Self-custody is foundational to bitcoin's value with Zack Shapiro | The Last Free Americans

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Nov 18, 2025

Zack Shapiro, head of legal and policy at the Bitcoin Policy Institute, dives into the importance of self-custody in Bitcoin. He explains how it underpins Bitcoin’s value and connects it to personal freedoms. The conversation touches on outdated laws clashing with peer-to-peer transactions and the implications of the Clarity Act for non-custodial rights. Zack also shares historical lessons about property rights and advocates for the preservation of self-custody in American law, emphasizing its role in ensuring financial independence.

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INSIGHT

Self-Custody Is Bitcoin’s Core Value

Self-custody underpins both Bitcoin's asset value and the network's permissionless power.
It enables peer-to-peer transactions and provides censorship resistance and freedom benefits.

INSIGHT

ETFs Can Detach Bitcoin From Its Roots

ETFs and financialization risk detaching Bitcoin from on-chain self-custody.
Maintaining individual capacity to self-custody protects against confiscation and intermediary failures.

ADVICE

Educate Lawmakers And Protect Developers

Teach judges and lawmakers about peer-to-peer Bitcoin to align laws with the technology.
Protect non-custodial development so people can realistically self-custody without legal risk.

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Zack Shapiro is the head of legal and policy at the Bitcoin Policy Institute and a key architect behind the Peer-to-Peer Rights Fund. He’s spent years on the frontlines where law, technology, and human freedom intersect—helping lawmakers and judges understand what it means to hold value in the digital age. In this episode, Zack joins The Bitcoin Frontier to break down why self-custody is foundational to bitcoin’s value, how the Clarity Act could define financial freedom for a generation, and why the right to hold your own money might be the most American right of all.

We dig into the constitutional roots of property rights, how U.S. law is being stretched to fit a peer-to-peer world, and why the fight for non-custodial software developers will determine the future of bitcoin in America.

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TIMESTAMPS:
0:00 – Intro & the mission behind The Last Free Americans series
2:00 – What self-custody really means and why it’s the foundation of bitcoin’s value
3:45 – ETFs, financialization, and the fading connection to real bitcoin
5:00 – Why self-custody matters more than ever in 2025
6:15 – How outdated laws are clashing with a peer-to-peer world
7:40 – The Clarity Act and the battle for non-custodial rights
9:00 – Would bitcoin even be valuable without self-custody?
10:00 – How self-custody connects to America’s founding values
12:00 – The Constitution’s protections for holding bitcoin: 1st, 4th, 5th, 9th Amendments
16:00 – The history lesson: Executive Order 6102 and gold confiscation
18:30 – Enumerated powers, the 9th Amendment, and the people’s retained rights
21:00 – Why protecting non-custodial developers is critical to freedom
23:30 – Tornado Cash, Samurai Wallet, and the dangerous new legal precedents
27:30 – Knowledge vs. intent: how the DOJ’s theories stretch the law
31:00 – The risk of calling developers “money transmitters”
33:30 – Steelmanning the other side: why regulators see a loophole
37:00 – How the Bank Secrecy Act evolved from mob busting to digital dragnet
40:30 – From halawa networks to bitcoin: applying old laws to new rails
42:30 – The real ideological divide: state control vs. individual liberty
46:00 – Why self-custody embodies the American idea of limited government
47:30 – If Bitcoin existed in 1776, would the framers have protected self-custody?
49:00 – Strategy going forward: the Clarity Act, education, and vigilance
52:00 – The political battle ahead: Elizabeth Warren, ICOs, and what’s really at stake
54:00 – How bitcoin helps the least powerful—and why that matters most

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