good afternoon bitcoiners happy new year happy new year 26 wow off to a bang it's been a long
year already yeah right a lot's happened yeah yeah it's intense how was your uh new year's
otherwise it was awesome yeah it was great got to do some fishing uh still eating leftovers
might have cleaned that out at lunch today i think it kept almost all gone finally oh yeah
That was a special meal.
Yeah, man.
It's always a special meal.
Okay.
What did you have?
God, that was a while ago.
We had a bunch of stuff.
I made this crazy squash dish on my own.
Bunch of acorn squash, mashed it up, roasted garlic, olive oil, salt, pepper,
and then covered it in roasted salted pecans and pumpkin seeds and pomegranate.
Fresh pomegranate.
Sounds great.
It was fire.
Okay.
All right.
I don't know if it's my cup of tea.
It was awesome.
And then the leftovers of it, I've made muffins of.
Woo-hoo!
I just finished those off for lunch today.
Have you been news fasting?
Kind of.
No, well, I mean, I don't know.
I'm just generally slowing down my social media activity.
So what did you make at the news on, what was it, Saturday morning?
What news was that?
Venezuela.
I mean, we've been seeing that coming.
I just didn't know when it was going to happen.
Were you following this?
Yeah, we had all of our military parked off the shores.
We confiscated a couple ships.
We took some oil tankers.
Shot some boats.
Killed a lot of people.
We have a couple Venezuelan, a few Venezuelan employees that were like,
finally, let's get this thing done.
They're very excited about it.
Um, you know, and yeah, I think what's now emerging is that there was so many, uh, reasons
for this to take place in regards to the Trump, Trump doctrine or the renewed Monroe doctrine
and all the other assets that have been seized, uh, and, or, and, or maybe even potentially
seized with Bitcoin.
Um, so it's interesting, you know, we're, uh, we're definitely going to try and lock
down the western hemisphere i guess cuba's next then our good friends to the north maybe
greenland uh colombia panama canal but you weren't shocked bought argentina's rare earths so
i mean like i did the entire world is reorganizing in a multipolar fashion uh and the first the first
move is seize as many assets as you can. If, you know, if Europe is, is dying and the Eurodollar
system is shrinking, then our GSIBs need assets to collateralize. They need, they need new territories
to, to conquer. Right. So what are the assets that are gained? I mean, obviously, yeah, obviously
the oil, obviously rare earths. I mean, I guess I'm looking at like, you know, we manipulated
Latin America for many, many decades to get fruit when it was out of season in the United States,
right? Like, I mean, that was like, and to get access to agriculture and, and things on a seasonal
basis. And now it's, it's transitioning to either, you know, install a US friendly government
or we might just take it.
And or, you know, because the United States
wants to build a vertically integrated system
across the Americas, I believe.
All right.
Well, let's keep going here.
I mean, Venezuela is the second topic.
So do you think that this is going to be
sort of more like an Iraq and or Libya
or is this sort of more tame and just a transfer of power that we approve of?
Yeah, I think it's a transfer of power that we approve of.
Do you think that we weren't running the Maduro regime or affiliated to Shabba through the CIA?
I think so. Yeah, I believe so.
Do you think that this was Maduro going willingly or unwillingly?
I mean, unwillingly or maybe sort of some sort of transaction?
Well, look, I don't know, but if you sort of looked at all the information that we have, you would say, okay, there are parties within our central intelligence agency that are maybe working for a global agenda versus a national agenda.
And if that global agenda was related to immigration, drug dealing for funding, sex trafficking, potentially flipping with Dominion, potentially flipping elections.
If there was a control structure and this was a safe haven for them to operate out of, then flipping the regime there to a more U.S.-friendly leadership will put pressure on the globalists.
It will put pressure on the globalists and Europe because that's where they're stationed.
And I heard that some of the Dominion offices were actually housed in Soros buildings that he owns in different parts of the world.
So you can just sort of see the globalist connections with the drug trade.
So if that's being taken out, number one, you've sort of pinched financial infrastructure for the globalist.
you have a narrative that supports that because you're taking out the drug trade that even though
they're probably supported by our own internal government so maybe you're taking out
people within our you know that are anti-american within the american system
um and you've got oil right if you're going if your goal is to fix the government balance sheet
then you need to run inflation if you want to offset that monetary and asset inflation you want
to have cheap oil so there's another check in the box right you're trying to build a bitcoin
strategic reserve and you can acquire 60 billion worth of bitcoin there's a check in the box
right it goes on and on and on and on with all these different things with the rare earths and
then simultaneously you're seeing jp morgan is is now done something with a smelter uh to process
rare earths. And it sort of puts everybody else on warning like, hey, look, now my trade
negotiations seem a lot more relevant. Like maybe you do want to pay tariffs and be friendly with
us because there's a stick behind the carrot. And I'm not saying this is right or wrong or
indifferent. I'm just saying this looks like what's happening and will continue to happen
throughout 2026. You've also put China on warning. Hey, China, you were getting oil from Venezuela.
You're getting oil from Iran. We just did 12 days of bombing in Iran. We just took Venezuela.
Maybe you want to like leave our part of the pond alone. And by the way, in April, let's have
another talk. So it's sort of like a pretty significant chess move in order for him to push
all the different agendas he's trying to push.
What if you maybe take the other side of the coin
and you say, well, this is a country without a central bank
or without a Rothschild central bank.
Iran's also an ally who doesn't,
I mean, this is maybe weakening their ability
to resist maybe central banking.
Sure.
And maybe there's other undercurrents here.
And I don't think that Venezuela
is a large supplier of drugs to America.
I think it's like 1% of what drugs
are actually coming in right and maybe it's us you know continuing sort of like well we had a lot of
uh illegal immigration or lax border control we let a lot of people in from this particular country
and uh maybe we shouldn't have but now we we kind of actually have to let them stay because they
can't go back so and we're causing more problems and we get to install people favorable to us and
maybe it's not about, and maybe Maduro is a willing partner through all this, or at least,
you know, he said, Hey, I don't want the Gaddafi exit, but you can exile me and I,
you transfer people to transfer power to my people anyway. Maybe things don't really change
on the ground. I'm just playing devil's advocate. A hundred percent. And this is all like,
this is all potentials. I think the only thing that we do know is that we know what the narrative
is. Right. And that narrative sets up a game plan for the rest of 2026. The narrative is
uh narco terrorism right it's not it's not the war on drugs anymore it's a war on terrorism now
and that that begets a lot more uh military uh might that begets a lot a lot more uh
executive order power and all these other things that come with it so this is a now become a fight
on narco terrorist and that puts leaders of countries like mexico and others that have
kept a porous border, have potentially helped the corruption and the drug trade, etc.
It might be in bed with them. And I'm not saying we're not either, right? I mean,
it's fully documented that the CIA has been involved in these operations as well.
But at least it puts everybody who's involved in that operation on some sort of warning.
Like either you're playing ball, you're going to help us restructure the
multipolar world in a fashion that we want, or you could see some significant force in your region.
And so that's a big message. That's why I say it's like a chess move.
And you could focus on whatever part of it is. I think it checks a lot of boxes for his agenda
and creates a lot of disruption around the world, right? That disruption is
I think super significant
because it's going to break
it has the potential to significantly
break the globalist
agenda
if anything
not to say that they're just going to roll over
but it is sort of
the signal of like we are now at war
against the globalist agenda
we're going to cut off funding
and we're going to try and restructure this thing
and look
I'm not
I do believe, too, that at the end of all this, it ends up being once the world order is destroyed,
now they're going to put in the order they want, which is not going to be great either.
We're going to have to fight that fight down the road.
Tom Luongo always says, you know, we're going to fight the fight where we have to fight now,
and then we'll worry about that down the road.
So, but yeah, just this is where we're at.
Yeah, I agree.
We'll roll the intro after this.
I want to read this Dave Colm quote, and then we'll get into the show.
So what am I missing about Venezuela?
One, it's not about oil per se, but about the petrodollar.
Two, the cigar boats were largely bullshit.
Three, probably a summoned Murrow doctrine 2.0 component.
Four, we captured Maduro because he realized it was better than getting a knife up the ass like Gaddafi.
Five, it is a made-for-TV story to make it look especially civilized.
Six, most of the stories are pure propaganda, although littered with some facts.
I mean, we got in there.
I guess we killed some people, but like we got into a secret final compartment room.
We beat the Russian missiles, the Chinese radar, the Iranian drones.
That's all.
The probably his loyal police force somehow didn't shoot him before we got him.
We bring him and his wife back.
He's given thumbs up wearing Patriot blue origin sweatshirts about the revolutionaries.
I don't know if you heard this story about the gear.
I will get into all that and more.
Are you not entertained?
Welcome back to Bitcoin Center live stream number 35 at our new time brought to you by
Byte Federal.
Check out Byte Federal Bitcoin ATMs point of sale and Bitcoin wallet Take self and go bank yourself My name is Cedric Youngelman Paul Tarantino Let get into it
Let's do it.
Hit like and subscribe.
Let's be real, right?
Praising Telegram for launching a Bitcoin wallet.
I've always felt like with Haley.
Bitcoin, this digital currency that's out there
that people say, oh, it might be the next big thing.
What do you think?
I think it's rat poison.
Bitcoins.
You never heard of them a few weeks ago?
Now everybody's talking about them.
But is it a currency?
I don't know.
Or is it more like a stock?
Or is it a tulip bowl?
Or is it just stupid?
To me, it smells like Ponzi scheme
and the greater pool theory writing.
You do like five minutes of freaking research.
Well, thanks for coming to my set talk.
Yes.
Don't buy shit.
Oh, man, I didn't get that wrong.
All right.
Bitcoin's recent rally.
Do you agree?
Is crypto finally dead?
Go to the next one.
Matter of fact, they're kind of in the Ethernet.
What are they?
Some rumors that it's a Japanese guy, but they know that he's a fake name.
It was a pseudonym.
I mean, you're literally putting real money onto a system that we don't even know who created it.
It will come to a bad ending.
Is this the most exciting bull run ever?
Not for me.
No, it's not.
Welcome to Bitcoin Center, the fast-paced show where the debate is the story.
Many Americans are unaware that behind the scenes the technical backbone of the financial system is decades out of date.
Many, many years out of date. You know that. Paul and others are straightening it out.
But payments and money transfers are costly and take days or even weeks to clear.
under this bill the entire ancient system will be eligible for a 21st century upgrade using the
state-of-the-art crypto technology that at some point in the not too distant future you won't even
have income tax to pay because the money would take it in is so great it's so enormous that
you're not going to have income tax to pay all right dude first question by the way it was nice
to trump to give me a shout out um so do you think that uh this is a serious plan to redesign
the u.s financial system or a narrative shift to focus away or to focus get the focus away from
hard questions around affordability and inflation oh this is a massive overhaul redesign you think
that's really coming i think attack use the word attack i do and because i think there is a bit of
a battle over turf here and how things will play out uh with with the integration of a new system
whether it takes over or they try to overhaul the old system but i mean it is an ancient archaic
system that that we're using and uh i think the amount we've seen in the last 12 months
push towards stable coins and crypto overall excluding bitcoin yes that's dramatic just to
a show there and day about this and i think i don't think we would have seen one-tenth the
amount of progress under uh harris biden administration that we've seen towards financial
surveillance and cbdcs so from your perspective moving the financial system on chain is for more
control absolutely by the centralized parties yes and do you how how serious are you do you
think he is about this uh irs income tax removal i don't yeah and i think if anything it's a lift
and shift i think you would just get taxed in a different way right and maybe that's not that has
some pros and cons and some some real pros or maybe income tax goes away for a certain level
i mean i saw a number being thrown around that the united states government collects around 2.4
to six trillion i think in income tax that's not total gross receipts and obviously we even spend
more than the total gross receipts but 2.5 in income tax and 1.4 to 6 is fraud the the outlays
the expenditures of government expenditures so there was like 90 of the people could not be
paying taxes you could say no taxes if we eliminated the fraud we we could have no taxes
for people making less than $500,000.
There's just so much room here.
But no, I don't see any of this actually necessarily...
Being that simple.
Being that simple and that beneficiary to us, beneficial to us.
But I do see massive changes.
I could see income tax going away.
That doesn't mean taxes are going away
or that your total tax bill is going down.
It's probably going up.
And if everything does move on chain,
there's this serious potential that it just gets taken right because i don't think it's actually
decentralized right chains that this is moving to right so i think this is about seizures and
sensors there might be some some benefits to the consumer around maybe uh transparency
which i i don't think is actually going to happen for the end user but i think that's the maybe the
only benefit right maybe some speed and some yes uh some cost reductions but i don't think that's
can be shared with the consumer either i totally agree to me it's like you know this whole move to
create um carbon credits which were essentially just another asset that they could trade that
they could tax that they could get tax benefits from vice versa creates a whole new market this
moving everything on chain is going to create and i think we're going to talk about this with jamie
diamond too a little bit but it's going to create a whole new uh paradigm of assets that they can
now be involved in sure making markets in taxing through capital gains trading activities financing
activities i think it's going to be there's a big push for these g-subs to to get more assets to have
more collateral in the system to get more things to trade to get bigger more markets um and yeah
and and i think at best maybe uh some lower income earners i think five hundred thousand dollars in
income is probably too high but you know maybe the like families earning under 120 maybe no tax
something like that but i i have i find it hard to believe but we'll see yeah i think there's gonna
be a lot of debt creation and wealth extraction through resource natural resources being tokenized
yeah so they'll say something like the the reserves in venezuela are worth around 20 trillion dollars
or 17 trillion dollars but very little that is extractable and usable and saleable uh now right
but they'll say if you tokenize it but it goes further than this goes right to uh bukele's uh
crypto um legislation not his bitcoin legislation his crypto legislation where they're very pro
and they have no tax on tokenized real world assets.
And so they're incentivizing wealthy people
to tokenize these assets that they own in the country
because then they could trade them,
basically create liquidity without taxation.
And I know we've talked about this a few times
where maybe there's something going on in El Salvador
where it's kind of like a template for the future
where they're floating new ideas
and seeing what works.
And this could be,
we could be moving to something similar.
Yeah, so I think Venezuela is going to be
the larger test bet for everything
that's been happening in El Salvador and Argentina.
Possibly, yeah.
And more at scale and more things,
I think more wealth to be extracted directly
from the local economy.
But I think rainforests are going to be...
What if they tokenize oil production?
They're going to tokenize rainforests.
Right, yeah.
It's going to go beyond oil.
Oil makes sense to people.
Oh, the oil's there, and we can't use it right now, but it's there.
Yeah, we can tokenize it to raise the money.
So why can't you tokenize the minerals that we've extracted from the rainforest?
That's what they want to do.
100%.
I agree.
All right.
Well, the next question is on Venezuela.
We've kind of talked about this in the intro.
I don't know if you have anything else to add there.
Well, yeah, I think there's a lot to be talked about here.
I mean, one, is it real?
You want to play a clip?
Yeah, I'm sorry about that.
Let's go.
Let's play a clip.
so there is a second order crypto effect here where since for going back a decade now my
reporting was back in 2017 because of spiraling inflation of the bolivar a lot of people had
turned to cryptocurrencies mining ethereum and bitcoin in their homes in order to just have a
stable source of of cash but the the other side of this is the fact that the there are multiple
reports that the government itself has been looking to evade sanctions by doing sales of
oil in Tether, which they then move into Bitcoin. And so much of this market moves on sentiment. So
even the promise that perhaps the U.S. government, when they came in, might seize these assets,
hold on to it. That's a bull case for Bitcoin. If you have a stockpile such as that,
that isn't being liquidated. All right. Very interesting stuff. Very quickly,
we got to go. Is it a tailwind for just Bitcoin or also Ethereum, Solana and some of these other
coins? It's a rising tide lifts all ships. In fact, XRP has had outsized performance.
And when you see one altcoin do particularly well, it really is one of these signs of a risk on environment.
All right.
McKenna Segales, great to see you as always.
Thank you very much.
We got to get into it.
So one, I think self-custody is sort of the silver lining of all this that I could just I don't know what's happening in Venezuela.
Is it going to be good for them?
Are our intentions good?
Even if our intentions are good, can we execute?
Right.
And so we want regime change.
Everyone feels that, oh, there's a humanitarian effort here.
Their voice wasn't heard in the last four original elections, but doesn't mean we're going to execute and deliver.
Libya has been a mess since we left.
And so what about but and we can, you know, we can take a president or leader by force.
Massive power production.
We can claim or argue, but really claim access rights and distribution rights to reserves, oil reserves and assets.
even bitcoin we might be able to take if depending on how they secured it
but bitcoin in self-custody where you control the majority of keys so if you're in a multi-sig but
nine people have the keys and you only five other people conclude against you
so i don't know if maduro's people or maduro has the keys if they have coins i mean i don't know if
The country does.
I don't know.
Who knows?
But the rumor is, yeah, there's a guy who handles the money.
I forget his name.
But there's a rumor that someone from the DEA helped build them the architecture.
When I saw this, I think I tweeted out on, I forget, the day this happened or whatever,
that this is the state-level wrench attack.
You know?
Yeah, well, it is.
But the silver lining is the individual can't be wrenched attack in the same way.
And it has their own threat factor.
but I think it really points a light.
Like your oil can be taken.
Your president can be taken.
I think it shines a light on self-custody.
And for me, I think it's like-
Yeah, at the end of the day,
in any of these kind of attacks, right?
You're forced to either defend your life
or give up your coins.
Right.
And you might not be able to protect your gold coins.
Sure.
So like right now, Bank of England
has 2 billion of Venezuela's gold.
Venezuela has been forced to sell their gold
Now I heard we sent
So I've heard
I think it took
I heard it took some years
To get the gold back to Venezuela
There was definitely a delay
Some news outlets are still reporting that
England still has the gold
But we're only talking about 2 billion in gold
But
This will all come out over time I mean But if you were you were a country right now yeah I think you would rather be thinking about 60 billion in multi Bitcoin
than 60 billion in gold or oil.
Sure.
If you were thinking about your own,
if you were a regime and you were thinking about your own sort of long-term
sustainability as a family or regime,
or even if you were an exile,
it's a good point.
And even if you were there looking about,
you didn't want your people,
and you want to keep the wealth within the country.
Yeah, but if that wallet's frozen,
if those assets are essentially on lockdown,
how do you extract the value from them?
Well, this is going to evolve in terms of how you secure the Bitcoin.
So it's secured until a point in which you can move it anonymously.
But way better than oil.
No, I understand what you're saying.
And gold bricks.
It's got potential.
It's got way more potential.
there's probably some models and some theories and some people trying things right now in case of
or right there's somebody in the maduro family who's running around with eight figures nine
figures of ten figures of bitcoin sure uh out of necessity yeah we're not aware of so you're
probably 100 right you know because even if they have 60 billion in bitcoin i i did again we don't
know what stories or propaganda but it's probably not in one address i mean not in one wallet these
Yeah, exactly.
So maybe there's some petty cash draw of 10 million sats.
Right.
And if this was a negotiated deal, there could have been a bunch of...
And Bitcoin has way more asymmetric upside over time,
where if your family was able to gather some of these sats...
Yeah, they get 100 Bitcoin in a private wallet and shoot it off somewhere.
And it's 20 years, a lot easier to secure that and move that over 20 years than gold.
That's a good point.
Yeah.
So there's a lot at stake here, but a lot of people are learning,
and it's shining a light, in my opinion, a positive light
on the essence and ethos of Bitcoin and self-custody.
And even these coins, because if these are Venezuelan coins.
How valuable are your tokenized oil assets when the oil's gone?
Or your tokenized gold and silver assets?
Or they shut down Oracle.
Right.
Or they change the database in Oracle.
But the $60 billion in the Bitcoin,
now if we do confiscate that, seize it,
as the United States government,
and follow the United States government policy
of keeping stolen, confiscated Bitcoin,
one, we're not executing justice,
that wealth should be returned to Venezuelans.
It's Venezuelan wealth.
Similar to the pig butchering scam
and the victims of that not getting their money back
and on and on.
So it's not a clean thing for America.
We're stealing.
Surprise.
That would be terrible.
No, not surprised.
But some Bitcoiners will point to, not Bitcoin, some mathematicians, it's just math, they'll be the last Bitcoin for sale.
That $60 billion will be locked up.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And that just has its own effect.
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
So it's interesting times.
Yeah.
Bitcoin is not, never disappears.
It's just either moving or not.
It's either liquid or not.
What do you think about, okay, I saw a video on social media.
media of maduro taunting trump pre then i saw videos of trump taunting back after we got him
which is very powerful brash i don't know if that's how i want to be represented as an american
um you know it's disgraceful in some ways some people would argue you know so definitely um you
know it goes back to the theory of like the money's broken everything's gonna get more worse and by
worse i mean more dramatic more of a yeah yeah nastier food fight right politics are just getting
yeah and it's maybe it's not nasty it's not it these are uh these are the times that we live in
there's nothing that um i mean look at power structures are going to do everything they can
to survive the united states is shrinking their global influence is shrinking so they need to
They need to become a dominant regional player.
And the way they're looking at it is their region is a Western Hemisphere minus Europe.
They're going to throw Europe overboard, right?
As Luke Groman says, we're going to stand on Europe's head as you stay afloat in the pool.
Like, that's where we're at in the world.
And that's what the United States is doing, whether we like it or not.
this probably will lead to a lot of internal unrest amongst the civilization over time.
I tend to believe that we're going to see a lot of these kind of conflicts,
not only performed by the United States, but performed by other powers around the world
as there's a rush to consolidate power and assets in their regions before this reset is done.
And then after that, I think we'll see a power play of a technocracy like power play, surveillance state, digital IDs, etc.
And then you're going to start to see these people that are tearing at each other's throat unite against the government.
And then at the end of this fourth turning, the final gameplay is going to be people versus their governments.
On the way there, it's going to be governments against governments, civil wars, civil unrest, and it ends with the people unifying against the authoritarianism within their governments.
And this is a decade-long process, in my view.
We're just seeing, you know, the first card get flipped over on the table.
Right.
What a display of power, though.
I don't know if I believe the entire story.
theater. I think it's a lot of theater. Yeah. But I think regardless of how much theater it is,
it could be a hundred percent theater. But I think the capabilities that were displayed in the
theater are real and or have to be interpreted as real by our enemies and our allies. I think
they're also just scratching the surface of our capabilities. I think if I think by the end of
this you know between now and the next five to ten years we're going to see shit that we didn't
even know existed get used in the in these operations so i think in a lot of ways you're
talking about some sort of cyber cyber kinetic sort of uh capabilities weapons we're not even
aware of energy sources we're not aware of but dial back from that just basic
to fight across the world for more than the plane to get there.
You have to have the plane to get there.
Then if you want to stay there, you have to be able to keep the planes there,
which are boats, aircraft carriers.
To keep the aircraft carriers, you have to feed those people
thousands of miles from home.
These are all just basic logistics that most nations,
probably zero besides us, have the capabilities.
Just to sustain warfare far away.
Right.
That's inflationary, period.
But I mean, what do you mean inflationary?
I mean, we can't sustain that.
Well, logistically, we could feed people a month.
It's going to be a lot easier to sustain a war.
I don't mean for years.
I mean, even for a month, two months, no other nation could dock aircraft carriers, submarines, fighter jets.
It depends how much money they're willing to print.
Right?
I mean, fiat is the currency of war.
They can't put the weapons.
They don't have the aircraft carriers.
I think China has plenty.
I think they're catching up.
I don't think they're there.
I think they could catch up to us in a matter of a week or two if they wanted to.
Looking for the evidence.
I think if there's any place that they are behind us, it's in secret military infrastructure,
deep state type military industrial complex infrastructure that we're not even really
aware of.
or we think are UFOs.
We think are alien technologies, right?
I think we have a lot of that.
And I think we've had it for a long time,
and it's probably evolved to the point that you can't even fathom.
So, you know, to the extent that it's going to take a lot of monetary inflation
to support these kind of colonization,
I think simultaneously we could run some deflationary technology in energy and manufacturing that I think we have the capability of that we haven't implemented yet.
Do you think China could, I mean, all of it, it's an honest question I'm asking, send warships to Ukraine a few months in advance, run exercises in the whatever body of water is right next to Ukraine.
Black Sea.
shoot boats of of ukrainian boats and kill ukrainians uh i think narco terrorists i think
why we're watching all of this right then take zelensky after i think china could you know
agreed to come wouldn't because they're a i don't think they're a manufacturer of the world that
relies on exporting goods all over the planet i think this setbacks about road initiative right
if they if they i think they could do that but it's not in their interest to do that
i'm not sure they would destroy their country as a manufacturer for the world
where we could go and do that we export dollars well right
and we have the web so we could do this and no other country can
right now right now yes right now which is also to your point why it's so scary we're burning
we're burning our bridges right that's why it's so scary we could do it but we are burning our
bridges in the process we're making enemies and just like we've we we've you know in all of our
wars in the middle east have created so much conflict that there's a whole multiple generations
of people that probably hate the united states and we're like nothing more than see the united
States fall because of the chaos and destruction we've created in their countries. And so whenever
you have this kind of force, you're building enemies, right? So yes, we could do it. I think
China could do it. I think China is thinking to themselves, why would we do this? Because we will
be destroying ourselves because they have a much longer term mentality. I think a dying empire
is like God has to like feels like they have to flex like there's their mindset is still we
dominate the world while they're while what's happening financially is that they're losing
power and control I wonder if you know there was a deal between China and Trump hey we get
Venezuela you stay out of there you get Taiwan we're not gonna yeah well I don't know if there's
a deal with I think I don't know if this is a deal with Russia same thing with Ukraine or a threat
yeah who knows hey you know like we've been letting you yeah that's happening simultaneously
right you hear japan saying that you know if china takes taiwan this is like a game changer
for japan we can't we can't access energy we have blocks the malarca strait we have all these issues
it's existential for japan in the meantime right their bonds are rising their interest rates are
rising um inflation is coming hot and fast to japan so um you know yeah i do think china is
As part of this infrastructure restructuring, China probably will take Taiwan.
Yeah.
But this is resetting the New Orleans.
Maybe this is a message to them don't.
Maybe this is a message we're taking the Western Hemisphere back,
and we want you to chill and pause, and we can come there too.
I don know Maybe We find out We find out We find out Let move on 2026 is the year of finding out Welcome to our new time Tuesdays at 2 p Eastern or 2 And this is Bitcoin Center
live stream number 35,
brought to you by BuyFederal.
Go bank yourself.
Please hit like and subscribe.
Ask questions in the chat.
Let's run on to Jamie Dimon here.
Blockchain is real.
It's been around for quite a while,
but now it's becoming more effective,
more efficient,
because people are finding ways
to do it faster and cheaper,
permissioned or not permissioned.
Smart contracts, I think, will...
What do you think, JD?
Is he coming around, or is this the game plan along?
JP Morgan has had ownership, or they sold...
They've been basically developing code on the Ethereum code base
for a long, long time.
They sold it to ConsenSys.
A lot of the tech and contracts that they developed,
they sold to ConsenSys.
So they've had this ongoing relationship with Ethereum.
again they're a bank they want to tokenize everything so they can trade everything and
make markets and everything so his move to he didn't say anything good about bitcoin no they're
going to lend against bitcoin as collateral i think you know really what people have to realize
is that these big banks want you involved in crypto they want you involved in real world
assets they want you in tokenized securities they want to lend against your bitcoin in hopes that
they can get it from you when you default on the loan they want to get the bitcoin in their custody
and everything they're going to deliver to you that's crypto is going to be centralized
on an exchange custodied by them permissioned i'll say i mean i think jd is jamie and i'm is
smart i think he's straight gangster i i'd go further i think wall street's been run by the
actual mob for a long time it's interesting when he talks about bitcoin he sounds like a mobster
from new york when he talks about crypto even but there he talked very eloquently and like a banker
and uh i think the thing to watch with with jp morgan is uh they're going to do tokenized deposits
so not stable coins they're going to take your money and say you have a deposit here and they
can provide maybe yield and they can do fractional reserve banking off of the tokenized deposits
so i think that's the thing to watch and even if they let you self-custody they're not it's going
to be on a proof of stake or centralized server that they can sanction control manipulate yeah
all right let's move on el salvador um it seems like they're making a pivot here
and they're making Bitcoin voluntary, still legal, I guess.
And this helped them get more aid from the IMF.
Do you sort of...
Yeah, that's the way I read it.
Do you have take here?
This seems a blended road.
This is sort of the same kind of,
the same opinion I've had forever with El Salvador
is that it's the difference between,
I don't think this takes anything away
from Naib's belief in Bitcoin,
what he's doing to educate kids in the country,
what he wants to do with mining, what he wants.
But I think there's bigger things there,
which is that in conjunction with building their Bitcoin reserve,
they also need to build a functioning country
and take it up a notch.
They're expanding development.
They're building new roads.
They're building new infrastructure.
Everything, it all takes money.
And so, you know, is Bitcoin this move?
Hold on, though. Let me say one more thing.
This move to make Bitcoin voluntary, even when it was mandatory,
when I was there and it was mandatory,
people that didn't want to accept it didn't accept it.
It was never enforced as mandatory.
Look, I think El Salvador has been a very interesting project.
It's something to be excited about in a lot of ways,
and there is a lot of excitement.
I think that could be, you know, we've seen it time and time again,
affinity marketing and scamming.
I'm not saying there's a difference between marketing and scamming,
but you could just say,
Hey,
we sell toothpaste and we're Bitcoin.
And that there's an affinity to that,
right?
Like the toothpaste nine different,
but you're conveying it's,
it's,
it's made with things you would like as a Bitcoin,
right?
This country is a Bitcoin country.
It's the beach is better because it's the same beach,
but we take Bitcoin at the concession stands,
right?
So you can have affinity marketing,
but just,
right.
What I,
well,
I want to get into here though,
real quick.
So I was,
El Salvador integrates Bitcoin and AI into national policy.
I think this is where it's a little ominous.
So according to O'Daly, El Salvador has officially announced the integration of Bitcoin and artificial intelligence as part of its national policy.
The country's treasury, so they have $660 million in Bitcoin.
Even if Bitcoin 10X is at $6 billion, it's not a lot of money, even for a nation their size.
The plan aims to utilize surplus geothermal energy to build data centers and AI special zones, providing a tax-free environment for the automation industry and decentralized financial services.
All things I'm nervous and weary about that are not necessarily decentralized in true form.
Yeah.
And could have some sort of Orwellian side to it.
I think they're even trying to put the entire educational platform on AI.
Yeah.
Which can, these things can sound progressive and great, but they can be very dark.
And I think.
Yeah.
They can be the Vatican library of information.
Yeah.
So it remains to be seen.
That's all I wanted to say.
No, and I agree with you on all these points.
I think El Salvador, though, I think what, you know, when it comes down to this specific question about their deal with the IMF,
to switch to voluntary Bitcoin
as opposed to a mandated
you must accept Bitcoin.
I think that's actually
in the Bitcoin ethos.
That is in the Bitcoin ethos,
but it's also the way
they operated from day one.
There, you know, people,
there was a whole bunch
of the population
when it was mandated
that you must accept Bitcoin
that they just didn't.
And it really wasn't enforced.
And so if anything,
this is, you know,
if this is what he had to promise
that IMF to get 1.4 billion,
Good on him because that's just like a...
Yeah, I get it.
I get both sides.
It's an empty promise.
I mean, to the IMF, they're like, okay, yeah, he's probably, yeah, sure.
And you make the deals you have to make.
Let's move on here real quick.
So BitFarms pivots to AI.
So they're selling their mining facilities in Paraguay.
They're moving out of Latin America.
I think a lot of this is to raise cash, move to a more consistent cash flow model that comes out of AI data centers,
move their facilities back to North America
where they have a lot more competitive advantage
and geographical proximity and knowledge.
So I think this is kind of par for the times.
Yeah.
I mean, look, they lost money mining Bitcoin.
Yeah, it was a tough year.
They weren't competitive.
So they're going to do what's right for their business.
Yeah.
I'm in a mining farm.
We had our first negative month in about like 18.
it's tough tough out there for miners right now yeah so all right let's move on which is interesting
because when i read this that's kind of this sense that i got and think about how much minor
capitulation you get near a bottom versus the top is this is there some sort of signal here that we
might be near a bottom like meaning near maybe we go the lower we stayed flat for over a year and
These miners are starting to have financial problems getting turned out.
Anticipate, probably invested infrastructures are anticipating $200,000.
Well, hashrate was competitive and high.
Yeah.
Price was low or sideways.
So, yeah.
So, I mean, we might be in a certain scale.
Capital intensive industry.
All right, let's move on here.
All right.
The government, Bitcoin holdings.
Governments around the world currently hold 3.1% of the Bitcoin supply,
worth $58.6 billion.
Strategic accumulation trend for 2026
or a double-edged sword amplifying regulatory overreach?
What do you think?
I'm going to go with the first one.
I mean, I think you're seeing accumulation by governments here.
U.S. has 328,000 now,
and a lot of that's through auctions.
No, some has been auctioned off previously to that.
China has 190,000 from the plus token case.
United Kingdom is 61,000 from the Keyon case.
Ukraine is 46,000.
Germany had 50,000 sold, 50,000.
El Salvador is up to 7,500.
UAE is up to 6,400.
Bhutan is up to 6,000.
So maybe not as high as we thought.
Netherlands up to 500 through cybercrime seizures.
And the list goes on and on.
Even North Korea is rumored to have 800.
So I think this is incredibly bullish.
Yeah, it's the hash war theory.
It's coming through.
All right, let's move on here.
All right, chain analysis.
Yeah, what did you make of this little news item here?
Well, let me read it to you.
So chain analysis sees 2026 focusing on compliance, scalability over rulemaking, an evolution towards mature markets or a subtle barrier raising for small players.
Yeah, I mean, it's obviously both, right?
I mean, they're right in that they're shifting over from rulemaking to compliance, and it is going to create a barrier for smaller players.
We see it every day in our business.
I mean, we've been highly compliant from day one, but now they really want to get in and they really want to make sure that you really are truly as compliant as they want you to be.
Whereas before, as long as you were seemingly following the rules, there weren't a lot of questions asked.
But now they want to actually get in and see the inner workings.
So I think this is truly the case
in that it is going to be now more and more difficult
for a small crypto company to come from the bottom up out of the garage
and become a big player because there are going to be pretty significant
regulatory moats that have existed in the traditional financial system
for decades that are being imposed through this new rulemaking
onto the crypto ecosystem.
Yeah, I mean, Operation Chokepoint 2.0 was successful.
It crushed a lot of nascent and emergent players,
maybe some rightfully so.
And it's now entrenched a lot of incumbents
from the old system.
And they'll have an easier time,
the incumbents of entering the system in the future
by acquiring or, you know, so.
So, yeah.
And then the war continues with Keone Rodriguez, Samurai.
It's very similar to what happened in the internet.
It's similar to what's happened with a lot of technologies.
It will probably drive a lot of M&A.
And, yeah, we're going to get a lot more.
And look, the main takeaway for Bitcoiners, do not give up your self-custody.
Self-custody is the antidote to all of these issues and fears that you have.
Be compliant, keep your nose clean, and hold your own Bitcoin.
And don't get involved in any of the derivatives thereof.
Yeah, and this is Bitcoin Center, live stream number 35.
Please hit like and subscribe if you're enjoying the show.
It's brought to you by Byte Federal.
Go bank yourself.
They got the Bitcoin ATMs, the point of sale, and the Bitcoin wallet.
It takes self-custody now.
If we have any questions in the chat,
but please hit like and subscribe.
Tune in every Tuesday at 3 p.m. Eastern,
maybe 2 p.m. Eastern.
2 p.m. Eastern, yeah.
So every Tuesday at our new time during the afternoon.
If there's any questions,
I hope to see you guys next week for sure.
Francis, do we have anything before we roll out here?
No questions.
All right.
Let's make it a great 2026.
Yeah, I think it's going to be a huge and awesome 2026 for sure.
Love you all.
All right.
See you guys next week.