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For the last four decades, basically since I began my career in Wall Street,

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Wall Street has grown wealthier than ever before, and it can continue to grow and do well.

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But for the next four years, the Trump agenda is focused on Main Street.

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It's Main Street's turn.

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It's Main Street's turn to hire workers.

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It's Main Street's turn to drive investment. And it's Main Street's turn to

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restore the American dream.

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Music.

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Welcome in to This Week in Bitcoin, episode 53.

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My name is chris chris las.com jupiterbroadcasting.com

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i could feel it last week as i

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was recording i knew this was gonna be a crazy

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one with all the tariff stuff just coming out last episode i knew we should

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probably wait to talk about it see how things unfold and i think that was the

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right move probably like a lot of you this week i have been heads down feeling

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like every couple of hours something new has developed since basically I've wrapped.

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As I was actually, as I was publishing last week's episode, I was already collecting several clips.

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It's been pretty nuts. And the more I started to pay attention and the more

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I started to read, first of all, I noticed inconsistencies.

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And I also started to appreciate the scope of what's happening here.

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So the goals we're going to talk about on the show, for the goals of what I

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want to talk about, they're going to be bigger than the trade tariff stuff.

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They're going to be part of it.

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But I also want to get to why Bitcoin has held so close to the 200-day moving

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average during the rest of the world market melting down.

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It's really been incredible. And there has been so much hyperbole to sift through

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as well. Come on, this is nonsense.

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This is all nonsense. What happens is they block our markets.

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When we open those markets, our volumes grow.

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Our farmers will thrive and the price of groceries will come down.

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Let Donald Trump run the global economy. He knows what he's doing.

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He's been talking about it for 35 years.

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You got to trust Donald Trump in the White House. That's why they put him there.

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Let him fix it. I understand. It's broken. Let him fix it.

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The president of the United States shouldn't even be fixing or running the U.S.

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Economy, let alone the global economy.

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I mean, it's just amazing how far everything but Bitcoin has come from a free market.

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So I played that clip for context, just so you know, kind of the messaging that

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is out there. I think that kind of stuff is a smokescreen and a lot of the talk

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around it that's kind of like it. I hope to make that case today, at least.

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And I have been impressed with Bitcoin, but I also worry it could be suggesting

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something much worse down the road.

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I mean, earlier this week, on Monday and Tuesday, the market gave us signs that

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it's just on a hair trigger.

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On Monday, a random account on X said that, well, we're taking a tariff policy

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pause. Just a random account said, we're taking a tariff policy pause. The U.S.

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Stock market pumped $3 trillion into stonks in 20 minutes.

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They're ready. They were ready. That money was on the sidelines. It was ready.

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Then 20 minutes later, news comes out, fake headline, $2.5 trillion wiped,

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wiped out like 20 minutes.

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Essentially double the Bitcoin market cap wiped out from stonks in like 20 minutes.

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Then we saw similar dynamics play out on Tuesday.

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Again, we saw the market pump like crazy on the news and then dump.

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And then today, we saw the same dynamics play out again, which we'll get into.

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During all of this, though, it's causing stress.

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Stress on the system, stress on people who are afraid of volatility,

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stress on the bankers, the poor bankers.

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Deutsche Bank put out a statement today saying, the simultaneous drops in price of all U.S.

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Assets, including stocks, dollars, and bonds, well, that's a real problem.

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So the head of foreign exchange research at the Deutsche Bank said,

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quote, it's very hard to foresee a market dynamics in the coming days.

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We are entering uncharted territory in the global financial system.

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If recent disruption in the U.S. Treasury market continues, we see no other

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option but for the Fed to step in with emergency purchase of U.S.

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Treasuries to stabilize the bond market.

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Emergency QE could be needed, Deutsche Bank says. Emergency QE,

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it's so crazy. It's all out of control.

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All right. I get the confusion. I get the confusion.

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The numbers don't quite add up. When you start looking at the trade stuff,

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the tariff structure, it doesn't make a lot of sense.

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What's going on here? Like, you look at some of these numbers,

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like, did they come up with this with AI? What happens here?

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I'll give you an example. Some of the things that don't make sense so far.

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We keep hearing about unfair trade imbalances, but I don't really understand what the hell they mean.

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If we're buying a lot of goods from, say, China or wherever,

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well, if we don't make goods they want to buy from us, of course there's going

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to be an imbalance. I have a similar trade imbalance with my grocery store and my butcher.

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We pay China for goods in dollars. China doesn't spend those dollars at home.

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They turn those dollars back around into the United States.

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They buy dollar-denominated assets like stocks, U.S. treasuries.

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They use U.S. dollars to purchase raw materials and commodities,

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which does further the dollar system down market.

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Is this system great for middle America? Maybe not.

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Maybe you're 401k, but outside of that, I think it's probably a net loss.

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I think history shows us for about 80% of the country, it's not been fantastic,

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but it has been great for the reserve currency and for government's degen spending.

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So the stuff around tariffs just doesn't add up.

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At a high level, it literally doesn't add up. If you're the reserve currency,

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this is the way the situation is going to be.

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Then today, right before I went on air, we saw that degen rip behavior again.

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And $3 trillion coming slamming into the market.

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Rumors were going on that Besson had been recalled to the White House.

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What's going on? I then saw markets continuing back to where they were pre-market.

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And just in the last couple of moments, the Dow has gone from up about 300 points.

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1,500 points with very little explanation as to what's caused this sudden move

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other than the canceled meeting Emily just told us about with Besant now being

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pulled in by the president to the White House.

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A couple of headlines from Trump on the wires about China tariffs.

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Megan Casella is in our D.C. bureau. Megan, maybe you can enlighten us with more.

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Kelly, we are just sifting through everything that we're seeing in this true

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social post, but two major developments.

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I'm going to go first that the president says he is authorizing a 90-day pause

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and substantially lowering the reciprocal tariff during this period of 10% effective immediately.

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There's some fuzzy language here. The upshot is that there's a 90-day pause

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in the reciprocal tariff.

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What I'm not clear on is whether we go to zero during that time or to back where

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we were, or if the 10% tariff remains in place.

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Either way, a major step forward.

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The president says that this is because

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more than 75 countries have called representatives of the United States.

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Negotiations are ongoing, and so he's instituting this 90-day pause in the meantime.

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On the other hand, some negative news on China, saying that based on the lack

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of respect that China has shown to the world's markets, he's raising the tariff on China to 125%.

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That's, of course, up from the 104% that took effect just at midnight,

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now going even higher to 125% because he does not like the way China has been retaliating.

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Rather than coming to the united states and wanting to negotiate so

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two major step forwards here one obviously very good

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for the markets you're seeing the markets react to that the other

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one on china looking like you know they they don't like the the lack of respect

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that they see so we oh so the tariffs are paused for 90 days now what happened

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to not blinking what happened to not backing down what happened to not checking

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the market well i have an idea i have a theory,

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And they kind of tell us in there, you know, so we see $3.5 trillion come back

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into the U.S. stock market.

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They're pulling back tariffs to 10 percent on everybody but China.

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And China, they're doubling down and calling out.

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Music.

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The president's own words gives us some of the insights that we need.

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And one of the things that you've heard probably this week, I definitely have

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come across it, is everyone's running around like a chicken with their head cut off.

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Well, I think I know why. And the reason is, is they're not zooming out.

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And nobody does that better than Ray Dalio, who has been writing about the changing

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guard in empires for a bit now. And he was on CNBC.

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And I think Ray puts into perspective what's really happening right now. It's not tariffs.

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It's something much larger. Bridgewater Associates founder Ray Dalio posting

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on LinkedIn and weighing in on tariffs.

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He says it's more important to focus on the idea that, quote,

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we're seeing a classic breakdown of the major monetary, political and geopolitical orders.

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This sort of breakdown occurs only about once in a lifetime.

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But they have happened many times in history when similar unsustainable conditions were in place.

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Joining us right now first on CNBC is Bridgewater founder Ray Dalio.

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And we're thrilled to have you here on a morning when we're still trying to

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make sense of what all these tariffs mean, Ray, and frankly,

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how all of this plays out.

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So to the extent that you can help us with the history, or at least the history

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lesson, if you think there are parallels, how does this play out?

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Good to see you, Joe. Andrew, Joe, and Becky.

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I think that we don't understand how the cycle goes because it comes along about once a lifetime.

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But there are orders, you know, there are systems.

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And the systems break down for certain reasons, and it creates cycles.

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For example, there's a monetary system.

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And then there's a debt cycle. And so as a result, we now have,

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you know, one man's debts, another man's assets.

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And when you build these up and you get to a point where you can't sustain that,

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you have a debt issue. We have a debt issue.

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We can get into that. But there's a monetary cycle.

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There's a internal political order cycle that takes us from one political order

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to another political order in which there's then classically great turbulence

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between the left and the right.

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And because of disorder, particularly in democracies, there's a lot of fighting

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because there needs to be cooperation, compromise, and so on.

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And we're in the process of changing that order.

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In addition, we have the international world order.

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International world order began in 1945.

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There's a war. You win a war. The dominant powers get to set the rules.

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That was a series of multilateralism, things like the United Nations,

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World Trade Organization, World Businesses and World That.

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And that multilateralism is then breaking down for unilateralism.

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So Reyes identified four historical trends that are converging.

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The debt cycle, the monetary cycle, i.e.

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The reserve currency cycle, the political order cycle, which

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we're seeing with the trump and uh fighting with

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the democrats and the international world world

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order which is sort of forcibly being restructured with the trade negotiations

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but you're also seeing it a bit with ukraine the eu and russia for the same

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reasons so there are these three orders related to too much debt that is money

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second internal order how does our system work.

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Who's going to get control of this problem? And then number three,

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in addition of the five main forces of five main forces, there's also throughout history, climate.

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Acts of nature, droughts, floods, and pandemics have killed more people and toppled more orders.

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And then there's also throughout history, man's inventiveness and new technologies,

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which is creating this transformative result.

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The interactions of these is what's going on. So if we look at tariffs...

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Tariffs represent a dealing with the imbalances.

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The imbalance means we have a tremendous capital imbalance and a tremendous

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trade imbalance, which is unsustainable.

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And so that's the backdrop of this. Related to that is also the international conflict.

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How do you have dependency, mutual dependency?

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How can the United States be a safe country and not manufacture things?

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And have to import them for China? Or how can China be safe in terms of having

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capital, an American capital?

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Those connections are breaking down.

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I'd say they have been under stress specifically since the COVID lockdowns,

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supply chain issues, and the fact that so many of the United States pharmaceuticals

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had to come from China and people recognize the vulnerability that could potentially

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cause in a conflict, in another pandemic, et cetera.

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That's what he's inferring to there. So that's the essence of the backdrop.

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When we get into the tariffs, I'm sure we'll get into it. Well, that's great.

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That's a great backdrop to understand the way you're thinking about it contextually.

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But let's get let's go straight to the tariffs, which is to say,

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how do you think, therefore, they play out?

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Is that, you know, given the history that you talk about, is there the political

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appeal either here in the U.S. or elsewhere for these tariffs ultimately?

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And from an economic perspective, as we're all watching the market today,

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it's gotten a little bit better.

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But obviously, you know, folks have lost 10 percent.

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You know, someone said to me last week, this is like a wealth tax,

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except that nobody gets the money in that, you know, 10 percent of a lot of

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folks wealth vanished overnight as a function of at least this discussion thus far. So what happens?

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Well, mechanistically, it raises costs. Right.

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It lowers revenues for companies. I mean, what does it mean for a company?

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It means costs are going to go up, revenue is going to go down,

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and capital is going to be harder to come by.

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And then we're trying to replace manufacturing.

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I mean, I agree with the problems, okay, about the fact that we don't manufacture

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and that there is a problem with that.

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But there's this structural problem of whether we can manufacture.

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We have a population that basically 3 million people, 1% of the population,

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is incredibly brilliant.

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I mean, they go to the best schools, they come out, they make the unicorns,

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inventiveness, half of which, by the way, are foreigners.

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And at the same time, they are making the unicorns.

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At the same time, what we have is 10% of the population around them that's doing very well.

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The 60% of the population has below a sixth grade reading level.

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And it's tough to be productive. So when we agree with the problem,

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too much debt, Secretary Benes and others agree, we should get it down to 3%.

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We have to get the budget deficits down to 3% of GDP.

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But what are you going to do because you still don't have a workforce that would

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be ready to take on that work, at least right now?

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So this is essentially the White House trying to skate to a future that we wouldn't

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be ready for even if they pulled it off.

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It it it really is hard to fully wrap your head around and you know now so here

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we are right now 3.5 trillion back into the stock market with the 90-day pause

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and everybody's just going to pretend like we're back to normal now.

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I can't unsee what i have seen i don't think things are going back.

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It's on the White House where I saw it, whitehouse.gov. I mean,

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I'm still searching for the words to really fully explain how surprised I am

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something like this is posted on the White House website.

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It's written by the CEA chairman, Steve Moran. He was at the Hudson Institute

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event of some sort. I don't know the event because I got this from the White House, not the event.

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And it's remarkable. Here's just a quote from it, a small one.

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On the financial side, the reserve function of the dollar has caused persistent

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currency distortions and contributed, along with other countries' unfair barriers

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to trade, to unsustainable trade deficits.

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These trade deficits have decimated our manufacturing sector and many working-class

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families and their communities to facilitate non-Americans trading with each other.

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They're saying, right there, what the CEA chairman is saying,

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and what is posted on the White House website,

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is that the reserve function of the dollar has caused persistent currency distortions

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and combined with other countries' unfair trade practices decimated the working

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class, quote, their families and their communities,

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and quote, the manufacturing sector.

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This is the United States White House saying this about the United States dollar,

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which is the reserve currency of the world, and they're saying that reserve

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currency status is leading to an unfair burden.

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In fact, in here, they talk about how the rest of the world needs to share the burden.

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We can still have the biggest defense, but people need to pay their fair share, they say.

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This is a remarkable statement coming from the White House. I don't know if

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it reflects greater White House thinking, if it's just tradition to put these

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statements on here, but it's something I would never have thought I would have

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seen on the White House in my lifetime.

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And it goes to what is really, despite the actual words being used,

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it goes to what the messaging is that is being received by the rest of the world.

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Something Jack Mahler's got in his podcast, Money Matters, recently.

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It's okay. If you're going to tell other countries, no more surplus,

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take your money and go home, their money is in NVIDIA.

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Their money is in our debt. They're going to dump treasuries.

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They're going to sell our stock market.

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Who's going to buy it? Who's going to replace the bidder that was China,

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that was the Middle East, that was Russia, that was Europe? Who's going to replace that.

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And if you listen, it's the Federal Reserve and it's the U.S. banking system.

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The amount of money that they're going to have to print in order to make up

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for the realignment of global trade. And when the White House comes out and

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starts self-admitting that the U.S.

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Dollar positions us unfairly to operate in a deficit and have global trade,

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if you want to be the world reserve currency, you have to operate in a deficit.

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Your job is to give the rest of the world your currency and import debt and real stuff.

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So if you don't like that setup, then you don't want to be the world reserve

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currency. It's just plain and simple.

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So when people say we're moving towards a neutral reserve asset,

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things like gold are valuable. Things like Bitcoin are valuable. Why?

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It's obvious because no one wants to be the world reserve currency.

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No one wants to operate into deficit.

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No one wants to de-industrialize. No one wants to eliminate their middle class.

285
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No one wants to disadvantage the poor.

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Nobody wants to over-financialize. Nobody wants any of these things.

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That's what Donald Trump is saying.

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Music.

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So what are we talking about here? Some long play?

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To take the dollar out of reserve status? I don't think so.

291
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But I do think the people around Trump that are now working on this problem

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have been thinking about this for a long time.

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This is a clip of Scott Besant before the election, before he was Treasury Secretary,

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before he even knew he was nominated or on the list.

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This was Scott at a banking event. I think as an economic historian and someone

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who's been in markets for 40 years, you know, I actually think I'm starting to look like it now.

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It is, you know, I think we're also at a unique moment geopolitically.

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And I could see in the next few years that we are going to have to have some

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kind of a grand global economic reordering.

300
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There's something on the equivalent of a new Bretton Woods, or if you want to

301
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go back, like something back to the Steele agreements or the Treaty of Versailles.

302
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There's a very good chance that we are going to have to have that over the next four years.

303
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And I'd like to be a part of it. I've studied this.

304
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I think it's kind of a unique skill set. And perhaps a moment in history and an opportunity.

305
00:21:45,803 --> 00:21:49,303
That is a fascinating clip when you think about what we've been going through

306
00:21:49,303 --> 00:21:53,523
for the last few weeks. Now, the Trump administration claims they've had nearly 75.

307
00:21:53,543 --> 00:21:58,563
The number changes constantly, but nearly 75 countries reach out to them to try to negotiate deals.

308
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And so part of the 90-day pause is so that way they have time to review and

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00:22:04,023 --> 00:22:06,103
create a bespoke deal with each country.

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That sounds horrible. That sounds tedious.

311
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That sounds complicated and intricate. It sounds bureaucratic.

312
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It sounds big government.

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And it sounds like something that a future administration would want to dismantle

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to simply simplify to make things understandable.

315
00:22:23,403 --> 00:22:26,883
Is that really what they're doing? Are they going to take 90 days and create bespoke deals?

316
00:22:27,403 --> 00:22:32,463
Or are they going to take this coalition of 70 or so, create a great deal,

317
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and essentially all work against China? China, a new alliance against China,

318
00:22:37,223 --> 00:22:40,943
perhaps a new understanding when it comes to gold as well.

319
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And we'll get to that. Because before we get to gold, I want to talk about the

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00:22:44,663 --> 00:22:47,963
bonds, because some of the previous theories was the cheap debt theory,

321
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one that I brought up on the show.

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Put it out there as a possibility, and it could still be in play.

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But if it is part of the plan, it has backfired. In just the last three days,

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the 10-year note yield has surged 60 basis points, while the S&P fell dramatically.

325
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So that's the largest three-day increase since 1982 and one of the largest divergences

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of the bond yield and the S&P in history.

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So this plan to get the yields down, it isn't working. In fact,

328
00:23:16,787 --> 00:23:20,127
it's having the opposite effect. It's making the debt more expensive right now.

329
00:23:20,407 --> 00:23:22,447
All right, so why don't we stay in the markets and your money?

330
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Because as bonds go, so go stocks.

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And you may not be paying as close of attention, but bonds, they've had huge

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00:23:29,247 --> 00:23:34,847
move the last few days with a nearly half percent move in 10-year yields in just the last 24 hours.

333
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And folks, for bonds, that's a massive move.

334
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Let's talk more about this and more with Rick Santelli in Chicago.

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I think everybody, I was joking with our team that every time we said the word

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whipsaw yesterday, somebody had to put a dollar in a jar so we could buy some

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beer later or whatever it is.

338
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But yesterday, honestly, the pond yields, they moved around like a stock.

339
00:23:59,007 --> 00:24:03,167
Absolutely. Absolutely. The stock market and interest rates are moving like

340
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commodities, like a corn market on a hot day in July.

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Like a meme coin. I mean, I've never in my life had the 10-year yield real-time chart up on my screen.

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It's something. So if the plan was to deflate the market a bit,

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drive everybody into bonds, and bring the yield down to get access to cheap

344
00:24:23,067 --> 00:24:27,487
debt, well, as of right now, that plan is a total failure.

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And you see, I was trying to get to this last week. We didn't have a complete picture yet.

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But I think some of the long-term goals here of the Trump administration,

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they are in the best interest of the United States, which is who they should be working for.

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But instead of using the carrot, Trump went with a stick.

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And I think the order of operations really mattered in how you execute something

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00:24:49,767 --> 00:24:52,987
like this. And they kind of just did all of it at once.

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And Besant was on with Fox Biz. And you can hear there is a three-step plan.

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And I don't think they should have started with tariffs. If we think about President

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Trump's agenda, tariffs came first.

354
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Now we're going to get tax done. We are pushing for deregulation.

355
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And the deregulation, unfortunately, takes longer to kick in.

356
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But I tell you, when it does, it's going to be powerful. I love this because

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00:25:19,667 --> 00:25:24,127
the regulation is just something they can vaguely quantify, right?

358
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Taxes, you know what the tax amounts are going to be.

359
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You can do the budget calculations. You can get the numbers,

360
00:25:29,807 --> 00:25:31,427
right? Same with the tariffs eventually.

361
00:25:31,807 --> 00:25:37,947
But regulation, that could be a trillion dollars of future potential over the

362
00:25:37,947 --> 00:25:39,827
next five years, right? I mean, who knows?

363
00:25:39,907 --> 00:25:42,967
You can say anything. So that's, but it's, that's the three-step plan.

364
00:25:44,247 --> 00:25:49,107
Tariffs, taxes, deregulation, which I think Doge is also in that deregulation

365
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category. So there's some government efficiency in there too.

366
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The deregulation should have begun first.

367
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Then the taxes, right? If we actually were going to see benefits from deregulation,

368
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first 100 days you go crazy with the deregulation, and towards the end of the

369
00:26:03,784 --> 00:26:04,984
100 days you get the tax cuts.

370
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You get the old trunk, the old tax cuts extended, and you get the new like no

371
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tax on tips, Social Security, overtime, those things that they're talking about.

372
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You get that stuff passed, so the American consumer is feeling a little bit

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more money in their pocket. Then you start rolling out tariffs.

374
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Maybe you start with these 70 or so folks who you could send out messaging to

375
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and tell them it's a serious matter.

376
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You're going to have 90 days while we sort out these regulations and efficiencies and tax breaks.

377
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Then you begin the process of tariffs.

378
00:26:41,144 --> 00:26:46,824
They didn't do it in that order. They didn't prepare the farmland before they

379
00:26:46,824 --> 00:26:48,044
wanted to start growing the corn.

380
00:26:48,224 --> 00:26:51,684
They just had a dirty field and they just threw the corn seeds in there and

381
00:26:51,684 --> 00:26:54,844
started watering them with too much water. I mean, that's a bad analogy.

382
00:26:54,964 --> 00:26:58,464
But I'm trying to tell you that if you listen to Besson here,

383
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they didn't necessarily have to do it in the order they did,

384
00:27:00,884 --> 00:27:04,684
and the results may have been more successful. And the deregulation,

385
00:27:04,684 --> 00:27:08,444
unfortunately, takes longer to kick in.

386
00:27:08,564 --> 00:27:11,344
But I tell you, when it does, it's going to be powerful.

387
00:27:11,544 --> 00:27:17,264
And part of the deregulation in the banking industry will be changing what's

388
00:27:17,264 --> 00:27:22,004
called the supplementary leverage ratio, which will allow banks to buy more

389
00:27:22,004 --> 00:27:24,544
treasuries without a big capital charge.

390
00:27:24,544 --> 00:27:30,624
So, you know, I would expect that we have created a new buyer for treasury securities

391
00:27:30,624 --> 00:27:34,184
or a larger, more durable buyer.

392
00:27:35,304 --> 00:27:40,684
Did you catch that? Besson is saying the plan is to go back to the way that things were in 2020.

393
00:27:41,304 --> 00:27:47,244
Let the banks buy treasuries right along with the Fed, which is another form

394
00:27:47,244 --> 00:27:50,344
of quantitative easing. Only it wouldn't be just the Fed.

395
00:27:50,664 --> 00:27:53,504
It'd be the banking industry along with the Fed.

396
00:27:54,344 --> 00:27:58,804
So Besant gets more buyers for his debt, and then he gets to pitch the whole thing as deregulation.

397
00:27:59,916 --> 00:28:03,436
That's, I mean, that's going to work. That's going to work. I mean,

398
00:28:03,436 --> 00:28:04,276
I don't know if it's a good idea.

399
00:28:04,476 --> 00:28:07,216
I'd love to know your thoughts, but it's definitely going to do what he wants

400
00:28:07,216 --> 00:28:09,336
in the short term. You're going to have more buyers.

401
00:28:09,836 --> 00:28:13,896
And if things get really bad and the bond yields continue to rip upwards and

402
00:28:13,896 --> 00:28:15,816
the cost of debt starts to get ridiculous,

403
00:28:16,496 --> 00:28:21,276
well, Luke Groman thinks that there may be a Hail Mary play to really drive

404
00:28:21,276 --> 00:28:27,096
those yields down could already be in conversation, even though it's been denied by Besson.

405
00:28:27,096 --> 00:28:31,756
Senator Lemus with the revaluing gold or revaluing gold certificates.

406
00:28:32,456 --> 00:28:37,196
Look, they could create now with gold this morning as we sit here, 3,150.

407
00:28:37,636 --> 00:28:42,076
Now, you're probably close to $850 billion that would get deposited directly

408
00:28:42,076 --> 00:28:47,816
into the TGA, with which Besant could do whatever he wants within some constraints,

409
00:28:48,016 --> 00:28:51,276
I suppose, which is an oxymoron. But he could certainly buy back debt.

410
00:28:51,616 --> 00:28:55,996
It reduces versus duration issuance by $850 billion.

411
00:28:56,556 --> 00:29:01,616
So paradoxically, for a long time, people said, oh, if the US revalued gold,

412
00:29:01,896 --> 00:29:02,956
treasury yields would spike.

413
00:29:03,196 --> 00:29:06,956
No, they wouldn't. They'd collapse. You want to get the 10-year treasury yield down?

414
00:29:07,816 --> 00:29:12,056
Talk up gold. Walk gold up. You're not going to issue any debt.

415
00:29:12,776 --> 00:29:16,116
And if you don't have to issue any debt, every year there's 400 to,

416
00:29:16,256 --> 00:29:18,436
I don't know, this is a guesstimate.

417
00:29:18,716 --> 00:29:23,716
Every year, there's probably 400 to 500, maybe $600 billion of just mindless

418
00:29:23,716 --> 00:29:25,376
duration buying in treasuries.

419
00:29:26,156 --> 00:29:28,796
They have to buy. And it's pensions and insurers, right?

420
00:29:28,896 --> 00:29:33,036
So they're going to buy 400 to 600 billion. And maybe it's 300,

421
00:29:33,136 --> 00:29:34,736
maybe it's seven. I don't, I don't know.

422
00:29:34,856 --> 00:29:40,136
But it's a decent chunk of money. And the point is, is that if you get duration

423
00:29:40,136 --> 00:29:44,036
issuance plus foreign selling of duration below that number,

424
00:29:44,736 --> 00:29:45,696
treasury yields are going to fall.

425
00:29:45,696 --> 00:29:50,776
Almost regardless of what's happening with inflation and all this other crap.

426
00:29:50,996 --> 00:29:58,036
So, yeah, you could revalue gold. You could walk or the gold certificates and

427
00:29:58,036 --> 00:30:03,596
you could significantly reduce treasury issuance, get yields down.

428
00:30:03,896 --> 00:30:08,696
That can work in this way. That just buys you time, though. That buys you a year or two.

429
00:30:09,136 --> 00:30:13,456
I'll note that Luke so far has nailed the call on the bond yields.

430
00:30:13,456 --> 00:30:16,796
He said they'd be going up as this went on, and he nailed it.

431
00:30:18,056 --> 00:30:22,696
So that would be fascinating right there. If they were to revalue the gold certificates,

432
00:30:23,676 --> 00:30:27,176
drive bond yields down, and then potentially buy Bitcoin, too,

433
00:30:27,236 --> 00:30:31,076
which is part of Lemus' plan, and then put that on the balance sheet.

434
00:30:32,256 --> 00:30:36,416
That would really be a wild outcome of all of this if we got to this point eventually.

435
00:30:37,016 --> 00:30:39,956
I think there would be signs. I think if they were going to make such a move

436
00:30:39,956 --> 00:30:43,416
like that in the gold market, there would have to be unilateral agreement,

437
00:30:43,476 --> 00:30:48,496
perhaps with these 70 or so folks that they seem to be negotiating with.

438
00:30:50,000 --> 00:30:55,920
Music.

439
00:30:59,600 --> 00:31:01,040
Let's talk about what impacts us,

440
00:31:01,180 --> 00:31:03,920
which are really the second-order and third-order effects of all of this.

441
00:31:04,020 --> 00:31:09,140
Price changes, products on hold, and a job market that needs to absorb hundreds

442
00:31:09,140 --> 00:31:11,520
of thousands of government staffers that have been laid off.

443
00:31:12,060 --> 00:31:14,120
The talk of a recession is way up.

444
00:31:14,940 --> 00:31:18,220
It's funny, I'm always chatting with my wife because she has a medical practice,

445
00:31:18,220 --> 00:31:23,720
and she sees lots of people every day, lots of clients. And a lot of them are

446
00:31:23,720 --> 00:31:26,140
coming in for stress and anxiety about the economy.

447
00:31:26,700 --> 00:31:30,600
And I've always been a fan of the rolling recession theory.

448
00:31:30,740 --> 00:31:34,520
We've talked about it before on the show. And I've also heard Kathy Wood from

449
00:31:34,520 --> 00:31:36,620
ARK Invest put it into pretty good terms.

450
00:31:36,840 --> 00:31:43,080
And she had an update this last week about her theory on if we're about to enter

451
00:31:43,080 --> 00:31:48,320
a recession or if we're really actually seeing the end of a rolling recession.

452
00:31:48,320 --> 00:31:54,360
If we do end up with two back-to-back negative quarters,

453
00:31:54,760 --> 00:32:00,680
many investors might fear that, oh, no, this is the beginning of a recession,

454
00:32:00,680 --> 00:32:04,200
and recessions usually last quite a long time.

455
00:32:04,720 --> 00:32:08,420
That's why it's so important to identify what this is.

456
00:32:08,560 --> 00:32:11,080
It's actually the end of a rolling

457
00:32:11,080 --> 00:32:19,040
recession. Now, what has kept the GDP numbers up in the last few years?

458
00:32:19,280 --> 00:32:26,300
High-end consumer and government spending. And both of those are about to change.

459
00:32:27,480 --> 00:32:35,160
So we think that we'll have, and in fact, they're in the process of changing as I speak.

460
00:32:35,160 --> 00:32:42,020
So I think that it will be the end of the rolling recession and we'll have a

461
00:32:42,020 --> 00:32:47,860
clean slate to move into the future with what we believe could be a very strong

462
00:32:47,860 --> 00:32:53,100
productivity driven recovery and then expansion. All right.

463
00:32:53,220 --> 00:32:57,440
So she thinks we're actually going to see for a bit the transition out of a

464
00:32:57,440 --> 00:32:59,640
rolling recession and long term.

465
00:32:59,960 --> 00:33:03,240
We'll see a productivity boom. She's not the only one that's talking long term

466
00:33:03,240 --> 00:33:04,500
boom either. Your boy with the

467
00:33:04,500 --> 00:33:07,880
plan Besson also thinks things are going to look good in a little while.

468
00:33:09,000 --> 00:33:15,160
The you know, the market expecting a sharp slowdown in economic activity, sir.

469
00:33:16,507 --> 00:33:19,547
Well maria i i think what the ceo may have alluded

470
00:33:19,547 --> 00:33:23,167
to and i've said it in the past that the manufacturing sector

471
00:33:23,167 --> 00:33:25,867
under the previous administration was in

472
00:33:25,867 --> 00:33:28,707
a recession so what what we are doing

473
00:33:28,707 --> 00:33:32,207
is what i call reprivatizing the economy you

474
00:33:32,207 --> 00:33:35,287
know 80 of the job creation was either

475
00:33:35,287 --> 00:33:38,447
government jobs or government adjacent which is education

476
00:33:38,447 --> 00:33:41,507
and health care and you know this massive

477
00:33:41,507 --> 00:33:45,187
amount of government borrowing so we are also getting

478
00:33:45,187 --> 00:33:48,267
the deficit under control right sizing the

479
00:33:48,267 --> 00:33:51,447
federal workforce and then on the other side we

480
00:33:51,447 --> 00:33:56,867
are they are going to relever the private sector through smart safe and sound

481
00:33:56,867 --> 00:34:02,947
bank deregulation and then you know as the ceo said they can come out of recession

482
00:34:02,947 --> 00:34:08,207
because the i expect that long-term interest rates should come down as we get

483
00:34:08,207 --> 00:34:09,327
the budget under control,

484
00:34:09,747 --> 00:34:15,107
inflation under control, energy prices come down, and then the private sector

485
00:34:15,107 --> 00:34:18,107
will have room to grow. Yeah, that's the plan, I suppose.

486
00:34:18,447 --> 00:34:24,487
So that would be, I guess, very beneficial for people to listen to this show

487
00:34:24,487 --> 00:34:28,327
and people out in the real economy, not just Wall Street, if it's true.

488
00:34:28,547 --> 00:34:32,707
And if this rolling recession theory that's been hitting different sectors works out.

489
00:34:33,167 --> 00:34:36,387
And, you know, there's a lot to actually pull off here. In fact,

490
00:34:36,527 --> 00:34:41,787
I was going to ask you, what would success actually look like?

491
00:34:42,027 --> 00:34:47,547
How would we know the Trump administration has achieved their goals?

492
00:34:48,047 --> 00:34:52,587
Because I think one thing, even though the tariffs have been paused...

493
00:34:53,264 --> 00:34:57,844
It feels like things will never quite be the same again. No other president

494
00:34:57,844 --> 00:35:01,644
would be willing to do what I'm doing or to even go through it.

495
00:35:01,804 --> 00:35:05,824
Now, I don't mind going through it because I see a beautiful picture at the end.

496
00:35:06,704 --> 00:35:10,624
A beautiful picture at the end. For more on what that picture might in fact

497
00:35:10,624 --> 00:35:12,564
look like, I want to bring in Justin Wolfers.

498
00:35:12,684 --> 00:35:15,944
He is a professor of public policy and economics at the University of Michigan.

499
00:35:16,064 --> 00:35:18,824
It's great to have you with it. Justice, you wrote an op-ed for The New York

500
00:35:18,824 --> 00:35:22,264
Times. You know what it says, but my audience does it, so let me go through it a little bit.

501
00:35:22,964 --> 00:35:25,864
Quote, your life will never be the same after these tariffs.

502
00:35:26,144 --> 00:35:30,324
You wrote also, these tariffs are going to hurt a lot. By my calculations,

503
00:35:30,324 --> 00:35:36,384
this round of tariffs may be 50 times as painful as the ones Donald Trump instituted

504
00:35:36,384 --> 00:35:38,384
in his first term. Simple question, why?

505
00:35:38,784 --> 00:35:42,084
I don't know where he gets this 50 times more painful. How do you measure the

506
00:35:42,084 --> 00:35:45,984
pain of the previous one and then assign a score to that than to say this one's

507
00:35:45,984 --> 00:35:47,404
50x more? That's just ridiculous.

508
00:35:48,224 --> 00:35:51,904
But I do agree things will probably never be the same again.

509
00:35:52,264 --> 00:35:53,964
So how do we measure success?

510
00:35:54,544 --> 00:35:59,584
It seems like a 1 in 100 shot that they pull all of this off without creating

511
00:35:59,584 --> 00:36:01,744
some kind of massive economic fallout.

512
00:36:02,104 --> 00:36:06,504
So how will we measure this success? I'd love it if you boosted in with your thoughts on that.

513
00:36:08,024 --> 00:36:12,804
And I want to say, I am just so damn proud of Bitcoin. Part of me is just floored

514
00:36:12,804 --> 00:36:15,764
how well Bitcoin has held up around its 200-day moving average price.

515
00:36:15,844 --> 00:36:20,104
In the past years, say like with the COVID lockdown crash, Bitcoin front runs it.

516
00:36:20,564 --> 00:36:22,704
Bitcoin's the first thing. It's the canary in the coal mine.

517
00:36:22,844 --> 00:36:25,344
It goes harder and faster than the stock market.

518
00:36:25,804 --> 00:36:30,944
But in this last week, on days when the stock market lost trillions of dollars,

519
00:36:31,744 --> 00:36:33,084
Bitcoin lost a couple thousand.

520
00:36:33,924 --> 00:36:35,764
That's amazing. Of course,

521
00:36:36,529 --> 00:36:40,489
The media's never happy. Donald Trump promised to be the Bitcoin president,

522
00:36:40,489 --> 00:36:42,749
but where's the upside for crypto?

523
00:36:45,809 --> 00:36:49,089
This is Sectors Up Close, and we're talking cryptocurrency.

524
00:36:49,689 --> 00:36:54,789
Bitcoin hit a 2025 low on Monday, sliding alongside equities,

525
00:36:55,149 --> 00:36:59,349
even though President Trump had promised favourable policies that would make

526
00:36:59,349 --> 00:37:01,569
the US the crypto capital of the planet.

527
00:37:01,929 --> 00:37:04,949
So what's happened to the optimism around cryptocurrency?

528
00:37:05,549 --> 00:37:09,329
Well, Andrew... Okay, the reason why I'm really playing this clip is because

529
00:37:09,329 --> 00:37:11,989
this clip is actually a lot more bullish than you realize.

530
00:37:12,329 --> 00:37:17,509
She's about to bring on the Digital Assets Managing Director of S&P Global Ratings.

531
00:37:17,849 --> 00:37:23,649
S&P Global Ratings is the largest credit ratings agency in the world.

532
00:37:23,869 --> 00:37:29,689
The type of folks that never used to spend a minute talking or thinking about Bitcoin.

533
00:37:29,929 --> 00:37:33,969
And now they're on these types of shows answering questions about Bitcoin.

534
00:37:33,969 --> 00:37:36,449
So I just want to listen to a little bit of his perspective.

535
00:37:36,449 --> 00:37:41,449
Because it is almost historical in itself that it's just somebody coming from

536
00:37:41,449 --> 00:37:45,789
S&P and they're commenting on Bitcoin in a positive way, which I'll let you

537
00:37:45,789 --> 00:37:46,689
hear now. Cryptocurrency.

538
00:37:47,069 --> 00:37:51,909
Well, Andrew O'Neill is Digital Assets Managing Director at S&P Global Ratings.

539
00:37:52,369 --> 00:37:56,409
Andrew, cryptocurrency was intended as a departure from the traditional financial

540
00:37:56,409 --> 00:38:00,489
system, but isn't it moving a lot like any other risky asset at the moment?

541
00:38:01,329 --> 00:38:04,429
Well, Elena, thank you for having me. I think you're referring to price movements

542
00:38:04,429 --> 00:38:07,029
in the last few days, few weeks.

543
00:38:07,449 --> 00:38:15,409
Certainly, we've seen a trend where markets have moved to a risk-off paradigm in recent days.

544
00:38:15,789 --> 00:38:19,949
And clearly, crypto has joined other asset class in that movement.

545
00:38:20,229 --> 00:38:25,829
I think when we come back to why crypto could be an asset that behaves differently,

546
00:38:26,089 --> 00:38:30,129
a lot of the assumptions behind that are things that are still developing.

547
00:38:30,489 --> 00:38:34,889
May, over a number of years, become true. But I would also highlight that then

548
00:38:34,889 --> 00:38:38,009
among crypto assets themselves, that there are significant differences.

549
00:38:38,229 --> 00:38:39,769
And when we're talking about that,

550
00:38:40,589 --> 00:38:46,489
Asset that may behave differently, that may be a hedge against currency debasement,

551
00:38:46,589 --> 00:38:49,929
for example, that may be uncorrelated to stocks.

552
00:38:50,389 --> 00:38:54,909
We're primarily focused on Bitcoin. Yeah. We're focused on its characteristics

553
00:38:54,909 --> 00:38:56,749
as an alternate form of money.

554
00:38:56,949 --> 00:39:03,509
We're primarily focused on Bitcoin and its characteristics as an alternative form of money.

555
00:39:03,749 --> 00:39:09,649
We're focused on the fact that it's decentralized, that it's geopolitically neutral. Oh, yes.

556
00:39:10,589 --> 00:39:14,689
And we're starting to see adoption in that sense of that narrative of investment

557
00:39:14,689 --> 00:39:18,609
appearing among institutional investors, among public sector investors,

558
00:39:18,889 --> 00:39:20,649
among national governments. Imagine.

559
00:39:21,289 --> 00:39:27,189
Oh, I love that it's decentralized. Non-government nature is finally being appreciated

560
00:39:27,189 --> 00:39:30,469
as a value and not a risk by these people.

561
00:39:30,889 --> 00:39:35,369
That is such a shift of the Overton window. Oh, it makes me so happy to hear that.

562
00:39:36,169 --> 00:39:41,049
You know, not great audio, not a great host for sure. I think also we should

563
00:39:41,049 --> 00:39:43,409
all be very proud of Bitcoin, but we should be braced.

564
00:39:44,289 --> 00:39:48,989
Really, it would take just another dramatic leg down in the market that happens

565
00:39:48,989 --> 00:39:51,989
at an inconvenient time for Bitcoin to take a hit.

566
00:39:52,549 --> 00:39:59,149
Right. The thing is, Wall Street got really, really close to the sell what you

567
00:39:59,149 --> 00:40:02,749
can, not what you want stage. We just avoided that with this pause.

568
00:40:03,049 --> 00:40:06,349
And when that happens, when they have to sell what they can,

569
00:40:06,469 --> 00:40:10,509
it triggers all kinds of sell offs. And if it happens on the weekends and the

570
00:40:10,509 --> 00:40:15,189
banks are closed, Bitcoin can be one of the only options if you need a lot of liquidity.

571
00:40:15,869 --> 00:40:21,629
So just bear that in mind. We are still in a little bit extra risky price season right now.

572
00:40:21,949 --> 00:40:25,709
This 90-day pause is probably going to relieve that pressure for a while.

573
00:40:25,849 --> 00:40:27,849
But if something else were to develop...

574
00:40:29,229 --> 00:40:34,149
Could turn pretty quickly. So I'm not declaring risky time over yet.

575
00:40:35,029 --> 00:40:38,429
I am curious to see how the price action behaves with this pause.

576
00:40:38,809 --> 00:40:43,789
As I record right now, we're still down. But you know, I would imagine as the

577
00:40:43,789 --> 00:40:47,629
news starts to percolate out there, it'll start coming up because it was breaking

578
00:40:47,629 --> 00:40:50,629
just as I went on the air. So let me know what you think.

579
00:40:51,249 --> 00:40:59,089
Send in your thesis on how we would measure success and what a successful outcome

580
00:40:59,089 --> 00:41:03,349
might look like, I suppose, because I don't know if it's really been defined.

581
00:41:02,800 --> 00:41:21,360
Music.

582
00:41:05,809 --> 00:41:09,369
All right, coming up, your boosts, some updates, a couple final clips of the week.

583
00:41:22,349 --> 00:41:25,329
I want to thank everybody who supports the show by doing just

584
00:41:25,329 --> 00:41:28,289
what you do if you're stacking sats on river use our link

585
00:41:28,289 --> 00:41:31,209
support the show if you're using the bitcoin well because you

586
00:41:31,209 --> 00:41:34,449
go self-custody all the way every day that's the bitcoin wells

587
00:41:34,449 --> 00:41:37,189
whole mo link to that in the show notes

588
00:41:37,189 --> 00:41:40,149
you're ready to spend your sats maybe with a gift card over lightning

589
00:41:40,149 --> 00:41:42,949
pew pew use the bitcoin company link to that

590
00:41:42,949 --> 00:41:45,669
that's what i use now if you want to stack sats when you're

591
00:41:45,669 --> 00:41:48,789
buying stuff if you're paying bills if

592
00:41:48,789 --> 00:41:52,149
you need a debit card that kind of thing the fold card is where it's at people

593
00:41:52,149 --> 00:41:55,909
loving our community i've got one and then salt lending helps you get access

594
00:41:55,909 --> 00:41:59,749
to your bitcoin value without having to sell it they do also have a couple of

595
00:41:59,749 --> 00:42:03,249
nice options if the price gets a little crazy including stable coin stabilization

596
00:42:03,249 --> 00:42:06,009
something to look into there all those links are in the show notes.

597
00:42:06,209 --> 00:42:09,229
You can just support the show by doing what you do. Those are our affiliate

598
00:42:09,229 --> 00:42:11,569
links, and I appreciate it very much.

599
00:42:12,240 --> 00:42:29,360
Music.

600
00:42:29,202 --> 00:42:33,062
We got some great boosts into the show this week. Thank you,

601
00:42:33,182 --> 00:42:35,042
everybody who sends those in.

602
00:42:35,542 --> 00:42:40,862
Let's start with our baller booster this week, who is Mr. Adam Curry,

603
00:42:41,002 --> 00:42:42,962
the podfather. Hey, rich lobster!

604
00:42:44,902 --> 00:42:50,542
Coming in with 50,000 tasty, tasty sets. This is a tasty burger.

605
00:42:50,762 --> 00:42:54,082
And he says, 50K for saying giga bullish.

606
00:42:55,262 --> 00:42:58,422
You know, I felt so stupid the moment I said that.

607
00:42:59,202 --> 00:43:03,842
And now I'm pretty glad I said that. Did you buy that from a certified vendor?

608
00:43:04,042 --> 00:43:05,742
Should I just like slip it into every episode?

609
00:43:06,062 --> 00:43:08,062
Nice to hear from you, Podfather. Thanks for the value.

610
00:43:10,542 --> 00:43:15,842
OBL918 comes in with 23,456 sats. Okay.

611
00:43:16,142 --> 00:43:20,262
Boy, they are doing a lot with mayo these days. And it's just a boosty McBoosterson.

612
00:43:20,502 --> 00:43:22,062
Thank you. Appreciate that.

613
00:43:22,542 --> 00:43:26,342
That's pretty funny. Next caller. A-Train comes in with two,

614
00:43:26,622 --> 00:43:30,262
nope, I'm sorry, 20,000 sats. This is the way.

615
00:43:30,462 --> 00:43:34,642
Ad-free boost. You got it, buddy. You keep boosting, and I'm going to keep it

616
00:43:34,642 --> 00:43:38,002
going as long as I can, ad-free. That's where I've come down right now.

617
00:43:38,642 --> 00:43:42,222
It's not 100% commitment, but as long as I can make it work,

618
00:43:42,322 --> 00:43:46,082
I'm going to. You're doing a good job. You know what I mean? That's how I feel.

619
00:43:46,542 --> 00:43:50,622
Hey, the Muso's here with 5,000 sats. You said boost. I was going to boost about

620
00:43:50,622 --> 00:43:53,862
the low network activity, but I think you covered that pretty good last episode.

621
00:43:53,862 --> 00:43:59,322
Instead, I'd like to encourage those running a node to support the development of software they use.

622
00:43:59,642 --> 00:44:04,982
I, for one, am supporting AlbiHub and plan to support the NixBitcoin developers as well.

623
00:44:05,222 --> 00:44:08,982
Both accept Lightning payments and NixBitcoin accepts on-chain,

624
00:44:08,982 --> 00:44:10,242
if that's your preference.

625
00:44:10,662 --> 00:44:14,302
Whoa, the muso. I did not know NixBitcoin accepted Lightning payments.

626
00:44:15,438 --> 00:44:17,918
I would like a link or something because I will forget about that after this

627
00:44:17,918 --> 00:44:19,058
episode. But I think I'd like to

628
00:44:19,058 --> 00:44:22,278
put him into the splits for a couple of episodes or something, you know?

629
00:44:22,958 --> 00:44:25,978
Help support the project. I love Nick's Bitcoin. I think it's the best way to

630
00:44:25,978 --> 00:44:31,118
have a real appliance level Bitcoin node. Appliance level, you know?

631
00:44:31,658 --> 00:44:34,118
That, Musa, great. Thank you. Let me know how it goes, okay?

632
00:44:34,218 --> 00:44:37,658
Fun will now commence. Just maybe follow up and let me know how to do that.

633
00:44:38,458 --> 00:44:43,178
Adversary 17 is back with 15,000 sats. Oh my God, this drawer is filled with

634
00:44:43,178 --> 00:44:48,038
fruit loops. And Adversaries says, My guess on why the Layer 1 transactions

635
00:44:48,038 --> 00:44:51,858
have been low is maybe due to Lightning getting increasingly adopted.

636
00:44:51,958 --> 00:44:54,998
When I send you sats and a boost, I've already made the transaction between

637
00:44:54,998 --> 00:44:58,038
my node and someone else's, so Layer 1 doesn't see a change.

638
00:44:58,358 --> 00:45:01,938
Could also be that people are stacking, there's no need to move anything around.

639
00:45:02,478 --> 00:45:07,098
I think you got a couple theories going in here. I could see that with zapping

640
00:45:07,098 --> 00:45:09,978
and things like that, some of the activity has gone to Lightning.

641
00:45:10,598 --> 00:45:14,298
Definitely could see some of that. But I think some of it's the ETFs too, right?

642
00:45:14,678 --> 00:45:19,018
People are buying and selling inside these ETFs, which as far as the blockchain

643
00:45:19,018 --> 00:45:20,498
is concerned, is almost like a layer too.

644
00:45:21,098 --> 00:45:24,738
And then I think it's the other thing you said. People be stacking and they're

645
00:45:24,738 --> 00:45:26,698
not moving them right now. They're not moving.

646
00:45:26,958 --> 00:45:32,338
People are not interested in really transacting or selling their Bitcoin when it's worth less.

647
00:45:32,818 --> 00:45:35,738
People expect it to be over 100,000. So they're sitting on it and they're waiting.

648
00:45:35,898 --> 00:45:39,298
They're hodling, which is what a lot of good Bitcoiners do.

649
00:45:40,140 --> 00:45:43,200
Good thinking. Thank you, Adversaries. Nice to hear from you. Appreciate you.

650
00:45:43,940 --> 00:45:46,860
Mix comes in with 10,000 sats. Just pump the brakes right there.

651
00:45:47,220 --> 00:45:54,040
And he says, thanks. Thank you. Appreciate it. User 54 is here with 4,444 sats,

652
00:45:54,120 --> 00:45:56,040
which I was trying to debate right there.

653
00:45:56,220 --> 00:46:00,120
I'm going to say it's a McDuck. This old duck still got it. It could be an Aflac,

654
00:46:00,200 --> 00:46:03,460
but I'm going to say it's a McDuck. Things are looking up for old McDuck.

655
00:46:03,700 --> 00:46:06,400
And he just says something, something quack. There you go.

656
00:46:07,700 --> 00:46:12,580
Ace Ackerman is here with a row of ducks as well. Hey, boost. Thank you.

657
00:46:12,840 --> 00:46:15,720
And Clarkian is here with 10,000 sats.

658
00:46:16,160 --> 00:46:18,480
Hey, thank you, sir. It's pretty funny.

659
00:46:19,040 --> 00:46:21,680
Next caller. Hey, no, give him something better. He deserves something better than that.

660
00:46:22,360 --> 00:46:26,640
That's not possible. Nothing can do that. Yeah, the random button's not always so great.

661
00:46:27,180 --> 00:46:32,340
Clarkian says, unfortunately, I'm one of the few states that salt lending does

662
00:46:32,340 --> 00:46:34,020
not yet service, which is Alabama.

663
00:46:34,500 --> 00:46:38,640
But I am able to use Lend. They have higher rates, but it's still a very cool

664
00:46:38,640 --> 00:46:41,060
unlock to live off of Bitcoin without having to sell it.

665
00:46:41,500 --> 00:46:45,200
Assuming the Bitcoin kegger is consistently higher than the rate,

666
00:46:45,420 --> 00:46:49,800
just roll over the loan after 12 months and reclaim some of the Bitcoin. Very nice.

667
00:46:50,220 --> 00:46:52,800
That's interesting. Lend is, I think, unavailable in my state,

668
00:46:52,920 --> 00:46:54,100
Washington, where salt is.

669
00:46:54,260 --> 00:46:57,260
There are those types of things. Probably comes down to like money transmitter

670
00:46:57,260 --> 00:46:59,900
licenses and other things like that.

671
00:47:00,060 --> 00:47:03,260
I always appreciate hearing experiences with other platforms.

672
00:47:03,860 --> 00:47:07,940
So if you ever have any updates you want to share about Len Clarkian, please do send it in.

673
00:47:08,260 --> 00:47:11,120
And I agree, as long as you've got the collateral to cover a dip,

674
00:47:11,520 --> 00:47:14,060
you know, you just you need to be a little dip aware right now.

675
00:47:14,200 --> 00:47:15,520
You need to be extra dip aware.

676
00:47:16,260 --> 00:47:19,340
And as long as you're extra dip aware, you'll be all right.

677
00:47:19,420 --> 00:47:24,960
You know, if you've got a way to ACH some money in there or whatever they do to cover, you're OK.

678
00:47:25,160 --> 00:47:28,040
Or if you've got additional coins, you can commit or if you could just close

679
00:47:28,040 --> 00:47:31,700
the loan. You know, those are things just to consider if you're a little dip concerned.

680
00:47:31,980 --> 00:47:35,520
I'd say be dip aware at this point. You know what I mean? And I'd love to hear

681
00:47:35,520 --> 00:47:37,380
your experiences. Thank you for the boost.

682
00:47:38,200 --> 00:47:41,120
Oppie 1984 is here with 4,000 sets.

683
00:47:41,340 --> 00:47:45,360
B-O-O-S-T. Just another boost. It sure is. And I appreciate it.

684
00:47:45,760 --> 00:47:47,160
Thanks, Oppie. It's great to hear from you.

685
00:47:47,600 --> 00:47:51,100
Moon Knight's here with 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 sets.

686
00:47:51,300 --> 00:47:58,080
So the culmination is 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Now is a great time to set up PeerSwap

687
00:47:58,080 --> 00:48:01,200
on your Lightning node for unfairly cheap liquid swaps.

688
00:48:01,500 --> 00:48:05,940
I did a 34-sat swap on one of my channels. Fees are low, so take advantage.

689
00:48:06,360 --> 00:48:08,740
Great advice. Great advice.

690
00:48:09,300 --> 00:48:14,620
When the fees are low, that's a great time to set up channels or do some swapping.

691
00:48:15,060 --> 00:48:18,520
PeerSwap, I'll give a plus one on my recommendation too. PeerSwap for Lightning.

692
00:48:19,320 --> 00:48:22,320
This is a great time to set up some channels.

693
00:48:23,080 --> 00:48:28,180
Make sure you've got a channel to AQIN. Get some big ones in there because the fees are cheap.

694
00:48:28,320 --> 00:48:32,100
And then later when they go up, you feel like a king. You're like,

695
00:48:32,160 --> 00:48:33,360
I set that up for nothing.

696
00:48:33,860 --> 00:48:38,760
It feels great. That's a great tip. Great boost. Thank you, Moon Knight. Appreciate it.

697
00:48:39,600 --> 00:48:43,340
Nakamoto 6102 is here with 7,000 sats.

698
00:48:45,500 --> 00:48:48,820
I've missed a couple of shows, so here's a couple more boosts. Thanks for the value.

699
00:48:52,300 --> 00:48:55,060
Well, thank you. Appreciate you, and thanks for catching up,

700
00:48:55,160 --> 00:48:56,220
Nakamoto. It's nice to hear from you.

701
00:48:56,800 --> 00:49:01,220
That's all the boosts above 2,000 sats, but I did want to pull up SickBlackCat.

702
00:49:01,420 --> 00:49:03,420
He came in under the 2,000-sat cutoff.

703
00:49:03,700 --> 00:49:07,620
He says, I found Fountain on a whim, and I was trying to see what Hive and some

704
00:49:07,620 --> 00:49:10,560
of the other infrastructure was actually being used for. That's a part of Podping.

705
00:49:11,100 --> 00:49:14,380
That's why I came across this show. As an American veteran, it means a lot to

706
00:49:14,380 --> 00:49:16,640
me, especially only being six years after transitioning.

707
00:49:16,880 --> 00:49:19,620
This is the only thing that has made me feel like I'm part of something bigger.

708
00:49:20,080 --> 00:49:23,080
And Chris is a big reason why I not only enjoy this movement,

709
00:49:23,180 --> 00:49:28,200
but honestly feel well-informed and confident in taking the orange pill. How awesome is that?

710
00:49:32,760 --> 00:49:35,820
Through reading about technology and finding Fountain, finding the show,

711
00:49:35,940 --> 00:49:38,440
he's discovering Bitcoin and he's discovering a community.

712
00:49:38,580 --> 00:49:41,640
I love that. Thank you, everybody who does boost in.

713
00:49:41,960 --> 00:49:46,200
It means the world. This is a value for value show. It means I put it out there, everything for free.

714
00:49:46,520 --> 00:49:48,960
And if you get value out of the analysis or what make you think,

715
00:49:49,080 --> 00:49:53,260
or if it helps you with your stack or whatever it might be, send some value back via a boost.

716
00:49:53,900 --> 00:49:56,580
And if it's above 2000 stats, I'll read the message on the air too.

717
00:49:57,040 --> 00:49:59,840
Fountain FM is probably your best way, easiest way to do it,

718
00:49:59,880 --> 00:50:01,000
but there's so many great ways.

719
00:50:01,120 --> 00:50:04,980
A lot of people in our community take the time to set up AlbiHub and then you've

720
00:50:04,980 --> 00:50:09,340
got a world of options available to you and lots of available apps over at podcastapps.com.

721
00:50:09,600 --> 00:50:12,660
So you'd really, you just, you got to pick your path there, but there's some

722
00:50:12,660 --> 00:50:15,260
good ones like a Saturday and

723
00:50:15,260 --> 00:50:18,820
it's some of the most rewarding and educational work you'll do as well.

724
00:50:19,160 --> 00:50:21,820
So I know I'm selling it pretty hard there, but I really love it.

725
00:50:21,960 --> 00:50:23,480
And then you also will be running a node.

726
00:50:23,700 --> 00:50:26,600
You could be boosted and running a node all from your own self-hosted infrastructure.

727
00:50:26,780 --> 00:50:30,120
But if you ain't got time for that, Fountain does all the hosting for you.

728
00:50:30,200 --> 00:50:33,060
And that's why I say Fountain FM is kind of the easiest way to go.

729
00:50:33,965 --> 00:50:36,865
Let's wrap it up. Thank you, everybody. Those of you who stream sats,

730
00:50:36,985 --> 00:50:39,025
we had 38 streamers. I really appreciate you.

731
00:50:39,285 --> 00:50:44,265
Collectively, you did a great lift this week, 50,358 sats from you sat streamers.

732
00:50:44,345 --> 00:50:52,365
When you combine that with our boosters, the show stacked a grand total of 218,702 sats this week.

733
00:50:57,525 --> 00:51:03,125
Not a barn burner, but level completed, and we are satisfied with the results, right? I think so.

734
00:51:03,745 --> 00:51:06,865
Thank you, everybody. I mean, I would love, I would really love it if you got

735
00:51:06,865 --> 00:51:07,865
value out of this episode,

736
00:51:07,865 --> 00:51:14,585
because what I tried to do this week was take all of the hours of reading everything

737
00:51:14,585 --> 00:51:19,625
and listening to everybody and entertaining every possible conspiracy theory, practical theory,

738
00:51:20,145 --> 00:51:25,885
applied theory, and just distilling down the bits that I think are actual signal.

739
00:51:26,265 --> 00:51:30,825
And this could have been a five-hour episode. And the value I'm trying to bring

740
00:51:30,825 --> 00:51:35,645
is something that is actually listenable and sharp enough that you get the big,

741
00:51:35,785 --> 00:51:39,685
big movements of what's happening here and how ultimately, of course,

742
00:51:39,865 --> 00:51:41,125
it's going to be huge for Bitcoin.

743
00:51:40,400 --> 00:51:48,240
Music.

744
00:51:51,805 --> 00:51:57,105
We have some updates. We have big updates. First up, the U.S.

745
00:51:57,445 --> 00:52:02,785
Justice Department has ended its crypto enforcement and regulation by prosecution program.

746
00:52:03,065 --> 00:52:07,705
The DOJ has announced that the U.S.

747
00:52:08,025 --> 00:52:12,225
Attorney's Office will now be taking the lead for digital asset cases instead of the DOJ. The U.S.

748
00:52:12,525 --> 00:52:16,125
Department of Justice has officially disbanded the National Cryptocurrency Enforcement

749
00:52:16,125 --> 00:52:21,385
Unit, a move signaling significant shift in federal policy towards crypto regulation.

750
00:52:21,385 --> 00:52:27,265
In a memo titled, quote, Ending Regulation by Prosecution, that was actually the title of the memo,

751
00:52:27,925 --> 00:52:32,825
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche emphasized that the DOJ is no longer to

752
00:52:32,825 --> 00:52:37,325
act as a crypto regulator, which aligns with President Trump's January executive

753
00:52:37,325 --> 00:52:40,505
order seeking regulatory clarity for digital assets.

754
00:52:41,745 --> 00:52:47,345
The NCET, which was this division, was formed in 2021 under President Biden,

755
00:52:47,525 --> 00:52:51,065
and it was involved in high-profile cases like those against the Tornado Cash

756
00:52:51,065 --> 00:52:54,625
developers and the Samurai Wallet developers that I've covered here on the show,

757
00:52:55,125 --> 00:52:57,905
as well as investigations in North Korean laundering and others.

758
00:52:58,285 --> 00:53:03,105
Now, the DOJ directs prosecutors to stop targeting crypto exchanges and privacy

759
00:53:03,105 --> 00:53:09,765
tools like mixers, tumblers or offline self-custody wallets for end users and

760
00:53:09,765 --> 00:53:13,265
also to stop looking for accidental violations.

761
00:53:13,625 --> 00:53:19,105
Instead, prosecutors are instructed to focus on individuals who are actively harming investors.

762
00:53:19,625 --> 00:53:22,745
Ongoing investigations and policies that don't align with this new approach

763
00:53:22,745 --> 00:53:26,125
are to be closed or rescinded immediately.

764
00:53:27,483 --> 00:53:33,323
I just think in other times, news like that would have been giga bullish.

765
00:53:35,183 --> 00:53:41,363
All right. Then in the, you know, background of that news, Phoenix Wallet is

766
00:53:41,363 --> 00:53:43,163
available again in the United States.

767
00:53:43,503 --> 00:53:49,163
They write on X, we are, we welcome the, quote, ending regulation by prosecution

768
00:53:49,163 --> 00:53:55,383
memo by the USDAG, Department of Justice. and the clarity it provides for the

769
00:53:55,383 --> 00:53:57,523
developers and operators of Bitcoin software.

770
00:53:57,743 --> 00:54:01,883
This is consistent with Executive Order 1478 that recognized the importance

771
00:54:01,883 --> 00:54:06,083
of protecting and promoting the ability of individual citizens and private sector

772
00:54:06,083 --> 00:54:11,023
entities alike to develop, deploy software, and transact with others and to

773
00:54:11,023 --> 00:54:12,583
maintain self-custody.

774
00:54:12,783 --> 00:54:17,143
We are happy to make our products available again in the United States.

775
00:54:23,543 --> 00:54:27,943
You know, I wonder, would Albie consider custodial lightning services again?

776
00:54:28,083 --> 00:54:34,703
I'm not saying we need them necessarily, but it definitely had an impact on the adoption for Boos.

777
00:54:35,083 --> 00:54:38,343
I can imagine it had an impact on the adoption of Noster as well.

778
00:54:38,683 --> 00:54:44,883
And it would seem that the enforcement by prosecution that I believe probably

779
00:54:44,883 --> 00:54:48,963
scared them out of self-custody services may no longer be a threat.

780
00:54:49,403 --> 00:54:52,943
And there will be a market opportunity for that type of service.

781
00:54:52,943 --> 00:54:57,423
And their API still works great, it'd be fantastic to have that as a companion

782
00:54:57,423 --> 00:54:59,563
to AlbiHub. I don't know. What do you guys think?

783
00:54:59,600 --> 00:55:10,320
Music.

784
00:55:10,643 --> 00:55:15,443
All right. I got two final clips of the week, which I shouldn't do.

785
00:55:15,523 --> 00:55:17,623
I should only have one. I should only have one.

786
00:55:17,883 --> 00:55:22,983
But there is a method to my badness here. Besant has been the star of this week's show.

787
00:55:23,563 --> 00:55:27,963
And there's a reason why. My sense after following all of these guys around

788
00:55:27,963 --> 00:55:32,823
Trump and listening to all of their statements is Besant is the one with his

789
00:55:32,823 --> 00:55:33,983
head around the big problems.

790
00:55:34,123 --> 00:55:36,603
He's the one that's been thinking about this for years.

791
00:55:36,983 --> 00:55:40,243
So I thought he gets one last play and this one's a goodie.

792
00:55:40,503 --> 00:55:43,683
Now, for some context, because I haven't been implicitly clear about this,

793
00:55:43,943 --> 00:55:46,763
this man is the current U.S. Treasury Secretary.

794
00:55:47,103 --> 00:55:49,863
This is the guy that replaced Janet Yellen.

795
00:55:50,423 --> 00:55:54,863
The man is deeply involved in reshaping global trade at the moment.

796
00:55:54,863 --> 00:55:59,923
And he said this about Bitcoin last week. So, like...

797
00:56:00,864 --> 00:56:07,404
It was unclear whether we were going to exempt gold from tariffs, which I believe we have.

798
00:56:07,564 --> 00:56:15,184
So there was a big move out of vaults in Switzerland, out of vaults in London to get it into New York.

799
00:56:15,504 --> 00:56:20,904
And look, there are a lot of different stores of value over time.

800
00:56:21,264 --> 00:56:27,244
Bitcoin is becoming a store of value. Gold has historically been a store of value.

801
00:56:27,384 --> 00:56:30,344
This is a really ginormous deal. I'm going to play it again,

802
00:56:30,464 --> 00:56:31,064
and then I'll let it play out.

803
00:56:31,564 --> 00:56:38,764
Over time, Bitcoin's becoming a store of value. Gold has historically been a store of value.

804
00:56:39,224 --> 00:56:43,884
I think what's interesting is where do we see the gold demand coming from?

805
00:56:44,144 --> 00:56:49,004
A huge amount is from China. Yes. Where, as I said, they're in the middle of

806
00:56:49,004 --> 00:56:51,684
an economic recession slash depression.

807
00:56:52,124 --> 00:56:56,624
People don't trust the Chinese currency because they have capital controls.

808
00:56:56,624 --> 00:57:03,484
There are 1.4 billion Chinese who all want to get their money out,

809
00:57:03,664 --> 00:57:06,424
and they won't let them. They will let them buy gold.

810
00:57:07,544 --> 00:57:13,164
And Bitcoin. And Bitcoin. One of the stories that came out today is that it

811
00:57:13,164 --> 00:57:18,564
is confirmed by VanEck that Russia and China have been settling some of their trade in Bitcoin.

812
00:57:19,244 --> 00:57:23,524
Confirmed to be settling trade in Bitcoin. It's probably nothing.

813
00:57:23,784 --> 00:57:28,104
Probably, probably nothing. And then to really wrap us up, I thought we should

814
00:57:28,104 --> 00:57:30,284
go with some classic Bitcoiner thinking.

815
00:57:30,584 --> 00:57:37,604
This is one of my favorite safe screeds on inflation and just reminds us why

816
00:57:37,604 --> 00:57:39,804
hard money is really so important.

817
00:57:40,224 --> 00:57:45,604
And I love a good safe rent. The average fiat currency or total fiat currency

818
00:57:45,604 --> 00:57:48,124
supply increases at around 14% per year.

819
00:57:48,604 --> 00:57:54,364
So you go from 2% to 14%. Well, 14% means you lose 50% in five years.

820
00:57:54,764 --> 00:57:59,204
So if you put that fiat, your average fiat paper, you put it under your mattress

821
00:57:59,204 --> 00:58:03,404
or under the floorboard and you wait five years, it's lost half of its value.

822
00:58:03,564 --> 00:58:06,264
It can buy you half of what it could buy you when you put it there.

823
00:58:06,424 --> 00:58:09,964
So let's say you have enough money to buy a house, but you don't want to buy a house now.

824
00:58:10,124 --> 00:58:12,784
So you put the money under your floorboard.

825
00:58:13,244 --> 00:58:16,644
Five years later, that money will buy you half the house that you wanted.

826
00:58:17,904 --> 00:58:21,724
So what that means is that our ability to provide for the future is massively

827
00:58:21,724 --> 00:58:24,844
compromised. and that just makes the future more uncertain.

828
00:58:25,204 --> 00:58:28,764
And as the future is more uncertain, we discount the future heavier.

829
00:58:29,044 --> 00:58:33,104
And I think this is an extremely powerful way of understanding all the bad things

830
00:58:33,104 --> 00:58:36,064
or many of the bad things that have happened in the 20th century.

831
00:58:36,444 --> 00:58:41,484
People's time preference has risen and this is really the reversal of the process of civilization.

832
00:58:41,764 --> 00:58:45,584
And that's why the subtitle of the book is not really just hyperbole.

833
00:58:45,684 --> 00:58:47,884
It really is an alternative to human civilization.

834
00:58:48,844 --> 00:58:53,424
Fiat is a way of just getting everybody to become a dead slave with no potential

835
00:58:53,424 --> 00:58:58,004
for thinking for the future and therefore little prospect for...

836
00:58:59,217 --> 00:59:02,197
Civilization little prospects for investing in the future for

837
00:59:02,197 --> 00:59:05,337
wanting to provide for the world wanting

838
00:59:05,337 --> 00:59:08,337
to provide a better life for the world for your future

839
00:59:08,337 --> 00:59:11,477
self and so everybody's just constantly becoming more

840
00:59:11,477 --> 00:59:14,517
and more high time preference becoming more and more present oriented

841
00:59:14,517 --> 00:59:17,697
and so you see this reflected in families you

842
00:59:17,697 --> 00:59:21,657
see it reflecting in people you know they spend their youth playing around

843
00:59:21,657 --> 00:59:25,637
and enjoying essentially eternal adolescence because it isn't

844
00:59:25,637 --> 00:59:28,677
as pressing to provide for your future because a you

845
00:59:28,677 --> 00:59:31,557
don't have a very reliable way of providing for your future and

846
00:59:31,557 --> 00:59:34,777
b the reason you don't have a way of reliably providing

847
00:59:34,777 --> 00:59:37,537
for your future is because your money is screwed and the reason your

848
00:59:37,537 --> 00:59:40,437
money is screwed is that the government is able to take your money

849
00:59:40,437 --> 00:59:43,897
so therefore the government can provide for you for your future so instead of

850
00:59:43,897 --> 00:59:47,577
working for your own future you know instead of investing in your own family

851
00:59:47,577 --> 00:59:54,457
you just go and do what all 20th century people do which is vote harder and

852
00:59:54,457 --> 00:59:57,257
you think that you know if i just vote harder then my government is going to

853
00:59:57,257 --> 00:59:58,457
give me all the things that i want.

854
00:59:58,000 --> 01:00:08,720
Music.

855
01:00:09,497 --> 01:00:13,237
Let's take a look at the state of the network as i get out of here i'm wrapping up at blockite,

856
01:00:15,397 --> 01:00:20,537
891,682. Bitcoin price in U.S. dollar right now is 82,180.

857
01:00:22,497 --> 01:00:26,937
That's not too bad. All right. Sats per dollar, 1,217.

858
01:00:27,577 --> 01:00:33,517
We're down 4.6% on our seven day, and we're still down 24.7% from the all-time

859
01:00:33,517 --> 01:00:39,657
high, which was now 79 days ago on January 19th, 2025. 109,160.

860
01:00:40,757 --> 01:00:44,517
Fee rate right now That was also very low. Two sats of eBite.

861
01:00:44,897 --> 01:00:49,557
Good time to go up on a channel. And the reachable nodes on the network, 22,031.

862
01:00:50,017 --> 01:00:51,577
You think we could get that to 35?

863
01:00:53,297 --> 01:00:57,317
I think you could. I think you could. Hash rates cooking.

864
01:00:58,397 --> 01:01:01,477
Bitcoin network is doing just fine.

865
01:01:01,840 --> 01:01:12,560
Music.

866
01:01:13,417 --> 01:01:17,857
Links to what I talked about at thisweekinbitcoin.show. My goal is not to get

867
01:01:17,857 --> 01:01:21,797
distracted by all the drama and emotion, and there's a lot of it this week,

868
01:01:21,897 --> 01:01:23,497
but to really focus on the signal.

869
01:01:23,797 --> 01:01:27,077
So let me know how I did with a boost and also boost in with what you'd like

870
01:01:27,077 --> 01:01:28,637
to hear from the show if I missed something.

871
01:01:29,137 --> 01:01:34,797
And then, last but not least, as you're going out the door, I'd like you to enjoy a little music.

872
01:01:35,157 --> 01:01:38,797
Last week, our track got to number one on the podcast value index charts.

873
01:01:38,997 --> 01:01:42,317
Awesome to see. And so this week, I'm doing something I've never done before.

874
01:01:42,457 --> 01:01:45,317
I previewed this song on my other podcast, The Launch.

875
01:01:45,597 --> 01:01:49,717
It's a new track from a great band, and I just think it needs some exposure,

876
01:01:49,717 --> 01:01:52,097
and I think you're going to love it. It is.

877
01:01:52,720 --> 01:03:56,830
Music.