The $100 Trillion Unallocated Wall & Bitcoin’s Coming Supply Squeeze

[Music] It all comes down to computers communicating. The information superighway can be a confusing mix of on-ramps and off-ramps. Bitcoin is worthless artificial gold. Is it still rat poison? Probably rat poison squared. We need to get into the world of okay, this is actually foundational technology. What the internet of money does is it creates a single network which can do a microtransaction to a giga transaction. The internet is going to be one of the major forces for reducing the roll of gun. The one thing that's missing but that will soon be developed is a reliable ecash. Welcome back to another episode of Final Settlement. Today is Monday, June 9th, 2025. How's it going, boys? Fantastic. Going good, man. I This world's crazy. I feel like we just Bitcoin's volatility. You go to bed one night, it's, you know, 76. Now, now you're at 105. You got Alain, Elon in, out, Trump. The end of the bromance, the rekindling of the bromance. Where are we at? You got Circle, you know, trading at what was it? They were priced at like $28 a share and they're at like 120 or something crazy and everyone's screaming on how Tether should be more valuable. Um it's just it's a wild world. It's a amazing timeline. Yeah. Yeah. No shortage of topics. We could jump into uh Michael, your favorite topic, stable coin news. There's some some activity there. Obviously, the Circle IPO that you referenced, Liam, I know you've done some work there. Maybe is that a that a good place to start? There's no shortage of uh of topics. What do you guys think? Stable coins. Let's hear it. Yeah. I mean, I think it all kind of makes a lot more sense now. I think when you know, one of the reasons I would hope we provide value on this podcast and I think it's helpful for us is when you go deep down the bat rabbit hole, Bitcoin rabbit hole, you end up in a in a everyone has their own frame of reference. So you like have your myopic view I guess because everyone is comes from a different background and it's ultimately up to the individual to be a critical thinker to continue to like grow the thesis understand plus on what Bitcoin is that's always a journey but then how does it play into the the market how does how will it integrate how will it get to be money at the end of the day and other people you know and everyone has their own reference exists and backgrounds and so point in saying that is like stables have been of interest the past couple months because of this market structure and thinking about well what does it mean for the landscape and and I I started to get really bullish after seeing um I forgot what it was I think it was I don't know if it was the the uh approval or like what was getting passed through the house but it was ultimately this understanding that the path to bitcoin is through stable coins at the end of the day like that's the the whole thing when you think about whether it's the digitization of a dollar to get access to BTC all the way to how does somebody start to think about permissionless or quoteunquote permissionless like getting rid of intermediaries and movement of global cap global a lot of people don't just necessarily jump direct BTC stable coins will be that first layer and there's a whole slew that's just like high level um but it's insanely it's insanely bullish for everything happening uh there was a recent podcast I shared in the Slack channel before this with Scott Milker and Bo Hines that was about 20 minutes long um that took place in Vegas and they were referencing ultimately a little bit about the market structure of the stable coin bill. Um, but also they have like an implementation method like there he's telling you like play for play. It's like Tom Brady sitting behind the scenes watching like Monday Night Football and explaining what's happening in in between that like game. He's explaining where we sit today uh as far as from from like the approval regulatory approval market structure coming next and then how they have an implementation method with the banking system as part of like the next partis cohort. So I think a lot of people think there's chaos and they're looking at these different sectors. But at the end of the day, u that's what's happening. And then I guess the last part is it makes complete sense why circle's trading at the premium they are is because institutional allocators ultimately here are stable coins, they think blockchain, they think innovation, which there is some innovation. And so it's their way from an institutional allocator's perspective to express their view on the asset class because there's one publicly traded vehicle for it. And just to go a little bit deeper there, I this all is going to tie back to Bitcoin. So bear with me here, but it's it's helpful to understand how institutional money gets out um you know interested in Bitcoin and gets exposure. So if somebody wants to buy or sell Bitcoin that you know is doing a substantial amount, they typically go to a prime broker that could be Coinbase Prime, Binance uh has that aspect as well or an independent entity like Sox. they will either deposit their Bitcoin or they'll deposit their dollars. And they typically can deposit all of it or do some amount on credit as well. Um, and then through those prime brokers, they will get the ability to buy large sums, buy or sell large sums of Bitcoin and settle that through uh independent OTC desks. Whoever have the best um, you know, amount or can give them the best price. the OTC desk then will either hedge out of the spot immediately or they will then um you know warehouse some of the inventory risk and that's kind of how the market works. So, taking a step back to 2020 and 2022 um when everything went absolutely sideways, you saw, you know, Alita, part of FTX as well as Genesis blow up and have um they they weren't able to adequately hedge their uh risk on the OTC side of things. So, um, and and on the prime broker side, they they don't necessarily need to deposit all of their capital, so they can get loans on their, uh, and and have essentially a margin on how much money they can trade. And so, when they go underwater, um, and and and there's two aspects to this as well. they can put their bitcoin in bitco wallet or they can put their dollars in a bank and when uh everything blew up because the main banks were signature and silvergate um that were serving the the bitcoin and crypto industry they essentially had to move to another asset class and that's where stables uh came in and they just wanted to settle in uh stable coins rather than just you know have risk to a bank where they they couldn't necessarily they didn't know if the bank was going to go under and then and the bank has their own loans and counterparty risk as well. And so um one they had to do it out of necessity because the bank went under and then two the there's just like reduced fris friction and layers of risk in that involved. And so, um, the industry has kind of shifted that way. And, uh, it's not necessarily just going to be bit, uh, you know, people that want to trade Bitcoin and and broader digital assets that want exposure to stable coins as their ultimate settlement layer, but it's going to be other industries as well that just are a little bit more worried about the risk at the margin. And so it's uh you you keep on seeing all these banks coming into the space and uh trying to get their own share of the stable coin market because they realize that they're going to lose deposits in the end. And tying this all back to Bitcoin, it's ultimately all about the trader and you know it's it's typically hedge funds trying to understand their counterparty risk and uh you know these stable coins still have counterparty risk as well whether it's circle, tether or whichever one comes next. And ultimately um I think that on the margins there will be more really large ed uh players that are educated about this and really understand that Bitcoin is really the only ultimate riskoff asset where you know they can ultimately control their keys themselves or be in a bankruptcy remote account that's not controlled by a single counterparty on the other side. Yeah. No, it's really well said and I think the biggest thing to me is is sort of Michael what you've alluded to is like just normalizing um digital dollars and having that basically UIUX get very clean and frictionless where it's like the dollar sit right next to your Bitcoin and that that chasm that has previously existed uh just gets smaller and smaller and smaller to where it becomes commonplace and extremely easy to save in Bitcoin, spend in dollars. Um, and to your point, Liam, be more and more detached from some of the more inherent risks of the actual traditional banking system. Um, and so up on the screen right now is is uh Circle stock price up 17% already this morning. I think it opened at 31 last week. Liam, you said you dug into a little bit around Circle specifically over the weekend. Any any thoughts around uh where this is trading currently? Well, yeah. I mean, maybe before go that because uh I I want to I'll let Liam go there and then I'll reference something about Circle. But before going to that, um everything Liam shared is absolutely right. I'm glad he ended on the point of like stable coins are going to affect much larger industries than Bitcoin. Uh and that's what the plan is. And there's a notion that we talk about a lot internally, whether it's an on-ramp or early riders. And um you know you're really on to something when you're kind of building as close to Bitcoin and and the underlying thesis or a lot of the uh anecdotes you referenced and and when I hear all the stuff we're just talking about it's like everything's good for Bitcoin. Everything's good for on early writers because what Liam just described is ultimately what we I was looking up the date. It was July 15th. It was episode eight of the last trade. We talked about Larry Frink was going to securitize or I was referencing Larry Fink was going to securitize Bitcoin. And I was thinking at the time he and it still is, but the ETF is the security. But the reality is everything is going to get securitized via digital whatever tokens and then everything is going to be traded between these USDC or whatever the token is. And a lot of people are going to conflate what Bitcoin is or what value is, what the stable coins and as Liam alluded to, they're all, you know, permission blockchains. They're not permissionless. And over time as certain individuals and groups build businesses to the underlying principles of understanding the robustness of Bitcoin and you know aligning with the value there. They're going to reap outsized rewards in the same way we talk about Bitcoin and people listen here and have majority of their wealth in Bitcoin and understand the reason why it just takes time and we're just ahead of that curve. Um so anyway that was just kind of like the anecdote of when you think about investing in the ecosystem as well. If you're playing a game for three, five, 10 years, you're building businesses that when the market wakes up to counterparty risk or realizing who holds the underlying or what are the trading pairs like stable coins are great and I think if you're not enough bitcoin companies implement and integrate them and that's like an interesting p u thing in itself of imagine like a you know whether it's enterprise business exchange like bitcoin and stablecoin working nicely next to each other for global accessibility you don't really see a lot of that usually just jealousy crypto firms. Um, so anyway, there's a lot of opportunity out out there, but it has to like be rooted back to the fundamentals of where this goes and where it goes is the market realizes 21 million is like non-negotiable and then more and more people want that aspect. 100%. And stable coins have kind of just taken some of the good aspects of Bitcoin and implemented them on the dollar side of things. I mean the real when when you see the crypto industry at large um there are two main drivers of value. One is liquidity which you know the dollar has plenty of. Uh Bitcoin is is second to that but you know dollars don't necessarily have a stable store of value over a long time horizon. It it continues to be debased and you know if you can have a slice of the 21 million you're going to continue to have that no matter what. Um, and so it's it's a marginal upgrade to the banking system when you think about counterparty risk. It's not permissionless. Um, but it's it's moving in the right direction. Um, and and tying back to circle a little bit too, I certainly uh I haven't looked deep into their financials and um, you know, definitely not going to I'm not interested in investing in a stable coin uh, at all. And so, um, definitely not going to make a call one way or the other, but, um, when you kind of look at how things are structured, it's it's primarily, uh, USDT, Binance are, um, you know, the biggest trading pairs in and kind of the east. Um, and that's how they run their Binance Prime desk. And then, uh, but over here in the west, it's primarily using Coinbase and they've integrated deep with um, USDC. And so it's it's not necessarily a call one way or the other. It's just kind of understanding where the world is and how institutional money here in the the east is primarily looking at USDC because Coinbase is uh you know partnered with them pretty deeply in terms of their preferred stable coin. Yeah, I think I think on the stable coin side and maybe transitioning um I think it's going to be fun when the real players get in like when you you know it came out publicly that Fidelity was testing something there and we know that some of these other I think it came out that the big four banks were working on something. Um but I think that ties into Let me see if I can share my screen really quick. Oh yeah, so Brian just popped that up as well. Well, I mean, this was another kind of really bullish thing that I don't think got enough uh juice. Brian pulled up um I think it was originally like one of the bigger tech platforms. I forgot what the source was, but Apple, Airbnb, goo Google, and I think Uber are referencing um using stable coins. And then I think like uh what's his name? Dra from Uber referenced that Bitcoin is like a store of value or just gave some kind of credence which you generally don't hear Silicon Valley talk about. Um, but what I was going to pull up really quickly was uh Open Range, the newsletter from Onramp, or I'm sorry, Early Writers that comes out Sunday from Liam. Um, there was a few a few notable things. There really two that tie into this. Um, let me see if I can do it. I have it. Uh, here we go. Yeah. So the the first one I was going to reference because it ties into this is the instit industry and institutional updates. JP Morgan will now accept shares of Black Rockck high shares Bitcoin trust. I think that came out after we had this episode last week. And I think obviously that's huge um given that they referenced they're going to allow for uh I believe all wealth clients or all clients, it's not just going to be the private wealth to get exposure or access to loans, but then also various other exposures. I don't think it was just IVIT. it was referencing other bit, you know, Bitcoin or crypto assets. Um, and I think that's important because when you think about this is the direction all banks will be going is lending against the underlying, not only do they have the lowest cost of capital, but they also will be having stable coin integration. So, you think about um the ability just to lend against your asset sitting right there in your bank account like not only for adoption, but for like the price, the the the liquidity from not selling. Um, I'll pause there. There was one other thing I wanted to call out on this, but uh yeah. Yeah. Lots lots in the uh in the newsletter that came out yesterday that we have up on the screen here. Um as you mentioned in the JP Morgan news circle stuff, uh one one thing I thought was interesting was Spurbank, which is largest uh Russia's largest bank, uh basically announced some sort of quasi bit bond uh structure that they're going to be pioneering. So, I talked a little bit about this on the last trade from last week, but this idea of of sort of Bitcoin in general, strategic reserves, bit bonds, these tighter integrations with the tra traditional finance system. Um, you know, the United States and this administration has kind of just put these things into the zeitgeist and now you're seeing um sort of that flow across the world. Um, Russia as an example. There was also um South Korea last week uh their newly elected president. A lot of his campaign um promises were around uh legalizing Bitcoin ETFs which are still not available in that country u despite it being you know I think it's 12th largest GDP in in the world and also a pretty crypto forward uh populace you know actual citizens and their interest in crypto. Um so you see sort of a lot of this um flowing across the world even though you know I think there's been uh there was some initial fanfare around the strategic reserve haven't had a ton of followthrough on it like you you mentioned that Bohines interview from from over the weekend I think um it's coming back to the four now I forget the exact timeline on when um the report is due that is basically going to uh reinvigorate some of that discussion around well one the audit of how how much Bitcoin do we have? Uh and then two, how are we uh potentially going to accumulate more Bitcoin for reserve? Um so expect that sort of you know uh the next month or so to to um sort of gain more traction again and come back into the limelight. But the point is just us saying these things um has sort of manifested across the globe and and you're seeing some knock-on effects of that. Yeah, 100%. I mean the the biggest one still that's at the forefront of my mind is uh I forget if it was MGX or Mubatala's uh you know $2 billion investment in Binance. I mean that's that's a big big sign um of you know the Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund getting involved and you know they have shares by bit um and and they certainly have the underlying as well. Uh I I think it's just like they're one of these countries who who kind of positions themselves as uh partnered with a bunch of different um you know both both the east and the west. And I think that um the rhetoric that's going on, you know, both about Russia's largest exchange as well as their largest bank, you know, giving institutional access to uh at least dollar denominated Bitcoin uh bonds and and uh futures trading is is definitely um not anything to understate. It's kind of the the geopolitical flow of funds is is definitely shifting uh a little bit more towards uh Bitcoin as well just on the margins. Yeah, I think um there's something interesting. It's like a paradox that the more global trade breaks down, the more people will drive to Bitcoin because if you think about it, if you had treasuries and dollars as your kind of medium of exchange and store value and as that becomes more and more untenable, um naturally people will go towards Bitcoin and understanding it and understanding the properties. Um the other aspect that was in that document which we we have we're doing so many pods now we talked about it. worth checking out. It seems to be uh enjoyed by listeners is the the uh the broadcast. I like to joke and call it the broadcast, but it's a broadcast we do every other week with uh Braum. And one of the things we talked about on that came out Saturday was uh the uh Bohe being down in El Salvador. And um I think that's a huge deal for for a number of reasons. And it's actually this was I was talking about it before listening to his pod with uh Scott Milker, but I think the key thing here is that these guys like are actually playing to win um in the sense that like his boss is David Saxs. David Saxs is a tenure worldass entrepreneur and then venture capitalist that's leading um this charge. He takes the job seriously. I mean it's shown based on the de the devestments of his like um exposure into the sector for for trying to get a job done or to do the job in a uh independent way. Point being is they're trying to understand who and what has been done previously to figure out how the US is going to step into this in the most efficient way and be a a leader for for not only the next five years but maybe for the next 50 plus years. And so I think that's just a big one that we haven't seen. And I think this ties into again um the opportunity set when when you think about everything coming in the news, all the different banking integrations, fintech, now you have tech companies. there's going to be no shortage of opportunities to jump into the space whether it's to work, invest, build um to just keep your eyes peeled because every day we look at different new opportunities whether it's in different parts of the market or the United States or different parts of market structure and how Bitcoin or you know other assets can you know integrate with other assets like financial, real estate, stocks, bonds. Um so it's just an exciting time 100%. One thing I I wanted to pull up was um sort of related to this is um you know this this chart from Tougher Digital that just sort of puts this all in context of like yes there's there's greater recognition uh around the asset class but the reality is is most of most of the capital is still unallocated. Um, and so this is just putting some of that in context and looking at, you know, US wealth platforms, uh, top central banks, 401k plans, uh, state pensions, and corporate cash. Um, you know, totaling over a hundred trillion that is basically unallocated to the asset class. Um, and as we know, you know, Bitcoin's finite supply, it's going to flow into there. And uh there there you know is already and will be increasingly this you know just massive supply demand mismatch as we as we move forward. Um and the yeah the additional context here 5 trillion. So if you're just putting you know a 5% allocation on that 107 trillion 5 trillion is 116 times larger than all the net flows into Bitcoin in 2024 which were substantial. Like 2024 there was a ton of flows into Bitcoin via you know largely the ETFs. Um and so this is just a a massive wall of capital that is is still unallocated. And part of this has to do with um you know turning on the access. You know we've we've looked at charts in the past of you know a lot of the wealth platforms, warehouses, banks are still not even um allowing access to to things like the Bitcoin ETFs. And so slowly but surely all of that's getting turned on. Um and this wall of capital is just going to continue to flow. Um, where do we want to go from here? The big beautiful bill, Trump, Elon, bromance. Any thoughts? And I I mean, we should touch on Trump alone, but we should come out with like we come up with whatever takes we want. I just can't help but like look at these charades and just think that we're just all like being watching a, you know, movie. It's just it's all so insane. Yeah. You think it I think there there is an argument that you know it was somewhat manufactured in the sense that u Elon to go back to his uh to go to go back to basically you know focusing more on Tesla he needed to detach himself from the administration in some sense. Um so I think there is that thought that like maybe this was all sort of purposeful to to have sort of a clean break and um but I think there was some reconciliation. uh he's, you know, retweeting to Trump again and so maybe they're uh maybe they patched the beef a little bit, but hard to tell. Yeah. I mean, he he could have just worked on Tesla without, you know, doing all of that and, you know, making his stock dump like 17% or whatever it was in a day. I think uh I I don't know. I I don't think that that was, you know, theater on purpose diverting away for something. um you know there there's no shortage of conspiracy theories out there on you know the the Epstein files and and everything like that but it just um there's yeah I mean there's just marginally less um respect for the the existing system going on whether it's you know uh how the president and the world's richest men operate down to the financial system Um, so yeah. Yeah, I think that's the key to take from all of this because we have to like per I personally have there's a fine line on on these pods of like you know we're keeping them professional and u related to financial services and and all of that but the reality is you have to be long chaos or long volatility uh and counterparty risk where we're going independent of like what's happening. It doesn't matter if Trump or it's Alain and Silicon Valley Elite running the show and and Trump's a puppet and was bailed out. Like there's all these like ways to look at like what's actually happening here and then whether Palunteer and everything that's happening from like a technocracy or technocratic state. Independent of that the world is fundamentally changing and when it changes so drastically you naturally are going to have disorder and with disorder comes lots of opportunity but also um a lot of potential ways that you can you can lose. I think it was said really well is um like the dollar isn't just a in inflation isn't just a marginal problem, it's an existential problem. And that was like really key for me to hear because ultimately I think that's why a lot of people listening and why there's so much room is they think everyone thinks it's a marginal problem. It's so that if I don't allocate it's like it's okay. I got something else. I'm I'm you know holding assets in a different form uh a different way to store value when in reality is it's an existential problem and people should just act accordingly. And I think this is what ties into it maybe like from a broader perspective is you just don't want to be at the whims of any like political faction. Uh and then also the banking system you know given we all know what's happening across the world. Yeah. I think just as it relates to sort of tying the loop on on the Elon stuff and and how it relates more specifically to Bitcoin is, you know, it it sort of felt like, you know, whether this was real or not, whether it was um, you know, more of a show than anything. I think there was Elon being very publicly facing about like realizing he couldn't stop the train to an extent, right? like the reason he backed this uh administration, the reason he wanted to get involved in government was to attempt to stop the train or at least steer the train um back onto the tracks in terms of cutting spending in some material way um which really hasn't been done in in several decades. Um and it sounds like he just got frustrated with, you know, primarily stemming from uh this spending bill that's um trying to be pushed through by by Trump and his his cabinet. And there was just this realization that like oh there is no political will to actually meaningfully cut spending. And then of course everyone on Bitcoin Twitter is is uh you know reply reply botting to Elon's tweets being like you're so close to understanding the solution here. You obviously understand the problem like you know and and again he's talked about Bitcoin in the past. Tesla SpaceX own some amount of Bitcoin. So it's not like he doesn't understand this stuff. Uh but there there's this natural inclination to be like just say the solution man like you you obviously understand the problem. The beauty like of individuals in bit in in Alain is like Elon there's I always get I mix up Elon and then and then Arlon from the edge. So uh but Elon is he's just like he's a troll and probably trolls like kind. So like referencing I remember like was it 21 or 22 is like yeah Doge is the blockchain of the future and it's like it just has higher throughput and it's like if anybody took that at face value it makes zero sense because if any you know the guy has a brain uh a very probably big brain and then the other one is the debt situation. So it's just like I don't it's all just theater in some form or fashion. But two things to just call out and curious where you guys want to go is um because I think they're they're I haven't looked deeply into them but they're big is um South Korea uh and what's going on there. I don't even know who the individual is if he's in office or potentially going to office and then um it went away for me. But the other one that I had pulled up is the pumpf fun uh uh $4 billion raise. I just think it's worth, you know, it calling out like No, I thought I I thought that was fascinating. So, they're raising Yeah, they're raising they're raising a billion at a four billion valuation. Um, and to me it's just indicative of this sort of um something I've talked about in the past of this this tacited mission of like you know the the broader crypto X Bitcoin XS stablecoin space has really devolved into just the gambling casino and that and this is a strong signal of that is like okay that's where that's where the actual value lies is is just this like hyperpowered uh online casino. Um, and so I think that that ray is is is very indicative of that um that sort of transition and and devolution into that. My favorite part of that take and I know I'm going to get from this probably from listeners especially from Liam because he's closest from coming from Trafi is I don't see any different than pumpf fun than the S&P 500 or public equities like because you know there's obviously a slight difference because there's some companies that you know generate some or generate value. I'd make the case that if you had to rebuild them, they'd probably get, you know, built more efficiently, wouldn't be around. But independent of that is they're all trading on vibes and momentum. And similar to the circle, what I was going to reference when you asked about the circle where it's trading, it's like, well, it's obviously trading overvalued because everything's trading overvalued. And then it just all comes down to the vibes. And so pumpf funds tokens just trade on vibes and mimemetic and whatever you can get on social and who you can pay to amplify it. And so it's very similar to like anything that's out there trading. It's based on like who do you know how you can pump it? And that's really like a lot of people just get caught when without thinking critically or from first principles is because you see people in the news or you hear people talked about in the recent treasury company or whatever. It's like there's capital behind that. There's a reason why you're seeing it. And so when there's capital behind it, reason why you're seeing doesn't necessarily mean it's bad, but also doesn't necessarily mean it has fundamentals or is good. There's just there's just money. So you're naturally seen in front. This is where I won't name any conferences, but there naturally is now starting to be like the ultimate top of funnel for the ultimate like mother of all shitcoin treasury companies. It's like let's just take all the capital from the front end, pull it in, and again, it all goes back to what is money and then what's credit? And Bitcoin is money. You can take delivery of it and whether it's pumped up fund tokens or treasury companies, you ultimately don't have any claim on anything other than the exposure to the ticker, which is the same as a cryptocurrency. Yeah, I think that's right. I mean, I think I would I would say the pump fund rate raise is more akin to like draft kings raising like it is literal literal casino vibes um as opposed to like you know operating companies with a business model or some form of cash flows right like there is some distinction there um but even Tesla's a great example because I haven't dug deep but like from a we'd have to write a whole paper on this but ultimately like they couldn't live without the fiat system because of the subsidies and the amount of Right. So, it's just like So, then what are we, you know, like that's the angle, but Liam, I know you I saw you take a deep breath there, so I'm really Well, I mean, like I just uh there is kind of a a difference too, like like let's take a step back. If if you're an HVAC company and you're providing a service that people will pay for just because the public market is not trading your uh vehicle or publicly traded company at you know what should be the right valuation in terms of Bitcoin and if they couldn't you know access cheap amounts of debt like there there's still underlying uh value that they're providing to the world that I think isn't necessarily there on the pumpf fund side of things uh and and yeah, there there is uh they're trading at a massive premium to what they should be if you know we're we're being honest with ourselves and uh taking a a deep lens into like okay how much more Bitcoin that can they produce in the future. um versus you know I I don't I haven't ever gone on pumpf fun and and I try to you know keep as many brain cells as I can by not looking at it too closely but I I think that there is definitely a difference there. Yeah. I mean obviously there's a difference if somebody's produc producing like value in the world. The thing that I think nobody really takes account for in prices is it's kind of like in life we always are good if it doesn't relate to us. Like if it's not our problem, if like somebody doesn't have exposure to Ethereum and they only have Bitcoin, they're fine with Ethereum being and you know crap. But if they have a little exposure to Ethereum, it's like well hey let's be open-minded. And so it's just it's just like people talk their boat. And so when you think about the capitalization or market cap of companies, if somebody's in equities, they're in their whole Bitcoin, they'll naturally say, "Well, of course real estate's going to be repriced, right? Well, let's have the other discussion. Well, of course, equities are going to be repriced because you have to look at just from a natural like amount of um not float but bloat in a company that exists from you know zer and government subsidies and you know being able to take you know bonds out like all like IBM's the best example but there's no shortage like what happens when people sell their equity for BTC when they realize why am I holding this well that company actually might go out of business because they fundamentally might not have the fundamentals to be alive anymore. And so that's that's kind of what I'm I'm grafting or I'm going towards is that um all these things are trading based on the amount of like liquidity in the system and then vibes that are based on it and are going to get repriced and if when they repric they may actually just go out of business and nobody actually knows where the bodies are buried. We know pumped out funds is probably a big body just because there's nothing. It's literally a it's a casino. But that's the point I'm trying to make is I don't think most people like think of the world being repriced in that way and what they're holding is is I I think that there's two there's a a little bit of a difference there though like once the world gets repriced accurately like a a boring like HVAC company or whatever can be traded at like 90 95% discount where it's uh you know today in terms of Bitcoin but like the pumpf fun and all of that it's just going to be traded at zero in terms of Bitcoin. That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying that a lot of these companies don't have sustainable business models. Yeah. Like that like they didn't actually build to have a sustainable business model. It's one thing if you've always been, you know, built with like fundamentals and then you're trading publicly and you're, you know, you're positive in the green, but there's a lot of companies that don't or that's what I'm referring to or you have to pay back your bonds and now you that's when you're out of business is the the Yeah. The the only other data point I was going to bring up around this is um so this is basically like a distribution of just the past month of uh pump fund and so like basically the vast majority of people lose and so it's actually like worse EV than like literal gambling at the casino. Um, and so it's it's on it's more on par with a with a literal casino casino actually like worse EV than a casino. Whereas like if you compare that to the equities market like I think there is a parallel there in the sense that what we know about the concentration of returns in the S&P for example right like MAG7 is driving the vast majority of performance and you know actually the majority of companies are underperforming the benchmark underperforming um generally speaking and so there is a parallel there there but you know again I would I would put this more akin to like literal casino gambling Um, yeah. Yep. I'd 100% agree. And uh kind of ties back into the the Trump uh company raise. And so, you know, they're uh it's it's interesting to see that they're now launching their own ETF. And you guys may have may have touched on this uh outside of the show as well, but um we haven't really seen this with, you know, they raised their 25 uh billion or 2.5 billion as a convertible note, and it looks like they're actually um taking the steps to launch an ETF. uh with that and we haven't really seen any of these um Bitcoin treasury companies. I I don't know if they're going to be considered one, you know, actually go and and do something with that and and uh try to create a product that, you know, they can get fees on with it. It's uh it's just the first one to go in this direction and I think it's worth watching to see if and and how successful it will be. But like why would it be successful? Why would anyone buy the Truth Central Bitcoin ETF? The the the the name on it 100%. If I was like this is the the the the pattern recognition when I see like you know being around the space in Salana being able to buy it under a dollar it's like you saw like the just it was great marketing and I look at something like this and even the treasury companies there's a principal version of why I don't trade them um because I see them as zero sum. But if I was a if I was looking to dump on somebody, I would definitely buy uh Trump Trump's ETF because to what Lamb said, it's the president of the free like free world and he has his own Bitcoin ETF. Like it has to be the best one. There's better Bitcoin in that ETF. Yeah, but it's not going to outperform Bitcoin. Like it's so it's different treasury companies. The bitcoins in the ETF by Trump are fundamentally better than the rest of the market. They're the best bitcoins. They're the best bitcoins. They were made in America. They've been blessed by him. Like it's just it's just better. It's better than definitely better than that would be something. Yeah, these are Americanmade bitcoins only in this ETF. I will tell you it is objectively better than Bitwise's ETF because Bitwise will tell people to go buy uh XRP and lobby off behalf of true you know there. So like Trump at least he's just staying principled with just a Bitcoin ETF. Uh um this is this is honestly how how insane the world has gotten that nobody actually talks about how insane the world has gotten. So we might as well just like bring it up every week until everyone realizes that we were just explaining how insane the world is because you can just buy spot Bitcoin. And you know what? I can't wait till um we have some some some fun stuff coming out coming out at on-ramp and um about two years ago we launched the on-ramp Bitcoin trust. I still fundamentally think it has pensions that have allocated to it. I think it's the best product in the market. Uh and it's not us talking our book. It's from you know sophistication perspective whether it's how the units trade to be able to deliver Bitcoin in kind. It's a private placement um requires accredited investors but uh you can take delivery of it and then it leverages multi-institution custody. It's just a beautiful product. The problem is that majority of the market a doesn't know who is but 2 b um doesn't understand why you would want it because most people have.1% exposure to the ETF or 1%. But again the whole thesis that we talk about and why always bring up the treasury companies is it's just it it's not in congruence with the world. It's nonsensical however you want to phrase it. why institutional allocators or an individual will eventually understand what Bitcoin is and realize they need to get out of that position because there's like 10 layers of execution risk embedded from the Bitcoin hitting their wallet to them delivering um so yeah 100%. Um we want to talk on the South Korean new president deal. Yeah, I'll pull up that link if you want to you want to start. Are you moving to South Korea? Asia Pacific's heating up. How do you feel about you being in Singapore for like maybe a year? Singapore is not South Korea. Uh well, I'm in Asia Pacific, so you can get you can get to I figured I wouldn't you wouldn't have to go to South Korea. Singapore was a nice like uh uh middle ground. It's nice. Yeah. Um No, it's just it's it's cool to see. I think uh I wanted to tie this back to what we talked about earlier um you know a couple weeks back which was the odds of a non Bitcoin digital asset uh president getting elected I think is has gone down significantly um over the past you know year or so I think at at least while while Bitcoin is uh you know not 80% off its all-time high uh we're we're going to see this trend continue. I think that there's no significant benefit to being anti- Bitcoin, anti- digital assets in general. I um and I think that this can only be a pro in terms of, you know, marketing your own strategy. the vibes are higher as as we talk about uh when when talking to other you know young people in particular but um it's good to see we'll we'll see how this if and when this actually does get implemented because you know a lot of these politicians which we're seeing just kind of talk their own books in order to get elected. So um but I think it's it's great to see on the margins. Yeah, I think there was a few key points from this. One was, you know, allowing spot crypto ETFs. Um, also pushing forward, uh, you know, a one pegged stablecoin. And then the third, which I don't see in this, uh, publication, but was also included in some of his campaign was allowing the, um, national pension fund, which I think is like has close to a trillion dollars in it, uh, to invest in in Bitcoin as well. Um, so yeah, very very positive in my mind. Um, I don't know if there's anything else there that we wanted to touch on. If not, if not, I could pivot. There's a there's there is something I did want to pivot to that is not as related to to Bitcoin espec necessarily, but more on the AI side. But I don't know if you guys saw this this report that Apple put out um basically saying that like AI reasoning models um aren't actually thinking or aren't actually reasoning like it's all just memorization and pattern recognition. And why this is interesting is basically because Apple is super behind on all of this. And so one way you could look at this is like them basically coping and just like futing everything that's going on and saying like we're not actually making the progress that we think we're making. um and were, you know, way farther from actual AGI as as some of these other companies uh would suggest. And basically that the takeaway is like they effectively created um created puzzles or things for these models to think about that they haven't been trained on. And once they're looking at things that they haven't been trained on, they basically hit this wall of of understanding and reasoning. And so what that would tell you is that they're not actually thinking. they're actually just memoriz memorizing what they've been trained on which I don't think is like a new novel theory but it is just fun funny to see Apple put this out um given that they are sort of behind all these other companies thoughts yeah I think this is just going back to what we've been talking about for a long time now which is just the incumbents are not going to lead on the margins they're not going to be you know the people that can innovate I mean the the great thing about uh or you know the one advantage that incumbents have when it comes to AI is you know having all the capital in order to train the models you know deploy all the data centers everything that you need in order to out compete because there are massive efficiencies when it comes to scale and in with these uh LLMs but it's really um just kind of disappointing to see that Apple is is so far behind all of the others because uh you know they're they're just going to kind of get their lunch eaten. It it looks like uh I I I think we always kind of knew that this was how these models operated of just like kind of uh checking other vectors and using reasoning behind them. They're not actually thinking themselves. Um but yeah, it's it's a little disappointing to see but expected. Yeah. Yeah. I think without being technical expert um I think the point you made Liam is like around the incremental nature or how fast it's moving you can surmise like this stuff is going to disrupt a a lot especially like middle management. Um the heristic that I'm personally because I just don't have the time. I'd love to to look into more and like play with I'd love to be a v viber and just you know vibe code vibe market. We have some on our team. Um but is like when you really start seeing people um anecdotally lose money or assets or get fish and scam because I think when it gets that good is you're kind of like no because there's a dynamic nature to this process, right? you see this like I I remember like a year ago and and then it came up that it was recently with u Alon Elon talking on uh YouTube where like have you guys have you guys ever gone on YouTube and then you'll see like the commercial come up and it's like Elon talking but then it's being done scam it's a literal scam and u point being is like when you start to see these become very like dynamic and in real time to the point of like that reasoning that when somebody's asking the question you're able to like actually bring together relevant information based on time local you know understanding of who the person is like that's when you'll start to like I mean you know and I think it'll happen in incremental steps but that's just something that I would use as a heristic to understand if the shit's really getting out of hand because right now like you don't hear about that you just hear of ordinary fishing and regular roll calls happening yeah maybe one other thing um just back to sort of global adoption regulatory front this was also from last week um the UK um sort of taking a more accommodative stance which you know I think they've been particularly uh adversarial to to crypto and Bitcoin historically and so this is uh a bit of a pivot um that they announced last week to lift a ban on the sales of crypto exchange traded notes um and sort of start to allow uh some more access to to these things. So again, it's just this this game theory of like, you know, now it's in the zeitgeist and now everyone's sort of putting their chips on the table and and and you know, figuring out that they need to be more accommodative than adversarial, which was the historical norm. Yeah. I mean, this this just all goes back to the point where um the most sophisticated people want Bitcoin. if they can't get access to it, they're just going to leave your country and you're not going to be able to, you know, get their uh taxes anymore. And so, you may as well lean into it and uh embrace it and, you know, take the capital gains taxes on it. I I think it's uh, you know, a win-win for everybody involved if if the current status quo um keeps up. I I don't love capital gains taxes, but you know, that's that's not going to change anytime soon. Yeah. This isn't exactly related, but it feels like we're coming winding to an end. Is like what's going on in LA? Yeah. I don't know. You have thoughts, Michael? I I mean, I don't I just I I just go on uh I'm just getting those like 2020 COVID vibes. Um you know, for kind of social unrest. And the reason why I mean I guess to tie it back to this is like you know, people get unruly and they don't follow the law. So like imagine somebody has wealth. This is like California like um empirically I would say directionally about half of the all the bitcoin uh sits in California. Uh specifically in the US in the United States. Yeah. Yeah. You can make the case potentially because of Coinbase. Um but because of Silicon Valley and and just you know technologist they were the first to really see it. Uh but point being is like that is a uh I mean it came out what last week. I don't know what you know it's not even in in you know stone but whatever was with the uh assets being like on an exchange if you if you pass away and they have access to a rights to but point being is like California holds a lot of Bitcoin. There's a lot of wealthy people there and uh it's practically like a failed state at this point. And so when you think about custody and your arrangements and how you do it, like that's kind of again the from how we started the show as being long volatility and counterparty risk. You want to be very careful with how you're positioning your money. Um so anyway, that would be how to tie it back to Yeah, 100%. Yeah. I mean, if uh if you're not able to keep people safe, then people will leave. Um especially when when their money and you know personal safety is involved. Yeah. All right. Anything else, boys, before we wrap? We should wrap sometimes if we come up with one if uh what do we what do we want to see or what's missing? There's like no shortage of stuff. So like but I have something top of mind and I'll I'll keep it quick if you guys have something else um we can extend. We just need we talked about a little bit a few episodes ago about like the piggy bank and the kid the kid idea and I think I still think that's awesome and should be done but I think there just needs to be a like very asset light exchange that's denominated in Satoshi's and probably just built on lightning or maybe even ecash or some hybrid of that. Um you'd have to figure out the regulatory setup on how to how to do that but it's not it can't be that complex. Um but the main point of that is just like where the market's heading. Uh there's more and more people getting out of their skis when it comes to leverage and thinking that 100k Bitcoin uh you know they can't buy a whole Bitcoin. And there's just something to things are going to start getting priced in SATs. People are going to start, you know, paying in SATS and there's some market advantage and opportunity to educate around financial wellness on just like how far your dollar goes right now in SATs and how it incrementally goes up monthly and annually. Um, and nobody's really like coalesed around that and done it in a good way that um, I'd really love to see and anybody can do it. It's not the hard part. I think really what it's come down to is the taste and commercialization of like how do you actually bring that to market and make it, you know, a viable business. Um, yeah. I mean, I would say like Block is probably closest to doing something like that just given the work that they've done um, on the Lightning side of things sort of in parallel um, with their uh, you know, Cash App and traditional exchange and stuff. So that would be my guess in terms of like who's closest to doing something like that. But to your point, it might might make sense to someone to someone to have a singular focus on something like that. Um would probably be pretty block reminds me a little bit like Fidelity. While I love both of those firms, the reality is like what Liam talked about earlier, I don't see both of them. They may lead from the incumbent's direction, but they won't lead from like 20 years from now us looking. And it's just basically because there's too much inertia. Like when block has to come up with something or wants to educate the market on Bitcoin, like not only do they have all the other things you referenced that they have to work on, but also it's always going to be some like tempered down version of what they really would want to bring to market or explain. And it's similar with Fidelity. Um so it stifles the innovation why people leave. So I fully would expect somebody that wins that is going to be kind of from like an early rider or somebody that's Yeah, 100%. I mean the Fidelity and Block have the best top of funnel because they already have all the customers but um it's just the the bureaucracy of the large organizations that you know limits the amount of innovation in the speed that can happen in the industry. Yeah, I think a prime example of that is like you know what they announced at the conference a week or so ago around you know turning on um basically access to to Bitcoin at all the terminals. Like that took years. Like people were calling for that for literal years and it it took them that long to get there. And it's unfortunate because anybody running a business knows like the first step is literally like just getting punched in the face. Like you got to launch it and then hear the market's feedback and understand how to commercialize it and how to like get the right tooling and all the things. So like they're starting today theoretically. Obviously they probably done some user testing. But to Brian's point, if they did it four years ago, they could have like disrupted you know global finance or how like interchange works. Um, so that's a great that's a great example. And then the use case of just buying Bitcoin or holding it or exchanging it for an intermediary good is like just it's like getting out of bed. It's expected. Like that's just the start. So then once they get there, somebody else is going to be running faster downhill. Um, that's why I always think of like when Fidelity does multi institution custody or Coinbase like there'll be like 10 other products that are already out in the market leveraging that we'll be doing. So it's always going to be playing catchup behind it. similar with Blockbuster. I'm assuming tried to do streaming and and didn't work out for them very well. Yeah. All right. Great rip, guys. Good rip, boys. Appreciate it. Um, thanks, guys. See you guys next week. All right. Thanks for listening to this week's episode of the show. If you found the information valuable, please share the episode with a friend or leave a rating on your favorite podcast app. All the links we discussed in today's show will be in the show notes inside your podcast app. Before we finish, a quick reminder that Onra Media is forformational and entertainment purposes only, and nothing should be construed as investment or legal advice. Regardless of where you are in your Bitcoin journey, we'd love to hear from you. Visit onrampbitcoin.com/cont to schedule a consultation with one of our private client adviserss.