Kyle Powers is the cofounder and CEO of LibertyPay, a Boston business that powers remittances to Brazil and Mexico – settling on Bitcoin, rather than traditional financial rails. LibertyPay has settled nine figures worth of value in its history – and most users never know their transactions are settling via Bitcoin. In this episode: 

• How LibertyX began with the cofounders standing beside a Bitcoin ATM in South Station in 2014
• The origins of LibertyPay and how the cofounders realized that Bitcoin-based remittances were a viable product
• How LibertyPay determined the most viable channels for their Bitcoin remittance product
• Why Brazil is a goldilocks zone for Bitcoin-powered remittances
• In which domains Bitcoin-based remittances outmatch the traditional system
• Why LibertyPay uses Bitcoin as their bridge currency and not another asset
• Why obtaining banking in 2014 was such a challenge
• Whether there was a coordinated attempt to unbank crypto companies in 2014-15
• Whether Kyle is optimistic about the future of digital cash
• Whether XRP will ever grow into its promise as a touted bridge currency
• Why Kyle views Bitcoin’s base layer as more of SWIFT analogue rather than a payments network
• Why owning Bitcoin gives you exposure to all of its descendants, in the case of a dispute
• Why Bitcoiners should be excited about stablecoins

Check out this episode!

Coin Metrics network data product lead Lucas Nuzzi joins the show to help explain how to audit the supply of Ethereum – and other, even more challenging blockchains. Also covered in this episode: 

• Does the Winklevoss gold asteroid mining talking point have any merit?
• Are the Winklevii being ironic or sincere
• The Boston Fed is hiring crypto engineers
• Why DeFi tokens remind us of PoW launches from 2014
• Why we need a new taxonomy for autonomous fair launched DeFi tokens
• Why DeFi might not herald a resurgence of the ICO phenomenon
• Microstrategy surprises to the upside
• Facebook focuses on payments
• ETH supplygate explained

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James Lovejoy, recent MEng MIT grad and former graduate researcher at the MIT Digital Currency Initiative, joins the show to talk about his masters thesis and associated project focusing on detecting double-spends in proof of work cryptocurrencies. Previously, little data was collected in a systematic way to detect double-spends and reorganizations across many cryptocurrencies. James’ project sheds light on previously unknown security properties of PoW. In this episode: 

• How James came to work on Vertcoin
• Why James thinks ASIC resistance is valuable
• James’ blockchain monitoring project and why it matters
• Why reorgs are challenging to detect
• Why investigating the economic damage of reorgs is difficult
• How James noticed a 51% attack in progress on Vertcoin and intervened to save Bittrex money – and how this can be replicated
• Why understanding Nicehash is critical to detecting and dealing with 51% attacks
• James’ critiques of dominant theoretical models of PoW security
• How James found reorgs and counterattacks happening on BTG in real time
• Why exchange processes like KYC might actually help protect blockchains from reorgs
• How permissionless trading and leverage makes certain blockchains more vulnerable to attacks
• Rules of thumb for confirmation requirements for exchanges
• The issue with calling coins “Nicehash-able” – and why it’s likely a lowball
• How exchanges can proactively mitigate the risk of 51% attacks and what they should be targeting
• How BTG developers finally defeated deep reorgs
• Whether James is confident in the long-term prospects of PoW
• Whether James still believes in GPU mining

Content referenced in this episode

• James Lovejoy, An Empirical Analysis of Chain Reorganizations and Double-Spend Attacks on Proof-of-Work Cryptocurrencies
• Raphael Auer, Beyond the doomsday economics of “proof-of work” in cryptocurrencies
• Eric Budish, The Economic Limits of Bitcoin and the Blockchain
• Hasu, Prestwich, and Curtis, A model for Bitcoin’s security and the declining block subsidy
• Carlsten, Kalodner, Narayanan, Weinberg, On the Instability of Bitcoin Without the Block Reward
• Moroz, Aronoff, Narula, Parkes, Double-Spend Counterattacks: Threat of Retaliation in Proof-of-Work Systems
• Judmayer et al, Pay-To-Win: Cheap, Crowdfundable, Cross-chain Incentive Manipulation Attacks on Cryptocurrencies
• Liao and Katz, Incentivizing Blockchain Forks via Whale Transactions
• James Lovejoy and David Vorick, ASICs and cryptocurrencies: benefits and drawbacks  [debate]
• Nic Carter, It’s the settlement assurances, stupid [blog]
• Elaine Ou, Cryptocurrency Deals can Always be Erased, for a Price [article]

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Nic and Matt cover deals and the news of the week. In this episode:

• Are we in a bull run or is fiat devaluating?
• Africa volumes growing on Paxful
• BCH contemplating redirecting block rewards to fund developers
• Electric Capital raises 110m
• Casa adds a direct buy bitcoin feature
• Dapper labs raises $12m with participation from multiple NBA players
• Matt’s scoop about the Microstrategy Bitcoin position
• Grayscale files a form 10 for their Ethereum Investment Trust
• Whether Bitcoiners should try to appeal to goldbugs
• Why the world needs Bitcoin hardware that demonstrates UTXOs held
• Is DGC the biggest company in the crypto industry?
• Square’s monster Q2 for Bitcoin
• Goldman has a new digital assets lead
• ETC keeps getting 51% attacked

Check out this episode!

Ray Youssef, founder and CEO of Paxful, joins the show to talk his journey with Paxful and his mission to bring Bitcoin to Africa. Paxful is a wholly bootstrapped startup that has recently taken the crown as the largest Bitcoin p2p marketplace in the world with $2.1B in annualized volume. Ray is from Egypt and has always sought to bring Bitcoin to Africa. Today, Africa is the 2nd most active region by volume on the platform (behind North America). In this episode:

• Why Bitcoin p2p is so popular in Africa
• Why interstate settlements in Africa are so challenging today
• Ray’s predictions about p2p volume versus centralized volume
• Why p2p exchange data is more reliable than centralized exchange volume
• How Ray went from being homeless to founding the largest p2p Bitcoin exchange
• Why KYC in emerging markets is so challenging
• How Ray went through 11 failed startups before starting Paxful
• The downside of taking venture financing and why Paxful is better off without it
• Why western startups fail when they try and get involved in African markets
• Why African users are under-served by KYC providers like Jumio or Onfido
• Why Paxful has KYC
• How the Paxful remittance flow works with gift cards
• Whether Paxful users are retail or wholesalers
• Why Nigeria, Kenya, South Africa, and Ghana are popular on Paxful
• Why Ray focused on Africa for Paxful
• How Ray found his way to New Orleans after Katrina
• The genesis of Ray’s humanitarian project to build schools in Africa

Paxful is hiring! 

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Jesse Walden, founder of Variant joins the show. In this episode we discuss:

• Jesse’s journey in the crypto industry, from founding Mediachain, to being an investor at A16Z, to founding Variant
• The crypto ownership economy and how Jesse sees the evolution of consumer software
• Crypto projects through the lens of contract theory

Learn more and follow Jesse at www.variant.fund and follow him on Twitter @Jessewldn

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Michael Graham and Pat McEvoy of Canaccord Genuity join the podcast to discuss how their firm has approached the blockchain/cryptoasset sector. In this episode we discuss:

• Michael’s perspective on blockchain/cryptoassets from his role as Head of Equity Research at the firm. We discuss how blockchain technology could alter the landscape of the dominant internet companies of our era
• Pat’s perspective on the maturation of cryptoassets and the increased participation of institutional participants in the trading of these assets
• Where Pat and Michael see the biggest opportunities and how Canaccord is positioning their blockchain strategy

To learn more about Canaccord visit their website.

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Matt and Nic review the stories of the week, featuring John Collins, partner and cofounder of FS Vector, to cover the OCC letter and its implications. Covered in this episode:

• Our Plustoken conspiracy
• Nic’s bird situation
• USDC raises $25m from DCG
• Avanti’s dollar-coin Avit
• Why Pats players keep declaring their intention to sit out the season
• Bitcoin Suisse raises $48.6m
• Polkadot raises $43m
• What tokensales and desert real estate have in common
• FTX is building a DEX on Solana
• Paradigm sponsors a Bitcoin developer
• Why Bitcoin’s patronage system is a competitive advantage relative to other blockchains
• Our predictions on whether this rally will last
• The circular logic inherent in valuations of certain DeFi tokens
• Why distinguishing pseudo equity from cryptocurrency is so important

Check out this episode!

Matt and Nic review the stories of the week. Covered in this episode:

• Why holding Bitcoin in banks isn’t necessarily contrary to the nature of Bitcoin
• VALR, a South African exchange, raises $3.45m from 100x Group and others
• The OCC’s bombshell letter saying that banks can custody cryptocurrency
• What this means for established crypto custodians
• Follow-up questions we have for the OCC
• Hester Pierce expresses her disappointment with the outcome of the Telegram case
• Standard Chartered working on cryptoasset custody
• Paypal partnering with Paxos
• Coinbase blacklists the Twitter hacker addresses
• Our explanation of what’s going on with Ampleforth
• The potential pro-Bitcoin regulatory troika in the US

Check out this episode!

Nate Maddrey, senior research analyst at Coin Metrics, joins the show to discuss a recent report published by CM in collaboration with Bitstamp, The Rise of Stablecoins. We talk through the report and analyse some of the charts in depth. In this episode: 

• Why the auditability of public blockchains is so useful for evaluating stablecoins
• Why fiat backed stablecoins have different price dynamics from ‘native crypto collateral’ backed ones
• How the arbitrage growth cycle works for fiat-backed stablecoins
• What the distribution of ownership and addresses for USDT tells us
• Liquidity for USDT versus USDC and BUSD
• Distinguishing stablecoins based on median transfer value
• Stablecoins as wholesale rather than retail value transfer networks
• What velocity of stablecoins relative to bitcoin and ether tells us

Check out this episode!

Caitlin Long, founder and CEO of Avanti Financial Group, joins the show. Caitlin is a thinker and writer we admire a huge amount and she has done a monumental job with her advocacy for responsible custody practices among crypto depository institutions. She is one of the key architects of the Wyoming Special Purpose Depository Institution legislation which establishes a new form of crypto bank in Wyoming. In in no small part thanks to her efforts that Wyoming is the most progressive state in terms of defining and regulating digital assets and the institutions that custody them. We share Caitlin’s enthusiasm for clarifying depositor exchange relationships and for public-facing proofs of reserve, so we were very excited have her on the show. Covered in this episode:

• Risks involved in complying with the FATF’s travel rule
• How the FATF enforces its recommendations
• Why compliance burdens freeze out small and community banks
• How the $10k limit for disclosure for cash transactions increases the scope of transactions that should be disclosed in real terms
• How the Bank Secrecy Act and the third party doctrine means the government can procure warrantless financial data
• Caitlin’s Bitcoin origin story
• The thawing of the gold community’s sentiments towards bitcoin
• The tension inherent in the institutionalization of bitcoin
• Why Proofs of Reserves aren’t more popular today
• The importance of distinguishing ownership of a key and a legal title
• Why users are poorly equipped to hold exchanges accountable
• Why the state by state regulation in the US doesn’t suit the reality of crypto custodians
• How the Wyoming SPDI legislation got started
• What the Wyoming SPDI laws actually mean
• How Avanti got its name
• Caitlin’s long term objectives with Avanti
• Why banking remains the achilles heel of the crypto industry
• Why existing banks might not be able to handle future growth of the crypto industry
• How the FDIC targeted the crypto industry
• Why custodians should have access to the Fed window
• Caitlin’s pitch to entrepreneurs to move to Wyoming

Check out this episode!

Sam Wyner and Sal Ternullo, cryptoasset services co-leads at KPMG, join the show to talk about KPMG’s newly-released analytics capabilities dubbed Chain Fusion. Chain Fusion is a patent pending suite of advanced analytics capabilities built on leading cryptoasset data and infrastructure products, to streamline the ability for financial services companies, FinTechs, and organizations across industries to deliver institutional quality cryptoasset capabilities and services. In this episode:

• KPMG’s historical engagement with the crypto industry
• How audit/consulting firms are engaging with crypto financial institutions 
• The choice to have a crypto specific team at KPMG (rather than simply focusing on blockchain)
• The reason why formal financial statement audits for crypto companies are not occuring in the US today
• Why an asset taxonomy from regulators matters to auditors
• What Chain Fusion is and what it’s designed to solve
• The intersection of Chain Fusion and Proofs of Reserves for exchanges
• Why audit standards still don’t take into account the notion of cryptographic signatures to prove ownership of an asset
• Why the FATF travel rule is so difficult to implement

Check out the press release for Chain Fusion which provides a high-level overview of the accelerator suite and contact information to get in touch with Sam and Sal.

Learn more about KPMG’s Blockchain initiatives to explore recent thought leadership including Cracking Crypto Custody which describes four pillars for winning institutional crypto custody models.

Check out this episode!

Matt and Nic review the stories of the week, featuring special guest Alex Treece, president and cofounder of Zabo. Alex joins the show to discuss his report covering the intersection of fintech and cryptocurrency. Also in this episode: 

• We gripe about the SaaSification of the world and the loss of genuine ownership
• Whether the Bitcoin hero’s journey requires a private blockchain digression
• The boys argue about the merit of soccer
• We talk Twitter hack scenarios
• Why the Twitter hackers had to use Bitcoin
• Social media handles as property
• Grayscale’s blockbuster quarter
• Abra settles with the SEC
• We cover the theory that individual bitcoins don’t actually exist

Check out this episode!

Matt and Nic cover the top stories of the week. In this episode: 

• Nic’s viral Tweet 
• The Fed competes with crypto startups for talent
• TikTok influences the crypto markets
• Why supply metrics should be reexamined
• Why we wrote our cryptodollar whitepaper
• Chainalysis raises another round
• Coinbase IPO rumors
• USDC funds are frozen for the first time
• Can the stablecoin ‘blacklist model’ survive?
• Our FATF 101 and what their new guidance means for the industry
• What the ‘travel rule’ actually means
• why the FATF is worried about stablecoins
• The FATF fires a shot at decentralized stablecoins

Check out this episode!

Tim Rice, Coin Metrics CEO, and Ben Celermajer, index manager at Coin Metrics join the show to discuss a new supply measure for cryptoassets which takes into account their “free float.” This is designed to take into account coins which are immobilized or illiquid, and brings a systematic approach to the issue inherited from traditional capital markets. In this episode: 

• Why Coin Metrics developed a “free float” measure of supply and why it’s informative to investors
• How CM borrowed from index weighting strategies in equity markets to devise a free methodology for cryptoassets
• Why the highly auditable nature of cryptocurrencies allows for extremely informative assessments of supply
• The lack of standards in how supply is assessed among existing data providers
• Which assets saw the greatest reduction in supply due to the free float adjustment
• How market capitalization in equities in indexes went through a historical transition from total supply to float-adjusted supply

For more on free float supply, see CM’s introductory research piece on the topic. 

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Matt and Nic cover the top stories of the week. In this episode: 

• The MPC custody debate
• NYDIG raises $190m for a Bitcoin fund
• Zimbabwe bans all mobile money services and contemplates redollarization
• 4% of the UK population owns cryptocurrency, according to the securities regulator
• What a long-defunct exchange has to do with Bitcoin’s GINI coefficient
• Why the ‘market cap’ of BCH and BSV is significantly overstated
• Why ‘market cap’ remains a problematic measure to compare cryptoassets
• Ark Invest’s rebuttal to Goldman
• Nic gets a paper published in an antitrust law journal
• The looming antitrust wave against big tech

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We host Lyn Alden, equity research and investment strategist focusing on global macro and commodities, to talk about the debt overhang, the effect of the dollar as the reserve currency, QE, the likelihood of inflation, and the prospects for Bitcoin. 

In this episode: 

• How the Bretton Woods system broke down and gave way to the Nixon shock
• The genesis of the petrodollar system with Saudi Arabia
• Alternatives to the dollar reserve that were mooted prior to Bretton Woods II
• Why the dollar reserve system has begun to impose a cost on americans rather than being a net benefit
• How the US became a debtor nation and what that means for the middle class
• Why the US dollar can’t find a natural equilibrium
• The relationship between dollar strength and emerging markets
• Why the US government is caught between remaining strategic power through dollar centrality versus re-onshoring supply chains
• Can the world transition past a dollar standard?
• Why global commodities being priced in a single currency is a historical aberration
• Why calling QE simply an asset swap isn’t a complete description
• Why our monetary situation bears resemblance to the 1940s
• The Fed’s changing inflation target
• Why QE in 2008-14 was largely noninflationary and why this time might be different
• Lyn’s view on Bitcoin and how it fits into her macro thesis
• Lyn’s major concerns about Bitcoin

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Dave Balter, the cofounder and CEO of Flipside Crypto, a business intelligence company focused on public blockchains, joins the show. In this episode we discuss:

• Dave’s new book, The Humility Imperative, and the lessons he has learned from seven startups
• His POV on leadership in an emerging market like cryptoassets/blockchain
• Reflections on fundraising, remote working, personal relationships and more.

To learn more about Flipside Crypto visit their website and follow Dave @DaveBalter

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Pat Larsen, cofounder and CEO of ZenLedger joins the show. In this episode we discuss:

• Pat’s entrepreneurial journey and the path that led him to start Zenledger
• The current state of cryptoasset tax regulation
• Perspectives on emerging consumer use cases and new applications for cryptoassets

To learn more about ZenLedger visit their website and to receive a 15% discount on your tax prep this year use the coupon code “Castle15”

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Matt and Nic cover the top stories of the week. In this episode: 

• More Proof of Reserve chatter
• OmiseGo’s parent company raises $80m
• Bitmex backs a new options exchange
• Paypal plans to roll out crypto products
• KPMG announces Chain Fusion
• USDC goes multi-chain
• We explain the COMP situation
• Telegram finally settles with the SEC
• Jay Clayton eyes the SNDY job
• An explanation of Bitcoin as a synthetic commodity money
• Our favorite and least favorite regional Fed branches
• Why a US CBDC has troubling privacy implications
• Our breakdown of the Compound situation

Check out this episode!