The Wolf Of All Streets - SOL ETF Incoming? Coinbase Sues Regulators! | Crypto Town Hall

Episode Date: June 27, 2024

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Hey, Mike. Stocks keep going up, man. What's going on? Hey, Scott. Well, it's end of the month, end of the quarter. And you know what they say about momentum. Momentum brings momentum. That's the cool thing about the stock market. If it goes up, it goes up. The question is how far? Yeah, I want to wait to get to the big crypto topic. So it's perfect that you're here. I had Dan from ChartGuys as one of the guests on my show this morning.

And he actually made a really interesting point. I think something you and I have been discussing, what happens when NVIDIA talks, right? We had this sort of drawdown on NVIDIA over 10%, I think, over a matter of days. He was pointing out that it was a very bullish signal, actually, that we were seeing Amazon and such making new all-time highs yesterday because it indicates that the money is rotating into other big tech as opposed to leaving the market yeah i'm i'm you know it's one of those things that um happens in extreme manias like this everything is bullish and everything will remain bullish until it's not um and making a new high is not bearish i mean i i find that i just know we a lot of us have sat through these things before and last lesson i've learned is never try and making a new high is not bearish. I find that I just,

a lot of us have sat through these things before. The lesson I've learned is never try to pick the top and find alternatives, which Bitcoin has been a great alternative. Gold is actually doing quite well on a four-year and one-year basis. But yeah, those are the kind of things you have to be very careful about. I don't know exactly when or where.

All I know is I look at the key thing for me is you look at things like volatility. It's buried on a 52 week moving average. You look at the S&P 500 versus its 100 week moving average. It's way up there. And then, of course, the macro versus GDP market cap. It's two times. We all know these are the kind of things that just the tinderbox awaiting a spark and you look for alternatives. Now. Yeah, I've been early, I've

been wrong. And there's other play, but there's other things have done very well. But the thing that's the thing about the other thing is done very well. It looks like the leading indicator, as I always like to say is Bitcoin has is showing lagging tendencies lately, and I think it's more likely not to catch up and more likely to just tell us there's more of a problem. But again, it's the last trading day of the month is tomorrow. It's a long week.

It's, you know, next week is a holiday weekend. We know typically for 4th of July in that type of period, it's good for the stock market, but there's nothing that's bad for the stock market anymore, which we all know is when you have to be careful. That makes perfect sense. I wanted to wait until we have a bigger panel and a lot more people listening today. But Matthew, I have a bone to pick with you, man. We got to talk

Okay. Yesterday, you know, you could have given it to me. I know you couldn't fiduciary duty and inside trading, I'm sure, and things. But yesterday, you were on my show on YouTube, and I made a fool of myself, which is not uncommon. And I said, I don't think there's any way. I said, randomly, not knowing anything about VanEck, I said, yeah, they just filed for a Solana ETF in Canada. There is no way that happens in the United States. The clip is above. You paused and you said, I wouldn't be so sure about yourself, Scott. And today, you guys file for a

Solana Trust. Can you unpack that a bit for me? Obviously. So is a trust the same as an ETF? We have Valtunas coming as well, because we've seen ETH and GBTC and Solana Trusts before. Is this effectively an ETF? Yeah, it's 100% an ETF. Same structure as Bitcoin and Ethereum spot ETFs. There's lots of different kinds of trusts, but this is definitely an ETF. And, you know, I obviously couldn't tell you yesterday until the filing was accepted. There have been instances in the past where we have attempted to file an S1 and the SEC has told us, please hold off. This is like the pre-2022 days. And we did that out of respect to the regulator. So there's no guarantee that we were going to submit this. I'm really

pleased that it was accepted. And we're just tired of waiting. Solana and Ethereum share too many things in common to make a differentiation between them when it comes to an ETF. And we think that the focus on the regulated futures market of significant size is misguided. There are a number of ETFs in the power, electricity space, uranium, where the futures market is extremely thin, and most of the activity takes place in the spot market or overseas. And we're confident that, you know, with the passage of time, the SEC will also acknowledge this. Yeah, unpacking that a bit more, because when we've had experts on before, they always made that point about the CME futures, right? And that's the one that I parroted, I guess, incorrectly many times on X. I'm willing to admit what I've made a mistake or maybe

potentially wrong. But it always seemed that Bitcoin had futures. So they kind of won that market of significant size debate, surveillance sharing agreements. We got that approved. Then based on that, basically, Ethereum had to be approved because they also had CME futures, right? And, you know, surveillance sharing agreements, et cetera. I thought that's where the line really was drawn. And you're saying that there's clearly another justification beyond that market to approve one of these. Yeah. So one way to possibly get around the regulated futures market of significant size is with these surveillance sharing agreements. So you may remember that in the run-up to the spot, Bitcoin ETFs, Coinbase entered into or proposed surveillance sharing agreements with a number of the listing exchanges, the CBOE and NASDAQ, so that the

regulator could see that information. Those surveillance sharing agreements are not what was used. In the end, it was the Bitcoin futures market, which was used. So we don't see why Coinbase can't sign another surveillance sharing agreement specifically around the Solana asset with the CBOE and NASDAQ and thereby satisfy the regulators look through requirements. You sort of hinted at the fact that you're tired of waiting. So does that, just for clarity, I'm assuming anyone can theoretically file anything that doesn't indicate a higher or lower odd of it being approved. Now, I know you guys wouldn't file unless you thought there was a viable chance of it being approved. But there's also seems like this is a brilliant move for putting some pressure on the net and pushing the narrative forward. and they have not explained why, right? So it's impossible for token issuers

and the public to understand under what situation is a token commodity and when is it a security. And if there is a large and liquid spot market, which leads the futures market, and let's be real, like most of the trading for all these tokens, including Bitcoin, price formation is happening in the futures market and lets be real, like most of the trading for all these tokens, including Bitcoin, price formation is happening in the spot market, then we just think eventually

the regulator is going to change its mind. So what kind of timeline does this put us on? Remind me, I know we all kind of unpack these with Bitcoin and ETH, but this could be a long slog, I assume. Yeah, there will be three different chances for the SEC to approve or delay these filings. Obviously, the 19b4s will have to go in as well. Initial review, you know, usually within 30 days. And then each round of review and comments can take an additional, you know, one to two months. It's not really that long. I say, you know, I think we all got conditioned to Bitcoin spot ETF process taking years. But you're saying that, you know, within weeks and months, we're at least going to have to start getting answers from the SEC to some degree, they can only take the can down the road so far. Yeah, initial filing to approval is typically three to six months. I'm

sure if Eric is on here, he will have more details. So, you know, that puts the election right in the middle of it. Yeah, really good timing for you guys. You got to say it. There's some like the universe is aligning in a strange way that you guys filed this within basically an hour of the news breaking that Coinbase was suing the SEC and FDIC. When we're talking about the idea that we want more clarity on these assets that they haven't given, there's a lot for one day. Yeah, and let me just clarify that as part of the filing process, we also need a partner assets that they haven't given. There's a lot for one day.

Yeah. And let me just clarify that as part of the filing process, we also need a partner exchange to file a 19B4. That has not been done yet. So that could, we'll see how long that takes. Sorry, David, you can jump in. Yeah. I was going to say that the hits for the SEC today don't stop coming. They just got a Supreme Court decision against them in the Jarkeesie case where the SEC has been alleged to be using in-house judges to go ahead and enforce their agency powers. And the Supreme Court has gone ahead and dealt them, I think, a major loss there. This is humble pie being served up to Gary Gensler's agency in extra helpings, doubles and triples at this point. And who knows, to your point earlier on your show, who knows if this all comes up in tonight's debate, you know, in some sense about crypto. But I just, I think it is, I don't know if this SEC now rolls over, or just crawls away and goes into a corner, and whether we need to wait for another administration in order to get activity.

I have no idea what's going to happen with any of these things that were filed today, Coinbase or Solana ETF, but I know that I can take solace in the fact that Gary Gensler currently is having one of the worst days of his life and is definitely down in the basement of the torture chamber, taking it from elizabeth warren one way or another and so you know we can all cheer for that i think on this day lawyer do you have a comment go ahead yeah i was just wondering what people thought about whether or not we need a solana etf or just like you know thoughts on that etf in general matthew should i let you take that one first since you obviously think we need a Solana ETF? Yeah, sure. I mean, we have a spot Solana ETF trading in Europe, and there's roughly $60 million in that.

So the US ETF market is obviously multiples of Europe. And we're very bullish on Solana. See, you know, bigger upside for the token if our thesis plays out. So there's, you know, why not, right? What's the reason not to? Yeah, fair enough. I can see that. If you guys dig into what ETFs currently exist for and are publicly traded, it goes a hell of a lot wilder than Solana. I mean, there are ETFs for literally almost anything. And we even had the inverse

frame of ETF guys, right? So I mean, I think Solana is actually probably a top 20% of reasonable things to have an ETF for when you actually dig into how many things have been approved. Go ahead, Dan. Yeah, so I think just to echo the previous sentiments, I think the fact that there's no regulated body that trades futures for Solana is breaking a barrier here. So if the SEC were to approve this ETF without the regulated market of the CBOE, which trades the futures, then it opens the door a little bit. I think then you would have you know, potentially further lawsuits for other ETFs So a dogecoin ETF or any other shit coin ETF? On the same grounds that a denial would be was it arbitrary and capricious?

I was saying to my friends recently. I think you know, we're a long way away from any other coin getting ETF So I was a little bit surprised to see it today um yeah i i think if they approve the slana etf without the cboe futures i i don't see it happening in my opinion the sec have been you know full-throated behind you know trying to destroy and and do everything they can to stop crypto so i don't think it's gonna happen but if it does happen then there's very little reason why they shouldn't allow etfs for everything so that's why i don't think what happened i know in switzerland there's etns for a bunch of stuff you know i i'm writing a book right now i was researching it recently i remember i was working at binance when the bmb etm was

approved in switzerland um i just don't see it happening and they say if it does it opens the the door for you know lawsuits again the same you know arbitrary and capricious reasons to deny it so i will be surprised if it gets approved but i hope it is so i think i think the answer is yes because every crypto coin should have a um every every bullish everything with bullish futures should have an etf i think is the answer right uh so it comes down to how do you define bullish? Now we get a comrocket ETF? Yeah, I mean, I think any crypto that will be around in a few years is bullish.

It'll be doing well. So that's why, for me, all these arguments seem to apply to anything that's shown that it won't go away. Do you want a Terra Luna ETF? No, no. Anything that's shown us that it won't go away, which is what I think is the only thing that Solana's done. So what a Terra Luna ETF? No, no. Anything that's shown us that it won't go away, which is what I think the only thing that Solana's done. So what about Terra Luna? That was the biggest coin for a long time, you know?

Yeah, but we knew that was good. I mean, people, sorry, Ran, if he's here, but a lot of people knew that was problematic, right? I know you're allowed to mock Ran today. He's not here. You can say whatever you want. Other people knew. Yeah, I mean, I guess it I guess it is a slippery slope.

I would say what's actually exceptionally interesting, I would say if these start to get approved would be the ability for indexing, which I think is the really big product and future for this market. I mean, anyone who looks at the way that people trade and invest in 2024, they know that it's largely passive and into mutual funds ETFs, indexes. So, you know, an approval of a Solana one or however further you go, then you start to get top 10 crypto token ETFs and metaverse ETF and gaming ETF. And that's where I think it gets really interesting. I can't imagine that there would ever be demand for an ETF of a crypto that's like 30th by market cap by itself, but that indexed into a smart product created by someone who understands the weighting. I think those become very, very compelling. Dave, then Simon. Yeah, I mean, I think that it depends, is the short answer on what happens in a regulatory sense,

and regulatory and how the industry does it. There are two reasons people like ETFs. The most, one of which it gives them, right now it gives them access in their brokerage account. So if there was ever a them access in their brokerage account uh so if there was ever a world where in your brokerage account you were allowed to like a 401k whatever buy a native crypto custody by a third-party provider where you had the same civic protection or similar type civic protection for your crypto assets and the same way to have a defined beneficiary if you die and all

that other stuff that you get with an etf if all that could happen with native crypto which and the same way to have a defined beneficiary if you die and all that other stuff that you get with an ETF. If all that could happen with native crypto, which by the way, it will, it just may take a long time because frankly, I think the vast majority of ETFs, equities, etc. will all trade on chain at some point in the future. But until that happens, the ETF gives people something that they just can't get in the crypto world in any meaningful sense as an individual. And so that's why your 30th coin might actually have some success from small ETF issuers. I mean, look, there are thousands of ETFs that are just tiny relative to the Bitcoin ETF. And they still make people can still make a living. You could imagine that world.

But does that make sense to put an ETF wrapper on an individual crypto that you could actually handle better? Well, objectively, it makes no sense. But in a short term, because it makes sense in this regulatory environment in this market, but it doesn't make sense when crypto goes fully mainstream and people just get wrapped or be native. Right. right i mean and so that when you have conversations with people who are in the traditional world once you you get them to understand you know how it could work then generally the light bulb goes on unless you're gensler and warren in which case you want the light you want to walk around smashing all the street lights and the light bulbs

because you don't want you know progress but outside. But outside of that, that's the big deal. So that's the only point that I think is worth making. Yeah, you could see, I mean, Solana is a slam dunk in my opinion, but you could see the top 30 coins all trading with ETFs if we still dither and haven't gotten anywhere so that the average person could trade it. It gives them the ability to buy it in a brokerage account. Simon? Yeah, I'd just say, you know, to answer the answer the question like is there a need for a salon or etf well it's not a product i want to consume and i have no need for it but it doesn't mean that somebody else doesn't want it so the the market and the rules are already written um the exchanges have their minimum liquidity requirements and their rules around listing

the regulators have their disclosure requirements and if everything can be disclosed and it's fair clear and not misleading um then it should be able to go out to the market and the company launching the etf if they think that there is a business model around it and it may be an awful decision and an awful business model, then they should be able to launch it, lose loads of money, make loads of money. In terms of a Terra Luna ETF, the job of the regulator is not to determine whether Terra Luna is a good investment or not. The job of the regulator is to ensure that everything that can go wrong is disclosed

and investors know what they're investing in and it meets the requirements of all the different actors that want to engage in it. So if somebody wants to custody Terra Luna and they think they can do that in the correct way and a market and exchange wants to list it and anyone wants to create the product, then that's what the most liquid,

best capital markets in the world should do. And it shouldn't be regulators saying, I think this is good and I think this is bad. It should be the market saying, this is an absolute dog-toed shit coin with no liquidity. And did we disclose all the risks? Matthew? Yeah, I was just going to say, Scott, that your point on the indexing of these coins is very relevant. So we announced yesterday our indexing subsidiary market vectors just hit $50 billion in assets under management tied to their licensed indices. That's an all-time high. And in the press release, we called out the growth in crypto as a big factor in that growth.

So Market Vectors has more than three dozen token indices. We've partnered with Token Terminal and have fundamental indices that weight constituents based on fees and users. And the interesting thing about these indices is that they are essentially regulated. When you read these ETF filings, you will see that the index is disclosed and the process that the index uses is also disclosed

because each of these indices has to pick and choose which exchanges are credible to include in the prices that constitute the index. So I do think that this Solana ETF is going to be the first step towards investable indices that trade on regulated exchanges. Matthew, is the credibility of that exchange something that's determined arbitrarily by the SEC? Is there some sort of metric for determining that? Yeah, it's a process. So market vectors, if you read the index guide, discloses how they choose which exchanges can be included.

And VanEck owns a piece of CC Data, the old Crypto Compare. That is the organization that calculates those prices. And they rank quarterly exchanges based on, I think it's six different factors. And then the top five exchanges each quarter are included as the price contributors. And you'll see the same thing for CF benchmarks, which is the underlying benchmark for some of the other ETFs. They have a similar but slightly different process. And top five based on volume, I assume, or something. Sorry. based on volume, I assume, or something? Sorry? When they say, you know, top five exchanges

based on volume, you know, what's the metric? It's like five different criteria, including volume. There's a compliance score based on, like, if the exchange is facing any lawsuits. I can put the link under the space. Perfect. Dan dan go ahead yeah so i think look we're gonna head to a future where you know a lot of coins have etfs um i don't think we're getting there without dragging the sec kicking and screaming the entire way and through

the legal process um if you look again to europe which is quite weird because if you look at the top 50 companies by market cap in europe none of them were founded in the last 100 years. And you look at America, none of the top 50 companies – sorry, the European companies were all over 100 years old. The American companies, none of them existed 100 years ago. America has been leading the way in innovation and stuff, and Europe has been a massive laggard in this kind of stuff but i think obscure like weirdly um the approach that europe has been taking towards um digital assets has been completely different you look in switzerland you have 21 shares you have all of these companies uh so all these coins are listed there i i think that is the future um i think it's the future in america as well um the future is already here. It's just not equally distributed.

I think we get there. But even with the regime change, I don't know that the apparatus of the government will change that significantly. That is the future. We're going there. We all know that that's the way it's going to go. But I don't think we get there quickly with the SEC. I think you're going to, again, have to drag them kicking and screaming the entire way. Yeah, I mean, different leadership could suffice even without fundamentally changing the apparatus, right?

I mean, we've never had, I don't think, an SEC that's been more anti-entrepreneurship, tech, innovation, etc. that we do right now. So even under the same regime without Gary Gensler or different mandate, I think it could be different. But I think your point about Europe is very important. I think that everyone recognizes that the United States is lagging and sees an opportunity to get ahead in markets like this. And that's the reason that we've seen sort of this warming, I think, to our industry and others abroad and not in the United States, because it's a huge potential capture for them to be ahead. Go ahead, David.

Yeah, I just want to make two quick points. One, you know, everyone who the the anti-innovation on gary gensler alone is smoking something uh you know that's not what i'm saying no no i know i just want to make a real quick point you and i agree on what i'm about to say i'll let me state that at the outset sorry scott uh that that gensler voted for the bitcoin etf because he realized he had to or as carolyn crenshaw, who Biden just re-nominated for another term, which would mean five more years of her, not only did she vote against it,

but she wrote a dissent that I have taken it apart and actually published a rebuttal to her dissent, which was borderline hysterical. It would have failed a middle school, maybe freshman year of high school essay. It would have been a failing grade because it was so badly documented. But she's so hysterically anti-crypto that, you know, understand that is what this administration still is for. So that's important. The second thing is the biggest single reason why the United States has crushed

Europe in innovation is because we've had a set of light-touch deregulation, and we've had a tax code which has been very pro-Silicon Valley in the sense of incentives for growing wealth and equity, and there are too many to list, which, by the way, Elizabeth Warren and the people running this administration are trying to change by things like wealth taxes, etc. If you believe, anyone listening who believes that innovation is the key to growing an economy and everything that's good about it, understand what's going on in this election. It is really important to understand who this administration is going to have because if Warren stays in control of the economy, I'm sorry, but that trend, it may not reverse, but it may just be China and Asia that will take over. But you won't see 100 years from now, the biggest companies will be 100 years old

in the United States. Check the pinned tweet above in the nest, Dave. I tweeted earlier, just jokingly, that something I said here, Gary Gensler's having an awful day and I'm here for it. John Deaton, who of course is running against Elizabeth Warren and I believe can beat her, said, I intend to make the worst day of his political career to be November 5th, 2024. Right? Which is funny because, you know, we're talking about Gensler, but that's him openly saying Elizabeth Warren is the problem and that removes Gensler if Elizabeth Warren is gone. Right. Well, I mean, it's, it, but the thing is is when you talk to people and we're going to have this debate

tonight, which is going to be like some reality TV show that, you know, otherwise known as, you know, people like to watch train wrecks. And it, but what it's really about is this, it's really about that. And, and, you know, we're talking about innovation and how important it's been to this country, actually to the world. That is really what's at stake unless they change. And Biden could change this, but he hasn't done so yet. There's rumors that he's trying to, you know, Panteras, I think, said that in meetings with the White House,

it seemed like he was genuinely thawing on his stance and engaging with the crypto industry. You know, we've seen, obviously, reports of his hiring back more crypto friendly people. But he vetoed ZAB 121 like two weeks ago. Hasn't withdrawn Crenshaw's nomination, which, by the way, that's the acid test that the crypto industry should force on him because she is decidedly anti-crypto innovation in print and in action. So that's very clear. And if you look at today's lost news of Coinbase suing the SEC, basically that reads like a platform of what is wrong with this administration. And unless they effectively change, unless they effectively do what Coinbase is asking them for, that should be I don't really give a crap what they say talk is cheap, as it were. Isn't the point of Coinbase's lawsuit to elicit documents that are going to be really bad for electoral purposes? Like I assume that's what Coinbase is going for. And so it's a

complicated calculus, like if they release documents that show Operation Chokepoint 2.0 is real and they were being prejudiced against crypto companies and trying to get and not working in good faith to make sure that they're well regulated, just trying to block them getting accounts like that could be pretty bad. Yeah. But Zach, do you doubt that any of that is true? No, I think that is true. But that's why I don't think the Biden administration is going to rush to comply with the SPOIA lawsuit, because what might come out in that lawsuit,

I suspect that you're right here is going to look even worse for them than being obstructionist in the lawsuit. Oh, yeah, I agree. I agree. But my point is, if Dan, you know, wants to believe anything about the Biden administration, then whether he's shown the documents or not, all the people in those documents that are doing those things need to be gone. Because outside of that, there's absolutely no reason. I mean, this is like the classic, you know, this is how, you know, you want to build a mousetrap or roach trap, whatever the hell you want, whatever trap you want to build, you put a little bit of bait, and then you let people go in. You want four more years of Operation Chpe Point unfettered because it's a second term. That's what you're signing up for unless

those documents are produced, and then they act to remediate them. Neither one of those things is going to happen, by the way. I just I'm saying that's what it would be. I'm just saying, just think through what would it look like to remediate them. It would have to start by saying, oops, we appointed anti-crypto zealots, and we were unfairly trying to stop innovation by not allowing American startups to get bank accounts. Right? Like step one in the process of remediation is a political deal breaker. So there's just zero chance. Hold on a second, Zach.

Hold on. There have been so, I mean, that may be the reason. And in fact, it probably would be, but that's not what they would say. They would basically start making people walk the plank and they would stop re-nominating people that are in that, that, you know, in that thing. And they would actually say, you know, and they would actually make a change. Now the reality is they have no interest in changing. And that's your operating assumption, which is the same as mine, by the way, we're on the same point, is they have zero intention of doing anything such as what Pantera wrote. In fact, that article from Dan, I mean, I have a lot of respect for him, but boy, that was

complete fantasy. I mean, I'm sorry, I'm more inclined to believe in Santa Claus. But, you know, that said, you know, but what we're we're basically saying is they need to actually change the construction of people at the OCC, at the Federal Reserve, at the, which is the FDIC, the kind of know what the hell's going on. And it's there. I mean, Nick Carter and Caitlin Long have documented so well, all the aspects of this, that it's at this point, in my mind, undeniable. The only way to change it is to change the people who are running it. That's it. Because the government runs on people. Oh, yeah, the banking thing is totally, totally undeniable. I mean, as someone who works with a lot of crypto startups, it was such a nightmare with everyone other than Mercury, which like, thank God for Mercury, that was the answer to get a bank account open for a crypto startup, even for my law firm, which has nothing to do with crypto in the name. We're just a law firm. We don't, we're certainly not going to issue a token or anything like that. But on our website, it mentions crypto, getting a like attorney escrow account with Citi was a fucking nightmare. It took months, I had to like talk to people up the chain, I had to call on favors, like the banking system was at least for, you know, a real time in the last couple of years, just openly hostile to anything involving crypto. Yeah, I was gonna say what I find so interesting about the Coinbase suit, which we can pivot to slightly here. I don't

think anyone's surprised at this point when a crypto company sues the SEC. It's become like practice and knee jerk reactions. Anything the SEC does, you just counter sue them and ask for clarity on Ethereum and continue to sue. The story to me is that they're suing the FDIC to your guy's point. Right. And going for the Operation Ch, operation choke point 2.0 information, because those, there were obviously, I believe they call them pause notices, but I mean, this was, you know, their, their freedom of information, Coinbase was rejected when asking for this. And then that was held up, I think, in an appeal. This is, you know, clearly the government,

and this is the banking regulators, a very different side of the government that they're now going after who are clearly, clearly hiding something. Right. Yeah, but Scott, you're not allowing this. You also shouldn't take for granted this current state of affairs where people, everyone's suing the SEC. That is a recent phenomenon really spurred on by Grace. It's a huge, it's a huge deal. And it's because Grayscale succeeded with the Bitcoin ETF. But previously, the sort of thought among crypto lawyers is like,

let's not rock the boat, hide in the corner, hope the SEC. And then that became so hopeless that affirmative litigation was the last line of defense. And that seems to be working. And that really is incredible at a relatively new state of affairs. Yeah, I mean, the anti crypto army pushed way too hard, right? And there was only one response, which was to push back or lose. So they forced an industry that has a huge, huge war chest of cash, Coinbase, for example, to strike back, and you get what you asked for. Right? They just pushed too hard. You're right. I mean, I was just saying in the crypto industry at this point, it's become par for the

course to see someone sue the SEC back in the last six to nine months. Has anybody mentioned the precedents that happened in May as it relates to the direct correlation of Coinbase's lawsuit with the SEC and the FDIC. The NRA took this very issue all the way to the Supreme Court and won. And that ruling came down, I believe, May 24th of this year. So I would assume, given how sharp Coinbase's lawyers are, that they saw that and quickly went into action. And we're now seeing the outcome of that going into action based on that precedence. So the SEC and FDIC can fight this all they want. But you and everybody on this call knows that Coinbase can take it to the Supreme Court

and they're going to win. The precedence already exists. Go look it up. It's running around on Twitter. I linked it under my post about the Coinbase lawsuit. There's precedents already that this is kind of a done deal. They'll go through the motions, but the Supreme Court has already ruled as it relates to this information that they're going to get it, that they're absolutely going to win the case.

A lot of conjecture as to what that information would be, I guess, but I think we... It's in a ruling. It's in a ruling. I mean, you can go read the SCOTUS blog. It's right there. The ruling, the NRA took these organizations to task associated with FOIA and the scheming that they were doing behind the scenes and that they wouldn't give up the information associated with those communications, they just flat out lost. I mean, it's a direct vector associated with this case by Coinbase. I'd be shocked if this wasn't a big part of the reason why they chose to bring suit

in this particular way. Dan? Yeah, so it's quite American-centric so far, but just to give some parallels to the UK. So I get if there's regime change in America, which I think, look, I think Trump's going to win. That's not just noise. I have money on him to win. I placed a bet on him to win. I do think he will win. I bet on him in 2016, and I think he's going to win. That's not just noise. I have money on him to win. I placed a bet on him to win. I do think he will win. I bet on him in 2016, and I think he will win.

However, in the UK, it was Boris Johnson that called out something called the blob, which is all the civil servant workers that work in all of this apparatus. So you have millions of Americans that work in these bodies, the SEC, the FTC, all that kind of stuff, FDIC, all of them, right? I get if there's a regime change, there will be some rule change. But do you think these people that have been working in these, you know, things for years and being so anti-crypto, these are the people that press the buttons,

that file the stuff. They're not going to immediately change their mind overnight on the back of this, right? There's still going to be this momentum where they're still anti-crypto. Maybe. Sorry? They're going online and they're seeing... They're going online and seeing every decision

that the companies or that the bodies make, seeing all these crypto people calling them a bunch of names. The biggest problem, as I've said and I'll say again, is that in crypto, the wrong people got rich. The wrong people got rich. It's not the people that should have got rich, right? So all the people that work in these bodies are not going to suddenly change their mind overnight because Trump wins. There's still going to be this momentum there where these people, they've been told that crypto is a scam and they, you know, to hate it and to block it all. Even with the regime change in the US, I think there's still this momentum there where they're still anti-crypto.

Maybe, but I think, and Dave, I'll let you speak and maybe you'll echo this, but I think that if you look beyond the leaders of some of these institutions, the staffers and the people working every day are tired of their bosses. Like Gary Gensler is wildly unpopular with almost everybody at the SEC beyond everyone else he's obviously unpopular with. So I think in some of these cases, you may be right in some, but I think in some, just taking out the leadership

could vastly change things. Dave, what do you think? I'm happy to be wrong on that. I'm happy to be wrong and I'm happy to do that. I would love to be the case. I'm just saying, do not over-index on the regime change

being the panacea for all of our stuff. I think there's a lot of people that have been told this for a long time and they've never heard any counter-argument. What they've done is, if they look on Twitter, if they look in the news, everyone's calling them dickheads and all this kind of stuff, right? You don't win anybody over by insulting

them. And so when a decision goes against a crypto community, Twitter goes off and calls them all knobheads or whatever. I mean, I get it. I just think let's not over-index on regime change. I think there will still be this momentum there among the body, but yeah. Yeah, I thoroughly disagree and I agree with Scott. And I'm like hip deep in this crap,

so let me explain. So as far as the SEC is concerned, the staff is dramatically different than the commissioners, right? And I say to staff, I'm not just talking about trading in markets, although there it's true. I've been in that building. I've talked to them. I had lunch with a very senior person in DERA, which is the Division of Economic Research and Analysis. And they are dispirited because they are told to do things they don't want to do. It's also an age thing. The people who are there that have been there forever, you know, they want their pensions. The people who have been there and are younger or actually want to do good, they care. The leadership is dramatically important, but it's not, it goes beyond that. The other big thing about this particular election, we will see, and it's

really simple. Anyone who's listened to him knows what this is. We know that if the neck has a senior part of this administration, and Trump has said he will, we don't know what that will be. I mean, his avowed goal is to start abolishing departments and cutting federal headcount dramatically. And it's not going to be pretty, and it's going to be focused on people who are obstructing innovation. So that could be a very big deal. But we don't know. We won't know until, you know, all this talk about politics, it's kind of pointless until we get into the fall and we actually know who the candidates that are actually going to be on the ballot are, because I think

there's a pretty good bet that it won't be Trump-Biden. And, you know, we'll see. But I agree with you. It's very American-centric. It's unfortunate, but it's true. I mean, the reality is most of the crypto industry is working overseas until something changes. I'm sitting in Singapore. You know, I hope you're right, Dave. I do.

I want you to be right. I hope you are. I'm just trying to temper people's expectations that when Trump wins, it's not going to be an immediate overnight thing. I agree. America is a little bit different from the rest of all. And I think it is a little bit more top down in terms of the government of these bodies or whatever. I should love you to be right because, you know, I'm all in on that. I hope it will be. And I agree with you on Vivek. I'm just saying that there may be some momentum of these people.

You know, the lower level employees that don't necessarily have any idea about they've just been told for years that crypto is a scam we have to block it at every level um you know i i hope you're right and i believe that you probably will be i'm just trying to offer a little counterpoint here is all but i think i think you know we agree yeah healthy skepticism against the guy uh well i have warned those skepticism against the American government is a good thing. Well, the only other point I'll point out is 12,000 or so lobbyists in D.C., many of which are for traditional financial firms, aren't going to go down. You know, they're not going down easy. Right. So they're going to pick their spots and and they's still going to be hurdles and roadblocks.

Hopefully, it won't be the kind of dirt road with pits with spikes in them that we've been navigating so far. But the reality is— But it can't be any worse than it has been, right? I think we both agree it can't be any worse than it has been. Some regime change will change stuff. Sorry for interrupting you or whatever, but I agree. I just want to temper the exuberance a little bit i hope it's right but i i maintain as scott said some some kind of healthy skepticism towards uh you know the apparatus of

the american government is all i'm not you know tinfoil hat guy but i'm just saying look you know that's all well these two these two presidential candidates have never lied to us before dan so i don't know where you would get that from. Go ahead, Zach. I was going to say, I think as an industry, we need to take the revolving door more seriously and not reward people who take anti-crypto enforcement actions against good actors in the space. I don't think crypto companies should hire law firms that take people from SEC enforcement actions that were openly hostile to the industry. I don't think a company should hire consultants or senior people for their boards who took these

anti-crypto positions. I think we need to make this career suicide if you'd like to make money in crypto to have been part of a openly hostile crypto government regime. I mean, look, I work for a few companies in crypto. We saw that sort of shift at Debtbox. Sorry. Look, I work for a few companies in crypto. We saw that shift at Debtbox. Sorry. Look, I work for a few companies in crypto. Go ahead, guys. Sorry.

But Zach, I was just going to say after Debtbox, we actually saw some of that really happen, right? That's when I think the industry said, listen, nobody hire any of these guys. Yeah. I just want to say one thing as well. Look, I've worked for like three or four of the big crypto companies. One of my former bosses is now sitting in a federal prison. Two of my former companies are being sued by the SEC. Look, I think we've bottomed out here.

I worked at Binance, Gemini, Polygon, and a bunch of others. But every company I've worked at has either been pursued aggressively by the US government or is being pursued aggressively by the US government. It's always darkest before dawn, but I think it can't get worse. Having been through that, my faith in the US government to do the right thing is probably somewhat lower than other people's. By the way, this revolving door point I think is especially potent for high-end litigators. The crypto industry is going to spend hundreds of millions of dollars, maybe more over the next couple of years, litigating all sorts of different things. And lots of big law firms are going to staff up or need to staff up with quote-unquote crypto experts. And like, it really is important if you're in a decision maker role at a big crypto company that has a large legal budget, not to hire law firms that hire former, you know,

high ranking SEC people that were hostile to crypto, right? Because otherwise, that's who all of these law firms are gonna go to recruit. And, you know, there's not going to be a penalty for taking these actions in the future. Dave Tao, go ahead. You're there. To state the obvious, Anthony Scaramucci has the most impossible lift right now to convince people that Biden is a pro-crypto guy. I mean, he obviously, Anthony has his own agenda, has his own set of problems. I think at the end of the day, net-net for him, his pocket will work out very well. The fortunes of SkyBridge and their investors will work out well. But in terms of the vendetta he has against Trump and the fact that he has no choice but to side with Biden, it's really putting him on the wrong side of things here.

But so be it. Just want for the audience, for the audience's information, I just want to make that clear. Yeah, I think, you know, like, there's nuance there, because in our echo chamber, I think a lot of people view themselves as single issue voters. Right. So yeah, I do agree that on that single issue, he's going to have a hard time. But there's plenty of people who, you know, don't think the cryptos who are in crypto, but don't necessarily think it's the only thing worth voting on, not making a value judgment on either side. But, you know, you know, he's got his he's definitely got a challenge in front of him from the perspective that you gave.

I mean, I've had a couple of interactions with him, you know, at conferences, etc. I mean, look, he's talking his own book, right? You know, he is trying very hard to want to say that this administration is going to pivot. At the same time, he also has been very unhappy recently and has made it very clear that as long as Elizabeth Warren is still controlling all the appointees, he knows that he's wrong and he's trying to push that. And God bless him. I mean, you know, there's no question about it that that's the issue. You know, there are plenty of Democrats, you know, plenty of progressive Democrats. I mean, hell, you know, people are asking me, you know, about them. I mean, he's young, but like Richie Torres is as progressive as they come.

But he's massively pro-innovation, was one of the first ones to speak up in support of the FID Act. And the concept behind the FID Act, just getting it out to the floor the floor he thought was important so it's not like they don't exist but ron wyden the wide ron wyden's another one in the senate and no one's going to confuse him with being a conservative so this shouldn't be partisan but it is because of warren and it's driving scaramucci crazy you're right but at the end of the day it also is because of sam dave it also is because of Sam, Dave. It also is because of Sam. Well, right. I mean, Maxine Waters, you know, thanking Sam for his candor long after we knew what was going on, long after it had been pretty much exposed before he went to prison, obviously. But I mean, yeah, these guys were embarrassed. But the truth of the matter is

Sam was trying to write people forget about the DCCPA. He was trying to write a rule that would have banned DeFi in the United States and would have made it almost impossible for people to compete with FTX. I mean, I'm sure Coinbase would have figured out a way. But, you know, people forget what they were actually pushing. And it was Sam pushing, you know, things for Sam, not for the industry, not for economic freedom. And, you know, they were bamboozled and they looked stupid. So then they're doing the exact opposite of what they should do, which is, you know, go against the things that Sam was proposing. But that's typical D.C. politics. But as far as the mooch goes, I mean, look, he's a smart guy.

He knows when he gets into the voting booth, if it is a Biden Warren administration, effectively, he knows what he's voting for if he actually votes that way. You know, to me, I find he's extremely anti Warren. He's extremely anti. He's almost anti Warren is the anti Trump. And without giving away the house, I understand his personal dislike for Trump. And frankly, I'm not sure if I was in his position, I would feel any differently. And just to be fair, and I know that and I've said that to him. So it's this is not me criticizing him.

I understand, you know, rock meet hard place. That's really where he is. And that's what David was saying. And David, I completely agree with you. Well, with Scaramucci, hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. So that probably needs to be said. But then on top of that, there's like Scott has said, there's there's nuance involved. Right. um there's like scott has said there's there's nuance involved right so skybridge was the

original capital allocator to uh blackrock's i bit uh bitcoin spot bitcoin etf so their their their feet um half their body are fully um into the space and what an amazing trade so it's like anything else in life um you know, good and bad, right? So Scaramucci screwed the pooch on FTX, but at the same time, smart enough to get in bed way before anybody else did with BlackRock and their iBit product and put the initial $200 million into that fund. That has worked out very, very well for their firm. Really quick, Andrew, you mentioned the NRA case, which was completely not on my radar before

as sort of precedent for what could happen with Coinbase. Do you have any idea of timeline of something like that? I don't know how, you know, I'm not a lawyer and I have no idea how you go from, you know, filing a particular suit to uh, to it getting to a court, to it getting to an appellate court, to it getting to the Supreme court. I don't know. Um, but I do know that if there's hard precedents like that, and you can go read the, linked on it, the SEC and FDIC would be foolish to try and take that thing the distance because they just lose. So again, to answer your question directly from a legal

standpoint, I don't know about the pace and speed. I do know the courts move relatively slowly. Any lawyer is going to tell you that. But there is a cadence to how the courts move. And when there's precedents like this, especially with an organization like the NRA, and here's a piece of information associated with that case, a liberal judge wrote the prevailing opinion on it, right? So when a liberal judge, Sotomayor, writes the prevailing opinion on behalf, essentially, of the NRA as the winner of that case, I mean, talk about precedence, man. That's some tough stuff for the regulatory bodies to try and push back on as it relates to Coinbase's case.

We do have two lawyers here. I mean, lawyer Zach, I know that's not necessarily your core competency there, though, but I'm assuming that the answer is this takes a long time. Yeah. That's right. Slow in with the cadence is probably the best way to put it. Into the next presidency, I would imagine, whoever that is. We're not getting clarity on something like this in the next five to six months before the election. No, no, not clarity. No. Yeah, because that would be

really fun to see Operation Chokepoint 2.0 exposed to the entire world ahead of the election. Right. You can imagine, right? That would be the reason why they're going to fight it, because they're going to push it to the quote-unquote term limit. And if there's a quote-unquote regime change and the heat dies down and now it's a cool off period, you know, is there meaningful reasons for Coinbase to pursue it once, you know, the shackles have been removed as it relates to the crypto industry? That's probably how those regulatory bodies will play it because they certainly don't

want all kinds of, you know, dozens of eggs on their face, you know, leading up to an election. Yeah, that makes perfect sense. Even like, you know, whether they want it or not, I think it just takes longer than that to get it done at this point. But I think, Zach, I'm really stuck, Zach, on kind of your point that, you know how we take for granted i guess at this point how much of a big deal it is to see so many people going after the regulators and i think that it regardless of what happens the presidential election the situation is improving right i mean even if biden wins i think they've learned how unpopular it is to attack this industry and the potential pitfalls that come alongside that. So I think you have to be optimistic. I mean, a year ago, guys, that we couldn't have been more miserable a year ago, right? Coinbase, Binance, backed back days, and zero wins. And we did not think that the courts were going to defend our industry. I shouldn't also there's more that the court once is affirmative litigation tools on the table. There are levels of that that we haven't reached yet.

Right. The SEC has a limited budget to fight things in court, like without talking out of school. Like I can tell you there are more lawsuits coming and their current investigations against big players in the crypto industry is still underway. But like, if you just look at like in the Coinbase and Kraken and Binance suits, all of the coins they listed, if each of those issuers just sued the SEC, trying to get some sort of declaratory judgment, they now there are reasons not to do that, because you don't want to you don't want to lose these cases. But if things got more desperate, and there were 11 or 15 well financed lawsuits from all of these token issuers against the sec where's the sec going to get the resources to defend all of those things

taxpayers right no yeah i get it that's what always makes me laugh is like when we cheer for things like sec pays a fine in debt box i'm like dude i paid that fine where did that money come from andrew yeah it's it's uh um all of the funding associated with the sec comes from taxpayers and so when there's a fine when there's some sort of judgment when there's quote unquote egg on their face um we can be we can talk tough about it but they they don't care. You know, I've, I've talked to lawyers at, at the spot ETF issuers. And this was back when, you know, it was assumed that the spot Ethereum ETFs were going to get denied. And again, it was said time and time again that Gensler and to some extent the SEC just does not

care if they lose court cases. They do not care currently what the climate is. They have an agenda and that agenda is anti-capitalist. That's what the agenda is. And so it's hard to make sense of that. You would think that if you lose case after case after case, that that would seem like a negative on your quote unquote resume. But in the world of of, you know, in the Democrat world, right, in that world that they live in, their their their own echo chamber, you know, that's seeing as being a cop on the beat. I went after these companies. I may have lost a few times, but I went after these companies and I won more than a lot more than I lost. That is seen as a positive in the world that, that they, that they operate in. And so it doesn't make sense to, to rational folks like us. But it is, it is the way that they look at it. All right. Well, I think we covered everything for today. And I think we need to like take a deep breath and save our energy for tomorrow and the coming weeks, because tomorrow we're

going to obviously have to unpack the Trump Biden debate. That is tonight at 9pm Eastern Standard Time. I think a lot of people have bets in that we will hear the word Bitcoin or crypto mentioned. And I think that it could be potentially an off-the-cuff attack by Trump on Biden, who will likely be woefully underprepared to discuss the topic. So it could get extremely interesting, I think,

if it's not something that's planned or told to Biden in advance about a question. So I think a lot of fireworks potentially tonight. And then we're going to move into next week with an Ethereum spot ETF approval, likely by July 2nd. So we've got a lot coming up today. Absolutely insane with the Solana ETF being filed for. Whether you believe it will be confirmed or not, up to you. But a huge statement, I think, to have that on the books. And of course, Coinbase going after both the SEC and the FDIC. Huge day, and it's only going to get bigger for our industry, guys. Thank you so much for tuning in. We'll see you tomorrow, 10.15am Eastern Standard

Time. Bye.