Full Transcript for Strike Launched Stacks: Treasury Kills the Unhosted Wallet Rule, Robinhood Buys Bitcoin

know, how's my community feeling? Are they are they happy about this feature launch? Are they upset about this hack or this, you know, chain delay or whatever? Right. we also we have we have secretly added another score which is repliability. And this is looking at, okay, maybe this is about me, but is this something that I should get involved with and actually jump Kate: Mm-hmm. Brandon: in and make a reply to? so that one requires a lot more nuance. It's something that we've been testing for for quite some time. but I think it's gonna be super, super important and super, super useful once we launch it. I think it's almost gonna be like a like a 2.0 version of VibeWatch, like I think once it's ready to go. so Kate: Yeah. Yeah. Brandon: in the works, we're testing it. Closed beta, I guess. but yeah, I'm excited for that. it's gonna be a big one. Kate: Sweet. All right. Shall we get into some public companies buying Bitcoin? Brandon: Yeah. so starting off with strategy, a a small buy for strategy, but they did buy Bitcoin this week, three hundred and thirty four BTC. So they now hold an even eight hundred and forty eight thousand Bitcoin. Kate: You said Mana MetaPlanet heard me last week and they s decided Brandon: Yeah. Kate: to take action. So last week they had another week of not buying Bitcoin. It was like eleven weeks in a row that they didn't buy. but this week they did buy a nice one thousand B D C. so they now hold forty four thousand in total. Brandon: Or so back. Kate: Mm-hmm. Brandon: Strive, they bought two thousand Bitcoin. so they now hold twenty nine thousand four hundred and sixty-two. And they have been outpacing strategy a lot in their Bitcoin buys lately. So they're Kate: Nice. Brandon: slowly, slowly, slowly catching up. They still have a long way to go. Kate: Then we have Sylvia Inc., they sold 165 Bitcoin. They now hold 4,965. Brandon: Yep. remix point bought seven point forty five Bitcoin. they now hold one thousand five hundred and nine BTC. Kate: And we should welcome Robin Hood to the Bitcoin Treasury World. they're the latest public company to adopt a Bitcoin Treasury and they have two hundred and ninety-four BTC on the board. Brandon: Pretty cool. Pretty cool to see another public company doing it. And yeah, Robin Hood is pioneering a lot. So it's pretty, pretty interesting. Kate: Right, let's move into some news of the week. This one I just found on the timeline, and it was kind of more of a scare than anything. Brandon: Yeah. Kate: immediately I saw Ledger hack and everyone goes, here we go again. and it did involve ledgers, but it wasn't from Ledger themselves, I guess. Basically, people bought a hardware device that they thought was a ledger from a third party and ended up getting scammed. Brandon: Mm-hmm. Kate: Think it was around like 86 million. Some of the posts that I've seen are now deleted, so I'm not really sure what's happening there. But Ledger did come out and say, like, we're investigating this, but this is basically not us. So if you're gonna buy device, buy directly from Ledger. I think people probably thought that they were buying from Ledger and it ended up being tampered with from like a third party reseller. I think it's Southeast Asia. That's where tip that's where most of these were targeted. but yeah, scary stuff. I think Brandon: Yeah. Kate: like the whole supply chain thing with hardware hardware devices is a very scary thing. So Brandon: It is, yeah. yeah, I don't really know what the best like way around that is because I feel like at any like that could happen at any like point in the chain, right? Even if you're like Kate: Mm-hmm. Brandon: going to Best Buy and you're buying a ledger from Best Buy, like how do you know Kate: Totally. Totally. Brandon: that like yeah, it wasn't tampered with in the past? Kate: Agreed. Brandon: yeah, I mean you but you would think though that like their their firmware, I mean I guess we there's still a lot that we don't know in terms of like exactly how you know, exactly what happened with these devices. Kate: Yeah. Brandon: and yeah, I guess it sounds like it's pretty, pretty kind of small, isolated to like this one particular reseller in Asia, but like the firmware should be smart enough to know that it has been tampered with and, you know, throw up some warning or something. So Kate: Yeah. Brandon: it is a little scary because it's like, yeah, how how do you know? Like there's just no way of like knowing for sure, I guess. Kate: You know? Brandon: Just start rolling dice. That's the that's all you can do. That's all you can do these days. Kate: That's what we're doing. Let's go gambling. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There you Brandon: Yeah, it is it is a gamble. Or use multi-sig, I guess, to to isolate yourself. That's Kate: go. Brandon: that's a a more rational option, I guess. all right. So some some US government news. Department of Treasury has cleared these two long pending and long hostile crypto roles. I thought this was pretty cool. So this was really largely championed by Coin Center. so I I took a lot of the bullet points from their article, but basically the Department of Treasury, they're clearing these two long-pending cryptocurrency rules off of their books that Coin Center has been fighting against for years. the Financial Crime Enforcement Network, which is more commonly known as FinCEN, they propose these rules that were targeting so-called unhosted wallets and cryptocurrency mixing. So it's two rules related to those two things. So Basically, what happened is in the final days of Trump's first term, FinCEN proposed these new record keeping and reporting requirements for financial institutions that were handling certain transactions that involved unhosted wallets, which basically means like self-custody wallets. So in practice, that meant that self-custody wallet providers would have had to collect and retain information about their users, which like obviously like that's not a

thing, right? Like you you're not KYCing your users. and it would have had to have been basically any user with a balance above like three thousand dollars or any transaction that exceeded ten thousand dollars, which is yeah, like essentially impossible as a as a you know self-custody wallet provider, right? Like you're not taking your customers info, your wallet can just be like freely downloaded and used. so in effect, like if you were really following the rules here, that basically meant like a de facto ban on having a self-custody wallet. In the US or or operating or publishing a self-custody wallet in the US, which you know, it's like Operation Choke point 2.0, right? It's like that type of rule. Like it's not a ban on crypto, but it is like a ban on crypto infrastructure that prevents you from using crypto, potentially. Kate: Yeah. Brandon: then in 2023, under the Biden administration, they proposed designated cryptocurrency mixing. involving a foreign jurisdiction as a class of transactions of quote, primary money laundering concern. so this rule would have imposed a special measure that required financial institutions to report transactions when they knew, suspected, or had reason to suspect that the transaction involved cryptocurrency mixing within or involving a jurisdiction outside of the United States. And again, kind of a de facto attempt to ban mixing services in the US because How can you know how can you know that? How can you know, you know, who these transactions are going to, right? Kate: Yeah. Brandon: It's just like impossible. So these rules were just like not compatible with how crypto works, which yeah, made it basically impossible to abide by. but fortunately we we don't have to worry about that anymore because they they cleared these these two rules. So yeah, that's a great win for for self-custody, great win for privacy. And yeah, shout out to Coin Center for you know, for fighting for this for for on behalf Kate: Yeah, yeah. Brandon: of, you know, the crypto industry overall. Kate: Yeah, for real. That is a real win. Very cool. okay, their next one we'll get into is also around US government. they kind of spooked the market this week. They moved a little over twelve thousand BTC, which is roughly one billion in USD terms. and people were very scared that they were they were selling it. So some of it I think went to Coinbase Prime, some went to unlabeled addresses. But yeah, people thought that they were might be selling this Bitcoin, but I think that they were just maybe moving it around, maybe it was a custody move. but I think it was related to the Bitfinex hack, is what a lot of people are speculating on. And and there was an executive order last year that basically said like any Bitcoin that was forfeited, would be put into the Bitcoin reserve and couldn't be sold. so spooked the market a little bit. People thought they might be selling off, but I think it was just kind of shuffling it around. and yeah, so Brandon:

Yeah, hopefully this is them yeah, just moving it to kind of safer, safer custody. did I did I ever tell you Kate: Yeah. Which could be a real win if they're doing that. Brandon: so the the Bitfinex hack, the Bitfine hack Bitfinex hack is interesting because like you have all this Bitcoin that was taken from Bitfinex, like that was taken from Bitfinex, like Bitfinex users lost their Bitcoin like as Kate: Mm-hmm. Brandon: a result of that. So It's pretty crazy just from like a legal perspective that like the US has the right to this Bitcoin. Like what Kate: Yes. Brandon: if you were a bit co a Bitfinex user, like what happened to your Bitcoin? You just like lost it and then that's it. but do you do you remember who did the Bitfinex hack? Kate: No, tell me. Brandon: The RazzleCon and her see wherever it is. Do you remember her? Kate: That's not like the one coin girl, is it? Razzle con. Brandon: Know that she was like it was she there it was RazzleCon and this other her like h husband or boyfriend. she's like a rapper and Kate: My god, okay. Brandon: somehow they pulled off this just heist and they s they they stole like a billion dollars worth of Bitcoin from from Bitfinex. Yeah. So I actually I Kate: I do remember you telling me this. my god. I didn't know that that was related. Brandon: met her like two years ago. at a a Bitcoin event and Kate: My god. Brandon: I knew who she was but I didn't and I talked to her for like a little bit and she was nice. and I didn't reveal that I knew who she was. I just Kate: Okay. Brandon: was just being a nice person and talking to her. Kate: How is she not in prison? Brandon: she was she was going to be going to prison but she was not yet Kate: Okay. Brandon: charged. So it was like she was like in limbo. Yeah. Kate: Amazing. Brandon: Pretty crazy. Kate: That's so funny. You've met some cool people in in Bitcoin over the years. Brandon: Yeah, that's that's one of them the wild ones. So yeah, I met I met the the one half of the the Bitfinex thieves, I guess. I don't know. Kate: Yeah yeah. Remember we were we were in Vegas so you saw Ross in the elevator? That was pretty cool. That was a cool one. Yeah. Yeah. Brandon: That was very cool. That was like that was a very cool moment. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I saw met a lot of yeah, a lot of Bitcoin celebrities over the years. Met Jack Jack Mallers at at that same conference. Kate: Nice. Yep. Brandon: yeah. I walked by Michael Saylor at that conference too. Kate: Mm-hmm. Brandon: Didn't say hi to him. I saw him. Kate: Very cool. Brandon: Yeah. Anyway. all right. some Kate: Side note. Brandon: more more US government stuff. So the CFTC, they have issued new guidance this week on digital assets. so Chairman Michael Selig, he wrote this op-ed in the Wall Street Journal. And I just wanted to read the opening statement because I thought it pretty cool. in the in the op-ed, he said, Washington long debated whether crypto was the future of finance or merely a fad. Meanwhile, American entrepreneurs built Investors put their capital to work and markets evolve faster than the rules governing them. Congress considered legislation to clarify the treatment of crypto assets under federal law and regulate firms in these markets, but failed to send a bill to the president's desk desk. He's talking about clarity, of course. fortunately, the CFTC and the SEC have the statutory authority to issue rules and regulations establishing a federal crypto regulatory market structure. Today the CFTC is proposing its first round of regulations for crypto markets. So Pretty cool that we're basically getting clarity without clarity through Kate: Mm-hmm. Brandon: the CFTC and through the SEC. So a little bit later in the op-ed, he talked about the fact that basically crimp crypto companies like FTX and BlockFi, and he mentioned a few others like Voyager and stuff like that. they historically had to seek these state-based financial transmission licenses, which were fragmented because every state had their own rules. That's why, especially back in the day, you know, you had a lot of crypto companies that were only available in certain states and not others. It wasn't just like a no New York thing. It was like, we're not available in New York and like South Carolina Kate: Mm-hmm. Brandon: and you know Arkansas for some reason. because they like didn't, you know, they had to go state by state to get these these licenses. and basically in the wake of Clarity failing, the CFTC is proposing these yeah, these new rulemaking things. They're calling it the Regulation crypto asset transactions or regulation CTX and regulation crypto market crypto asset markets or regulation CAM, throwing lots of acronyms at us. I Kate: As always. Brandon: guess the one thing is unlike the Clarity Act, these regulations wouldn't require crypto assets to trade on CFTC registered platforms because they don't have the authority to impose that without congressional action. So without a law, they can't enforce that. But they can at least establish a purpose built option for crypto asset exchanges that wish to operate under kind of a single federal market regulatory scheme. So basically rather than going state by state, you know, to get these licenses, they want to have like a federal license that you can get. Kate: Yeah. Brandon: which is is pretty cool, you know, that they're they're giving more clarity. And they said, you know, it they said the first round, you know, of regulations for crypto markets. So they're gonna continue. to provide more clarity and and give more structure. but yeah, cool, cool development this week. Kate: Yeah, nice. That's like a genuine unlock for a lot of exchanges too, which is cool. Brandon: Yeah. Kate: all right, well, speaking of exchanges, our next one is OKX. They are venturing into the world of tokenized stocks, so they just filed with the SEC to launch their tokenized trading platform. So this is going to make them one of the first major

crypto exchanges to really take advantage of these new US rules that allow digital versions of OK. public company shares to exist on crypto rails. so this just came out last month. So to start, it's gonna be sixty-three listed companies that are gonna be available for around the clock trading throughout the week. some of these include Nvidia, Tesla, Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, JP Morgan, Walmart, Coca-Cola, Cisco, and McDonald's, some biggies in there. Brandon: Yeah. Kate: and they also raised a new funding round, a $25 billion valuation with some pretty big names backing it. So there's Cube Research and Technologies, Circle, Ripple, and Standard Charters, SC Ventures. So some pretty big moves on OKX's part. Brandon: Yeah. It's been really impressive to see like how much that they've like successfully entered the US market, Kate: Yeah. Brandon: compared to like Binance. 'cause OKX was kind of like Binance like several years ago, where you know, Kate: For sure. Brandon: they were pretty much outside of the US. They were like you could maybe use them in the US, you know, but it was kind of Wild West, maybe a little bit sketchy. And now it's just like not. Like you can OKX, they're just like a major exchange and you can use them and Kate: Yeah. Brandon: yeah, it's pretty cool. Making a lot of moves. All right. speaking of yeah, I guess exchange is making moves. We're continuing to do segues. Kate: Mm-hmm. Brandon: so strike, they have taken a page out of Rivers Playbook and they are launching interest on cash holdings, which is a cool feature from them. So they're offering 3.6% interest on cash, and that interest is paid in Bitcoin. so the cash that you hold within strike comes with FDIC insurance, which is also really important. that interest accrues daily and pay is monthly, and there's no minimums or maximums. So pretty cool stuff. Yeah, you can have, you know, either cash or Bitcoin on strike and yeah, be be earning, you know, be stacking some sats, I guess. Kate: Yeah. Brandon: through that, which is is cool. But speaking of stacking sats Kate: Yeah, I mean my God. Brandon: But go ahead, we'll we'll before we s before we go to that, go ahead. Kate: I was just gonna say, like I love I love when like all of these like kind of new products that are offering basically people Bitcoin. I think like any kind of like competition that wants to give people more Bitcoin is a great thing for the market, great thing for Bitcoiners. So I feel like this one is pretty cool. next one is not so cool. Brandon: 100%. yeah, spe speaking of stacking sats, so Strike had another announcement this week. they have taken a page out of Stax's playbook to launch Stax. Kate: Ha ha ha. Brandon: so basically I'll I'll let me let me share the tweet here on the screen so we can look at it together. So introducing stacks. you can now organize your savings in your strike account. So basically, they've relaunched this feature that essentially allows you to separate your BTC and cash

holdings into their own sort of sub-accounts or buckets. and this feature they are calling stacks, which is very confusing because we already have obviously a a big crypto project in you know in the crypto ecosystem called Stacks. I was I was personally quick to kind of point this out. you know, in the reply to Strike saying, I think Stacks already exists. And then we had our boy, Matt Cravalo here, that that took the Kate: Ha ha ha. Brandon: bait and and replied to me. And he said, That's not Bitcoin, it's a different chain with a different asset. which like isn't isn't like the argument, right? Like, Kate: No. Brandon: we're not we're not having that argument about you know stacks being like a you know affinity scam like they they like to say right Kate: Yeah. Brandon: doesn't make sense to have that argument but anyway so I kind of replied and I was like you know is is strike gonna launch a product called Ethereum because they don't care about Kate: Ha ha ha. Brandon: you know conflicts with other cryptocurrencies and and then his reply was like so confusing to me because he replied and was like this post And the one by Jack add up to 33,000 views. There was a total of one reply mentioning stacks. That's how irrelevant STX is. There's no brand conflict to care about. Stack was used by Bitcoiners for years before a shitcoin branded itself around it. so yeah, I think I I thought it was just interesting that it seemed like he was bragging about 33,000 views, which like if you're you know, if you're on crypto socials, like that's kind of like That's kind of dog shit numbers. It's like not that great. Kate: Yeah, for a for a product launch, yeah. Brandon: but anyway, he's proud of it. So I congratulated him for those 33,000 impressions. but like I think I I think it's so funny because well, one, it makes a lot of sense that they're taking this stance because he previously worked at Swan. Kate: Mm-hmm. Brandon: so that's just that just tells you all that you need to know right there. the only thing that he Did to sort of amplify this announcement was quote tweet it saying, No, Strike has not listed Stax STX. We're using the word as intended, not the way it was co-opted by an affinity scam. And I all the replies I think are are just so funny. It just clearly he was already aware that Stax exists, and they Kate: Yeah. Brandon: decided to launch this feature anyway and call it Stax. And Yeah, there's just a lot of people in the replies just being like, You're you're an idiot. I I don't I don't know what else to say. Kate: Yeah, I mean like I I think it's like well known. Like stack is like stack like without the S is like a very well known Bitcoin term. Like stack sets, like yeah. Brandon: Of course. Stacksats, everyone talks about that, but Stacks Stacks itself is a different thing. Yeah. Kate: And it like just I don't know, it just like looks very similar. I it's just like I just kinda feels like in bad faith or something. But anyway, like Brandon: Yeah. Kate: I think the whole interaction just like doesn't it just doesn't really like speak well for itself. it I just don't feel like it's a good look. Brandon: Yeah. And you have like I mean, the Stacks logo and like their Stax logo Kate: Yeah. Brandon: also like I they're both like Sansara fonts, but like they're Kate: Yeah. Brandon: very similar fonts. don't know if they're the same exact fonts, but like look at the T, right? The little like the little Kate: Yeah. Brandon: trailing tail on the T is even like similar. Like how was this not intentional? Kate: Yeah, yeah. It's funny. It's I I'm laughing Yeah. Brandon: it has to be, right? Like it just it has to be. Kate: Or it was just like a really not well thought out product launch that was like rushed and like if that's the case, like that's also maybe something to look into. But I don't know. It the replies were funny because like people were like calling Grok, being like, which one is self-custodial? Like which one do I have to give my Bitcoin up? And obviously, Brandon: Yeah. Kate: like with the Bitcoin staking launch, like it is self-custodial. Like whether you you know, whether your position on Bitcoin L2s is affinity scams or not, like If you're going to be using this product, you're giving up custody of your Bitcoin. So it's just it's a it's tough. It's a tough one. Brandon: And like it's just it it's it's such a shame that like people like Matt exist in this industry because like Kate: Yeah. Brandon: we just we're like yes, you're sell like you you're non-custodial and that's fine. There's a need for that in the industry. Kate: Yeah. Yep. Totally. Brandon: you know, Stax is trying to bring DeFi to Bitcoin, and that's fine. There's a clearly a desire for DeFi and a need for that in Kate: Yeah. Brandon: the industry, and it's Much better to do that on stacks than it is on Ethereum if you're a Bitcoiner. It should be obvious that you should want Kate: Mm-hmm. Yep. Yeah. Brandon: that. So like I just don't understand like their the positioning of like people like Swan and like c Matt, I guess. And it's just it's a shame that you know that that strike is going down this road of like also being hostile to stacks for for no reason. Like Kate: Yes, yeah. Yeah. Brandon: do your own thing and Like I like Strike. Like I was one of the first users of Strike. You can go to strike.me slash Brandon and I got that because I was one of the first users that took that username. Like I I like Jack. I've talked a lot about Jack on the show. it's just a shame, you know, that they are taking this position. And I don't know. Like I I mean, I I'm not like a heavy user of Strike, you know. We we follow what they do on the show Kate: Mm-hmm. Brandon: and we talk about. We talk about strike and we talk about Jack quite a bit on this show. and I'm we we continue, we will continue to do that. but it's just frustrating. Like it's just why why are we still having these types of arguments and this type of stuff? There's just there's so much more productive things that Kate: I I agree. Brandon: we could be doing. yeah, it just makes me upset. Like I'm just like, it's just yeah, it's just it's just really annoying. So anyway. Kate: Anyway, ha g good luck with the good luck with the SEO moat. Try to come for it. Yeah. Brandon: Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. Yeah. very very odd. Very odd to like you yeah, you could have called it I don't know, anything else. It's weird. Kate: We'll see how plays out for sure. Brandon: Yeah. Kate: It might die with with this though. Who knows? Brandon: Well, yeah, I guess I guess that wraps it up for the week. wanna wanted to also give our friends at Xverse a shout out. They closed around this week from Draper Associates and Trust Machines. so Kate: Yeah, very exciting. Brandon: congrats to to Xverse for doing that. but yeah, I think I think that wraps it up for the week. It was a good week. Yeah. Kate: It was a good week. Some good news in there. Yep. Brandon: Yeah. I feel like the last couple of weeks have been a little a little slow. So it's nice to have a little bit of uptake, I think. Everyone's coming back from from you know the crypto conferences and now they're back to building and we're starting to see some more stuff happening. So some some good developments there. But yeah, thanks everybody for tuning in. We will see y'all next week. go go follow us on X if you're not following us there at good for BTC. We don't talk about that enough. so Kate: I know. Brandon: wanna give that a shout out. And yeah, go to goodforbitcoin.com where you can find our YouTube and on on Spotify or Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen in there, go subscribe, go give us a review, go do all the things, like and subscribe, you know, as they say. and yeah, we stream live here every Friday at two PM Eastern. So we will see y'all next week and have a good weekend, everybody. Kate: All right. See you guys. Bye.