Latest / The Paul Barron Crypto Show / XRP = Safest Crypto Asset?🔥Market Crash w/ Matt Hougan Bitwise INTERVIEW

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XRP = Safest Crypto Asset?🔥Market Crash w/ Matt Hougan Bitwise INTERVIEW · The Paul Barron Crypto Show

• 0:06
  Speaker 1: Dive into a little bit of XRP news today. We'll
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: also be talking about the potential of an XRP ETF
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: with a special guest. You guys don't want to miss it.
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: My name is Paul Barre. Welcome back in a tech path.
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: Let's get started. We want to thank our sponsor and
• 0:17
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• 0:19
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• 0:22
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• 0:34
  Speaker 1: and see what you guys think. Listen, we did a
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: video last week and it was in reference to Japan
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: and it was primarily focused a little bit on the
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: Japanese strategy around lowering crypto taxes. Now, this was prior
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: to the Crypto Summit that occurred last Friday. We'll talk
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: about that. We're going to have a guest that's going
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: to break that down.
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: But the reason we.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: Did that video was mainly because of a lot of
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: the strategies that were being implemented by some of the
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: companies and banks within Japan. Japan Nowsher's a stable corn
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: era with SBI, and then this of course was a
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: big deal because it is also including not only URLUSD
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: but also USDC. The milestone allows the platform now to
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: facilitate the use of stable coins, which is a big deal.
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: And this was all following the fund Settlement Act and
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: Banking Act that was adjusted and then further into it.
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: They have a beta version of their.
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: USDC related services that launched on March twelfth, so are
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: getting ready to So the key here is is that
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: SBI has already started to make some pretty big moves
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: in Ripple. We already know enough about SBI and what
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: they've been doing and the things if you look at
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: just this PDF right here, because this is going to
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: be kind of interesting, is their operation of a validator
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: node on the XRP ledger, all coming into the digital ecosystem.
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: This being SBI, I think waiting for the market to
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: adjust to some things and also get some regulatory alignment
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: as well.
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: And if you look at.
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: Some of the people that have been pushing this, this
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: of course is a in this particular case a pro XRPCEO.
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: That was one of the things that they were really
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: pressing for, and the Japanese regulators responded and said, okay,
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: we'll do that. Let's drop our crypto taxes down to
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: twenty percent. That of course happened last week. And the
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: thing that works with this is a lot of the
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: companies within Japan have been waiting for this. They've been
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: looking at, well, if we can get crypto taxes down,
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: if we can get some regulatory alignment, all of this
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: is what we're waiting to see. And Sega is one
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: of the biggest companies in Japan, and I think this
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: is what they're waiting on.
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: This is their CEO. I want to go to this clip.
• 2:43
  Speaker 3: Why does Sega still see a future? I mean, how
• 2:45
  Speaker 3: do you yourself envision incorporating Web three.
• 2:49
  Speaker 4: Into Saga pay people, I mean game a game game
• 2:52
  Speaker 4: has been growing.
• 2:54
  Speaker 3: Gets a bit more of a dipping your toes into
• 2:56
  Speaker 3: the Web three tech.
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah, somebody like you.
• 2:59
  Speaker 3: Have a hook as we've been hearing executives talk about
• 3:02
  Speaker 3: a super game coming sometime in twenty twenty six, right,
• 3:06
  Speaker 3: is that correct?
• 3:07
  Speaker 5: Could be?
• 3:07
  Speaker 6: Could be?
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yes, yes, sometimes are on that area.
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: I was saying and that will incorporate all of your
• 3:13
  Speaker 3: ips or various ips from your catalog.
• 3:17
  Speaker 7: Well, we're not, you know somehow you know, uh, we
• 3:22
  Speaker 7: are they, you know, denying potential.
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: I like that we're not. We're not verifying, but we're
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: not denying. So a good statement point being is that
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: when you look at Sega in general or a lot
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: of the Japanese companies, they have been waiting for what
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: now we have seen as a new strategy going forward
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: on crypto, and it seems as though the Digital Minister
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: there in Japan is all in. And of course the
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: reason it is important is because of the global competitive nature.
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: And we're gonna play a clip from Scott Bessen here
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: in a little bit that will show you some of
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: the concern that we're looking at the United States and
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: what Japan is doing from a strategy at least on
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: their crypto and their Web three side that could apply
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: here in the United States. So I wanted to bring
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: on Matt Hogan coming in from bit Wise. You guys
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: have seen him on the show before, but Matt, thanks
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: for coming in today.
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: We appreciate it.
• 4:16
  Speaker 5: Excited to be here, Paul, It's a good day to talk.
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: The biggest news was the Crypto Summit. We got a
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: chance to see David Sachs and what looked to me
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: like the Avengers team for crypto. Just almost every major
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: player you could imagine was represented there at the event.
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: First of all, what was your opinion on I know
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: you did a piece on this. I want to get
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: your opinion on whether you think this was a good
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: thing for crypto, because obviously the market did not necessarily
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: respond positively.
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: What were your thoughts.
• 4:48
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean I actually think it's a great thing
• 4:50
  Speaker 4: for crypto, not just a good thing for crypto.
• 4:52
  Speaker 5: The market is upset because.
• 4:54
  Speaker 4: The government didn't smash by a couple hundred thousand bitcoin
• 4:59
  Speaker 4: and and other assets as well. That was never a
• 5:03
  Speaker 4: realistic expectation. We need to step back and realize that
• 5:06
  Speaker 4: the US government just said that bitcoin is a strategic
• 5:09
  Speaker 4: asset that shall not be sold and that crypto deserves
• 5:13
  Speaker 4: to be in a stockpile. That's the kind of words,
• 5:17
  Speaker 4: That's the kind of framing that leads to a multi
• 5:19
  Speaker 4: year bull market. I think eventually the market will wake
• 5:22
  Speaker 4: up and realize that it's incredibly bullish. You know, we're
• 5:27
  Speaker 4: sort of getting overwhelmed right now by bearish news in
• 5:30
  Speaker 4: the broader economy that I think is trickling over into
• 5:34
  Speaker 4: the crypto space. But to me, that's creating what's going
• 5:38
  Speaker 4: to be a coiled spring in crypto. There's just so
• 5:40
  Speaker 4: much good news being ignored right now that once the
• 5:43
  Speaker 4: sentiment turns, I think we're going to move quite quite
• 5:46
  Speaker 4: fast to the upside.
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: And you can kind of see, you know, the chart's
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: not looking good there.
• 5:50
  Speaker 2: But I do agree with you.
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: I think the macro pressures continue to show consistency. One
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: maybe with the Fed getting a little bit surprised at
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: not only job numbers, the slowness of the economy, do
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: you think I'm just kind of curious. Do you think
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: we're going to see a little bit of a pivot
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: there from Powell?
• 6:07
  Speaker 4: I think that's what the Trump administration is hoping for,
• 6:10
  Speaker 4: right They're hoping to force a pivot from Powell. I
• 6:13
  Speaker 4: think they're hoping to create space for the economy to
• 6:16
  Speaker 4: bottom and turn around.
• 6:18
  Speaker 5: I wouldn't be surprised if we've seen it. We've seen
• 6:20
  Speaker 5: it around the world.
• 6:21
  Speaker 4: We continue to see central banks cutting rates, cutting rates
• 6:25
  Speaker 4: to reflect the uncertainty elicited by the terraf regimes. You know,
• 6:31
  Speaker 4: My core view, as you know, Paul, is that the
• 6:33
  Speaker 4: US has outlawed recessions, and most governments around the world
• 6:37
  Speaker 4: have effectively outlawed recessions. So I do think as soon
• 6:40
  Speaker 4: as we see the economy wobble, we're going to see
• 6:43
  Speaker 4: people come in with interest rate and physical support to
• 6:46
  Speaker 4: shore that up, and sure enough that will be a
• 6:48
  Speaker 4: positive for the market as well.
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: If you look at the two major assets that are
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: in these whether you look at the strategic reserve or
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: the sockpile, and you've got bitcoin ethereum a handful of
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: others that are making their way in there, including XRP,
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: and you kind of look at this and say, all right,
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: which one is better to take a look at overall?
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: Do you feel like Bitcoin or eight?
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: Between those two at least, which one do you feel
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: performs better in these funds or in these these stockpiles?
• 7:20
  Speaker 4: Oh great, Yeah, I'm glad you made it just bitcoin
• 7:22
  Speaker 4: and eth. That makes it much easier between those two.
• 7:25
  Speaker 4: I think bitcoin is incredibly well positioned. The thing people
• 7:29
  Speaker 4: overlook in the executive Order is it directed the Secretaries
• 7:33
  Speaker 4: of Commerce and Treasury that they shall investigate ways to
• 7:37
  Speaker 4: increase the government's position in bitcoin as long as it's
• 7:41
  Speaker 4: done in a budget mutual perspective. I actually think that
• 7:44
  Speaker 4: word shall means a lot there. I expect the US
• 7:48
  Speaker 4: government to actually be buying bitcoin by the end of
• 7:50
  Speaker 4: the year, and I think the market just sort of read.
• 7:53
  Speaker 5: Right past that.
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: I want to play a clip for you.
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: This is David sachs our Crypto and ais are, and
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: he's talking about the Treasury. Mister Bennett maybe becoming an
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: asset manager.
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: Take a look.
• 8:06
  Speaker 7: We don't know exactly what digital assets the federal government has.
• 8:10
  Speaker 7: I've seen reports that it might have, for example, fifty
• 8:13
  Speaker 7: thousand eth which is a theoreum. Figure out exactly what
• 8:16
  Speaker 7: the assets are. We're going to move him into the
• 8:18
  Speaker 7: digital stockpile. That sectually, the Treasury will figure out how
• 8:21
  Speaker 7: to maximize the values of these holdings. If the sectuary
• 8:23
  Speaker 7: of the Treasury decides that's in the long term interest
• 8:26
  Speaker 7: of the US to rebalance the portfolio or change the portfolio,
• 8:29
  Speaker 7: the Secretary has the discussion to do that.
• 8:31
  Speaker 8: So maybe the decision with the theorem is, hey, this
• 8:33
  Speaker 8: thing's waning, we just put it into bitcoin because we
• 8:35
  Speaker 8: know that's the more solid one. Yeah, that's what I'm
• 8:37
  Speaker 8: reading into it.
• 8:37
  Speaker 7: Yeah, I mean, I think that's largely fair. And unfortunately,
• 8:40
  Speaker 7: we have a Secuary of the Treasury who is an
• 8:43
  Speaker 7: extremely successful format EDG fund manager.
• 8:45
  Speaker 8: He has to make those decisions and that's going to
• 8:48
  Speaker 8: be part of how he's evaluated by the President. So
• 8:51
  Speaker 8: hopefully he's going to be sharp about that.
• 8:52
  Speaker 7: Right, if some other digital asset could prove that it's
• 8:56
  Speaker 7: as decentralized and as secure and as widely accepted as
• 9:01
  Speaker 7: a store of value as bitcoin, then maybe it could
• 9:03
  Speaker 7: be elevated in the same way that bitcoin has. I mean,
• 9:05
  Speaker 7: I'm laying out the criteria for you.
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: So it's interesting that Sachs made that statement there, because
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: if he truly believed that it was only a bitcoin
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: only world, we probably wouldn't have seen that statement. He
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: clearly is leaving an open door. You've got Scott Bessett
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: now that potentially has the wherewithal to be able to
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: manage that stockpile and possibly go after something else besides
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: Bitcoin of just you know, especially when you look at
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: the stockpile side as things. So my question to you
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: would be which is the safer asset? Would you go
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: with a bitcoin or would you go with something like
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: the lead I would say the lead asset in the
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: stockpile being XRP.
• 9:43
  Speaker 4: You know, I think the thing I would read into
• 9:45
  Speaker 4: that I always like to think about what the facts say,
• 9:48
  Speaker 4: which is what the market thinks. So I think that
• 9:51
  Speaker 4: what's interesting about that clip is what the market thinks.
• 9:55
  Speaker 4: Is it certainly bitcoin only, right, that's what the market thinks.
• 10:00
  Speaker 4: Whether whether I think it should be bitcoin or XRP
• 10:03
  Speaker 4: or eth actually irrelevant. I'm not the Secretary of the Treasury.
• 10:07
  Speaker 4: But the important thing that statement calls out is that
• 10:10
  Speaker 4: the probability of these other assets having a space is
• 10:12
  Speaker 4: not zero. And so that's the kind of delta that
• 10:15
  Speaker 4: I look for as an investor, where the market thinks
• 10:18
  Speaker 4: one thing, in reality says something else. That's often the
• 10:20
  Speaker 4: land where opportunity lies.
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: Which brings me to other countries. Now you've got the
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: potential of us having well, not even the potential, we
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: have a strategic reserve. Now will we see the rest
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: of the G twenty starting to step up and say, hey,
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: maybe we need to do it as well? This came
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: from your analysis.
• 10:38
  Speaker 5: Yeah, absolutely.
• 10:40
  Speaker 4: This is the other thing that I think the market
• 10:41
  Speaker 4: is misreading here. If you're in another country and you're
• 10:44
  Speaker 4: looking at the US saying this is an important reserve.
• 10:47
  Speaker 5: You're looking at the US, which.
• 10:49
  Speaker 4: May consider selling some gold to buy bitcoin or to
• 10:52
  Speaker 4: build a bigger crypto reserve.
• 10:54
  Speaker 5: I don't see how you stand pat right.
• 10:57
  Speaker 4: I don't see how if you're Russia, if you're China,
• 10:59
  Speaker 4: if you're India, if you're smaller countries and you're watching
• 11:03
  Speaker 4: your peers move in this space. If you're Saudi Arabia
• 11:05
  Speaker 4: looking at you know, Abu Dhabi allocating to bitcoin, do
• 11:09
  Speaker 4: you really want to take the chance that you're wrong,
• 11:13
  Speaker 4: that this becomes a really important asset. You almost have
• 11:17
  Speaker 4: to or are encouraged to start allocating, start building a strategy,
• 11:22
  Speaker 4: maybe even to front run the US buying a digital bitcoin.
• 11:26
  Speaker 5: Maybe do it fast.
• 11:27
  Speaker 4: So you know, our expectation at bit wise is we're
• 11:29
  Speaker 4: going to see the number of countries holding bitcoin double
• 11:31
  Speaker 4: this year. We're inside the US, so we're thinking about
• 11:35
  Speaker 4: this with a great deal of nuance, with our political biases,
• 11:38
  Speaker 4: et cetera. Outside the US, the President of the United
• 11:41
  Speaker 4: States of America, the largest country, the largest economy in
• 11:44
  Speaker 4: the world, just said bitcoin's a strategic asset.
• 11:47
  Speaker 5: I don't think you're going to ignore that. I think
• 11:49
  Speaker 5: it would be foolish to be potentially a historic mistake.
• 11:52
  Speaker 5: So I do think there'll be a global arms.
• 11:54
  Speaker 4: Race to position in this asset, and ultimately that'll benefit
• 11:57
  Speaker 4: crypto investors across the spectrum.
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: Well, I think you look at and we've continued to
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: dive into this strategy that the Japanese are really underway
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: significantly with. Obviously SBI's position is I look at it
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: much like almost like a Michael Sailor, And you know
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: what strategy has been now no longer micro strategy, but
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: strategy has been doing with bitcoin SBI seems to be
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: doing with XRP and ripple. And this is a clip
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: from Scott Bessant because he's obviously dealt with these kind
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: of things before, and he said something very interesting in
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: this clip that I wanted to get your opinion on.
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: Let's go to that clip.
• 12:39
  Speaker 6: Over the next few years, Tokyo will do the best
• 12:42
  Speaker 6: of any major market. It's almost like a helicopter drop
• 12:45
  Speaker 6: into their bank accounts, and I think no one's imagining
• 12:49
  Speaker 6: what that could look like in six or nine months.
• 12:52
  Speaker 6: In a way, the most dangerous thing is a Japanese
• 12:54
  Speaker 6: company with a lot of cash, because they'll do something
• 12:57
  Speaker 6: crazy with it.
• 12:58
  Speaker 4: So you're continually looking for that position that we'll enable
• 13:00
  Speaker 4: you to win with the least risk.
• 13:02
  Speaker 6: Many times, there is one investment you can do and
• 13:06
  Speaker 6: you win. What is the key square. It's when they're
• 13:11
  Speaker 6: just two kings, several ponds and there is one square
• 13:15
  Speaker 6: you can move to and you win.
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: All right, Well, like his statement, there one square you
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: can move to and you win. Japanese energy firm this
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: is just one of the examples now have purchased XRP
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: and dosecoin. Now granted, just to Scott's point, they're going
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: to do something crazy, you know, and you can't really
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: count the Japanese out. And if they do, try to
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: take something in this direction and it follows along with
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: the rest of the G twenty. Remember that the Japanese
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: have a huge impact on a lot more.
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: Of the global market as well.
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: So with that being said, I mean, well, first of all,
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: do you think the Japanese will continue to buy XRP.
• 13:57
  Speaker 2: They seem to be all in earth.
• 13:59
  Speaker 5: Yeah, fascinating question. I know there is significant demand. I
• 14:03
  Speaker 5: think you can't rule it out.
• 14:05
  Speaker 4: You know, look, you look at the top four plus
• 14:09
  Speaker 4: crypto assets and they're firms making major strategic bets on
• 14:13
  Speaker 4: those assets and building reserves and building in that ecosystem.
• 14:17
  Speaker 4: XRP is certainly one of them, alongside Solana and eth
• 14:21
  Speaker 4: and bitcoin, and I don't think investors should count out
• 14:25
  Speaker 4: any of those assets becoming or really emerging as geopolitically
• 14:31
  Speaker 4: important and strategically important for companies and countries around the world.
• 14:35
  Speaker 5: I think they're major parts of the future.
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: The amount of XRP being held by Japanese people has
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: now surmounted the amount of ethereum being held, So that's
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: a pretty big move. You know, when you look at
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: the comparisons, Bitcoin of course at sixty five percent, now
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: XRP holding a commanding lead at eighteen percent as the
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: number two asset. So a lot happening here. What do
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: you think happens on April sixteenth? How would XRP respond?
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: How would the market respond here on April sixteenth? On
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: April sixteenth, that's potentially when the lawsuit would be final, I.
• 15:11
  Speaker 4: Think the market would love it, right, I do think,
• 15:14
  Speaker 4: you know, from my thirty thousand foot view specific to XRP,
• 15:20
  Speaker 4: I think there is a significant chunk of the crypto
• 15:22
  Speaker 4: market that has sort of written it off or forgotten
• 15:27
  Speaker 4: about it, and I think that part of the market
• 15:29
  Speaker 4: is wrong. I think the reality is XRP has been
• 15:33
  Speaker 4: suppressed by litigation for multiple years and we don't yet
• 15:36
  Speaker 4: know what it can do on the global stage when
• 15:38
  Speaker 4: it's sort of freed from those restraints. And I think
• 15:43
  Speaker 4: if we get full clarity and we can now see
• 15:46
  Speaker 4: true business development opportunity in the US and abroad without
• 15:50
  Speaker 4: that sort of damicles hanging over it, then I think
• 15:53
  Speaker 4: we'll see what XRP can do in the market. I
• 15:56
  Speaker 4: don't think there's any guarantee it will be enormously accessful,
• 16:00
  Speaker 4: but there's equally no guarantee that it.
• 16:03
  Speaker 5: Won't be right.
• 16:04
  Speaker 4: And I think anyone who sort of proclaims one or
• 16:06
  Speaker 4: the other is is wrong at this point. So I
• 16:09
  Speaker 4: think the market would react very well to that day
• 16:13
  Speaker 4: when and if it comes, and then I think it'd
• 16:15
  Speaker 4: be exciting year to follow see how it does.
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: This would be great timing if this case is settled
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: for the bit wise ETF to.
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: Launch on XRP.
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: So what's the timing look like right now for a
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: bit wise XRP ETF.
• 16:30
  Speaker 4: Yeah, you know, obviously, when we have a live filing,
• 16:33
  Speaker 4: we're restricted from what we can say. You know, the
• 16:36
  Speaker 4: limited part that I can say is we continue to
• 16:38
  Speaker 4: push forward. And you know, we we don't file for
• 16:42
  Speaker 4: ETPs for fun. We file for ETPs because we think
• 16:45
  Speaker 4: they can launch, and we think there is a significant audience,
• 16:48
  Speaker 4: and we think it's an important asset. And so all
• 16:51
  Speaker 4: of those are intact, you know, across all the funds
• 16:54
  Speaker 4: that we have filed for. And yeah, the day after
• 16:56
  Speaker 4: tax day would be it would be a beautiful day.
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: That'd be a beautiful time.
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: Right now, everybody's out from under it. If they got
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: a refund, then they need to go spend it summer.
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: A couple other things I wanted to get with you
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: in terms of US crypto because this is something that
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: obviously President Trump is very focused on to try to
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: create more innovation here in the United States. US crypto
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: was well represented last Friday. Do you think there's going
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: to be some sort of advantage because we have seen
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: market tariffs out there in other categories. Could we see
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: something like that or at least some sort of tax benefit.
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: That could possibly be applied to US crypto. What are
• 17:36
  Speaker 2: your thoughts?
• 17:37
  Speaker 4: Yeah, you know, I actually think where the benefit will
• 17:39
  Speaker 4: come will be normalizing US regulation and tax policy to
• 17:43
  Speaker 4: the best state of what it is around the world.
• 17:46
  Speaker 4: So just getting to neutral will allow the US to
• 17:49
  Speaker 4: be the absolute leader in this space. We have the
• 17:51
  Speaker 4: best tech community, the best developer community, be the best
• 17:55
  Speaker 4: venture investing community, the best retail investing community.
• 17:59
  Speaker 5: So as long as.
• 18:00
  Speaker 4: We can align with global standards, I think we'll be
• 18:03
  Speaker 4: set to win. We don't need any protectionist tariffs or
• 18:07
  Speaker 4: unique sort of benefits from my point of view, we
• 18:10
  Speaker 4: just need a level, staying playing field.
• 18:12
  Speaker 5: We haven't had that for the last four years.
• 18:15
  Speaker 4: I think we're well on our way to getting that
• 18:17
  Speaker 4: with the actions we're seeing from the SEC and hopefully
• 18:20
  Speaker 4: we'll see from Congress.
• 18:21
  Speaker 5: And if we do, I think you're.
• 18:23
  Speaker 4: Going to see US built crypto apps, protocols, and investment
• 18:28
  Speaker 4: vehicles really thrive in the market.
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: For sure.
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think this is going to be another, as
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: Trump calls, another Golden Age, potentially. I'm looking at your
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: crypto index over on bit wise, so you guys can
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: visit this and see you've got obviously bitcoin ethereum x rpiece,
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: Alana Cardano, all of the big guys in here. The
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: one that I see that I'm wondering about, and I
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: haven't heard, even though we've started to see more potentials
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: of ETFs. Is Hadera hbar any potential your thoughts on HEDERA?
• 19:01
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think it's a very interesting, very technologically differentiated
• 19:05
  Speaker 4: approach to building a blockchain. It's something we look at
• 19:07
  Speaker 4: and think about and it you know, it's certainly something
• 19:12
  Speaker 4: we reunderwrite from the index perspective on a regular basis. So,
• 19:16
  Speaker 4: as you know, Paul, the way I like to invest
• 19:18
  Speaker 4: and the reason we have an index fund is I
• 19:20
  Speaker 4: want exposure to as many different approaches to building crypto
• 19:24
  Speaker 4: networks as I can because it's hard to forecast exactly
• 19:28
  Speaker 4: which we'll win. Hedera is a very unique and differentiated approach,
• 19:33
  Speaker 4: and therefore, you know, as an investor, I would love
• 19:36
  Speaker 4: it to be within the confines of what I can
• 19:39
  Speaker 4: allocate to, and it's certainly something we look at on
• 19:42
  Speaker 4: a regular basis.
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: Another area that I want to talk about is the
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: staking component. Now that the SEC appears to be loosening
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: up the reins of that, most likely we'll see staking
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: possibly going into all of these ETFs as we.
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: See them today.
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: When do you think that staking rewards could lure in
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: maybe the money market funds that are out there setting
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: idle so to speak. Right now, what would be the percentage.
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: I guess would be the reward rate.
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: Is there anything that you think would lure in those investors?
• 20:18
  Speaker 4: Oooh, I mean, I think it depends. I think there
• 20:20
  Speaker 4: are a lot of crypto investors. Actually, I think the
• 20:23
  Speaker 4: initial money that would be most interested in that is
• 20:25
  Speaker 4: crypto investors who have a long term position in these
• 20:28
  Speaker 4: assets but want to generate some amount of income to
• 20:32
  Speaker 4: live off of and pay their bills, et cetera. That's
• 20:34
  Speaker 4: where I think the bulk of the interest would be.
• 20:37
  Speaker 4: I think we're a ways away from competing on yield
• 20:43
  Speaker 4: challenging money market funds, but you know, sort of the
• 20:47
  Speaker 4: history of commodity based investing and crypto fits into that
• 20:51
  Speaker 4: scheme is.
• 20:52
  Speaker 5: One of the knocks on it.
• 20:53
  Speaker 4: One of the knocks on holding gold historically is you
• 20:57
  Speaker 4: can't generate income from that. To the extent that staking
• 21:00
  Speaker 4: allows crypto assets to remove that impediment, it should increase
• 21:06
  Speaker 4: the amount of allocation to that space. So it's something
• 21:08
  Speaker 4: that I hope happens. It's something that I think will happen,
• 21:12
  Speaker 4: and it will definitely make this on the edges more
• 21:15
  Speaker 4: attractive for investors.
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: I'm looking also at because this gets into the next
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: layer that could be impacted around crypto, and that is
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: centralized exchanges and decentralized exchanges. And you guys, of course,
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: have the uniewap fund right now, private fund.
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: That's available out there.
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: Uniswap is already doing quite a bit. First of all,
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: is unicewap undervalued right now? When you look at the
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: amount of on chain I was just going to go
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: show some data here right here, here's a good example
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: from token terminal. But you can see the on chain
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: activity picking up on unit chain now starting to expand.
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: Is there a possibility where we could see DeFi becoming
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: maybe the new de facto trading engine for a lot
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: of what happens in crypto.
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: What are your thoughts?
• 22:03
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think I think that's absolutely right. I actually
• 22:05
  Speaker 4: think we're on the cusp of a DeFi renaissance, both
• 22:08
  Speaker 4: from a utility perspective and from an investment perspective. From
• 22:12
  Speaker 4: a utility perspective, it's just proven through very volatile markets
• 22:17
  Speaker 4: that it works enormously well, whether that's trading or lending
• 22:21
  Speaker 4: or other things. It's more robust than centralized exchanges, often
• 22:26
  Speaker 4: cheaper and more reliable in many ways from an investment perspective.
• 22:31
  Speaker 4: The big challenge that DeFi has faced historically is that
• 22:35
  Speaker 4: regulators made it very hard for a DeFi asset to
• 22:39
  Speaker 4: actually accrue value. If it was anything more than a
• 22:42
  Speaker 4: weak governance token, it was effectively illegal. And so you
• 22:46
  Speaker 4: have all these poor tokenomic designs embedded into these DeFi protocols.
• 22:51
  Speaker 4: I expect as regulation changes, you're going to see that switch.
• 22:55
  Speaker 4: You're going to see much more direct monetization, and then
• 22:59
  Speaker 4: investors going to realize that these assets are substantially undervalued
• 23:03
  Speaker 4: versus the economic value that they're delivering to their customers.
• 23:06
  Speaker 4: You look at something like UNISWAP doing seventy eighty billion
• 23:10
  Speaker 4: dollars of trading volume. That's an enormously valuable business with
• 23:14
  Speaker 4: very low overhead. I think once we get this economics right,
• 23:18
  Speaker 4: I think there'll be a repricing of DeFi, and then
• 23:22
  Speaker 4: I think there'll be a dramatic expansion of use as well.
• 23:24
  Speaker 4: So I'm very bullish on the DeFi space over the
• 23:27
  Speaker 4: next twelve to twenty four months.
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: Well, if you look at just DeFi LAMA, this is
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: showing the des volume that continues to explode here overall,
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: So to your point, even though market is down, we're
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: still seeing upward trends here. Maybe there's a middle ground
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: here because if you look at centralized exchanges and DeFi,
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: then you look at maybe what robinhood has done with
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: their Robinhood connect to where you literally can use your
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: spending power directly into your phantom app and buy an
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: asset without leaping through a bank or a transferring of USDC.
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: That starts to change the one the habits of crypto
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: friendly and cryptoogs.
• 24:07
  Speaker 2: But could we.
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: Get into an era where a lot of people coming
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: into this space actually start there, much like the neo
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: banks with what we've seen in terms of growth.
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: What are your thoughts?
• 24:18
  Speaker 5: Yeah, one hundred percent.
• 24:19
  Speaker 4: I'm glad you touched on that because that speaks to
• 24:21
  Speaker 4: the third revolution that makes me so excited about defying
• 24:24
  Speaker 4: the future, which is this user experience revolution. The reason
• 24:28
  Speaker 4: that wasn't true in the past is these things were clunky,
• 24:31
  Speaker 4: they were hard to use. You had fractured layer twos
• 24:34
  Speaker 4: et cet trial, it was hard to move assets. It
• 24:36
  Speaker 4: was a mess, and all that's getting abstracted away. You
• 24:39
  Speaker 4: gave the Robinhood example, but there are multiple examples of
• 24:42
  Speaker 4: that being abstracted away and all of a sudden it's
• 24:45
  Speaker 4: very easy to use, and I think that will ten
• 24:48
  Speaker 4: x usage. I mean, that chart is a great example
• 24:51
  Speaker 4: of what we talked about earlier, which is that opportunity
• 24:54
  Speaker 4: lies between reality and perception. I think the perception of
• 24:58
  Speaker 4: DeFi is that it's still dead. We haven't come back
• 25:02
  Speaker 4: from the DeFi Summer of a few years ago. That's
• 25:05
  Speaker 4: just not true, right, you're showing it.
• 25:07
  Speaker 5: The volumes are through the roof, the utility is through
• 25:11
  Speaker 5: the roof.
• 25:11
  Speaker 4: And I think eventually the market will wake up to
• 25:14
  Speaker 4: this reality and it's going to be you know, DeFi
• 25:16
  Speaker 4: Summer two point zero. I mean, just look at that chart,
• 25:20
  Speaker 4: right It's one of the most beautiful charts in finance,
• 25:22
  Speaker 4: and it shows you that investors are increasingly relying on
• 25:26
  Speaker 4: this as their primary vehicle for trading.
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: Twenty four allion of twenty four hour volume setting at
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: six point four billion right now. This is the weekly
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: chart there on the decks volume. So that's pretty impressive
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: considering the market is depressed right now and we haven't seen,
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: you know, the kind of trading activity and some of
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: these alternative assets. So some crazy things I think are
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: about to happen. Let's just when I say that crazy
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: things about to happen, I have to jump over to
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: TikTok and these crazy things may be happening right there.
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: This is, of course, is Alexis, founder of Reddit. He's
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: jumped in and I should I should say, thrown in
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: with Frank McCord, Jimmy over at, mister Beast, and of
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: course even Kevin O'Leary. So let's just say they when
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: the TikTok bid. In an addition, they're trying to, you know,
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: create some new Here's the interesting thing, Alexis, Jimmy, mister wonderful.
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: I mean, that's a star studded team right there. To
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: really shift in, we could see a blockchain on social
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: media this year. What kind of impact do you think
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: that would happen, especially for content creation?
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: What are your thoughts there?
• 26:35
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean I think it would do two things.
• 26:37
  Speaker 4: You know, I think it would be a wonderful thing
• 26:40
  Speaker 4: because it allows the data to be separated from the
• 26:44
  Speaker 4: front end. The big problem with many social media sites
• 26:47
  Speaker 4: is the data in the front end are integrated. So
• 26:49
  Speaker 4: if you have a following on Twitter and you don't
• 26:51
  Speaker 4: like the editorial, policies on Twitter or x you can't
• 26:55
  Speaker 4: move to another front end.
• 26:57
  Speaker 5: You're study.
• 26:58
  Speaker 4: The thing when you make it blockchain based social media
• 27:02
  Speaker 4: app is you can keep your data, keep your followers,
• 27:05
  Speaker 4: and move from one front end to the other. It
• 27:07
  Speaker 4: gives everyone choice, increases freedom of speech, and is hugely
• 27:12
  Speaker 4: beneficial to those content creators because they own their network
• 27:15
  Speaker 4: and they own their audience. You know right now, if
• 27:18
  Speaker 4: you have a large audience on YouTube or x or
• 27:21
  Speaker 4: TikTok you don't actually have that audience. You're like borrowing
• 27:25
  Speaker 4: it from the provider. I think if we see this,
• 27:30
  Speaker 4: it'll be great for content creators, It'll be great for
• 27:32
  Speaker 4: TikTok us. It will also open people's eyes to the
• 27:35
  Speaker 4: fact that blockchain is about more than just finance, and
• 27:38
  Speaker 4: maybe there's this whole other industry we're on the cusp
• 27:40
  Speaker 4: of developing that will make the world a better place.
• 27:43
  Speaker 4: So I'm really hopeful to see this. I love to
• 27:45
  Speaker 4: see those celebrity forces aligning, and I think it would
• 27:49
  Speaker 4: be a major breakthrough for society to be honest.
• 27:52
  Speaker 5: If we can to this point.
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: This is a clip from Frank and Frank mccoort and
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: Kevin O'Leary and they're talking about maybe an alternate route,
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: and I wanted to kind of get your thoughts on this.
• 28:02
  Speaker 2: Let's go to that clip.
• 28:03
  Speaker 3: Your bid doesn't include the algorithm. That's not exactly true, Okay,
• 28:08
  Speaker 3: so tell me what's the plan.
• 28:09
  Speaker 9: They may decide for the sake of cooperation that they
• 28:13
  Speaker 9: will do some iteration of it, and when you fork
• 28:16
  Speaker 9: the code, you can make changes.
• 28:18
  Speaker 10: But we've been approached by very very large platforms that
• 28:22
  Speaker 10: actually manage algorithms that have come forward and said, look,
• 28:26
  Speaker 10: will provide some back end help for you. You know,
• 28:29
  Speaker 10: during this transition. Blue Sky has over fifty thousand algorithms
• 28:34
  Speaker 10: that you can choose from. We'll all have our own algorithm.
• 28:39
  Speaker 10: Paul Allen, who developed ancestry dot com, is building sixteen
• 28:43
  Speaker 10: apps right now. We'll be making a series of announcements
• 28:45
  Speaker 10: going forward of other platforms that are moving over to
• 28:50
  Speaker 10: this stack.
• 28:50
  Speaker 9: But it gets better because this is not going away.
• 28:54
  Speaker 9: It's going to continue to keep festering up into the news.
• 28:57
  Speaker 9: Geometric increase in news as we move towards April fifth,
• 29:02
  Speaker 9: What do these two world leaders want to signal to
• 29:05
  Speaker 9: the world about cooperation. There's a time for being adversarial
• 29:09
  Speaker 9: and there's a time for cooperation and what a fantastic
• 29:13
  Speaker 9: brand to start with.
• 29:15
  Speaker 10: And we'll be mentioning some of these companies by name
• 29:18
  Speaker 10: in the coming weeks. I think it's going to be
• 29:20
  Speaker 10: a really interesting four weeks coming up.
• 29:22
  Speaker 9: The opportunity is absolutely immense, all.
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: Right, So big opportunity here brewing. I'm looking at your
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: Web three holdings. You've got Meta, which is an algorithm
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: creator out there, which is a good leader, and obviously
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: a lot of the investment platforms and then roadblocks I mean,
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: which of course is a great engagement tool. When you
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: look at Web three, this could be another asset that
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: starts to make its way out of the market. It
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: may not necessarily be just TikTok either. It could end
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: up being something brand new with the Courts team going forward.
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: If that happens, Matt, and you look at the impact
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: on big tech in general, because the market has kind
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: of sold off of that, do you think that could
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: be maybe an Nvidia like event to push some of
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: these tech stocks back into position.
• 30:12
  Speaker 4: Those tech stocks or new ones. Absolutely. You know. The
• 30:16
  Speaker 4: thing about technology investing is we always assume the leader
• 30:20
  Speaker 4: is permanent and will always be there. Right, it was
• 30:23
  Speaker 4: always going to be IBM, it was always going to
• 30:26
  Speaker 4: be Google, it was always going to be Microsoft, it
• 30:28
  Speaker 4: was always going to be Hewlett Packard.
• 30:30
  Speaker 5: And that's never true. We're never at the end of
• 30:32
  Speaker 5: this story.
• 30:32
  Speaker 4: There is always a new There's always an Nvidia, where
• 30:35
  Speaker 4: there's always a Meta, or there's always you know, an
• 30:38
  Speaker 4: Amazon that comes right. So I think both the companies
• 30:41
  Speaker 4: that get it and embrace this move to Web three
• 30:44
  Speaker 4: could vault up. And I suspect some companies that are
• 30:47
  Speaker 4: further down the chain that see it could emerge as leaders.
• 30:51
  Speaker 4: So I think the leaderboard could shift. I think Meta
• 30:54
  Speaker 4: is well positioned. I think they understand that, but I
• 30:57
  Speaker 4: bet there'll be one or two others that maybe we're
• 30:59
  Speaker 4: not thinking of today, right get on this train early
• 31:03
  Speaker 4: and rise to the top.
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: Definitely an exciting time in the asset market right now,
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: for sure. If you guys want to learn a little
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: bit more about what Matt's doing on a day and
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: day app basis, just go over to a bit Wise Investments.
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: That's his website right there. Thank you Matt for coming
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: in today. We always appreciate having your thoughts on the show.
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: Thanks again, Thanks Paul, appreciate it so yeah, all right,
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: you guys, if you're not in the Diamond Circle, that's
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: our own private member group.
• 31:28
  Speaker 2: It's very easy to join.
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: We always leave a link down below, and of course
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: you can join the Telegram group also. I'm in there
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: quite a bit. We're constantly going in and discussing different assets,
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: also different strategies, and also thoughts about where the markets
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: are going. So if you want a community to really
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: kind of belong to use that link down below. That'll
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: get you into our Telegram group. Follow me out there
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: on X I know it was down this morning for
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: like a couple hours, but you can catch me out
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: there just at Paul Barn. We'll catch you next time
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: right here on tech Bath
• 32:01
  Speaker 5: Apple exp