Unchained: Bits + Bips — Vanguard's Crypto U-Turn, Tether/MSTR FUD & Picking Future Winners

Episode 967, December 2, 2025
Panelists: Austin Campbell (Host, Zero Knowledge Group), Chris Perkins (CoinFund), Rahm Al Awalia (Lumina), Alex Krüger (Krüger Macro)

Episode Overview

This episode dives deep into the intersection of global macro shifts and crypto market dynamics, focusing on:

• Key events shaking up the market, including Vanguard’s launch of crypto ETFs, volatility around the Bank of Japan, panic related to Tether and MicroStrategy, and major structural issues in financial market infrastructure.
• The shifting investor landscape as institutions move in, retail fluctuates, and legacy attitudes reemerge.
• The persistent debates around regulation, market structure, and what projects/protocols will be the long-term winners.

Tone: Conversational, sharp, irreverent, and expertly informed, with an eye to repeating historical lessons in both macro and crypto cycles.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Vanguard Enters Crypto ETFs: Institutional Adoption Grows

• The episode opens bullish: Vanguard, a $11T asset behemoth, moving into crypto ETFs signals continued institutional adoption.

  “Even Vanguard just came out as we were launching. They're going to start offering crypto ETFs. Evidence today is Vanguard coming into the space.” — Chris Perkins [03:20/05:18/13:19]

• Host and panelists posit that, in the long run, “institutions are marching forward” even as retail and market makers remain in post-bear-battle fatigue.

2. BOJ Rate Hike Shocks: Macro Ripples in Crypto

• Bank of Japan (BoJ) signaling a rate hike for Dec 18-19, shaking up the JPY carry trade and global risk assets.

  “USD JPY is moving significantly ... markets are currently pricing well over an 80% chance of a hike to 0.75%. ... But the genesis of this is the yen carry trade...” — Austin Campbell [02:14]

• Bitcoin and alts saw sharp pullbacks; “biggest loser of course Zcash because the bank of Japan strongly opposes privacy. Maybe correlation is not always causation.” — Campbell [02:14]

• Panelists split on whether the macro event or market microstructure (thin liquidity + excess leverage) exacerbated the violence.

  “The move starts at the exact same time in synchrony with...Japanese bonds and the Nikkei … It opens at 9 am Japan, which is 7 pm Eastern time. That's the move, that's the trigger. That doesn't explain why bitcoin moves so much more.” — Alex Krüger [07:34]

• Retail and cross-asset “high beta” pain:

  “When one sells off, they've got to sell the others. High beta is just selling off in unison...people park in quality assets.” — Rahm Al Awalia [10:49]

3. Rotation to Value and Defensive Assets, Including Bitcoin

• Macro environment has driven dramatic asset class rotations — from high-beta growth (crypto, uranium, Palantir) to defensive and value equities.

  “This high beta sprint that we've had since April is just giving way to a rotation to value.” — Rahm [00:27/05:20]

• In crypto, expectation is performance divergence – “Bitcoin should outperform alts, I would expect. That's probably an easy view for all of us.” — Rahm [12:56]
• As rates rise, “operating companies with cash flow” outperform unproductive assets; impacts crypto as well, shifting value to “organic” yield (e.g., ETH staking) versus just speculative upside.

4. MicroStrategy FUD & Narrative Violations

• MicroStrategy CEO's recent comment about potential Bitcoin sales if their “M NAV” (Market Net Asset Value) dips below one spooks the market.

  “The CEO piped up and said, yeah, if we went to a negative M nav...I could see a situation where we could sell some bitcoin...market didn't respond nicely.” — Chris Perkins [13:20]

• The narrative violation: Saylor/Strategy was perceived as unwavering HODLers, so public acknowledgment of potential to sell created panic.

  “...people viewed Saylor as like the diamond hands, the one guy who would never sell. And now here's the CEO...being like, no, we would totally sell if we had to.” — Austin [14:54]

• But panelists agree it’s fundamentally reasonable risk management for a public firm with debt.

5. Regulatory & Political Winds

• Recent US “blue sweep” has impacted asset sectors, benefiting healthcare and green energy while animal-spirits assets (crypto, uranium) have underperformed.
• Actual Congressional/legislative action for crypto (like clarity around securities status) remains distant.

  “Clarity...is a more complicated problem earlier in the legislative process...the poll there is longer than people think.” — Austin [26:44]

• Importance of using current “pro-innovation regulators” for near-term precedent, since the next US regime could reverse the trend.

  “Time is not on our side...But we do know we have amazing, proactive, pro innovation regulators right now.” — Chris [27:38]

6. Fed Policy, Succession, and Macro Implications

• Fed rate cut odds: Markets price an 80–88% chance of a December cut. Debate centers on whether inflation or employment will drive the Fed, with upcoming NFP data possible trigger.

  “It's kind of a Rorschach test of the market...” — Austin [31:28]

• Discussion about the next Fed chair: If the dovish-supply-sider Hasset or Warsh is confirmed, expect a regime change allowing more GDP growth before triggering rate hikes.

  “If the new chair changes the staff director and...the projections...you get more dovish projections that would influence the rest...” — Alex Krüger [36:09]

• But, as Austin cautions, the Fed is more decentralized and fragmented than most realize.

7. Tether: Perennial FUD and the Reality of Stablecoin Economics

• Arthur Hayes’ warning that Tether could go bust if BTC/gold holdings drop 30% is met with skepticism.

  “I've learned over the years don't bet against Tether. ...Fast forward to today. These guys are printing $10 billion, you know, through 2025.” — Chris Perkins [43:48]

• Rahm points out insolvency “doesn’t matter,” especially since Tether functioned as a “bank” with opaque but sticky liabilities.

  “You can't get a bank run on tether. Fundamentally, it is a bank.” — Rahm [49:43]

• Institutional money prefers regulated, transparent assets for treasury—potential future pressure on Tether & similar unregulated tools as yields compress with rate cuts.

8. Market Structure Issues: CME Outage, Disaster Recovery, and the Case for Blockchain

• Long outage at CME Illinois highlighted single-point-of-failure problems in global derivatives trading.

  “Any system with a single point of failure, it's a matter of time until you have the failure.” — Austin [52:30]

• Disaster recovery policies aren’t always functional: Panelists lampoon procedures that “collect dust.”
• Call for distributed tech: Centralized market infrastructure (see $700T derivatives post-GFC) is legacy, inefficient, and more brittle than blockchain-based models.

  “Much better system than having a freaking air conditioner blow up and take down one of the most important...markets in the world for 10 hours.” — Chris [54:00]

• Regulatory and industry resistance to innovation (“don’t move so fast with these tokens”) is mocked given recurring failures of existing infrastructure.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the cyclical nature of crypto debates:

  “We relitigate so many things every cycle. We're talking about Tether now again. ...China is now banning crypto again. Oh my God, you're right. ...It typically has the same outcome.” — Chris Perkins [22:54]

• On narrative fragility:

  “It's like saying Santa Claus doesn't exist. This wasn't supposed to happen. It's not part of the story.” — Rahm on MicroStrategy possibly selling BTC [18:34]

• On financial news reporting:

  “With a comment like that, if somebody says, oh yeah, we would sell bitcoin if it hits 25k, they're just going to report the first half of that sentence.” — Austin [17:05]

• On the cost of holding unproductive assets:

  “Positive rate environments...put significantly more pressure on things that are not cash flowing...the cost of holding things that are doing absolutely nothing ...goes sort of monotonically up.” — Austin [19:56]

• On Fed decentralization:

  “We talk about the Fed like this is a unified single entity. ...But when we say the Fed, we may as well be saying the large banks, which is to say JP Morgan does not agree with B of A, who does not agree with Wells Fargo...” — Austin [39:33]

• On market structure ossification:

  “It feels very two-faced to me when people are saying oh we're the much safer way and yet all their systems are breaking constantly.” — Austin, after CME data center outage [56:12]

Timestamps of Key Segments

• Vanguard announces crypto ETFs: [03:20, 05:18, 13:19]
• Bank of Japan rate hike & impact: [02:14–10:49]
• Asset rotation & value thesis: [05:20–12:38]
• MicroStrategy FUD and narrative: [13:13–18:34]
• Political/regulatory winds: [22:12–28:55]
• Fed cut odds & future path: [31:28–42:39]
• Tether “FUD” and stablecoin analysis: [42:39–51:09]
• CME outage & blockchain case: [52:30–58:50]
• Closing thoughts: [58:50–End]

Conclusion

This episode provides a micro-to-macro view of the current crypto landscape—how institutional flows, legacy financial market fragilities, regulatory rumblings, and persistent tribal narratives all intersect. The hosts and guests offer sharp, occasionally sardonic commentary that cuts through headlines to reveal underlying market forces and cyclical patterns. For listeners, especially those seeking to understand not just what’s happening in crypto now but why, this is a must-listen analysis.