Unchained

Preston Van Loon, cofounder and Ethereum core developer at Prysmatic Labs, talks about the Merge, its impact on an environmental level, and why he is a plaintiff in the lawsuit against the Treasury Department over Tornado Cash. 

• what the Merge is on a technical level and what its impact will be 
• whether the proof of stake consensus mechanism makes the network more decentralized and secure
• what happens if the Merge fails and whether there’s a contingency plan
• why Preston founded Prysmatic Labs and how Prysm works
• what the next steps are for Ethereum and what the community is working on
• whether Preston thinks a proof of work Ethereum fork would succeed
• when and how Ethereum’s high fees and scaling issues are going to be resolved
• why Preston joined the lawsuit against the US Treasury over the Tornado Cash sanctions
• how Preston would celebrate a successful Ethereum Merge

1inch

Crypto.com

Messari

Twitter 

Previous Coverage of Unchained on the Merge:

• Arthur Hayes, Former Ethereum Skeptic, on Why the Merge Makes Him Bullish on ETH
• With the Merge, Will Ethereum Take Over Bitcoin’s Title as Digital Gold?
• Why Kevin Zhou Believes Ethereum Will Have 3 Forks After the Merge
• Post-Merge, If Lido Becomes Dominant, What Does That Mean for Ethereum?

Lawsuit against the US Treasury:

• Coinbase is supporting a lawsuit against the Treasury Department by six users of Tornado Cash.
• Fortune article on the lawsuit
• Why Preston joined the lawsuit.

The Merge:

• Ethereum Foundation Merge announcement.
• Ethereum carbon emission reductions.

ETH Post-Merge Dynamics:

• Cumberland on the Ethereum dynamics after the merge 
• Miles Suter on the implications of the Merge
• The triple point asset

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Arthur Hayes, cofounder of BitMex, discusses how he’s trading the Merge, the impact of macroeconomic policy in the markets, his career as a writer, and much more. 

• how crypto is reconfiguring how humans do finance over the internet
• why Arthur initially thought Ethereum was worthless 
• how NFTs allow users to trade human culture and will unlock trillions of dollars of value
• why Ethereum doesn’t even need to be deflationary
• whether other layer 1s can take some market cap from Ethereum
• why Arthur thinks that a successful Merge is understated and why this is a valid reason for hedging
• why he thinks an Ethereum proof of work chain won’t succeed and how Arthur will trade ETHPoW
• why LDO, Lido’s token, is a riskier bet but has more potential gains
• how he believes the Shanghai upgrade will impact ETH’s price
• whether the Merge affects BTC’s narrative as digital gold and whether the inflation hedge theory of Bitcoin still holds
• why Bitcoin is a measure of USD liquidity and why the Fed rates don’t matter as much as everyone thinks
• whether hedge funds and institutional investors would want to invest in crypto given the high correlation with traditional markets
• what Arthur believes the impact of a potential US recession would be on the crypto markets 
• why he believes the real economy is not relevant to the financial markets
• whether algorithmic stablecoins are doomed to fail
• how the credit cycle works and how it repeats again and again
• Arthur’s method for identifying good projects to invest in
• how Arthur became such a good writer
• whether BTC is money and the religious aspect of the Bitcoin culture

Crypto.com

Ava Labs

a16z

• Twitter
• Medium 

• With the Merge, Will Ethereum Take Over Bitcoin’s Title as Digital Gold?
• Why Kevin Zhou Believes Ethereum Will Have 3 Forks After the Merge
• Post-Merge, If Lido Becomes Dominant, What Does That Mean for Ethereum?

• Eth-Flexive
• Ether, a double digit shitcoin
• Teach me Daddy (on USD liquidity and Macroeconomics)

• Adam Cochran on the Fed’s QT
• Pantera Capital’s newsletter

• Whether Ethereum’s Merge is priced in
• Gauntlet’s view on the Merge
• BTC correlation with stocks

• Cumberland on the Ethereum dynamics after the merge 
• Miles Suter on the implications of the Merge
• The triple point asset

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Welcome to The Chopping Block! Crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi and Tom Schmidt chop it up about the latest news in the digital asset industry. In this episode, Jill Gunter, the empress of Espresso, also joined the conversation. 

Show topics:

• Whether product management is the new consulting
• What is going to happen with macroeconomics and whether monetary policy is data-driven
• Why Jill’s faith is getting renewed, especially after listening to Fed authorities
• The TL;DR on the Ava Labs conspiracy story
• Why the industry needs a decentralized RPC
• The role of Flashbots and Ethermine in censoring transactions 
• Potential over-compliance from the biggest crypto projects on how to deal with sanctioned addresses
• Whether social slashing allows Ethereum to stay uncensored
• The importance of educating regulators on crypto
• What Haseeb thinks lawyers would recommend to Coinbase about validating transactions from sanctioned addresses
• The significance of both transactional and application-layer privacy
• How stablecoin providers need to implement some basic levels of privacy
• Why corporations do not run Ethereum and whether users are pro-OFAC restrictions

Hosts

• Haseeb Qureshi, managing partner at Dragonfly Capital
• https://twitter.com/hosseeb
• Tom Schmidt, general partner at Dragonfly Capital
• https://twitter.com/tomhschmidt

Guest

Jill Gunter

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/jillrgunter

Episode Links

Tornado Cash

• Treasury Press release 
• Tornado Cash developer arrested 
• Circle freezes USDC in sanctioned wallets
• Crypto exchange dYdX blocked accounts that received funds from Tornado Cash
• What the sanctions mean for privacy coins
• Celebrities get dusted
• Previous coverage of the Tornado Cash Sanctions on Unchained:
• Is TRM Labs Blocking Addresses From DeFi Protocols? Ari Redbord Says No 
• Tornado Cash Sanctioned. Did the Government Overstep Its Bounds?
• The Chopping Block: Did OFAC Overstep by Sanctioning Tornado Cash?

Ava Labs Accusations:

• CoinDesk article 
• Crypto Leaks article

Social Slashing and Censorship on ETH

• Axios summary of the situation
• BitMex research on how the sanctions affect Ethereum
• Ethermine banning transactions
• Nic Carter’s article
• Eric Wall’s article on social slashing
• Hetzner banning Ethereum users
• Previous Coverage on Unchained
• Given the Sanctions on Tornado Cash, Is Ethereum Censorship Resistant?

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Miles Jennings, general counsel at a16z crypto, talks about its new “can’t be evil” NFT licenses and how they help to solve many problems within the NFT industry. Show highlights:

• what “can’t be evil” NFT licenses are and what problems they solve
• what can these licenses achieve for content creators
• which are the five rights that the licenses address
• whether the NFT licenses help resolve hate speech issues for creators
• why a16z described its licenses as “can’t be evil”
• how these licenses will be enforced
• how anyone buying NFTs should now be able to understand what they are buying
• why previous attempts to create standardized NFT license didn’t succeed
• why Miles thinks these new NFT licenses are going to succeed

1inch: https://1inch.io/

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021

Messari: https://mainnet.events/ 

Twitter: https://twitter.com/milesjennings

• a16z article: https://a16zcrypto.com/introducing-nft-licenses/
• Miles’ thread: https://twitter.com/milesjennings/status/1564991860824674305?s=20&t=pJEE9HfA9DnC_9PlsGelEw
• Wiki article: https://www.nftstandards.wtf/NFT/NFT+License

• What legal rights NFTs come with: https://unchainedpodcast.com/what-exactly-do-you-get-when-you-buy-an-nft-three-lawyers-discuss/
• Understanding intellectual property rights with NFTs: https://unchainedpodcast.com/excited-about-your-bored-ape-or-crypto-punk-make-sure-you-understand-your-ip-rights/
• Punk 6529 on how rights helped Bored Apes succeed: https://unchainedpodcast.com/punk6529-on-the-significance-of-bored-ape-yacht-club-and-cryptopunks/ 

• Galaxy Digital report on NFT owners being misled about rights: https://decrypt.co/107827/bored-apes-moonbirds-misled-buyers-nft-ip-rights-galaxy-digita 
• CryptoPunks gets IP rights: https://decrypt.co/107184/as-cryptopunks-nft-owners-get-commercial-rights-yuga-hopes-to-secure-their-legacy-as-artwork 
• Bored Apes’ more permissive license helps it become more valuable than Crypto Punks: https://www.thedefiant.io/bored-apes-yacht-club-cryptopunks-copyright-fight 
• Moonbirds controversy ignites after move to CC0 license: https://www.thedefiant.io/moonbirds-cc0-license-nfts

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Show highlights:

• the legal meaning of the OFAC sanctions on Tornado Cash and why it is causing complications
• how legislation is built for the fiat world, and how in DeFi and crypto there’s no clarity 
• how miners have changed their behavior prior to the Merge
• whether a proof of work chain or a proof of stake chain would be more censorship resistant
• whether laws apply to validators in a PoS chain
• the ways in which the government could provide more clarification 
• the different entities involved in Proof of Stake
• the liabilities for each entity in PoS and what secondary liability is
• how the task of the bidder can be described as a mathematical optimization problem
• whether Lido is exposed to US regulations
• how long would it take for a large staker like Coinbase to stop being a validator
• how a user-activated soft fork works and the conditions in which a fork could happen
• whether social slashing is enforceable considering it is not in the protocol
• the likelihood of Ethereum becoming a permissioned system
• the role of Flashbots’ relay code and what it means for Ethereum’s censorship resistance
• how DeFi’s exposure to US-based institutions can affect the likelihood of the chain complying with sanctions
• whether DAI is just wrapped USDC
• how MakerDAO is trying to be more independent of USDC
• why US-based companies will choose a conservative path, considering the lack of guidance
• the importance of educating the regulators 
• how cash and crypto are the only remaining private payment methods 

Thank you to our sponsors!

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021

Ava Labs: https://avax.network

a16z: https://link.chtbl.com/HObAJQDL?sid=unchained

Andrew

Twitter: https://twitter.com/propelforward

Martin

Twitter: https://twitter.com/koeppelmann

Previous Coverage of the Tornado Cash Sanctions on Unchained:

• Is TRM Labs Blocking Addresses From DeFi Protocols? Ari Redbord Says No: https://unchainedpodcast.com/is-trm-labs-blocking-addresses-from-defi-protocols-ari-redbord-says-no-ep-387/
• Tornado Cash Sanctioned. Did the Government Overstep Its Bounds?: https://unchainedpodcast.com/tornado-cash-sanctioned-did-the-government-overstep-its-bounds-ep-384/
• The Chopping Block: Did OFAC Overstep by Sanctioning Tornado Cash?: https://unchainedpodcast.com/the-chopping-block-did-ofac-overstep-by-sanctioning-tornado-cash-ep-386/

Social Slashing and Censorship on ETH

Axios summary of the situation: https://www.axios.com/2022/08/23/how-transactions-might-be-censored-after-ethereum-changes-next-month

BitMex research on how the sanctions affect Ethereum: https://blog.bitmex.com/ofac-sanctions-ethereum-pos-some-technical-nuances/

Ethermine banning transactions: https://twitter.com/takenstheorem/status/1560690035955011585?s=20&t=59hWdhr8_O-hYA8uYnZJ8w

Nic Carter’s article: https://www.coindesk.com/layer2/2022/08/25/if-ethereum-starts-slashing-it-burns/

Eric Wall’s article on social slashing: https://ercwl.medium.com/the-case-for-social-slashing-59277ff4d9c7

CoinDesk article: https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2022/08/23/as-censorship-on-ethereum-begins-could-this-open-sourced-code-help-counter-it/?outputType=amp

Hetzner banning Ethereum users: https://twitter.com/koeppelmann/status/1563146729314467840?s=20&t=ubFhCQqrQyHKfflgMHEmJw

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Travis Kling, Chief Investment Officer at Ikigai Asset Management, talks about how ETH changes after the Merge, what factors are going to affect its price action, and whether it can decouple from traditional assets. 

• how the supply and demand dynamics of ETH will change after the Merge
• why he believes the Merge is the most significant catalyst in crypto history
• what the risks are in terms of price action 
• whether there is an estimate of how much ETH will be locked up and how this lockup resembles Mt. Gox’s BTC
• the impact that being a deflationary asset will have on the price of ETH and whether it will actually become deflationary after the Merge
• how activity levels have been decreasing in the Ethereum network 
• whether ether is underpriced or overpriced, and how to evaluate it
• how institutional money is sitting on the sidelines at the moment after all the de-leveraging events that happened this year
• how the Merge affects BTC’s narrative and value-proposition
• how institutions have never been more interested in ether 
• what the futures market is saying about the price action of ether
• whether ETHPoW has any value and how to trade it
• how macroeconomics has been impacting the crypto markets and whether ETH can decouple from the macro setups

1inch: https://1inch.io/

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021

Messari: https://mainnet.events/ 

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Travis_Kling

• Ultra sound money dashboards: https://ultrasound.money/
• Dune dashboards on the Merge: https://twitter.com/DuneAnalytics/status/1562021273575751680?s=20&t=HELDvcJ6gI3Z5RmVsGHdiA
• Cumberland on the Ethereum dynamics after the Merge: https://res.cloudinary.com/drw/image/upload/v1661351279/comm-cumberland/uploads/The_Ethereum_Merge_-_Derivative_Market_Opportunities_Changes_to_SupplyDemand_Dynamics_1_zwearq.pdf
• Miles Suter on the implications of the Merge: https://twitter.com/milessuter/status/1560070819518234624?s=20&t=qjolzcydMY_nTU__vZNciQ
• Robert Leshner on the Ethereum Merge: https://twitter.com/rleshner/status/1559727104903757826?s=20&t=cKkI7b_Hj7dDe0DKmgP13g
• The triple point asset: https://newsletter.banklesshq.com/p/ether-a-new-model-for-money
• Previous coverage of Unchained:
  • Is ETH on Its Way to Becoming Ultra-Sound Money? Yes, Says Justin Drake: https://unchainedpodcast.com/is-eth-on-its-way-to-becoming-ultra-sound-money-yes-says-justin-drake/
  • Why Kevin Zhou Believes Ethereum Will Have 3 Forks After the Merge: https://unchainedpodcast.com/why-kevin-zhou-believes-ethereum-will-have-3-forks-after-the-merge-ep-381/
  • Why Ethereum’s Merge Was Delayed and Why It Won’t Reduce Gas Fees Much: https://unchainedpodcast.com/why-ethereums-merge-was-delayed-and-why-it-wont-reduce-gas-fees-much/

• Whether Ethereum’s Merge is priced in: https://www.coindesk.com/layer2/2022/08/22/is-ethereums-merge-priced-in/
• Arthur Hayes on the ETH trade: https://blog.bitmex.com/eth-flexive/
• ETH flips Bitcoin open interest: https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2022/08/01/ether-flips-bitcoin-in-options-market-for-the-first-time/
• “Max bidding” by Arthur Hayes: https://cryptohayes.medium.com/max-bidding-7a1c56c1cd07
• Gauntlet’s view on the Merge: https://medium.com/gauntlet-networks/gauntlets-view-on-the-merge-7c79e39e4b59
•  

• Arthur Hayes on USD liquidity conditions and how it affects assets:https://cryptohayes.medium.com/teach-me-daddy-33e7a66dfe76
• Adam Cochran on the Fed’s QT: https://twitter.com/adamscochran/status/1562077260819173378?s=20&t=Jh2DRYu-nr2mRg_4kJEFqA
• Pantera Capital’s newsletter: https://panteracapital.com/blockchain-letter/ethereum-tightening-more-than-fed/

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Stephane Gosselin, cofounder and chief architect of Flashbots, and Uri Klarman, CEO of bloXrouteLabs, joined Unchained to discuss everything about MEV, an especially important topic now with the Merge coming. 

Show highlights:

• what MEV is, how it works under Proof of Work
• some examples of MEV, like frontrunning and arbitrage
• how MEV is a rabbit hole full of monsters
• the role of Flashbots in the MEV industry and how Flashbots enabled a reduction of gas fees for users
• how MEV-geth functions and how it relates to auctions systems
• how bloXroute, Uri’s company, is working with MEV
• where Stephane and Uri disagree on MEV, despite agreeing on many fundamental things
• how MEV changes with the implementation of Proof of Stake
• what MEV-Boost is and the problems it solves
• what proposer-builder separation is and the motivation behind this idea
• whether DeFi would flourish more if there wasn’t frontrunning and why MEV-Boost doesn’t prevent it
• what externalities MEV-Boost or proposer-builder separation (PBS) would solve for users
• how MEV exists in other industries and in traditional finance
• why Flashbots’ own investors would rather trade on a fair-sequenced rollup than on Flashbots
• how the number of MEV extractors has been decreasing and whether this would end up centralizing MEV
• whether exploiting certain types of MEV is illegal
• how other chains are trying to solve frontrunning, like Osmosis with threshold encryption
• what are the levers that can be pulled to solve MEV, according to Uri
• how eradicating MEV can positively affect the price of ETH, and by how much
• whether validators can potentially share MEV profits with users
• how to determine if a network has a good MEV supply chain

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021

Ava Labs: https://www.avax.network/

a16z: https://link.chtbl.com/HObAJQDL?sid=unchained

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/uriklarman

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/thegostep

• The Debate Over Ethereum MEV: Should It Be Minimized or Boosted?: https://laurashin.bulletin.com/the-debate-over-ethereum-mev-should-it-be-minimized-or-boosted
• The Other Side(s) of Ethereum's MEV Argument: https://laurashin.bulletin.com/the-other-side-s-of-ethereum-s-mev-argument

• What is MEV: https://ethereum.org/en/developers/docs/mev/#:~:text=Maximal%20extractable%20value%20(MEV)%20refers,of%20transactions%20in%20a%20block
• Proposer-Builder separation: https://www.alchemy.com/overviews/proposer-builder-separation
• Uri’s blog post: https://medium.com/@uri_61495/flipping-the-table-on-the-mev-game-dc31df8baaf7
• MEV Profit sharing validators: https://www.recvc.com/mev-2-0-the-rise-of-mpsvs/
• Panel conversation mentioned in the episode (39:53): https://youtu.be/UKfBFV1TuEM?t=2393
• Sealed auction design: https://ethresear.ch/t/mev-sgx-a-sealed-bid-mev-auction-design/9677 
• Priority Gas Auction (PGA): https://www.mev.wiki/terms-and-concepts/priority-gas-auctions#:~:text=What%20is%20a%20priority%20gas,up%20fees%20for%20other%20users.
• Dune’s dashboard - amount of MEV extractors: https://dune.com/queries/1171509 
• The MEV Game of the Crypto Economy: Osmosis' Threshold Encryption vs. SGX of Flashbot?: https://mirror.xyz/infinet.eth/SFjR1H1-RMnKoIoPjqkxpauVPrLYGqLHQP1dY9FHvx4
• Bank of International Settlements report on MEV: https://www.bis.org/publ/bisbull58.pdf

• Flash Boys 2.0 paper: https://arxiv.org/pdf/1904.05234.pdf
• Flashbots Dashboard: https://dashboard.flashbots.net/
• Flashbots auctions: https://docs.flashbots.net/flashbots-auction/overview
• Flashbots relay open source: https://twitter.com/hasufl/status/1559908331145265156?s=20&t=gtHe5sVetxQXVKfZL2VMYg
• MEV Boost: https://www.alchemy.com/overviews/mev-boost
• MEV in ETH PoS: https://writings.flashbots.net/writings/mev-boost-call-for-testing

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Ari Redbord, Head of Legal and Government Affairs at TRM Labs, talks about the sanctions on Tornado Cash, and the role of blockchain analytics tools in crypto. 

Show highlights:

• Ari’s background as a federal prosecutor and his work for the US Treasury
• why regulators sanctioned Tornado Cash, according to Ari
• why the Ronin hack was important for regulators to start taking DeFi hacks more seriously
• the fact that for the first time the Treasury Department sanctioned software
• whether the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) messed up
• whether regulators understood the impact on regular users
• the role of TRM and blockchain analytics tools in mitigating risk
• how decentralized applications use tools like the ones provided by TRM to comply with regulations and to block addresses
• why, if Ari were a regulator, he would focus on regulation guidance
• whether the sanctions on Tornado Cash are unconstitutional
• what the future of privacy in crypto looks like and whether the government is going after privacy technologies

Thank you to our sponsors!

1inch: https://1inch.io/

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021

Ari

Twitter: https://twitter.com/ARedbord

Tornado Cash

• Treasury Press release: 
• https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy0916#:~:text=WASHINGTON%20%E2%80%93%20Today%2C%20the%20U.S.%20Department,since%20its%20creation%20in%202019
• Tornado Cash Sanctioned: https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2022/08/08/crypto-mixing-service-tornado-cash-blacklisted-by-us-treasury/
• Developer arrested: https://www.fiod.nl/arrest-of-suspected-developer-of-tornado-cash/
• TRM Labs blog post: 
• https://www.trmlabs.com/post/how-defi-platforms-are-using-data-from-trm-labs-to-respond-to-tornado-cash-sanctions
• Tornado Cash post on compliance: https://tornado-cash.medium.com/tornado-cash-compliance-9abbf254a370
• Coin Center’s article authored by Jerry Brito and Peter Van Valkenburgh: https://www.coincenter.org/u-s-treasury-sanction-of-privacy-tools-places-sweeping-restrictions-on-all-americans/
• Second Coin Center article authored by Jerry Brito and Peter Van Valkenburgh: https://www.coincenter.org/analysis-what-is-and-what-is-not-a-sanctionable-entity-in-the-tornado-cash-case/
• Coin Center may challenge the US Treasury's decision to sanction Tornado Cash: https://decrypt.co/107475/coin-center-tornado-cash-ban-court
• Circle freezes USDC in sanctioned wallets: https://www.theblock.co/post/162172/circle-freezes-usdc-funds-in-tornado-cashs-us-treasury-sanctioned-wallets 
• Crypto exchange dYdX blocked accounts that received funds from Tornado Cash: https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/08/11/crypto-exchange-dydx-blocked-accounts-that-received-even-small-amounts-from-tornado-cash/
• The possibility of forking Tornado Cash: https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2022/08/10/cloning-tornado-cash-would-be-easy-but-risky/
• What the sanctions mean for privacy coins: https://www.coindesk.com/layer2/2022/08/09/what-the-tornado-cash-sanction-means-for-privacy-coins/
• Tornado Cash laundered $1.5 billion, according to Elliptic: https://hub.elliptic.co/analysis/tornado-cash-mixer-sanctioned-after-laundering-over-1-5-billion/
• Celebrities get Dusted: https://decrypt.co/es/107090/tornado-cash-dusts-public-wallets-jimmy-fallon-brian-armstrong-steve-aoki-logan-paul
• Previous Coverage of Unchained:
• Tornado Cash Sanctioned. Did the Government Overstep Its Bounds?: https://unchainedpodcast.com/tornado-cash-sanctioned-did-the-government-overstep-its-bounds-ep-384/
• The Chopping Block: Did OFAC Overstep by Sanctioning Tornado Cash?: https://unchainedpodcast.com/the-chopping-block-did-ofac-overstep-by-sanctioning-tornado-cash-ep-386/

 ** For more episode links and details visit the Unchained website **

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Welcome to The Chopping Block! Crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, and Tarun Chitra chop it up about the latest news in the digital asset industry. In this episode, Laura Shin, host of Unchained and author of The Cryptopians, also joined the conversation. 

Show topics:

• What Tornado Cash is and why it got sanctioned by the OFAC
• The difference between Tornado Cash and blender.io 
• Whether privacy is dead as a category and whether regulators are going after it
• How these sanctions have a negative impact on the funding of privacy projects
• How people within the industry can have different points of view, even when they understand the technology
• Whether the ban of Tornado Cash only means that malicious groups will just go and use other protocols
• Why regulation by enforcement sucks
• The asymmetry between the government’s sanction and the effort needed to push it back.
• What changes after the Merge for ETH in terms of centralization
• Whether some MEV solutions make Ethereum more centralized
• Why MEV is intrinsic to blockchains and whether it is impossible to get rid of it
• Why Proposer-Builder Separation is helpful for the network
• Whether MEV is illegal and the plausibility of major exchanges not extracting MEV
• Why Facebook has an MEV extraction business model, according to Tarun
• How some NFT exchanges are not enforcing royalties
• What Sudoswap is and how it works
• How the royalties were there to bootstrap the supply side of NFTs
• Why Tarun thinks music NFTs will never happen
• The economic reasoning around royalties
• The differences between NFT marketplaces like OpenSea and Magic Eden
• Whether NFTs have a real-world use
• How Dragonfly’s acquisition of Metastable brought Laura some old memories

Hosts

• Haseeb Qureshi, managing partner at Dragonfly Capital
• https://twitter.com/hosseeb
• Tom Schmidt, general partner at Dragonfly Capital
• https://twitter.com/tomhschmidt
• Tarun Chitra, managing partner at Robot Ventures
• https://twitter.com/tarunchitra 

Laura

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/laurashin

Episode Links

Tornado Cash

Treasury Press release: 

https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy0916#:~:text=WASHINGTON%20%E2%80%93%20Today%2C%20the%20U.S.%20Department,since%20its%20creation%20in%202019

Developer arrested: https://www.fiod.nl/arrest-of-suspected-developer-of-tornado-cash/

Coin Center’s article authored by Jerry Brito and Peter Van Valkenburgh: https://www.coincenter.org/u-s-treasury-sanction-of-privacy-tools-places-sweeping-restrictions-on-all-americans/

Second Coin Center’s article authored by Jerry Brito and Peter Van Valkenburgh: https://www.coincenter.org/analysis-what-is-and-what-is-not-a-sanctionable-entity-in-the-tornado-cash-case/

Coin Center may challenge the US Treasury's decision to sanction Tornado Cash: https://decrypt.co/107475/coin-center-tornado-cash-ban-court

Circle freezes USDC in sanctioned wallets: https://www.theblock.co/post/162172/circle-freezes-usdc-funds-in-tornado-cashs-us-treasury-sanctioned-wallets 

Crypto exchange dYdX blocked accounts that received funds from Tornado Cash: https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/08/11/crypto-exchange-dydx-blocked-accounts-that-received-even-small-amounts-from-tornado-cash/

The possibility of forking Tornado Cash: https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2022/08/10/cloning-tornado-cash-would-be-easy-but-risky/

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Surojit Chatterjee, chief product officer at Coinbase, comes to talk about what products Coinbase is building, how it can thrive in such a competitive landscape, how to onboard billions of users into crypto, and much more. 

Show highlights:

• how Surojit got into crypto and ended up at Coinbase
• what sets Coinbase apart from the competition
• how to bring billions of customers to crypto 
• Surojit’s mental model of a bridge between the fiat world and the crypto world
• how Coinbase is integrating its main app with Web3
• whether crypto can become a utility rather than an investment asset
• how Coinbase is building a product in such a way that it attracts even “crypto-native” people
• what happened with Coinbase NFT Marketplace’s failure and whether the company will keep investing in NFTs
• whether Coinbase has lost crypto-embedded people among its employees
• how the partnership with BlackRock indicates how far crypto has come
• the amount of money that institutions could potentially pour into crypto
• how Coinbase will prevent itself from having the largest percentage of staked ETH
• how the company is monetizing the Coinbase wallet and what would happen to revenue if the trading volume were to move from the exchange to Coinbase wallet swaps
• why Coinbase is suffering a decline in trading volume
• whether Coinbase can compete with newer exchanges like FTX and Binance and why Surojit still thinks Coinbase will win
• why it is important to keep investing and building through this crypto winter
• Surojit’s take on the frontrunning of coins about to be listed on the platform
• why the Howey test (which determines whether something is a security) is outdated
• how Coinbase understands securities, and whether the firm thinks the tokens listed on the platform are securities
• how can Coinbase compete with decentralized exchanges like Uniswap
• why Surojit is worried about regulatory clarity and stablecoins
• how hacks and security give the crypto industry a bad reputation
• what Surojit’s dreams are for the industry

Thank you to our sponsors!

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021

Ava Labs: https://www.avax.network/

Show Links

Surojit: 

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/surojit

Coinbase Q2 2022 Earnings:

• Shareholder letter: https://s27.q4cdn.com/397450999/files/doc_financials/2022/q2/v2/Q2-2022-Shareholder-Letter.pdf
• Summary: https://twitter.com/fintechintern/status/1557130836574539776?s=20&t=R-oDUTEaev-F8bPonC2q5Q
• Earnings call: https://s27.q4cdn.com/397450999/files/doc_financials/2022/q2/Coinbase-Q2%2722-Earnings-Call-Transcript.pdf

NFT Marketplace:

• Coinbase NFT launch: https://decrypt.co/99561/coinbase-nft-marketplace-150-users-first-day-public
• NFT Market data: https://dune.com/Marcov/0x-NFT-Market
• Gamestop NFT stats: https://dune.com/dataisking420/gamestopnft-stats
• Gamestop’s performance against Coinbase: https://decrypt.co/105069/gamestop-ethereum-nft-sales-dwarf-coinbase-nft

Partnerships

• BlackRock: 
• https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/03/24/blackrocks-fink-says-ukraine-war-could-accelerate-crypto-adoption-report/
• https://blog.coinbase.com/coinbase-selected-by-blackrock-provide-aladdin-clients-access-to-crypto-trading-and-custody-via-b9e7144f313d
• https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2021/07/14/blackrock-ceo-larry-fink-seeing-very-little-demand-for-crypto-lately/
• Integration with META: https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/08/04/meta-confirms-nft-rollout-across-100-countries-amid-coinbase-integration/

** For more episode links and details visit the Unchained website **

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Jerry Brito, executive director of Coin Center, talks about Tornado Cash, why it was sanctioned, and what this means for privacy in crypto. 

• what Blender.io is and how it relates to Tornado Cash
• how hackers have used Tornado Cash to launder money
• whether the Office of Foreign Assets Control made a mistake, according to Jerry
• how Americans were affected by the sanctions
• why Jerry believes OFAC should have done an analysis to estimate how many people would be impacted by its decision
• whether the sanctions should have been aimed at North Koren wallets and not the protocol
• whether the sanctions are unconstitutional and whether Coin Center will litigate this
• how Jerry believes Circle freezing USDC complicated everything
• what the famous people who received 0.1 ETH from random accounts via Tornado Cash should do 
• what would happen if someone forked the Tornado Cash code and deployed a copycat smart contract to a new address
• whether the sanctions signal the beginning of a privacy war on crypto
• how regulators are applying the same traditional rules with crypto as they use with centralized entities

1inch: https://1inch.io/

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021

Twitter: https://twitter.com/jerrybrito

Tornado Cash Sanctioned: https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2022/08/08/crypto-mixing-service-tornado-cash-blacklisted-by-us-treasury/

Coin Center’s article authored by Jerry Brito and Peter Van Valkenburgh: https://www.coincenter.org/u-s-treasury-sanction-of-privacy-tools-places-sweeping-restrictions-on-all-americans/

Circle freezes USDC in sanctioned wallets: https://www.theblock.co/post/162172/circle-freezes-usdc-funds-in-tornado-cashs-us-treasury-sanctioned-wallets 

Crypto exchange dYdX blocked accounts that received funds from Tornado Cash: https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/08/11/crypto-exchange-dydx-blocked-accounts-that-received-even-small-amounts-from-tornado-cash/

The possibility of forking Tornado Cash: https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2022/08/10/cloning-tornado-cash-would-be-easy-but-risky/

What the sanctions mean for privacy coins: https://www.coindesk.com/layer2/2022/08/09/what-the-tornado-cash-sanction-means-for-privacy-coins/

Tornado Cash laundered $1.5 billion, according to Elliptic: https://hub.elliptic.co/analysis/tornado-cash-mixer-sanctioned-after-laundering-over-1-5-billion/

Celebrities get Dusted: https://decrypt.co/es/107090/tornado-cash-dusts-public-wallets-jimmy-fallon-brian-armstrong-steve-aoki-logan-paul

Hacks linked to Tornado Cash

Ronin: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/15/ronin-hack-north-korea-linked-to-615-million-crypto-heist-us-says.html

Harmony: https://decrypt.co/104138/north-korean-attackers-behind-100m-harmony-hack-report

Crypto.com: https://www.wired.com/story/crypto-hack-nso-group-security-news/

Nomad: https://decrypt.co/106459/crypto-bridge-nomad-exploited-190m-frenzied-free-for-all

Previous Coverage of Unchained: Will the Nomad Mass Looting Change How Law Enforcement Treats DeFi Hacks?: https://unchainedpodcast.com/will-the-nomad-mass-looting-change-how-law-enforcement-treats-defi-hacks-ep-382/

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Welcome to The Chopping Block! Crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, and Robert Leshner chop it up about the latest news in the digital asset industry. In this episode, Hasu, the gourmand of governance and Rune Christensen, chief mischief maker at MKR, discuss how to manage a DAO, their respective visions for MakerDAO, and much more. 

Show topics:

• What MakerDAO is, how DAI works and whether it is the “central bank” of DeFi
• How the visions for MakerDAO of Hasu and Rune differ
• Whether Maker should only hold highly liquid collateral assets
• Hasu’s mental model of DAI as eurodollars
• The role of real-world assets in backing DAI
• What the purpose of a DAO is and how it differs from a legal entity
• Whether people behave in their purest form within a DAO
• How DAI can create positive externalities and make a better world
• How crypto holders are not only in it for the money but also for the philosophy 
• What the “decentralized stablecoin trilemma” is
• Whether there’s a need for dollar-denominated collateral for DAI to work
• What “clean money” is according to Rune
• Why Rune thinks having a single council is not viable due to the political risks and whether the solution is to have multiple councils
• How to keep the principal-agent problem in check, according to Hasu
• Why Hasu believes council members wouldn’t pursue their own interests and go against the benefit of MKR token holders
• Whether a council would be corruptible and the dangers that it entails
• What kind of interests should be represented in the council
• Whether Maker can create more synthetic assets
• The iron law bureaucracy and how it relates to governance
• How to design the DAO to be steered in alignment with the token holders
• Whether ossification is a feature to be pursued, and where innovation happens
• How complexity is very expensive for an organization

Hosts

• Haseeb Qureshi, managing partner at Dragonfly Capital
• https://twitter.com/hosseeb
• Tom Schmidt, general partner at Dragonfly Capital
• https://twitter.com/tomhschmidt
• Robert Leshner, founder of Compound 
• https://twitter.com/rleshner 

Hasu

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/hasufl

Rune Christensen

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/RuneKek

Episode Links

MakerDAO

• Hasu’s governance proposal: https://vote.makerdao.com/address/0xafaff1a605c373b43727136c995d21a7fcd08989#delegate-credentials
• Rune’s proposal - the endgame: https://forum.makerdao.com/t/the-endgame-plan-parts-1-2/15456
• Proposal to add a lending oversight core unit: https://forum.makerdao.com/t/mip39c2-sp33-adding-lending-oversight-core-unit-love-001/15098
• Previous Coverage of Unchained: 
• Rune Christensen of MakerDAO Part 1: How to Keep a Crypto-Collateralized Stablecoin Afloat: https://unchainedpodcast.com/rune-christensen-of-makerdao-part-1-how-to-keep-a-crypto-collateralized-stablecoin-afloat/
• Rune Christensen of MakerDAO Part 2: How Dai Stayed at $1 While ETH Crashed From $1,400 to $85: https://unchainedpodcast.com/rune-christensen-of-makerdao-part-2-how-dai-stayed-at-1-while-eth-crashed-from-1400-to-85/
• The Rise of MakerDAO: A Personal Journey:  https://unchainedpodcast.com/the-rise-of-makerdao-a-personal-journey/

Real World Assets:

• Huntingdon Valley Bank (“HVB”) proposal: https://forum.makerdao.com/t/huntingdon-valley-bank-hvb-rwa-collateral-onboarding-risk-assessment/15828
• $500 million allocation proposal: https://forum.makerdao.com/t/signal-request-asset-allocation-of-mip65-clydesdale/15922

The stablecoin trilemma: https://fluid.ch/stablecoin-trilemma/#:~:text=A%20deeper%20dive%20into%20the,decide%20on%20the%20stablecoin%20supply.

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Layne Haber, Co-founder of Connext Network, discusses the Nomad bridge hack, how it happened, and what can be done to prevent these exploits. 

• what Nomad is and how it works
• how the hack occurred and what the vulnerability was
• how much TVL the protocol had and how much of it was drained
• why the Nomad hack was unique
• how this exploit resembled the DAO hack on Ethereum
• the bounty program that Nomad offered and how hackers responded to it
• how Nomad is working with law enforcement, and the reasons why law enforcement has decided to get involved
• how Nomad has partnered with TRM Labs to help with tracking the hackers
• whether privacy developments in the crypto ecosystem will make it harder for law enforcement to track down hackers
• why cross-chain hacks happen so often
• what Layne thinks can be done to improve bridge security
• what mechanism can be implemented to prevent errors that enable these types of mass looting
• what Layne expects to see in the next few weeks around the Nomad exploit

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021

Ava Labs: https://www.avax.network/

Oasis: https://oasisl.ink/3Bo612R

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/LayneHaber

• https://www.theblock.co/post/160731/nomad-cross-chain-crypto-bridge-suffers-possible-exploit
• Sam Sun explaining the hack: https://twitter.com/samczsun/status/1554252024723546112?s=20&t=SHIZQRqJ00mmuZVXFKXuZg
• Nomad’s bounty program: https://twitter.com/nomadxyz_/status/1555293965049630722?s=20&t=RxH5UuWbBXiRLqu5gHDNyg
• Pranay Mohan’s thread: https://twitter.com/pranaymohan/status/1556402131325915137?s=20&t=RxH5UuWbBXiRLqu5gHDNyg
• $36 million recovered: https://twitter.com/nomadxyz_/status/1556681397993058304?s=20&t=makkX3SX1ezAXQSd6fdZYA 

• Chainalysis article: https://blog.chainalysis.com/reports/cross-chain-bridge-hacks-2022/
• Adam Cochran on crypto bridges: https://twitter.com/adamscochran/status/1554473323073093634?s=20&t=8YFw6sPEGfjvh12q8w7p-Q
• Vitalik’s take on cross-chain applications: https://old.reddit.com/r/ethereum/comments/rwojtk/ama_we_are_the_efs_research_team_pt_7_07_january/hrngyk8/
• Previous Unchained coverage:
• • The Chopping Block: How to Improve DeFi and Cross-Chain Bridge Security: https://unchainedpodcast.com/bridge-hacks-have-caused-1-billion-in-losses-heres-why-bridge-security-is-tricky/
  • Bridge Hacks Have Caused ~$1 Billion in Losses. Here’s Why Bridge Security Is Tricky: https://unchainedpodcast.com/bridge-hacks-have-caused-1-billion-in-losses-heres-why-bridge-security-is-tricky/

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Kevin Zhou, co-founder of Galois Capital, comes to talk about the possibility of a Proof of Work chain on Ethereum after the Merge, the LUNA death spiral, how he plans to play the Merge, and much more... 

• how Kevin got started in crypto 
• what Galois Capital is and what its investment thesis is
• why Kevin was more vocal than most about the possibility of the LUNA death spiral
• whether Kevin made money out of the Terra collapse and what was his strategy
• what the difficulty bomb in Ethereum is
• the potential scenarios that could arise after the Merge
• whether the public is not considering the risks of the Merge
• how the fact that everybody was telling the same narrative about ETH made Kevin suspicious
• how Chandler’s statement about forking Ethereum made it a lot more likely that it would happen
• the groups behind the encouragement of a proof-of-work Ethereum chain
• whether there is a value proposition for a Proof of Work chain
• how Kevin used The Cryptopians to remember how the DAO fork went
• what replay protection is and why it is important when forking a chain
• why anyone would want to keep the difficulty bomb in a potential proof of work chain
• Kevin’s predictions about the market cap of the potential Ethereum forks
• how a proof of work chain of Ethereum would function without the biggest stablecoins like USDT and USDC
• whether Tether is going to support Ethereum 2
• why Kevin writes using metaphors related to history and gaming and how those analogies relate to Ethereum
• how Kevin wanted to “stick it” to the Ethereum Foundation by offering his services
• whether Vitalik trolled Kevin on Twitter
• whether Kevin will apply the same strategy he used with ETC after the DAO fork

1inch:  https://1inch.io/

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Galois_Capital

What is the Merge?: https://ethereum.org/en/upgrades/merge/

Kevin’s analogy: https://twitter.com/Galois_Capital/status/1554053321165512705?s=20

Haseeb’s answer to Kevin’s arguments: https://twitter.com/hosseeb/status/1554163977806000128?s=20

Chandler Guo’s proposal: https://decrypt.co/106409/prominent-chinese-ethereum-miner-wants-to-resist-merge-create-fork

Kevin’s consulting offer: https://twitter.com/Galois_Capital/status/1553090706708856832?s=20

BitMEX researchers on the possibility of an Ethereum PoW chain: https://blog.bitmex.com/ethpow-vs-eth2/

CoinDesk article: https://www.coindesk.com/layer2/2022/08/03/who-will-mine-ethereum-after-its-gone/

Poloniex’s announcement: https://twitter.com/poloniex/status/1555085757450272768?s=21&t=jkjNGieNXdY5SgT2e9xhoQ

Justin Sun’s support of ETHW: https://twitter.com/justinsuntron/status/1555112296006922240?s=21&t=jkjNGieNXdY5SgT2e9xhoQ

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Lyn Alden, founder of Lyn Alden Investment Strategy, and Mauricio di Bartolomeo, cofounder of Ledn, discuss how inflation could affect the digital asset industry. Show highlights:

• how Mauricio’s upbringing in Venezuela and firsthand experience with inflation led him to Bitcoin
• what a “long-term debt cycle” is and why Lyn thinks the 2020s could be similar to the 1930s and 1940s
• the difference between inflation and hyperinflation
• how inflation changes consumer investing and purchasing decisions
• what the impact of inflation is on Bitcoin
• how Russia’s war on Ukraine will continue to impact inflation
• how rising interest rates will affect Bitcoin and stablecoin adoption 
• what type of economic environment is worst for BTC growth
• whether Bitcoin is an inflation hedge
• why Lyn is long-term bullish on stablecoins and Bitcoin
• what effect a global recession would have on Bitcoin
• how global inflation has changed adoption rates for BTC in developing economies
• how Venezuelans use and perceive Bitcoin 
• why Lyn and Mauricio are excited about Lightning Network in developing countries
• what Lyn and Mauricio think about El Salvador’s adoption of BTC and its billion dollar BTC bond
• how Ledn, as a lending company, was able to navigate the Celsius/Voyager crash
• how Lyn analyzes the risks associated with firms like BlockFi
• what lessons Lyn and Mauricio have learned in 2022 about digital assets and the economy

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021 

Ava Labs: https://www.avax.network/ 

Oasis: https://oasisprotocol.org/grant-programs?utm_source=unchained&utm_medium=partnership&utm_campaign=podcast-oasis-grants-program 

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/LynAldenContact 
• Website: https://www.lynalden.com/
• Previous Unchained episodes:
• • Is Ethereum a Good Investment: https://unchainedpodcast.com/lyn-alden-and-raoul-pal-is-ethereum-a-good-investment/
  • Why Bitcoin Now: https://unchainedpodcast.com/why-bitcoin-now-meltem-demirors-and-lyn-alden-on-the-perfect-conditions-for-bitcoin/ 

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/cryptonomista
• LInkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mauricio-di-bartolomeo-780284101

• https://www.lynalden.com/ecb-trapped/
• https://www.lynalden.com/investing-during-stagflation/
• https://www.lynalden.com/may-2022-newsletter/
• https://www.lynalden.com/the-area-under-the-curve/
• https://www.lynalden.com/blockfi/

• https://ledn.io/ 
• https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/07/01/blockfi-approached-with-ledn-led-funding-offer-amid-ftx-acquisition-talks-report/ 

• https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/02/opinion/bitcoin-el-salvador-bukele-crypto.html?searchResultPosition=1
• https://unchainedpodcast.com/bitcoin-in-el-salvador-why-would-cypherpunks-support-government-mandated-bitcoin-adoption-ep-375/

• https://twitter.com/nic__carter/status/1538909209022058498
• https://www.reuters.com/business/imf-cuts-global-growth-forecasts-warns-high-inflation-threatens-recession-2022-07-26/
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGCxEMgnMco&list=PL9flMWibV82fmwt5vd0YROikG2msYYphX

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Welcome to The Chopping Block! Crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, and Tarun Chitra chop it up about the latest news in the digital asset industry. In this episode, Balaji Srinivasan discusses his latest book, “The Network State, how different digital tools like crypto will help empower network states, and analyzes how crypto fits into the current political environment. 

• why Balaji wrote a book and why he is so enthralled with a digitized future
• what a “network state” is, and what components of crypto are embedded into the idea
• why Balaji is interested in “re-centralization”
• why Balaji believes that networks states need to be recognized by real nations
• what makes a network state better than a physical nation or digital community
• why Balaji thinks a community of people who eat a keto diet could be the first network state
• why Balaji thinks the network states will be a good thing
• where Bitcoin maximalism fits into the left vs. right political divide, woke culture, and Christianity
• what the overlap between politics and crypto will be going forward
• what is the best way to learn, read, and debate “The Network State”
• where crypto tools and communities have gone wrong so far and how the industry can improve going forward
• what lessons Balaji learned from the tech bubble in the early 2000s
• what Balaji’s over-under is for when the first network state will arrive
• Balaji’s pitch for a 50:50 BTC/ETH portfolio (note: not investment advice)

• Haseeb Qureshi, managing partner at Dragonfly Capital
• • https://twitter.com/hosseeb
• Tom Schmidt, general partner at Dragonfly Capital
• • https://twitter.com/tomhschmidt
• Tarun Chitra, managing partner at Robot Ventures
• • https://twitter.com/tarunchitra 
• Robert Leshner, founder of Compound 
• • https://twitter.com/rleshner 

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/balajis 

The Network State

• ​​https://thenetworkstate.com/ 

Technological Revolutions and Financial Capital

• https://www.amazon.com/Technological-Revolutions-Financial-Capital-Dynamics/dp/1843763311 

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Marisa Tashman, policy counsel at Blockchain Association, analyzes the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) decision to name nine tokens as securities and investigate whether Coinbase lists securities. Show highlights: 

• why the SEC named tokens as securities in an insider trading case where no exchanges or token teams are listed as defendants 
• what happens if the Coinbase insider trading case is settled or goes to court
• why the SEC’s actions should be considered “regulation by enforcement” 
• whether there is any process to force the SEC to reveal its reasoning for calling a token a security
• why Marisa thinks the SEC is actively harming US investors with its crypto policy
• how Coinbase is handling the SEC’s investigation
• what Marisa thinks of Coinbase’s listing process
• why the Cynthia Lummis-led crypto regulatory framework is a good start
• what Marisa believes will happen in the crypto regulatory landscape in the near future

1inch: https://1inch.io/

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021 

• https://twitter.com/mtash

• https://theblockchainassociation.org/ 

• SEC investigation into listing unregistered tokens: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-07-26/coinbase-faces-sec-investigation-over-cryptocurrency-listings
• SEC insider trading case: https://www.sec.gov/news/press-release/2022-127
• Coinbase does not list securities blog post: https://blog.coinbase.com/coinbase-does-not-list-securities-end-of-story-e58dc873be79 
• Coinbase petition: https://www.sec.gov/rules/petitions/2022/petn4-789.pdf 

• CFTC Commissioner: ​​https://twitter.com/CarolineDPham/status/1550159347984044033
• Lindsay Lin: https://twitter.com/lindsayxlin/status/1552320370019106822?s=21&t=4OaAjw3r8NlH23ppWiVK1w 
• Jake Chervinsky: https://twitter.com/jchervinsky/status/1550515627961589762?s=20&t=gGwDPAJzZXSu6Gwc9agDOg 
• Hester Peirce: https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2022/05/03/hester-peirce-pushes-back-against-secs-plans-to-nearly-double-crypto-enforcement-staff/ 
• Matt Levine: https://twitter.com/matt_levine/status/1550202036570017792?s=20&t=e1g8U-V4K_ixd1vJoRc9gA 
• Chair Gary Gensler wanting crypto exchanges to register as securities exchanges: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-07-28/sec-chair-gensler-hardens-line-on-crypto-exchange-registration?sref=m9L277rN
• https://twitter.com/garygensler/status/1552700562533236739?s=21&t=mNENJd2qeQYkeFFdZqWUPA

• https://www.gillibrand.senate.gov/news/press/release/-lummis-gillibrand-introduce-landmark-legislation-to-create-regulatory-framework-for-digital-assets 

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Two crypto law experts, WassieLawyer and Adam Levitin, analyze the bankruptcies of 3AC, Celsius, and Voyager. Show highlights:

• the difference between Voyager and Celsius “custody” and “earn” deposits
• why Celsius commingling customer custody and earn deposits could make it harder for creditors to get their money back
• what similarities and differences the Voyager and Celsius bankruptcies have
• how Chapter 11 bankruptcy works
• why Wassie and Adam believe Celsius might have engaged in shady business practices, whereas they believe Voyager was just an irresponsible lender
• what the latest is on the 3AC bankruptcy and the location of Kyle Davies and Zhu Su
• what Celsius and Voyager can clawback from 3AC
• how Alameda fits into the Voyager bankruptcy case
• whether creditors will receive funds back in crypto or dollars
• the three types of ways creditors can “claw back” funds in a bankruptcy case
• why Wassielawyer and Adam believe Celsius’ Chapter 11 plan to restructure around mining is so weird
• whether the founders from 3AC, Celsius, or Voyager will see jail time

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021 

Ava Labs: https://www.avax.network/ 

Oasis: https://oasisprotocol.org/grant-programs?utm_source=unchained&utm_medium=partnership&utm_campaign=podcast-oasis-grants-program 

• https://twitter.com/AdamLevitin 

Adam Levitin 3AC/Celsius/Voyager Content

• https://twitter.com/AdamLevitin/status/1549935271323607040

• https://www.thedeal.com/restructuring/oped-looming-legal-issues-in-cryptocurrency-bankruptcies/  
• https://www.thedeal.com/restructuring/oped-crypto-winter-arrives/  
• https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4107019 
• https://twitter.com/AdamLevitin/status/1549142827774447619  
• https://twitter.com/AdamLevitin/status/1548727063930077188  
• https://twitter.com/AdamLevitin/status/1547945325125480451  
• https://twitter.com/AdamLevitin/status/1547699788279193600  
• https://twitter.com/AdamLevitin/status/1547584853180162049 
• https://twitter.com/AdamLevitin/status/1547389680198508546  

WassieLawyer

• https://twitter.com/wassielawyer 

WassieLawyer 3AC/Celsius/Voyager Content

• https://twitter.com/wassielawyer/status/1543238225338454016 
• https://twitter.com/wassielawyer/status/1538167831946473472
• https://twitter.com/wassielawyer/status/1545827666590601216
• https://twitter.com/wassielawyer/status/1536192639112183808

Celsius Content

• https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2022/07/19/celsius-lays-out-mining-focused-reorganization-plan-at-first-bankruptcy-hearing/
• https://twitter.com/BradyDale/status/1549415579399979008 
• https://www.cnbc.com/2022/07/19/former-employees-say-issues-plagued-crypto-company-celsius-years-before-bankruptcy.html
• https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/07/18/celsius-outlines-next-steps-as-bankruptcy-proceedings-begin/ 
• https://twitter.com/wassielawyer/status/1548947257961086976
• https://www.reuters.com/technology/crypto-lender-celsius-files-bankruptcy-2022-07-14/ 
• https://blog.celsius.network/a-memo-to-the-celsius-community-59532a06ecc6 
• https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2022/07/13/wobble-in-steth-price-shows-fear-celsius-might-dump-435m-stake/ 
• https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2022/07/11/celsius-reclaims-172m-collateral-from-aave-compound/
• https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2022/07/13/celsius-pays-off-last-defi-loan-reclaims-nearly-200m-of-wrapped-bitcoin-from-compound/ 

Voyager Content

• https://unchainedpodcast.com/voyager-digital-files-for-chapter-11-bankruptcy/ 
• https://www.reuters.com/technology/crypto-lender-voyager-files-bankruptcy-2022-07-06/ 
• https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/06/22/voyager-digital-requests-loan-repayment-from-3ac-considers-issuing-default-notice/ 

3AC

• https://unchainedpodcast.com/3ac-files-for-chapter-15-bankruptcy/ 
• https://www.theblock.co/post/157141/bankruptcy-court-judge-gives-green-light-to-serve-subpoenas-to-3ac-founders-for-discovery
• https://unchainedpodcast.com/why-possible-insolvencies-by-celsius-and-3ac-could-spell-disaster-for-crypto/ 
• https://unchainedpodcast.com/the-chopping-block-heres-what-was-so-bad-about-three-arrows-capital-ep-368/ 
• https://unchainedpodcast.com/does-venture-capital-investment-violate-the-ethos-of-crypto-sequoia-says-no-ep-367/ 
• https://unchainedpodcast.com/three-crypto-bankruptcies-3ac-celsius-and-voyager-what-happens-now-ep-374/ 

Other

• Kirkland and Ellis are running both bankruptcies
• • https://twitter.com/kadhim/status/1549864279536553984 
  • https://twitter.com/tier10k/status/1550133741158219776 (made $1m/week)
• What is happening to assets in bankruptcy cases
• • https://twitter.com/OGLawPanda/status/1549357959746043909 
• No exposure for Coinbase
• • https://finance.yahoo.com/news/coinbase-celsius-voyger-three-arrows-exposure-142730485.html 
• KeyFi lawsuit
• • https://fortune.com/2022/07/08/crypto-lender-celsius-ponzi-scheme-used-customer-funds-manipulate-token-prices-jason-stone-says-lawsuit/
• 3AC founders break silence
• • https://cryptobriefing.com/the-whole-situation-is-regrettable-3ac-breaks-silence-to-bloomberg/ 

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Adam Cochran, partner at Cinneamhain Ventures, discusses the impact of 3AC’s impending liquidation. Show topics:

• why 3AC founders (and family members) are listing themselves as creditors
• what the “corporate veil” is and why it matters regarding 3AC
• where retail investors stand in the pecking order of creditors 
• why Adam doesn’t believe we know the full story about 3AC’s downfall, despite liquidators leaking a 1,000-page report about it
• what creditors might do with 3AC’s yacht
• why Adam is less worried about the health of GBTC in light of recent 3AC filings
• what effect 3AC’s fall will have on Genesis and Digital Currency Group
• why creditors might prefer liquidations to be paid out in equity compared to cash in this environment 
• how 3AC’s liquidation is impacting retail investors at Voyager and Celsius
• why there could be a crypto credit crunch coming soon

1inch: https://1inch.io/

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021 

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/adamscochran 

• Adam Cochran Twitter thread on 3AC liquidation: 
• • https://twitter.com/adamscochran/status/1543253799929876480
• Adam Cochran Twitter thread on 3AC contagion:
• • https://twitter.com/adamscochran/status/1546477191420170240
• 3AC founders subpoenaed
• • https://www.theblock.co/post/157141/bankruptcy-court-judge-gives-green-light-to-serve-subpoenas-to-3ac-fouSubpoenaedders-for-discovery 
• 3AC x Genesis relationship
• • https://www.theblock.co/post/158167/crypto-lender-genesis-lent-2-36-billion-to-three-arrows-capital
• 3AC owes creditors $3.5 Billion
• • https://www.theblock.co/post/158169/three-arrows-capital-3ac-creditors-list-3-5-billion-crypto-affidavits
• 3AC liquidation committee
• • ​​https://www.theblock.co/post/158279/three-arrows-capital-3ac-creditors-committee-five-members 
• 3AC x Blockchain.com relationship
• • https://www.theblock.co/post/158533/3ac-borrowed-and-repaid-more-than-2-billion-from-blockchain-com-before-outstanding-debt 
• Deribit liquidation dispute
• • https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2022/07/19/stake-in-crypto-exchange-deribit-becomes-disputed-asset-in-three-arrows-bankruptcy/
• 3AC x StarkWare
• • https://thedefiant.io/zhu-3ac-starkware/ 

• Wassielawyer on 3AC, Celsius, and Voyager
• • https://unchainedpodcast.com/three-crypto-bankruptcies-3ac-celsius-and-voyager-what-happens-now-ep-374/

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Nelson Rauda, Salvadoran journalist for El Faro, comes to talk about the impact of Bitcoin in El Salvador, the needs of Salvadoran people, Bitcoin City and the Bitcoin Bond, and much more. 

• Nelson’s story and how he began covering BTC
• what kind of politician and president Nayib Bukele was before BTC
• what the financial reality was for Salvadoran people before the implementation of BTC
• the reasons for the high rates of unbanked people in El Salvador
• how Bukele changed the monetary policy with what Rauda says was very little discussion
• why Rauda believes the BTC law is not meant for Salvadorans, but instead is a PR stunt
• how people reacted after the announcement of BTC as legal tender, and how it resembled the dollarization of the economy in 2001
• how Nelson did not even understand BTC at the moment of the announcement and how he says there was not an effort from the government to educate the population
• whether BTC was successful in attracting investments and tourism, and how there’s no hard data about it
• why Nelson believes Bukele was trying to hide the scandals when he adopted BTC
• whether BTC has been used as a PR stunt
• why bitcoiners are enthusiastic about an authoritarian government adopting BTC as legal tender
• how Bukele might be undermining his own authority by adopting BTC, a type of money that is not controlled by a state
• whether the Chivo wallet is a surveillance tool
• why Nelson believes BTC does not represent a solution for the needs of average Salvadoran people
• whether the $30 dollar initial gift to download the BTC wallet was seen as just another subsidy
• the status of Bitcoin City and how Nelson believes it represents the most spectacular PR stunt from Bukele’s administration
• how the expensive prices of electricity in El Salvador make the country not the best place for mining
• the significance of Bitcoin Beach
• what the BTC bond is, what Bukele tried to achieve with it, and why it has been postponed
• whether El Salvador will default on its debt and what the impact of the BTC price has on the national finances and on how Salvadorans perceive Bitcoin
• how Nelson believes people in El Salvador do not have political freedom and how it contradicts the narrative of financial freedom that BTC aims to provide
• what Nelson thinks about Bitcoin and whether governments should adopt it as legal tender

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021

Ava Labs: https://www.avax.network/

Oasis: https://oasisprotocol.org/grant-programs?utm_source=unchained&utm_medium=partnership&utm_campaign=podcast-oasis-grants-program

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/raudaz_
• NYT Opinion article: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/02/opinion/bitcoin-el-salvador-bukele-crypto.html?referringSource=articleShare

• PwC report: https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/financial-services/pdf/el-salvadors-law-a-meaningful-test-for-bitcoin.pdf
• Full law: https://freopp.org/el-salvadors-bitcoin-law-full-proposed-english-text-9a2153ad1d19
• BBC article - The IMF urges El Salvador to remove Bitcoin as legal tender: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-60135552
• BTC as a Trojan horse: https://bitcoinmagazine.com/culture/bitcoin-is-a-trojan-horse-for-freedom
• Last BTC Purchase: https://decrypt.co/104275/el-salvador-president-nayib-bukele-more-bitcoin-after-losing-60m
• Washington post article on tourism attraction: https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/2022/07/06/el-salvador-bitcoin-beach/?utm_campaign=wp_main&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter
• NYT Article on El Salvador’s bet: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/05/world/americas/el-salvador-bitcoin-national-currency.html

• Research paper on El Salvador by the NBER: https://www.nber.org/papers/w29968
• The World Bank report on El Salvador: https://www.worldbank.org/en/country/elsalvador/overview
• El Salvador and the IMF: https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/el-salvador-finance-minister-says-possible-imf-deal-no-panacea-2022-07-14/
• CNBC on El Salvador Finances: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/06/25/el-salvador-bitcoin-experiment-not-saving-countrys-finances.html
• IMF report on El Salvador Finances: https://www.imf.org/en/News/Articles/2022/02/15/cf-el-salvadors-comeback-constrained-by-increased-risks

• https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/03/25/bitcoin-city-el-salvadors-dreams-for-utopia-on-hold/
• El Salvador postpones BTC bond: https://www.reuters.com/technology/el-salvador-postpones-bitcoin-bond-issue-expects-better-conditions-2022-03-22/

• https://www.dezeen.com/2022/05/12/bitcoin-city-el-salvador-president-nayib-bukele/#:~:text=Bitcoin%20City%20is%20planned%20for,from%20the%20nearby%20Conchagua%20volcano.

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In a highly educational conversation, Wassielawyer, a lawyer specializing in restructuring and insolvency, discusses the bankruptcy and liquidation of Three Arrows Capital, plus sheds light on similar processes unfolding with Celsius and Voyager. Show highlights:

• Wassielawyer’s experience as a lawyer and his professional background
• what the liquidation process looks like and what drives a company to get into this situation
• what the creditors of 3AC can expect from the liquidation process and who will be paid first
• why he doesn’t think the liquidators breached their fiduciary duty by not exercising the Starkware token warrants
• what Chapter 15 bankruptcy is and what it means for a company
• whether Zhu’s and Davies’ unknown whereabouts affect the liquidation process and whether they are likely to cooperate
• whether 3AC counterparties will get anything back from the credits they provided
• how Chapter 11 bankruptcy differs from Chapter 15 
• what Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing means for Celsius and its account holders
• what are the similarities and differences between Celsius and Voyager filings

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021 

Ava Labs: https://www.avax.network/ 

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/wassielawyer

• Wassielawyer’s threads:
  • https://twitter.com/wassielawyer/status/1543238225338454016?s=20&t=kXB2gr4UCkAz5p09LD24XA
  • https://twitter.com/wassielawyer/status/1538167831946473472?s=20&t=kXB2gr4UCkAz5p09LD24XA
• Unchained Newsletter: https://unchainedpodcast.com/3ac-files-for-chapter-15-bankruptcy/
• Crypto Contagion: 
•  
• Court order allowing subpoenas: https://www.theblock.co/post/157141/bankruptcy-court-judge-gives-green-light-to-serve-subpoenas-to-3ac-founders-for-discovery
• Previous coverage:
  • Unchained Coverage: Why Possible Insolvencies by Celsius and 3AC Could Spell Disaster for Crypto: https://unchainedpodcast.com/why-possible-insolvencies-by-celsius-and-3ac-could-spell-disaster-for-crypto/
  • The Chopping Block: Here’s What Was So Bad About Three Arrows Capital: https://unchainedpodcast.com/the-chopping-block-heres-what-was-so-bad-about-three-arrows-capital-ep-368/
  • Does Venture Capital Investment Violate the Ethos of Crypto? Sequoia Says No: https://unchainedpodcast.com/does-venture-capital-investment-violate-the-ethos-of-crypto-sequoia-says-no-ep-367/

• Wassielawyer’s thread: https://twitter.com/wassielawyer/status/1545827666590601216?s=20&t=kXB2gr4UCkAz5p09LD24XA
• Unchained Newsletter: https://unchainedpodcast.com/voyager-digital-files-for-chapter-11-bankruptcy/
• Bankruptcy: https://www.reuters.com/technology/crypto-lender-voyager-files-bankruptcy-2022-07-06/
• Voyager exposure to 3AC: https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/06/22/voyager-digital-requests-loan-repayment-from-3ac-considers-issuing-default-notice/

• Wassielawyer’s thread: https://twitter.com/wassielawyer/status/1536192639112183808?s=20&t=kXB2gr4UCkAz5p09LD24XA
• Celsius bankruptcy: https://www.reuters.com/technology/crypto-lender-celsius-files-bankruptcy-2022-07-14/
• Halt of withdrawals: https://blog.celsius.network/a-memo-to-the-celsius-community-59532a06ecc6
• Celsius repaying debt and claiming collateral:
  • https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2022/07/13/wobble-in-steth-price-shows-fear-celsius-might-dump-435m-stake/
  • https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2022/07/11/celsius-reclaims-172m-collateral-from-aave-compound/
  • https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2022/07/13/celsius-pays-off-last-defi-loan-reclaims-nearly-200m-of-wrapped-bitcoin-from-compound/

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Welcome to The Chopping Block! Crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, and Tarun Chitra chop it up about the latest news in the digital asset industry. In this episode, Anatoly Yakovenko, Tsar of Solana, joins the show to discuss the use cases of Solana, whether it’s actually a blockchain, how Solana scales, and much more! 

Show topics:

• What Anatoly thinks of Andre Cronje's opinion that Solana is not a blockchain
• Why Solana has had so many instances of downtime
• Whether Solana is the NASDAQ of blockchains
• Why Solana changed its approach to fee markets and how it is different from other blockchains
• Why Anatoly is bearish on generic Layer2s
• How to prevent a mempool to blow up
• Whether Anatoly is pro app-chains
• Why Anatoly would have had Solana build a fee model from the start
• What proof of history is and what its problems are 
• How vertical scaling and horizontal scaling differ
• What the use cases of Solana are 
• Why Solana decided to build the SAGA phone
• How a web3 phone enables new ways of innovation
• Why Solana doesn’t see Avalanche or BSC or other EVM chains as competitors but Mysten and Aptos
• Why the execution environment is where all innovation happens
• Why Tarun thinks rollups on Solana is a good idea
• Whether EVM could work on Solana and why Anatoly cares less about EVM on Solana than Solidity
• What Anatoly’s biggest lessons from building Solana are
• Why Haseeb admires Anatoly and what the similarities are between him and Vitalik
• What Anatoly advises people who are building in crypto

Hosts

• Haseeb Qureshi, managing partner at Dragonfly Capital
• https://twitter.com/hosseeb
• Tom Schmidt, general partner at Dragonfly Capital
• https://twitter.com/tomhschmidt
• Tarun Chitra, managing partner at Robot Ventures
• https://twitter.com/tarunchitra 
• Robert Leshner, founder of Compound 
• https://twitter.com/rleshner 

Guest: Anatoly Yakovenko

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/aeyakovenko

Episode Links

Solana

• Serum: https://www.projectserum.com/
• Some of the Solana outages and consequences: 
• September 2021: https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2021/09/14/solana-validators-ready-potential-restart-amid-blockchain-outage/
• January 2022: https://www.theblock.co/post/131278/traders-are-complaining-about-solanas-performance-raising-questions-about-its-status-as-a-wall-street-darling 
• May 2022: https://www.theblock.co/linked/144639/solana-restarted-after-seven-hour-outage-caused-by-surge-of-transactions 
• Solana’s blockchain clock 30 minutes behind: https://www.theblock.co/post/149112/solanas-blockchain-clock-loses-track-of-time-now-running-30-minutes-behind 
• June 2022: https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2022/06/02/solana-halted-by-bug-linked-to-certain-cold-storage-transactions/
• Popularity of NFTs on Solana: https://www.theblock.co/post/153214/magic-eden-raises-series-b-funding-solana-nft-unicorn
• Solana phone
• https://solana.com/news/saga-reveal
• https://dune.com/queries/952048/1656567
• https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/06/23/solana-labs-is-building-a-web3-mobile-phone/ 
• Fee market: https://www.reddit.com/r/solana/comments/u3p8xc/eli3_solana_fee_market/
• Aptos/Mysten: 
• https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/07/11/web-3-startup-mysten-labs-aiming-for-2b-valuation-in-latest-funding-report/
• https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/05/31/paypal-ventures-invested-in-team-reviving-diem-blockchain/
• Paper on Proof of History: https://www.shoup.net/papers/poh.pdf

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Ryan Berckmans, Ethereum investor and community member, and Alexandre Bergeron, Bitcoin investor, discuss Lido’s dominance as a liquid staking provider, whether that issue can be resolved, and how it could be a centralizing force for Ethereum. Show highlights:

• what stETH is, what the uses cases are for stETH, and why it is important
• how Lido had a first-mover advantage and how that kicked off network effects
• whether the liquid staking derivatives system is one of a “winner-take-all”
• how much of the staked ETH will be turned into a liquid staking derivative
• how Lido might have a huge MEV opportunity after the Merge
• what the proposer-builder separation is
• whether Lido's dominance will increase over time
• whether other competitors have been competitive with Lido
• why Lido is a natural monopoly because of the incentives and MEV opportunities
• what the implication of Lido’s monopoly is for Ethereum’s censorship resistance
• whether Lido is effectively a single entity despite having multiple node operators
• whether there could be a long waiting period for becoming a validator after the Merge
• how Lido is moving its staking derivatives to other chains
• how Lido’s new dual-governance proposal works, why it might be useful to decentralize Lido and whether it reduces the power of LDO token holders
• how Lido’s centralization is the biggest threat to Ethereum in the long term and what are the possible solutions
• why Ryan believes the value of ETH comes from its credible neutrality and whether Lido's centralization may jeopardize that
• whether finding solutions around MEV opportunities is a good way to reduce Lido’s monopoly
• whether Lido’s competitors could form an alliance and build a tokenized basket of their staking derivatives to compete with Lido
• whether Lido could airdrop the LDO token to all ETH holders to decentralize its governance token

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021

Ava Labs: https://www.avax.network/

Oasis: https://oasisprotocol.org/grant-programs?utm_source=unchained&utm_medium=partnership&utm_campaign=podcast-oasis-grants-program

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/bergealex4

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/ryanberckmans

• Lido’s explanation of what stETH is: https://twitter.com/LidoFinance/status/1535184472546889735?s=20&t=oQeB1uj7HG7Y4he-0gbcLg
• Previous Unchained Coverage: In the Recent Crypto Market Meltdown, What Role Did Lido’s stETH Play?: https://unchainedpodcast.com/in-the-recent-crypto-market-meltdown-what-role-did-lidos-steth-play-ep-370/

• Alex’s thread on why ETH is broken: https://twitter.com/bergealex4/status/1410761639226318852?s=20&t=JLyNokP7Kxj7tIiDzHIHTQ
• Ryan on a liquid staking monopoly: https://twitter.com/ryanberckmans/status/1521179049548300291?s=20&t=JLyNokP7Kxj7tIiDzHIHTQ
• Ryan’s proposed solutions: https://twitter.com/ryanberckmans/status/1531731955011579904?s=20&t=JLyNokP7Kxj7tIiDzHIHTQ
• Is Lido making Ethereum less decentralized?: https://cryptobriefing.com/is-lido-making-ethereum-less-decentralized/
• LDO token analysis: https://medium.com/general_knowledge/lido-finance-liquid-ethereum-staking-ldo-potential-f5dc3553b8d2
• Ethereum researcher Danny Ryan’s take: https://twitter.com/dannyryan/status/1524044527828303872?s=20&t=H4UNoLn7sKQyZx5ll3-Ncw
• Ryan’s take on Lido’s self-limit: https://research.lido.fi/t/should-lido-on-ethereum-be-limited-to-some-fixed-of-stake/2225/9?u=ryanberckmans
•  

• Lido + stETH dual governance: https://research.lido.fi/t/ldo-steth-dual-governance/2382
• Hasu on Lido’s dual governance proposal: https://twitter.com/hasufl/status/1540652075352313857?s=20&t=sJU5C5xo5litEJrZZDaWNQ
• Lido’s two-phase voting scheme: https://blog.lido.fi/moving-to-two-phase-voting/

• Ryan on post-merge MEV: https://twitter.com/ryanberckmans/status/1453597003397611526?s=20&t=JLyNokP7Kxj7tIiDzHIHTQ
• Alex on proposer-builder separation: https://twitter.com/bergealex4/status/1540934540901744640?s=20&t=JLyNokP7Kxj7tIiDzHIHTQ
• Haseeb on post-merge MEV: https://twitter.com/hosseeb/status/1464003851942391834?s=20&t=JLyNokP7Kxj7tIiDzHIHTQ

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Amir Haleem, CEO of Nova Labs and founder of Helium, talks about the use cases for Internet of Things (IoT), how blockchain and crypto help to construct a decentralized internet infrastructure, and what is the future of Helium. Show highlights:

• what Helium is and what it is trying to solve
• how, after struggling for years, introducing crypto tokens, finally helped Helium grow
• who the users of Helium are and how they differ from each other
• how Helium grew to have one million devices around the world
• what the challenges and use cases of the IoT space are
• why Helium decided to add new networks
• why Helium is launching specific tokens for each of the new networks
• what proof of coverage is and why it is useful
• what an open-source cellular network is and how it would work
• whether there is a need for some centralization of the network
• what Helium’s roadmap is and what the major milestones are for the future

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021 

Ava Labs: https://avax.network

Amir

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/amirhaleem

Helium:

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/helium
• Website: https://www.helium.com/
• NYT article: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/06/technology/helium-cryptocurrency-uses.html
• Plans to launch new networks: https://www.theblock.co/linked/151491/helium-network-accelerates-multi-network-protocol-expansion
• • https://blog.helium.com/helium-chapter-2-a-network-of-networks-7372262210bd
• Helium 5G plans: https://blog.helium.com/whats-next-for-helium-5g-data-transfer-proof-of-coverage-rewards-67b54f19f8d5
• Number of Helium hotspots growing: https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2022/02/17/helium-network-passing-half-million-hotspots-could-fire-up-hnt-price/
• Where Helium users are: https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2022/03/09/helium-miners-from-lisbon-to-miami-say-its-location-location-location/
• Nova Labs raises $200 million: https://www.axios.com/2022/02/18/crypto-startup-helium-raises-200-million
•  $111 million token sale: https://www.theblock.co/linked/114095/helium-token-sale-a16z

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Hasu, strategic advisor to Lido, and Tarun Chitra, founder of Gauntlet, explain everything about staked ETH, aka stETH, how it should be priced, Lido’s market dominance, and much more. Show highlights:

• the role of Lido, what stETH is, and what its benefits are
• whether Ethereum’s lack of delegated proof of stake contributes to the need for stETH
• why stETH is not mispriced and why it doesn’t necessarily have to be worth 1 ETH
• the inherent risks associated with stETH
• how there was not enough liquidity to handle all the liquidations, especially in automated vaults on, for instance, Instadapp 
• how automated market makers work and what Curve’s amplification factor is
• whether 3AC and Celsius had a significant impact on the stETH/ETH “de-peg”
• how does the Merge affect the liquidity of stETH
• Hasu’s and Tarun’s level of confidence that the Merge will happen this year and whether it will be a success
• what will happen to the price of stETH after the redemptions are enabled
• why Lido has achieved such a level of dominance
• how Lido decreases the cost of staking and helps improve the security of the Ethereum blockchain
• whether there is going to be a “winner take all” in the liquid staking derivatives market
• how liquidity fragmentation can cause the system to blow up
• why LDO tokenholders might not have the same incentives as ETH tokenholders
• what is Lido’s new dual governance model and what is it trying to achieve
• whether Lido should self limit its market dominance
• how Lido coordinates validators and the role of the LDO token in this coordination
• what are the lessons to be learned from the stETH situation
• how governance is a liability to DeFi protocols

Thank you to our sponsors!

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021

Ava Labs: https://www.avax.network/

Oasis: https://oasisprotocol.org/grant-programs?utm_source=unchained&utm_medium=partnership&utm_campaign=podcast-oasis-grants-program

EPISODE LINKS

Hasu: 

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/hasufl
• Uncommon Core Podcast: http://uncommoncore.co/podcast/

Tarun: 

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/tarunchitra

stETH

• Lido’s explanation: https://twitter.com/LidoFinance/status/1535184472546889735?s=20&t=oQeB1uj7HG7Y4he-0gbcLg
• Lido’s explanation #2: https://twitter.com/LidoFinance/status/1536756933054676992?s=20&t=oQeB1uj7HG7Y4he-0gbcLg
• Hasu’s thread #1: https://twitter.com/hasufl/status/1524717773959700481?s=20&t=oQeB1uj7HG7Y4he-0gbcLg
• Hasu’s thread #2: https://twitter.com/hasufl/status/1525427069198508033?s=20&t=oQeB1uj7HG7Y4he-0gbcLg
• Tarun’s take: https://twitter.com/tarunchitra/status/1538775828573609985?s=20&t=oQeB1uj7HG7Y4he-0gbcLg
• Tarun’s paper: Why Stake when you can borrow: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3629988

Lido

• Self-limit?: https://twitter.com/LidoFinance/status/1540258690942615555?s=20&t=sJU5C5xo5litEJrZZDaWNQ
• Hasu on Lido’s dual governance proposal: https://twitter.com/hasufl/status/1540652075352313857?s=20&t=sJU5C5xo5litEJrZZDaWNQ
• Lido’s two phase voting scheme :https://blog.lido.fi/moving-to-two-phase-voting/
• Previous Unchained Coverage on DAO governance: Solend and Bancor Drama: Did These DAOs Violate the Ethos of Crypto?: https://unchainedpodcast.com/solend-and-bancor-drama-did-these-daos-violate-the-ethos-of-crypto-ep-366/

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Badiucao, Chinese artist and activist, talks about the importance of NFTs for political activism, the role of China in his career as an artist, the significance of blockchain technologies to resist censorship, and much more. Show highlights:

• why Badiucao became an artist and how the censorship in China brought him to NFTs
• how Badiucao only learned about Tiananmen Square when he was 22 years old 
• why Badiucao took up work as a preschool teacher in Australia
• how anonymity is important for Chinese activists for their family’s safety
• the intention of Badiucao’s art and what is he trying to express
• the repercussions of Badiucao’s activism
• why Badicuao eventually gave up his anonymity
• why Badiucao decided to issue art as NFTs and what possibilities he sees in NFTs
• how Badiucao enabled people to write a message of protest in the blockchain with the launch of his NFT and how this represented the first large mass protest written into the blockchain
• whether the Beijing Winter Olympics is an outrage and a disgrace for the international community and how this inspired Badiucao’s NFT collection Beijing 2022
• how Niki approached the issue of the possibility of having the art taken down
• how Badiucao used NFTs to help Ukraine due to the war
• the reasons political art has so much value, and how NFTs enable possibilities for all political artists around the world
• whether NFTs are much more than just some apes, and how learning about art is important
• how to get started as a political artist and the importance to remain truthful
• the significance of using power as an artist

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021 

Ava Labs: https://avax.network

Badiucao

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/badiucao
• Website: https://www.badiucao.com/

Niki

• Website: http://nikiselken.com/

Documentary about Badiucao:

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt10601676/

60 Minutes interview: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/badiucao-60-minutes-2021-12-26/

Unveiling his identity: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/04/world/asia/china-tiananmen-cartoonist-badiucao.html?searchResultPosition=1

The importance of NFTs

• How Activists are Using NFTs as Civil Disobedience: https://www.jumpstartmag.com/how-activists-are-using-nfts-as-civil-disobedience/
• Nadya Tolokonnikova on NFTs with social messages: https://editorial.brytehall.com/nadya-tolokonnikova-on-nfts-with-social-messages-and-shock-value/
• Unchained Coverage: This Noble Family’s Art Was Taken by Nazis, But Is Being Saved by NFTs: https://unchainedpodcast.com/this-noble-familys-art-was-taken-by-nazis-but-is-being-saved-by-nfts/
• Unchained Coverage: Punk6529 on the Significance of Bored Ape Yacht Club and CryptoPunks: https://unchainedpodcast.com/punk6529-on-the-significance-of-bored-ape-yacht-club-and-cryptopunks/
• Unchained Coverage: Why This Environmentalist Doesn’t Blame Creators for the Carbon Footprint of NFTs: https://unchainedpodcast.com/why-this-environmentalist-doesnt-blame-creators-for-the-carbon-footprint-of-nfts/

Beijing 2022 Collection

• https://www.badiucao.com/nft
• Badiucao launches NFT collection to protest against China's human rights record on eve of Beijing Winter Olympics: https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2022/02/01/badiucao-launches-human-rights-protest-nft-collection-on-eve-of-beijing-winter-olympics

NFTs for Ukraine Collection

• https://www.badiucao.com/ukraine

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Welcome to The Chopping Block! Crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, and Tarun Chitra chop it up about the latest news in the digital asset industry. In this episode, Taylor Monahan, matriarch of Metamask, joins the show to discuss the contagion of major crypto firms, the bear market, SBF saving crypto, and much more! Show topics:

• The importance of UX and security
• How Three Arrows Capital’s practice of borrowing to leverage their bets has caused a crisis for crypto lenders that rippled out to many customers
• How the GBTC arbitrage trade was part of 3AC’s undoing, and how that trade was one many other crypto trading institutions had previously abandoned
• How crypto lenders were being degens with customers funds
• Why SBF stepped in and made sure that BlockFi and Voyager didn’t default on customers’ deposits
• Whether this whole wind-down reflects a credit cycle
• How DeFi protocols were built to avoid these kinds of centralized finance problems 
• How the systemic issues caused by CeFi institutions like Celsius, BlockFi and Voyager are reminiscent of the Great Financial Crisis
• What are the similarities between this crypto meltdown, the Mt. Gox debacle, and the 1907 and 2008 financial crises
• What are the consequences of losing retail money vs. institutional money
• How surviving a credit cycle crisis creates the best risk managers
• The lessons to be learned from all these crises 
• How MakerDAO is trying to figure out what to do with its money
• What happened with Solend and why the DAO resorted to a centralized action
• Why DeFi needs more clauses about how to handle edge cases
• The difference between doing dumb things and wrong things
• Why Tarun is impressed with Solana’s DAO tooling
• Why Taylor is thankful for the bear market

Hosts

• Haseeb Qureshi, managing partner at Dragonfly Capital
• https://twitter.com/hosseeb
• Tom Schmidt, general partner at Dragonfly Capital
• https://twitter.com/tomhschmidt
• Tarun Chitra, managing partner at Robot Ventures
• https://twitter.com/tarunchitra 
• Robert Leshner, founder of Compound 
• https://twitter.com/rleshner 

Guest: Taylor Monahan

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/tayvano_
• Taylor’s thread on resources to learn about all things crypto: https://twitter.com/tayvano_/status/1509380091184246784?s=20&t=kNk8fJ7pJAWfEEVZQHwpvg

Episode Links

• Crypto Contagion
• 3AC: https://blockworks.co/three-arrows-capital-brink-default-owes-voyager-657m/
• Voyager
• Celsius + Goldman buyout? https://www.protocol.com/bulletins/goldman-celsius-bankruptcy
• BlockFi bailout: https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/06/21/blockfi-receives-250m-credit-facility-from-ftx/
• Unchained newsletter on BlockFi’s bailout: https://unchainedpodcast.com/vitalik-says-this-deserves-mockery/
• CoinFlex: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-06-27/crypto-exchange-coinflex-to-issue-tokens-after-withdrawal-freeze?sref=Q2SpVkJl
• Babel: https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/06/20/babel-finance-reaches-debt-agreement-with-counterparties-after-withdrawal-freeze/
• Unchained Coverage: Why Possible Insolvencies by Celsius and 3AC Could Spell Disaster for Crypto: https://unchainedpodcast.com/why-possible-insolvencies-by-celsius-and-3ac-could-spell-disaster-for-crypto/
• Solend DAO situation:
• Unchained Coverage: Solend and Bancor Drama: Did These DAOs Violate the Ethos of Crypto? – Ep. 366: https://unchainedpodcast.com/solend-and-bancor-drama-did-these-daos-violate-the-ethos-of-crypto-ep-366/
• https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2022/06/19/solana-defi-platform-votes-to-control-whale-account-in-bid-to-avoid-liquidation-chaos/
• Covered on Unchained Newsletter: https://unchainedpodcast.com/does-this-dao-deserve-emergency-power%e2%81%89%ef%b8%8f/
• MakerDAO governance proposal: https://www.theblock.co/post/154515/maker-governance-is-voting-to-invest-500-million-in-us-treasury-bills

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Shaun Maguire and Michelle Bailhe, partners at Sequoia, discuss their long term view and thesis about crypto, what do they look for to invest in a crypto project, the takeaways from the blowup of Terra, the insolvency of crypto companies, and much more. Show highlights:

• what is Sequoia’s long term view and thesis about the crypto industry
• how different our lives will look in 20 years from now due to blockchain technology
• how Sequoia had to adapt to invest in this new asset class and what are the similarities and differences with investing in traditional startups
• when a product or service on the internet should be offered in a decentralized or centralized way
• how Sequoia decides whether to invest in the entity behind a project or in the tokens
• whether having venture capitalists involved at all goes against the ethos of decentralization
• why Shaun believes that Ethereum proved that decentralization can be achieved even when you start being centralized
• whether people underestimate the value that VCs can add to a project
• why Shaun believes that Solana is moving towards decentralization
• Sequoia’s thesis about privacy in crypto and the potential of zero-knowledge proofs 
• how Michelle sees the macroeconomic environment impacting crypto and whether this cycle is different from the previous ones
• the importance of product market fit in crypto projects
• what crypto projects should be focusing on and the business model they should be pursuing
• the main takeaways of the Terra collapse and how it was a major setback for algo stablecoins
• how crypto founders should always do the right thing even though there is no clear regulation
• whether SBF is the Berkshire Hathaway of crypto today
• the lessons to be learned from the potential insolvency of some crypto lenders and investment firms
• how demand for blockspace will keep increasing and whether a single blockchain could supply all that space
• the future of the metaverse and how it can be defined
• Michelle’s mental model for crypto and the phases for achieving worldwide adoption

Thank you to our sponsors!

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021

Beefy Finance: https://beefy.finance/

Ava Labs: https://www.avax.network/

EPISODE LINKS

Shaun Maguire: 

• Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/shaunmmaguire
• Sequoia Profile: https://www.sequoiacap.com/people/shaun-maguire/

Michelle: 

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/michellebailhe
• Sequoia Profile: https://www.sequoiacap.com/people/michelle-bailhe/
• Michelle’s investment thesis: https://www.sequoiacap.com/article/ask-not-wen-moon-ask-why-moon/

Bear Market:

• Michelle’s Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/michellebailhe/status/1526373378516365312?s=20&t=c7vdmdg2mnQ34rsAGIm0lg
• Insolvency of crypto lenders:
• Voyager: https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/06/22/voyager-digital-requests-loan-repayment-from-3ac-considers-issuing-default-notice/
• BlockFi: https://decrypt.co/103422/blockfi-secures-250-million-line-of-credit-from-ftx
• Celsius: https://www.theblock.co/linked/151522/crypto-lending-firm-celsius-pauses-withdrawals-and-transfers-citing-market-conditions
• Celsius possible bankruptcy: https://www.theblock.co/linked/154100/crypto-lender-celsius-hires-more-advisors-ahead-of-possible-bankruptcy-wsj
• Previous Unchained Coverage:
•  Why Possible Insolvencies by Celsius and 3AC Could Spell Disaster for Crypto: https://unchainedpodcast.com/why-possible-insolvencies-by-celsius-and-3ac-could-spell-disaster-for-crypto/
• Cobie and Chris Burniske on How to Navigate a Crypto Bear Market: https://unchainedpodcast.com/cobie-and-chris-burniske-on-how-to-navigate-a-crypto-bear-market-ep-354/

** For more episode links and details visit the Unchained website **

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Derek Hsue, cofounder at Reverie, discusses the recent controversial decisions by Solend DAO and Bancor, the importance of establishing processes for black swan events, and whether decentralized governance truly exists. Show highlights:

• what situation prompted Solend to feel it was in jeopardy
• what Solend DAO’s response was to that situation
• why Derek views it as “the nuclear option”
• why the proposal sparked an outcry from the crypto community
• whether this issue could have been prevented or managed differently if the protocol was built on a blockchain other than Solana
• why, a day later, the DAO reversed its first decision to take over the whale’s account
• whether Derek thinks the DAO made the right decision to not take over the whale’s account
• what is Impermanent Loss Protection, a feature offered by Bancor
• why Bancor decided to pause Impermanent Loss Protection
• whether Celsius and 3AC had anything to do with Bancor’s problem
• how Bancor’s decision was made unilaterally
• how DAOs should deal with black swan events

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021 

Ava Labs: https://www.avax.network/

Derek

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/derek_hsue

Reverie

• Website: https://www.reverie.ooo/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/hi_reverie

Solend DAO Situation

• Covered on Monday’s Unchained Newsletter: https://unchainedpodcast.com/does-this-dao-deserve-emergency-power%e2%81%89%ef%b8%8f/
• Proposal to invalidate the first one: https://decrypt.co/103330/solana-lending-dao-overturns-vote-to-take-over-at-risk-whale-wallet
• The whale moved $25 million from Solend: https://www.theblock.co/post/153207/solana-whale-shuffles-25-million-to-reduce-risk-to-defi-protocol-solend

Bancor Pausing Impermanent Loss Protection

• Bancor’s post: https://blog.bancor.network/market-conditions-update-june-19-2022-e5b857b39336
• Anthony Sassano’s reaction: https://twitter.com/sassal0x/status/1539082583832526848?s=20&t=OzTV6M5bCH4fxJIJUtLA4Q

DAO Governance issues:

• Lido DAO proposes to reduce the existing scope of governance of its token holders: https://research.lido.fi/t/ldo-steth-dual-governance/2382
• Jack Niewold 's thread: https://twitter.com/JackNiewold/status/1539307339928457217?s=20&t=OzTV6M5bCH4fxJIJUtLA4Q
• Unchained Coverage: How Soulbound Tokens Could Reduce Speculation and Improve DAO Voting – Ep.360: https://unchainedpodcast.com/how-soul-bound-tokens-could-reduce-speculation-and-improve-dao-voting-ep-360/

Main tweet

On this Friday’s Unchained, Derek Hsue explains:

* why the first Solend DAO vote was the “nuclear option”

* whether Solana’s history of downtime spurred the proposal

* Bancor’s decision to stop Impermanent Loss Protection

* what this all means for DAO governance

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Caroline Pham, commissioner at the Commodities Futures Trading Commission, discusses how we should build a regulatory framework for crypto assets, whether the SEC and CFTC should work together, what were the consequences of the Terra collapse, and much more. Show highlights:

• how Cmr. Pham got started in crypto and became a CFTC commissioner
• the importance of the regulatory strategy around crypto
• what crypto’s role is in the financial system
• how bitcoin is a sort of money outside of the traditional financial system
• how friendly regulators should be with the industries they regulate
• why she believes transparency is one of the greatest ideals of American democracy
• how Cmr. Pham believes in self-determination and the power of free markets
• why Cmr. Pham published an op-ed with SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce
• how the Terra collapse incentivized regulators to look deeper into the space
• whether the US approach towards regulation can improve
• the role of the regulatory agencies in making the US the financial leader of the world
• what Cmr. Pham thinks about the new Gillibrand and Lummis bill
• whether SEC Chair Gary Gensler is right about the majority of cryptos being securities
• what are the low-hanging fruit opportunities for regulators when it comes to crypto
• how Cmr. Pham believes we should have a global regulatory framework for crypto
• why she believes algorithmic stablecoins are derivatives
• why things like Terra could act as a “shadow banking 3.0”
• whether there is a way to regulate without having intermediaries
• what Cmr. Pham thinks about FTX proposal to bypass futures commission merchants 

Thank you to our sponsors!

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021 

Beefy Finance: https://beefy.finance/

EPISODE LINKS

Caroline Pham

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/CarolineDPham
• CFTC Profile: https://www.cftc.gov/About/Commissioners/CarolineDPham/index.htm

Stablecoin regulation

• Financial Times article: https://www.ft.com/content/981c380f-bb1c-45bd-8d0d-a95b15d96a00
• CNBC on crypto regulation: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/06/03/cryptocurrency-industry-focus-regulation-stablecoins-market-crash.html
• Unchained Coverage: Why Crypto Twitter’s Disrespect Toward Regulators Is a ‘Really Bad Business Decision’: https://unchainedpodcast.com/why-crypto-twitters-disrespect-toward-regulators-is-a-really-bad-business-decision/
• Unchained Coverage: Can a DeFi Smart Contract Be Regulated? Two CFTC Commissioners Discuss: https://unchainedpodcast.com/can-a-defi-smart-contract-be-regulated-two-cftc-commissioners-discuss/

FTX proposal to serve as the trading engine for derivatives:

• https://www.forbes.com/sites/jasonbrett/2022/04/27/the-ftx-us-proposal-that-shook-congress-and-the-crypto-derivatives-world/?sh=3dac29ef4e19
• Unchained Coverage: FTX Wants to Compete with CME – Here’s Why It’s a Big Deal: https://unchainedpodcast.com/ftx-wants-to-compete-with-cme-heres-why-its-a-big-deal/

Hester Peirce

• Caroline’s op-ed with SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce: https://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/3503277-making-progress-on-decentralized-regulation-its-time-to-talk-about-crypto-together/
• Hester Peirce's token safe harbor proposal: https://decrypt.co/66453/secs-hester-peirce-floats-revised-crypto-safe-harbor-rules
• Unchained Coverage: Hester Peirce’s Former Counsel on Terra 2.0, XRP and a Bitcoin Spot ETF: https://unchainedpodcast.com/hester-peirces-former-counsel-on-terra-2-0-xrp-and-a-bitcoin-spot-etf/

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Mika Honkasalo, independent crypto researcher, discusses what is happening with Celsius and Three Arrows Capital, the importance of having proper risk management, and the contagion effects on the industry.

Show highlights:

• why is it so significant that Celsius paused withdrawals
• what is stETH and why is it important to understand the Celsius situation
• how the Luna/UST debacle started a contagion effect in the crypto space
• why Celsius’s investors won’t bail the company out
• what will happen to Celsius’s retail customers
• what Three Arrows Capital (3AC) is and whether they have a solvency problem
• how 3AC was levered long and whether they had poor risk management
• who will be hurt if 3AC goes under
• what would be the effect of 3AC and Celsius collapsing
• which types of funds that Mika will be eyeing to see if they also end up in a similar situation to 3AC and Celsius
• why Mika would counsel anyone who keeps their money with centralized crypto lenders to scrutinize their practices

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021 

Ava Labs: https://avax.network

Mika Honkasalo

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/mhonkasalo
• Substack: https://mhonkasalo.substack.com/
• Mika’s writings on The Block: https://www.theblockcrypto.com/author/mika-honkasalo

Mika’s blog post on the stETH-ETH peg: https://mhonkasalo.substack.com/p/stetheth-peg-not-a-peg-presents-a?s=r

Celsius announcement that they would be withholding assets: https://twitter.com/CelsiusNetwork/status/1536169010877739009?s=20&t=hL-ZsBSKZOLF-whTwNmjgw

Nexo’s offer to buy Celsius assets: 

https://twitter.com/Nexo/status/1536256598993211393?s=20&t=vKmJCZGNToaOqZU-TEjcDg

Celsisus’s investors unlikely to bail out company: 

https://www.wsj.com/articles/celsius-networks-investors-unlikely-to-provide-more-funds-to-bail-out-crypto-lender-11655395113

Celsius hires restructuring lawyers: 

https://www.wsj.com/articles/crypto-lender-celsius-hires-restructuring-lawyers-after-account-freeze-11655250575?tpl=br

Why staked ETH is part of Celsius’s and 3AC’s woes: 

https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2022/06/14/staked-ether-becomes-focus-of-crypto-stress-from-celsius-to-three-arrows/ 

Conor Ryder on the stETH liquidity problem

https://twitter.com/ConorRyder/status/1537130483007508480?s=20&t=pZGZf17ed_DyOS18CHExmQ

The DeFi Edge on the 3AC situation: https://twitter.com/thedefiedge/status/1537465349976694786?s=20&t=Q29mo3EKSASasTenHVEm4Q

Who else has exposure to 3AC: 

https://fortune.com/2022/06/16/crypto-crash-hedge-fund-three-arrows-capital-insolvency-rumors-novogratz/ 

3AC withholding $1M in assets from 8 Blocks Capital: 

https://twitter.com/Danny8BC/status/1537224378554806272?s=20&t=Q29mo3EKSASasTenHVEm4Q

Meltem Demirors explains the problem from the balance sheet perspective:

https://twitter.com/Melt_Dem/status/1537155214897201153?s=20&t=Q29mo3EKSASasTenHVEm4Q

Adam Levitin on Celsius bankruptcy

https://twitter.com/AdamLevitin/status/1536932912674836481?s=20&t=Q29mo3EKSASasTenHVEm4Q

degentrading on Why Celsius and 3AC going under should cause you to worry

https://twitter.com/hodlKRYPTONITE/status/1536902115540742144?s=20&t=Q29mo3EKSASasTenHVEm4Q

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Olta Andoni, deputy general counsel at Ava Labs, and Ari Redbord, head of legal and government affairs at TRM Labs, discuss the Terra stablecoin meltdown, implications for impending international regulations, and the history of stablecoin regulation internationally. Topics covered include:

• What the most important legal issues are for the Terra meltdown
• How the Terra implosion will trigger more regulation of the space
• How regulators seemed to think stablecoins should be regulated even before Terra
• How their approach differs between dollar-backed stablecoins vs. algorithmic vs. crypto collateral-backed coins
• How European regulators want stablecoin issuers to be treated like banks
• What the Lummis-Gillibrand bill would mean for US stablecoin regulation
• Whether Terra’s demise will mean that regulators won’t tolerate experimentation with algorithmic stablecoins 
• Why regulators will be skittish about stablecoins in response to Terra’s meltdown
• Why Olta and Ari were impressed by the NY Department of Financial Services guidance on stablecoins
• What the establishment of SEC jurisdiction over Terraform Labs based on the Mirror investigation from last fall means for any enforcement action by the SEC over Terra 
• Whether Do Kwon and/or Terraform could face criminal charges in multiple jurisdictions
• Why international regulatory consistency is important in the crypto space
• Whether civil and class-action lawsuits against Terraform could be expected
• How Terra 2.0 could open TFL up to further action from regulators and law enforcement
• Why more education is needed to overcome anxiety about DeFi regulations
• How hack nondisclosures could be subject to government investigation

Thank you to our sponsors!

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021 

Beefy Finance: https://beefy.finance/ 

Episode Links

Olta

• Avalanche
• https://www.avax.network/
• Ava Labs
• https://www.avalabs.org/
• LinkedIn
• https://www.linkedin.com/in/oltaandoni/
• Twitter
• https://twitter.com/AndoniOlta

Ari

• TRM Labs Website: 
• https://www.trmlabs.com/
• TRM Labs Twitter
• https://twitter.com/trmlabs?s=20&t=m24Ir0OerqPgEejlhL-bdQ
• TRM Talks
• https://www.trmlabs.com/category/trm-talks
• LinkedIn
• https://www.linkedin.com/in/ari-redbord-4054381b4/
• Twitter
• https://twitter.com/ARedbord?s=20&t=m24Ir0OerqPgEejlhL-bdQ

Lummis-Gillibrand Bill

• Bill Introduction:

https://www.gillibrand.senate.gov/news/press/release/-lummis-gillibrand-introduce-landmark-legislation-to-create-regulatory-framework-for-digital-assets

• Legal Memo from DLx Law: https://dlxlaw.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/DLX_FSV-summary_RFIA_060722.pdf
• Lummis-Gillibrand Section by Section Overview (summary by bill authors): https://www.gillibrand.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Lummis-Gillibrand%20Section-by-Section%20%5bFinal%5d.pdf
• Responsible Financial Innovation Act (full text): https://www.gillibrand.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Lummis-Gillibrand%20Responsible%20Financial%20Innovation%20Act%20%5bFinal%5d.pdf
• Blog post intro (by Senator Kirsten Gillibrand): https://gillibrandny.medium.com/the-responsible-financial-innovation-act-218a764abd6c

FINMA

• FINMA:

https://www.finma.ch/en/

• FINMA on Stablecoins:

https://www.finma.ch/en/news/2019/09/20190911-mm-stable-coins/

• FINMA Publishes Stablecoin Guidance:

https://www.sif.admin.ch/sif/en/home/finanzmarktpolitik/digitalisation-financial-sector/stablecoins.html

NY DFS

• Guidance on Stablecoin Issuance:

https://www.dfs.ny.gov/industry_guidance/industry_letters/il20220608_issuance_stablecoins

• Press Release:

https://www.dfs.ny.gov/reports_and_publications/press_releases/pr202206081

• CNBC Coverage:

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/06/08/new-yorks-financial-watchdog-issues-stablecoin-guidance-calls-for-reserve-requirements.html

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Welcome to The Chopping Block – in person at Consensus in Austin! Crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Robert Leshner, and Tarun Chitra are joined by guest Kyle Samani of Multicoin Capital to chop it up about the latest news in the digital asset industry. Show topics:

• why Kyle believes people are too negative about the macro environment 
• how the only crypto product with product-market fit is parties
• what soulbound NFTs are, and what their pitfalls might be
• why Kyle and Robert have a beef between them
• why Kyle has a lot of run-ins with other people in crypto
• how Kyle thinks about Solana’s 12 instances of downtime over the last six months 
• how this has caused problems for SOL held in cold storage
• how Kyle and Robert think projects need to make tradeoffs between stability and adaptability
• why Kyle thinks every layer 1 and 2 will have a major failure over the next several years
• how Kyle thinks EVM chains are value-destructive
• how Tarun thinks zk L2s might be better aligned with the Ethereum ethos
• how Optimism’s market-making partner Wintermute was hacked for $20 million in OP
• why the hacker returned most of the money
• how programming language centralization makes sense
• how the Lummis-Gillibrand bill is a good opening salvo with respect to crypto regulation
• why they believe that being paid for staking is not the same as being paid a dividend
• how disclosure requirements could be onerous for small new projects
• how they think the crypto industry is moving up the learning curve for lobbying 
• why they believe the Lummis/Gillibrand bill will be changed to target stablecoins and DeFi more

EPISODE LINK

Hosts

• Haseeb Qureshi, managing partner at Dragonfly Capital
• https://twitter.com/hosseeb
• Robert Leshner, founder of Compound 
• https://twitter.com/rleshner 
• Tarun Chitra, managing partner at Robot Ventures
• https://twitter.com/tarunchitra

Guest

• Kyle Samani, cofounder and managing partner of Multicoin Capital
• https://twitter.com/KyleSamani?s=20&t=DN1G0CNY7JR11OoXOAFD2g

Show Topics

• Wintermute Compromise
• Optimism Foundation statement:

https://plaid-cement-e44.notion.site/A-Message-to-the-Community-from-the-Optimism-Foundation-f49b913bb0974d8a854a8bdd409a9dd6

• Wintermute statement: 

https://gov.optimism.io/t/message-to-optimism-community-from-wintermute/2595

• https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2022/06/09/15m-of-optimism-tokens-stolen-by-an-attacker-after-wintermute-sent-wrong-wallet-address/#:~:text=Optimism%20is%20a%20permissionless%20network%20and%20behaved%20as%20intended.&text=Wintermute%2C%20for%20its%20part%2C%20says,make%20the%20protocol%20whole%20eventually.%E2%80%9D
• Osmosis Hack
• https://www.theblockcrypto.com/post/150752/osmosis-dex-on-cosmos-exploited-for-5-million-as-validators-halt-the-network
• https://twitter.com/stake_fire/status/1534598315441913856?s=20&t=VvGyUlOjGSlhXXUwZvKszw
• Litecoin Delisting
• https://decrypt.co/102350/crypto-exchanges-delist-litecoin-privacy-feature-concerns
• Solana outage re: durable transactions (12 serious outages this year, about 2 a month)
• https://www.theblockcrypto.com/linked/149698/solana-blockchain-suffers-new-network-outage
• https://solana.com/news/06-01-22-solana-mainnet-beta-outage-report-2
• Unchained episode with Andre Cronje about Solana’s downtime: https://unchainedpodcast.com/the-chopping-block-did-andre-cronje-pull-an-epic-crypto-rug-pull/ 
• Cynthia Lummis & Kirsten Gillibrand presents landmark crypto bill
• Coindesk Coverage: 

https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2022/06/07/key-us-senators-introduce-bill-outlining-sweeping-plan-for-future-crypto-rules/

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Lewis Cohen, lead attorney at DLx Law LLC, joins to discuss the recently proposed Lummis-Gillibrand bill, the Responsible Financial Innovation Act, which he helped shape. In this episode, we cover: 

• how Lewis was impressed by Gillibrand’s and Lummis’s offices’ hard work and bipartisanship  
• how the bill creates a new definition for an “ancillary asset” with split oversight responsibilities between the CFTC and the SEC 
• how the bill proposes a test of managerial centralization as a determinant of disclosure requirements for digital assets 
• his response to criticism that the ancillary token approach is more complicated than need be and gives too much power to the SEC 
• why the bill didn't adopt an approach more similar to something like SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce’s token safe harbor proposal 
• how Lewis would respond to SEC Chair Gary Gensler’s contention that the vast majority of digital assets are securities 
• how Cohen is concerned about legislation or regulation impinging on basic freedoms to transact by over-applying securities regulation
• what kind of SEC disclosures will be required for “ancillary assets” and the requirements for projects to be able to cease mandatory disclosure
• how the bill defines stablecoins
• whether the requirement for stablecoins to maintain reserves means the end of algorithmic stablecoins or whether they will just be called something else
• how the bill handles DAOs and how legislation in this area must be delicate
• why Lewis believes the proposal is a “bright spot” for thoughtful US legislation and bipartisanship
• why he doesn’t see the bill being adopted in the current Congress 

Thank you to our sponsors!

• Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021 
• Ava Labs: https://avax.network  

EPISODE LINKS 

Lewis Cohen 

• DLx Law LLC: https://dlxlaw.com/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/NYcryptolawyer 
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lewis-cohen-a3211410/

Lummis-Gillibrand Proposal (Responsible Financial Innovation Act) 

• Legal Memo from DLXLaw : https://dlxlaw.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/DLX_FSV-summary_RFIA_060722.pdf
• Lummis-Gillibrand Section by Section Overview (summary by bill authors): https://www.gillibrand.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Lummis-Gillibrand%20Section-by-Section%20%5bFinal%5d.pdf
• Responsible Financial Innovation Act (full text): https://www.gillibrand.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Lummis-Gillibrand%20Responsible%20Financial%20Innovation%20Act%20%5bFinal%5d.pdf
• Blog post intro (by Senator Kirsten Gillibrand) : https://gillibrandny.medium.com/the-responsible-financial-innovation-act-218a764abd6c

Commentary:

• CoinDesk recap: https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2022/06/07/key-us-senators-introduce-bill-outlining-sweeping-plan-for-future-crypto-rules/
• Fortune on what the bill means for algo stablecoins: https://fortune.com/2022/06/08/algorithmic-stablecoins-terra-luna-crypto-regulation-senate-bill-lummis-gillibrand/
• JW Verret's critique: https://twitter.com/JWVerret/status/1534165678831325191?s=20&t=nIWYdZKJzXsr-SVK7F_W9w

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Glen Weyl, RadicalxChange Foundation founder and political economist & social technologist at Microsoft Special Projects, and Puja Ohlhaver, strategist at Flashbots, discuss “soulbound tokens” and their implications for collaboration and social organization in a variety of spaces. Topics covered include:

• how Glen got involved in crypto, wrote a book, and came to co-write a paper with Vitalik Buterin 
• how Puja studied economics and got in touch with Glen in pursuit of a middle ground between left and right politics
• what soulbound NFTs are and how they work
• how Vitalik’s paper articulated how the concept of the soulbound token could advance decentralized collaboration in web3
• how decentralized reputation can enable larger networks of coordination
• how identity can be understood through the lens of community participation
• how the name ‘soulbound token’ came about
• how these tokens could provide a technology for those who value scarcity but disdain speculation
• how identity-dedicated tokens could work on a technical level (including recovery)
• what is DeSoc and why is it important?
• how non-transferable tokens can improve DAO organization, including resolving issues with quadratic funding
• how identity-locked tokens can be protected from bots and AI abuse
• how these tokens could support community privacy and responsible information disclosure

Thank you to our sponsors!

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021 

Beefy Finance: https://beefy.finance/ 

Related Reading

• Decentralized Society: Finding Web3’s Soul (Weyl, Ohlhaver, and Buterin; 2022)
• • https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4105763 
• Georg Simmel, German neo-Kantian who laid groundwork for antipositivism
• • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georg_Simmel 
• How Blockchains Can Help Create Little Democracies Everywhere
• • https://unchainedpodcast.com/how-blockchains-can-help-create-little-democracies-everywhere/ 

Soulbound Tokens

• Vitalik on Soulbound tokens
• • https://vitalik.ca/general/2022/01/26/soulbound.html

• TL;DR written by Glen
• • https://www.coindesk.com/layer2/2022/05/11/after-defi-desoc-finding-web-3s-soul/

• Other write-ups
• • https://nftnow.com/guides/soulbound-tokens-sbts-meet-the-tokens-that-may-change-your-life/
  • https://www.radicalxchange.org/concepts/soulbound-tokens/
  • https://fortune.com/2022/05/26/what-are-soulbound-tokens-web3-buterin/
  • https://thedefiant.io/vitalik-soulbound-tokens/

Projects Mentioned

• Ceramic
• • https://ceramic.network/ 
• Verifiable Credentials Data Model (w3)
• • https://www.w3.org/TR/vc-data-model/#abstract 
• Optimism
• • https://optimism.io/ 
• Gitcoin
• • https://gitcoin.co/ 

Glen Weyl

• Personal Website
• • https://glenweyl.com/ 
• Twitter (@glenweyl)
• • https://twitter.com/glenweyl/ 

Puja Ohlhaver

• LinkedIn
• • https://www.linkedin.com/in/puja-ohlhaver-b44b878 
• Twitter
• • https://mobile.twitter.com/pujaohlhaver 

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Jason Gottlieb, a crypto attorney and partner at Morrison Cohen, discusses the insider trading case being built by the US Department of Justice against former OpenSea employee Nathaniel Chastain. Show topics:

• why Nathaniel is being charged with wire fraud and money laundering instead of insider trading
• what makes NFT insider trading different from usual insider trading indictments
• why an employee’s “duty of confidentiality” can be important when building an insider trading case
• whether the money laundering charge makes sense 
• whether moving money between self-custodied wallets constitutes money laundering
• why Jason does not think this particular case will have widespread implications for the NFT and crypto space
• Jason’s advice for employees at crypto exchanges and companies who may be tempted to trade on private information
• what happens next in the Chastain case
• why the potential sentences are so long – 20 years for each charge
• how likely it is that Chastain has to serve jail time

Thank you to our sponsors!

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021 

Ava Labs: https://avax.network 

Episode Links

Jason Gottlieb

• Website: https://www.morrisoncohen.com/jgottlieb
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/ohaiom 

Department of Justice Press Release

• https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/former-employee-nft-marketplace-charged-first-ever-digital-asset-insider-trading-scheme 

Nathaniel Chastain

• Arrest
• • https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2022/06/01/us-charges-ex-opensea-exec-with-nft-insider-trading/
  • https://www.theblockcrypto.com/linked/149685/former-head-of-product-for-opensea-indicted-after-insider-trading-scandal
• Resignation
• • https://www.coindesk.com/business/2021/09/16/opensea-exec-accused-of-insider-trading-leaves-company/
• Insider trading allegations
• • https://www.coindesk.com/business/2021/09/15/insider-trading-allegations-rock-opensea-nft-marketplace-responds/
• Twitter
• • https://twitter.com/natechastain 

Insider Trading and Crypto

• https://www.morrisoncohen.com/siteFiles/files/Insider%20Trading%20and%20Cryptocurrency%20-%20A%20Primer%20for%20Traders.pdf
• https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=132529

Taylor Monahan Recap of the Case

• https://twitter.com/tayvano_/status/1532085029857284101 

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Welcome to The Chopping Block! Crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, and Tarun Chitra chop it up about the latest news in the digital asset industry. Since Robert Leshner couldn’t make it, Laura also decided to hop on the show too! Show topics:

• how Terra is trying to rebuild
• what its value proposition is
• why Laura is surprised at how fast Do Kwon began shitposting again
• how teams affected by the Terra collapse, like Delphi Digital and Mars Protocol, are responding
• how its implosion will affect Cosmos
• why Tarun thinks Osmosis’ purchase of Keplr was the “best” purchase in crypto history
• whether the collapse of UST could help Cosmos in the long run
• what the legal implications of UST’s depeg will be
• whether Terra was a fraud like Theranos
• why Tarun thinks that investors should be sued for getting clients involved in Terra
• why Tarun thinks regulators are against 24-hour trading
• why Tarun thinks Matt Levine is a “boomer”
• what FTX’s chances are in getting approval from the CFTC to be the engine for 24-hour derivatives trading
• why NFTs are denominated in ETH/SOL instead of fiat
• why Tom doesn’t think airdrops matter
• what went wrong with the OP token drop

Hosts

• Haseeb Qureshi, managing partner at Dragonfly Capital
• https://twitter.com/hosseeb
• Tom Schmidt, general partner at Dragonfly Capital
• https://twitter.com/tomhschmidt
• Tarun Chitra, managing partner at Robot Ventures
• https://twitter.com/tarunchitra 

Guest

• Laura Shin, host of Unchained
• https://twitter.com/laurashin 

Show Topics

• Terra revival plan
• https://www.protocol.com/bulletins/terra-blockchain-restart-approved 
• LUNA 2.0
• https://fortune.com/2022/05/30/do-kwon-luna-2-airdrop-plunges/  
• LUNA airdrop calculation issues: 
• https://twitter.com/terra_money/status/1531410663674888192 
• https://agora.terra.money/t/terra-ecosystem-revival-plan-2-passed-gov/18498 
• Delphi Digital
• https://www.theblockcrypto.com/post/147755/delphi-digital-admits-we-were-wrong-on-terra-stablecoin-risks 
• Luna Classic
• https://www.theblockcrypto.com/post/149361/mirror-protocol-suffers-new-exploit-and-could-be-drained-in-hours 
• https://www.theblockcrypto.com/post/149342/a-90-million-defi-exploit-on-terra-went-unnoticed-for-seven-months 
• Korean prosecutors are looking to crackdown on Terra
• https://www.theblockcrypto.com/post/149309/terraform-labs-employees-summoned-korea-prosecutors-ust-luna 
• Adam Neumann crypto project
• ​​https://www.vox.com/recode/23142106/adam-neumann-crypto-carbon-credit-offset-flowcarbon 
• FTX and CFTC and CME
• https://twitter.com/aguye_/status/1529547230318718976 
• ​​https://www.theblockcrypto.com/linked/143792/as-it-weighs-ftx-proposal-cftc-announces-a-roundtable-on-disintermediation 
• https://www.theblockcrypto.com/post/148786/cftc-roundtable-on-ftx-proposal-highlights-barriers-in-clearing-of-digital-vs-physical-assets 
• Farmers vs FTX
• https://twitter.com/fintechfrank/status/1531605653269188608 
• CME word salad
• https://twitter.com/fintechfrank/status/1524811596421382144 
• Optimism Airdrop
• https://twitter.com/epolynya/status/1531719021833334784?s=21&t=MoImAkB4p8qwOV3p63sSnw
• https://dune.com/hildobby/op-airdrop 

Unchained Coverage on Optimism

• https://unchainedpodcast.com/will-optimisms-op-token-draw-people-back-to-layer-2s-on-ethereum/ 

Unchained Coverage on Osmosis and Keplr

• https://unchainedpodcast.com/how-osmosis-is-trying-to-improve-the-crypto-user-experience/ 

Unchained Coverage on FTX x CFTC

• https://unchainedpodcast.com/ftx-wants-to-compete-with-cme-heres-why-its-a-big-deal/

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Sunny Aggarwal, co-founder of Osmosis Labs, talks about how Osmosis is being built, the innovations that are coming, the reasons to use app chains, and much more. Show highlights:

• how Sunny got into crypto 
• how the DAO hack turned him off Ethereum at first 
• how the scaling issues with Ethereum got him interested in the Cosmos vision of app-chains
• why he is interested in Proof of Stake
• what the vision of Cosmos is
• how Sunny compares the evolution of blockchains with human evolution
• why he thinks that Cosmos integrates the best of Bitcoin and Ethereum networks
• why he thinks that having more than one Proof of Work chain is fundamentally insecure
• which three technologies are necessary for Cosmos to succeed
• what IBC and the Cosmos SDK do
• why Sunny decided to build Osmosis 
• how automated market makers are massively underexplored
• why UX is such a priority for the Osmosis team
• why Sunny does not want to list the OSMO token on other exchanges
• why Osmosis has a curated dex as well as a permissionless one
• how Osmosis governance works 
• how security is provided on Osmosis
• what superfluid staking is
• how CosmWasm helps Osmosis compete with centralized exchanges
• how Osmosis is solving frontrunning with threshold encryption
• why the Osmosis team chose Axelar for bridging
• whether Yuga Labs could have used an app chain 

Thank you to our sponsors!

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021

Beefy Finance: https://beefy.finance/

EPISODE LINKS

Sunny Aggarwal

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/sunnya97
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sunnya97/

COSMOS

• What is Cosmos: https://v1.cosmos.network/intro
• Cosmos whitepaper: https://v1.cosmos.network/resources/whitepaper
• CosmWasm: https://cosmwasm.com/
• Cosmos IBC: https://www.coinbase.com/es/cloud/discover/dev-foundations/ibc-protocol#:~:text=The%20Cosmos%20ecosystem%20has%20a,protocol%20(IBC)%20was%20created.
• Cosmos SDK: https://v1.cosmos.network/sdk

OSMOSIS 

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/OsmosisZone
• Website: https://osmosis.zone/
• Superfluid staking: https://medium.com/osmosis/osmosis-superfluid-staking-launch-feb-28-45f8e43064af
• Osmosis Vision: https://medium.com/osmosis/vision-for-osmosis-e68e796ff1c2
• Threshold Encryption: https://medium.com/zero-knowledge-validator/privacy-in-cosmos-defi-edition-event-summary-8cafda021aa6#:~:text=Threshold%20encryption%2C%20applied%20by%20Osmosis,of%20votes%20required%20for%20consensus.
• Osmosis Governance: https://docs.osmosis.zone/overview/governance.html

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Coy Garrison, former counsel to SEC Commissioner Hester Pierce and partner at Steptoe & Johnson, discusses the role of regulation in the crypto industry and what the SEC could be doing to make crypto a better space. Show notes:

• how Coy started working with crypto
• why Coy decided to leave the SEC
• why recent comments by SEC chair Gary Gensler made him hopeful in how the SEC approaches crypto
• how the crypto industry has grown and evolved over the years
• whether the regulations are impeding innovation in the crypto space
• how stablecoins should be regulated
• what Coy thinks about the UST collapse
• what is the SEC’s take on decentralization
• whether ETH is centralized and whether it is a commodity 
• why the SEC has not approved a BTC spot ETF

Thank you to our sponsors!

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021   

Coinchange: https://coinchange.io 

Ava Labs: https://avax.network

The Graph: https://thegraph.com/graph-day

EPISODE LINKS

Coy Garrison

• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coygarrison/

Steptoe & Johnson: https://www.steptoe.com/en/

Previous coverage of Unchained on regulation:

• Why the SEC’s Proposed Rules Affecting DeFi Could Violate the First Amendment: https://unchainedpodcast.com/why-the-secs-proposed-rules-affecting-defi-could-violate-the-first-amendment/

• Why Crypto Twitter’s Disrespect Toward Regulators Is a ‘Really Bad Business Decision’: https://unchainedpodcast.com/why-crypto-twitters-disrespect-toward-regulators-is-a-really-bad-business-decision/
• Can a DeF Smart Contract Be Regulated? Two CFTC Commissioners Discuss: https://unchainedpodcast.com/can-a-defi-smart-contract-be-regulated-two-cftc-commissioners-discuss/

Terra/Luna: 

• Why Terra Collapsed and Whether an Algo Stablecoin Can Ever Succeed: https://unchainedpodcast.com/why-terra-collapsed-and-whether-an-algo-stablecoin-can-ever-succeed/
• Did Someone Deliberately Attack Terra/Luna to Kick off a Death Spiral?: https://unchainedpodcast.com/did-someone-deliberately-attack-terra-luna-to-kick-off-a-death-spiral/
• The Chopping Block: Kevin Zhou on Why He Knew Terra Would Crash: https://unchainedpodcast.com/the-chopping-block-kevin-zhou-on-why-he-knew-terra-would-crash/
• The 5 Biggest Lessons From Terra/Luna’s Collapse, According to Tascha Che:  https://unchainedpodcast.com/the-5-biggest-lessons-from-terra-lunas-collapse-according-to-tascha-che/
• Here’s Why USDN De-Pegged From the Dollar – And Why UST Might Too: https://unchainedpodcast.com/heres-why-usdn-de-pegged-from-the-dollar-and-why-ust-might-too/

Bitcoin Futures ETF vs Spot ETF:

• https://medium.com/@laurashin/why-investment-experts-say-a-spot-bitcoin-etf-would-be-superior-to-bitcoin-futures-etfs-aaab862262ff

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Cobie, co-founder of Lido and UpOnlyTv, and Chris Burniske, partner at Placeholder Ventures, talk about surviving a crypto bear market, the Terra collapse, lessons they’ve learned from their mistakes, and much more. Show highlights:

• whether Chris and Cobie think crypto is in a bear market
• why Chris says these are the times to buy
• what effect the Terra debacle will have on the crypto industry
• why Chris was expecting UST to blow up
• why Chris thinks there is going to be another massive liquidation event
• whether an algo stablecoin could work
• why bear markets are sometimes a good thing
• how USDT was stress tested and proved its resilience
• how macro is affecting the crypto space and what the role of the Fed is
• when will we see the bottom of this bear market
• how meme coins are the symptoms of a broken system
• why this crypto cycle is different
• whether regulations are helping VCs rather than the retail investors
• why risky assets are the ones that could increase 10,000x 
• whether the future of crypto is multichain or not
• how developers signal what ecosystem is going to win in the next expansion cycle
• whether Cobie thinks staking is dying
• how Chris judges market bottoms and tops
• what lessons Cobie and Chris have learned from their mistakes
• what innovations will catalyze the next bull cycle
• what needs to happen in the future for crypto to succeed

Thank you to our sponsors!

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Episode Links

Cobie

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/cobie 
• UpOnlyTv: https://uponly.tv/
• Substack: https://cobie.substack.com/
• L1 trading: https://cobie.substack.com/p/trading-the-metagame?s=r
• Death of staking: https://cobie.substack.com/p/apecoin-and-the-death-of-staking?s=r
• Token unlocks: https://cobie.substack.com/p/on-the-meme-of-market-caps-and-unlocks?s=r
• Cycle Tweets:
• Why “the next cycle” reasoning scares him
• https://twitter.com/cobie/status/1524965475813568512
• What projects will survive the bear
• https://twitter.com/cobie/status/1469253171885318146
• His call to “buy” on March 12 2020
• https://twitter.com/cobie/status/1238282793244860417
• Which VCs will win
• https://twitter.com/cobie/status/1515667977118826500 

Chris Burniske

• LinkedIn
• https://www.linkedin.com/in/burniske/
• Twitter
• https://twitter.com/cburniske
• Previous Unchained episode
• https://unchainedpodcast.com/chris-burniske-a-blank-slate-of-state/
• https://unchainedpodcast.com/chris-burniske-of-placeholder-on-the-downsides-of-icos/
• https://unchainedpodcast.com/want-to-diversify-your-portfolio-try-bitcoin-say-arks-chris-burniske-and-coinbases-adam-white/
• https://unchainedpodcast.com/how-to-value-a-crypto-asset/
• Cycle Tweets
• Feb 2022 bear call
• https://twitter.com/cburniske/status/1495468570708426754
• March 2022 bear call
• https://twitter.com/cburniske/status/1523021991619428352 
• November 2021 top call
• https://twitter.com/cburniske/status/1457884538806308868 
• DCA advice
• https://twitter.com/cburniske/status/1525906152881459200
• https://twitter.com/cburniske/status/1500593438433021952 
• What could knock the market further down
• https://twitter.com/cburniske/status/1525157945079496705
• https://twitter.com/cburniske/status/1524260987787902978 
• 2017 ATH calls
• https://twitter.com/cburniske/status/1524838447784947712
• https://twitter.com/cburniske/status/1524524188366635008 
• Trying to time the bottom
• https://twitter.com/cburniske/status/1523573129431240710 

Chris x Cobie

• Luna
• https://twitter.com/cburniske/status/1524280637431164929 
• Feeling sorry for people who have lost $
• https://twitter.com/cburniske/status/1524267901456248832

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Tascha Che, founder of Tascha Labs, unpacks the Terra/Luna debacle and reveals what she believes are the five main takeaways from its collapse. Here are some highlights from the show:

• how stablecoin issuers make money
• what caused Terra’s downfall
• why Tascha is bullish on algo stablecoins
• whether she believes undercollateralized stablecoins can work
• how fast market cap expansion without actual network effect equals death for stablecoins
• why she doesn’t believe a stablecoin’s network effects mean much for its success
• why small(er) stablecoins are better
• how blockchains mirror national economies 
• which stablecoins is Tascha excited about
• how FRAX is a stablecoin that resembles fiat currencies
• whether the UST collapse will affect the stablecoin development and further regulation
• how cross-chain agreements would be helpful for the stability of the crypto ecosystem

Thank you to our sponsors!

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021      

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Episode Links

Tascha Che

• Twitter: 
• • https://twitter.com/TaschaLabs
• Tascha Labs: 
• • https://taschalabs.com/ 

• Tascha’s thread on nonobvious lessons from the Terra fallout: 
• • https://twitter.com/TaschaLabs/status/1526276308119932928?s=20&t=SCxfocBJoQqTEvCHadjYxA

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Welcome to The Chopping Block! Crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, and Tarun Chitra chop it up about the latest news in the digital asset industry. On this episode, Kevin Zhou, the CEO of Galois Capital and long-time critic of UST, also joined the conversation. Show topics:

• the UST depeg and Terra collapse 
• Kevin on what it was like being one of the earliest naysayers of LUNA
• why Kevin believes that UST initially depegged and became a “fear cascade”
• how Galois Capital traded the UST depeg, from shorting LUNA to keeping their UST in Anchor until the last moment
• why Kevin was disappointed in the lack of transparency in how Luna Foundation Guard attempted to defend the UST peg
• the implications of UST’s collapse across the crypto and traditional financial markets 
• whether Terra’s decline will lead to more regulation in the crypto industry
• why Anchor was the “cancer” of the Terra system 
• why VCs are reticent to say something bad about protocols they don’t believe in
• why grifting is so much more prevalent in crypto 
• what Jump Trading had to do with the Terra collapse
• the difference between the way trading and VC firms interact with crypto
• the issues with the Terra 2 proposal without UST
• which chains are receiving the people leaving the Terra ecosystem 
• why Haseeb compared the collapse of UST to the collapse of the Soviet Union
• who Kevin believes should be reimbursed in the aftermath of the UST collapse
• how political considerations might affect how Terra continues to develop going forward
• why Terra NFTs were skyrocketing during the Terra meltdown
• whether crypto is in a bear or bull market

Hosts

• Haseeb Qureshi, managing partner at Dragonfly Capital
• https://twitter.com/hosseeb
• Tom Schmidt, general partner at Dragonfly Capital
• https://twitter.com/tomhschmidt
• Tarun Chitra, managing partner at Robot Ventures
• https://twitter.com/tarunchitra 
• Robert Leshner, founder of Compound 
• https://twitter.com/rleshner 

Guest

• Kevin Zhou, CEO of Galois Capital
• https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevin-zhou-82938324/ 

Previous Unchained Coverage

• Nic Carter, Erik Voorhees, and Eric Wall on the collapse of UST
• https://unchainedpodcast.com/why-terra-collapsed-and-whether-an-algo-stablecoin-can-ever-succeed/ 
• Do Kwon on backing UST with BTC
• ​​https://unchainedpodcast.com/do-kwon-is-backing-ust-with-bitcoin-and-heres-what-else-he-is-building/
• Kevin Zhou on the risk of UST’s death spiral
• https://unchainedpodcast.com/heres-why-usdn-depegged-from-the-dollar-and-why-ust-might-too/ 
• Jon Wu on how Terra got depegged:
• https://unchainedpodcast.com/did-someone-deliberately-attack-terra-luna-to-kick-off-a-death-spiral/
• Do Kwon on The Chopping Block
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xl8u7-KVwM 

Haseeb’s summary of the Terra collapse:

• https://medium.com/dragonfly-research/the-reign-of-terra-the-rise-and-fall-of-ust-208dabbc8e6e

Jon Wu’s write-up on the UST Depeg

• Article: https://www.notboring.co/p/terra-to-the-moon-and-back 
• Thread: https://twitter.com/jonwu_/status/1523793482850050048?s=20&t=lvB1zdz98wu5TE5emh4fCw 

Terra Background Info 

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/terra_money 
• UST Mechanics: https://angelprotocol.medium.com/how-does-ust-work-ec7b2f6e2c2c
• UST Bank Run: https://www.wsj.com/articles/crash-of-terrausd-shakes-crypto-there-was-a-run-on-the-bank-11652371839
• Speculation of a deliberate attack: https://onchainwizard.substack.com/p/how-to-make-800m-in-crypto-soros?s=r
• Do Kwon’s Proposed Terra’s Revival: https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2022/05/13/do-kwon-proposes-restart-of-terra-blockchain-as-ust-luna-plummet/
• Anchor: https://twitter.com/anchor_protocol 
• Terra 2.0: https://unchainedpodcast.com/do-kwon-has-a-new-plan-again/ 

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Nic Carter, general partner at Castle Island Venture, Eric Wall, former Chief Investment Officer of Arcane Assets, and Erik Voorhees, founder of ShapeShift, discuss what happened with the TerraUSD (UST) and LUNA fiasco, Do Kwon’s responsibility, the impact on the crypto ecosystem, and much more. Show highlights: 

• how Erik used to feel that algo stablecoins were impossible and why he changed his mind
• why Eric considers that the demand for UST was tied to a sh*tcoin
• why Nic didn’t think LUNA would work
• how a stablecoin could theoretically be decentralized
• whether Nic, Eric, and Erik think this was a deliberate attack
• why they think whether or not there was a deliberate attack is not even relevant
• how the de-peg started with a liquidity issue on Curve
• why Nic thinks that Terra’s biggest mistake was the 19.5% APY on Anchor
• whether pursuing a decentralized stablecoin is a worthy goal
• what aspects of UST were decentralized, according to Erik
• whether algo stablecoins are dead or whether in the future, death spirals of algo stablecoins can be avoided
• why Erik believes that everything in the crypto space is an experiment, even BTC
• what it says that the VCs behind Terra knew were so reputable
• why Do Kwon's arrogance and inexperience might have caused this chaos
• whether Terra can be rebuilt
• whether this collapse imposes risks on other blockchains and other assets
• why the Luna Foundation Guard’s purchase of Bitcoin might have made the UST collapse even worse
• what Erik thinks about the global financial system and the US dollar
• how this event could trigger more regulation in the crypto space and why it might hurt the entire ecosystem
• how regulators might use the Terra case to impose CBDCs.

Thank you to our sponsors!

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Episode Links

Erik Vorhees 

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/ErikVoorhees

Eric Wall

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/ercwl

Nic Carter

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/nic__carter

Previous Unchained Coverage of Terra

• Do Kwon on backing UST with BTC
• • ​​https://unchainedpodcast.com/do-kwon-is-backing-ust-with-bitcoin-and-heres-what-else-he-is-building/
• Kevin Zhou on the risk of UST’s death spiral
• • https://unchainedpodcast.com/heres-why-usdn-de-pegged-from-the-dollar-and-why-ust-might-too/ 
• Jon Wu on how Terra got de-pegged:
• • https://unchainedpodcast.com/did-someone-deliberately-attack-terra-luna-to-kick-off-a-death-spiral/

Terra

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/terra_money 
• UST Mechanics: https://angelprotocol.medium.com/how-does-ust-work-ec7b2f6e2c2c
• Luna Foundation Guard: https://lfg.org/team/
• UST Bank Run: https://www.wsj.com/articles/crash-of-terrausd-shakes-crypto-there-was-a-run-on-the-bank-11652371839
• Speculation of a deliberate attack: https://onchainwizard.substack.com/p/how-to-make-800m-in-crypto-soros?s=r
• Do Kwon’s Proposed Terra’s Revival: https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2022/05/13/do-kwon-proposes-restart-of-terra-blockchain-as-ust-luna-plummet/
• Terra Blockchain Halted: https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/05/12/luna-issuer-terra-halts-blockchain-after-week-of-losses/

Upcoming Regulation

• https://www.protocol.com/bulletins/terra-stablecoin-loses-peg
• https://www.theblockcrypto.com/linked/146583/yellen-says-the-stablecoin-market-is-still-too-small-to-pose-systemic-risk

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Jon Wu, head of growth at Aztec Network, recaps a historically chaotic week in the Terra ecosystem that saw $UST depeg, Anchor depositors flee, and $LUNA fall 99%. Show highlights:

• how $UST, $LUNA, Luna Foundation Guard (LFG), and Anchor Protocol are supposed to work
• why Jon compares the Terra blockchain with VISA, LFG with the Fed, and Do Kwon with Jerome Powell
• how a previous $UST de-peg foreshadowed this week’s dystopian price action
• how a bitcoin short seemed to have kickstarted $UST’s depeg and why Jon thinks it was a deliberate attack
• why Luna Foundation Guard originally purchased Bitcoin – and how that plan backfired and made the Terra death spiral even more violent
• why $UST had such low liquidity this week – making it more susceptible to a bank run
• what Jon’s predictions are for $UST and $LUNA going forward
• what were the reasons behind Terra halting
• why Jon does not think this will be the end of algorithmic stablecoins
• why Jon thinks this should not affect ETH directly, even though there is a high amount of staked ETH in the Terra ecosystem

Thank you to our sponsors!

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Episode Links

Jon Wu

• Twitter
  • https://twitter.com/jonwu_

Jon’s Write-Up on the UST Depeg

• Article: https://www.notboring.co/p/terra-to-the-moon-and-back 
• Thread: https://twitter.com/jonwu_/status/1523793482850050048?s=20&t=lvB1zdz98wu5TE5emh4fCw 

Previous Unchained Coverage of Terra

• Do Kwon on backing UST with BTC
  • ​​https://unchainedpodcast.com/do-kwon-is-backing-ust-with-bitcoin-and-heres-what-else-he-is-building/
• Kevin Zhou on the risk of UST’s death spiral
  • https://unchainedpodcast.com/heres-why-usdn-de-pegged-from-the-dollar-and-why-ust-might-too/ 

Terra:

• Terra proposal to accelerate the burn of UST and increase the base pool: https://station.terra.money/proposal/1164 
  • https://www.theblockcrypto.com/post/146254/terraform-labs-ceo-do-kwon-unveils-plan-to-restore-ust-peg
• Terra halting the network: https://twitter.com/terra_money/status/1524785058296778752?s=20&t=FUJkFuN8PyxRoF9TCPgrGg
• Terra going live again: https://twitter.com/terra_money/status/1524812171179327488?s=20&t=FUJkFuN8PyxRoF9TCPgrGg
• Regulatory risks: https://www.theblockcrypto.com/post/146426/the-sec-has-already-sued-terraform-labs-it-has-every-reason-to-investigate-ust-lawyers-say 

Other Recaps on Terra: 

• CoinDesk on how Do Kwon was behind previous algorithmic stablecoin: https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2022/05/11/usts-do-kwon-was-behind-earlier-failed-stablecoin-ex-terra-colleagues-say/ 
• Rekt: https://rekt.news/luna-rekt/

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Kain Warwick, founder of Synthetix, and Ben Jones, cofounder and chief scientist at Optimism Foundation, discuss the current state of Ethereum Layer 2s, Optimism’s new governance structure, why Synthetix chose to build on Optimism, and more. Show topics:

1. what Optimism and Synthetix are
2. how zero-knowledge rollups differ from optimistic rollups
3. why Synthetix decided to build on Optimism
4. what makes L2s more enticing to build on than other L1s
5. how Optimism’s governance is going to change with the launch of the Optimism Collective and OP token
6. what issues Synthetix has had with Discord governance and early token voting, and how they have now solved this by forcing users to consolidate wallet addresses
7. what retroactive public goods funding is and how it could create a “flywheel” of development on Optimism
8. why whales might be excluded from Optimism’s token grant to Synthetix
9. why Ben thinks the future is about the “superchain” rather than multi-chain 
10. what Kain and Ben think about bridging between L2s and Mainnet
11. why Optimism is a staunch backer of EIP 4844
12. how the merge could affect Optimism and Synthetix

Thank you to our sponsors!

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Episode Links

Guests

• Ben Jones: https://twitter.com/ben_chain
• Kain Warwick: https://twitter.com/kaiynne 

Synthetix

• https://twitter.com/synthetix_io

Optimism

• https://twitter.com/optimismPBC 

Optimism Collective

• https://optimism.mirror.xyz/gQWKlrDqHzdKPsB1iUnI-cVN3v0NvsWnazK7ajlt1fI 

Synthetix Launching on Optimism

• https://blog.synthetix.io/optimism-launch-announcement/ 

Synthetix Governance

• https://docs.synthetix.io/governance/ 

Kain’s Blog

• https://blog.synthetix.io/author/kain/ 

Rollups

• What are the biggest risks to optimistic rollup chains?
• • https://vitalik.ca/general/2021/01/05/rollup.html#:~:text=Anatomy%20of%20a%20fraud%20proof 

• What is the difference between optimistic and ZK rollups? And why did Synthetix choose Optimism?
• • https://blog.matter-labs.io/optimistic-vs-zk-rollup-deep-dive-ea141e71e075 

EIP 4844

• https://eips.ethereum.org/EIPS/eip-4844
• https://www.eip4844.com/

The Merge

• https://unchainedpodcast.com/why-ethereums-merge-was-delayed-and-why-it-wont-reduce-gas-fees-much/ 

Kain’s previous Unchained appearances

• Ethereum killers episode
• • https://unchainedpodcast.com/how-solana-and-binance-smart-chain-could-take-ethereums-lead/
• How Synthetix became the second-largest DeFi platform
• • https://unchainedpodcast.com/how-synthetix-became-the-second-largest-defi-platform/
• DeFi summer
• • https://unchainedpodcast.com/why-comp-5xed-on-day-1-and-what-this-means-for-a-defi-bull-market/ 

Optimism’s Bridging Solution

• https://twitter.com/optimismPBC/status/1517548430297604096 

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Eric Golden, the owner of BAYC #7560 and host of Web3 Breakdowns, discusses the Otherdeed NFT drop that stalled Ethereum and burned over $150 million worth of ether. Show topics:

• what the Otherdeed mint is 
• Why Yuga Labs had buyers undergo a know-your-customer process in order to mint the NFTs
• why Eric was pretty certain a gas war was imminent in the hours leading up to the mint
• how KYC’d addresses played into the Otherdeed mint
• what Eric thought about Yuga Labs’s decision to scrap a Dutch auction in favor of a flat minting price
• why Eric does not believe Yuga Labs purposefully botched their smart contract, as many in the Ethereum community alleged
• why Eric was frustrated with Yuga Labs’s response on Twitter to the mint 
• why Eric does not think Otherside needs its own chain
• what effect the Otherdeed mint is having on other Yuga Labs-adjacent assets like ApeCoin and Bored Ape Yacht Club
• what Kodas are and why they are trading for tens of thousands of dollars
• why Eric is confident that Yuga Labs is well-positioned to follow through on their promises to build out a metaverse game

Thank you to our sponsors!

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Episode Links

Eric Golden

• https://twitter.com/ericgoldenx

Otherside

• https://otherside.xyz/

Otherdeed License

• ​​https://otherside.xyz/license
• Punk6529 thread:
• • https://twitter.com/punk6529/status/1520697396119879680 
• CryptoGarga saying at least one term in the license would be changed: 
• • https://twitter.com/CryptoGarga/status/1520818410149617666 

Otherdeed

• Yuga Labs’ response to the sale:
• • https://twitter.com/yugalabs/status/1520612362986078208 
• NFTs: https://opensea.io/collection/otherdeed 
• Canceling the Dutch auction
• • https://www.theblockcrypto.com/linked/144298/yuga-labss-otherside-scraps-dutch-style-auction-for-nft-sale 
• 0xcrumbs’s tweet showing there was more demand than supply:
• • https://twitter.com/0xCrumbs/status/1520559050592817152?s=20&t=ngPe9YzByzwJbMa_N1hThw
• CoinDesk coverage:
• • https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/05/01/bayc-team-raises-285m-with-otherside-nfts-clogs-ethereum/
  • https://www.coindesk.com/layer2/2022/05/04/the-yuga-labs-catastrophe-could-have-been-prevented/ 

Smart Contract Conversation

• Will Papper: https://twitter.com/WillPapper/status/1520592312379658241
• Vitalik Buterin:  ​https://twitter.com/VitalikButerin/status/1520621813209784321 

Kodas

• https://medium.com/@jseid212/koda-rarity-ranking-the-newest-creatures-in-the-yuga-lab-ecosystem-9e6adba0ab68 

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Welcome to The Chopping Block! Crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, Robert Leshner, and Tarun Chitra chop it up about the latest news in the digital asset industry. On this episode, Andre Cronje, the recently retired (sort of) DeFi developer, also joined the conversation. Show topics:

• why being doxxed led to Andre retiring (sort of) from crypto
• Andre’s response to Robert who calledl his departure from DeFi “an epic rug pull” 
• why Andre is back – and why he is working on “regulated” crypto products
• how the Otherside KYC’d NFT drop was an “absolute fail”
• where identity fits into the crypto space and why traditional and DeFi institutions alike are interested in the identity of their users
• Dalle 2
• why the Bored Ape community likely sees the Yuga Labs Otherdeed NFT sale as a turning point
• why Robert would compare buying a BAYC NFT last year to purchasing BTC in 2010
• main takeaways from Solana’s seven-hour outage and why designing a mempool (or multiple) is critical for the chain
•  

Hosts

• Haseeb Qureshi, managing partner at Dragonfly Capital
• https://twitter.com/hosseeb
• Tom Schmidt, general partner at Dragonfly Capital
• https://twitter.com/tomhschmidt
• Tarun Chitra, managing partner at Robot Ventures
• https://twitter.com/tarunchitra 
• Robert Leshner, founder of Compound 
• https://twitter.com/rleshner 

Guest

• Andre Cronje, DeFi OG
• https://www.linkedin.com/in/andre-cronje 

Show Topics

• Andre Cronje’s Retirement
• https://unchainedpodcast.com/this-defi-og-is-leaving-crypto/
• Andre Cronje’s return to regulated crypto
• https://andrecronje.medium.com/crypto-regulation-vs-regulated-crypto-aae56b36dcd8 
• Solana outage 
• https://www.theblockcrypto.com/linked/144639/solana-restarted-after-seven-hour-outage-caused-by-surge-of-transactions
• https://twitter.com/0xEdgar/status/1521188981538537472
• https://github.com/metaplex-foundation/metaplex-program-library/pull/417
• Yuga Labs rakes in $317MM from the sale of Otherside land NFTs and causes huge congestion on Ethereum.
• https://www.theblockcrypto.com/linked/144549/otherside-land-nfts-sell-out-in-hours-as-yuga-labs-rakes-in-317-million

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André Allen Anjos, who is better known as the crypto-friendly artist RAC, and David Greenstein, co-founder of Sound.xyz, a web3 music platform, analyze the current state of the web3 music scene and discuss how artists can leverage web3 tools to get paid at fair market value for their art. 

Show highlights:

RAC’s experience in the traditional music industry

why David believes music is the most undervalued sector in the world – and how Sound and crypto can help value it correctly

the different types of NFTs with which musicians like RAC are experimenting

what Sound.xyz is and how it is helping artists unlock their fanbase and community

why David is so passionate about creating a social experience when it comes to music NFTs

Sound.xyz’s decision to allow artists to deploy their own smart contracts

what RAC has made in NFT drops compared to Spotify streams

why Sound.xyz was built with “editions” as the most common format for NFTs sold on the platform

what makes blockchain technology well-suited for the music industry

RAC’s crypto adventures: $TAPE, $RAC, and more …

how the famous “Amen Break” sample would work as an NFT

what artists will be measured by in the NFT world

Thank you to our sponsors!

Crypto.com: https://crypto.onelink.me/J9Lg/unconfirmedcardearnfeb2021     

Coinchange: https://coinchange.io   

OnJuno: https://onjuno.com/ 

Episode Links

David Greenstein

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidgreenstein/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/dgreenstein1?lang=en

RAC

Twitter: https://twitter.com/RAC

Website: https://rac.fm/

Crypto Adventures

RAC Token

https://etherscan.io/address/0xc22b30e4cce6b78aaaadae91e44e73593929a3e9

https://v2.info.uniswap.org/pair/0xf744417d0a5fd18b5b18726ce1b48f931dfa32ea

https://blog.ourzora.com/home/introducing-rac

https://www.billboard.com/pro/rac-nfts-social-token-platform-racos-web3/

Music NFTs (w/ Sound.xyz embeds)

https://rac.fm/nfts

Discord

https://discord.com/invite/rac

Tokenized cassette tape

https://www.theblockcrypto.com/post/64760/ethereum-tokenized-cassette-dj-rac-zora-grammy

Sound.xyz

Website

https://www.sound.xyz/

FAQs

https://soundxyz.notion.site/soundxyz/Frequently-Asked-Questions-1-0e39e44edccb42f8b3c3ca5d93c703a9

Recent raise

https://techcrunch.com/2021/12/15/sound-xyz-raises-5m-from-a16z-to-explore-how-web3-can-upend-the-economics-of-the-music-business/

Recent drops that are fun

Bored Ape Yacht Club Band

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Chris Perkins, president of CoinFund, a web3 investment firm, discusses his experience at the Crypto Bahamas conference before diving into an FTX.US proposal that would allow for direct trading of crypto derivatives in the US – which appears to be rocking the boat of certain regulators in D.C. Show topics:

• Chris’s two biggest takeaways from his Crypto Bahamas experience
• how Chris’s experience at Lehman Brothers and Citi prepared him for crypto 
• what issues arise via the plumbing of traditional financial markets
• why centralized intermediaries make derivatives trading efficient
• what FTX.US is proposing and how it could be a boon for retail traders
• how crypto settlement would work compared to the current batch trading method
• why the acquisition of LedgerX enabled FTX.US to make this proposal
• what license FTX.US feels like it no longer needs since it can settle derivative transactions on a blockchain
• whether FTX.US would expand to other derivatives and what that might do to an entity like CME
• what Chris is listening for in the CFTC’s public discussion surrounding FTX.US’s proposal 
• whether FTX.US’s proposal will be a partisan issue

Thank you to our sponsors!

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Episode Links

Chris Perkins

• LinkedIn: 
• • ​​https://www.linkedin.com/in/christopher-perkins-092569a/
• Twitter: 
• • https://twitter.com/perkinscr97 
• CoinFund: 
• • ​​https://twitter.com/coinfund_io 

Coverage of the FTX.US Proposal

• Bloomberg: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-04-21/crypto-billionaire-rankles-wall-street-with-futures-trading-plan?sref=m9L277rN 
• Forbes:
• • https://www.forbes.com/sites/jasonbrett/2022/04/27/the-ftx-us-proposal-that-shook-congress-and-the-crypto-derivatives-world/
• The Block:
• • https://www.theblockcrypto.com/linked/143792/as-it-weighs-ftx-proposal-cftc-announces-a-roundtable-on-disintermediation 
  • https://www.theblockcrypto.com/post/137304/cftc-opens-up-ftx-uss-derivatives-trading-model-to-public-comment 
  • https://www.theblockcrypto.com/linked/140026/ftx-derivatives-proposal-takes-center-stage-at-congressional-hearing-with-cftc-chairman 
• CoinDesk
• • https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/03/10/ftxus-derivatives-unit-seeks-cftc-amendment-to-clear-margin-trades-directly-for-customers/
  • https://www.coindesk.com/video/recent-videos/ftx-us-to-meet-with-cftc-regarding-derivatives-trades/ 
• Public comment: 
• • https://www.theblockcrypto.com/post/137304/cftc-opens-up-ftx-uss-derivatives-trading-model-to-public-comment
• May roundtable: 
• • https://www.cftc.gov/PressRoom/PressReleases/8519-22
  • https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2022/04/19/ftx-plan-said-to-face-cftc-roundtable-next-month/
  • https://www.theblockcrypto.com/linked/143792/as-it-weighs-ftx-proposal-cftc-announces-a-roundtable-on-disintermediation
• CME opposition to proposal: 
• • ​​https://www.marketsmedia.com/cme-to-oppose-ftx-clearing-proposal/

Unchained Coverage of FTX.US and LedgerX

• 2021:
• • https://unchainedpodcast.com/why-the-ftx-us-ledgerx-deal-indicates-crypto-ma-might-start-booming/ 
• 2019:
• • https://unchainedpodcast.com/ledgerx-on-the-reasons-to-trade-bitcoin-options/ 

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Amy Wu, head of FTX ventures and gaming initiatives, discusses her role at FTX, what problems need to be addressed in the web3 gaming world, and her thoughts on APE and Yuga Labs as a board member of Apecoin DAO and investor in Yuga Labs. Show highlights:

• what Amy does at FTX
• how her background investing in gaming prepared her for her role at FTX
• Amy’s vision for FTX’s gaming studio
• how FTX is helping gaming studios get into web3 and NFTs
• why Amy thinks blockchain games are the evolution of the ‘free to play’ gaming archetype
• what best practices Amy believes web2 companies should implement when transitioning into web3 gaming
• why there is so much backlash against traditional companies incorporating NFTs (hint: it’s not just about environmental concerns)
• how FTX Ventures is looking to deploy capital and why it is so interested in Korea and India, specifically
• why Amy thinks the L1 wars will end with just a few winning chains
• why “consumer products” are going to be more important than high throughput blockchains in onboarding the next billion users
• what Amy’s role as a board member of Apecoin DAO is like
• what Amy thinks about APE and Yuga Labs
• trends for the rest of 2022: social media, dating apps, and more…

Tickets to the Cryptopians Book Clubs Go on Sale Today at 1pm ET!

Today, Tuesday, April 26, at 1pm Eastern Time, we will sell the NFT tickets to five book clubs to discuss my book, The Cryptopians. All the book clubs, which are 90 minutes and limited to 22 participants each, will be hosted by me and will take place on my Discord from May 2nd to May 10th. The sale will will take place on Bitski: bitski.com/@laurashin/created

The dates and times for the book clubs are: 

• Monday, May 2, at 8 pm ET 
• Tuesday May 3, at 1pm ET with Lefteris Karapetsas, Griff Green, and Christoph Jentzsch of the DAO
• Thursday, May 5, at 12pm
• Monday, May 9, at 12pm ET with Andrey Ternovskiy of Chatroulette
• Tuesday, May 10, at 3pm ET

Again, the link for the sale is at https://www.bitski.com/@laurashin/created. 

Also, join me for a Twitter Spaces, hosted by Bitski (https://twitter.com/bitski), at 12pm ET today. 

Unchained Is Hiring! 

Find out information on the three openings at Unchained and how to apply here: 

• part-time remote social media marketing manager:
• •  https://unchainedpodcast.com/seeking-part-time-remote-social-media-and-marketing-manager/
• part-time remote editorial assistant:
• • https://unchainedpodcast.com/seeking-remote-editorial-assistant/
• part-time remote video/audio producer:
• • https://unchainedpodcast.com/seeking-part-time-remote-video-audio-producer/a

Thank you to our sponsors!

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Episode Links

Amy Wu

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/amytongwu/ 
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/amytongwu 

Roles

• FTX Gaming
• • https://twitter.com/amytongwu/status/1495834891858100232
• Apecoin DAO Board
• • https://twitter.com/amytongwu/status/1504238389737967622 
• FTX Ventures
• • https://ventures.ftx.com/ 

FTX Stuff Going On

• NFT lounge at Coachella
• • https://twitter.com/amytongwu/status/1515407892693745665
• FTX Ventures x SuperteamDAO (India)
• • https://twitter.com/ajm_ftx/status/1510339725059629058
• Acquisition of Good Luck Games
• • https://twitter.com/amytongwu/status/1506308327399063557
  • • Backlash
    • `https://kotaku.com/nft-crypto-blcckchain-storybook-brawl-card-f2p-steam-re-1848708120 
• FTX Africa
• • https://twitter.com/amytongwu/status/1504095099873280005 
• Com2uS, a publicly-traded company, launched a token on FTX
• • `https://twitter.com/amytongwu/status/1501675620832583684 
• FTX launch in Europe
• • https://twitter.com/amytongwu/status/1500902895880974340
• YGG India push for FTX
• • https://twitter.com/amytongwu/status/1499075404887465994 
• FTX Future Fund
• • https://ftxfuturefund.org/announcing-the-future-fund/ 
• $400 million raise w/ plans for M&A’s
• • https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-01-31/bankman-fried-s-ftx-valued-at-32-billion-after-latest-round 

Miscellaneous

• Blockchain gaming backlash
• • https://www.vice.com/en/article/xgd78d/the-crypto-revolution-is-an-existential-crisis-for-video-games 

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