Latest / Simply Bitcoin / BIGGEST BITCOIN ANNOUNCEMENT IN OVER 1 YEAR?! | Beyond Bitcoin

Transcript

BIGGEST BITCOIN ANNOUNCEMENT IN OVER 1 YEAR?! | Beyond Bitcoin · Simply Bitcoin

• 0:00
  Yeah, yeah, I know the price is down, but you want all those
• 0:03
  views, you want all the sweet clicks and all of that price
• 0:08
  stuff, I get it. But just just cheer me up for a
• 0:11
  second. The SEC and the CFTC may just
• 0:15
  have changed everything. For years these agencies have
• 0:18
  been attacking Bitcoin any chance that they get, and they
• 0:20
  also attack each other, but they finally agreed upon.
• 0:23
  So this week was probably the biggest breakthrough in over a
• 0:25
  year, which by the way, could affect price.
• 0:28
  I know, I know the price is down this morning.
• 0:31
  The price matters. Yes, yes, yes, but this is
• 0:33
  really big news. Yes, yes, I will mention the
• 0:35
  price at 69,000 something. OK, and then I'll say something
• 0:39
  like emotions. This is beyond Bitcoin.
• 0:42
  Let's go. Or you know, do you like, let's
• 0:47
  dive in better. Bitcoin price.
• 0:55
  Let's get that out of the way, OK?
• 0:56
  Sitting at around $70,000 at the moment, which is down about 2
• 1:01
  1/2% as of this recording. The Fear and Greed index is at
• 1:05
  23 in extreme fear. It's sunny and 86° outside, Tom.
• 1:11
  Perfect. Good.
• 1:11
  We love it. You know why we love it?
• 1:14
  Because what happened yesterday has nothing to do with price and
• 1:17
  everything to do with the future of Bitcoin and of your right to
• 1:21
  actually use it. Here's the thesis.
• 1:22
  Today, the SEC and the CFTC just ended six years of regulatory
• 1:27
  warfare, 6 years of attacking Bitcoin, six years of fighting
• 1:31
  each other over who gets to regulate what.
• 1:33
  And yesterday at the DC Blockchain Summit, they made a
• 1:37
  joint announcement that changes the game.
• 1:39
  Not the player, the game. Today, I'm going to break this
• 1:41
  down for you. First, what the SE CS Paul
• 1:44
  Atkins actually said at the DC Blockchain Summit, and what the
• 1:47
  new token taxonomy means for Bitcoin and the 15 other things
• 1:52
  they listed alongside of it. Second, the privacy win buried
• 1:56
  in this announcement that almost nobody is covering correctly and
• 1:59
  why Bitcoin developers just got their biggest legal protection
• 2:02
  in years. And 3rd, the Clarity Act.
• 2:05
  That's the thing that you've been hearing about on X that's
• 2:07
  always in a state of just about to pass.
• 2:09
  At 3:00 PM today, Senator Lummus says it is happening.
• 2:13
  Hell or high water at the end of the year.
• 2:15
  We'll talk about whether she's right.
• 2:17
  Bitcoin is the answer to everything.
• 2:18
  But today I want to make sure that you understand exactly how
• 2:20
  close we are to a world where Bitcoin can be freely used as
• 2:24
  money without asking anyone's permission.
• 2:26
  Quick background, because if you're new here, you need to
• 2:28
  know what we're actually talking about.
• 2:30
  The SEC Securities and Exchange Commission, their job is to
• 2:33
  regulate securities, stocks, bonds, anything that qualifies
• 2:37
  as an investment contract under something called the how we
• 2:40
  test. How we test that you invest
• 2:42
  money in a common enterprise, expecting profits primarily from
• 2:46
  the efforts of others. That's a security.
• 2:48
  Regulatorily speaking, the SEC owns that Now, the CFTC,
• 2:52
  Commodity Futures Trading Commission, they're in charge of
• 2:55
  commodities and future markets, oil, gold, things that are
• 2:59
  things, not investment contracts.
• 3:02
  Now here's where Bitcoin enters the picture.
• 3:04
  For the past six years, Gary Gensler's SEC said everything is
• 3:08
  a security. Bitcoin, Ethereum, whatever your
• 3:10
  cousin is shilling on Telegram, that's a security under our
• 3:14
  jurisdiction. Come register with us or we will
• 3:17
  find you, the CFTC said. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait,
• 3:20
  wait. Some of this stuff is clearly a
• 3:22
  commodity. Bitcoin is a commodity.
• 3:25
  This is ours. News flash, CFTC Bitcoin belongs
• 3:28
  to all of us. Anyway, They fought publicly for
• 3:31
  years while Bitcoin developers, builders, wallet creators, all
• 3:35
  of them had no idea if they were waking up to a lawsuit.
• 3:39
  That's what they call regulation by enforcement.
• 3:41
  You had no idea what the rules were until the SEC told you that
• 3:46
  you'd broken them. Well, that era just ended
• 3:50
  yesterday, so here's what happened yesterday.
• 3:53
  Paul Atkins, the new SEC chair, takes the stage at the DC
• 3:57
  Blockchain Summit in Washington, and he drops this.
• 4:01
  Now, I suspect that many in this audience are really tired of
• 4:05
  hearing about the perils of uncertainty.
• 4:08
  Well, quite frankly, so am I. It's way past time for us to
• 4:14
  stop diagnosing the problem and start delivering the solution.
• 4:19
  On that note, I should like to walk you through my thoughts for
• 4:22
  what a Safe Harbor proposal could consist.
• 4:25
  Of whoo solution, you say? Here's Atkins on CNBC going
• 4:30
  further into detail. Take a look.
• 4:31
  But first of all, yes, yesterday was a real break with the past,
• 4:35
  a formal break. The Commission came out for the
• 4:38
  first time with an interpretive interpretative release that
• 4:42
  really sets a line between what are commodities and the digital
• 4:46
  asset space and what are securities.
• 4:50
  And the significance also about this particular release that we
• 4:53
  did is that the CFTC participated with us in it.
• 4:58
  And so they had some guidance that's included in that release
• 5:02
  along with our interpretation. So basically, as you said, and
• 5:06
  that tripped off your tongue very well.
• 5:08
  So it's very good. We are outlining 4 types of
• 5:11
  assets that are not securities and those are digital
• 5:15
  commodities, digital tools, digital collectibles and stable
• 5:19
  coins and stable coins per the Genius Act that was enacted last
• 5:24
  year. So yeah, so we're, we're
• 5:27
  breaking with the past. We are now giving clarity from
• 5:31
  the SC CS perspective as to what are and are not securities.
• 5:35
  OK, let me break this down because there's a lot in here.
• 5:37
  The SEC, in conjunction with the CFTC just published a 68 page
• 5:42
  interpretation of how existing securities laws apply to crypto.
• 5:46
  Sounds like someone's going to need a ChatGPT subscription.
• 5:49
  This is effective immediately, and it establishes 5 categories.
• 5:52
  Category one, digital commodities, Bitcoin, and 15
• 5:56
  other tokens. Well, these are not securities,
• 5:59
  which is that's CFTC territory. Category 2, digital
• 6:03
  collectibles, NFTS and digital art.
• 6:06
  These are not categorized as securities.
• 6:09
  So your monkey Jpegs are safe. Category 3, digital tools,
• 6:13
  utility tokens, access passes, not securities.
• 6:17
  Man, we're on a roll. Category four, payment stable
• 6:20
  coins under the Genius Act framework.
• 6:23
  These are not securities. Category 5, digital securities,
• 6:27
  which I assume are going to be labeled as securities.
• 6:30
  Yes. This is the only thing that
• 6:32
  stays in the SE CS lane. Traditional securities that are
• 6:35
  tokenized. We're talking about a stock on a
• 6:38
  blockchain. That's it.
• 6:39
  Paul Greywall, the chief legal officer at Coinbase, said it
• 6:42
  best. 2023 me couldn't have imagined that 2026 me would see
• 6:47
  such a thing. Now I want to acknowledge the
• 6:49
  bad, because there is bad in all of this. 15 altcoins just got
• 6:54
  classified alongside Bitcoin as digital commodities.
• 6:58
  We're talking about Solana, XRP, whatever else made the list.
• 7:02
  Now, a lot of people on Bitcoin Twitter are rightfully annoyed
• 7:05
  by this. We thought that, you know, the
• 7:07
  altcoin cycle was finally dying, and the Howie test is pretty
• 7:11
  clear. Bitcoin is the only true digital
• 7:13
  commodity. Everything else is structured
• 7:16
  like an investment contract. But the regulators drew their
• 7:19
  line and 15 alts got through the door.
• 7:21
  That's the bad of all this. Before we go any further, given
• 7:25
  to what we just talked about, today's sponsor is actually
• 7:27
  relevant if you're paying attention to where the
• 7:29
  regulatory environment is heading for Bitcoin mining
• 7:32
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• 7:34
  decisions are all going to be in one room this summer at Mining
• 7:39
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• 7:43
  It's the world's largest Bitcoin mining Expo.
• 7:45
  It started as a Telegram chat between miners and insiders, and
• 7:49
  now it's the place where the entire industry converges.
• 7:53
  Operators, energy companies, hardware manufacturers, the
• 7:56
  people building Bitcoin's physical foundation are all
• 7:59
  going to be there. And now that Bitcoin mining is
• 8:01
  formally confirmed as a digital commodity, not a security, not
• 8:06
  under the SEC thumb, the conversation happening at that
• 8:10
  conference this summer is going to be lit.
• 8:13
  And if you go to miningdisrupt.com and you use
• 8:15
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• 8:19
  Genesis and mining tiers sell out first.
• 8:21
  So you better go to miningdisrupt.com right now and
• 8:24
  go get your tickets because they're selling out.
• 8:26
  OK, now the good. And this, this is the part that
• 8:29
  actually matters. Here's what almost nobody is
• 8:32
  saying correctly about yesterday's announcement under
• 8:34
  Gary Gensler. The SEC wasn't just trying to
• 8:37
  regulate Bitcoin, they were trying to classify Bitcoin
• 8:40
  wallet developers as securities broker dealers.
• 8:43
  Think about what that means. If you were writing software, if
• 8:46
  you are building a Bitcoin wallet, an open source protocol,
• 8:49
  any tool that touches digital assets, you would be required to
• 8:52
  register with the SEC. And the moment you register as a
• 8:56
  broker dealer, you are legally required to implement KYC and
• 9:00
  AML programs. Know your customer and anti
• 9:02
  money laundering programs. This is your Bitcoin wallet
• 9:05
  asking for your name, your address and your photo ID.
• 9:08
  That was the direction we were headed.
• 9:10
  And this wasn't theoretical. Lola Mir from the rage And look,
• 9:13
  if you if you know me, I don't usually quote the rage on this
• 9:16
  show approvingly, but she said it perfectly.
• 9:18
  The SEC's interpretation now makes clear no AM LKYC for
• 9:23
  Bitcoin, at least not under the SE CS authority, probably the
• 9:27
  biggest advancement for privacy under the entire administration.
• 9:30
  Someone in her replies wrote. I can't believe I just read a
• 9:33
  post from you about an advancement for privacy and she
• 9:36
  was like, I know, right? Alas, the day has come.
• 9:40
  If Lola Mir is celebrating a Bitcoin privacy win, something
• 9:43
  real just happened. And then the CFTC went even
• 9:46
  further. Phantom Wallet.
• 9:47
  You may know them as the Solana wallet, but that's beside the
• 9:51
  point. They received what's called a
• 9:52
  Number Action Letter from the CFTC.
• 9:54
  And in plain English, the CFTC will not pursue enforcement
• 9:57
  against self custodial wallet developers who connect users to
• 10:01
  regulated trading venues as long as they don't custody user
• 10:05
  funds. Under existing U.S. law, any
• 10:07
  entity that facilitates derivatives trading typically
• 10:10
  has to register as an introducing broker.
• 10:12
  And that rule was written for Wall Street middle men.
• 10:14
  You know, like fax machines and people in suits.
• 10:17
  But as Bitcoin and crypto wallets started integrating
• 10:20
  access to markets, developers faced a Gray area.
• 10:23
  If you're just writing software and your wallet connects users
• 10:26
  to a regulated exchange, are you a broker?
• 10:30
  The CFTC just answered that no, you are a software provider.
• 10:34
  You just write code. You don't touch the funds, you
• 10:36
  route through registered intermediaries.
• 10:38
  The CFTC will not come after you, and this is the first time
• 10:41
  that line has ever been formally drawn.
• 10:43
  Here's why this matters beyond the legal language.
• 10:45
  Under the previous administration, ambiguous
• 10:48
  intermediary rules were used as a weapon against developers.
• 10:52
  For instance, Tornado cache developers were prosecuted for
• 10:55
  writing code code that didn't even touch user funds.
• 10:58
  Front ends were shut down pre emptively before anyone was
• 11:01
  charged. They're just gone.
• 11:03
  The chilling effect pushed builders offshore.
• 11:05
  Wallet of Satoshi, one of the best Bitcoin lightning wallets
• 11:08
  in the world, pulled out of the US market entirely rather than
• 11:11
  risk prosecution. But they're coming back, U.S.
• 11:14
  market back open. And every developer watching
• 11:16
  this right now, every person writing open source Bitcoin
• 11:19
  software just got a legal anchor.
• 11:21
  The government drew a line and for once Bitcoin was on the
• 11:24
  right side of it. You write software, you don't
• 11:27
  custody the funds. You route through registered
• 11:30
  intermediaries. You are not a broker. 6 years of
• 11:33
  uncertainty gone this week. OK, the Clarity Act.
• 11:37
  So Claire, you can read it underwater.
• 11:39
  At the same DC Blockchain summit, Senator Cynthia Lummis
• 11:43
  stepped up and said this. I thought we'd be doing a
• 11:47
  victory lap by now on passage of the Clarity Act or market
• 11:52
  structure. I thought we'd be doing that
• 11:55
  victory lap at the end of the last calendar year, but man, did
• 12:00
  we get hung up on things that I did not expect we would.
• 12:06
  Of course, the biggest thing being the request to reopen the
• 12:11
  Genius Act so we could deal with the issue of yield versus
• 12:16
  rewards. So as the industry is matured,
• 12:21
  the legislation behind it has matured, we've all sort of grown
• 12:26
  up together. And I want to tell you, it's
• 12:29
  been a great ride. As you know, I'm not running
• 12:31
  again. So number one, we're going to
• 12:35
  have this thing done come hell or high water before the end of
• 12:41
  the year. I love Senator Lum, she's been
• 12:43
  fighting for this legislation longer than my open claw has
• 12:46
  been trading at a negative, which is a long time.
• 12:48
  OK, here's where things stand. Banking Committee markup is
• 12:51
  expected second-half of April after Easter.
• 12:54
  And the big sticking point has been stablecoin yield.
• 12:57
  Banks have been refusing to allow stablecoins to pay yield
• 13:00
  to its holders because it competes with their deposits.
• 13:04
  That standoff is reportedly breaking.
• 13:06
  The banks are coming to the table.
• 13:08
  Senator Lummis also said they think they have the D5 issue
• 13:12
  resolved. What did you get rid of it?
• 13:14
  My honest take, the SEC and the CFTC interpretation gives you
• 13:17
  clarity right now, today, effective immediately. 68 pages,
• 13:21
  5 categories. No KYC for Bitcoin developers.
• 13:25
  And that's real. And it does not need Congress to
• 13:28
  act. The Clarity Act would lock all
• 13:29
  of that in law permanently, which is much harder to reverse.
• 13:33
  And that matters. But the legislative window is
• 13:36
  closing. Nothing of substance tends to
• 13:38
  move after June in an election adjacent year.
• 13:41
  Midterms heat up, politically viable moves get prioritized.
• 13:45
  Everything gets sort of kicked if Senator Lummis gets the
• 13:48
  markup done in April, and I hope she does.
• 13:51
  There's a real path to passage before the clock runs out.
• 13:54
  But if it slips past April, they should probably rename it the
• 13:56
  Murky Waters Act. Still not clear and far more
• 13:59
  murky, am I right? Real quick?
• 14:02
  Because everything we just talked about leads here.
• 14:05
  The government just confirmed if you hold your own Bitcoin in
• 14:08
  your own wallet with your own keys, you are a sovereign
• 14:11
  individual. No KYC, no broker registration,
• 14:15
  no one between you and your money.
• 14:17
  But a lot of people watching this want to get self custody
• 14:19
  and genuinely don't know where to start.
• 14:22
  The bitcoinway.com makes it easy and simple and if you go to
• 14:26
  thebitcoinway.com/beyond Bitcoin you'll get a free 30 minute
• 14:29
  consultation one-on-one. No sales pitch.
• 14:32
  They walk you through exactly what self custody looks like for
• 14:35
  your specific situation. Also cybersecurity, Plan B,
• 14:39
  residency consulting, the full picture of financial
• 14:41
  sovereignty, The bitcoinway.com/beyond Bitcoin.
• 14:44
  That's the link. Free 30 minute consult.
• 14:47
  Book it now. OK, so the price.
• 14:49
  My producer told me to talk about the price.
• 14:51
  So here we are, about $70,000 down a couple points on the
• 14:54
  morning. You get arguably the biggest
• 14:57
  regulatory clarity announcement in six years, and Bitcoin sells
• 15:01
  off Classic. It's fine.
• 15:03
  Here's the macro picture, and this matters for understanding
• 15:05
  where we are. the US national debt just crossed $39 trillion.
• 15:10
  We were at 38 trillion in October.
• 15:13
  We're adding roughly a trillion every five or six months. 40
• 15:17
  trillion is coming this year, 50 before the decade is out.
• 15:20
  What's 50 trillion among friends, huh?
• 15:22
  Just get it over with, guys. Just push the damn OverDrive
• 15:25
  button already, please. And here's the thing about the
• 15:27
  war in the Middle East and what it's doing to the macro picture.
• 15:30
  And I know this is coming out of left field, but listen up.
• 15:33
  Fernando Naito from The Bitcoin Perception put it better than I
• 15:36
  ever could. Rate cuts are impossible with
• 15:38
  oil driven inflation and rate hikes are impossible with war
• 15:41
  driven debt expansion. the Fed is truly stuck.
• 15:45
  He compared it to the 1970s oil crisis, when gold went from $35
• 15:50
  to 850. And he said Bitcoin at 69,000 in
• 15:55
  the most constrained monetary policy environment in 50 years
• 15:58
  is either the most underpriced asset on earth or he's
• 16:02
  completely wrong about everything.
• 16:04
  There's no middle ground. the Fed met this week, paused rates
• 16:07
  didn't cut, didn't hike, just sat in their seats frozen
• 16:12
  because what are their options? They cut rates with oil at $100
• 16:16
  and inflation explodes. They raise rates with war driven
• 16:19
  debt expansion and the economy stalls.
• 16:21
  So let's hold rates and watch inflation creep higher.
• 16:25
  They know this, we know this, Bitcoin knows this, but it
• 16:29
  doesn't care. Meanwhile, while Bitcoin is
• 16:31
  sitting at $70,000, the fear and greed index is at 23.
• 16:36
  Extreme fear, the same number it was when we were at 45,000.
• 16:40
  Here's the thing about extreme fear.
• 16:42
  That is not a prediction. That is not me saying Dubai.
• 16:45
  I am not your financial advisor. I'm just noting the folks panic
• 16:49
  selling their Bitcoin this morning to cover their next
• 16:51
  Costco 24 pack of paper towels are making a very interesting
• 16:55
  decision in a very interesting week.
• 16:57
  You see where this is going, right?
• 16:59
  We have a macro environment where the Fed is frozen, the
• 17:01
  national debt is past 39 trillion and accelerating, oil
• 17:04
  is above $100, inflation is higher than ever expected, and a
• 17:08
  war in the Middle East is an open variable at the moment.
• 17:11
  And we have a regulatory environment where for the first
• 17:13
  time in six years, Bitcoin developers know what the rules
• 17:16
  are. Wallet builders are legally
• 17:18
  protected. Self custody is affirmed.
• 17:20
  Bitcoin mining confirmed as digital commodity, not security.
• 17:24
  KYC and AML requirements do not apply to Bitcoin software.
• 17:29
  Monetary chaos, regulatory clarity, that combination.
• 17:32
  That is exactly what Bitcoin is built for.
• 17:34
  Think about what a Bitcoin developer in 2020 faced no
• 17:37
  regulatory certainty. The SEC classifying everything
• 17:40
  as a security. Tornado Cash developers
• 17:42
  prosecuted for writing code that didn't even touch users funds.
• 17:46
  Think about what a Bitcoin developer in 2020 faced no
• 17:49
  regulatory certainty. The SEC classifying everything
• 17:52
  as a security. Tornado Cash developers
• 17:55
  prosecuted for writing code that didn't even touch user funds.
• 17:58
  Builders fleeing offshore. Now compare that to what a
• 18:01
  Bitcoin developer in 2026 faces. You can write software, you can
• 18:06
  vibe software. You can build wallets.
• 18:08
  You can build self custody tools.
• 18:10
  The government drew a line and you're on the right side of it.
• 18:13
  The day Bitcoin can freely be used as money without permission
• 18:17
  just got a lot closer. Now I want to acknowledge the
• 18:19
  bad one more time because it's worth it. 15 alts got classified
• 18:23
  as digital commodities. The shit coin cycle everyone
• 18:26
  hoped was dying just got regulatory oxygen.
• 18:29
  If you are a Bitcoin only purist, and a lot of you are and
• 18:33
  I respect that because I'm kind of a Bitcoin purist myself, this
• 18:36
  is a legitimate criticism. The counter argument has always
• 18:39
  been we don't need the state to protect Bitcoin.
• 18:41
  Bitcoin wins on its merits alone, which is probably true.
• 18:45
  But here's the thing. Gary Gensler tried to classify
• 18:48
  Tornado Cash developers as unregistered brokers, and two of
• 18:52
  them are sitting in prison right now for writing open source
• 18:55
  code. I will take a world where wallet
• 18:57
  developers are free over a world where they're in jail.
• 19:01
  Even if that world also includes Solana getting called a
• 19:04
  commodity. I'll take the win.
• 19:06
  Bitcoin is honestly the answer. The market doesn't always price
• 19:10
  that in immediately, but the institutions, the developers,
• 19:13
  the lawmakers, they are starting to understand it one, three
• 19:16
  letter agency at a time. Real quick, before we sign off,
• 19:19
  Club Orange, formerly known as the Orange Pill app, this is the
• 19:23
  Bitcoin community app, the premier app, the place where
• 19:27
  Bitcoiners actually connect, not just to share memes, but to find
• 19:30
  people in your city, find people at the same point in their
• 19:34
  Bitcoin journey and actually build a real community around
• 19:37
  that. I've met so many of you there
• 19:38
  and honestly, thank you so much for reaching out.
• 19:41
  It's been wonderful. You can find me there.
• 19:44
  I'm at Oceans OSHINSI. I'm on it.
• 19:47
  If you want to connect me directly, go for it.
• 19:49
  It's Club orange.org. And if you haven't joined yet,
• 19:53
  this week is probably a good week to do it.
• 19:54
  You know what's funny about all this?
• 19:56
  For six years, the regulators told us implicitly, through
• 19:59
  enforcement actions, through lawsuits, through prosecutions,
• 20:03
  that Bitcoin was dangerous, that the people building it were
• 20:06
  criminals, that the technology needed to be controlled.
• 20:09
  And Bitcoin, it just kept building, kept growing, kept
• 20:13
  producing blocks every 10 minutes.
• 20:14
  Now the same regulators are saying actually saying digital
• 20:18
  commodity. Software providers are not
• 20:21
  brokers, no KYC required. Bitcoin didn't need the SE CS
• 20:24
  approval to exist, but it's kind of nice that the SEC finally
• 20:27
  stopped pretending it could disappear.
• 20:29
  Anyway, thank you so much for watching this show.
• 20:31
  If you like what you see and you want to see more, make sure you
• 20:33
  hit that like button below. Or you could subscribe to the
• 20:35
  Simply Bitcoin channel for more content like this.
• 20:37
  We're coming out with it every single day of the week.
• 20:39
  Also, don't forget to hit that notification bell.
• 20:42
  Leave us a comment if you like. If you want to reach out to me
• 20:44
  directly, I'm on X at Run Dance Bitcoin, otherwise I'm oceans.
• 20:49
  This is beyond Bitcoin. Until next time.