Circle P:

Episode Transcript
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(00:01):
It is 08:51AM
Pacific Daylight Time. It is the June
2025.
This is episode
eleven
twenty
of Bitcoin,
and this is where you get the signal. You get to skip the news. I will read to you the Bitcoin news that actually matters. I do it every day. My name is David Bennett. I'm your host

(00:27):
of Bitcoin.
And we've got all kinds of stuff that's going on today. So
let's just get into it directly. Let's go right to Texas because on June,
Texas signs publicly funded Bitcoin Reserve Bill
into law.
It finally happened.

(00:48):
Texas
has a strategic Bitcoin Reserve
law. It's not fluff.
It's not sitting in the house. It's not sitting on the senate floor.
It's out of all committees. It's out of the house. It's out of the senate. It went to Greg's desk. Greg, the governor of Texas, sat down and signed it.

(01:08):
Well, for those of you who who know Greg, he's permanently sat down. I probably shouldn't have said it that way, but it it's the truth. Anyway, let's just do this one.
On June
2025,
Texas governor Greg Abbott signed senate bill 21
into law creating the Texas
Strategic

(01:29):
Bitcoin
Reserve,
a state managed fund that will buy and hold Bitcoin as a long term investment.
Texas now joins Arizona as well as New Hampshire
in passing Bitcoin reserve legislation,
but is the first to actually commit public funds
and create a completely separate reserve

(01:50):
outside of the state treasury.
Senator Charles Schwartner, the bill's author, said,
quote, we can buy land,
we can buy gold. I think the state of Texas should have the option of evaluating the best performing asset over the last ten years, end quote.
The new reserve is separate
from the state's general treasury,

(02:12):
so the state can manage the Bitcoin without mixing it with regular state budget funds.
It will be overseen by the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts,
currently
Glenn
Heager.
And guided by a three person advisory committee on Bitcoin investment experts or rather of Bitcoin investment experts, the fund will be financed

(02:33):
through legislative
appropriations,
investment
gains,
fees,
and voluntary Bitcoin donations.
I love Texas. It's my home state. I will always love Texas. You'll never be able to get the Texan out of me. But please for the love of God, do not donate your Bitcoin to Texas.
Keep it yourself.

(02:55):
Force Texas to actually go to the open market and buy the actual Bitcoin.
Please don't give the state any of your money.
Just I'm just saying. And this is coming from somebody who
desperately loves Texas. Okay? Now,
to ensure stability,
the law allows investment only in digital assets with a market capitalization

(03:18):
of over $500,000,000,000
that is a threshold that is currently only met by Bitcoin.
SB 21 was reviewed
and updated before final passage, and the latest version has stronger risk controls, clearer investment rules, and limits on speculative spending.
Another bill named House Bill forty four eighty eight was signed earlier and works alongside

(03:43):
SB 21
to protect the Bitcoin Reserve from being redirected
into the General Revenue Fund.
Texas can manage its Bitcoin separate from budget politics thanks to its financial safeguards.
HB forty four eighty eight also ensures
the reserve will exist even if no Bitcoin is purchased immediately

(04:03):
so the state can develop a strategy.
And supporters of the reserve say,
it's a hedge against inflation and a way to diversify the state's assets.
Lawmakers and Bitcoin advocates believe it will keep Texas
ahead in the digital finance game.
Governor Abbott has been vocal about his pro Bitcoin stance. Quote, Texas is already the home of crypto mining.

(04:26):
This session, Texas should become the crypto capital. I really wish you wouldn't use the word crypto, but Texas Blockchain Council president
Lee Bratcher said that the state
could invest tens of millions of dollars in Bitcoin, quote, it's still early, and the comptroller
is going to utilize proven investing standards to determine how much to buy and when to purchase, end quote.

(04:52):
Texas is moving forward while others are pulling back. In May, Florida and Arizona
both killed or vetoed
Bitcoin reserve bills, and Arizona governor Katie Hobbs called digital assets
untested investments and killed the state's bill there.
But Texas stands alone in creating a fully funded Bitcoin reserve,

(05:13):
unlike Arizona's
unfunded version
or New Hampshire's plan to hold Bitcoin in the existing state treasury.
Beyond government, Bitcoin adoption is booming in business. According to Bitcoin treasuries, 223
public companies now hold Bitcoin. Yeah. Yeah. We get it, and then they talk about Michael Saylor strategy. I I don't I'm we know. We understand that.

(05:36):
But
this was
I had been waiting for this one because it is my home state of Texas, and that bill, SB 21,
had been going back and forth and back and forth, and it was in committee and out of committee and on the floor and then on another floor. And it just
it it's like it just wouldn't end. And then when they finally got it out of the senate,

(05:58):
my first question, which I asked directly to governor Abbott on on on on the x, not that he's ever going to read it nor care if he did, but my first question and only question to governor Abbott was, are you actually gonna sign this thing? Or is this just gonna be some kind of weird crap and well he signed it.
So now in the state of Texas it's actually law

(06:22):
and it's a good fit because governor Abbott's not wrong it's Texas is kind of the, Bitcoin mining capital of the world right now,
and we're gonna talk a little bit more about that in the second half. But first,
keeping along
with this whole what's going on in Texas and the governor,
we've got another story that's kind of actually, it's completely unrelated,

(06:47):
but I find this interesting and I think it's going to end up being really important.
Because Texas,
there's been a bill passing
back and forth, you know, in the legislature
about banning all THC
products. And if you don't know what THC is, it's the active compound in marijuana that gets you high. It's the psychoactive

(07:09):
component,
or the the majority of the psychoactive component of of marijuana.
Well, they wanted to ban it and they were gonna get they were getting close to banning it.
In fact, they got so close to banning it that they passed a bill to actually
ban all THC products in the entire state of Texas and that would have also killed a hemp industry

(07:34):
that could help cotton farmers because hemp grows in some really poor soils and the cotton farmers in the Panhandle Of Texas have pretty much destroyed all the soils up there, so they need something. Well, this would have banned hemp production too.
But then here comes Abbott,
and he vetoes the damn bill.

(07:55):
I couldn't believe it. I figured
he was going to sign this bill.
But there's a catch here. Right? And this this is where I think it's important.
Let me get you this one from Fox seven out of Austin.
Abbott vetoes Texas THC ban,
and here's how lieutenant governor Dan Patrick

(08:17):
reacted.
Governor Greg Abbott's last minute decision to strike down
a sweeping prohibition on consumable t h c products has ignited strong
disapproval
from his lieutenant governor Dan Patrick
even as it drew praise from the state's hemp industry, the action
taken just moments before the veto deadline on Sunday,

(08:40):
ensures the continued operation of Texas'
rapidly expanding hemp market and sets the stage for a contentious upcoming special legislative
session.
So here's what they're saying, and I there's a couple of people in here, but I'm only concerned with Dan Patrick, and I'll tell you why here in a second.
Patrick,

(09:00):
a vocal advocate for the ban who has publicly described THC infused items as a quote poison
in our communities
swiftly condemned
the governor's move. In comments made on social media late Sunday, he criticized Abbott for maintaining
total silence
on senate bill number three throughout the entirety of the legislative session.

(09:25):
Patrick suggested the veto would leave both enforcement officials and families impacted by high potency products feeling deserted.
Quote,
this late night veto,
despite overwhelming support from legislative republicans, law enforcement, and medical and educational
professionals,
as well as families who have witnessed the

(09:47):
devastation
caused by these potent substances
will leave many feeling abandoned.
My deepest sympathies go out to those who testified and shared their painful experiences.
I plan to elaborate further
at a press conference tomorrow
in Austin.
Apparently, that's going to be sometime today. And I'm going to be very interested in what Dan Patrick has to say. But before I get into a little bit of commentary here, let's continue.

(10:17):
The veto directly
undermines one of Patrick's top legislative priorities during his nearly two decades
in the legislature.
He actively championed the band, visiting cannabis retailers, and producing investigative style content
to highlight what he characterized
as dangerous business practices.

(10:38):
But then, conversely, we've got the hemp industry.
The Texas Hemp Business Council, which had vigorously lobbied the governor to reject the bill, celebrated the decision as a triumph
for both the industry and Texas consumers.
Quote, governor Greg Abbott's veto of SB three reaffirms Texas' standing as a leader in business innovation

(11:01):
and pragmatic
governance, the council posted online, quote, by opting
for a balanced approach
versus overreach,
Governor Abbott has safeguarded a flourishing federally recognized hemp industry
that provides
employment for 53,000
Texans
and contributes
$4,300,000,000

(11:21):
in annual sales, end quote.
The council contended that an outright prohibition would have driven consumers towards unsafe alternatives
and jeopardized public health and choice.
They said existing regulations
established under house bill thirteen twenty five
already impose strict limits on THC content,

(11:42):
require comprehensive testing,
mandates licensing, and governs labeling.
The council also reiterated its support for sensible additions such as restricting sales to individuals 21 and older, mandating child resistant packaging,
and implementing
distance requirements from schools, provisions that they noted were rejected by those pushing for SB three.

(12:06):
Consistent polling
indicates that Texans do not favor a ban on hemp derived products, the council said, condemning Abbott
or commending right. Not condemning. Commending Abbott for heeding the voices of over a 150,000
petition signers
and thousands more who shared their personal stories.
So why is this important?

(12:29):
Especially if you don't live in Texas,
you don't follow the saga that has been the relationship between Dan Patrick and governor Abbott.
For a very long time,
they have been in each other's pockets.
Now, yeah, they've had, like, a couple of little squabbles here and there.
Whatever. Little tiny little disagreements in the grand scheme of things. But this one,

(12:52):
Dan Patrick
basically called Greg Abbott straight out
in public
on x. I've never seen Dan Patrick do this before, not to this degree.
This is different.
He's been doing this for twenty years.
He's been lieutenant governor for longer than I can even he's been lieutenant governor for longer than Greg Abbott,

(13:17):
has been governor of Texas, if I remember this correctly. In either event,
this marks a complete departure between these two people.
And as Lieutenant Governor,
Dan Patrick is basically kinda second in command, and if anything happens to Greg, he ends up being governor.

(13:38):
It's odd
and it's gonna be interesting to see how this shit plays out in, you know, in Texas but
I've never seen this before and I think it's going to be very important moving forward considering
that it would have been stupid
to ban
something like the the hemp industry in Texas even though hemp

(14:00):
technically doesn't have any THC.
But I guess there were provisions in s b three that would have caused major problems and headaches to the point that people would just say, fuck it. I don't wanna mess with this hemp stuff anymore.
And $4,300,000,000
is nothing to turn your nose up at. And hemp is actually a really, really great product for farmers to be able to grow. It's it's really easy to grow.

(14:24):
Almost
it has almost no diseases.
It's like it almost gets no pest pressure and it grows in some of the crappiest soil you can possibly imagine. I'm a soil nerd. I don't think it should be grown in those conditions. I think that they should, you know, be regenerative about their soil, but I ain't there and they ain't listening to me. So I just gotta move on with that one.

(14:47):
And also,
isn't it time we just give up on this whole,
Oh, it's too potent.
Dude, have you ever downed, like, you know, a bottle of Bacardi one fifty one? Have you ever drank that shit? A 151
proof rum and somebody's telling me that, oh, my God, my kid's gonna die because there's too much THC in this gummy. Oh, bullshit.

(15:09):
Still though,
it's gonna be interesting to see how this relationship
between the lieutenant governor and the governor of Texas
shakes out because this is a complete departure from everything that I've seen. Now moving on
to Genesys Digital, and we are still in the great state of Texas.
Genesys Digital Assets Limited has acquired one thousand

(15:32):
air cooled miners
to mine Bitcoin. Good luck with that in Glascott County.
This is Oscar Perez writing for Bitcoin Magazine.
Genesis Digital Assets Limited, one of the largest Bitcoin mining companies in the world in terms of hash rate, has announced it has entered a purchase agreement with Aradyne,

(15:52):
a Silicon Valley based provider of blockchain and AI infrastructure solutions.
In the agreement, GDA will receive 1,000
Teraflux AT twenty eight eighty two seventy seven air cooled miners,
one of the latest inventions from Auradyne.
The company plans to install
all of them in their 40 megawatt data center in Glasscock County, Texas.

(16:18):
Pausing to give you a little bit of reference,
Glasscock County is Extreme West Texas.
Okay?
Glasscock County is hot.
In the summertime,
it doesn't get any hotter. All of Texas is hot, but you wanna talk about some blazing ass heat, go to Glascott County in the middle of freaking July or the August 1. Holy crap. Quote,

(16:41):
GDA's strategic priority is to combine operational excellence with long term term sustainability, yada yada yada, more suits speak, more suits speak. The air cooled miner gets up to 260
terahashes per second
of hash rate energy efficiency as low as 16 joules per terahash,
delivering performance and sustainability, and the new machines will participate

(17:03):
in Texas'
ERCOT demand response program once they're up and running.
Quote, we're proud to partner with GDA. Yeah. More suit speak. This deployment shows
GDA's
United States expansion strategy
positioning Texas as a cornerstone
of its operations due to its renewable energy assets, regulatory alignment with the industry,

(17:25):
and innovation friendly environments.
A month ago, Auradyne released their new mining products featuring high performance ASIC chips,
specialized cooling systems, and fully integrated modular containers engineered for scalable megawatt
class mining operations.
And then the CEO gives another suit speak statement, which I'm not gonna get into.

(17:48):
It's just that be aware.
Texas is doubling down all over the place on Bitcoin, on mining.
It's gonna be hard it's gonna be really, really hard to beat.
And as we saw last week,
governor Hagerty
of Tennessee,
I think is is is it Hagerty or I think it's Hagerty.

(18:10):
He's been talking about,
Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the Tennessee Valley Authority. There's there's a whole history
of high power solutions coming out of the state of Tennessee that reaches all the way back to the Manhattan Project.
And And I'm gonna probably write up an article about that sometime this week. I've I've given a a smaller one on Noster and and, posted it also to x. And some people have received it fairly well, but it was kind of like a one off quickie.

(18:41):
I really wanna dig into a little bit more of the history of Tennessee because
between the states of Tennessee and Texas, you're probably not going to find
more states that have more power
that they're willing to deliver to Bitcoin mining than both Texas and Tennessee, and it just so happens
that the two most well known

(19:03):
Bitcoin co working environments for lack of better term is Bitcoin Park in Tennessee
and the Bitcoin Commons
in Austin, Texas.
Texas and Tennessee are going to lead The United States
in ways that I don't think anybody really understands just yet, but we gotta move on

(19:24):
because SoapMiner is gonna get you clean. If you gotta get away clean, go to soapminer.com
where he has
handmade
tallow soaps. There's all kinds of soaps, in fact. There's
Earl Grey tallow, there's goat's milk tallow, there's lemongrass, there's
orange
and clove, there's
oh oh he's got a new one redacted

(19:45):
tallow. I love okay okay this is this is one of my favorite products. I haven't used it yet because he just came out with his stuff, but here's here's the thing.
It just so happened that I asked soap miner,
does he have an activated
charcoal
tallow soap?
And he wrote back like and I was like, oh, and, you know, I we could put that I've figured out a way to to source some some, you know, charcoal for you. It'd be great. And he's like, no. No need, dude. I'm already working on it. We're about to release it next week, and it's here.

(20:18):
He says that this is his version of a low grit mechanics
soap.
The ingredients are thus pure grass fed beef tallow,
activated
charcoal powder,
pumice powder,
distilled water, and lye. So not very many ingredients.
It's the activated

(20:39):
charcoal powder that I'm the most
most interested in.
That,
honestly,
is some of the best soap you will ever use for as a deodorant soap. Not only does it get you clean, because it's gonna do all that, but is that activated charcoal.
Man, it
will literally
suck up any odors on your body

(21:01):
and you'll have to work a sweat up to get you to get stinky again because you gotta get clean. You gotta get clean with SoapMiner's redacted tallow soap. He's also got a regular rough cut tallow, tea tree, pine tar, cedarwood, pepper. He's got an entire line
ending with lavender
tallow and if you use the code Bitcoin and you get 10% off your entire purchase, the circle P is

(21:28):
proud
to represent soap miner in the circle P and this is where you support
people like Soap Miner who are bringing you goods and services
and they're and he's just like you. He's just a regular pleb and then Soap Miner, if you tell him using the Bitcoin and code, then he will know that I made a sale
and he will get me back on the backside with some sweet sweet Satoshis. So just be aware

(21:53):
that's soapminer.com,
soapminer.com,
and Anthony Pompliano is back in the news. He's been making waves lately, but apparently something has actually happened this time
because from CoinDesk and who's writing it, but none other than
Will Kenny,
which I don't think I've ever read before. But Anthony Pompliano is taking his Bitcoin native financial platform,

(22:19):
ProCap BTC
public
through a 1,000,000,000,
that's billion with a b,
$1,000,000,000
merger with Columbus Circle Capital Corporation.
It's a special purpose acquisition company, otherwise known as a SPAC, sponsored by an affiliate of Cohen and Company. And the transaction,

(22:41):
announced today,
positions the new entity
named ProCap Financial Incorporated
as one of the largest
Bitcoin treasuries
ever
to hit public markets.
In what's being called the largest initial fundraise for a public Bitcoin treasury company ever or at least to date,

(23:03):
ProCap raised $550,000,000
in preferred equity and secured 225,000,000
in convertible notes, giving future shareholders immediate exposure
to Bitcoin through a structure designed to acquire Bitcoin
ahead of the deal's close.
Led by Anthony Pompliano, a well known investor and vocal Bitcoin advocate, ProCap aims to operate at the intersection of digital assets and traditional finance.

(23:30):
The company plans to generate profit
not just by holding Bitcoin,
but by actively deploying its Bitcoin balance sheet across yield
generating strategies, oh god, that mitigate risk and capitalize on crypto financial infrastructure.
I don't like this. Quote, the legacy financial system is being disrupted by Bitcoin, and ProCap Financial represents our solution

(23:55):
to the increasing demand for Bitcoin native financial services,
at at least among sophisticated
investors of which plebs ain't sophisticated.
Sophisticated investors essentially is sort of another word for
qualified investors, and I think it means you better have a million dollars.
The merger values the combined entity at up to $1,000,000,000

(24:20):
depending on the final Bitcoin purchase price at closing.
Pro caps BTC assets will be custodied until the transaction completes,
giving investors near instant BTC exposure without having to wait for the company to go public.
The transaction is expected to close before the end of this year pending SEC review
and shareholder approval.

(24:41):
The Financial Times first reported that Pompliano was set to become the CEO of ProCap BTC
and that the company was planning to raise $750,000,000
to acquire Bitcoin.
So yet another one, and I really don't like this. How are you gonna generate your yield? I I I just don't like this one.

(25:01):
Let's see. Where where's this?
It was back up here somewhere.
Okay. I'm I'm trying to find this this part where, yeah, generate profit
not by hold just holding BTC, but actively
deploying
its Bitcoin balance sheet
across
yield generating strategies

(25:23):
that mitigate risk and capitalize on crypto financial infrastructure.
Ladies and gentlemen, that's pure suit speak.
That tells you
nothing.
What
yield generating strategies?
How are you mitigating
risk?
In what way are you capitalizing

(25:45):
on what crypto financial infrastructure?
That is a pet peeve with me.
I just I can't stand suit speak. It's like mission statements that drone on about
leveraging their workforce to employ a a
rainbow filled room like environment. I'm like, I don't even know what the hell that shit means.

(26:09):
Please
stop doing that. Speak plainly and tell me exactly
how you're going to make money and exactly how much money
you think you're going to make. Otherwise, it's all bullshit.
And you know what else is bullshit is, yes,
Iran.

(26:30):
Iran.
Bitcoin rebounds
as market price in short
lived
Iran
conflict according to Sebastian Sinclair
from Decrypt. Let's see what he's got to say about this whole
Middle East thing that we're in
again.
Bitcoin regained a footing late Sunday to trade above $101,000

(26:54):
recovering from earlier weekend losses as investors responded to The United States
joining Israel air strikes on Iranian nuclear sites, and the gains came alongside modest moves in gold.
And interestingly,
a muted reaction across oil
and equity futures, signaling traders expect a contained conflict rather than a sustained geopolitical shock.

(27:18):
The US operation carried out in coordination with Israel targeted Fordow, Nadinats,
and
Isfahan
using more than a 125
aircraft and bunker busting munitions.
Iran responded with missile and drone attacks on Israel cities and threatened to strike US military bases in The Gulf.
Iran's foreign minister also flew to Moscow on Sunday for emergency consultations

(27:42):
while president Trump signaled a pause in further US military action. A final decision on steps could come within
two weeks.
In the meantime,
European leaders have urged restraint and signaled openness to renewed diplomacy.
Despite the escalation,
markets stabilized quickly. Gold briefly hit $33.98

(28:04):
before easing back to $33.74,
while oil paired
an early surge to finish up just
one half of 1%.
Quote, the market is still expecting
a short lived war.
I've gotta pause.
What short lived war has anybody seen lately?

(28:24):
I mean,
in all honesty,
this sounds like a new creature.
It sounds like
a a a new critter, the one that we've never seen before is a short lived conflict, especially anywhere close to The Middle East.
I don't know, man. But the Kovesi letter wrote on x,
noting that oil remains far below levels historically associated

(28:48):
with any disruptions in the Strait Of Hormuz.
Crypto market showed similar posture while Bitcoin initially sold off during the height of the weekend headlines.
Traders returned as risk appetite increased, and then they talk about shit coins.
Yeah.
I don't know
what they think a short lived event

(29:11):
of this nature is actually going to be.
People have been itching to hit Iran since Hillary Clinton
was in the state department.
I I I don't know what these people are talking about.
So
either
either The United States and Israel

(29:33):
carpet bomb that entire country from end to end, north to south, east to west, and all points in between,
or we're gonna find ourselves in a very long conflict with Iran,
just like it was with Iraq. And it's I'm tired of it. I'm so sick of it.
I literally want to build a wall around the Middle East and just let them all fight each other. And whoever wins, we, I don't know, do a trade deal with. It's that bad. I've been dealing with this shit since the seventies.

(30:02):
I mean, literally in the seventies, there was a problem with Iran.
It's all I mean, it ever
since.
Who was not crew? I have not cruise. Jeff, who am I thinking of? Is that dude that worked for,
for Kennedy,
that went over and made all the deals with with Saudi Arabia in The Middle East for for oil. It's how we ended up with the petrodollar

(30:25):
ever since that.
Ever since we did that,
it has been nothing but one fucking problem
after another after another, and it doesn't look like it's ending anytime soon. So when these people talk about short lived, I'm like, dude, we've been jacking with this country since 1973.
Short lived for who?

(30:46):
For god's sakes. But
it is interesting
insofar that it's going to affect all the numbers which we are going to run right now.
Futures and commodities.

(31:08):
Oil is down a tenth of a percent to $73.76.
Ladies and gentlemen, it hit
almost $78
over the weekend.
Yeah. Exactly.
Brittnorsy
is down, two tenths of a point, $76.87.
Natural gas,
plumbing low, three and a quarter percent of the downside, $3.72

(31:30):
per gal or per thousand. And gasoline is up,
slightly 0.5
0.05%
to the upside, $2.33 a gallon.
Gold is up a half point to $34.00
4 and 2 dime. Silver is up point 63%. Platinum is up almost 2%, and palladium
top in the charts at three and a quarter percent to the upside.

(31:54):
Meanwhile,
most of ag is in the red today.
Biggest loser looks to be
wheat
at two and a half percent to the downside. Biggest winner is chocolate, four and a half to the upside, so taking a little bit of a bounce on these
last few weeks of losses.
Live cattle is down almost a half point, lean hogs are up point one three, and feeder cattle are down

(32:17):
point 15%.
Meanwhile,
I guess everybody's holding their breath in the markets because the Dow is crab walking sideways and only slightly in the green.
S and P is up a quarter of a point. The Nasdaq is up point 4%,
and the S and P is down point 15%.
So I think people are just holding their breath trying to figure out if this shit's gonna be short lived like they say or not.

(32:43):
And we've got a drop in the Bitcoin price to $100,600.
That is exactly a $2,000,000,000,000
market cap. We can only purchase 29.6
ounces of shiny metal rocks with our one Bitcoin of which there are 19,882,297.7
of, and average fees per block are really low, 0.03

(33:06):
BTC taken in fees on a per block basis.
There look to be about 13 no. 12 blocks carrying
24,000
unconfirmed transactions waiting to clear at high priority rates of 5 Satoshis per vByte.
Low priority is gonna get you in at four,
and we have lost yet more hash rate. We're down to 826.4

(33:27):
exahashes per second. Still pretty high.
I I mean, honestly, that's still a lot of mining going on.
So who knows what the hell is going on? Anyway, from
from HODL with Lore, which was last week's or last Thursday's Bitcoin and podcast episode,
and I didn't do one on Friday simply because they're, honestly, I just didn't have it in me. I was really tired.

(33:52):
But I got progressively worse with 7,000 sats. Thank you, brother. He says,
I was driving from Nevada to Ontario.
Holy crap. That's a drive. Anyway, the last couple of days,
thank you for filling some of the mind numbing void that would have been there without your show. Here's a small token of gratitude from me to you. Much love. Thank you, progressively worse. And Jay with five fifty five says, I wonder how many of those men hiding crypto in their marriage divorce

(34:21):
actually just have gambling addictions
as opposed to trying to hide their fat stacks of Bitcoin.
There's a lot of people that have gambling addictions.
They're all all coiners.
Yodel with, five eleven says, howdy ho. Have a good weekend. I did. Thank you. I appreciate that. Turkey with five hundred says nothing is normal.

(34:42):
Richard Whitman with three hundred says Coinbase blows. I know. It really does.
God's death with 237 says thank you, sir. No. Thank you. Perma nerd with 210 says if you want to listen to a man that admits when he is wrong,
none of your business is that man. He is even less afraid of of admitting when he is right. That is that's true, and that's the weather report.

(35:14):
Welcome to part two of the news you can use.
Teenager
has strong incentives to flee.
After pleading guilty to a $245,000,000
Bitcoin heist,
governor says,
wow. Ryan s Gladwin decrypt.
Jesus.
This kid's, like, 19. He stole almost a quarter of a billion dollars in Bitcoin.

(35:40):
The
the f, man.
Oh, no.
I guess it's not the governor. The gov, the United States government
is opposing the release of a 19 year old
after he plead guilty in November
to a $245,000,000
Bitcoin heist.
No. I'm not replacing the word crypto with Bitcoin. He actually stole nothing but Bitcoin, I guess. Anyway, the government argued that the teenager's

(36:07):
coconspirators
may help him flee the country before his sentencing
so that he won't testify
against them.
Recently unsealed court documents reveal that Veer Chatel
pleaded guilty in a Washington DC court to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and conspiracy to launder monetary instruments

(36:27):
in connection with a Bitcoin scam
that took place
in 2024.
According to the plea agreement, he faces between twenty and twenty five years in prison,
a potential fine
of 50 to $500,000,
and has been forced to forfeit items that were bought with proceeds from the offenses.

(36:48):
The highest was carried out by socially engineering victims
into leaking their private keys via a screen sharing service
and sending their crypto funds from the Gemini exchange to a compromised wallet Onchain Detective involved in this in the case,
Zach xBT
explained.
One victim

(37:08):
lost approximately
$245,000,000
in Bitcoin due to the sophisticated
social engineering attack,
court documents say. In a week after the theft,
Chatel's parents were assaulted
and kidnapped
in a failed ransom attempt. Oh, that's
that's an interesting twist.

(37:29):
According to court documents unsealed last week,
Chatel's role in the heist was to call potential victims pretending to be technical support from major companies,
assure them of his legitimacy,
and then convince the victim to click on the account access request
from a coconspirator.
Chatel laundered his funds using trusted professional launderers, that's actually a quote,

(37:52):
according to the documents and alongside his conspirators.
These conspirators,
Chatel,
Malone Lamb,
and
Jindell
Serrano,
then lived a luxurious life with the stolen funds, court documents and Zach XBT alleged.
The teen used his funds to purchase watches,
designer clothes,

(38:13):
and multiple cars, probably Lambos if I had to guess. Anyway, in searching Chatel's house,
the FBI found $37,000,000
in stolen crypto connected
to the $245,000,000
heist. The document also claims he had defrauded approximately
50
other victims, netting $3,000,000

(38:33):
in personal proceeds.
On Sunday, the government opposed Chatel's motion for release as he awaits his sentencing.
Quote,
considering the status of the case
and the impending substantial
prison sentence,
mister Chettle or Chital, however you pronounce it, has strong incentives to flee and little

(38:54):
motivation to stay. Yeah. No shit. Any of the unchained,
uncharged
co conspirators,
including those involved in the October 2024 theft could easily pay for mister Chatel to flee the country in an effort to avoid him testifying
against them.
That said, the government commands Chatel's

(39:14):
admission and apology for the crime.
Last month,
12 individuals were charged in connection with the heist on top of Lam and Serrano who were also arrested and charged last year, and it appears that the government believes
there may be more con conspirators out there who have yet to be
charged.
So yeah.

(39:35):
19.
19 years old and is already gonna go to prison for anywhere between,
you know, fifteen and twenty five year or twenty and twenty five years is, you know, it's like don't do that shit.
Come on, man. I mean, honestly and
it what what's really
annoying about this is that it's it's like every other idiot that

(39:59):
that gambles with their life like this.
Instead of immediately leaving the country
and but I don't know. Somehow or another setting up some kind of, like, you know,
company to buy
maybe a house somewhere in, I don't know, Central America or something like that. No. He spends it on watches.
You know? Some of these you know, I've seen million, million and a half dollar watches.

(40:23):
You can blow you can blow through a shit ton of money just buying watches by themselves.
Do you really?
In designer clothes.
Really.
Lamb Lambos. You know what I've said about Lambos. They're fucking awful cars.
They're air cooled for one. They're did you know that?
Lamborghini for the most part, almost every Lamborghini I know of is an air cooled engine, which means what?

(40:48):
You need air flowing across the engine to actually cool it. Why is that important? Do you know how many Lamborghini pictures of Lamborghinis
I've seen
on fire
or
had clearly been on fire that's right next to a gas pump?
Why is that important? What's the tell?
Because they're just slowly cruising around town in their Lambo.

(41:13):
They don't realize that they need to actually have some kind of speed
to get air to flow across the engine so that it will cool the engine. So after heating and overheating the engine for God only knows how long, what do they do? They pull into a gas station to get more gas.
Now there's literally no airflow going on, and that's when the engine decides to, you know what?

(41:36):
Screw a bunch of this. I'm going home and catches on fire. And then, you know,
your $240,000
supercar burns to a crisp
right next to a gas pump, like the safest place in the world to be. Right? This everything is stupid
and it's really annoying. It just is. But we've got good news.

(41:59):
Ashigaru
has brought back Whirlpool.
On chain privacy coin join
has returned.
This is out of Atlas 21, by the way. The development team behind the Ashigaru wallet has officially revived the Whirlpool coin join solution,
once again offering users the ability to improve the privacy of their Bitcoin transactions.

(42:22):
The release of Ashigaru
Whirlpool represents a fateful implementation of the original protocol developed by
SamuraI Wallet.
The platform allows users to voluntarily
participate
in zero link coin joins ensuring full privacy for both past
and future transactions by breaking deterministic

(42:43):
links between inputs and outputs with 100%
entropy
according to the announcement.
All connections to the Whirlpool coordinator occur exclusively
via the Tor network.
The core architecture remains true to the original design
created by tdev d, Samurais
Zero Link, and LaurentMT

(43:04):
of o x t, while introducing updates developed by the open source Ashigaru
project over the past six months.
One of the key innovations lies in the user interface.
The Whirlpool introduces
Ashigaru
terminal and terminal user interface application that marks a clear shift

(43:25):
from the previous graphic user interface model. The new system
uses an Electrum server as the back end
removing the dependency on Dojo
and making the solution compatible with platforms such as Start9,
Umbrel, and MyNode.
This architecture change
also ensures that the Ashigaru team has no access

(43:48):
to users, master, public keys, or xPubs.
Ashigaru terminal is available,
excuse me,
On all major desktop operating systems, Windows, Mac, Linux, to keep continuous reaffirming or remixing active,
users must keep their computers connected and online, properly configuring power settings to prevent automatic sleep modes

(44:11):
or wireless disconnections.
The Ashi Garu Whirlpool code is publicly available
for community review and contributions,
and there are some fees involved.
I won't get into that.
If you want if you're if you're gonna be a Whirlpool user,
then you can damn well go find out the fees for yourself. You don't need me because I I would

(44:34):
bet my bottom dollar that
most of you guys out there aren't using Whirlpool. We probably all should.
I haven't really ever used Whirlpool,
but here's what I love about this.
You know, the samurai wall samurai wallet guys are are still in jail.
You know? They're they're we still have a problem with this.
And here we have the Ashigaru

(44:56):
team saying, screw it. We're we're putting Whirlpool back up.
So my question becomes,
are the are the developers of the in the Ashigaru
team,
have they insulated
their identity
well enough that they cannot be known?
Therefore, they cannot be charged

(45:17):
because I guarantee you,
if they find out who these people are, they the the SEC or the FBI or department let's just say the Department of Justice.
We'll find them and we'll charge them, and we'll have the samurai wallet issue all over again. And I'm getting kind of sick of watching developers
try to do the right thing

(45:38):
for the rest of the world and then get hosed
by people who just absolutely demand nothing but 100%
fealty.
You can't you can't use anybody else's money. You can't use anybody else's
privacy solutions. No. You've got a AML
KYC
though yourself
out the wazoo,

(45:58):
and the only thing that that actually helps are 19 year old kids who know what telephone number to call to try to get you to click
on something that's going to screw you over.
That that that's all KYC
AML actually does. It serves the purposes
of thievery.
That's all it's ever done. That's all it can do, and that's all it will ever do.

(46:22):
So I while I applaud the Ashigaru
team,
I am hoping beyond
all levels of hope
that they have done everything that they can do, that nobody knows who these people are,
that nobody will ever know who these people are.
I don't know if that's true. I can only assume that if it's not true, then they are

(46:45):
have an ironclad
lock on their defense as to why it is they should not be charged with any crimes
by spinning Whirlpool back up.
We'll have to wait and see on that one. Meanwhile,
we've got a couple of news stories out of Norway.
First up,
Norway's Green Minerals

(47:06):
announces the adoption of their very own, you guessed it, Bitcoin Treasury strategy.
Bitcoin Magazine written by Oscar Perez,
Today, Greenmineral
AS,
a mineral miner in Norway, has announced the adoption of a Bitcoin treasury strategy,
marking a shift in its financial approach to protect against inflation and geopolitical uncertainty.

(47:30):
The deep sea mining company aims to diversify its treasury by integrating Bitcoin into its balance sheet,
moving away from the reliance on traditional fiat currencies. Quote, in this era
of significant monetary expansion,
maintaining a strong balance sheet is more critical than ever,
said the executive chairman of Green Minerals, Stale Rodal.

(47:51):
Bitcoin's decentralized noninflationary
properties make it an attractive alternative
to traditional fiat. And by integrating a Bitcoin treasury strategy, we are not only mitigating fiat risks,
but also reaffirming our commitment to financial innovation and the sustainable creation of long term value, end quote.

(48:12):
They aim to finance up to $1,200,000,000
in partnership with others
with Bitcoin exposure forming a key part of the capital structure.
The move supports the upcoming launch of the first high efficiency
deep sea mining program under its partnership for responsible production.

(48:32):
Quote, green minerals emphasizes that its core operational strategy remains steadfast.
The Bitcoin treasury program is implemented
to support the company's project plans.
Green Minerals also sees the blockchain technology,
as an important
role in playing
in mining to ensure supply chain transparency,

(48:54):
mineral origin certification,
and operational efficiency.
Yeah. That's all bullshit.
You're you're not using blockchain
to ensure supply chain transparency
or mineral origin certification.
Maybe operational efficiency, but doubtful.
But you're definitely
not going to be able to use blockchain to certify

(49:18):
where a mineral came from.
Blockchains don't do that.
They all I mean, the only thing the blockchain for Bitcoin does is verify a transaction is valid and make sure that once it's mined, that it cannot be undone.
Right? So
how why does it not work here?

(49:39):
Because I would actually have to input,
like, as a human, I would say, yeah, this I don't know. This chunk of gold came from this latitude and longitude.
I'm gonna stick it in the blockchain.
Okay.
That means that I have to trust your initial transaction of making sure that the information was not only correct but that you're not lying. Because what if somebody said, you know,

(50:02):
I'll pay you a $100,000
if you
instead of saying it came from these coordinates
that they really came from over here, which is not really where they came from for whatever purpose. I don't know. Maybe it's Lex Luthor and he's got some kind of nefarious
mustache twisting plan involving, I don't know, a maiden tied up and on train tracks. I don't know. I don't give a shit. All I do know is the guy that's actually gonna put this stuff into the blockchain

(50:30):
is probably gonna go a $100,000
sounds really good.
Sure, boss.
See, that's why blockchains don't work. We always used to make fun of this thing called bananas on the blockchain
because there was literally companies out there saying, we're gonna be able to use the blockchain to verify the origin the country of origin of this coffee or these bananas or these, I don't know, mangoes and papayas. I don't give a shit. It was never gonna work. It's

(50:57):
still never been actually done.
So that part of that statement is complete and utter bullshit.
Anyway,
the company plans to introduce a new key performance indicator
called Bitcoin per share,
which will provide shareholders with a transparent reporting on its digital asset holdings.
Green Minerals expects to acquire its first Bitcoin in the coming days. Quote, this approach

(51:23):
is particularly
well suited for a company with such a long project horizon
as Green Minerals, said Rodal.
Quote, with significant future capital expenditures planned for the production equipment and the program offering a robust hedge against currency debasement, end quote.
Green Minerals says it also sees long term potential in blockchain.

(51:45):
Beyond treasury use. It plans to apply blockchain technology throughout its operations to ensure
earlier what we said supply chain transparency,
improving efficiency, and certify
mineral origins. That's bullshit, but here's a quote.
This strategic move reinforces Green Minerals' position not only as a leader in sustainable

(52:07):
mineral extraction,
but also as an innovator in financial and technological
practices.
The company invites all stakeholders to monitor the forthcoming updates
as it paves the way towards broader blockchain adoption.
So I definitely smell a bunch of horse pucky here.
We'll have to see, but it's gonna be interesting how they move forward

(52:29):
when the second part of the news out of Norway
isn't quite so
bright and fluffy.
Also from Oscar Perez and also out of Bitcoin Magazine,
Norway plans to temporarily
ban new Bitcoin and crypto mining centers to conserve energy. Sounds like

(52:51):
sounds like Norway might have a conflict of interest here.
That today, the government of Norway announced its plans to introduce a temporary
ban
on establishing new Bitcoin and cryptocurrency mining data centers.
The government concluded
that it was better to redirect electricity to other industries and economic sectors and that it would be better for the national interest, quote.

(53:15):
The Labour Party government
has a clear intention
to limit the mining of cryptocurrency in Norway as much as possible,
said the minister for digitalization
and public administration,
Carrie Anne Tongue.
The ruling labor party has attributed the upcoming ban to the

(53:35):
excessive
energy consumption
by power intensive Bitcoin and crypto mining operations, which it says offers
little benefits to the broader economy.
Quote, crypto mining is very power intensive and generates little in the way of jobs
and income for the local community.
She added. A temporary ban could be introduced during the autumn of twenty twenty five according to the Norwegian government.

(54:01):
So Norway pulling out the Glock nine and pointing it to its head and blowing its own brains out. There you go.
Texas
still is a model of how this actually does work for
if it works for
a state the size of Texas,
it's gonna work for the
for a country the size of Norway. I'm I'm just saying.

(54:24):
Now last up for the day,
Bitcoin ASIC producer, Canaan,
pilots US production,
but
in a twist,
EXIT's artificial intelligence business, Adrian Zmunsky,
Cointelegraph,
Bitcoin mining application specific integrated circuit manufacturer,

(54:45):
Canaan,
has completed a pilot production run inside The United States and has fully abandoned
its artificial intelligence hardware manufacturing
efforts.
In a statement sent to Cointelegraph on Monday,
Canaan
a Canaan representative said that it, quote,
has successfully completed a pilot production run-in The United States,

(55:08):
replicating its Malaysia based operations.
Canaan also announced the discontinuation
of its AI semiconductor
business in what it said is a strategic
realignment aimed at sharpening its focus. Quote,
I believe
that doubling down on our core strengths in crypto infrastructure and Bitcoin mining is the most
strategic

(55:29):
path forward for Canaan,
said
Nanking
Zhang,
chairman and CEO of Canaan.
A Canaan representative acknowledged that production costs are higher in The US, but said that the company views this initiative
not just as a hedge against tariffs,
but as a potential strategic investment in long term resilience, end quote.

(55:51):
Producing
closer to the North American market, the company added, will help improve delivery cycles,
respond faster to local demand, and navigate future geopolitical or regulatory
shifts.
The statements follow recent reports that Bitmain,
Canaan, and MicroBT,
which collectively produce most of the world's Bitcoin mining ASICs, are bringing production to The US.

(56:17):
And I believe I brought you that story last week.
This addition of the discontinuation
of its AI infrastructure plans
is what I think is the most interesting part about this story.
Let's continue. Canaan's representative
noted that producing Bitcoin mining ASICs in The US
is part of a long term effort and is more than just a response to tariffs. Quote, we're actively working to optimize

(56:42):
our United States cost structure with the goal of limiting production costs. Well, of course, you are. Why wouldn't you? The representative said,
the company's products manufactured in Malaysia
are currently subject to a 10% tariff.
When it comes to imported components and raw materials,
the tariffs are less clear, which makes expense planning very difficult.

(57:04):
For this reason,
Canin's US expansion
will ultimately depend on achieving commercial viability through a combination of cost management,
customer demand, and clarity around the tariff environment, end quote.
The company addressed potential concerns over US national security standards highlighting
that its devices shipped into The US are produced in Malaysia and certified by local authorities,

(57:31):
the representative added, quote,
should we expand our US production further,
we intend to ensure
that our operations align with evolving US standards for technology
as well as security, end quote.
The comments come after the US Customs and Border Protection Agency halted the delivery

(57:51):
delivery of thousands
of Bitmain ASICs in November of twenty twenty four
following an investigation by US authorities
into Chinese chip designer,
Ximen
Softco,
over an alleged business relationship with US sanctioned telecommunication
telecommunications firm, Huawei,
the devices were only recently released.

(58:13):
So the abandonment of the AI is really the centerpiece of this story here because
a lot of
a lot of the Bitcoin
mining infrastructure
is seeing shifts
towards AI. We've seen that over the, you know, over the past year, really.
We've seen like, okay. Well, we're gonna devote some of our megawattage on this particular mining thing. We're gonna just, we're gonna we're gonna do AI stuff. We're gonna get some GPUs. We're we're gonna divert the the power to to power these other machines.

(58:45):
And then we started seeing some, you know, some of the Bitcoin miners start talking about maybe that you get into the AI chip manufacturing,
and it looks like Canaan tried
and just said, you know what? No. Let's just let's just mine Bitcoin.
Because
I use artificial intelligence. I use it every day.

(59:06):
There are some things that it's really good at.
There are some things that it's very helpful with. Is it intelligence?
No.
It's definitely artificial, but it is not intelligent.
And anybody who tells you that this shit is going to be able to think anytime in
the foreseeable future
is fooling themselves and they're trying to fool you.

(59:28):
It's not going to happen,
but that doesn't make AI
useless.
It doesn't
make everything that comes out of AI that you use it for
useless.
It is a very, very
useful tool to have. And like I said, I use it every single day.

(59:49):
And I'm, you know, I'm learning more and more as I go along. How how does it work? How does it act? You know? What is his response in in these particular situations?
And I I do I actually recommend for those people that are out there that are like
the truth is always in some kind of shade of gray.

(01:00:09):
There's two kinds of people in AI.
One, AI is gonna solve all of our problems and it's going to be more smart. It's gonna be smarter than any human
ever, and it's gonna be smarter than all humans ever
have been combined.
And then there's the people who are like, no, man. This shit is like completely it's completely bogus and it's going to do nothing but take jobs. It's like it's either one or the other with these people. The truth actually exists somewhere between those two extremes. Alright? That's not hard that's not hard to conceive of. But But there's a lot of people that are like, yeah, I just don't I I don't want to learn how to use this. You're gonna have to.

(01:00:44):
I I know.
And and for the people that are leaning more towards
this thing will never amount to anything and it's a complete scam,
you're
gonna if you're not seeing what it can do,
it's not that it can do all the shit that the people on the other end of the spectrum say is gonna be smarter than humans. No. It's not gonna do that shit either,

(01:01:05):
but it's not useless.
There's a lot of stuff that it can do,
but I kind of recommend that for those people that think that it can't do anything and that it's just stupid and it's just a waste of time,
take it. Take a small class. There's probably a few free ones
because I think a lot of people, I think the the term chat g p t

(01:01:26):
really screwed up the
what the initial
part of what AI might be able to do for people. I think they screwed it up by naming the thing chat g p t. Even though there's way more stuff out there than just chat g p t, that was the first word that everybody heard of. That was the first word that was marketed or at least successfully.

(01:01:48):
So most people think of it's a chatbot.
You chat with it.
No.
No. You you don't. In a way, you do, but I think a lot of people thought,
what should I you know, I don't know. Like,
hi. What's your name?
Oh, that's interesting.

(01:02:09):
My name's this. And I literally
these are some of the very first
the very first conversations
I saw happening with chat g p t when people were like, hey, man. This thing just came out. Check out what I did. And it's like nothing. It's like how like talking about your dog.
No. No. No. Why why don't you say, give me five,

(01:02:30):
here it's like ask me five questions
about who I am
and just ask them one at a time, let me answer, ask another one.
Do that five times. Right? So, ask me five questions.
Do that exercise.
Right? And then ask it one thing after that.
If I wanted to start a business of my own, let's say you don't have one. If I wanted to start a business of my own, given what you know about me from those five questions,

(01:02:57):
give me 10 examples of what you think I might be able to do as a either a side hustle or starting my own
entrepreneurship
and watch what happens.
Does that mean that it's like, oh, well, I should do everything it says. No. That's not the point of the exercise.
The point of the exercise
is maybe it will fire up something that you weren't thinking of,

(01:03:21):
and that's where a lot of what I use AI for today really comes from.
What have I not seen about this thing?
Read this web page.
Here's what I think is going on in this particular news story.
Am I missing anything?
Is there is there a nuance here that I'm not getting?

(01:03:43):
This
is one of the myriad ways that I'm using artificial intelligence at this point, and it's honestly
very, very good at these kinds of things. And it's also good at a lot of other things that I haven't really figured out yet. And there's a lot of things that I use it for that I don't have time to illustrate here. But I am saying,

(01:04:05):
if you think that this shit's just gonna go away,
you're putting yourself in a boatload of danger.
Please
go find a free class
or something like that.
Right now, I'm taking a class from Jack Spierko who's host of the Survival Podcast.

(01:04:25):
Cost me a $100 to get in. I can't believe I actually got in because he was only taking a 100 people.
It's a very good class because he's approaching it from a here's how you use it for
generating content ideas because he's a podcaster.
Here's how you use it for generating ideas on on what business you might be able to run-in your future given what skill sets you have.

(01:04:49):
Is is there something I'm missing? Is there is there something that I mean, I think I know what I could do, but is is there something that that would be more interesting that I haven't seen yet?
He's
using it in a way for marketing.
It to be a marketing manager and a marketing, you know, a person in marketing that comes up with ideas.

(01:05:09):
And it's not bad.
It's really not bad. It's not bad at all.
And I mean, sure, he was just gonna do that class again and it's probably gonna cost more than a $100 next time. But
the reason you want somebody else
to tell you how to use chat GPT or artificial intelligence

(01:05:30):
isn't because you're dumb and you don't know how to use it
It's that when you see how to how other people use the same tool whether it's AI or I don't know a socket wrench,
you might actually go oh shit I never thought of using it that way And then all of a sudden
you now you now you're armed with being able to do something else.

(01:05:51):
So
it's it won't won't won't won't take you that much long or that you know much time to go find
potentially even a free class
and just give it a shot.
See if you can get it to do something that is of value to you
because
I guarantee you there are

(01:06:11):
millions of people
that are starting to use this every day
And if you're one of the ones that five years from now, you still haven't touched any one of these things to figure out how it can work for you,
then you may be working for one of these other people.
Just let that sink in, and I'll see you on the other side.
This has been Bitcoin,

(01:06:32):
and and I'm your host, David Bennett. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and hope to see you again real soon.
Have a great day.

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