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- [00:00]
A
Good morning, everybody, and welcome to the final crypto town hall of this somewhat boring week that's becoming less boring by a minute. Until I was just going to say it was boring until it stopped being boring. Listen, man, you know, I don't share many higher conviction plays, but I very publicly bought Bitcoin at 112 this morning because.
- [00:26]
B
Why not? Yeah, well, I would have if I wasn't on getting off of an overnight flight and now. And jumping up. Yeah, we're going down this staircase. Yeah, we're in. We're in pass out Germany going up and down stairs. So I'll just make this quick. If you shorted and you can tell because all the, the, the crypto, all the assets that basically sold off the hardest on this little correction are all the ones that are correcting more. And when you see that sort of a reflexive thing, it's tradable. And, you know, we're right back into the middle of the range. It's going to take virtually nothing for that to happen. So, I mean, I don't really see a whole lot to talk about other than that. But it feels like, it really does feel like September could be very interesting. We'll leave it there.
- [01:12]
A
Yeah, I mean, listen, bitcoin trading, well, we got 115. I mean, it's bouncing all over the place, but it's about 115. It broke below 112 this morning. Anybody who watches charts knows that there's basically been two ranges this summer, 12 to, we'll call it 123 or 124. Clearly in August, there's not much conviction to push and make new highs. So when that happens, you expect that you go down and sweep the lows of the range and bounce around. And in this case, you had a confluence. I mean, I've been spamming the charts for the technical analysts out there. Bullish divergence, oversold rsi. All the signals I personally like to look for for local bottoms. And of course, those align right with the moment that Powell's to give his speech. Right. I mean, so you get this nice bounce. Who knows? I don't think that this speech pushes us above 123, but I certainly think, as you said, it kind of pushes you right back into the range.
- [02:07]
B
But, but I mean, it's eerie, right? You know, all the people, all the doomsayers out there who were selling on this narrative that that Powell was going to be excessively hawkish, give a middle finger to Trump, et cetera, and then he does the opposite talked about policy changes. I mean, unless I misread what I read. I mean, it just feels like a lot of people sold that now need to buy and I don't know who the sellers are.
- [02:34]
A
Can you guys hear me? I can't hear Dave.
- [02:38]
B
Yeah, sorry, Scott, I'll have to talk to you next week. This is, this is bad.
- [02:41]
A
No, you're good, you're cut out. I appreciate you showing up. Thank you. Yeah, I'm getting obviously, I mean, PAL I think is either actively still speaking or just finished. So hard to, hard to for now. But there were, as Dave said, there was a lot of predictions as to how this would go. I think though, the day you did is that being concerned for bitcoin price action about what Powell says on any given day is completely when you know he's going to be gone in less than a year. And you know exactly the kind of person that Trump is for the long term as an investor. You know, if you care about rate cuts, that they're coming, whether it's happening today or in, in a few months. But I would love to go to the panel here to discuss what's happening here. Actually really quickly before we do that because I forget things like this. We have a quick disclaimer about this segment right now that's brought to you by a partner of Crypto Town Hall. Actually, they'll be on at the end of the show as well. Imagine front running Wall street on the world's fourth largest crypto a deflationary powerhouse that yields storage and fuels One of the most active blockchains on the planet. BNB has outpaced Bitcoin with 25x returns over five years. Yet it's been off limits to most US investors until now. Enter CEA Industries ticker BNC on Nasdaq, the first publicly traded company to adopt BNB as its core treasury asset. Echoing MicroStrategy's Bitcoin playbook. Backed by institutions like 10X Capital and Yzi Labs, they've already raised 500 million. Positioning for massive inflows from ETFs, exchanges and sovereign funds. Sophisticated investors distorted BNB exposure via a single ticker. Start your due diligence on NASDAQ BNT today before institutions flood in and the edge vantages. Like I said, Daniel will be on later in the show. Let's dig in right now though, to what's happening here with pal. Go to the panel guys. Just throw your hands up, hopefully I'll see them and start to give your comments. Carlo, you gave a heart. I'M going to count that as a hand up and say good morning, Carlo.
- [04:46]
C
Good morning, Scott. So my take, I don't think bitcoin cares what Powell says today or whether rate cut announcement comes because bitcoin is going to do what it's going to do. And I think this is largely, in my opinion, a non event because I think we all know where this is going. We may have a delayed banana zone where we may have a delay in rate cuts until Trump gets to put his own Fed chair in place in May. I think a rate cut is coming in September, but probably not many more to follow is my initial feeling. And I think we should all probably prepare for markets to tank today based on his comments because I don't think he's going to back down from the position he's taken. I think the economy's too hot to cut rates and I think he's going to continue to stick to that talking point. Did I lose you, Scott?
- [05:47]
A
I think I lost Carlo there. I don't know about you guys, but Eric, you jump in.
- [05:51]
D
So Carlo, I'll honestly, I'll take the contrarian view. I mean if you look at the way the markets are responding right now, they're running. I think Powell realizes that he was up against an unwinnable fight. And the most interesting like comment that I read through his remarks was the balance of risk appears to be shifting. I think this is a man who sees that he's got a short time prize and in the position that he's currently in and he is probably legacy shopping like anyone in that position would be doing right now. And so if you look at where youth unemployment, employment is in the country right now and some other key metrics that I certainly look at, the, the environment is ripe for rate cuts right now and I think he realizes that and I think September is pretty much baked in at this point. The market certainly seems to be indicating that the equities market, I think that you probably get another one or two on top of that potentially, which would not take us, you know, a rate cut at every meeting through the end of the year. But certainly I, I think it's a high probability at this point. Additionally, my favorite line of this very short spaces so far is yours, Carlo. Bitcoin is going to do what it's going to do, which is true. I, I think that to a certain degree I'd like to see it do what it's going to do and not trade so much in sympathy with the overall market the way it has been trading in tandem more recently. It would be great to see the, the true divergence that we've had in some earlier cycles. So anyways, those are kind of my early thoughts on what's going on, William.
- [07:42]
E
Yeah, so what I picked up from Powell is that he said that the tariff effect is going to be short term now. So finally he said that in April, you remember, he said we don't know what the tariff effects are going to be. So again, it's another kind of bullish signal looking ahead. The other thing I want to say is, I mean everybody's talking about Bitcoin leading the fray here, but I think you guys should look at Ethereum again because I think in my opinion that both of them will be leading now in terms of being out there before others, rightfully so today at least, it seems that the Ethereum price has reacted a little bit more aggressively than Bitcoin. It started to move almost 7 to 8% in the last two hours that I've been watching it. So do look at both of them as leading indicators of good or bad things to come in the future.
- [08:54]
A
Anyone else here, specific thoughts on the Fed, bitcoin price action, everything that's sort of happening today because it's pretty significant move I'm looking now. I guess we're still trading right around 115 actually maybe the bigger story is that Bitcoin's up almost 1% since this time yesterday and Ethereum's up 6%. So Ethereum keeps catching a bigger bid it seems, whenever Bitcoin makes a move. Anybody specific thoughts on why that might be the case?
- [09:24]
F
Yeah, I just think it's because of the BTC ratio. It's obviously Ethereum's been losing value against Bitcoin for a long time and it finally bounced back in. Let's have a look here. The ETH btc really it bounced back in June, like it bottomed out in June and has been moving up against BTC and we're still only at like point zero, almost 0.04. So I just think it's just catching up with, you know, just as it always does every cycle. The last cycle, what did it go to like point like 5%. So it's still got a little way to go. I just think it's people traders are betting on Ethereum short, shorter term to outperform against Bitcoin.
- [10:13]
A
Yeah, obviously there's the Tom Lee tailwinds and all the other things we've discussed about Ethereum here as well. I think right now it's just having this brief moment, as the darling we know, as you said, it kind of doesn't last and eventually bitcoin obviously will dominate anybody. Well, Ron, I got you here. So. Hey Ron, let's talk about politics. I know there's not much going on at exactly this moment, but actually Wyoming was big from what I saw beyond just Jackson Hole and the Fed. The Wyoming blockchain or crypto symposium was happening there with salt. It seems like every politician who wants crypto votes was out there speaking.
- [10:55]
G
Yeah, no, I was there. Just got back last night. It was honestly really solid, really good attendance. Probably one of the best conferences I've been to at least in crypto space in terms of attendees. All pretty high level there, you know, at least, you know, we didn't get too much, you know, news news to say the least. I mean we saw that the DOJ had some more statements about protecting software developers. That got a lot of excitement more in the defi community there. You know, I would say that Lummis, Senator Lummis from Wyoming was speaking about more kind of what's next for market structure. You know, some of the deadlines we're starting to see move a little bit just more because of the general political apparatus. For those who don't aren't aware we're facing a shutdown come end of September that's likely to draw a lot of attention in Congress on top of Ukraine and everything else going on, including the markets. So she was saying that we're looking at maybe Senate Banking moving forward on their market structure proposal end of September. And then she said Senate Agriculture Committee, that's the other committee that needs to do the other half of the bill is looking for more mid October. So again that's expected and she's hoping still to get something done beside before the end of Christmas, which again that's still a lot to go for Congress here, but we're starting to see the timeline shift a little bit. And then lastly I would say, you know, we did see a lot of, you know, more House politicians there as well. I'm talking to Brian style for quite some time. He's all Angie Craig there as well on the Democrat side and they're committed to get this over the finish line here. So and we're starting to see folks like I think the big update this week is more the banks coming out and saying, hey, if you're going to move market structure, you're going to have to close these quote, quote loopholes on interest bearing stablecoins and making sure that they're prohibited for affiliates, broker dealers and a few other points to put it out. So we're seeing the banks now starting to put a line in the sand saying we're not moving market structure with our support unless you close the interest bearing stablecoin loophole in their mind even further. So get ready. It's going to get really nasty probably in September.
- [12:54]
A
Really nasty in September.
- [12:55]
B
Wow.
- [12:55]
A
Okay. And she's listen, so a couple months ago we had Tim Scott saying we get market structure by the end of August. It's pretty much the end of August. Right. So that was an unreasonable expectation. Her claim now is by 2026. I assume if we don't get this by 2026, it just gets washed out in the midterm nonsense, right?
- [13:14]
G
Yeah. Usually it's like around March, May, timeframe election years, things really drop off. So it's not the end of the world. It doesn't get done by Christmas time. But I mean, at least Tim Scott is like kept true, is worth saying. Like he'll have a draft out and we kind of have like a half a draft right now. So. But again, it's very different than not very, but is different enough from the House version. So they're kind of doing their own path here and we'll see how far it goes along.
- [13:38]
A
Makes sense. Were any of the speeches particularly impactful or just kind of consistently the same narratives? We're looking at because listen, we know the elections are coming. People want to woo the crypto industry and we're seeing news like the Winklevoss is giving 25 million, you know, to a new super PAC. Clearly we're ramping up for midterms and making sure the industry is well represented.
- [14:02]
G
There was the undertone of the elections are starting to percolate again. You know, we saw Sherrod Brown jumping back into the race. He was one of the main losers of the last election cycle and a lot of that due to crypto getting heavily involved in supporting his opponent, Brian Marino. And so he made some interesting comments saying he's open to more crypto for Ohioans, which was kind of shocking to see how he was so aggressive against us for years. And now he's starting to change his tone right when he's trying to announce his reelection bid. So that's going to pick up the question kind of is are we going to be seeing more folks backing certain more factions, like more of the bitcoin, pro bitcoin only members of Congress versus maybe more pro crypto generally or more try to entice More Democrats to kind of come on over to the other side of supporting crypto. So I'm sure all those conversations are happening right now, but there's one thing for sure is that the crypto industry has got a lot of money to play with in this upcoming election, and D.C. knows not to piss him off at Preston.
- [15:04]
A
Ron mentioned, obviously, the DOJ statement on coders, effectively that if you don't have malicious intent, you can't be charged. Meanwhile, we have Roman Storm just found guilty of one of his three counts, and the samurai guy is pleading guilty. So how do we parse that?
- [15:22]
H
Yeah, so I mean, I think, honestly, it's. It's a. The DOJ statement is really just an honest statement of American law around the First Amendment and publication. I think there were some issues with. I mean, the issues with Tornado Cash is that there were. There was an operating protocol, there were ongoing activities and communications. I don't want to get into the details because for two reasons. One, I'm not that familiar with the actual evidentiary record in the Roman Storm case. I just haven't. You know, I'm familiar with it in a general sense, but it's not directly relevant to my business, so. Or actually, it is fairly directly relevant to my business, but. But I'm friends with this lawyer and, you know, I don't want to get into it. Let me put it this way. I don't want to be going on, on record in public and starting to explain what I think the government's case is. What I will say is that as a general rule, right. Publishing code for a very long time has been established as well, protected by the First Amendment. This was the issue with PG, with certain crypto protocols back in the 90s. People wanted to publish those. There were export controls on those and restrictions, and those were, you know, overturned in, in the US Federal courts. And, you know, where people get into trouble, right. Is where you both publish the software and then you do something else, right? So let's say, for example, you say, well, I'm going to publish the software, and then if someone writes to me and they say, hey, how can I use this software for this illegal purpose? Like, you cannot respond to that email, right? You cannot turn around and say, oh, well, here's how you do this, or I'll help facilitate this, or something like that. But as a general rule, you know, the publication of code is protected speech under the First Amendment. It's always been protected speech under the First Amendment. There have been attempts to make it not protected speech under the First Amendment. And, you know, it's. I think the DOJ acknowledging that out, you know, acknowledging that principle in its enforcement practices, unlike what the Biden DOJ did, which was like, well, you know, we're going to try to go for some very, very weird edge cases and see if we can, you know, see if we can convince a jury that. That it's a crime. I think that's really refreshing. Right. Because ultimately, in a lot of. Even when you have a case which is borderline and the defendants on the right side of the line, when the DOJ comes after you, the process is the punishment, right? So you can be acquitted and you can still be bankrupted. You can be acquitted and your life. And you've given up three, four, five years of your life, you know, defending the criminal charges, and, you know, it's probably taken years off of your life due to the stress. So I think it's really reassuring that the DOJ is going to do that. That notwithstanding, I don't think that's. And, you know, I don't think that means it's, you know, free. You know, it's. It's a free for all. And I don't think that, you know, if someone came to me and said, well, I want to run a transaction mixer or anonymizer or something that runs on identical principles to Tornado Cash, and I want to do so as a going concern, you know, that would be something where I'd say, okay, if you're going to do that, right, you have to be extraordinarily careful, you know, to. To not trip up over these tripwires, because simply publishing, you know, you're starting more, you. Publishing code is one thing. Doing more than publishing code is another thing. So it's. It's definitely not a, you know, it's definitely not, you know, free for all these days because of what the DOJ said. And there are definitely ways that you can get in trouble running something like tornado cache. But, you know, it's certainly reassuring that.
- [18:36]
B
They'Ve said what they've seen, said.
- [18:40]
A
Carlo, you had your hand up.
- [18:42]
C
Yeah. Scott, one of the things that I'm curious about in all of this is obviously we had a guilty verdict in Roman's case on money transmitter, and we had a plea on the heels of that verdict in the Samurai wallet case, where the defendants in that case pled guilty to a money transmitter violation. So the DOJ is an interesting position here, especially Southern District of New York. Are they going to agree to vacate that plea given that the DOJ has kind of confirmed their policy position on this. Again, arguably there could be more facts that would cause them to say that this was beyond just innocent code writing. But this definitely sets a very interesting precedent going forward and I'm curious to see how they respond, not just in Roman's case, but in the Samurai case as well.
- [19:34]
A
William. William, I believe you had your hand up.
- [19:40]
E
Yeah. I was going to say one thing about the inflation. A few days ago, something important, I think was announced that Canada's inflation rate in July went down to 1.7%, down from 1.9 the month before. So what I'm saying here is we're going to tame inflation in the US If Canada can control the inflation and already is heading towards the below 2% mark, the US is doing it, there's no doubt about that. So think of that as one leading indicator about what's going to happen with inflation in the U.S.
- [20:22]
A
Preston? Oh, sorry, yeah, it shows your mic. When you lift your mic and you're so popular and have a lot of followers, it throws you right up to the top for me. Sorry about that. You have something very important. No, it's, it's all good. A few people just jumped up. I mean, since William just sort of took us back to inflation in that conversation. Florian, any, any thoughts there?
- [20:52]
I
Well, I mean, the, the Fed is obviously cornered, in my opinion. I think they will probably cut. I mean, that's the 85% probability here for a rate cut in September. And then we have to see, I assume that we're going to see a second push in, in the inflation numbers rather sooner than later. And if they start lowering. Yeah, that could lit up some fire again. I mean, there are so many factors playing in this whole thing and of course it's always also a psychological kind of thing. But I assume that, for example, oil prices will move up again. I don't see that there's a peace treaty on the table here with Ukraine. I think this is much more challenging and complex than Trump assumed initially. So I think they will start lowering. Yes, but the inflation is, is still a problem and will come back usually. I mean, that's what we've seen in the 70s and that's still my expectation.
- [21:56]
A
Anyone else specific thoughts on inflation expectations? We can find something else to talk about. Really not that much. Huge news, honestly, this week, besides what's happening here with the Fed. I would love to talk about market expectations and how you're looking at the market. Florian, maybe we'll, we'll start there. You're obviously digging into the charts. I kind of made the point this morning that there was a lot of confluence, at least on the bitcoin chart, that this could be a local bottom, you know, oversold conditions. And I like bullish divergences, 112 being sort of the key range lows. So I mean we can talk about I guess the setup for September.
- [22:39]
I
Yeah, I agree, I think I would agree with your assessment here. I mean we had this pullback over the last 10 days and I have oversold stochastic here. We have the lower Bollinger band around 11, 1000, 1100, 500ish. So and now it bounced back to the 50 day moving average. Nice, nice day up today I think. Yeah, I mean overall this is going sideways since mid of July and I don't think this is going to end anytime soon. But we have seen most likely a local bottom and might swing to the upside again towards 120k. Usually September is a little bit of a challenging month for the stock markets and that also means for the highly correlated crypto and bitcoin space. So I would be still a little bit cautious here. Let's see what September brings. But like latest by end September, latest mid October. I think you want to be fully invested and ready for the year end really. That's my take here. So we're still in the summer door drops, let's not forget that.
- [23:39]
A
Great. It's been a really good August actually relative to the past, I think, in my opinion. And a good Summer Even in 2021, if you believe in the four year cycle, which was one of the most bullish years for crypto, we went from 65 down to 28 before heading back up to 69. Having even been flat or up price action of any sort in the summer I think is a massively bullish signal. Okay, Panos, go ahead.
- [24:06]
F
Yeah, I was looking earlier at like bitcoin's average monthly performance and September is on average your bitcoin is usually down between 4 to 5%. So I just wanted to throw that out there.
- [24:21]
A
Yeah. But then I assume I haven't looked at the seasonality in a while and I don't know if it's year to year, but October, November, December tend to be very, very good. Right?
- [24:30]
F
Correct. Yeah. So if you're looking at October, typically this. Hold on, let me see when this, this was from 2010 till June 30, 2025. So this is the, the data that's coming over for the last 15 years. Basically, you know, October, you're looking at like a 27 up, November 38 up, and then December, like 10% up. So, you know, seasonality wise, typically October and November are really, really good months.
- [25:04]
A
Maybe we chop sideways between 112 and 123 until October and then. Not that past performance is indicative of future results, but that's what you'd be looking for if you're kind of a cycle believe. I don't know if you're you actually. Yeah, go ahead. Sorry Panos, go ahead.
- [25:27]
F
I was going to say, are you a cycle believer or are you.
- [25:31]
A
I was one of those, if it ain't broke, don't try to fix it and you know, until it's proven otherwise. But I think it's less relevant now if you were truly a cycle believer. I think bitcoin obviously, because of the ETFs, preempted the cycle with an early all time high. So that was one indication that the cycle might be at least slightly broken. And the beginning of this year should have been absolutely wild for altcoins and it was horrible. If you believed in the four year cycle, you would have had bitcoin topping, you know, when it came around 100 or whatever and then altcoins would have gone nuts. And it took until this summer for Ethereum to really catch a bid. The meme coin trend somewhat died already in January with Trump Token. And so no, I think if you're a deep believer in the four year cycle beyond bitcoin, you should have seen a lot more altcoin action a lot earlier. What do you think?
- [26:25]
F
I tend to go with the trend, but I'm open to maybe a slightly extended cycle this, this time around. But I still think most probably it's going to be a, like coincide with the other four year cycles. But that's just my, that's just me.
- [26:42]
A
Understood. Dave, are you able to talk or no, because I saw, I saw an emoji, but I don't want to call any of you.
- [26:48]
B
I assume I'm on the boat. WI fi. Now we're back on the boat.
- [26:52]
A
WI fi is. Yeah, dude, you've been, you're like planes, trains and automobiles all in the last 30 minutes.
- [26:57]
B
Yeah, we've got, it's been, it's been crazy, but yeah, no, we were just walking around an old city and doing some shopping and now we're just trying to stay awake so that we can get a good night's sleep tonight. So that's the deal. Look, I think that the notion of a four year cycle being specific to bitcoin is Absurd at this point. I mean it's. And the reason it's absurd is because in every cycle we've gotten, we've gone from the four year cycle mattered a lot because of the change in mining reward to okay, it still mattered some to now it's literally irrelevant from a demand point of view versus supply. I mean it's, it's an afterthought. The amount, the difference between the last one and this one is negligible. Difference in this one and the next one is, is almost immeasurable, is it's smaller than ETF flows and forget everything else. So I think that that's silly. Now that said, stock markets often have four year cycles based on politics. But we've had a Fairly. We've had two bull runs in the S&P since 2009 of over a decade. I mean, you know, not to over a decade. There was one from before to 2009, from 1990, you know, from the depth of 2001 we had one that from 2009 effectively almost till now. So yeah, there's going to be bumps in the road, et cetera. But the thing that really is interesting is Bitcoin in particular is going to be driven by adoption and crypto is going to be driven by liquidity overall. And adoption of Bitcoin hasn't really even entered the mix yet. When that happens, then the mold of this cycle, the idea that this cycle is going to be less explosive than past cycles. No, I don't think so. I'm not saying that'll happen in the next year and it could. But people just need to understand what you're talking about and just consider that the acting president of the World Economic Forum is calling for Bitcoin to 5x from here. And that's all you got to know. You can't say it's an impossible.
- [29:06]
A
Did we ever talk about the fact that Larry Fink is now the head of the World Economic Forum? Do we ever even discuss that, Dave?
- [29:13]
B
Oh, I mentioned it, I mentioned it. You were out when Noel was hosting Macro Monday. On Monday. I thought it was relevant. But you know, look, I think the most relevant thing here is, I mean I, I missed 40 minutes of this. The, the speakers here. Do people perceive is the market perceiving Powell waving effectively the white flag? You know, is, is that, is that what the market perception is? Because it feels that way. And if that's the case, Scott, then we had a lot of selling, pretty much all the sellers who sold over the last week. And I'm talking About the fact that Bitcoin underperformed stocks. I'm not talking about, you know, we're talking about the underperformance of crypto vis a vis equities. I think was pretty much due to hyper focus on Powell and all that has to get reversed which will bring us right back to the top of the range and then we'll see whether price discovery sets in. And I think that it's entirely possible that we'll have issues at the top of the range again. But generally speaking, the second time is probably more likely, but maybe it'll take a third time again. So, you know, we'll see. I mean we, we've seen these ranges play out for long periods of time before. I mean, that's my thoughts.
- [30:30]
A
Anyone else want to jump in? Nobody has specific questions. Please ask a question.
- [30:40]
B
Well, no, I, I, I had a question that's gonna, that's gonna rile up some people. So it's totally separate topic. It's an XRP question. I thought I saw when I was scrolling through my feed that the European Central bank for their CBDC is looking at Ethan Solana to run it. Did I miss that? Was that, was that bullshit or was that real?
- [31:03]
A
Literally, I lost Internet for one second when you were asking it what was it exactly?
- [31:09]
B
I said I thought I saw a story and I have. Admittedly, you know, I'm not paying that much attention, but it looked like I saw a story that said people were saying that the European Central bank for their central bank digital currency were evaluating Ethereum and Solana. Now I asked that if there's no idea.
- [31:27]
A
I didn't see that.
- [31:29]
B
If it's real, it's a big deal for XRP because there was so much then it would, that would seem to be a major deal, right? Because so many of the XRP army. I can remember hundreds of posts of people saying, well, we may not like CBDCs, but if they're going to use our token, that's going to be a big deal. I'm just wondering. It might have been. That's why I'm asking it. I'm phrasing it as a question. I don't know.
- [31:56]
A
I totally missed that. So anybody have any on that?
- [31:59]
G
I think there's an FT article he might be referring to. I'm not sure. David, that's it or not. It said that. At least the headlines I'm seeing here are more going for a digital euro on a public blockchain via the Stable Coin. But I'm not seeing anything on the XRP or Soul side.
- [32:21]
B
Okay, well, I'll keep researching it. If it's there, I'll make a comment. I just, I'm just very curious. Sorry.
- [32:27]
J
Scott, congratulations on your $112,000 buy yesterday, buddy.
- [32:32]
B
That was awesome.
- [32:33]
J
And pickup.
- [32:35]
A
Thank you. It wasn't even yesterday. It was about two hours ago.
- [32:39]
B
There you go.
- [32:40]
A
I bought it this morning. Yeah, you're up four grand. Just gratuitous bottom signals. Listen, if we're being fair, I, as I said when I did it like I'm buying it here just in case this is support. But if it goes lower, I'm happy because I'll buy more. If it goes higher, I'm happy.
- [32:54]
B
When probably.
- [32:57]
J
Yeah, yeah, I think it's the right play, man. You just got to keep scaling in. Well done to everybody.
- [33:05]
A
You buy it, you buying. You buying today and every other day.
- [33:08]
J
I picked up MicroStrategy yesterday at 3:38 so picked up a chunk. It was easier for me to do it that way than bitcoin, so we'll see. Everybody's so negative on MicroStrategy. I was like, I don't think I'm gonna fade this play, dude. You guys are way, way, way too bearish.
- [33:28]
A
Yeah, I don't know if you were here yesterday. Tomer was breaking down. We were talking about SCRC and it's trading yesterday it was at 93 bucks when I checked this morning, 94. I'm assuming it's up now based on all of this. But that also seems like a really reasonable play considering it's supposed to be at par at 100 and offers a yield. I don't know if you looked at.
- [33:47]
J
That, but yeah, agreed.
- [33:49]
A
Probably pushes back to 100 and then you also get the 9% yield on top of that. So 6% upside move plus yield.
- [33:57]
J
Yeah, it's at 94.75 right now.
- [34:04]
A
Already rising there.
- [34:06]
J
That's going to suck a lot of capital, man. 9%. I mean you take retirement, retirees and they'll take that all day long.
- [34:17]
A
Dave.
- [34:19]
B
Yeah, I found the story that I was talking about Happy Coin News and another one called AI Invest, which the hell knows that is. I haven't seen it from anything else though on, on what the CBDC is. I guess we'll pay attention to that next week. We'll just look out for it. As far as the other Gary won't take, you know, he took credit for I, I as soon as you you posted about MSTR. I made the the. I quoted Mike McGlone who probably didn't want quoted in this. But I said, you know Gary, buying MSTR now is classic buy in when they're crying. Now the only question is will he be selling when they're yelling, you know, when it gets over 500 or whatever. But yeah, I mean it, it's, it's almost always a good idea. Yes, there's sometimes you're catching a falling knife but you know when you get the kind of short term bearishness when there's no real news and it's in the no volumes, it's yeah it, because it's not too hard to be tradable. You know it's funny, I had set up, I was kind of hoping that this would happen, you know, later, you know, like next week. But you know, whatever because I was out of pocket. But I think that it was definitely, I think this part, it's showing how strong the support at the bottom of this range is, is really what matters here.
- [35:39]
A
Yeah, I mean MicroStrategy was down what 21% in a week. Unless you think that it's going to utterly collapse. Seems like if you're a believer you just want to like Gary did.
- [35:52]
B
I keep, I keep trying to point this out to people who don't really understand it. I mean the tax implications matter. If you're in a tax free account or if you're not paying capital gains taxes for whatever reason, then it, then yeah, then, then trade it. You know, if you're a hedge fund and you, and you're trading, trade it. But if you're an investor and you're paying long term capital gains because you owned it from lower, then it's really hard. Then you just kind of look at it and understand. You have to understand MicroStrategy is going to always underperform Bitcoin when it's range bound. Always. It has to. Same thing happened last year. It has to because it is based upon volatility. It's also based on momentum but it's really, it's an acceleration play. It tends to do outperform. When Bitcoin is accelerating, then it will accelerate faster. But when Bitcoin is just kind of chopping around, it's going to underperform. It's literally designed to do that. That's what Sailor wants. And if you listen to his presentation, he sort of understands it. So during periods of ranges he's going to need to tap the ATM to satisfy to make the debt payments on the vehicle that he used to buy Bitcoin, which is, it's not horrible, but you Just have to know that that's going to happen. If you think Bitcoin is going to have a big rally in it, then MicroStrategy is going to outperform during that big rally. If on the other hand you think this is a cycle top, then you should be running screaming from the, the building that it's MicroStrategy. I personally don't like, I'm the former, not the latter. But I think that that's how you should inform your investing. You see what I mean? I mean it's a structural thing. It's literally how it's set up. And yet all the have you watched scheme is so ridiculous.
- [37:31]
A
Well, that's stupid at all. How have the other.
- [37:35]
B
Dr. Donna.
- [37:35]
A
I was gonna say how have the other treasury companies. Hey, go ahead. Sorry.
- [37:40]
B
Well, no, it. Well that's a valid question and that's separate. Microstrategy in specific has set up all these debt instruments that are very attractive for people that allow him to buy Bitcoin with it. The problem with those debt instruments, it's not really a problem, is when Bitcoin is stuck in a range, he doesn't have any volatility. There's no optionality for him to be able to, you know, make the interest payments. So he's going to have to sell something and he's not going to sell Bitcoin, so he's going to dilute common shares. If you think that Bitcoin is going to stay in ranges for most of its life and just kind of lurch higher in gaps, I made that point six months ago that it's not going, you're not going to get the kind of leverage that you think you're going to get. But you do need to understand it's like, it's like a ball surface, the volatility surface. Are you doing options? It's just the, the nature of the investment is that way. It is not a Ponzi scheme, but it is well understood. And it, because a Ponzi scheme assumes it's just there's nothing there. I mean this is based. Microstrategy is a play on positive Bitcoin acceleration period. That's what it's based on. And you're not holding it. It's not like the other alternatives. The other ones are, okay, well I'll just take my interest rate and that's okay. Right. Based on Bitcoin as pristine collateral, the fact that it will likely keep insolvent enough for you to get your rates, your all your cash out and a really Good return. Those are different. And people need to understand and articulate those differences. And unfortunately, unfortunately, most of the narrative over the last two weeks has been people screaming, he said he wouldn't sell kind of stuff. Sorry.
- [39:21]
A
Gary, you gotta have a thought on that.
- [39:30]
J
I agree, I agree with what Dave just said. I think MicroStrategy is not Bitcoin, but it's a play on bitcoin. And, and look, nothing's changed, okay? This guy is buying more bitcoin than any corporation in history and you can't look at a three month move and go, gosh, you know, this all changed. I, he's either going to be the largest holder of bitcoin in the world as a, you know, single corporation and whether that really get, brings a premium, I'm not sure about that. Like, but he's, he's most, most definitely. Look, he, there's, there's what, 200 or 300 companies looking at doing this and none of that would be happening had he not been here. I just, I don't know what's changed and why people are going all, you know, negative on the guy, any mistakes that he's made. This is my concern about holding these others, these other strategic reserves, chasing that. If you're saying he's made a mistake over the last three months, then what kind of mistakes are these other guys going to make? Like there are going to be mistakes. Bitcoin is not like, you know, magic bullet for bad business. So I looked at MicroStrategy yesterday and went, man, the M naps about as low as I've seen it. I don't know why I wouldn't pick some up here. So anyway, we'll see what happens.
- [41:11]
A
Man. Yeah, I haven't even looked for me, it's more powerful than your etf. Yeah, that's what I was gonna ask. I could have bought the ETF, right? Yeah, 100%. I was going to ask if anyone had been tracking the treasury company performances. I haven't seen it, so I just haven't been paying attention. But obviously this drop in MicroStrategy while Bitcoin's been kind of flat has to be a compression in m nav for MicroStrategy. I'm wondering how much the other ones have come down. Is anybody here looking at that? I don't want to put anyone on the spot, but I just haven't been watching it. Dave, I assume you haven't been tracking that too closely.
- [41:53]
B
Negative.
- [41:55]
A
Yeah. Okay. We're waiting for David to join at the moment to talk about BNB Network. Any other topics on your mind, Dave, as we are kind of coming towards the end here?
- [42:10]
B
No, in fact I'm gonna go look at the sunset off. Off the. Off the ship. So you know, RV to Zane as they say here.
- [42:19]
A
Enjoy the week everybody. About you too. You too. Maybe we'll see it. You said you weren't going to be here today, so now I'm just assuming you're going to show up every single.
- [42:27]
B
Day when shit's happening.
- [42:33]
A
Yeah, I'll show what's happening today. So any, Anyone? I would love just as we're kind of going towards the end here. Market thoughts on what they think of all coins? Carlo, I'd love your opinion on this. What do you think is going to happen here with all coins if we get the. Oh, Carlo just bounced. As we, if we get the premise of, you know, we kind of get somewhat bullish, chop around September and head into October. Does anybody think we actually get a major bid on all coins beyond the ones that are available to stock traders at this point? William?
- [43:05]
F
Yeah, I think once, once, once Ethereum breaks all time high, we will start seeing altcoins running again. That's my opinion and I think that will happen over this month or September.
- [43:19]
A
Do you think that we could get a bid on like a real alt season?
- [43:26]
F
Yeah, I think it might be a brief one but I do think we're going to get an alt season. I think the reason we haven't had an alt season this cycle like a prop, we've had meme coin seasons but the typical altcoin seasons that we've had in the past cycles is literally because Ethereum has literally just been losing value against Bitcoin this whole time. But now that's changed and I think people are crazy buying bitcoin over Ethereum right now. I think there's more upside to Ethereum in, in the short term, short to midterm than there is on a, on bitcoin as a trade and I think.
- [43:58]
A
Yeah.
- [44:00]
F
As a trade.
- [44:01]
B
100.
- [44:02]
F
Yeah, don't get me wrong, like long term, you know you're going to see bitcoin take the reins again. But as a trade in the short to midterm, I think Ethereum's the play here and if it does break, we're very close to all time high. Don't like what's the all time high? 4800 and something.
- [44:16]
A
Yeah, we were like 1% away or something, right?
- [44:21]
B
Yeah.
- [44:22]
F
So I think once we break that and we start going into price discovery, you're going to see money rotating into the altcoins again from, from Ethereum. That, that's, that's my prediction anyway.
- [44:31]
A
I mean I do get eviscerated for saying these things because we're talking about trading and not investing and not long term prognosis. But yes, I think that, and I've been saying it since ethereum was at 1400 and was bottom against Bitcoin that if you were trading it was. Even if you're trying to get more Bitcoin as a trader, the best way was to buy Ethereum and then eventually sell it into Bitcoin. William, I know you agree, right?
- [44:59]
E
Yes, yes. I didn't have too much to add. Of course Ethereum is hot right now. When somebody said it's not going to catch up to Bitcoin, I don't know what that means but all I know is for sure Ethereum is catching up to Bitcoin. I don't believe it's going to overtake Bitcoin and market cap, at least not in the foreseeable future. But it is getting closer. And when we talk about Bitcoin nowadays I want to hear talks about Ethereum in the same breath because both of them are special snowflakes.
- [45:37]
A
Special snowflakes, I love that. Cam, I seem to come to you at the end because you know, for your thoughts but any thoughts on this? Not too much. Just wanted to mention that there's a big Celsius distribution coming. Well really I suppose small in comparison to the losses but $220 million is going to be, was announced this week, is being distributed. So I suppose just anybody affected. There's you know, 80,000 creditors who are eligible and lots of phishing attempts out there. So probably the best thing to do is to. There's a website that the wind down estate has set up called claimsportal.celsius.net, and there's like a one time passcode login system. So it's nothing you need to give any information away. So just be very careful of phishing attempts. But that distribution is eminent and should be coming out in the weeks ahead. Where does that stand in the like in the cycle of distributions here? Like is this the final one? Are there more potentially coming? So this is the third distribution and it's not clear if there will be other ones but it's likely there will be future distributions as well. But it depends on the ongoing litigation. Understood. All right guys, we're going to head into the weekend here on seemingly a bullish note for the market we were waiting for, for a sponsor to show up. It seems we've been having trouble getting them on stage and I'm going to let you guys go. Thank you to all the guests. Thank you to all the speakers. An amazing week as usual, and it's going to get really interesting, obviously, moving forward. So come back every day. 10:15 crypto town hall. Thank you, everyone. Bye.