The Wolf Of All Streets - QT Ends, Crypto Rallies! Will Trump Speech Boost BTC? | Crypto Town Hall

Episode Date: March 20, 2025

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the How are people feeling this morning? Good morning Dave. How are you? Oh, I'm doing just dandy. Just had an interesting conversation with Yago on Bitcoin, which is something for Scott on his channel. He has to be more bullish than I was beforehand, which is always a good thing. But yeah, what do you make of these rumors, which I still think are kind of crazy, and I'm not sure that even could do it about Trump announcing, you know, capital gains, you know, no capital gains taxes or capital gains relief for crypto or Bitcoin or whatever. Just like everything else that's going on right now with respect to executive order season, in some way, shape, or form,

it'll meet with resistance and potential lawsuits. Changing tax code is probably something that's going to involve Congress, obviously. An executive order and the pattern of executive orders that I'm seeing coming out of the White House, I think are more intended to set the tone for the agenda as opposed to actually getting constructive things done. I don't think it's a bad thing to see an agenda being pushed that puts crypto first and forward. So I'm excited about that. But when you have to get to the

granular level of getting things done in Washington, you still have to go through the legislative branch because money and the purse is tied to the legislative branch. So interesting, Powell's comments yesterday, also interesting. I think he is trying very hard to temper inflation and call it more of a transitory temporary thing that's tied to tariffs. His comments and if you read into his comments suggest that he's not prepared to push any

rate cuts at this moment but is watching and overall doesn't see big indicators of an inflation concern. I mean obviously we're seeing gas prices coming down. The risk assets responded nicely to it. And I think we just need to have a little patience as always, Dave. Yeah, I mean, my read is, it was pretty straightforward. I said before it, you know, what people are gonna care about is will QT end sooner

rather than later or be extended and that's probably the biggest thing people were thinking about because I don't think anybody really expected a rate cut or announcements about rate cuts and he said ending in April which is sooner than I guess the markets were a hundred percent in May but it wasn't clear so I know that was sort of an all clear kind of thing I kind of wonder in a way if he regrets his comment using the word transitory because I think from a legacy point of view, it's associated with such obvious stupidity from the last time that it was used that I wonder if he regrets that. But I think

that looking at true inflation and looking at things going on, I mean, to say that what inflation we have are due to tariffs when they haven't really started yet is interesting to say that inflation, that the tariffs that are gonna start on quote, National Liberation Day, which I find amusing by the way, on April 2nd will be inflationary. I think that that's basically two plus two

equal four math, right? Alex. Yeah, I think one thing we've definitely seen is like the business community is very anticipatory of things. And so, you know, this is one of the big challenges that the Biden admin had, I think, in getting inflation down is that what people believe is going to happen is what happens. And since people thought it was going to keep perpetuating, they kept jacking their prices. Workers kept demanding raises and it perpetuated out.

And so when you've got a business community, especially if you talk to anyone in construction or anyone who's using, you know, buying steel or other hard materials, they're already announcing their price increases in expectation of the tariffs, which causes other people to be like, okay, well, my input costs are going up and they start announcing their price increases and it just becomes kind of a perpetuating cycle on it. So I think Powell's showing that he's going to be reactive to things, obviously, and they're

keeping an eye on it. But I think learning the lessons from the past is very much what the market wanted to see from him, which is why you're seeing the positive reaction on it. Going back to what Carlos said about the capital gains thing on Bitcoin, I will bet anyone a lot of sats that you're not getting no capital gains on Bitcoin. You might get a meaningless executive order like we've seen many of, but at the end of the day, federal tax law has to go through Congress. And if you look at the budget, there is no way that the House and Senate Republicans are going to cut Medicare, because they're going to have to cut Medicare under the current budget proposal,

cut Medicare to pay for a capital gains tax cut on Bitcoin. I mean, the amount that they would get thrashed for that is unbelievable. So don't see that happening. Yeah, I completely agree. I also don't think it's a smart move. I think that what they could do that would be a smart move, but of course, it's a question of degree, is issue guidance that spending Bitcoin doesn't trigger a taxable event. That they probably could do.

But even there, it's one thing to say spending Bitcoin for a cup of coffee isn't a taxable event. But if you spend Bitcoin to buy a house, I doubt very seriously that they could do. Yeah. I mean, it's always agreed. At the end of the day, Bitcoin should probably just be treated as any other foreign currency is. And if you're trading foreign currencies, you're taking tax obligations as you cross.

Yeah, although the number of people who pay taxes, if you happen to have, you know, I don't know how you would sell Turkish lira. I mean, basically the number of people who would actually pay capital gains taxes on currencies if you're not an actual trader are probably counted on one hand. Right, but that's also because it's de minimis, to your point about earlier with like the

cup of coffee, it's because it's de minimis amounts of money. Yeah, I mean, that's true. Although, I mean, look, they're commercial, commercial hedgers and commercial traders who probably, you know, it depends on how they do it. You know, it's really interesting. I mean, you know, I don't know the answer to these questions, but what I do know is that Bitcoin is a different animal because unlike, you know, when you're buying or you're repatriating, you know, foreign currency because you've made sales, which generally is done

contemporaneously with the sale, sometimes hedged in advance, and the hedging is almost certainly taxable. Bitcoin can easily be spent, it's designed for it. So it is different, and I just don't think there's any really good way for them to do anything without congressional action. That's really the point, I think. Do you suspect, suspect Dave that these announcements are gonna come out today at the BlockWorks Summit that's happening in New York?

I look, I personally doubt it, but the rumors are circulating on crypto Twitter. So you make of that what you will. I mean, look, Bitcoin, if it holds these levels right now, I mean, the technicians, some technicians are already capitulating, but there's not a lot of positive momentum here. This is still, yeah, I mean, it held support and all the dire predictions look to be not happening, but we shall see.

We all know, I predicted a bottom a couple weeks ago so far I look smart markets have a way of making me feel like I'm stupid I think anyone who trades should understand that it's really all about risk management But we're still seeing we're not seeing anything close to approaching greed yet, right? Definitely. I don't know how much hype is there but There's all people always hype this stuff. I think we're still in chop season, Dave. And I agree with you. I think we're still going to see some chop as things continue to unravel and work themselves out. But the fact that he's slated to

appear along with Sailor and speak today, obviously good news for the sector. Yeah, I mean, look, I'm very public about the fact that the announcement of the strategic reserve and the singling out of Bitcoin and in fact, yesterday it didn't get reported very much but the fact that someone in the administration, Bo Heinz, called Bitcoin digital gold and they view it that way and we want to, basically he sounds like me in terms of how much that Bitcoin is dramatically undervalued. That's the kind of thing that gets investment advisors attention. That's the kind of thing that will probably start moving the needle with investment consultants.

That's the kind of thing that funds that have discretion over what they're investing in will care about. And it does matter. Now yeah, there are certainly funds out there who are anti Trumpers. Also. Oh my god, we want to do the opposite but Honestly when money is online, I think most people tend to check their politics at the door, which would be a wise wise thing Alex, yes Yeah, hey Dave Really enjoying discussion. I got a couple of quick things one if I had to guess what Trump will say today, I would go with sort of a non-announcement related to the presidential working group. March 24th, they have the second round of things they have to deliver to the PWG. So the first 30 days was a catalog of all the issues that various agencies have related to digital assets. And then 30 days after that, which is March 24,

is a series of recommendations of how they would alter them. And my guess and a rumor I'm hearing is that he'll say something like, you know, he'll announce some of the recommendations early, right, or he'll say like, you know, as I promise, my government has delivered x, y, z amount of, you know, recommendations to improve crypto my government has delivered XYZ amount of, you know, recommendations to improve crypto in America. That's my guess is what he'll say.

I like Bo Heinz. I would take what Bo says is a little bit of a grain of salt. He's sort of a political spokesperson at most and the junior one at that. So just generally speaking, like what Bo says, whether he said at the BPI roundtable that we want to acquire as much Bitcoin as possible, like possible doing a lot of heavy lifting there and that sentence and he's kind of just vibe talking pretty sure he's not really like that important of a spokesperson understood that there.

Yeah, that certainly makes sense to me. The real question for investors is in the crypto world, so many people have gotten burned serially every time there's a hype cycle and levered up and then got liquidated. The question is, is that over now? Is it a long-term versus short-term thing? Has the market shaken out? I'm curious. Anyone who thinks that this is different than Carlo, what he thinks, because I tend to agree with Carlo. I think we're still in flop and chop season. I just don't think that the technical damage was nearly as bad as people believe.

I do think that the fundamentals will matter. But right now, not much. Zilean, what do you think? Yeah, I think that the price movements, like you always say, you know, they're made by people making prices. So I think that obviously in our environment, there is still a lot of predatory behavior. there is still a lot of predatory behavior, and there is still a lot of service providers and participants that don't live up yet to the promise. This is very important. I think maybe they don't see what's in it in them for the... I don't understand why they don't basically level up because we are going somewhere. I think that the fact that you have a US president that is talking about the asset class at this level, you have an organizational setup that is made to advance the crypto agenda, etc.,

is very important. I think this is how this asset class will move forward. My last experience today, I'm just speaking about this if anyone can have an idea how I can do it. But just today, I had the custody account with blockchain.com that was there for like two, three years. I haven't touched it. And today it got hacked and assets were withdrawn. And I asked specifically the support yesterday when I noticed to freeze

my account and nothing was done until 12 hours later where assets were withdrawn. You understand? So there is a level of service level that these certain providers, obviously not the top providers because top providers are the top because they offer a certain level of service. But at a certain point, we're talking here about financial assets, right? We're talking here about people's money and people's savings. For me, it's not given my overall picture, it's not a huge deal, but it's still a significant amount of money that lives just because the customer care is not is not syncing with the they don't have emergency procedure or God knows what they have in their operation. And these these entities, these same

entities, they show up in conferences and they say we are the most secure environment. No, they're not. I just paid the price. So anyways, bottom line, I think that from an agenda perspective and from a pathway perspective, I think we're making significant progress, right? Now still from a price discovery perspective, we still have stuff to do. You're going to have a large improvement of the environment from the service level that these providers offer to their customers. You still have long ways to go. But yeah, we're in the right path and this is very exciting fundamentally. I mean, when I hear that, you know, and by the way, I'm sorry to hear that, but you know, when I hear stories like this and we do all the time, you at the same time, last week was it, Kevin O'Leary going on national television talking about how it's safer to hold your Bitcoin on

centralized exchanges and you know, I find it bewildering. You know, it's one of those things where I can understand if it's insured, but the average human being, the average investor in America is so use and conditioned to, and then people probably if you ask most, they wouldn't even know what SIPC is.

They just know if they have stock in a brokerage account that it's there and there nothing is gonna happen exactly I mean look can you imagine like you signal to the actual help desk and you tell them look please freeze the account and they send you like a generic email saying please check this please check that no freeze the account and then we'll talk later, right? Because, and these are such simple procedure, but you at, I mean, if you, if you, if you do, if you, when this stuff happens to you personally, you're like, Oh my God, how can I trust this organization? How can any regulator not check? Because these, these guys, they claim to be regulated. They claim to do a lot of things. So to be secure. Anyways, I mean, I'm baffled

to be frank with you because I would never have thought that blockchain.com would have such a low level of response. It's crazy. I mean, you know, you signal the account and they don't freeze it for 12, 14, 24 hours. It would be great to get someone from blockchain.com on here. But I suspect they're going to want some more research before it. Carla. Yes, please. Yeah, look, first of all, I feel your pain.

I'm sorry that that happened to you. But if you look at it from both sides, traditional finance is still so far behind the curve when it comes to security measures, even in comparison to Coinbase. I would venture to say that Coinbase is a more secure platform to store your assets on than a bank or a traditional finance house because banks still will not allow two-factor authentication with Google Authenticator and require you to use your cell phone or your email address, which anyone in this space knows is the absolute worst two factor authentication layer. And it's the same for most traditional investment funds that

you'd store or custody your money with. So there's still a lag in traditional finance in catching up to exploits. And it's only natural that we're going to see it in crypto as well, but your money is just as vulnerable in a bank in certain aspects or in Vanguard for that matter, because they are really still behind the curve in creating proper security measures to protect against, which let's be real, the biggest vulnerability is still human error and people falling for and getting scammed with fake verification codes and so forth, getting texted to them. So that's not really right. Number one, it depends on the bank that you're using.

Frankly, I'm annoyed that Chase does it that way, but that's just because I want the convenience of using pass keys rather than a text code thing. But you're also kind also comparing apples to oranges. Banks are looking at different threat models that they're countering against too. Unlike with Coinbase, if you get scammed and send the money, you're responsible for it. If the bank's security procedures get breached and someone gets in and sends money who wasn't you, the bank's got to put it back. So it's a completely different threat model there versus if someone gets into your Coinbase account and sends it, even if it breached really on Coinbase, it's set like that's your problem and the crypto is gone.

And I think that, by the way, that that's something that people like. They like knowing that it is not their problem, or that the money will get put back if there is fraud, again, as opposed to a scam where you choose to send it. That's a thing that people like. And so they don't really care that there's not, you know, task key based authentication versus SMS based authentication. The banks still ultimately have a better user experience for most people. And then that's going to get into the additional layers after that. Again, this is one of the things that gets annoying for those of us who are more sophisticated, but like, and there are days where I'm trying to send like, large wires from Chase,

and it's like, yeah, because you know, their security teams are actually reviewing their algos are actually reviewing every transaction, and stopping them and not sending them unless you then go through additional layers of verification. And then you carry that to self custody to then Alex self custody invites its own sets of risks because at least with some of these more reliable, more, I think, robust centralized exchanges, at least they have people watching this stuff. Whereas we just saw the recent Chrome exploit, anyone with MetaMask, anyone working off of the Chrome browser could potentially be exploited,

even if you're self-custodying. So it's a never-ending challenge. And I mean, one of the interesting things with self-custody too is like you're actually, because if you're going to use something that's really secure, which is basically protocol level multi-sigs, you're actually limited in the controls. If I want something where I can say, hey, I want, let anyone who's authorized send $10,000 out of this account, but require two people to sign off if it's up to a million and three people if it's above a million. I reckon the only way I can do that is with centralized third-party custodians who've built their own software layer on top of it.

I can't do that using native protocol, right? Native protocol, I can pretty much only do either, you need a multi-sig for everything. So even if I just want to send a $1 test transaction, it's still like three signatures. And again, one of the things we're gonna have to do is we're gonna have to make it less nerve racking to do this. Like I regularly have had to do seven, eight, even occasional, the occasional like nine figure

crypto send. There is no way currently to not make that an absolutely fucking nerve racking, nauseating experience. I don't care how many test transactions you do. I don't care how many people are on the multisig signing a fucking transaction that you know is completely irreversible to send. You know, 10, 20, 30 million dollars somewhere is absolutely nerve wracking.

Anyone who does them will tell you this. And you know, that's when we're talking about like these huge controls, I don't know how we expect people to send significant chunks of like their personal net worth, right? Because $10 million to a company is the same as a thousand or $10,000 to the average person sometimes. I don't know how we expect people to do that without really evolving it or giving people really good solutions where they feel like They have a fallback and a response and like that's what again

This goes back to why people like banks at the end of the day They may hate the banking system in the abstract, but they like their bank because they feel protected by it and at least when someone, the account holder calls you and says, freeze, you freeze. What is this? Yeah. Well, I mean, look, anyone who's ever done it is crazy, but I do want to point out a couple of things that are fascinating. One is today, anyone who sends a Zelle, Zelles are generally thousands,

not millions of dollars, I don't know anyone's sends a Zelle, now Zelles are generally thousands, not millions of dollars, I don't know anyone's allowed to do that, but it tells you right when you're pushing the button, are you sure once you do this, it's irrevocable, the money is lost. So understand, and that's actually within the same rails, which I find fascinating. The second point is in a post stablecoin world

where banks are using stablecoins as their rails, expect more to be like Zelle and less to be less like what it currently is because with that speed will become an irrevocability, which means that banks need to come up the food chain in terms of security rather quickly in that world, which by the way is another reason why they're less enthusiastic about it than the rest of the world. So it is worth understanding that that is coming. It does matter. I mean, I see you giving the heart. I assume you agree with that.

Yeah, look, we all have felt the creeping dread of having to move things off of centralized exchanges to do the responsible thing and put them in self-custody. And like Alex said, it's always, you know, you do your test transaction, then you second guess, you double check the address before you make the big transfer, and you just hold your breath. And with Bitcoin, that takes a long time to reconcile. It's terrifying. It's not a fun experience.

That's why this is still not for everybody in the way it currently runs. Yeah, I agree. It's why I have, you know, personally multiple self custody wallets and multiple exchanges. You know, it's the same thing, you know, and look, there are some other problems that we talk about this, but these are all going to get solved. There are problems, right? Like survivorship. So you're doing a will, or if you don't do a will, right now, if you have a brokerage

account, you put a beneficiary on it. To my knowledge, unless they've changed it in the last month, Coinbase, Gemini, Kraken don't allow you to put a beneficiary on it. Well, that's a problem for a lot of people. So, you know, there's all sorts of small intermediation that people are gonna want that will happen. I personally think there are people looking to solve that problem right now.

If I had to guess, I haven't talked with Mike Belshe about it, but I'm sure that between Anchorage and Bicco and other custodians, they're looking at these sorts of problems in ways of solving them. You know, it's only been a month or two since the regulators would even let them even attempt to. So, you know, I guess we'll see. If you want to solve. Oh, sorry, Alex. I was just going to say real quick, if you want to, I recognize you the best inheritance solution I've seen so far is CASA's team,

which is self custody with it. They have a really good inheritance set up for people. And that's in talking to, you know, technology, but not crypto oriented. To friends, that's one of the biggest things that keeps them from buying in is like, what happens if I get hit by a bus and where does all that? You know, how do I know that like my spouse or kids or whatever actually going to be able to get in? Then you layer on top of that the concerns about the actual exploits that can happen

when you're swapping, like Mav attacks and sandwich attacks. And how do you explain like adjusting your slippage and protecting against someone who is using sophisticated algorithms to track when you're moving a massive amount of coins from one to the other and how they can get in there, exploit and completely wreck your transfer. I mean, there are so many challenges still unanswered. Well, I mean, you're talking my language now. I mean, one of the things that I always think about with crypto is how immature the market structure is. And it really is a rabbit hole, but the entire DeFi trading experience,

as opposed to the DeFi yield experience, the DeFi yield experience is significantly more advanced. DeFi trading experience for most people, it is crap. It's the kind of thing that reminds me of 1990s level trading in the equity markets before NASDAQ market makers had to settle. At the time, it was a land breaking, a groundbreaking billion dollar settlement with the authorities for screwing around with their markets. And what they did is child's play compared to what happens in the DeFi world. Yet people in DeFi don't care for a variety of reasons, most notably in all likelihood, what they view as less oversight. It could be for anonymity, it could be for people who are dumb,

tax avoidance, it could be for people who are dumber, regulatory avoidance by being able to do stuff or people who just want freedom from the government. But the fact is the DeFi trading experience has got awful for that exact reason in many cases. I mean, the very nature of MEV would be it makes what Michael Lewis talked about in Flash Boys in terms of front running, once again, look like child's play, you know, dramatically larger numbers. So you know, there's a lot of things that are going to happen. But please, everyone should understand that, you know, there are people out there who are

looking if you're buying a meme coin, you expect to 1000 X, do you really care that you lose one or 2%? You know, you trip lost one or 2% when you're buying Amazon stock, you know, you would be screaming. I mean, hell, people get mad about losing a hundredth of a percent or a thousandth of a percent in the equity market. So it is a very different world. Okay.

So other than that, anybody else have any thoughts? I mean, the same a lot of our people, a lot of people who are normally here are probably at DAS waiting. Does anyone know when the actual speech is going to be? I mean, I think it was recorded, but I think they're going to play it soon, right? If we can nerd out for a minute, I'm really excited about tomorrow's SCC summit, and that's going to be broadcast live. And I'm excited to hear what's going to be discussed there, because I think that's going to lay tracks, Dave, for some clarity on how we can move forward when it comes to

digital assets. Yeah, I mean, I'm very interested in that, too. I was trying to think of if there was a way I could get myself invited because I understand a lot of these issues. The biggest thing that's going on with that working group is there are things they want to do that they don't have the jurisdiction to do. And it's funny because unlike the previous administration, where when they didn't have the jurisdiction, they just claimed it, administration, where when they didn't have the jurisdiction, they just claimed it. That's just not in the DNA of, of, of either, you know, Commissioner purse or we either, or the

working group, they they're looking to see what can be done that to create sandboxes to create environments for entrepreneurs to be to feel free to actually, I don't want to say come in and register, but come in and talk and understand it. It is interesting. The most important question I would love to hear answered, and I know it won't be, is okay, you have this asset, which is a security because we think it has to do

with a corporate entity, an asset which is not a security, we want to trade them on the same platform, how do we do it? What do you think? Can you repeat the question, Dave? I'm sorry, I got distracted. Yeah, the real question that we have as an industry is for years, we've said being a security is a debt sentence

because the laws just don't work. Well, this SEC gets that, and I've talked to members of the task force, so I know they get that. They don't want it to be. But that doesn't answer the fact that let's say you're trading Bitcoin, you want to do a transaction to swap Bitcoin for some token that may be deemed a security because it's controlled by a it's controlled the efforts of a central corporation are relevant,

or maybe even it's for a future revenue stream. Things that coins haven't, people in the US have shied away from. That sort of thing, or even a stable coin, which might not be considered a security. Actually facilitating individual transactions that involve securities and non-securities is something that has to get tackled before it all works.

Don't you agree? Yeah, no, and I think we're starting to see it. I've seen several smart lawyers in the space beginning to write proposals arguing why things are not securities, arguments that in the prior administration and regime would have been unthinkable to advance. Now we're seeing more robust creativity and conversation about, hey, this is not a security and here's why. So I think the season now is going to be understanding

that there are certain hard and fast rules that cannot be escaped, but having more of a dialogue about exceptions to these rules. understanding that there are certain hard and fast rules that cannot be escaped, but having more of a dialogue about exceptions to these rules. And I think it's going to be exception season if I had to predict. Yeah, I just don't think that does what we needed to do. I mean, for digital asset for the asset markets to go digital, there needs to be there needs to be changes to rules or exceptions.

And I think you're probably right, it will start with no action relief. But I don't know how much can happen without Congress setting clear jurisdictional boundaries. And obviously, I think there's big hope for a market structure, Bill. But realistically, the CFTC and SEC need to work together or it won't work. I still maintain that we need to revisit the Howie test. And I think, you know, unfortunately, the downside, and I say this with a big caveat, the downside of these cases all getting dismissed is there's nothing teed up to challenge whether Howie is the appropriate test, whether it's an outdated test,

and whether the Supreme Court needs to revisit it. We had several cases in the pipeline that were teed up to challenge that if they got that far. I'm relieved that they're not going that far, but also part of me thinks that aspect needs to be revisited as well. Because we've always accepted this notion from the SEC that the Howey test applies to digital assets

and whether they're a security or not and whether they're an investment contract. And we've pushed back against that, but lower courts are bound by precedent. So until we get clarity from the Supreme Court on that, we're still kind of stuck in that quandary where anytime you do challenge whether a digital asset is an investment contract or not, you've got to go through the tedious Alley analysis, which I think is somewhat outdated and probably is due for a refresh.

Yeah, I mean, I agree, except I think that we're asking the wrong question. I will always say it this way. That is so so, you know, Robbie's on the panel, or, yeah, and you guys, you're invested in a ton of businesses. And I would phrase, I would love, I hope you can, you're available to speak, but I'd love to have your answer to this question. I just don't think it makes any sense for a company

who's deciding how to raise capital, to have to worry about the asset that they're creating whether or not it's considered a security or not. If you are trading every bond or basically everything the capital stack of corporations is considered a security, they have different methods of trading. But let's say for the sake and look at MicroStrategy strategy as an example, you know, they have multiple asset classes. So now let's say you want to sell future revenues in the form of a token that's in an ecosystem alongside equity.

Should you really be deciding, should those things trade differently just as a first principle? My answer is no, they should trade the same. But of course, we have embedded problems in equity, such as the accredited investor rule, which is really the thing that needs to go. Those sorts of rules need to go because the one of the reasons people use crypto is to get around the accredited investor rule, which is insane. I mean, if the rule itself is insane. Anybody have an opinion on that? I mean, Alex, your hand is up. Yeah, I think I think there's a lot of kind of crazy rules

and then extend. Well, I think the idea, though, that like this isn't really a thing for the SEC or the courts to do right. Like when it comes to this is how we outdated, like yes and no. I don't have that big a problem with how I think it like is a good fundamental test when it like is a good fundamental test when it comes to a good enough, I should say fundamental test when it comes to securities. I think the issue is that digital assets and things really don't fit into the traditional box well.

But the answer, the only answer to that is cool. Congress needs to get off the house and actually write new laws to it. And if someone good in the SEC like you, Ada and Perse, I love, want to propose a thing, which is exactly what well-understood expert agencies and things should be doing is saying, hey, here's a good proposal we can work off of. And there's obviously some things out there. But fundamentally, you need a baseline catch-all test when you don't know what's coming down.

And when you're dealing with finance and people trying to do things, you need a good baseline test like how we did do it. It's just that when you find specific cases where it's not gonna work, you then need to come up with different paths, different ways to define things. But the only way to do that is in the

law, which means Congress actually having to do it. Yeah, I'm just want to jump on this one, because this is I thought the path that David Sachs was taking, right? He's taking basically a path of complete clarity via the law. So entrepreneurs should not worry about this type of stuff. Is that correct? I think that is what he wants to do, but that's why, but it's not trivial to do it. I think also that's why I was quite optimistic when I saw Brian Quintez being sort of reappointed back

to CFTC because I think if we can really differentiate, between things that are securities and not securities and add a little bit more common sense in there, coming at it from, we have a background in video games. And so when we came to blockchain originally, it was to create tokenized in-game content back in 2017. And the idea that just because something has more liquidity, it should be considered a security, even though it's just a collectible piece of IP in a video game is kind of absurd because nobody ever decided that beanie babies and Pokemons were securities. And the same thing applies for traditional in-game currencies like gold in World of Warcraft,

etc. And we've used these examples quite a lot. So I think my big hope is that there's a little bit more common sense coming into this because obviously there will be bad actors, there will be people who will try to wash trade with beanie babies. This stuff happens. But by and large, we need to just have more pragmatic rules for the mainstream, I think.

Well, I certainly agree with that. I think that a baseline, principle-based rule set which goes targets fraud and anti-manipulation for all electronically traded assets is something that contends Paul Atkins and will almost certainly agree upon. I mean, anyone who has my background and believe me, I understand liquidity arbitrage and I hate to admit it at various times in my career going back decades, thankfully, but regulatory arbitrage, those are things you don't want. You don't want rules where people do things that have nothing to do with the economic reasons but have to do because there are different

legal paths. Lawyers, of course, they love that because they get to create those different legal paths. Sorry, Carlo, but it's a fact. I have lots of friends who are lawyers who are experts in doing things such as structuring derivatives to get around tax laws in a particular way, et cetera, et cetera. In this, my contention is simple, Robbie. It's that we want a consistent method for trading digital assets that provides a base level of protection without going too far. And I would defy anybody. And I mean, I literally I know them all, or most of them, the market structure, quote, experts in the

equity markets in the US, to say that if they had a blank sheet of paper, they would design the market structure we currently have. I literally don't know. Completely agree. And so to me, that's a big deal. The reason I am so supportive of this administration isn't because – I've been called fanboys and other sort of things – it's that the people who are in power make sense. Scott Bessent, if you've seen any of his recent tour on macro, makes enormous sense to me. In fact, the first one, the first Secretary

of the Treasury, I think we've had in a very long time to actually understand the problem, frame the problem, and also try to frame the solutions. Same thing with David Sacks in terms of understanding the issues and getting there. To me, that's the important thing. You know, people always say, I've heard you say it, Carlo, people is policy, right? I mean, to me, that's why I'm so hopeful. But there's a lot of work to get there. 100%. There's definitely a lot of work to get there. But conditions have never been better to get there. And, I mean, you could not ask for a more favorable environment for undoing what's been done and forging a path forward. And I'm excited.

And as far as I'm concerned, I have pretty much from my own internal clock, proclaimed this a bull market. And I'm excited to start talking to builders again about building things. And I think the enthusiasm is starting to come back to builders again about building things. And I think the enthusiasm is starting to come back to the sector. So I'm really excited to start talking about not being afraid of doing things, but doing things again. And yes, we still need clarity. But nevertheless, I'm still very bullish on what's coming. Absolutely. I'll jump on this very quickly. I think that a lot of entrepreneurs have been very scared to do things like the very good

ones and the risk-averse guys and the guys that have opportunity costs. They don't want to jump into this. This is very problematic for them. First of all, you have regulatory issues once you launch whatever you launch to finance your gig with. Second, you can't pivot because once you launch whatever you launch, you have a community behind you and you can't pivot to find product market fit. So that's another issue.

Third, you can't go bankrupt. Can you imagine a country where you can't, what happens to countries where you can't go bankrupt, where you can't orderly dissolve your crypto enterprise. You cannot do that in the crypto space. So a lot of people, a lot of very good builders are saying, I'd rather build something else in Web2. What I have, because you build it offshore. Or yeah, or just come here to Dubai and structure it very well, etc. And, and you're welcome, actually, if you want to come to Dubai please do. Thank you guys thank you for having me I have to address this issue of the hack if anyone please know someone at blockchain.com would be really great to get

in touch I'm just trying to get in touch with someone I'm unable to and thank you Dave again for having me. Yeah thanks for taking the time Z, Zillian. And good luck and godspeed. Yeah, I mean, it is completely fascinating. You know, from my perspective is interesting, because, you know, I co founded a company that has effectively started in the US. And I wouldn't say move to Dubai, but we're half in Dubai now. And you see the difference. And understanding that that could be here is something that I don't think the market is remotely pricing it.

I think there are probably some of the biggest winners don't exist yet or maybe don't even have tokens yet, or if they do, we don't know who they are. But understanding that sea change is a very big deal. In terms of Bitcoin, I mean yeah I don't know is Trump speaking because the market looks like it just dropped a thousand bucks. I don't know if people are on top of it, I haven't seen anything but yeah I think it's a very very big deal. thing. But yeah, I think it's a very, very big deal. There's a lag, Dave, there's always a lag, people were very impatient. We saw the enthusiasm post inauguration,

executive orders came out. But then everyone gets disappointed because they don't see immediate pumping of their bags, and they get angry and frustrated. And they don't realize that when it comes to making the sausage, it takes time for all these regulatory changes to work themselves out and get integrated into the system. And people become impatient. crypto is already an impatient,

adrenaline, FOMO driven space to begin with. But for the people who understand the long game, it could not be better. I mean, you really could not have scripted a better situation right now when you've actually got a crypto czar in the White House. You know, obviously, I agree. I don't think we have, you know, it's I constantly make the joke, you know, on our macro Monday, you know Monday that things are not priced in, but markets in the short run don't react to liquidity. That's really what it is, and momentum. We have a very fast news cycle that people are carrying, and so we get over reactions

and underreactions. If you take a step back and zoom out, you end up with a very, very different scenario. Like altcoins, people look at altcoins and they view it as a monolith. Well, it's not. There are building communities that are very, very different. And there are very, very different use cases and very, very different things. That's why people like Robbie have jobs. You figure out what builders make sense. And in crypto, we've gotten away from that in technical training because these things are so highly correlated. Well, why are they highly correlated? They're highly correlated because they're all reacting to these sort of macro factors of both liquidity and regulatory. It is highly likely that within the next several years

that liquidity will always be there, but that you will start to see real builders start to emerge. You know, if you were paying attention back in 2003 and you were able to get money allocated into Google when people were saying, hey, yeah, we're using this thing, but it wasn't public yet, you did extraordinarily well, right?

I don't know what chains are going to matter, and I don't know where the adoption will come from. I have suspicions, but I'm not gonna talk about that now. But there's just a lot going on here, and you're right, Carlo, it's just a very, very big difference. But I will be, I've said it before, I'll be really happy when lawyers

don't have to talk about the Howey test and we just know that these assets are going to be traded on these platforms and here's how they're going to work. Here's what the disclosures are going to be for issuers. Here's how we understand, you know, here's what gets, what gets prosecuted and what doesn't. Right. But you know, it's, it's, it, it it's it I'm struggling here because there's just so such a big divide right you know that's the other really big big divide in the in the industry but anyway seems like with tasks going on and what's going on the market we just we have much less than usual it's after 11 o'clock so if anybody has anything else to say please let me know or we will call it for today and come back. Let's see is there anyone down here?

No. We'll call it for today and we will see tomorrow we'll actually be able to discuss what was said in terms of instead of speculating about what was said or what will be said. So see you back here tomorrow at 10 15 for Click to Town Hall. Thanks.