The Wolf Of All Streets - Larry Fink's BIG STATEMENT! | FTX Clawback SOON? | Crypto Town Hall

Episode Date: October 17, 2023

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All righty, we're just going to get everybody on. We're just waiting for Mario and then we'll start the spaces, just getting all the speakers on. I see some of the speakers are already up. I see Mario. I think Mario is actually joining us today. Scott, I don't know if you're with us. Yeah, I'm here.

Are you half with us? I'm here. And I'm just very excited to hear the mythical voice of Mario Nothall that is so long, so long. Yeah. Yeah, we've been missing him. But now it seems we've got to get him up on stage. He's become a war reporter, a war correspondent. Unbelievable.

I don't think the guy slept in a week and a half, two weeks. I see him down there as a speaker. His coverage has been amazing. His coverage has been absolutely amazing. Harry, I think he's here. Are you actually with us today it's crazy it's crazy it's good to be back to this is like normal life for me when we talk about misinformation or some some wrong story by coin did you know what happened yesterday she ran i'm not sure if scott told you yeah on stage that was insane i shared that today go ahead. Go ahead. I'm just innocently going to an event that Gaurav told me to speak in. So I'm like, sure, man. I wake up. I go there.

On the way, I'm looking in our group and I find out that, hey, the ETF got approved. I'm like, holy shit, Bitcoin's pumping. And then you guys start going like, hold on, no, no, it's not confirmed. I think it's the wrong story. I'm like, okay, cool. More drama and crypto. And I just kind of put my phone away. I go on stage and the senior editor of Cointelegraph is meant to interview me. And it didn't click that they're the ones that got the wrong story. Remember, I just woke up, dressed up and went to the event.

And then she's meant to interview me, but then she starts with a long monologue apology. I'm like, oh, shit. Now I know what's going on. I just looked at your face and you just straightforward you showed zero fucking emotion there was zero emotion well especially especially when she decided that her approach was going to be yeah we this was bad that we shared this bad news but it's not really our fault it's because we have to be first and not vet our information and also it's society's fault for forcing us to be that way and then basically said anyone who believed it should have done their own research making that long-awaited etf

yeah she actually hold on she actually she actually said that because i tuned out when she's giving her long apology speech i mean they're just and she quoted ricky bobby saying if you're not first you're last from talladega Nights, which really, that one made me almost cry. I don't know if she did that intentionally or not. But I mean, I don't think you're going to have a more sort of like colorblind and inappropriate response to what happened, which should have just been, we made a big mistake. We're figuring it out. It won't happen again. Not it's society's fault for believing fake news.

What makes it more ironic is that she's meant to and she's a great person like i don't know a person if i know she's friends with gorav and that's how i know her she's like a nice person but she's meant to interview me about journalism so like the timing couldn't be worse my luck couldn't be worse and then she starts talking to me about journalism and the integrity in journalism and how you have to always be first and verify. And then she's like, she's kind of giving me kind of critical feedback about covering the war. I'm like, I didn't say it, but you cannot give me critical feedback today from all day. But that was it.

And she, I mean, what was crazy is when you dug into Cointelegraph's response finally, where they printed a, you know, basically a retraction apology on what had happened. I mean, it was insane to see how they gather and vet news. It was literally like it said there's a telegram group that are that I'm just laughing. I'm sorry. There's a telegram group that our writers like to look at for potential news scoops. We saw a screenshot in there and our reporter just ran with it. So like literally like a telegram group, they don't even control of anonymous people posting whatever they want was vetted enough news apparently for them. But they never landed up writing an article that they're proud of themselves. To their credit, right? They never landed up. Yeah, the article is completely irrelevant if you tweet it, right?

And if anybody needs evidence of that, a $2,000 up and down move in 30 minutes of Bitcoin should show you. I mean, that does, it's worth discussing how much of a thirst there is for it, but still. I want to ask you a question. Just give me a simple yes or no. Was it market manipulation? And did someone actually get rich on this yes or no? Don't give me the explanation. Yes.

Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. I mean, there are charts that show a lot of leverage buying on buyberts, on Deribert before the event. There was a massive spot fire before the event.

So you think this is maybe market manipulation? I'm keen to hear from the rest of the speakers. But crypto was pumping before the news, wasn't it, Ryan? Yeah, but the point is that could be a front run. Yeah, Bitcoin was up 4% before the news, right? It was already up on the news, wasn't it, Ryan? Yeah, but the point is that could be a front run. Yeah, Bitcoin was up 4% before the news, right? It was already up on the news. But, Ross, the question is, I'm inclined to agree with you, but the way that this happened,

unless Cointelegraph is outright lying, which is possible, I mean, just posting it simply in a telegram group doesn't like if that's the extent of the way someone was attempting to manipulate this market they couldn't have known that coin telegraph was going to pick that up uh and actually kind of run with it unless they orchestrated it unless they orchestrated it unless quite i mean i'm not but like i'm not why would you do that i just don't understand if Is Cointelegraph some sort of reputable source? It's relatively reputable for crypto. Yeah, but when you say for crypto, that immediately diminishes.

I did say it. I don't know. It's like you see it in the stock market all the time. It's a pump and dump, 101, rookie, pump and dump. Somebody made money. Also, people are making up shit and posting it in crypto telegram groups all the time. I think to Scott's point, like, it's much more likely someone just made this up and stuck it in a dumb group, having no idea that, like, someone from Cointelegraph is going to pick it up.

Well, I thought the tweet of the day went to david weisberger where he said i thought the futures etf was supposed to protect from market manipulation which is what the sec has been saying but of course that was just as manipulated as the spot market so it kind of goes to show that the whole futures etf prevents market manipulation kind of just fell flat on his face with what happened right there yeah we had the futures went much worse than the spot but just for the record the spot price pumped to 30 000 exactly the futures price went depending on which futures you looked at but it went up to about 30 800 so if you think that the futures price protected people, not at all. I also think Bitcoin is trading pretty thin right now. So it probably doesn't take too much movement to get Bitcoin really moving, you know?

Nothing. Yeah. I mean, very thin. That's definitely a key. That's definitely a key takeaway from this is like when this thing gets moving, you kind of got a little taste of how thin the market can get. Yeah. I mean, we're like, we're looking for custodians right now like how many custodians the united states of any size really exist anymore you know well prime trust was a fraud fortress uh lost 15 million bucks they're doing a deal with rippleipple that got rejected. So there's pretty much BitGo.

But I think that the world is moving. Obviously, the crypto world is for better or for worse moving towards legacy custodians. I think that one of the major stories of the next cycle will be Bank of New York, Mellon, and State Street being custodians, trusted

quote-unquote custodians. Honestly, fidelity will do your BTC and ETH right now. Yeah, Fidelity is doing a lot of stuff. Like we just talked to them last week. And they're like, if you move 100 million of like regular assets, we'll let you do whatever you want with Bitcoin and open wallets again and all this kind of stuff. So we're working on something with Fidelity.

But Fidelity is making moves in a big way. And Fidelity has been here, by the way, since 2014 or 2015. Guys, before we move on, we do have Mr. 2%. I actually want to dig into the Cointelegraph story a bit further. Now, before we get into why the market is bumping and the order books, I want to talk about the story that cut out yesterday regarding the approval of the ETF. Now, from experience, and 2%, I know you've worked at Cointelegraph, so I'd love to get your take on it. I give them the benefit of the doubt. I'm surprised Cointelegraph made the mistake.

We made this mistake in the early days of out of nowhere, suddenly we're covering news. So we look at all these different sources when we did the mutiny when we're doing the war including many telegram groups the good thing about these telegram groups that there's people on the ground they're generally so early but the problem is a lot of the shit on there is false so we never pulsed anything before we verify with one of the reputable sources that we have but we mention things like for example on a space we say there's unconfirmed reports of this. And we say that from telegram groups we know are trustworthy, but we know there's a likelihood that they're not going to be true. We say unconfirmed.

Now, for coin telegraphs, let's say they saw something in a telegram group and posted it. That's something we don't do. And we don't even – I don't like to call what we do journalism because it's not what I plan to do. But 2%, there was a discussion early on whether that was planned, that was intentional, whether anyone made money. I want to get your thoughts. Yeah, Mario. So I don't want to correct you, but I've never worked for Cointelegraph.

I've worked with them as far as doing business through different companies. So I'm in the camp that Cointelegraph, that this wasn't market manipulation, as more so this was just incompetence or just stuff dropping uh their co-workers dropping the ball um i believe that coin telegraph is good you're this is going to be one of first of many mistakes that you're going to see from coin telegraph they're going to make more mistakes not just with um posting bad articles but you're going to see from Cointelegraph. They're going to make more mistakes, not just with posting bad articles, but you're going to see more and more complaints

come from this company. Mario, but I don't take huge issue. Sorry, I was going to say, I don't take huge issue with them reporting something false. I think that's inevitable when you're a news source, especially in the market. No, no, no, no, no. It's not that something is major.

It's the way they justified it. And then honestly, it's the comments with the lady sitting right next to you on stage that blew my mind. The response bothers me more than the actual recording. Yeah, I think that this is too major to say something like the impact is too big on the market. And now, Ryan, I think you talked about it in your show that this could then be used by Gensler to show how easy it is to manipulate the market. Yeah, but I mean, it's easy to manipulate any market if you think about it. If you've got a big enough news outlet that's willing to publish or not publish fake news by mistake,

then it's going to happen. And no amount of SEC protection is going to, in an international market, no amount of SEC protection is going to help us when it comes to something like that. GameStop, HalfCraft, GameStop. What was the other one? Bed, Bath & Fund as. So GameStop, GameStop. What does the other one bed, bath and fund as well?

AMC GameStop. I mean, we've talked about, I mean, listen, Hertz went bankrupt and then went up like five X. Yeah. So,

so I think that no amount, but, but, but look again, I don't want to be spreading, you know, rumors and I don't want to be, but,

but to me it just feels, it feels too, it just feels too simple to have messed up that. These are, this is not a new, this is not a new news organization. They've been around for a long time. They know exactly what they're doing.

This is not like saying a new publication that was born yesterday. By now, I'd imagine they have enough systems and processes to deal with fake news. To me, the explanation doesn't suit what they're saying, to be honest. And again, I'm not trying to – I'm just saying I'm looking at the differences. It's just too basic for me that's it so we become so paranoid in crypto go ahead so I'll take the other side of that cuz like I think actually this was more likely to happen around this story because there's so much height and it's been such a long drawn out process on it.

Everyone is going to wants to be first on the official news. So I think if anything, people are more likely to bypass their normal journalistic process and procedures and safeguards because they know that if they get it out first, it's their tweet and things that's getting re-put around the internet announcing it Question, William, I'd love you to jump in but also I'm curious and remember I've been tuned out for a week, what's behind the current rally? So maybe William we can jump in, comment on what the Cointelegraph mishappened

and the rally that we're seeing in the last couple of days I'm not sure yet what's behind it, but I know that the volumes are up slightly. I would agree with Ran that I have not heard anything from Corn Telegraph that would give me confidence that this will not happen again. I mean, this really shows how amateurish we could be

or this organization could be and how fickle we are about this. And typically when a big news happens, all of the major news places copy each other and you see the same story replicated. And we didn't see that. So it is unfortunate. We were a little bit too anxious. Yes, we did.

We did see that. We did see that. Yes, this was went from coin telegraph to reuters and benzinga and then being reported by reuters and benzinga on the bloomberg terminal i missed that so that was heated and and and and by the way part of the reason that people took this seriously is because on friday through the same chain not point telegraph but Reuters and Benzinga, Benzinga reported something, Reuters picked it up, picked it up. And what that was, then it hit Bloomberg, was that the SEC was not appealing the Grayscale decision. And that turned out to be true. So a big reason why people were immediately believing this was

because Benzinga and Reuters in the same chain picked up the Cointelegraph story and it hit the Bloomberg terminal. Yeah, I think Cointelegraph is hurt, at least for the short term. In my opinion, they have a black mark right now. Yeah, but this is not the first time i've done this fake news effect is is quite common and like benzinger and reuters often you know are in a race to just like print stuff and so what happens is everybody's in a race to get the news out because once the news happens and the bitcoin starts moving you know they feel like they need to get news out whether it's like properly vetted and that's that's how it just cascades.

And this news is easily vetted. You just go to the SEC website. If it's approved, you can check that. So maybe I'll go with you with the same question you and Ryan. Is the markets over the last 48 hours, do you have any thoughts on what's behind? Well, it seems the rational response is that it was, you know, being front running this news and then the actual news itself. And then price landed effectively slightly back higher before that, before the news event happened. But I think, you know, if you look at the altcoin pairs versus Bitcoin, I would say that the market really isn't up.

We're doing the old washing machine where liquidity goes back and forth. And I think that this, once again, even though we saw that big move to the upside, it wasn't really new money coming into the market. Seemingly, altcoins dumped against Bitcoin. So we probably saw people FOMOing out of their altcoins into Bitcoin. And that's where the liquidity was coming from. This is an extremely thin market. I don't think there's really much new liquidity at the moment. I think it would take, you know, a day or two of that kind of spot Bitcoin approval, ETF approval news to get even any inkling of new money coming back in.

Look, I think the one thing, I think the one thing that it gave us was that this is a dress rehearsal for like the actual ETF and actually does get approved. So I think we learned thing that it gave us was that this is a dress rehearsal for the actual ETA when it actually does get approved. So I think we learned a couple of things. The first thing we learned was we learned that it's not priced in and that yesterday it would have gone way past 1,000 on a candle if the news was actually real and it wasn't debunked. That's the first thing we learned. The second thing we learned is that actually BlackRock is much more bullish than we thought about crypto.

I mean, you know, yesterday's events actually led to Larry Fink being interviewed on, I think it was CNBC or Fox. In fact, I have it right here. I'll play it for you guys. We got a Bitcoin. So why there is so much. Here we go. Here we go.

I probably heard it an hour ago. It wasn't... We should point out, Ellie Turett, my producer, broke the story that it was not real. But it's like wishful thinking, isn't it? Isn't this what this is all about? I can't talk about the specifics of anything. I think it's just an example of the pent-up interest in crypto.

And we're hearing from clients around the world about the need for crypto. I mean, when you think about, I think some of this rally is way beyond the rumor. I think the rally today is about a flight to quality with all the issues around Israeli war now, global terrorism. And I think there's more people running into a fight for quality, whether that is in treasuries, gold or crypto, depending on how you think about it. And I believe crypto will play that type of role as a flight to quality.

What would you have paid, Larry Finkink to say that in an interview? The idea that Larry Fink is calling Bitcoin and crypto, not Bitcoin, a flight to quality. The idea that Larry Fink is saying there is a pent up demand within our clients to buy Bitcoin or to buy crypto. I mean, those comments must have a value, right? What is his motivation? What's his motivation? He's soon going to be selling a product and he knows it. He's soon going to be selling a product and he needs to create demand for the product. Yeah, iShares is not going to be out of this business.

It's like their core business for BlackRock is ETFs. And I assume when the ETF is announced, it'll be an SEC announcement and they'll probably approve is ETFs. And I assume when the ETF is announced, it'll be an SEC announcement, and they'll probably approve multiple ETFs at the same time as not to be accused of, you know, preferential treatment. And if you saw just the action the other day, yesterday, when this is approved, because I'm fully confident it will be approved at some point in the next 12 months, it gives you an idea of how much upside potential there is in a thin market once institutional money can buy a product. And we have tons of clients that want a Bitcoin-like product without actually owning the

Bitcoin anymore. It's ironic. It's like come full circle because owning the Bitcoin has become so risky, people would actually rather buy an ETF. So the demand among institutional and retail clients is, you know, tens of maybe hundreds of billions. So, you know, this is going to be a massive moment for Bitcoin. And that's why I'm so bullish. Yeah, I think, to me, you look, I have a tendency to look a little bit deeper into what Larry Fink is doing. Because if I look at the fees that iShares is going to... You make some assumption on the AUM of an iShares Bitcoin ETF, and then whatever fees they're going to be taking,

and you just take whatever that annual fee number is divided by BlackRock's total revenue, and you're talking about some tiny fraction of 1% of their revenue. And he's out there shilling this thing that is so polarizing, right? It's like the most polarizing financial instrument on planet earth. And it's like, why is his message changed recently and so strongly that he's now willing to be this vocal of a proponent? It doesn't make sense to me that the answer to that question is for three one hundredths of one percent of revenue for BlackRock. So what's your answer, Travis, what do you think? I don't know. I mean, I have a tendency to kind of for the backdrop to that question to be that BlackRock is basically an unofficial arm of the government. And so when you hear Larry Fink talking about Bitcoin in a big public venue like that, that you should think about that as that being this sort of pseudo extension of the US government. And I think I still don't have

an answer. But I think that's the right that's like the right way to frame it. Do you really think so? Do you really think that he's acting he's speaking as an extension of the US government? Yeah, I'd love it. Yeah, I'd love it if he was but but you know, on the one hand, you got the SEC saying, we don he was, but on the one hand, you've got the SEC saying, we don't want Bitcoin. On the other hand, you've got Larry Fink saying, this is the best thing since last year. I know. I agree. It's strange. But I think it's about timing.

I think what Larry Fink is doing, he's priming the pump. He's making things ready. But what he didn't say is that he wants to see the bad news being flushed out. Now, if ETFs were to be approved, I think the upside is going to be a lot more than what we saw the last 24 hours. And this is going to be a massive, massive upside. However, what is the entry point? I'm not sure that the entry point is what we see today. It's possible that the entry point might be a bit lower. So I really want us to see all the bad news being flushed out. That's really what's going to be getting be the getting us to the

flight to quality that he's talking about and and we shouldn't mistake his enthusiasm for the timing that the timing could could could be the big swing here it may have to do with politics as well too i mean i'm not i'm not familiar with larry fink's politics but he goes on fox news right so i think that tells you a pretty good amount and like just sort of directionally that he's willing to go on that particular news station he's a huge democrat and the king of esg but oh yeah he's a huge literally literally created esg for black he did do all the esg shit that's a great point. I was going to say maybe this is like a political battle versus

Gary Gensler and the SEC have become very politicized. I think we all know that. I was thinking maybe this is like trying to fight back from the other angle, but that's a great point about the ESG thing. They were leading the charge on that. Guys, guys, guys. Why are we looking into it? What if you just mean...

BlackRock cares about money. That's all they care about. Exactly, exactly. What if they just believe in crypto? What if they believe how the... Larry's big politics is what will suit him for the day. Yeah, so, but what if what he said is just genuinely what he believes what if they're starting to believe in the value of crypto and they're starting to see the use cases

this they like the the regulation that's kicking in and you know the statements mean exactly what he's saying there's nothing under there's nothing more to it i agree trying to dig you know try to look into the political side and arm of the branch of the government, etc. They're starting to believe in crypto. We're getting more regulated. Use cases are starting to evolve, and it takes some time to understand the use cases. And we've seen the narrative change among others, not just Larry Fink. So what if just him, along with the rest of the institutions, is starting to see the value of crypto, in this this case as a store of value just to confirm what scott said i i just

googled on on his wikipedia think as a lifelong supporter of the democratic party so just to just to close that loop yeah but but travis what about my point in terms of he just means what he says and there's nothing more to it which is great for us to me the startness the startness of the change of his messaging that's the part that i think you can't ignore like it came too much out of nowhere they file this etf on the back of an absolute shit storm in crypto in 2022 we're in the middle of the hangover from 2022 they file this etf market starts going crazy next thing you know larry fink is on tv talking talking this thing uh i don't it's just it feels too like but isn't it like be greedy when everyone's fearful and vice versa 100 for for for three one hundredths of one percent of revenue like

you know it's like for now but that what if he sees it to be a much bigger piece of their revenue share also let's look at it as let's look at it as creating a new asset class so this is like just think about this as like you know an et an ETF for an asset class. And maybe the initial part is the X100. But actually think about it like after this is a crypto ETF. And then there's a Bitcoin and crypto ETF. And we go to all the various things. I think, you know, in the revenue now just seems too narrow minded. Maybe, I'm just thinking out loud.

This is complete conjecture on my part. Maybe BlackRock is setting up to acquire Coinbase. And maybe the US government – Why would they want to talk the price up? Why would they want to talk the price up? Why would they talk the price up? They're just beginning to shift. I mean, they don't care what they, they don't,

they're not going to care that much about what they pay for it. It's tiny. It's an $18 billion company. No, every, every, every company is, every company cares about, about what they pay. I mean, specifically, you know, this is specific. You can't not care about what you pay for something. Yeah.

I mean, I guess they would have, they would have to start to move the messaging of BlackRock broadly before they stepped out and made an acquisition. This is complete conjecture on my part. I think you have to think about Larry Fink's messaging from the context of him being

an unofficial extension of the US government. I don't think you can think about this any other way than from that backdrop i think because of what bitcoin as an asset represents well no i think you have to look at it it's like blackrock is you know i i just want to jump in because i i'm an institutional bitcoin trader and blackrock fidelity citadel virtue merrill everybody is setting up to trade Bitcoin and an ETF. And there's going to be billions and billions of dollars made taking this industry away from a bunch of crooked kids and

putting it in Wall Street. This is exactly they were waiting for this moment for all the exchanges to explode and shut down. And they're going to take over the trading of Bitcoin. It's much bigger than the ETF because they trade and they make the spreads on all the trades and then they lend out against the trade. Like in my ETF, GK, our shareholders get to keep the money we make lending out our stocks to short sellers. And so this industry is way deeper for a company like BlackRock than just 0.3% of their revenues. This is about a massive growth opportunity that they can be a key cornerstone in building the institutional crypto business. And that's exactly what I'm working on for the RIA space.

And I have been for years, despite now, incredible challenges that we're going through. But I can tell you what they're doing, and they're doing this. It's going to be incredible. Alex? Yeah, I was going to say, I mean, look, BlackRock is a financial products company. Their entire existence is to create financial products that they can sell to advisors and consumers and everyone. This is the exact same as like Microsoft putting, you know, knocking off a Slack clone with Microsoft Teams and putting it in there. Like they see there's a growth opportunity. People are going to want this thing.

They're going to build the damn thing. Because the last thing that BlackRock does is want is you thinking like, hey, we should actually go look at someone else's fleet of financial products. They want to be able to sell you everything they do. They see it as a growth opportunity. They're going to sell it to you. Patrick, what do you think?

Yeah, I think it's simple. And like Ross was saying, he sees the same long-term trends that we see. BlackRock, everyone in the industry sees the same long-term trends that we do. And he sees an opportunity to make a lot of money in an emerging new asset class that'll be worth trillions of dollars and as far as how strongly he's talking about it i mean it's probably the highest profile product they're launching this year you know what is he supposed to do waffle back and forth and you know and not express a strong conviction in this new product they're launching i i think i think it's all about money. Yeah, I agree. Mikkel and William, what do you guys think?

I don't think it's just about the fees. The BlackRock playing into the ETFs is not just about the fees. It's a signal to let a lot of the client wealth go into crypto. That will open up the floodgates for many other things. And it's a signal, could be helpful to the venture capital space as well. Adapradar recently, yesterday, announced that the VC investments in crypto is down 30% from the previous quarter, only 600 million. So think of it as something that will be a domino effect. It's not just about the fees. Yeah, I just wanted to say quick, like, I don't think you can look too much into him

changing his opinion quickly on this market. I mean, think of what how we all first looked at crypto when we got in, right? You look at it and you're like, what is this? This seems like some magic internet money. It's nothing. And then you learn about what it really is and your opinion changes very quickly. If you listen to him talk in past interviews, he's been talking about tokenization actually for a bit now. It seems like he does have a firm grasp on how this technology can be used in an emerging financial system. To me, it just seems like he has smart people at his firm who are kind of easing him into this process of what these cryptocurrencies could be used for. And now as he goes on interviews, he's talking more bullish because he's really starting to wrap his head around how this technology could be used at his own firm.

And then he's launching products on top of looking into these products and their potential. But now we see the larger institutions starting to wrap their head around exactly how these products can materialize in the real world. I see there's a tweet by James Safar, by the way. Just I think it sums it up pretty well. Sorry if my audio is not too good. Look, all I mean is if you came to me six months ago and told me that Larry Fink will do multiple national television appearances where he preaches about the virtues and benefits of Bitcoin and crypto more broadly, I probably would have laughed at you. He's saying six months ago, not two, three, four years ago. Mike McGlone, how do you interpret Larry Fink's comments that Rand played earlier?

Well, thank you. I agree with James. That's a major paradigm shift, but it's clear what other commentators said. He's pushing a product. I used to be on that side of the business. But the key thing I take away from listening to this is the key quote from Benjamin Disraeli, what we anticipate seldom occurs. We all know there will be ETFs, spot ETFs

in the US to track Bitcoin, eventually broad cryptos. It's probably going to happen within the next few months. We got the little buzz of that yesterday. But it's the environment that's I'm very much considered that's shifted from the whole history of cryptos. And that's, we just look at today, the US 10-year note yield has just reached a new 16-year high. We have Fed funds pushing more rate hikes in the system. So I get the whole, it's just the world's changed for Bitcoin. And you look at Bitcoin, it's the only crypto that's actually performing well. I mean, you look at converted broad indices versus Ethereum, it's Bitcoin versus everything else.

So you got to admit there's a lot priced into Bitcoin, hopefully. I do want to also dig into one other thing is Kathy kathy was i'm trying to fix my mic but kathy woods comments uh so she's saying something that kind of links to i can't remember which speaker was saying that we're hearing from clients around the world ross you were saying that we're hearing from clients around the world about the need for crypto and she talks about the rally today is way beyond the bitcoin stop spot etf rumor the rally today is about a flight to quality. Crypto will play that type of role as a flight to quality. Larry Fink made those similar comments.

Now, when Larry Fink, Ross, in your opinion, when you made the comments that Bitcoin is a flight to quality, was you referring crypto? I don't know, Mario. I'm not sure if you would say that. I actually did watch the interview. I didn't actually hear it, to be honest. I think that's a quote from Larry Fink, isn't it?

I may be wrong. Could be. I got it from the agenda. What did you have? I think it was last week that we had responded to the SEC's report for information around our Bitcoin filing. And we responded. And that's basically all we can say. I think many people think the fact that the Fed, I mean, the Fed, the SEC,

chose to ask questions is a change in behavior. And therefore, I do think hopes are rising that a or a number of Bitcoin ETFs will be approved. Yeah, my understanding is the court now is going to issue a... So she's saying, look, the ETF is going to be approved and she says their deadline is by the 10th of Jan. So our position is that you've pretty much got 85 days to make your Bitcoin purchase before you know there's going to be a God candle because you started seeing the God candle yesterday.

So you've got eight. But then I want to ask what happens after the God candle as well? Does the market shift? Yeah, maybe you want to just fix your mic. I think you just need to disconnect from the Bluetooth and reconnect. Okay, I'll try to do that. I mean, what happens afterwards? I think there's going to disconnect from the bluetooth and i'll try to do that okay um i mean what happens afterwards i think there's going to be a massive inflow to bitcoin we saw it yesterday

where the pump was capped at at a certain number which was uh 31 000 let's call it um but after that i i mean i guess institutional funds start flowing into a limited supply asset etf which is i mean again i don't, again, Michael Saylor always says, and I don't want to sound like Michael Saylor, but I mean, I think it's the biggest, the easiest trade out there today, because you know the institutional barriers are going to get removed. You know it's the only ETF with a truly, truly, truly limited supply. It's pretty much the biggest out there. And yesterday, you had a dress

rehearsal, and you could see in the dress rehearsal Bitcoin performed really well until we lifted the curtain, so to speak. I don't know if Mario's back. No, I don't know about him. I got a judgment. It is hard for me to imagine

price dumping too hard over the next like like i mean i think bitcoin price should be relatively well bid over the over the next few months unless they come out and do some really hard kibosh on the spot etf you know both the gbtc conversions and all the other filings that are out there um yeah it's hard for me to imagine that i mean you get some really bad event you know some binance situation or something like that but but other than that you would think it would stay stay pretty bad so i have a i have a request to allow the larry fink parody account into the into the stage i mean i'm so i'm so tempted to bring him up here. I mean, do you remember when there was the Elon Musk? Do you remember when the Elon Musk parody account was brought up?

He's got a big following. He's got like over, I think he's getting close to a million followers. I've brought parody accounts on before by accident because they put the same profile photo. The Elon Musk parody one is like a clear parody, but there's others that you can't tell. So get the profile photo. But I wanted to go to George. I'm not sure if my mic is better. I know he's got a few comments.

I think Benjamin's requesting as well, Ran. But George, I'll let you comment on what's been said so far. But the question I was asking Ran earlier is when we see that God candle, especially after we saw yesterday, what happens to the crypto market once the ETF, if and once the ETF gets approved, in your opinion? Well, let's just – I sort of flip it upside down. I would say that a BlackRock ETF is just – George, I thought my mic was bad. You're significantly worse. I'll shout out a bit.

I think this room is more... It's actually the quality of the mic. I don't know if you can maybe just change mics or go into AirPods or something. Yeah, it's glitching as well. I did bring up Benjamin, though. Benjamin, I'm not sure if you guys had him on stage yesterday. Benjamin, I'd love to get your thoughts on the market response

to the fake news yesterday and what that means if and when the ETF gets approved. Yeah, I mean, I guess so. So my view here is that there's not really a lot of new money coming into the space and all these pumps that we're seeing by Bitcoin. It's just people converting their alts to Bitcoin um i mean look at all bitcoin pairs look the ethereum bitcoin ratio is is literally collapsing right now and it's taking the altcoin market with it and the issue is that you know a lot of people get very bullish on bitcoin around this time before the halving and last cycle and the cycle before that

we we eventually saw bitcoin drop 50 before the having it's the secondary scare it tends to occur it tends to occur before the having and i think the reason that it occurs is because you know people you know people just sort of they they see all these great news headlines like spidey tf they you know they the halving. And everyone just starts focusing on Bitcoin. So the liquidity leaves the altcoin market. It goes to Bitcoin. And it leads to these rallies. But at some point, and I think that point is coming relatively soon,

there's no liquidity left in the altcoin market. And so that when Bitcoin goes into a risk-off environment, there's no longer a bid for it. And then it crushes the altcoin market. And Bitcoin goes down a lot. And then after all that happens, environment there's no longer a bid for it and then it crushes the altcoin market and and bitcoin goes down a lot and then after all that happens that's normally when the real bull market begins and that's likely not going to occur until until the fed pivots and until qb returns i mean i don't think we should assume that that the that the altcoin market and the cryptocurrency asset class

is immune to monetary policy so yes it's it's a great narrative, the spot ETF, but as long as we are in QT, as long as we are in higher interest rates, I don't see it making, you know, having a sustained, a longer lasting impact. I think it'll, long-term, it'll lead to liquidity coming into Bitcoin. But for now, I think it's still mostly people converting their alts to Bitcoin.

So Ben, I want to ask you a quick question around the timing between now to the halving. So in order to mine, so most of the mining companies and most of the big mining companies or a lot of big mining companies are listed on the stock exchange. Obviously, as you know,

the last thing that they can afford to do is come out with 50% of their earnings when the halving happens. And all of a sudden, for the same amount of mining power, they're mining 50% of the Bitcoin. I'm going very simplistically here. Do you think that part of the dump between now and the halving is them selling all their Bitcoins that they can invest in new miners so they can put more miners online? Yeah, it could have something to do with that. I think the market is

really cruel um and i i think what it you know what people sort of learn in the in the pre-having year is that these altcoins just bleed back to bitcoin and so you know the all these people all the all these investors sort of finally get on the bandwagon because they think that bitcoin can do no wrong and that it'll only ever go up. And so after everyone gets that memo and all the liquidity from all this has been drained, that's when then Bitcoin drops. And then, you know, everyone who thought that, you know, Bitcoin was the relatively safe haven,

it's, you know, even the king, even the king will bend the knee in the end. So, I mean, I think you're right. Like, I think that probably has something to do with it. But I think the bigger issue here, I mean, I think it all comes back to just liquidity and liquidity is leaving. Look at yields today. You know, these are the reasons why these risk assets are doing so poorly. I mean, this is not an environment that crypto is that familiar with. And I think it all goes back to

liquidity. But I do agree that there are probably some other nuances related to, you know, to selling pressure from the miners and other things like that. Mario? Benjamin, yeah, I've got a question for you, Benjamin. Talking about the liquidity entering the space, especially the current QT environment, you don't think an approval of spot etf would bring that liquidity in i mean look it might bring some liquidity in but there's probably also a lot of people that would sell into that as well it might just create a lot of supply um i i mean a lot of i mean look what happened with with with the ethereum futures just a few weeks ago that was being hyped beyond belief and there was basically no demand for it and ever since then ethereum has just been falling and the ethereum bitcoin valuation has been collapsing you i mean

these these things there's a lot of people that i have to imagine that a lot of the people that want exposure to bitcoin right now probably already have some type of exposure that doesn't mean that that everyone does i just don't think it's going to save the day. Think about every major cycle top when we have a big thing launch. It almost always ends up being a local top for at least a little while. It happened last cycle. It happened the cycle before that. I don't really think it would be any different.

I mean, I know you think that everyone who wants exposure to Bitcoin has exposure to Bitcoin, but if you're a big pension fund, a big institution, you want exposure to Bitcoin, how do you get it? Well, you go out and buy the Bitcoin futures ETF when you know that it underperforms spot. And Ross, to add to it as well, Benjamin,

Ross was just saying that he's got a lot of clients who have had other say this on the panel, a lot of clients that want exposure to Bitcoin. They don't have a way to get. Right. So it like it. But it could lead to some short term demand. But after all that demand comes in, we still need to go back to QE.

We still need to go back to lower interest rates. Like it's not going to change the whole macro environment. Like if the S&P sells off, you know, back to the lows, we can't expect Bitcoin to hold up just because there's a spot ETF launch. And by the way, considering what happened yesterday, you get one piece of fake news that comes out, the market moves 7%. That's not a point in Bitcoin's favor. I mean, I hope the spot ETF gets approved, because I'd like for us to talk about something else. But I mean, that is, I mean, it just sort of makes the SEC's case easier that there's a lot of fraud and manipulation.

But isn't this manipulation in any market? Like, I mean, is this not the same as, I mean, you know, Scott mentioned it earlier, things like Gangstaff, Bed Bath & Beyond. This is not unique to crypto. Of course not. No, I mean, it mentioned it earlier, things like Gangstaff, Bed Bath & Beyond. This is not unique to crypto. Of course not. No, I mean, it's in every market. I think the Spot ETF should be approved. Don't get me wrong. I think it should be approved.

I think it's silly that we've had to wait this long. I just think that, you know, we know what the SEC's agenda has been and will likely continue to be. So this is just something that will probably make them take another look. You know, you get one tweet out and the market moves 7% and then it retraces after that. It's not, it just, I feel like what it does is everything that happened yesterday, just it puts the cryptocurrency asset class in a bad light. Like it makes it look very immature. And we, I am bullish on a long term but we we have a long

way to go and i i don't really see i mean look the total market cap of crypto over a year let me ask you a question i know i know that we shouldn't um push fake news fake news is a very bad narrative and and whatever else but they. But I'm debating how angry and frustrated I should be at Cointelegraph for what happened yesterday. On the one hand, they made our industry look like fools. On the other hand, the SEC is definitely watching this, etc. But number one, we've got a pump in Bitcoin, which is the same. Bitcoin is still trading at $28,500

because I think that what happened was people looked at this pump and said, hold on a second, it's inevitable. We are going to be approved. It's just a matter of when. There's a maximum of 85 days before the final deadline for Fox ETF. Therefore, I better start loading up in the position now. Two, we got Larry Fink sending amazing, amazing, amazing comments

about Bitcoin and crypto, how he views Bitcoin and crypto. I mean, you ask me, I don't know, maybe from positives versus negatives, not the worst trade-off in the world to sacrifice a telegraph to get this kind of result. Before you answer, Benjamin, Ryan, I just want to, you know, I think we should cut aintelegraph some slack. Remember, that happens all the time in the traditional financial space. Like this is journalism 101.

They get stories wrong all the time. Remember the story about Financial Times during the collapse of the Silicon Valley Bank? Very sensitive time. They put out a piece that this other bank, can't remember the name, was also facing a potential bankruptcy. And it turns out to be false news and they're being sued. I think it was the Financial Times. I could be be wrong like this happens in triad fire all the time so i just want to i want to cut up some slack i think the mistake is obviously unacceptable and i'm sure they've learned from it the way that they've explained it's getting news from telegram

group and tweeting it it's a bit odd um but you know i know it's not your question but i just want to kind of give them the benefit of the doubt and i don't think their credibility should be hit that hard after one mistake although it is a serious mistake but go ahead man i mean there were i remind you this is not their first mistake i'll remind you that they made another mistake they broke the story about elon musk's spacex selling 337 million dollars worth of bitcoin do you remember? Do you remember that story? Yeah, actually you put it in the agenda. I saw it there, but I forgot it. I didn't know they broke that story. I remember the story because we covered it, but

I didn't know they're the ones that broke that story. So yeah, that's not a good look. Yeah, you can actually buy a Cointelegraph article, which is an NFT of the story in their own digital collectibles. Yeah, so I think Benjamin, Brian's question

is to you regarding the price that the market post finding out the story was false. Yeah, well, I mean, but I mean, look at it. I mean, a lot of that move was retraced, not all of it, but the reason that it went up, I mean, look at total market cap. Total market cap has basically been unchanged since January. This is, again, this is not new money. Look at the Bitcoin dominance. It's over 52%.

All of this move by Bitcoin is just coming from all of the people here, right, in crypto. The few people that are left, it's just coming from people converting their alts to Bitcoin. It's not new money. And that's the issue is that until we get new money coming in, it likely is not going to lead us to new highs. We have to get new money coming in. And this phase of the market cycle, it usually ends up being the most brutal. I know it might not seem like that right now because Bitcoin is up. But look at all these altcoins.

They've broken down on their Bitcoin support levels. If Bitcoin so as much sneezes down $2,000, the altcoin market is going to get decimated. And, you know, I've seen these market conditions many times. I get why people are excited about the SPY ETF, but I can't get past the idea that this is not new money. And the only reason Bitcoin is going up is because people are converting their alts to Bitcoin. I'm 100% with Benjamin on that.

And I think the other thing is too, you can look at there are some other coins that are more correlated to Bitcoin or in the Bitcoin ecosystem along those lines. And it's the same deal. The closer the associations to Bitcoin right now, the better the performance has been over the last six months.

They tend to move much more in line with Bitcoin. And I think that just reflects the movement from a lot of the other alts into Bitcoin. Fair enough. I don't have anything to add on yeah let's talk about the FTX testimony and specifically I mean we had Nishat Singh yesterday

on the witness stand pretty damning evidence but I think later on in the evening there was I think it's a proposal for clawbacks Travis you've got some feedback around this is it a proposal for clawbacks is Travis, you've got some feedback around this. Is it a proposal for clawbacks? Is it actually a settlement offer?

How real is the possibility of clawbacks here? Yeah, so this is a settlement basically between the UCC, the ad hoc, and the debtors on what to do with customer clawbacks, which they first alluded to back in late August. And there was a slide deck that had a couple slides talking about customer clawbacks, I think, in the first part of September. And so there's been a bunch of back and forth behind the scenes. And this announcement last night was basically the resolution of that back and forth behind the scenes.

And it's a pretty good outcome. I mean, I think the TLDR is the nine-day window from petition filings, basically starting at November 2nd. You look at your net withdrawals, so kind of withdrawals net of deposits in the nine-day window before the bankruptcy. If you withdrew less than $250,000, then you're good to go. You're free and clear. You're not going to get clawed back at all. If you were a net withdrawer of over $250,000, then they are going to basically offer you a 15% haircut to your claim amount relative to how much of a net withdrawal you were, basically. So sort of settling your net withdrawal amount at 50%. What if I don't take the settlement? What if I was over 250 grand and don't take the settlement?

That's right. Then you go and get in a legal fight with the debtors. So you basically get into a legal battle where you goors. So you, you basically, you know, get into a legal battle where you go, this is why you shouldn't be able to claw anything back from me. And they'll do that on a case by case basis. And that, and that'll be a big part of what, you know, the, the litigation aspect of the FTX bankruptcy we'll be doing, you know, for the next probably couple of years, I would guess, or certainly all of next year. Yeah, it's fine. It is one more thing.

It is also worth mentioning that they did kind of specifically carve out that like insiders, like people that they deem or entities that they deem to have an insider type of relationship with FTX or Alameda, you know, may not be subject to receiving this settlement offer. So they still leave the door open for folks, say like a jump trading, for example, that got however much money they got off. They're not going to get this 15% settlement. So probably.

What do you think the actual risk is? Like a lot of our viewers aren't sitting in the United States. Do you reckon if I'm a viewer and I'm sitting in Portugal or Afghanistan, do you really think they're going to come and sue me for 15% of $250,000? Let's talk about the practicality of it. Right. Yeah. I mean, I really don't want to give people advice on that. I mean, it is going to be jurisdiction-based.

I mean, if you're sitting in a country outside of the United States, I would just do a little Googling around to try and understand how the long arm of the U.S. law interacts with your particular jurisdiction. I mean, you Google around for a little bit, you could probably get a sense of, you know, can U.S. bankruptcies reach into country X, Y, Z? If you're in China, they can't get you. If you're in Russia, they're not going to get, you know, it's.S. bankruptcies reach into country X, Y, Z? If you're in China, they can't get you. If you're in Russia, they're not going to get, you know, it's like there's some places where it's just not going to happen, but it's going to, you know, it's going to be on a case by case basis. The other thing that's really worth mentioning about this is that

the way this is, again, I'm not a lawyer and this is the first bankruptcy I've ever been involved in in my life. I have been very focused on it because we have a huge claim in this deal. But the 15% settlement offer implies an expected total recovery of 85 plus percent. They kind of arrive at that 15% number because they think the overall recovery is going to be kind of 85 cents plus. And that's the first time we've seen debtors and that would be a number that was blessed by both the UCC and the ad hoc and then put out by the debtors. And this is the first time we've seen a number like that implicitly or explicitly given by the debtors. And that's a very big number. It's great news. That's a very,

I mean, that's just great news overall for creditors. What are you expecting to get back? You're saying you're very close to the fire. You've got a big claim. What are you expecting to get back if you were to give me, let's talk about what and when. So how much are you expecting to get back? You've had some great feedback around Anthropic. You've had some great token performances.

You've got Layer Zero case, which is, I think, a work in progress. What do you, what do you like thinking you're going to get back? Yeah, so we're probably going to sell our claim. We're probably going to sell it, you know, maybe at the end of this year, but more likely probably sometime in Q1. I would be kind of surprised if we're still in the claim by 331 24 and my guess is we're going to get we have a big claim we have a 65 million dollar claim it's 18th largest creditor in the bankruptcy and i would and because it's big you get higher pricing for big ones um and my guess is you know at this point i think we're going to get 55 60 you know maybe even 65 cents. Why wouldn't you wait and get 90% in Q2 of 2024 as was implied yesterday in the announcement?

No, see, that wording was confused. The 90% is that they are going to try and distribute. So they didn't word that very well. A lot of people have been confused by that. The 90% number was when you look at customer versus non-customer claims, that customers are going to get 90% of the quote unquote distributable value if the plan is approved in Q2 of 24. That was confusing language, actually. We still don't know. We are expecting an initial distribution in Q2 of 24, but they have not put out an estimate of what

that is going to be. There are other people that are kind of, you know, you can kind of put together an Excel spreadsheet and kind of guess what that number is going to be. And I think at the end of the day, you know, a big part of it is just opportunity costs. You're going to take the money back and presumably, you know, we're going to continue running our fund and deploying into a strategy that, you know, is going to outperform holding Bitcoin or at least has historically. And if you think Bitcoin is going to have a pretty good year next year, then you kind of want to get it. You know, it's like you start playing for like from 55 cents to 60 cents if you maybe hold for another quarter. And you're like, OK, well, that's like, you know, whatever that is, a 12 percent bump or something like that. And then or no, a little less than a 10 percent bump. And then you weigh that versus like, what do you think you can go get in the market as an opportunity cost? So I think that's a pretty critical factor. Super interesting. Cause the last time we spoke,

one of the last time we spoke here, you were contemplating the future of the fund. Yeah. I remember you, like you said, look, we don't know what future of the fund holds. So you mentioned that your claim is 60 million. So quickly, just that 60 million was out of a total fund NAV of how much? And then maybe just walk us through what you guys are planning on doing with the fund. Yeah, I mean, I really cannot talk about fund details in a setting like this for regulatory reasons.

I mean, just simplistically, everything's still up in the air. You know, we think we got a good path to continuing to operate EQ guy. But I, I, you know, this, this is just not the right venue to be talking about that kind of thing. Okay. And, and what, I mean, can you say what the total NAV of the fund was? Nah, that's one of the, that's one of the things regulators really hate. We, I literally just went through an entire sec exam and it was a huge pain in the ass it went

fine but it was a huge pain in the ass so i gotta be really really careful about talking about fun stuff yeah i mean uh anybody else got any opinions about this clawback and how real it is i know there's a lot of people who read this and are panicking about the clawback. So maybe anybody else got any insight into it? I see. Mario, I think pretty much on my side, that's it. Anything else on your side, sir? I'd like to put,

as long as we're talking about FTX, I'd like to put one thing to the group. What is the over-under right now on how long Sam's gonna go to jail it's either life or two lives right three lives or four lives i'm just i'm following the testimony very closely and i'm not an expert in in the world in in American legal, but I can tell you that it doesn't look very good for him. Caroline's testimony, Nishad's testimony. Holy shit.

I mean, look at us. Ryan, I've been away for a week. What are the highlights from the testimony, especially Caroline's? You've got to read it, dude. It's worth it. It's worth your time. BitMEX, I think BitMEx research has been doing probably the best summary they haven't been doing the live tweets inner city press is doing the live tweets

but bitmex research at the end of the day is like i think maybe they're getting a transcript and then summarizing directly maybe from a transcript but it's worth reading dude it's just it's too send me the summary yeah can you send me the summary travis i'll check it out yeah yeah i'll sit what was it yeah let me give you a few let me give you a few teasers so this is the shots carolines was i'd say probably the most brutal um yeah i mean i don't know i'd probably set the over under at 25 30 years probably 25 fish probably i don't know if other... I'm just curious if anybody else is paying... You would double it, huh?

Yeah, I'd put the over-under. The judge fucking hates this kid. He does hate it. The judge hates his ass. It's facts. Hates his ass. And one of the things I keep coming back to is the judge is making it easy on the prosecutors, but the prosecutors are doing a great job being just super friggin'

methodical with all these witnesses and just being like so you did crimes with him right please describe exactly the crime simply and they're going yeah let me let me read you this let me do this it's for fun what is your job at ftx i was head of engineering you commit any financial crimes ftx yes what crimes did you commit while you're working at the company? I defrauded customers, investors, I participated in money laundering, and I violated campaign financials. Did you commit those crimes on your own or with others?

Who? SBF, Gary Wang, Caroline Anderson, and Ryan Salami. Okay, then a couple of other things. So, they go into FTX sponsorship deal. How much did the Miami Heat Arena sponsorship cost? Summing the first thing,

the miracle value column, it's $205 million. What does MLB stand for? Nishad's testimony. I read the whole testimony yesterday. It was the craziest thing I've ever read in my life. Like I just can't see, I can't see how he gets out of this one.

The thing is that his, his story corroborates with Caroline's story and, and, and yeah and they're both doing this like they're both they're all kind of doing this thing of like well i wasn't super thrilled or happy with the idea of this and they're admitting responsibility while still being like look i didn't love it but like sam told me to and said it was totally fine and really wanted to do it and so i you know went ahead and did it but like sam told me to and said it was totally fine and really wanted to do it and so i you know went ahead and did it and like sam's lawyers are just freaking terrible at their job they're just doing nothing to undermine these witnesses i know i completely agree yeah i mean again i'm not like this is not my area of expertise but i feel like i mean he's got like the best defense attorneys in

the world right this is this is like the the people that represented Ghislaine Maxwell and shit like that. And I feel like he's getting killed. Like, I don't know. I mean, maybe we'll get a grand finale or something. The judge is not having it. And the judge is the one that decides sentencing. The jury decides guilt and innocence, and the judge puts the number on it. Exactly.

He's definitely getting convicted on most of these counts at least. And then it's just in the judge's hands. And I don't think this judge is doing easy. Alex, when do we get the ruling? I think the prosecution originally was expecting to wrap this week. I think they only have one or two more witnesses, including a law enforcement agent. And then, you know, it goes over to the defense and no one's really sure how long they're going to take. I think the original estimate was a six to eight week trial.

And so we're about three now. I think Kaplan said four to six originally and i think it's going a little slow so it's probably six seven ish yes and then i don't know what the length of time is does anybody know what the length of time is between a verdict and a sentencing um it all i heard i heard sentencing cannot be late this year yeah i think either very late this year or beginning of next year but i mean we're talking before before the halving let's put that yeah my guess is the judge my guess is the judge goes through all the steps and gets a probation report and like i don't think the

judge is going to shortcut anything here and leave uh you know any room for like appeals or being overturned on something like that so you, you know, I think Sam, you know, assuming he's convicted, obviously he's already in custody because of everything that happened. So it's not like he's going to be let out in between sentencing. And now he'll be remanded. And I would assume it'll be,

yeah, anywhere from two to four months. You know, they'll do the probation support. They'll go through it all. And yeah, like I said, I think the judge drops the book on him my one of my best parts my best parts was the letter that

his counsel sent to the judge asking for for the 20 milligram adderall slow release because his adderall keeps running because you know that's like adderall during trial so his adderall keeps running on him so they want higher dos, but they also want the slow release. It's so fucking crazy, dude. I mean, the crazy thing is they're going to put him on the stand. And like, on some hands, I know people who are really excited for this. And I'm like, I actually think him on the stand is going to be terrible. Like, again, he doesn't have good lawyers.

Are we allowed to go in? Is anybody allowed to go and listen? Is anybody allowed? I mean, can I fly to the US? It's 100% public. You show up that day. You show up as, you know, there's obviously a line for it. You go through security.

But U.S. criminal court proceedings are all 100% open. So I can fly. I mean, it might be worth flying just to get his testimony. I mean, every, you're going to have to get there early. I know there's an overflow room and there can't be like infinite overflow room so i would guess that you have to be like first in line yeah there's an overflow right but what i mean is it's not like you have to ask permission where there's any kind of restriction in that way there is a capacity there's reserved

space obviously for like uh you know his family and for members of the press, but there is a public gallery, and as long as you are in line early enough, or in front of the line, you get in. Go in as a member of the press, Ran. Ran's going to camp out with a tent in front of the courthouse and do a live crypto town hall from his tent the night before.

Pull a big boy. I mean, hold on. I guess that if people could have been recording, they would have been recording. So I guess the judges said no recording. Correct. U.S. federal courts do not allow for audio or video recording. That's why you get the transcript.

And that's also why like the courtroom sketches are still a thing because you're not allowed to take photos. I mean, that might be be this might be a very um i don't know maybe a very naive question but you think i mean people are in there with their phones right surely like hundreds of people are in there with their phones no uh yes yes maybe i believe sorry maybe not an adult yeah so actually Yes. Maybe not. I believe. Maybe not in the federal court. So actually, so having testified in federal court before, you actually have your electronic devices taken from you. So the exception to that.

But then how are they sending all those notes? Members of the press in the overflow rooms that are able to do it and so and so i mean you know they're not situations where a member of the press accidentally very accidentally leaves his voice notes on so are you are you encouraging right are you encouraging crime in our reputable space? No, I'm just trying to find out what happens in the case of accidents. I believe you can be

held in criminal contempt and jailed by the judge for that. And I will not be testifying in that if you're a cop. Not worth it. So tempting, but not worth it. I think it was a good show call. Not worth it. Not worth it. But so tempting but not worth it. All right, man. I think it was a good show

and we'll see everyone again tomorrow. Yeah, Ryan? Anything else? Yeah. Tomorrow, hopefully, you got a better mic. A better mic, Mario.

Yeah. Can you tweet that the Bitcoin ETF is approved so we have another story for tomorrow? Yeah, I'll do that. I'll do that.

I'll get one of my interns'll do that and i'll get one of my infants i'll get one of my intentions i'll send it i'll send it on whatsapp i'll send it in the whatsapp group for us i'll see you guys tomorrow ciao guys