The Wolf Of All Streets - BlackRock ETF Sees $1bn Inflows In A Week | Crypto Town Hall

Episode Date: October 18, 2024

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Morning, everyone. Wait for the music to stop here. Happy Friday. Hope everybody's having a great week. Heading into the weekend here. It's a pretty big week in the crypto space. Obviously, Bitcoin up about 10% on the week. All coins have trailed. I'm actually talking about Dogecoin, which is actually up about 24% on the week, of course, because Elon Musk is back to talk to you about the Department of Government Efficiency, aka the Doge Department in the government. I think there's a lot of reasons we can discuss as to why prices might be up this week. And that's something we'll get into.

Obviously, one of those reasons is the title here BlackRock ETF sees 1 billion inflows in a week. Luckily we have Jeff here from Bitwise to unpack the flows and what you're seeing in the ETFs right now. Obviously Bitwise had a big week as well Jeff right? We did yes yes sir we had one of our strongest weeks since the inception when we had about 100 million of inflows on one day uh which is great so what do you attribute this i mean we see trends of inflows now flows sort of steadily right so it's become less of a newsworthy event. But what do you attribute this sort of last run here, obviously, coinciding with that 10% run on Bitcoin? Yeah, I think there's a few dynamics at play. One is more on the short end of the opportunity,

and maybe one is on the long end. On the short end, I do think there are some smart money active trading going on between the widening of the futures basis spread between the CME futures and Bitcoin. It's nowhere near as high as it was in Q1, but it is rising. And it's, I would say, past that hurdle rate that hedge funds need, which is something I equate to around 7%. And I think once it's above that range, even in the high single digits, there's demand for that structured market neutral, delta neutral trade. And so I do think there is some short-term flows participating in that profit opportunity. But on the longer term horizon, I don't think it's escaping anyone here that there is potentially a relative value opportunity here in which there may be room to make an allocation for from the historical

anomaly that is widening. So I do think there's a little bit of that coil spring effect that people are taking notice of Bitcoin in the last three months of gold price action, relatively speaking. And of course, the dollar is strengthening post-array cut. Mike, you must be getting the edge. He said gold. Well, I appreciate you going there, Scott, because I get a lot wrong, but that's at least one I've been getting right. And I'm really concerned right now.

I think I have to really tilt over to what Stanley Druckenmiller said, and that is the market's ready price for Trump to win right now. Certainly, if you look at what's happening, crude oil is plunging. Gold's breaking record highs. Stock market's making highs. Bond yields have been going up. Not today. They're going down. Crude oil's going down. And Bitcoin's catching up to gold and beta, at least from lately, obviously, in a bigger picture basis, it's been leading. So that, to me, is the risk. When you price for one outcome, the risk is you get the other. Now, I'm proud to have a view, and my view is that we will get a Harris presidency and a Republican sweep of Senate, which will be a great, really bad for gold in the short term, because it would mean maybe a little bit check and balance that we're not getting for the unlimited deficit spending. It may be bad for Bitcoin in the short term. But the bottom line is, I like to say for Bitcoin, I'm very indiscriminate. I view Bitcoin in a very

similar setup as I do copper. I mean, the charts look great. I get that. Copper charts look great. Bitcoin looks great. But when they start underperforming the typical things they used to, they usually outperform. For Bitcoin, we just mentioned typically outperforms gold, typically outperforms beta S&P 500, typically outperforms Nasdaq, particularly on a risk adjusted basis. It's been underperforming for a while now. Particularly, obviously, since that peak in March, which was for a good reason. It was one of the best reason ever for an all time high, at least for now. When it starts underperforming the things that typically outperforms, you have to be concerned. And that's why I am. So I see the same thing about copper. Copper is underperforming the stock market. It's going down more with China. And it's also if you overlay Bitcoin versus the, you know, the Hang Seng index, just kind of measure it on a 100 week basis. It's at levels that are showing the risk is to the downside. So we've got to get through this election. That's the bottom line right now.

The market's priced for Trump to win. The risk is he doesn't. It's that simple, I think, right now. And at some point, big picture, I completely agree with the long-term things that Dave always says about Bitcoin, completely agree that in the long term. But in the meantime, I have to point out it's just this pattern recognition thing that's happening, this thing that is quite disconcerting. And bottom line is we're priced for Trump to win. And the risk is he doesn't. Mike, we discussed this yesterday at Market Mavericks, obviously, if the market is priced for Trump to win, generally in a situation like that, don't you actually see a sell the news event when the market is moving on an expectation?

Both. So there's both there's there's exactly there's both particularly when you have a don't you actually see a sell the news event when the market is moving on an expectation? Both. So there's both. Exactly. There's both, particularly when you have a lot of leveraged money making a lot of money, which has been really what's been driving commodities this year. Leveraged futures, SPACs, hedge funds have been really driving things. You can see when they get too long, markets go down. When they get too short, markets go up. So that's a key factor for both sides of it. I think the bottom line that we have to remember with the Trump presidency, it's virtually guaranteed we'll get more volatility. And volatility is at historic lows from the stock market standpoint, because we know he's a very volatile person. The market gets it. That to me is why I stick with gold as the net winner, whoever wins. But in the meantime, if Harris

wins, that's a pretty decent pressure factor for gold in the short term but yeah you're right buy the rumor sell the fact and right now the market is very much a leveraged market cryptos are the best trading vehicles on the planet you get a few profits you book them and um that's where we're going into i think a very volatile period and just a lot of uncertainty we have no we don't know for sure we will have a definitive transfer of power we don't know for sure we'll have a definitive new president um after the day after um after november 5th but this is a tremendous trading environment i think that's what you're seeing in cryptos is bots and the algorithms are taking advantage joe i saw you with all kinds of a slew of emojis there. So I know you've got some feelings here.

Yeah, I mean, look, so I think there's way too much focus on the presidential race. OK, what the market actually cares about is gridlock government. They want to make sure that there's a divided House and Senate and from the presidency. However, that shakes down. That is more important from an impact standpoint because I think it's going to keep the tax regime relatively stable, going to keep spending relatively stable. I think that far bigger than these issues, there's concern about whether you get a reacceleration of inflation. That's probably a discussion we should have

moving on with how strong the economy is. I mean, you're printing what is Atlanta Fed real GDP. Now we're sitting at 3.4 percent real, meaning we have around 6 percent nominal. I mean, that's a strong economy. So I think that's just sort of misguided. I do think there are trades put on that are keeping a lid on the market in the short term. I said this publicly until after the election. I think you're going to get a massive run after the election. And with all due respect about the volatility, if you look at Trump's presidency, you know, 2016, 17, 18, 19, we had a volatility regime that was lower than it was currently. You know, even particularly in 2017, you know, Trump was president, right? He had some of the lowest readings on the VIX in history. So the notion that Trump's volatility as a political actor

somehow transcends to markets, I think is just misguided and wrong. I mean, if you look at the actual data, I think the average VIX score for the years of his presidency was somewhere in the 15 range. We're sitting at 18. So I don't really understand or follow that logic. So let me follow up on that. And first of all, I bow in your general direction, Joe, you've been spot on in the stock market. I always respect people who are right. I completely respect people who do it. The bottom line is when the Trump was elected presidency president in 2016, the VIX was a bit high. It was elevated. Now we have it in some cases, eight year lows. If you subtract out the T-bill, to me, it's a key factor.

It's the lowest since 2007. I used that because it was one of my best indicators. It made me a lot of money in 2008. The point is now volatility is very low, and there's little room for it to go lower. Now it can stay lower, but typically the number one rule in volatility is it's always being reverted. Just look for a trigger. But, Mike, hang on a second. So I'm just looking at this because i always want to

make sure the numbers are correct i'm looking at july of 17 actually you can go back for may of 17 you're sitting at 10 for about a year you go down to nine i mean there's an 8.9 reading for a week here that we're sitting at we're sitting at 18 uh so so the notion that that's like you know significant decline in volatility from these levels. I look at 52 week moving averages, 50, 100, 200 week moving averages. And volatility when Trump was elected was running, the average was running 20 percent or so. And now it just recently bottomed around 14. It's just it's the it's the path of what's the path of the trend and it's heading upward.

And what a path the interest rates are heading downward. What's the path of the global economy is heading towards recession, certainly in China. So I'm just pointing out bodies in motion. And where I don't know. I mean, I know I'd be interested in that, that idea that the path of interest rates here is headed lower. Since the Fed cut, the 10-year is up roughly 40 bps. We can talk about what signal that's sending, which is a fascinating conversation. But the notion that interest rates are going to crash now and fall lower when you have an economy running this hot, I don't think makes a lot of economic sense. But I know there are folks that may disagree with that. Well, let's put it that way. I'm glad you went there. It's a good point.

The Fed made a mistake, according to the bond market. When bond yields jump this much and the Fed eases more than what was generally expected, the bond market's telling you you made a mistake. You should not ease it anymore. And also, right now, I think the bond market is basically a put on the stock market. The stock market keeps going up and keeps increasing as a percentage of GDP, which is two times right now, the most in 100 years. Yeah, that's a pretty inflationary force. The bottom line is look at the rest of the world.

The top five major economies in the world, their average bond yields are about 100 basic points below the U.S. Let's start with China, 2.12 percent. Before the great financial crisis, it was the opposite. So that's the fact for the what's happening on a global basis, you made point about the world and you asked, but what's Trump going to do if he gets elected tariffs? What does that mean for the rest of the world? Remember, smooth calling tariffs act in the early 1930s. It's just the fact of it. And that's also how markets look when you look at the river, you

mirror shirt economy is great. Get it. Why did the Fed start easy? Because unemployment started to pick up that unemployment ticks low, ticks down, downward we're not going to get more easing if inflation stays high so we're not going to get more easing what's the key fuel for cryptos typically is that liquidity and that fuel from lower interest rates so you're a good point i agree with that the point is you have to be looking forward what's going to be the next big trade and that's why i'm still bullish gold but um on a risk adjusted basis i'm still concerned that bitcoin's just not doing it and that's why you know maybe here's the key thing

i'll end with as long as stock market keeps going up we're fine bitcoin's fine it'll keep doing fine copper will be okay um but that's the bottom line beta is just so stretched here you gotta be careful james uh so you're jumping in uh yeah i was gonna say i agree with joe on some points and mike on that well i think the important thing with the u.s economy is to understand that a lot of what we're experiencing right now in terms of slightly better payroll numbers has led people into this false sense of security that everything's great in the u.s economy um and i don't think it is um if you look at the loan delinquencies in autos, they're the highest since 2010 and rising.

And they tend to have around a two-year sort of lag to rate rises. If you look at corporate loans, they've not even started rising and they will likely start soon. I think there's lots of quite forward-looking signals. I mean, even today we have building permits in quite a big miss, which suggests there's something wrong with the US housing market. So I think the Fed was right to cut 50 basis points. But the market, yeah, is a little bit skeptical now that they'll do another 75 or another 50 by the year end. But we're just in this limbo period. I think we we have pivoted now the fed

has pivoted and that will likely be quite supportive for for something like bitcoin and but i don't necessarily think that um the markets are priced in fully a trump win if you look at real clear politics or 538 various polling websites, it still shows Harris, for the most part, quite far ahead, except the active vote shows Trump ahead and the polling market shows Trump quite far ahead as well. So I think the markets are only just now starting to price it in. This week we've seen, what, $1.8 billion worth of inflows. So markets are just starting to work up to this idea

that trump genuinely has a chance of winning now so i bet i think there's a lot more to go and i don't necessarily think it would be a case of uh sell on the news either um and a trump win i think we'd also have the combination for continued loose monetary policy and that could easily get us to this this,000 mark that people are wishing for by the end of the year. Dave? Well, the single biggest data point that tells you the market's not pricing a Trump win is Bitcoin dominance.

Yes, Trump will be more bullish for Bitcoin than Harris marginally because you won't have the supply overhang. You'll have the Bitcoin strategic reserve. You'd have a much better shot of the Loomis bill being passed. None of that is even remotely priced in or even thought about. And we can delve into that and probably will on Monday. But the thing that's really interesting, as you were talking about with NLW this morning, about the Trump coin, the Liberty Financial. World Liberty Financial, is how they jumped through hoops to deal with accredited investor laws, how it meant there was no immediate liquidity,

and all of the things that now have taught Trump and his family that they are going to want to change when they get responsibility for the White House and the SEC. Now, what does that mean well that means a world where the united states can actually enter the real crypto industry that is not even even a whiff of that is priced in and understand what that would mean it would mean less shit less real shit coins but a far easier path to the market for both the projects that already currently exist, eliminating the overhang of risk, as well as new real projects that can allow economic participation. That isn't even, no one's even thinking about that.

And yeah, maybe it's a second order effect, but it's a big deal. And there are a lot of smart people out there. If and when a Trump win becomes anything close to being priced in the markets, you're going to see the better altcoin projects do very, very well. As far as this notion that markets want a divided government, I mean, it depends which market you're talking about. If you're talking about Bitcoin, where you would put Bitcoin really its investment case is you're talking about acceptance and ability to use it at the same time as more depreciating

or devaluing dollar. I think that that's a little bit different than a lot of the stock market or like Nvidia stock, for example, which depends upon continued spending and continued earnings. And so you really do want to make that distinction. I think for the most part, Joe and I are on the same page. I agree with most of his points before. As far as volatility goes, I mean, Mike's smoking crack. I mean, you know, we literally we were below 10 volatility during the during the Trump years. I mean, people forget that when Trump was first elected the first election, everyone said,

Oh my god, the market's gonna get killed. Because look how crazy he is. And that didn't happen. And so it really is interesting. Market was also supposed to completely die when Biden was elected, right. So I think we have a long history of hyperbole as to what's going to happen the second that another person is elected to the market. Exactly right, which is exactly right. Just let me finish, Mike, because I'm driving through South Carolina and highly likely to lose internet again. The last point is, that is right. We have, for the most part, before what might happen in this election, and I say might, if in fact Trump really does put Elon in the Department of Government Efficiency, really does let Vivek advise him on really changing the bureaucracy

and really unleashing lower regulation. Absent that, both parties are going to spend and print more, and they're both going to encourage loose monetary policy. And that is always going to prioritize assets over the consumer, and that is a big deal. Okay, Mike, go for it. Oh, no. So, Dave, I do love how you attack people sometimes about smoking crack and things. My kids, I don't think, even did that.

It just makes for good listening. You know I love jokes. We love the banter, and we're so overdue to fulfill that bet when Scott visits in Miami. But just one key fact I want to – a lot of my views are based on what I hear from professional smart people. Like Druckenmiller, who's made the point that the stock market's already starting to price into Trump wins. So it wasn't my view, it's what Druck said. So key thing is- Druck short bonds, by the way. Druck is short bonds, Mike. So maybe just point out one key fact about, I just read the book, At War With Ourselves by General McMaster, former Trump national security advisor. And he made the point,

which I thought was very clear. First, that Trump is inherently contrarian, which I would think made him a good commodity trader, which I have held stuck in my blood. But he also made the point that if we get a next Trump administration, you expect nothing but yes men. Virtually anybody who disagreed with him was gone and out. And certainly some of his family members. So if the Trump 2.0 comes, expect pretty severe global volatility, particularly him to do the things he says, at least to try to. And we were going to get, at least we have a good chance we're going to get a Republican Senate.

So that would be a red sweep. Sure, that's good for the stock market short term, as Druck said. But based on what McMaster said and what some of these experts would say, you expect a complete yes-man type of administration, maybe particularly similar to what we see with presidency in China. Now, that's not my view, but that's the view from General McMaster that he's only going to get yes-men to join him now, and there's only people to stick around him now. Joe.

Okay, so let's talk about this whole pricing in thing. First of all, I don't change my view. I think that the divided government is far bigger of a deal for the markets. But let's talk about the probability and pricing in thing, right? First of all, I don't change my view. I think that the divided government is far bigger of a deal for the markets. But let's talk about like the probability and pricing in Trump. If I told you I was going to flip a coin 10 times and four times, it's going to land on heads, right? Do you feel really good about your odds? No, of course not. And even the most bullish sites for Trump right now, the predictive like polymarket, it shows four out of 10 times Kamal is going to win this race. That's how probability works. That's the current breakdown of the numbers, even on the bullish sites. Some of the more betting sites showed basically a coin flip,

you know, 45, 55. That's not overwhelmingly in favor of Trump. And I know, you know, people in this space are, you know, very bullish Trump. I hear that all the time. But I just want to make sure, you know, like it's not like you're going into an election where the numbers show it's going to be a landslide in some person's favor. It's coming down to a handful of counties. OK. Dave, go ahead, as we can hear your background. Oh, sorry, I hit the wrong button. But yeah, no, I am totally on Joe's page here I keep telling people that the bot the betting odds are more or less when you shove all your money into the middle of the pot with ace-king and Honestly, I hate doing that until I have to

Because it is I mean the odds of a Trump election are ace-king against a middle-pocket pair. It's not pocket aces against a middle-pocket pair, which, for those who care, is about a 6-to-1 odds. And as a result, I don't think people are making huge bets in the market. I mean, you want to know the most obvious Trump bet? The most obvious Trump bet is going to be domestic manufacturing stocks versus global importers, right? You know, if that were priced in, then you would already see that rotation massively. And from what my friends are telling me, that rotation, even if it's a little bit of it, but not nearly as much as would indicate anything remotely close to priced in.

But, you know, look, Druckenmiller, basically what he's saying is that people are hedging and there's at least a possibility. And so you don't have big bets. And for the audience, just what I mean by a big bet, I mean dramatically underweight things that might be hurt by tariffs and dramatically overweight things that might benefit from tariffs within the S&P 500. That's really the market mechanics that you want to look for for that. And what he's probably saying is some of that is starting to happen. Well, the most, just one thing on Druck again, because people keep bringing it up. If you actually listen to it, he thinks the 10-year goes back to 5%.

Now, if you study the stock market, both times, October 2022 and 2023, right, when the stocks were starting to struggle was when that 10-year was bearing down on that 5% yield. So if that's true and, you know, Drucker's short bonds here and they're going higher and the Fed did cut too early and you're going to get a reacceleration of inflation, if you see that dynamic, right, that's not bullish risk assets, regardless of who's in the presidency. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. I think when talking about the presidency here, I want to pivot slightly.

There's the notion that Bitcoin will be fine regardless, right? But that big question marks obviously surround the crypto industry as a whole, and then more specifically in the United States. Robbie, since we have you here, obviously, at Animoca, it doesn't seem like you guys are too concerned with the presidency, being that this is a worldwide asset class and you're investing, obviously, across the board in all of the different facets of the industry. I mean, do you guys even consider the election at this point

when you're making your decisions? I guess yes and no. I mean, you can't avoid it, obviously, election at this point when you're making your decisions? I guess yes and no. I mean, you can't avoid it, obviously, especially, I was in the States over the summer. And as all of you know, who are there, I mean, you can't turn on the TV without pretty much just seeing the election coverage. And that was in July. But no, I think also, we've always taken a much longer term view, because we're not really, you know, trading in the markets. You know, we're not,

trading is not our core business. So we're always thinking sort of at least a two or three year time horizon. I think if anything, we've actually spent a lot more time over this past year thinking about whether meme coins are a thing as opposed to concerning ourselves with the outcome of the U S election. And I think one thing that we've noticed recently, which is kind of an interesting trend, is thinking about the relationship of meme coins and NFTs from a cultural perspective,

because now we're starting to see NFT collections being launched on the back of existing meme coin communities, as opposed to NFT communities launching meme coins. So I think that's actually a positive kind of evolution of the space. So how are you now framing meme coins? Do you think that flash in the pan, investable, something that's here to stay, you know, is it going to be sort of cyclical where some of them go and, you know, 99% of them are just kind of, you know, pump and dump so i think

yeah i think you have to separate it between uh let's call it blue chip institutional meme coins you know like doge and shib and and the sort of granddaddies um compared to what i would call the pump.fun ecosystem and the pump.fun ecosystem i UGC, right? It's user-generated content. And some of that is going to deliver returns for people, and most of it is not going to. But I think it's here to stay. I think it's an activity that people enjoy for entertainment, first and foremost. And then, you know, some people make some money at it as well, because, you know, it's speculative entertainment, the way people speculate on, you know, some people make some money at it as well because, you know, it's speculative entertainment the way people speculate on, you know, buying trading cards of baseball teams and other things that they like. So I think for those reasons, it is definitely a part of the culture and it's part of what's grown out of Web3 culture.

So I think it's here to stay. think that things like eventually, you kind of, in my opinion, move up the food chain a little bit. And that's where I see the role of NF T's because things start to become more meaningful and long term and purposeful and more expressions of personal identity, maybe instead of just group identity. You know, you may be a you may have a board ape, but each ape is unique, if you know what I mean. So I think all of these are positive for the space, because if you think about it, it's a way to onboard users through different types of entertainment or investment products. And I gave a presentation at a conference last week, and I think it may be the first time that a slide contained Fidelity, BlackRock, VanEck, and, you know,

DogWiffHat and Hamster Combat on the same slide. But I think all of these are, you know, great products that we've seen over the last six or nine months that are essentially bringing on new kinds of constituencies into Web3. And once they're here, they find lots of other cool stuff. I think that's the best part. So you think we're actually seeing new people here to some degree and not just sort of the people who have been here already rotating and finding new things to play with?

Yes, I think that the, like there's a group of whales that rotate back and forth and they farm things, they do all kinds of things. And that's the core, you know, sort of Web3D gen, if you want to give it a name. But I do think that you always have new people at the margins because new people are attracted to the memes. New people are attracted to the telegram games. New people are attracted to, I mean, right now right now look we have um you know triple a console gaming for the first time off the grid nfts so exactly um so i think all of these things are you know they may not be bringing in 50 million users at a time but they're definitely growing

the space that's interesting because i think one of the sort of general sentiments has been there's no new people right we haven't reached the time of the cycle, what's going to bring any new retail in? And you're saying it's happening, it's just kind of bubbling under the surface. Yeah, yeah, it's just not, you know, it's not earth shattering in the same way that people plowed into Axie Infinity three years ago. It's, you know, we're adding users in the same way that people plowed into Axie Infinity three years ago. We're adding users in the million, like single-digit millions at a time rather than tens and hundreds. That makes sense. I mean, it keeps coming up, and you brought it up again, too, but I think it's worth having at least a brief discussion with gaming.

I think it was one of those things that we were too early in the last cycles and got very excited about and sort of saw the early iterations, like you mentioned, in Axie Infinity. it was one of those things that we were too early in the last cycles and got very excited about and sort of saw the early iterations like you mentioned in Axie Infinity but now you know you have a real AAA game that's you know one of the most streamed and downloaded in the world that's actually blockchain based with off the grid from from Godzilla mean, do you think that one game or two games or five games finally coming like that could be the catalyst that brings a ton of new people into the space? And those people may not even know that they're in block in the blockchain space. But I think the most important thing it does is it's about the narrative that kind of

helps people get over their prejudices because realistically most people are going to be coming to the space through mobile and through casual entertainment content but something like off the grid acts as a halo product that gives credibility in the core gaming community and that was you know culturally speaking the biggest anti-nft crowd um and those are the people that are often the hardest to win over and in that constituency often are the gaming journalists as well um so i think that's that's why this is such a great um sentiment mover but it's not going to necessarily be this specific game that brings them all in so it's going to be the little games on Telegram and such that kind of do it,

that the Farm Bills and Candy Crushes. 100%. And it always has been. I mean, everybody played Tetris and Super Mario, etc. Right? They didn't necessarily play Warcraft. Yeah, that actually makes a ton of sense. I mean, anybody else on the panel have any particular feelings on this topic, sort of what's going to be the next catalyst for mainstream adoption and gaming? If not, it's okay, because I know who we have on the panel today. Ambitious Dirt here representing exactly that. Is that your birth name?

Yes, that is my birth name. No, that is Hey birth name. No, that is. Hey, Robbie. And hey, everyone. I know we're gonna hopefully be able to get some time to speak later. But But yeah, just chiming in on what Robbie said, like, that's exactly what we are doing. Partnered with Aptos with Mo and Avery is bringing that sort of web to audience to Web 3 through gaming with that credibility. We all came out of Ubisoft and DreamWorks. So it's sort of using that credibility to onboard without knowingly onboard Web 2 users into a Web 3 world while, you know, using microtransactions and NFTs as battle passes on the Aptos blockchain. So that's exactly sort of what we are trying to do. So I wanted to just chime in and say yes to what Robbie was saying. And that is where we see the community moving.

And it's a big bet for us and also a big bet for for our partners in uh at aptos jeff hey um agree with all this big fan of everything animaka is doing a big fan of you robbie um i just want to make maybe one other plug of what I think could be really interesting for crypto adoption mainstream, which is prediction markets. I had the chance to meet with Shane this week, and there were some statistics he shared that I thought was fairly mind blowing. One, which was that actually most of the value tied up for betting on poly markets, we would think is elections related. But it turns out more than half is actually not. Something like 60% is actually not elections related. And people are making bets on all kinds of things from what year Taylor Swift is going to get married to

elements of sports betting. And, you know, I think about crypto as a movement. And at the core, one ethos I strongly share is that it is a little bit at the fringe of breaking things that is driven by grassroots retail interests and retail movement. And I think about the unlock that comes from prediction markets, which is essentially giving somebody a chance to speculate on an event that another person might need an insurance for. And that kind of two-sided market that crypto is creating, to me, prediction markets just feel so naturally representative of all those shared interests.

And so I just want to make a plug for that. Also, in addition to mobile gaming, where I think we should hopefully see some more mainstream adoption. I mean, the fact that Bloomberg now has a live ticker that you can pull up on polymarket odds that you can then track to Bitcoin price on a tick by tick basis shows you that financialization of that entertainment value is meaningful. And this is going to come to all parts of the ways we consume information. People are going

to know what events happen based on polymarket odds moving quicker than the new york times is going to be able to send out a tweet on what they think happened at some part of the world and and that kind of data uh is really at the core of crypto movement in my opinion so i just want to make a plug for that as a as a thing of interest predictive markets are not isolated to crypto right there are predictive markets that have existed long before crypto and will continue to exist outside of crypto. So that's not unique to crypto. Yeah. The reason I think it might be different with crypto is because of, I think, the way that

regulation on prediction markets in general is outside the confines of the system. And some things that I think crypto does a really good job is they push the boundaries on these things in a way where they eventually kind of have to catch up. I think of the Tether story as a crypto story. And I look at predictions market as one of the things that could have a breakout moment because it's crypto. And so I agree with you, it's been around. People would say, actually, it's been around for hundreds of years. But the zero to one moment that we could anticipate for this to be a real institutional market, I think it's going to be crypto. It's going to be built in the backbones

of crypto. Yeah, but you can't skirt the regulatory framework. I mean, there are people trading on Polymarket we know, and they say this openly on CryptoTrader, they're just using a VPN, right? And if Polymarket folks are aware of this, and they're trading on Polymarket we know, and they say this openly on CryptoTrader, they're just using a VPN, right? And if Polymarket folks are aware of this and they're not taking steps to mitigate this, that subjects them to liability and the truth is in the United States. Yeah, I agree. Which also depends on who wins the election, maybe. But yes. Again, I'm coming from the core ethos of what crypto really is about.

I'm thinking about Tether. I'm thinking about Telegram. I'm thinking about Tron as a network that has used more parts of the world than Americans are using it. So that is the perspective I'm coming from. I hear you. But I think this is one of those things where we could have a different outcome because it is really against that regulatory establishment and the ways these products come to life. People want to speculate, right? People want to speculate. And I think at some point, it's going to be very challenging to suppress that interest. I love John's emojis. I think saying that people want to speculate is completely true people want to

get rich quick and that's how all of these products prey on people and it's just kind of sad to hear that i think you're right about the regulatory joe's absolutely right about the regulatory side of things it's really remarkable scott and I wonder how you feel about this because I'm reading about how now Mark Cuban is out there stumping for Kamala Harris. And here's a guy out there stumping who was a major part of the Voyager scandal. And the Voyager's not just a scandal. The Voyager was, in my opinion, a criminal enterprise. They said that their monies, that your money when you invested in it, was FDIC insured and safe, and it wasn't. They committed a very, very basic fraud.

And Mark Cuban, and remember, I would probably vote for Mark Cuban for president, sort of along the same lines of why Muhammad Ali used Don King to promote his fights. He knew Don King was a crook, but he also knew this stuff needed to get done and you needed someone like Don King to promote his fights. You know, he knew Don King was a crook, but he also knew this stuff needed to get done and you needed someone like Don King to do it. So maybe I would still vote for Mark Cuban and maybe I would think it would be great if he were head of the SEC. I mean, what's going on at the Securities and Exchange Commission, remember, I worked there for 20 years in the Enforcement Division, is very different than ever before. You know, first off, you have employees who are only coming in one day a week. So it's a very, I don't know how much work is going on, but a lot of work is going on in the crypto space and they're winning like crazy in every judicial decision.

So if Kamala Harris is elected and somehow Mark Cuban becomes SEC chair or someone similar to him. Those two Democratic, remember, there were five commissioners. There's one that's elected, appointed the chair. And then there's the two Republicans, Mark Ueda and Hester Peirce, who are very extreme in their libertarian views. And Hester, especially, and I respect Hester a lot. I've known her for a long time. And she's brilliant.

And her heart's completely in the right place. She's just a real libertarian. They are very extreme, but as are the Democrats. And so you have these two Democratic commissioners who aren't going away. And maybe when their term ends, they get thrown out a year after their term ends or so. But they're still going to be there. So you have this odd thing going on where more money is being spent than ever before from crypto promoting companies on the election cycle. I think it's like now up to at least 120 million. So you have 120 million being spent,

which is more than half of the money being spent on the election period. And yet there's a Fed study out that says only 7% or so own crypto. So you have a very small percentage of people. Now, maybe that number is wrong, but that's what the Fed says. But you have a very small percentage of people who actually care about crypto, but you have a very large percentage of election spending going that way. And then you have this odd bizarro movement from people like Mark Cuban and our friend Anthony Scaramucciucci to your literal best friends that I've known for 50 years. You know, we've been buddies since seventh or sixth, fifth grade, you know,

and, and I love them. I vote for Anthony. I'd love for Anthony to be president or to be head of the sec, even though we disagree on a lot of things. So I don't, Scott, I mean, how do you feel when you see Mark Cuban up there stumping for Kamala Harris? You see all this money being spent on crypto, and the reality is it will have a dramatic impact on everything that everyone in this space cares about. Because if President Trump is reelected, then most crypto enforcement efforts will come to a screeching halt, except for fraud cases. The rulemaking will come to a halt, and they'll stop bringing all these

cases. I don't know what's going to happen with most of these companies are being sued right now. I mean, it's hard to find a company that's not being sued by the SEC or that hasn't lost some motion to the SEC. So if Kamala Harris is elected, are things going to be dramatically on the other side? I mean, she's singing a tune that might sound nice that, hey, I want to protect innovation and I want to do what's right for technology. But those are, I think, I don't know that those words are really telling. And I've worked closely with the House Financial Services Committee and some of the other committees in Congress, and they are definitely split. So how Congress goes is also really going to do everything for this movement in the U.S.,

everything that Joe was just talking about, I think, will matter most as to who wins the election. And that's a first. I worked for seven different chairs, SEC chairs, and I never cared what party they were in. Even I was 11 years chief of the Office of Internet Enforcement, bringing lots of cases of all kinds, and sometimes called being anti-technology, which was ridiculous because I was a real, I celebrated the technology of the internet, you know, and breached it and was an evangelist for it during my tenure. And most people at the SEC were. So I, but I didn't care who was chair. They always wanted us to do what was consistent with the securities laws, which was pretty consistent for all of them.

But I don't know if you, Scott, you're in touch with these people. How do you feel when you wake up and you see Mark Cuban talking about Kamala Harris? Does it tick you off on both angles? I don't think it ticks. So I'm unaffiliated, literally registered unaffiliated, not even independent, but unaffiliated. So I kind of like you. I'm indifferent generally until it there's a candidate that I'm either passionate about in either direction, passionate about voting for or against. But when it comes to Cuban, I have actually sort of mixed feelings about it because one side of me is exceptionally skeptical as to what a Harris administration would look like for crypto. Obviously, you know, there's a this sort of

narrative that the Harris administration, potential administration is thawing. But when you hear and Nathaniel Whittemore actually this morning articulated this well when I was talking to him, when you hear the words that she's using, and of course, the places that she's talking about crypto, it doesn't seem very genuine, of course, and sort of talks about protecting investors. He called it the Genslerian, I believe is what Nathaniel said this morning. He said, it's like the Genslerian lingo about crypto. She's not saying, you know, she's not talking about self-custody and your right and the power of these asset classes. She's talking about protecting investors who own crypto, right? So it sort of sounds like the way that the SEC or Elizabeth Warren talk about crypto. So I have my

skepticism there. But the flip side is that no matter how badly this industry wants to believe that Trump is a shoo-in, which I don't think is the case, obviously, I think either side could win, that you're going to want a seat at the table regardless of who wins. So whether you agree with Cuban or not, having someone who at least is a proponent of the industry outwardly, who could have a seat at the table if things don't go the way that the industry is anticipating or desiring could also be a major benefit right so like you know i we both really like anthony you know everybody questions his motivation or why he's uh pushing for one or the other but if she does happen to win better than anthony's there than nobody right so i think i just kind of have this mixed view yeah Yeah, that's a great point. I think

you can understand Anthony in that, you know, having grown up with him, he was probably one of the brightest, if not the brightest in our entire high school class. And I was a treasurer of the student body when he was vice president. And then I was vice president student body when he was president, we ran as a ticket together. And again, he was a superstar athlete, a superstar academic, but he was also the toughest kid in the class. So in the public school where I went to on Long Island. And that's what's driving him. Trump ticked him off. Trump insulted his wife.

And for Anthony, you don't do that. And Anthony will never step down from a fight, step back from a fight. Again, he's one of the toughest, if not the toughest guy I've ever met in all the years, even including the time I was a prosecutor. So I think you're right. It's good to have Anthony in the mix. And he's a real scholar also. He reads everything. We just disagree on things. I just find it amazing that no one seems to talk about Mark Cuban is out there. People get out there and stump for Trump. And if they have the slightest problem with their background, then Trump is castigated for surrounding himself with people like this.

But meanwhile, Mark Cuban is out there for Kamala Harris. And he's the one who got up with the Dallas Mavericks, with Voyager, had a big rollout, gave $100 credit to all the people, all the Dallas Maverick fans who would sign into Voyager, and they all lost all their money. And yet nobody seems to, and again, I admire Mark Cuban. I'd probably vote for him for president. I'd probably support him for the SEC. But I also lost millions on Voyager. You're preaching. And to some degree, I was even before they were a yield platform when they were just

an exchange. They were actually my first podcast sponsor. I mean, I speak pretty openly about that, but I ended up losing a ton of money. I can't I don't know Mark's role or can't defend it, but I can tell you that the executives were bold-faced lying also, I'm assuming, to Mark. You talk about the FDIC insurance part. Well, that was a claim that was also made to Mark Cuban by Steve Ehrlich, right? But it's such a ridiculous claim. It takes five minutes to figure out that they're not. Well, yeah, it was on the $250,000 of your dollars through a secondary bank, the way that they wrote it.

Yeah, I don't know what his level of culpability is, and I wouldn't want to speculate to that, but I have read all the lawsuits against him, and I have read all the lawsuits against Voyager and to me it seemed like an awful and predatory environment where they took advantage. In this case, it's an affinity fraud. Let's take it, you know, that's the way these things are. Let's pray on people who are libertarian. Let's pray on people who have a particular race or ethnic background. Let's pray on people who are Dallas Mavericks fans. You know, I'm a Washington Wizards fan. I've had season tickets forever. And they try to do it too. I get to my seat and there's an advertisement for some stupid NFT for me to buy. And I can't believe it. But maybe the other speakers are right. The adoption is just so prevalent now. I don't find that to be an excuse just because

something is widespread that it's a good thing. Heroin manufacturing is pretty widespread, but I don't see it as a good thing. So I would disagree with that, but the evidence is right in front of my face. I can't deny it when I go to the Wizards game and on my seat, which I pay good money for, is a stupid advertisement for an NFT sponsored by the Wizards. Yeah, that's pretty funny. Mario, are you here? Yeah, man, of course I am. Are you enjoying our conversation?

I am, I am. Did Robbie say that gaming is going to blow up? Yes, we talked to... Of course I did. Yeah, so Robbiebie he like the first of course robbie if you need like uh for us to blow up your ego a little bit the first thing mario says when he's signing on in the private chat is can i please talk to robbie yeah and my response was i already asked him all the questions you want to ask him man but hey just listen to the

recording we'll go to chat to you robbie i'll listen to the recording um but yeah dylan how are you man uh great thanks for uh having me up here that's right man who came up with the with the name goat network um that's a great uh lore question i believe it was early days uh one of our early researchers i believe from zkm came from uh came up with it randomly um while out in the middle of a greek, I believe. There's more lore to it, though. Creative guy. Let's kick it off.

Let's start with the basics. I love these discussions. I learned something new, and I think similar to yesterday or two days ago, I think I'm going to learn something new in this one as well. So if you want to explain to someone new to crypto, what is Goat Network? Yeah, so Goat Network is a Bitcoin layer 2 built on top of bitvm and 2 and we use taproot for verifying roll-up on top of bitcoin and so we use ethereum to effectively build a zero knowledge roll-up on top of bitcoin okay let's dig into it let's take a step back even more.

So when you say Bitcoin L2, so the problem with Bitcoin is not scalable. There's been a never-ending debate in the crypto world. And there's various solutions for that. And one of them is just through various L2 solutions. Now, some people love L2 solutions. Others just completely despise them. and one of them is just through various L2 solutions. Now, some people love L2 solutions, others just completely despise them. I just want to focus on scaling the L1 infrastructure itself.

Can you just maybe kick it off with first, add any more context to what I said? If I said anything wrong, you can also feel free to correct me. But then dig into the pros and the cons of L2s, kind of playing devil's advocate as well on what the other side or the other argument is. Definitely. I'll start there actually with the pros and the cons, Mario, is because the cons are actually the fact that the sequencers of layer two networks are typically centralized. And so in Ethereum and even with application frameworks, and even with a lot of the parachain frameworks,

these are just substrates that are connected to via other substrates. And so when we build a layer two, we have to build what's known as a sequencer. And in order so that we can relay block space to layer one, because we're guaranteeing the security of the layer two through the layer one. Right. And so that's the premise of the layer two. And the problem with layer two is that it's a centralized sequencer. And the con that we believe that we're optimizing on is our pro, which is that we're decentralizing the sequencer. But instead of using it on top of Ethereum, we're decentralizing the sequencing space for Bitcoin instead. And then we can optimize the yield for say, like delegates. So we can perform something like a proof of stake

on top of a network, like a proof of work. Okay, so taking a step back, so can you just explain basically what a sequencer is for anyone listening, trying to understand and learn something new? Yeah, because this is sort of new in terms of how we interpret the definition of a sequencer. So I would pair it in terms of how we interpret the definition of a sequencer. So I would pair it in terms of three things.

It can be a prover, it can be a relayer, and it effectively is indexing messages from the blockchain. So it can index messages from chains. It can also relay those messages to other nodes and other endpoints and other systems. And the great thing is that it can also be used as specialized hardware to accelerate zero-knowledge proofs for a GPU stick.

So you can use this for a specialized prover network, similar to things like Aztec, Alio, other prover networks that you see out there that you may know of. And so we're no different. We use the ZKM, the ZKVM, which is a zero-knowledge virtual machine. And we use that inside of the sequencer. So we're a relayer, a prover, and an indexer.

That is the sequencer. And this is providing us the consensus for the ecosystem. Okay. But then, so it goes to another another question is that with L2, because there's so many L2s out there, I know we're invested in a few of them as well. Does Bitcoin really need an L2? Because I know there's various solutions as well, some public, some not, that are looking at scaling Bitcoin itself from an L1 perspective.

Would an L2 be necessary if Bitcoin ends up, these L1 scaling solutions end up succeeding? If they need them or not, that's an amazing, you know, I think most people would agree that we don't necessarily need a layer two scaling solution for Bitcoin, because Bitcoin is what it is, right. But the thing is, is that we're a vertical scaling solution. And so in terms of vertical and horizontal scaling, you can take it in terms of a few approaches. Now, what we're doing is, is that we're creating a permissionless bridge with Bitcoin. Now, that is the first service that our network is providing to others. So if a developer wants to come to the GOAT network, they're going to be able to leverage a permissionless bridge protocol. Now, that is permissionless and decentralized and anybody can come and build that and use that.

So now as far as scaling the architecture, this is through the full node network. So because we're a rollup, the sequencers do all the work of doing the proof and the commitment uh uh phases so they would prove the space of of of ethereum roll up space and they would have to then commit signatures together and so the scalability actually scales quite nicely we can compare it to things like metis since we're using a lot of the same architecture so um is it needed? I think in some areas, yes. I think a lot of people want to access decentralized Bitcoin in other ways and they want to be able to bridge.

So my question, what I meant is kind of two arguments. One of them, should you even scale Bitcoin or keep Bitcoin as a sort of value? And then the other one is, if you want to scale Bitcoin, should you look at scaling it through L2 solutions or should you scale from an L1 perspective instead of looking at scaling through L2s on top of the Bitcoin layer? So there's like two ways of scaling Bitcoin. And then does L2 scaling from an L2 perspective, would that make more sense than scaling through various L1 solutions? Well, again, there's two different approaches.

We take on the approach of doing it with a permissionless bridge, which gives you access to decentralized finance, which in and of itself is decentralized, if you believe it to be, at least with Ethereum. And so now that's one gateway. And crypto can be accessed through multiple gateways. And we know that layer ones are optimized through Lightning Network, which can also be considered layer two. And then there's other optimizations like Frost and so on that have optimized layer one and Opcat that's soon to come out. And so because there are these optimizations to layer one,

we're using the same optimizations. The layer one optimization is called taproot. And we're using this and bit VM two, because this is just a methodology of using taproot in order to create an existential honesty assumption with layer two nodes. Now this bit VM two white paper only introduced the permissionless bridge as an existential honesty assumption, if and only if you had a central sequencer. We're breaking that gap by decentralizing the sequencer and optimizing the yield that people stake onto Bitcoin to promote this protocol that we're all building on top of. So multiple L2s, Bitcoin L2s take on the same approach. But we take on a slightly different approach. We take a lot of what the inspired Metis to scale so quickly and so efficiently. And then we use

ZKM to create that roll up space that gives us the ability to create validity proofs on Bitcoin. And then so the argument on why build on Bitcoin versus Ethereum is an interesting one. So I'll ask you that question. Why would you look at Bitcoin scaling solutions? Why do you want to scale Bitcoin when there's already a solution through Ethereum and other L1s out there? Do you really need to build L2 solutions on top of Bitcoin? I think it's a necessary experiment to be had in the large, kind of like the larger point of view, if you want to think about it. And I think it's, I've been saying this recently, that like Bitcoin

is almost can be thought of as a universal, like verification layer, because it has so much trust and belief and speculation built on top of it, it's very unlikely that it's going to go away. So that means you can trust it as this like, you like this, like, like this universal tool almost. And there's other books where Bitcoin can be used as almost like as a weapon. And so it's interesting that Bitcoin can be utilized as more than just a currency. And so it can also be used as a full turn complete engine for your essentially your system where if you're building a layer two, you can use this very efficient. It it settles every 10 minutes around the globe. And its cost is not the problem. It's it's it's it's somewhat of a feature because it creates blob space for us to put storage and signatures on this, this layer one. It's and it's 1. And it's great to have. And there's much more to Bitcoin than meets the eye. And so I think Layer 2s explore this idea much more

than most people kind of investigate. So just to understand the technical aspects of it. So the way that you guys operate is essentially settling the transactions on Ethereum, bundling them on Ethereum and then settling them on Bitcoin. Is that an oversimplification of how it's done, how it works? A little bit. I will correct one thing is that we're using Ethereum as a fork, but we're not on Ethereum. Ah, okay.

My bad, my bad. Okay. Okay. Okay. Makes sense. And, uh, you know, how much have you guys raised so far? Um, raise, uh, I'll, I'll, I'll keep those questions for, uh, for, for, for others in my group. Uh, I don't have exact answers. Uh, who's on stage from the group by it's a bit glitching for me.

Who else is on stage? Oh, ambitious is there. Is it, you mean on, are they on space right now, Dylan? I don't believe so, no. Oh, good. All right, cool, cool, cool. Yeah, I'm just looking at the various LG scaling solutions on top of Bitcoin as well.

How's the adoption of all these solutions? We're invested in a few of them, but I haven't looked at the metrics in a while um are we starting to see a lot more adoption oh there's a lot of hype about it a few months ago how's that hype going yeah so um uh so just to clarify like i'm in the developer relations uh team so i lead in the community engagement with the developers so this is a better question in my case because I've seen the adoption and I've seen the growth and I've seen the excitement rally around the ideas around Bitcoin layer two. I've gone to all the different conferences, Nashville, SBC and so on. And I've met with a lot of these founders. club because I found that there were so many entrepreneurs looking to scale Bitcoin and they

were looking to like reinvent Bitcoin because of all the innovations and the Cambrian explosion that happened in Ethereum recently and Cosmos as well as Polkadot and other ecosystems. And they're trying to bring that to Bitcoin. And so I kind of said to myself and to our team and our growth team and lots of excellent creative experts around us, which is like awesome to kind of go in and engage with. We created a group and we're going to be coming out with more news hopefully next week. And we also are thinking about launching the testnet pretty soon. Right. And do you have any information on the token launch, the raise, the exchanges, any of that information at all? The token launch and the raise, as far as the exact details around the finances, no, I'm not good at answering these questions.

These are my favorite questions. But yeah, so just going back to the GOAT token, can you explain how your native token works or the tokenomic structure and how the yield is derived as well? The tokenomic structure and yield in some sense, yes. So as far as yield, you can compare the yield structure very similar to, say, something like Pendle, where when you lock the Bitcoin on Bitcoin layer one, what's happening is, is that we're creating a lock script and the script it's called the optimistic challenge protocol. It's a Bitcoin script. It's a, the bit VM script that we're writing and that allows us to verify whether or not the sequencer is honestly, uh, you know, creating a correct commitment to Bitcoin

or verifying the correct roll up space. So that's the first proof. Now, when we lock Bitcoin on layer one, we're able to then create a minted object or the gas of layer two, which is goat token or the goat BTC. This token can be locked. And when it's locked to a sequencer which means like delegated to a sequencer meaning a user has bridged their bitcoin from layer one to layer two we we're gonna have a really awesome bridge ui that you're gonna be able to play around with to bridge your bitcoin from layer one to layer two starting with testnet moving up to mainnet which is gonna be you know it's it's it's pretty amazing to see that like bitcoin can actually be leveraged in a pretty like you know trustless way um but like anyway so the the the the fact is is that you're gonna have a ui and then with uh with that

comes obviously an api and all the developers in the founders club are gonna get access uh to you know of course the permissionless, which is a part of the protocol. And so when you lock the token, you're going to generate yield, and the yield can pair a bond into either a principal token or a yield token. So that's the similarity to Jesus is such a mindfuck. Yeah, I'm just trying to keep track of it. What was it? What was the last like the last part? I missed that one.

Yeah, so the the token when you was the last like the last part i missed that one yeah so the the token when you get the token the reward token is a ybtc but it's also decomposed into its para bond which is a zero coupon bond like asset which is a pbtc and ybtc so y token right so you have a token that basically decomposes as a zero coupon. Jesus, man. Should be a 15-minute conversation. This will be a two-hour conversation. And just going back to Founders Club, I wish you had more information.

Do you know who your backers are? I'm trying to find them. I'm keen to know. Well, I do know that Amber and Hashkey and huobi and a couple of others had been oh nice all right um and i do know that uh i do know that like well i mean i do work closely with some of the co-founders and like the founding team from metis and so they're awesome to work with some of their developers are working with our developers and our researchers to kind of kind of create this you know this protocol together and um and we're also obviously talking with the zkm researchers uh to kind of build out this prover uh you know this validity prover that you know creates this roll-up space on on bitcoin

yeah so yeah i can't find much yeah yeah yeah i'm trying to find more information online as well um and going to the uh um the last couple of questions just look at the founders club that you guys have so it's actually is that just a club of founders building on top of goat um and you guys give them support oh so um in general like uh it's a group of founders that apply for points on the ecosystem. So the entire ecosystem is also designed and built around a points program so that like you can basically you can apply and you can get points for launching projects and points apply and they accumulate points for tokens. So it's a very... How do you determine how many points they accumulate points meaning like uh points equate tokens so you can apply yeah i know but how when you so

so how do you earn those tokens you build it you build on top of the network but then what how do how can you earn more tokens as you build more yeah so um that's the cool thing about the founders club is that they you know they uh it's the group itself is the one keeping track of the point allocation. So they set up challenges on chain that you have to meet. And so those chain challenges actually end up as being goat like analytics. And so the goat analytics, they get like this Founders Club app. And then they get to track their analytics. And they if they hit their milestones, they get the points. And if they get the points, they get to either switch them them out for tokens or they give them to their community as an airdrop it's pretty cool it's like an it's like an it's like a native incentive for like creating community on chain nice and your marketing guy is called mario as well is he mario yeah yeah nice he's great um uh he he is i am which mario so i didn't understand uh mario yeah mario's great he's uh he's our lead head of marketing and um he's been uh all over the place so far and uh that's actually how i met you guys uh oh shit yeah oh hey there was no way he

was going to be talking about you for the record give it a shot i'm glad you're listening to those conversations that's it it's just so i love this conversation i'm here how deep are you in that world how deep are you in the world and the various scaling solutions top of bitcoin well to me my background is in is as as an engineer so i've been in the space for a long time i'm not you're you're you're i'm not doing your background he's not questioning you he's trying to question me he wants to put me on the spot yeah but how i understand it actually pretty well and i think that uh what they're doing is is relatively incredible and i and i think since obviously taproot it's drawn a lot of attention back to

bitcoin uh effectively and interestingly i think things being built on other chains acted as sort of a test net for what could potentially happen on Bitcoin. I have very close friends with Yago Sovereign, and we've had him on stage a million times, and he's sort of been beating this drum for years. So I've been paying attention to this for over a cycle, even before it was really doable, but conceptually that this was happening. you know, been beating this drum for years. So I've been paying attention to this for over a cycle, you know, even before it was really doable, but conceptually that this was happening.

So to me, it's really, really exciting. I think, you know, we're all Bitcoiners at heart, so we should cheer for seeing the things that are developed everywhere else. What I'm trying to say is like, do you need, but how, so, so what solutions and I don't know if you can answer that, Scott, like what solutions does Taproot not solve that you need to, you need L2 solutions to solve, other L2 solutions? I think it's Ethereum. And, Dylan, you can correct me if I'm wrong,

but I think Ethereum is a pretty close roadmap for the reasons that would be the case. You just can't. I mean, Bitcoin itself I don't think needs to be changed. I also just think that like you're playing with fire if you start to do everything on the base layer, you know, when these things can be solved by, you know, taking it off that base layer and then just settling the most important transactions there.

I think that this is the right approach. I think it's really, really cool. And I'm really, really cheering to see meaningful adoption and usage of this. Yeah, there's just a lot of projects that are just kind of playing on the Bitcoin narrative. i'm just not doing i won't name any here but she's not doing it right at all just like from when i speak to anyone that's a bit technical and trying to get through the solution they have is like you know this set of transactions on bitcoin again i won't name the projects um in a way that that just it does not seem sustainable

at all but they can say hey we're building on top of bitcoin um and we're we're a scaling solution for bitcoin but i think when we dug into your structure go even though i'm dealing with i'm even though i'm not too technical um it seems that you guys are doing it right so that's uh it's really good to see um i like the you know kind of the minefield we went into and how the native token works and the reward structure. But if anyone wants to learn more, definitely check out Gold Network. They're on stage.

Their name is in the title as well. You could learn more. You could chat to them if you want to participate in the, what is it called? The Founders Club? Is that what it's called, Dylan? Yes, sir. It's the Founders Club

and everything will be coming out and run sometime next week. Check out our page and check out our website. We're going to be coming out with lots of new updates. It's going to be exciting. I think that's really cool too, Mario,

like kind of the governance and the way that this can be controlled and sort of, I guess, similar to a DAO structure, I think is... Internal DAO structure. Internal and external DAO structures because that was the missing part with decentralizing sequencers

that each sequencer might actually end up having its own community and its own DAOs. And so they also might compete for various rewards and also might even give various rewards back to their users for delegating to them. So they're competing too. So there's this entire new thesis on competing validators for Bitcoin. It's very cool. Nice. It's really cool, man. Well,

I appreciate being here. I appreciate coming on the show. We'd love to have you again. And thanks for having us. I hope we're on your cap table. Um, if we are appreciate, I'm guessing we are.

So if we are, thanks. I think we are. Yeah. I remember God network. Um, so thanks for having us on the cap table. Um,

otherwise for everyone else, um, we should see us tomorrow, but no, today's Friday, Monday, Monday, Friday.

When it's got last question for you. When do you think we'll hit an all-time high, in your opinion, if you had to guess? By the day, exact day. What would you say if you had to guess the day? No, late November. Late November? Oh, shit.

But total guess, shot in the dark. Yeah, I mean, we're not. We're only like 13%, 13% off. I mean, that's it that's one good day who do you think is uh will be the president i i i think i personally think that it's a complete toss-up right now even even with the betting platforms putting trump up by such a wide margin i mean the betting platforms are putting trump up by a large large margin but i think when you really i just think it's a very highly contested race that's going to be decided in a few counties and a few states by a few tens of thousands of voters.

And it's very hard, no matter how you poll it nationally, to really determine what's going on in those places that are going to make the huge difference. It's going to be a pretty crazy couple of weeks. All right, everyone, thank you so much for your time. We'll see you again on Monday. Gold Network, thanks a lot for being here. Everyone keep an eye out for Goat Network for when their token launches. Bye, everyone. Have a wonderful weekend. Bye, Scott. Bye, guys.