creating a national Bitcoin Reserve, usually like, utilizing seized cryptocurrencies as a strategic asset akin to the federal petroleum reserve

Starting point is 00:41:41 and an advisory council. He plans to establish a Bitcoin crypto presidential advisory council to develop clear and favorable regulatory guidelines within 100 days of office. I mean, he's not even in office yet, but some of these things are seemingly being manifested as we speak, especially that advisory council with the appointments, the absolute demolishing of chokepoint 2.0 members and being replaced by some of the most pro-crypto-pro-marketes people possible. You've got to give him kind of an early preemptive green check on the advisory council. Regulatory changes, well, Gary Gensler, he said he's leaving. And so in the face of Donald Trump coming in, Gary Gensler just said, I'm out. So he doesn't even have to dismiss Gary Gensler

Starting point is 00:42:26 anymore. So also a green check on that one. Pro-Bitcoin agenda and a strategic Bitcoin reserve, we're going to actually wait for him to get into office to facilitate those things. But the trend is pretty strong. So this is why people are saying that we are getting an incoming golden years for crypto because we have never had a pro-crypto, pro-cropto regulatory administration. This is a first for all of us. Crypto has either been experiencing indifference, even when we need some amount of just like attention from regulators just to get clarity on things. We had indifference at best, and then over, of course, the last four years, and even some of the years before that from the Biden administration,

Starting point is 00:43:07 like absolute regulatory oppression. And it seems like the pendulum is going to swing violently from regulatory oppression to regulatory favorability as a result of the Fair Shake Super PAC, the donations to Donald Trump, Donald Trump realizing that these are the people that he wants to align with, avid supporters with a bunch of capital, he's a Donald Trump's favorite things.

Starting point is 00:43:29 And so as a result, when a Bitcoin, of course, crossed $100,000, Donald Trump tweeted out on real truth social. Congratulations, Bitcoiners, $100,000. You're welcome. Together, we will make America great again. So that was the third largest thing that I think happened in the crypto world. The second, coming in at number two, not a thing, but a movement. Meme coins, like them or hate them, meme coins defined the year. A coin gecko report measured that meme coin domino.

Starting point is 00:43:59 dominated 31% of crypto investors' attention in 2024, a 4x growth compared to 2023, where they already had a very strong foothold. The rise of meme coins initially driven by the dog-themed coins, of course, because we like the dogs, expanded into every new category imaginable, even attracting the attention of celebrities with both short and long-term focuses on their memes. Of course, this is the year that Pump. Fun became massive, and using that as a proxy for success of these tokens, nearly 5 million new meme coins were deployed on Solana alone this year, with the platform capturing $335 million in fees. Solana meme coins represent about 7.6% mind share of the meme coin,

Starting point is 00:44:41 base meme coins at 2.1% AI meme coins, 1.5%, and a cat-themed meme coins 1.2%. And that is of the overall total investor attention categories. So that means like all of all crypto, all crypto investment attention categories. Slano meme coin has got 7.6% of the total attention of the entire crypto industry. The number one meme coin, Doge, up 250% on the year in comparison to Bitcoin's 127%. The Shib Inu, the number two largest meme coin by market cap, up a 100% on the year. So it's the only meme coin that underperformed Bitcoin.

Starting point is 00:45:17 Pepe, up 1,200%. And then Bonk, the OG Solana meme coin, actually only up 77% on the year. But really, actually, if you go to 14 months rather than 12 months, it's up 7,000 percent. Because about 14 months ago was when the Solana ecosystem really caught fire. And then fifth, the fifth largest meme coin, dog with hat, up a modest 830% on the year. There's a lot more meme coin stuff to talk about. But I think you guys all get the gist. So we'll go ahead and move to number one.

Starting point is 00:45:50 The biggest thing that happened in crypto, the number one thing. Drum roll please. Bitcoin crosses $100,000. On December 5th, 2024, making a historic milestone for the cryptocurrency market. 1.95 trillion dollar market cap in just Bitcoin alone. As a reminder, Bitcoin price is also Bitcoin fundamentals. Unlike traditional assets, where fundamentals are analyzed through cash flows, earning, tangible production metrics, Bitcoin's fundamentals are inherently tied to its network effects. Adoption, these are the things that make Bitcoin valuable as money. And when the price breaks $100,000, that is just a clear, planted flag in the ground that this thing is working and is working as intended. Price number go

Starting point is 00:46:41 up is Bitcoin working. A rising price, of course, strengthens fundamentals. It goes backwards too. More users are drawn into the network, more security from higher mining revenues, greater institutional and individual confidence in Bitcoin. You know, we have these dollars that say in God we trust where, you know, this fiat currency, what does fiat mean? Faith, faith in the Federal Reserve, not inflating away the value of our dollar and appropriately managing that supply. Bitcoin doesn't have that. Bitcoin confidence is literally measured one to one by the price. And when the price is $100,000, that is $100,000 per Bitcoin's worth of investor confidence in the Bitcoin system. Also, Bitcoin price is the best marketing machine for Bitcoin.

Starting point is 00:47:28 It's free marketing. $100,000 plus it everywhere across mainstream media, across the crypto industry, all of you, all the crypto friends who had Normie friends telling them that they're crazy, gets to go and show their $100,000 Bitcoin price. Because, you know, if you're a Bitcoin person, your friends probably know you're a Bitcoin person. And I think probably most importantly of all these things, Bitcoin bubbles have popped four times. And Bitcoin has recovered and blown past previous all-time highs five times. So I think if anyone in the year 2025 says that Bitcoin is a bubble, you have permission to go tell them to stuff it.

Starting point is 00:48:04 They're just wrong. All right. Bankless Nation, thank you guys so much for sticking with a year of weekly roll-ups. We have never missed a weekly roll-up, and we continue to never miss a weekly roll-up. And if we're going to do a very quick single item, bankless yearly roll-up, that single item would be 1,000 episodes. Bankless Cross 1,000 episodes not too long ago. I think this is probably episode 1003, 1004.

Starting point is 00:48:32 Thank you, everyone who has listened to even just some of these episodes, especially this one today, that I have your guys' ears with me right now. some of you have listened to all 1,000 of these episodes, which is insane. And thank you, especially to you. But man, the Bankless Nation really keeps me and Ryan going in the whole entire bankless team. We started the Bankless podcast in January of 2020. So we are entering our fifth year of this podcast. Crossing a thousand episodes is pretty damn cool.

Starting point is 00:49:04 Some of you guys have been with us forever the entire time. And some of you guys came in 2021. and some of you guys came in 2022, and we're all still here. And we're going to make podcasts. We're going to make a thousand more podcasts. Even though that sounds intimidating, I'm sure the time will just fly by. We've had a ton of fun making these podcasts with you guys. So thank you for sticking with us through the very amazing, incredible, bullish year of 2024.

Starting point is 00:49:28 After getting through the terrible year, that was 2023. And I think 2025 is going to be pretty damn cool. So if anyone came in in the class of 2021, bought the top of, 2021 as one does when people come into crypto. I'm I go my heart goes out to you guys because you guys earned it. You guys had some of the most crazy battle scars that the crypto industry has ever seen. And I hope your net worth, crypto net worth is at all time highs and it's not, it will be soon. So with that, as you guys know, crypto is risky. You can lose what you put in, but we were headed west. This is the frontier. It's not for everyone, but we are glad you

Starting point is 00:50:04 go with this.

Bankless - ROLLUP: Top 5 Biggest Crypto Events Of 2024

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