The Wolf Of All Streets - Everyone Screaming Crash Smart Money Reloads #CryptoTownHall

Episode Date: February 17, 2026

In this episode, the panel discusses bearish crypto sentiment, Bitcoin's sideways trading in the mid-60k range, and ongoing confusion between Bitcoin and altcoins/scams. They reflect on a heated Macro Monday debate, stress Bitcoin's unique hard-money properties, address PR/education challenges, institutional hurdles (quantum FUD, advisor views), institutional distrust amplified by Epstein files, stablecoin vs. Bitcoin tensions, and regulatory outlook (Clarity Act prospects). Despite widespread fear, many argue Bitcoin is quietly bottoming— a candid macro-crypto conversation on education, tribalism, and long-term potential.

Good morning, everyone. I hope you can hear me. Was that the strangest music that we've ever heard on this site? I think it was pretty ridiculous. You know, before we get started in this, I think it's actually funny that I was an observer, front row seat to something that everyone in the market was talking about, which I can't believe it has become such a big deal, which is the fight between Larry and Mike on Macro Monday yesterday. Just from my perspective, I think it's really serious. It's pretty obvious that it's important to get contrary views and to air them. And yeah, Mike talked over Larry and Larry tried to talk over Mike.

And Mike's comment is something that I personally find dumb. I found it dumb for the last two years listening to him, namely that Bitcoin doesn't have a supply cap because you can infinitely create other cryptos. But it is important. and people inside the crypto bubble need to understand that normal investors often don't understand and use the word Bitcoin and crypto interchangeably. So it is incumbent upon everyone in the crypto space to tell people exactly and explain exactly what the differences are. And frankly, I'm not sure that we all agree on what the differences are other than the

fact that there are differences. So, you know, just, you know, for example, you know, Lou, you're a Bitcoiner for the most, most part, but you host a very popular meetup series called Cryptom Mondays. And you've been spending your time on education. I think the point, particularly when you get to these bare market kind of bottoming, in my opinion, but bear market doldrums, it's very important to educate people on what it is the hell we're talking about. And I think that the fact that so many analysts and so many people actually make that mistake

is relevant. And while I don't like the notion of being unable to talk about it. to one another, I think it is an important point. I mean, Lou, you get involved with those. Not to put you on the spot, but I mean, am I crazy? Do you think that everyone in the universe understands the differences between Bitcoin and all the other tokens that are out there?

Obviously not. But to some degree, this does not become a mass market thing until people don't have to understand the difference, right? This is all just, you know, none of us understand how an iPhone works, but we all get massive out. you from it every day. Right. And, you know, I think that's true. But the problem, I mean, Gary often says this, you know, that we're our own worst enemies. You know, the problem is when we

talk about Bitcoin as hard money is verifiable and all the various characteristics that it has, and a couple of kids in their dorm room can go on pump. Dot Fund and create a token and pump it up to millions of dollars, then suck the most of it out of the, of the ecosystem. and rugpole, everybody who paid, people hear that and they say, oh, look, this Bitcoin is a scam because look what this is. Well, obviously, it's not Bitcoin, but that is an issue. And I think it's actually a real one, you know, and we hear more of this crap at bottoms than we do, obviously at tops, but even in the middle.

It just, it tends to be, you know, when you see the Atlantic and the New York Times and the financial times prodding out people who have been saying Bitcoin is worthless since it was under a thousand bucks, you kind of understand it. So I do think that it's relevant. I mean, curious, anybody else care or think that there's a PR problem here? I actually, yeah, I'll say one more thing. Yeah, I don't know. There's an, my all-time favorite epic head talk is John Wooden,

who was the coach of the UCLA Bruins, arguably the greatest coach in U.S. sports history. And he had a great line, which is, you know, your reputation is what people think. of you, your character is what you are. If you focus on your character, the rest of it takes care of itself. You know, Bitcoin has been doing the same exact thing for 15 years. I was just at dinner last week with a bunch of people, wealthy people in New York around the Bitcoin Pompeiano's Bitcoin conference. And these were, you know, people interested in learning.

And half of them, when they made comments, they said, well, I know it could go to zero. No, it can't. It can't go to zero. It's going to do the same thing it's been doing for 15 years. And every day, more people are seeing it. Doesn't mean the price goes up every day, but what it certainly means is the price goes way up every five, ten years. Yeah. Well, I mean, I'm not sure I agree. I think that anything can fade into the dustbin of history. But I'd say the odds are quite stacked against Bitcoin going to zero.

We're right. Nobody starts off talking about Microsoft. Well, Microsoft could go to zero. Yes, it can go to zero. Everything can go to zero. You're right. But to spend time talking about it. it is a total waste of time.

Absolutely, 100%. And that is, but the thing that no one seems to want to understand is there's one logical chasm, we'll call it, in the minds of people that I think it's really only in people who are over, well, younger than me, but over 40 is there are people out there who believe, for whatever reason that nothing truly virtual can have value, that everything for value has to be physical, which of course is completely insane when you consider the fact that dollars are virtual. Yeah, there's some paper, but who uses it anymore? I mean, I mean, I carry cash with me because I'm a dinosaur, but, you know, I think that it's, it is, it is, there are people, in Peter Schiff is a classic.

At the end of the day, if you start arguing with him, it always boils down to the same thing. well, nothing virtual can I value because there's not, you can't touch it, feel it, and hold it. And I think pretty much every single person on this panel thinks that that's just an insane statement. So, I mean, but that's quite literally a big deal. I mean, you know, here we are. I don't know. Do you even think that he believes it? I don't think he believes it.

I think he's just, yeah, I think he's the market. I think he has resurrected his career after the failure of his bank on being an agent provocateur against Bickick. coin and it has given him the ability to raise money and do things and and that's fine i mean i don't know him well scott you know him so you you can make that that guess are you up here behind the mic god yeah i'm here can hear me yeah we can hear you cool i mean specifically about chif i think it's a mix i think he knows where his but his uh his uh bread is buttered as far as engagement and just easily triggers us as much as uh he sees fit uh but I do believe that he does at least have a core belief in gold superior order to Bitcoin.

But yeah, I mean, he's actually a pretty nice guy. And if you get him in person, he laughs about it. It's not like, it's not like if you're sitting for a drink with Peter Schiff, he starts screaming at you about how Bitcoin is tulips. It's very much a persona. You had to bring that one up. I mean, you missed my intro, but how did I? Yeah, what did I miss?

Nothing. I just, you know, it's just, it's amazing. I mean, the fact that you had to talk about Macro Monday again this morning with the arch guys, there have been a ton of posts. I mean, I don't know. All I'll say is you and I are aligned on one key thing, which is if you don't have controversy, if you only have people who agree, you don't, you can't critically think and your own ideas will get stale. Yeah, I think the constant like comments that, you know, people aren't going to watch the show anymore.

and I'm not coming back till McLone leaves. I casually say bye. Exactly. Why? Sorry, you know. I also, it blows my mind. You know, people take things so out of context. They don't watch the whole thing.

But the show is literally called Macro Monday. And the major point of contention seems to be that we have a quote, macro guy on the show. Yeah, exactly. It's just, it's absurd. But, you know, look, we're at this cycle now. We're at this period of time where pretty much, everyone seen the despondency and the the it's like it's it's hard to say it every single day

but people look at at what's going on in the crypto markets and and so many people are making the statement that over if the next few days if we don't see prices change then the entire narrative of something that's been building for uh well you know 17 years uh is dying and nobody nobody who's playing in size thinks that by the way oh i'm aware I'm aware. It's all the crypto, it's all the, the, we keep calling crypto Twitter, whatever. It's, it's the, the ecosystem inside a community of people. You know, I posted a tongue in cheek, you know, quote this morning that, you know, Laila Halpern decided to post, I mean, it's just a completely unsurious version of, you know,

video basically talking about how Bitcoin is crashing. And I'm like, I personally, when I, my first reaction with this is, thank God she wasn't pumping it. because if he was pumping it, no one would take it seriously. So, you know, it's crazy the kind of world that we're in right now, where there's so many people are looking at the narrative as being driven by what the price is doing. Meanwhile, you know, the price has been stuck, you know, we hit, what, we hit 59, you know, on this move and we've been in the mid-60s ever since, you know, it's not doing anything. I mean, it is correlated a little bit more to silver like I thought it would be.

But other than that, we haven't seen much. Anyway, we're talking a lot. Who else has as strong opinions on the dichotomy in terms of the fact that we are at extreme fear? Everyone, all the narratives are negative. And yet the price is sitting here and, you know, it seems like the entire crypto community believes it's going to crash down to lower. Okay, Carlo, you had your hand up first then, Jamie. Yeah, I think tensions across the border high, as we have seen in some of the spaces and in some of the conversations that are being had.

One of the things that I think is really driving it and intensifying it is this Epstein stuff because it has broken down trust in so many institutions and people are starting to question why they pay taxes, why they support a fiat system that is run by these, you know, individuals, and it certainly makes the conversation about Bitcoin very front and center. But, you know, I think part of the thing we have to balance here, too, is that we are not ready to jump to a full Bitcoin standard because people still have businesses to run and they still need to get paid in the available form of exchange. And it's not gold and it's not Bitcoin.

It's still Fiat. and I advocate that it'll probably be stable coins in the future because it empowers consumers to send and receive money faster for lower fees. It enables businesses to avoid those merchant fees that are drained out of what consumers pay them and that frees up capital to do what you want, which is if you believe it's Bitcoin or if you believe it's gold to hedge again against all this uncertainty. But I think we're getting to the point now where people are really becoming becoming a little bit tribal in what they are advocates for and very, very reluctant to hear criticism,

as we've seen over the last few days in some of the reactions. Look, I think it's great to have passion. We all bring passion, but it's also very important to see all sides of the equation. You can't just get lost in the weeds of your team, let's say, without seeing the value of the other side and that we kind of have a need to have a balance here.

Can I ask a question, Carlo? Because there's a narrative that I've now read from three different people, all of whom have very large followings. Person, I think it's absurd, but it doesn't matter. I'm just curious what you think, which is that stable coins effectively are anti-Bitcoin because they're going to extend the life of the Fiat system. Yeah, I'm actually grappling with that. And while I understand the underlying concern,

you know, Scott, you had that interview with John Carlo, where he talked about it being a legislative workaround essentially and a surveillance mechanism for the government. And, you know, it's kind of a backdoor CBDC, which, by the way, we were supposed to have an anti-CBC bill. I'd love to know where that is in Congress. But I'm hearing a lot of this as well. And I think we've got to slow down here for a second and understand that we have to play in the current financial infrastructure that exists. And we can do that at the same time as respecting where we think the financial infrastructure

is going to evolve too. But I still think you need to give consumers the reality on the street, which is, if I go full Bitcoin standard, I'm going to completely shrink the pool of potential customers who I can barter with and exchange goods and services. I have to accept a form of exchange, a monetary form of exchange that's widely accepted and used by people. And I understand that there's a concern about what's happening now with governments and lack of trust and institutions. And I mean, I've heard it called Pito Money. I mean, it is alarming. what we're seeing and what's going on right now.

And we're probably coming up on that fourth turning that everyone talks about, but digital dollars are not going away. I mean, it's either you accept the direction that your money is going, and you position yourself in a way that you can benefit from it, but also be mindful of the dangers of it. It can be to a certain extent a poison pill. Stable coins can be a backdoor to CBDC. They can be shut down.

They can be monitored. I get all of that. But it doesn't change the fact that the law is on the books. And that's where the entire financial system is moving. So be mindful of it. Be aware of the risks. But turning it off and ignoring it, I don't think is going to work for the average consumer

and the average small business owner who still needs to pay the damn bills. Sorry, Jamie. You had your hand up next. Yeah, hey, guys. I appreciate it. You know, I definitely think, I mean, fear and greed is like 13 right now, you know. It's definitely a different sentiment from last cycle fear levels. I mean, but those are more largely related to like the Terraluna, the Celsius, three arrows, FDX, you know,

and we've had much more bullish news legislatively this year within crypto. So I agree with Carlo that, you know, I think the fear might be more likely tied to government trust and macro events, you know, cause uncertainty from, you know, other than Bitcoin and crypto-related concerns, you know. I mean, sentiment in our discussions and spaces and stuff, it's less focused on price. I actually see a lot of experienced investors in this space looking forward to discount opportunities in buying lower as opposed to fears of last cycle where they were worried how low is going to go. I think that's kind of shifted. And I think what I'm hearing largely in our discussions is more about time.

How long is this going to last? That's my concern. Will people stick with it and get bored if it's an extended downtrend? And that's something that we try to talk with people about, get the feel what they're thinking, and kind of just offer some opinions back and forth about how to manage that possible extended downtrend. Tony. Hey, Dave. Can you hear me?

Yep. Oh, thank you to having some issues with this app this morning. But to add to what Carlo was saying, I've had multiple conversations with Chris John Carlo over the years. And he did flag that stable coins do present the same risks as CBDCs. And to his point, the anti-CBDC bill, that has not, that was supposed to be put into the defense spending bill. It did not make it there. And it seems it's kind of lost in limbo right now. And no one's pushing it. No one's pushing it to be added. to the Clarity Act. So that is something we have to do, we have to keep monitoring. But to Carlos' point, I don't think governments are going to give up control of Fiat and the Fiat currency system that easily. And in a digital format, it's probably going to give them some more power to do things and program money in a different way. And there's some draconian aspects of that. But it's not going away. And I think part of the ecosystem, the crypto ecosystem, or digital asset ecosystem will will be a big part of it will be stable coins. Bitcoin will exist. And our hope is that, you know, as the future generation, which is more digital and focused, as they learn about

blockchain tech and stablecoins, they gravitate more to Bitcoin over time. But no way stable coins are going away. Oops. Sorry. So Matt Hogan, I see you're here today. I started this by making a statement that you probably have had to deal with more times than anybody on the panel, maybe all of us combined, which is the understanding of Bitcoin as an asset specifically and how it is different than a lot of the other crap that's in the crypto ecosystem, particularly the pump. Fund stuff, all the stuff that people read about in terms of hacks and rug pulls, etc. I'm curious, you know, I don't think it's very hard to understand, but I'm curious, you know, what's your experience in terms of educating investors and where kind of the state of play is

with the financial advisors that you deal with? Yeah, great question. And sorry that I was late joining the space. I was in a meeting with an advisor. The answer is sort of at two levels. The worst level of that, and I think it's a very real risk, is most people actually just won't talk to you about it. So there's a huge number of people who just lump everything crypto together and won't take the time to dig in underneath the surface. if you get a chance to dig in underneath the surface, then it's relatively easy to separate the wheat from the chaff. And it's also relatively easy on Bitcoin specifically to make a very strong case for valuation. And those cases are more difficult once you go beyond that.

So I think the biggest worry to me is not like when you get in a room with an advisor, can you explain to them that there are good things and bad things in crypto? You can definitely do that and they'll play along. what what i experience is very real is i think a lot of people are just like uh crypto no because of some of those scams uh and rugs and all the the negative stuff in there if if that that makes sense perfect sense i mean it and and i think that when you get to these you know i don't know call it whatever you want to call it naters you know down down markets depressed times whatever that feels like impossible.

And, you know, at, you know, when, when you're at all-time highs and feels like you're every, you know, every Uber driver, every clerk in a store, people that you pass on the street, if they, if, you know, in my case, if I have to be wearing something that has some crypto symbol on or my, I wear a ring that has Bitcoin on it, I get, I can always tell if I'm playing poker and we're at, at top, you know, and the market is doing well, everyone always gravitates to the ring and starts a conversation of a Bitcoin. Today, you can probably wear a Bitcoin tattoo in the middle of your forehead, and no one would talk to you about it. I think that's right. For what it's worth, you know, people are sometimes confused by the level of

tribalism in crypto and why, you know, one group hates another and another hates another. It's exactly for this reason that it is true that the best parts of crypto get catch the shade of the worst parts of crypto. That's just an objective truth in the market. And yeah, it can be tiring. Look, ultimately, it won't keep the price down, but it can delay where it goes in the interim. Yeah, no doubt, no doubt.

I mean, I'm just curious, you know, what do you make, you, sorry, somebody else. No, no, I didn't mean to interrupt you. My mic just didn't work, go ahead. Yeah, no, I was just gonna ask. I mean, you know, we've seen the flood of articles recently, you know, both on two topics. one specific on quantum and we've talked about that.

If we have experts, then I would engage in a conversation about it. But more or less, the idea that Nick Carter pushed, which is Bitcoin development community needs to address it and not ignore it, which I think is fair, but that's been stretched to by a bunch of other commentators to, oh, well, Bitcoin's going to die. So why would you want to invest in something that's going to And I'm curious how do you deal with that? I mean, then you get the Atlantic and the New York Times and the FTs saying it's worth zero.

I mean, you know, you hear this stuff. I'm curious. I mean, it seems to these things come out of the woodwork every time we're at a bottom or about to be at the bottom. They definitely do. And they take so long to rebut, even though you have good arguments. And we've seen this through for FUD for years. I mean, how long ago was it that people were still? worried whether Tether was just a Ponzi scheme because of one paper that two guys in Texas published

a long time ago. You know, I probably spent, I don't know, a thousand hours talking to people about Tether because of that one article. So even something like, like Quantum, I agree that, you know, Nick was in the right for pushing it out there and the community has listened and is taking important steps. and that is all for the best. But yeah, for sure, we're going to be fighting quantum flood for the next two or three years, actually long after the issue is even put to bed in the Bitcoin community

because it sticks in people's minds. And I said this earlier on a podcast. Someone asked me, is quantum really preventing advisors from allocating? And the answer is yes. And the reason is the way they invest is there's an investment committee of like, six people and they talk about crypto and then one of them raises their hands and says, what about quantum risk? And if the answer is longer than like two seconds, it just gets tabled into the next meeting. So it is a real thing. It is weighing on the market and it will weigh on

the market longer than it should in my perspective. But that's just the reality. Tony, is that a... Yeah, Dave, I was going to ask, I mean, it's not like Matt and I don't talk every week, so I probably know the answer. But you kind of say how people are still conflating them and the best parts answer for the worst parts. I would say, though, we do get new bearish narratives like quantum, but isn't generally the trajectory of that in the right direction? I mean, each year that gets better, even though there's worse arguments against it and easier to explain for? For sure. And the sort of starting point of people is much more positive than it was in the past. And I do think we'll get that, you know, you have quantum on one side, you have Larry Fink on the other.

And that's a much better situation than we were with Tether, where you had, you know, Tetherfoot on one side. And then, you know, basically no reliable institutions that people knew and trusted on the other side of the equation. So it is getting better. And there are also more people telling the story. And there are lots more positive narrative. So, yeah, you're right about that. I'm not dower about it. But I do think it's weighing on the market.

For what it's worth, I think it's going to be one of the catalysts that draws us out of the bear market is people accepting that Bitcoin is now taking Nick Carter seriously. It is taking steps. I think it's almost turning into a positive catalyst. But that process will take some time. Jamie? Yeah. So we actually had a Hunter Beast on Space this last week. And he's one of the authors of the BIP 360.

He offers some interesting context, you know, regarding quantum. And the way he spoke about is that, you know, he was hoping that it's a Y2K event, that we come to approaching it and it ends up being nothing. He said he noted that, you know, it's not provably close, but experts have been wrong in history. And he gave the example of the Wright brothers where a month before they achieved flight, that experts said it wasn't achievable. And so it's at least worth preparing for because, you know, we may think we're not close now, but, you know, a Q-day event could come. And there would be some risk to some of those wallets if we weren't find a solution now.

And then, you know, obviously there's the Willie Wu tweets and you guys did a piece on it as well. You know, and, you know, that whole sentiment regarding, unless a solution is presented that potentially that's, getting priced in. That's kind of where it's impacting a Bitcoin price now and moving forward. So it is something I think should be addressed, is being addressed, and it's definitely a real sentiment regardless if it's, you know, something that's actually something we have to worry about. Dave, do you see any hands? Because mine all went blank. This space was downloaded via spacesdown.com. Visit to download your spaces today. I want to just sorry. Sorry. Sorry. My button was frozen. I think by the way,

that Carlo made like the, I think the most important point earlier. And it's something I've seen across the board, which is that people are so highly emotionally charged since the Epstein files were released. Yep. I mean, it really, I think it has changed the narrative. He's right on effectively everything. I tweeted about it, right, that like any monochum of, or like any shred of belief that I had left, which was naive probably in the first place, but it's gone. Like, it just, I mean, it is a very, it's funny because Carl is an attorney. And so he knows perfectly well that if you're the, if you are actively trying to make a case against people, the worst possible thing you could do would be to leak out all the information that you're using to build said case. Right. So we understand

that that is true. Doesn't change the. that we were dumped because there was a campaign promise and then a congressional bill that became a law with a veto-proof majority that said you have to release this information. We released information where the one thing they redacted was not the victims, which you could have understood them rededacting, but the recipients and senders of emails to and fro Epstein. And that was, I mean, honestly, if you set out to try to end up, anger, I mean, the American people and cause a firestorm, that would have been the plan. So it's sort of like they knew that if you were going to, you know, pick up a stick and whack a hornet's nest, you know, it was done on purpose.

I mean, either that or you couldn't be that stupid, right? I mean, is there anybody here who thinks differently about that? I mean, it seems like you can believe that people are dumb, but to think that that action where every single, one of the elites that interacted with Epstein via email for the most part was covered up, wasn't going to trigger every single person on both sides of the aisle to say this is, this is bullshit. It feels like that to me. Now, you know, I know that I'm always looking one level deep and I'm always, you know, a conspiracy theorist, in a sense, because after all, trust no one but verify, that's sort of kind of our way of looking at it, but it feels like

that's what they did. And I can't explain it for any reason other than the question that I asked in the article I wrote last weekend, which is, well, because if we did release that, then it will cause panic. Well, fuck it. I mean, you know, capitalism, when people talk about what are the benefits of free markets, one of them, arguably one of the most important ones, is what they call creative destruction. I mean, things that need to be destroyed or should be torn down or replaced or fixed need to happen. And it doesn't happen if you don't get transparency. So within that, that, now we have a world where as many people in crypto didn't trust governments before, who trusts them now?

Anybody? I mean, it's like impossible. I mean, we all know that we've all kind of, no, no is the wrong word. We've all assumed, because, you know, it's been a tale as old as time that if you're rich, you're going to be above the law to a certain point. I mean, you know, every once in a while, they'll throw people like Harvey Weinstein to the wolves. I'm not saying he didn't deserve it because it strongly seems like he did. But for every one Harvey Weinstein who ends up behind bars,

there's probably a dozen redacted, redacted, redacted. And yet the one community, which is unredacted, which came out in the files we were talking about is the Bitcoin community, which is literally the antithesis of what would enable that in the first place. So I just find the whole thing crazy. I mean, Matt, you've written about this and you're giving a lot of the emotion. I mean, what do you think? Yeah, man, I took, I took arrows yesterday, like a settler moving out west off the

McLone piece. I put in the article why he might be wrong. I don't think enough people read that far into it. But if I can just really quick, and I got to jump to a meeting here, guys. But I just want to maybe give you three reasons why I'm still bullish on Bitcoin. I still think that we get market clarity and structure this year. I think we get Fed rate cuts. And I think the agenic wallets and AI are three narratives to give me a strong bull case

for the end of 2026. I love your thoughts on that. And then I got to jump here in about 10 minutes, guys. Thank you. I say we go to the panel on that, if anybody has thoughts. Yeah, I hate jumping in, but I know you don't think we're going to get the Clarity Act passed. Right, Scott?

It seems like there's a little bit of momentum now, but once again, I mean, do I trust and it's not, I just think that the press releases are sound bites. You know, we're going to get it. It's coming soon. How long do you, I mean, you know, fool me once. I mean, maybe it'll happen. I'll be pleasantly surprised.

And after talking once again to John Carlo the other day, even if it does happen, I think it'll probably be awful. Yeah. And I think that's, well, awful for certain things and not so for others. Yes, crypto. That's what he said. And he's the closest person I know to it. Well, when you say crypto, what does he mean?

He mean Bitcoin? So first of all, he believes and having, once again, being very close to it, advising people, his take is the first person I'd heard say, the genius Act is very bad for privacy and that it basically locks in the Bank Surveillance Act for stable coins and that we now on the stable coin front have both government surveillance and private company surveillance and it's probably worse than the CBDC which would have just had government surveillance so that was a pretty hot take but then he says if we get the clarity act listen anything that passes in government you know that both sides should be unhappy

if there's a compromise, right? He just thinks that naturally, the entity that will be less happy will be the crypto industry and certainly not the powerful bank lobby and the politicians. So, you know, when I think maybe, I'm not sure if that means I align with no bills

better than bad bill, like Brian Armstrong has said. I just think there's no such thing is really a good bill. And so. I mean, at the risk of a 15-minute Bruce Diatribe, which I will probably agree with about 80% of, I'll give Mike very quick take. I think that the likelihood is you get some regulatory umbrella one way or another that allows for tokenization to move forward, that allows, gives the banks enough of it advantage, but invites

a few players like Coinbase, Cracken and Robin put into the club, and shuts out other startups from that club as most regulations do. And it's always a soft shutout. It's not a block. It's just the regulatory costs are high, et cetera, et cetera. The net result of which will be very good for the number go up for Bitcoin and bad for the privacy and ability to transact a version of Bitcoin, meaning that I think that there's too many institutional interests, whether it's BlackRock or the Trump family or, you know, JPMorgan, frankly, that want to see Bitcoin go up in price because they can do a better job and more monetizing it than gold even, that that will happen. I think that competing financial systems are going to get set back because it always is, right? You know, they fight,

fight, fight against things that disrupt their business. So defy is extremely important long term, in my opinion, but is going to get pushed. That's sort of my, you know, base case, which is why I keep saying that I think that Bitcoin is bottoming here. Do I think this is necessarily good for the human race? I'm not making that comment. I'm just stating what I think is as opposed to what I think should be. Oh, come on. That could add to a perfect. Nobody cares. Jamie, is that an old hand or is that a new hand? Oh, no, no. That's an old hand. Shadowhand. Yeah, the old shadow hand. Nobody has any opinions on this? The old shadow hand. Come on. Okay. Well, Bruce, I teed you up. I mean, I know what you think in terms of regulation, but I guess you were at the

Satoshi Roundtable, you know, not all that long ago. I mean, what are, what are, what were the folks they're talking about in terms of what's going on in the U.S. or our heads up our asses? And what are you guys thinking? Yeah, I mean, I was glad to see regulation wasn't a big topic. And I was also, it was, it was a lot of focus on Bitcoin. You know, sometimes it drifts into, you know, other other types of projects or something. I think sometimes bare market roundtables people have said are the best because it's more signal of noise and more people kind of head down building. So there's a lot of like, you know, Bitcoin was the biggest topic.

AI was the second biggest topic. We didn't have a lot of, you know, the regulatory people are usually, you know, grifters who can't produce. You have makers and takers in the world. You have the people that take and they can't do anything or make anything or build anything. So they either become regulators or they become, you know, think tank type people. people or they go and work for big firms trying to push regulation. That's the main people

interested in regulation, you know, rent seekers. And so they're not, you know, not that interesting. And they thrive in a bull market because it's sloshy, silly fiat money that enables their grift. In a bear market, you need more pedal to the metal, like actual results, people that build. So, yeah, I mean, there wasn't as much talk. I mean, usually we have some. regulatory panels, there was, there's very, probably the least, actually, now that I'm, I'm thinking, you know, I don't have the board memorized of what the topics were. Roundtable is like an unconference. So people put the topics organically, you know, the attendees are basically all speakers and everybody decides that, you know, on the first day, kind of what the topics are. But yeah, I mean, you know, Bitcoin was the biggest topic. I think, I mean, I'm not a fan of clarity. I think genius was bad. I'm glad to hear that, Giancarlo said that. There's a funny clip of me going pretty hard on him in a panel

that we were on when he was being pro CBDC and I was like, I said, I kind of got fired up and I'm like, well, can you get, you know, why don't you guarantee right now that it'll never be used against people? Because at the time he was like pro-CBCC. And then they've just pivoted

as some people alluded to earlier. They've just pivoted from CBDCs. They knew that that was totally untenable because it's just an absolute path to tyranny. So they were smart. They gave up on that and said, all right, we'll just get our tyranny another way. We'll just regulate the heck out of stable coins and have a wolf and sheep's clothing. And, you know, just same as they did with social media. Under the U.S. Constitution, it's extremely difficult to censor. So what they did is they just figured out ways to pressure the private industry. So in some ways, you can have even more tyranny through the stable coins.

And I think that a lot of the legislation that we've had, I mean, it's all pushed by, you know, pinheads and tyrant fans. who don't understand liberty or freedom. And most of these bills are just, you know, some of the dumbest people in the world, you know, who push these bills. Like there's almost nobody who understands liberty. And most of these think tanks and, you know,

all these, you know, working groups, just look at the bios of the people. It's a bunch of statists, boot-looking commie authoritarian who've never produced anything in their life. And the reason that they want to be on this board is so they can say, oh, I'm on the crypto-regulatory advisory board. so that they can put something on their LinkedIn and try and grift for a better position. You know, they're not people that actually understand the world or understand human freedom or understand this technology.

And then you have, you know, so, and they're kind of the better of the two. They're the, you know, what Milton Friedman would call the well-meaning do-goaters. And then the special interests are the, you know, the banks and the establishment powers who, you know, as Scott mentioned with this Epstein thing, it's all tied together because these people are the most evil, flipping people in the world. I mean, they're demons. It's the most evil people in the world trying to drive things. And they got these

well-meeting pinheads who are sitting there doing their bidding and like, oh, yeah, you can't have freedom. Oh, we're going to, you know, you got to check this in, you know, and people get fooled for it. You know, even things that are well received in our industry like Lemus Gillibrand has 30 pages of new,

you know, you need this board and that board and a new committee and a new this that you've got to go approved stuff. It's a bunch of anti-freedom nonsense. You know, none of this, none of this is legitimate. It's all absolute evil. It has no place in a civilized society. None of it.

It should all be scrapped. All should be burned to the ground. And maybe if we continue going down this utterly stupid and evil demonic path of fiat, then eventually it'll just crap and hopefully we'll, you know, Bitcoin will rise and we'll all win, maybe. I don't know. Having so much problem with my mic. Matt, I saw a hand, but I'm not sure if it was a previous or new.

I think that's a ghosted hand there, Scott. It's so hard to moderate a conversation on this panel, on this platform. It's painful. It's painful. I mean, look, you know, the evil of the, it comes down to, there's two expressions that I would say, one, absolute power corrupts absolutely. And we know that's true. We know that people who believe they're above the law will do really horrible shit. And I don't care who those people are. I mean, there's just a lot of horrible shit in this world.

And there's no way of looking at it. We may all disagree on who, but I think we can agree on what. The other is the sad reality is, and the expression that has been, that is really at the root of a lot of what we're facing today is, I guess I heard George Stephanopoulos say it, But I mean, it's been the expression that people have used for thousands of years, which is don't let a good crisis go to waste. And so, you know, we had 9-11, which was a human tragedy for sure, in a sense, I think in a historical sense, the fact that it created the Patriot Act and all the crap around it, the response and then the Gulf War, all of that, the reaction was worse.

And we can see that throughout history. The reaction to all this really horrible crap is generally, the reaction is the cure is worse than the disease. And so with Bitcoin, there are people who think, well, it'll be a better financial system, and that's probably true, almost certainly true. But I don't see how you get there. There's two ways of getting there. One is burn it all down and we go to Mad Max and we have a fourth turning, yada, yada, yada. The other is it gets adopted by the financial system.

And the question is, does it improve things? And that's really the question, right? You know, I've been writing about that a lot lately and a lot of people here are talking about it. But what our audience care about? It's sad, but our audience cares about number go up or number go down. That's what people care about. They care about, you know, how do you invest to protect yourself? And really, you know, that's not where, you know,

there's a lot of people who are gold bugs and saying gold is going to go to $10, $20, $30,000 an ounce. Well, I don't view those any differently than people talk about Bitcoin going to $10, $20, $30 million a coin. And it is different than Bitcoin going to a million dollars. There's Bitcoin in a million dollars is basically just replacing gold or at least getting pari-pousou with gold. But that's the world, right? And so, you know, we have to try to reconcile those two things. I mean, that's my thought of the day. Don't know if anybody cares.

I mean, I just don't think that anything has changed since yesterday. You know, here we are. Where are we? You know, right? You never have my glance over. It doesn't matter. Everything has changed since yesterday. I mean, Bitcoin is a good title.

67,000 between 66 something and 68 something every day for the last, you know, since basically since, you know, we had the wick down and then the, the quote, recovery back up. And here you want to try talking about it. Okay, we got a new person. So, hey, Joe, you just joined the panel and you're never at a loss for words. What are you thinking about all this stuff? Well, I mean, let's go back to clarity for a moment. Okay, this is classic the legislative dilemma that we can all agree on the why, but then we dispute the how, right?

Everybody's for change in general, but they're against it with respect to the specifics, and you have coalitions breaking apart. You have lobbyists, you know, at odds with one another, particularly some that carry more favor and influence than others. This is nothing new. The question, I think anybody in the space realistically asks, and I think the framing of, like, a good bill is, A bad bill is better than no bill is completely wrong, in my opinion, for a couple of reasons. Number one, you're assuming that the current enforcement regime, which is more laissez-faire, is going to be around forever. And we know that that is not the case. We know that we can easily get a more draconian, hostile regulatory agency head in there that can completely change the game,

especially if the Democrats come back to power and, you know, they ride a populist wave. So to me, I'm very nervous about that, and I think that it's a tragedy that we can't get at least some version of this across, even if it's a version that has to go back and fix problems that are there. Obviously, I'm very sensitive to the financial surveillance aspects of it and all that. I think those are issues with the bill. The Democrats scheming here to focus on the issues of the president being able to profit off the mean point and using that as a political narrative for stronger ethics and conflict. rules, I think that is politically very savvy, although it shouldn't be something that relax the whole bill. And then, you know, the non-custodial wallet software stuff, I think you can, even in the text

of the bill is currently drafted, I think there are strong arguments against that if you actually go through and look at the text, and that's what some of the proponents of it have argued. So to me, it's very unfortunate. You want a law. You don't want the, you know, continued regulation by enforcement. You don't want continuing to push developers abroad. I think it's bad for the industry as a whole. And I understand, you know, Bruce's persistent argument, and I'm sympathetic largely to it about how you shouldn't have to ask, you know, some, what did you say, pinhead for a ticket to do, you know, innovation and development.

I totally get that. But, you know, this is the real world. And we have to make sacrifices. And you can't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. And overall, some bill is better than no bill. It really is. And for a variety of reasons that take the, I think, discretion out of the regulator's hands. So I just came up to offer that opinion because I didn't hear it being offered.

And I definitely think that people should consider what it means that we're not going to get any serious clarity act or variation of it through under this presidency because it's looking increasingly likely that the midterms are gone. Yeah, I do. I think clarity is like a sub 10%. But like sub 10% could pass, but I think sub 10%. I mean, I think the market is certainly pricing nothing, which is why. And I actually think that something's going to get done. I don't think I'm going to love what's going to get done, but I think something's going to get done for a simple reason.

The Democrats want to get a win on the ethics side. And frankly, you know, Trump is very transactional and there's no more money to be made on meme coins. And so banning elected officials from or, you know, post-election from being able to launch a meme coin is essentially, yeah, it's giving them a rhetorical win, but it's nothing. At the same time, the Democrats are scared. of $200 million going 100% against their candidates and taking and doing to these midterms

what the stupidity that the Republicans did over abortion messaging did to the last midterms. Yeah, but Dave, right now, oh, sorry, I thought you were done. No, it is done. I mean, I think that. I was going to say, but right now, I don't know that there's like, I don't know if public perception and we can, and I'm not saying this, I'm saying this from a 30,000 foot view. I don't know if public perception of Clarity Acts failure to pass is that it's because of the Democrats. Actually, right now, people are screaming that it's because of Brian Armstrong and Coinbase.

I'm not, by the way, I'm not saying it's correct or wrong, but the Democrats are right now. You know he's going to cave. He cares about that the only part of the Clarity Act that was of the draft that caused him to have a shitstorm. And I literally talked about this with a couple of fairly, you know, in the no people was. It's the yield. It's the yield. No, it's not the yield. He can get around that.

The yield is, is what the, is, that's the one that everyone's yelling about because that's the weakest argument from the banks. It's the one that politically is bad. The one that he was arguing about that, that caused the absolute shitstorm was the one that was, and it would never survive into the final bill, but it was in a draft, was stopping, taking away the discretion of the SEC to write rules for digital securities. That was, that was the issue. I mean, it's funny because people don't...

His own team proposed that. What are you talking about? They did not propose taking away Atkins SEC from having the ability to rewrite security rules to be different for digital versus non. So transfer agents and all that stuff. I mean, no. If he did, then his team is foolish. And I'll say it directly. I don't get.

And I know people there. I'm just saying that would be foolish. I mean, taking away discretion for the SEC. Look, look, but hold on. He just spoke three days ago, okay? And his decision to try to, you know, influence the narrative. And I'm quoting from the art because I thought I'm, he's saying the potential, this is what he chose to talk about.

The potential ban on crypto rewards would make the everything exchange more profitable. He said, talking about his own exchange. But however, this ban, if it went into law, would make, would put us in a substantial disadvantage to the banks. Customers should get rewards as best. for the U.S. to keep regulated state of corn's competitive on a global. I know that. So why is he choosing to have oxygen consumed with that cocking? Because that is a because that is an incredibly powerful narrative. He's right. He's a hundred percent right of what he's saying there. It's, you go public with something. You want to be able to go public with things that are very clear that

have that makes it that paints your opponent into being apologists for the banks. That's what he wants to do with it. He is, it's a very smart rhetorical strategy because it's accurate, but this bill is incredibly complex. That's all I'm trying to say is the rewards. Look, how do I phrase it this way? You know how money market funds were effectively, you know, shelved and people still have demand deposits? The reason is because if you buy a money market fund on a brokerage platform and you need to move money into a demand deposit so that you could pay your bills, it takes, over a day and it used to take two or three days. You agree with that, right, Joe? Yes. Right. So now in a world with stablecoins, with faster rails, if you can have a tokenized

money market fund, B-U-I-D-L from BlackRock or the Benji from Franklin Templeton or whatever, or something else, you know, something that Coinbase offers or creates or works with. And so you could have money there and you can within minutes move it into a demand deposit so that you can pay your bills on the same platform. Is that going to be any different than rewards and stable coins? Other than the fact that the rewards and stable coins will pay less than those things? From a consumer point of view, from a consumer perspective, not. It's not, but that's not really the issue. The issue is from a business model perspective for certain entities. It's a massive world of difference. Is it not about what? It's about the who. 100%. So if you're, so it, so the

rhetorical frame, what I'm just saying is it's brilliant to frame it as, oh, you're hurting the consumer. But you and I have basically just come quickly to the agreement that what it's really about is different business models in competition. Right. Now, given the fact that we got there within 30 seconds, do you really think that that's going to be the thing that's going to stop this act from going forward? That's all I'm saying. I mean, when the, when the doors are closed and they finally get around to it, I don't think that's going to be the big deal. I don't, I don't follow the logic because the lobbyists that are railing against this arguably curry more favor and power on the hill than the crypto lobby of course the banking lobby so so i don't i don't understand why it wouldn't

stop because they're out there they're saying this is going to lead the deposit flight and and massive losses for the banking system which put which they will always drum and hit the drum of systemic risk i i totally hear you but the truth is these people aren't stupid and if what they end up with is an environment where they could have offered, because if you look who underwrites most of the rewards programs in America, it's the banks and the incumbent credit card companies, right? If they're going to quickly figure out that they're better off in a world where they can offer rewards than a world where everyone is pushed towards digitized money market funds that can immediately be moved into payment accounts, which will cause exactly the same pathology they're worried about.

I think they're not they're going to figure that out that that that's my opinion I just don't believe they're stupid and maybe I'm wrong we'll see we'll find out in the next six months but what is the stupidity the stupidity is that they're their proprietary advantage their competitive advantage gets undermined that's the that and from your standpoint you're saying you seem like that you don't think that's an issue it's a huge issue for them I just think that it's even I'm just saying let me let me phrase it this way I'm saying that giving in on rewards where they have to compete with Coinbase and Cracken and Robin Hood is a hell of a lot better than ending up with a bill that bans rewards, but encourages all the platforms, including their own, to offer instantaneous

money movements between interest-bearing accounts and non-interest-bearing accounts, which is exactly what the technology is destined to do and will do inevitably. That's what I'm saying. Yeah, but if that technology, which we agree is superior, I think there's, We're in complete agreement on that. If it's superior, but it is hamstrung from a public policy standpoint to not be able to economically compete with interest-based money markets, that's the best scenario for the banks. Because in that scenario, they trap capital and they still can experiment legally with the stable coins,

but they have all the money, right? Why do you rob a bank? Because the bank has all the money. They don't lose the money. It's just now we're offering stable coins, in addition to our interest-bearing, yield-bearing, accounts. So to me, that's like the best scenario. I don't see why that's a negative. Okay, well, we'll see if it, we'll see how it happens. I mean, I don't want to go down the, I mean, go down the rabbit hole in another space. But the point being that there's too much

economic interest in order and, and political interest to not have the Democrats, the Democrats do not want to be pointed as the 100% anti-crypto army going into the midterms because it's a wedge issue that could screw them. When, you know, they don't want to snatch Vic, defeat from the jaws of victory like the Republicans damn near did in the last midterms. So, I mean, there is precedent here. They're not dumb. And so you'll get something, but I think you're right. It won't be what we like.

But you'll get something. That's my bet. I could be wrong. Well, they show 60-40, right? Now, just check the recent polymarket. So it's a little better than a coin flip, something gets done. Okay. Well, yeah.

And I think the, I think the crypto market is pricing it at 1090. But so that is another reason why I hate to say it, but, you know, I think we're bottoming here. But, you know, that's besides the point. Anyway, I think we've beaten this one to death. Yeah, perfect timing. I think it's time to exit the building and run it back tomorrow. So everybody, thank you for joining. Dave.

Thanks for doing all the heavy lifting. And thanks to everybody on the panel. I think that everybody humbly should follow them because they're here for a reason, because we love them. And we value their opinion. So I give everybody on stage a follow and we'll see you guys tomorrow. Thank you, everybody. Have a great day.