On The Brink with Castle Island

Matt and Nic return for another week of deals and news. In this episode: Kraken brings back PoR Bitfinex hack money launderers are arrested The long history of Bitfinex, hacks, Recovery rights, Tether, and LEO Who is entitled to the recovered BTC from the Bitfinex hack? The NY Fed attacks stablecoins, and private banknote issuance Ottawa truckers are banned from Gofundme Are US Treasuries backing stablecoins stranded liquidity? Why central bankers attack stablecoins to promote CBDCs Content mentioned: NY Fed, The Future of Payments is not Stablecoins Sponsor notes: Fireblocks is an enterprise-grade platform delivering a secure infrastructure for moving, storing, and issuing digital assets. Learn more at fireblocks.com

In this episode, Kraken chief product officer Jeremy Welch joins the show to cover Kraken's newly announced Proof of Reserve procedure. In this episode: Why bring back PoR? What distinguishes today's proof of reserve from the procedure Kraken undertook back in 2015 Why haven't exchanges done PoR historically? What Kraken's PoR actually proves to depositors The role of Armanino in Kraken's PoR What happens when a depositor verifies their PoR How Kraken protects user privacy in PoR The trustlessness of the PoR procedure What regulators can gain from a PoR How Kraken clients can benefit from PoR How Jeremy expects other exchanges to react Sponsor notes: Compass Mining is the world's first and largest online marketplace for bitcoin mining hardware, hosting, and ASIC reselling. Start mining your own bitcoin by visiting compassmining.io See more on Kraken's PoR here

Tom Brady retires to focus on NFTs Was Satoshi interested in altcoins? Our thoughts on startups raising 69.420m The Solana-Ethereum bridge is hacked for over $300m– and then bailed out by Jump Capital Was Vitalik's warning about cross-chain interoperability prophetic? Is the cross-chain vision dead? Kraken revives their Proof of Reserve – after 7 years Why do exchanges avoid Proof of Reserves? Bitcoin developers at the MIT DCI are building the Boston Fed's CBDC pilot program How whaling was the predecessor to venture capital Gamestop launches an NFT marketplace Content mentioned in this episode: MIT News, MIT experts test technical research for a hypothetical central bank digital currency Bloomberg, Biggest Texas Bitcoin Miner Shuts Down Ahead of Cold Blast Bloomberg Quicktake, This State is Becoming America's Crypto Capital Kraken, Proof of Reserves Sponsor notes: Fireblocks is an enterprise-grade platform delivering a secure infrastructure for moving, storing, and issuing digital assets. Learn more at fireblocks.com

In the first episode in our web3 music series, Cherie Hu, founder of Water & Music, sits down with Ria to talk about transitioning Water & Music into a research DAO and Cherie's thoughts on the growing interest of musicians in crypto. We discuss: How Cherie found a niche covering the intersection of music, technology, and now web3 The decision to formalize the Water & Music community into a research DAO harnessing the wisdom of the crowds The shortcomings of early experiments with music and crypto and how the recent approach differs The salient macro factors contributing to enthusiasm and experimentation with music NFTs, DAOs, and social tokens The pushback against music NFTs by skeptical fans and artists

Veteran Bitcoin commentator and inventor of Drivechains Paul Sztorc joins the show to talk Bitcoin's sustainability and the role of merged mined side chains. In this episode: Why Paul is the 'Steely Dan' of Bitcoin Revisiting 'Measuring decentralization' Revisiting Paul's argument on Proof of Stake being veiled PoW Why you should roll your own statistics Concentration of power in miners and mining pools Is PoW worthless if it isn't challenged? How Bitcoin energy FUD is based on neo-malthusianism The Julian Simon / Paul Ehrlich wager Why none of our resources are finite How climate change diplomacy is neo-colonial Why and when innovation happens Why Paul is a critic of Bitcoin development culture Paul's critique of Stock to Flow Why Bitcoin culture is static Why Bitcoin needs more satire Bitcoin fees are 80-100x less than those of Ethereum Why BTC fees are not sustainably high Why Bitcoin fees and security budget need to grow over time Can you just wait for more confirmations if security spend declines Are fees destined to be effectively 0 through the creation of more blockspace? The history of Drivechains /BIP300 Does merge mining make it more expensive to run a node? Do we know how to upgrade Bitcoin Core today? The relevance of sidechains and merge mining to Bitcoin today Was Satoshi into altcoins? Would more sidechain development have inhibited the growth of Ethereum? Does BIP300 solve the problem of the Bitcoin security budget? Why you can't reduce blockspace to increase security budget? Update on Drivechains Content mentioned in this episode: Truthcoin, Security Budget in the Long Run Truthcoin, Security Budget II, Low Fees, and Merged Mining Truthcoin, Measuring Decentralization Truthcoin, Nothing is Cheaper than Proof of Work All about Drivechains/ Bip300/301 Sponsor notes: Fireblocks is an enterprise-grade platform delivering a secure infrastructure for moving, storing, and issuing digital assets. Learn more at fireblocks.com

Matt and Nic return for deals and news of the week. In this episode: Fidelity's Wise Origin spot Bitcoin ETF is denied Putin walks back the central bank ban on mining NY isn't processing BitLicense applications Facebook is selling their IP being Diem/Libra to Silvergate Ripple buys out their Series C Investors Google's cloud division makes a blockchain push A DeFi protocol founder is revealed to be a former Quadriga executive Are anonymous developers the future? Ark comes out with their Big Ideas for 2022 Content mentioned: Ark's Big Ideas 2022 Bloomberg, Putin Backs Crypto Mining Despite Bank of Russia's Hard Line Sponsor notes: Fireblocks is an enterprise-grade platform delivering a secure infrastructure for moving, storing, and issuing digital assets. Learn more at fireblocks.com

Chris King, Founder & CEO of Eaglebrook Advisors, a digital assets SMA platform, join the show. In this episode, we discuss: Eaglebrook's Series A announcement Chris' path into the digital assets space and the origins of Eaglebrook Advisors Crypto penetration in the RIA and asset management space Inflection points in the market over the last couple years that have put a spotlight on solutions for RIAs and asset managers Key parts of the SMA solution that offer advantages for end clients Eaglebrook's new product launches in 2022 To learn more about Eaglebrook visit their website. Sponsor notes: Compass Mining is the world's first and largest online marketplace for bitcoin mining hardware, hosting, and ASIC reselling. Start mining your own bitcoin by visiting compassmining.io

Will Peck, the head of digital asset at WisdomTree joins the show. In this episode we discuss: Will's path to WisdomTree and how the firm began researching digital assets How WisdomTree is approaching exchange traded products in the public blockchain ecosystem Views on the Bitcoin futures ETF products vs. the proposed spot products Views on the various Bitcoin ETF proposals and the prospects of an SEC approval in 2022 Views on tokenization of investment products How 'legacy' asset management firms will face increased competition from digital asset early adopters To learn more about WisdomTree visit their website. Sponsor notes: Compass Mining is the world's first and largest online marketplace for bitcoin mining hardware, hosting, and ASIC reselling. Start mining your own bitcoin by visiting compassmining.io

Matt and Nic return for a busy week of deals and news. In this episode: We cover the witness selection for the House energy hearing on Bitcoin mining The SEC goes to war with its employee union The SEC rejects the Skybridge Bitcoin ETF proposal GBTC is trading at a 30% discount Walmart is building its own metaverse Twitter rolls out NFT avis Crypto dot com's ad copy We correct the record on Ari Juels' Congresional testimony on PoW Content mentioned in this episode: Ari Juels' congressional testimony The House Energy Committee's memo on Bitcoin mining The House Hearing 'Cleaning up Cryptocurrency' Sponsor notes: Fireblocks is an enterprise-grade platform delivering a secure infrastructure for moving, storing, and issuing digital assets. Learn more at fireblocks.com

In this latest installment of the mining miniseries, Iris Energy cofounder and co-CEO Daniel Roberts joins us to talk through their approach to mining. In this episode: How Dan came to work in mining Backgrounds of the Iris executive team Which thinkers influenced Dan in his Bitcoin journey Why Iris focuses on sustainable energy and on only entering energy markets where they will not drive prices up for households How Iris chooses geographies to operate How Iris found abundant underutilized power in British Columbia Why Iris' entry to British Columbia actually drives down energy prices for regular households Why Bitcoin mining has better location agnosticism than aluminum smelting or hydrogen production How Bitcoin miners are more flexible loads than other datacenters How Iris is geographically diversified in Canada, Texas, and Australia, and why geographic diversification is so important How flexibility from Bitcoin mining replaces peaker plants burning fossil fuels Why the oversupply of power is an issue for many power markets Are Western miners being sufficiently responsible in finding low carbon energy sources How Dan thinks about political risk at the state level Can the world accommodate Bitcoin's power consumption growth if the price goes up tenfold? What plateauing efficiency gains for ASICs means for Iris Why Iris doesn't see itself as a pseudo Bitcoin ETF and does not seek to hold Bitcoin on its balance sheet Sponsor notes: Compass Mining is the world's first and largest online marketplace for bitcoin mining hardware, hosting, and ASIC reselling. Start mining your own bitcoin by visiting compassmining.io