Join me today for Episode 1020 of Bitcoin And . . .
Topics for today:
- Texas AND Oklahoma SBR Bills Officially Introduced
- Sen. Lummis Rattles US Marshall's Service About BTC Sale
- BitMEX in Trouble Again
- Bitcoin Safe Wallet Looks GOOD
- Blockstream Drops $75 Million in BTC on Komainu
#Bitcoin #BitcoinAnd
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https://cointelegraph.com/news/bitcoin-strategic-reserve-bill-oklahoma
https://cointelegraph.com/news/senator-lummis-probes-us-bitcoin-sale
https://decrypt.co/301226/sec-appeals-ripple-ruling-seeks-reversal-on-xrp-classification
https://www.nobsbitcoin.com/bitmex-slapped-with-additional-100m-fine-over-bank-secrecy-act-violations/
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https://www.coindesk.com/business/2025/01/16/nomura-backed-komainu-receives-75-m-bitcoin-investment-from-blockstream-capital
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[00:00:02]
David Bennett:
It is 9:15 AM Pacific Standard Time. It's the 16th day of January 2025, and this is episode 1,000 20, 10/20 of Bitcoin. And Texas is in the news as well as Oklahoma. Senator Lummis is, ah, rattling some cages out there. Thank God Almighty. And the SEC is appealing a ripple ruling, and we'll find out how that's probably gonna fall on its face and bit Mex. Yes. If you were ever around in the early days of Bitcoin, you might remember something called BitMex. It was one of the earliest earliest exchanges and famously allowed things like 100 times leverage on futures contracts.
And it was, great fun watching people get wiped out. Yeah. I know. Shouldn't be praising that. But, hey, man. If you're gonna be a degenerate when it comes to this kind of stuff, you should be prepared to get wiped out. And bitmex was one of the it was like a garbage scowl. It took out the trash all the time. Because when you're doing leverage at like a 100x, year, should you were playing with with nuclear explosive material, not just gas, not just lighter fluid, not just matches. No, no, no. People were getting wiped out. And yet, they were told and had complied.
They're no longer in exchange. And yet, they're in trouble again. We'll get into that one. The Bank of Japan is also rattling some cages this morning. It may not look good for the yen carry trade again. And if you were around, I don't know, about a year and a half ago well, was it was it last summer? I I think it was last summer. Yeah. It was last summer. We saw, some real issues when the Bank of Japan started making moves the way that they are saying they're making today. We got a piece about Nostr and we've got a new item up for a wallet but it is kind of unlike any wallet that I've ever seen just the sheer amount of offerings that this one application has is kind of mind boggling but let's kick it off with Texas who has kicked off its 89th legislative session with a new strategic Bitcoin reserve bill.
Now, I have reported on this. It has now been introduced into the 89th legislative session. Whereas when I was talking about it before, it was just a draft. It's happening, ladies and gentlemen. Martin Young from Cointelegraph says that the Texas state senator Charles Schwertner has introduced the bill in the new legislative session to establish a strategic Bitcoin reserve in the Lone Star State. Quote, it's time for Texas to lead the way in establishing a strategic Bitcoin reserve, the republican politician and physician said while announcing the senate bill, which is titled s b 778 on Twitter on January 16th.
That would be today. Quote, if passed and signed into law, it would make Texas the 1st state in the nation to establish a strategic Bitcoin reserve. This would position our state at the forefront of the digital economy, driving growth and securing economic freedom in our great state. The Texas Strategic Bitcoin Reserve Act aims to establish a special fund outside of the General Revenue Fund allowing the state to own and custody bitcoin as a financial asset and to accept Bitcoin donations from the public. Look, I love Texas, guys. I was born there. You will never get the Texas out of my bones. But why the hell would you donate to a state?
No. No. No. Don't donate your Bitcoin to Texas. Don't donate it to the United States. Stop donating your Bitcoin. Keep it for yourself. We're all gonna need our Bitcoin. It recognized the bill recognized BTC as a valuable digital asset with strategic potential for enhancing this state's financial resilience while acknowledging its decentralized nature and finite supply, which are unique qualities that can serve as a hedge against inflation and economic volatility. The bill proposes implementing secure storage and management systems while mandating cold storage and regular audits for transparency and security.
Legislature can appropriate funds to purchase Bitcoin with funding limited to 1% of the general revenue. SB 778 is not the 1st legislation proposed to establish a strategic Bitcoin reserve in the Lone Star State. Back in December, Texas representative Giovanni Capri Giuliani proposed a draft Texas strategic Bitcoin reserve bill that would allow residents and government entities to donate BTC to the reserve. Again, don't do that. I love Texas, but there's no reason to donate your bitcoin to the Texas strategic reserve. That's kinda idiotic, but whatever. Cointelegraph reached out to senator Schwertner for clarification on the differences between these two bills but has not received a response.
Meanwhile, Texas is not the only state angling for a strategic Bitcoin reserve. On January 15th, representative Cody Cody Maynard proposed HB 1203, the strategic Bitcoin Reserve Act for the state of Oklahoma, which shares a northern border with Texas. And that is next on the list. We've got it right here. And the story is written by Vince Quill from Cointelegraph as well. Bitcoin strategic reserve bill has been introduced in the great state of Oklahoma. Yay. It's second state. I mean, these are actual introductions to the state legislator. These are not drafts.
These are not wish list. These are actually now forced upon the legislature. They have to read them. They have to analyze them, and they have to talk about them. And then they're gonna have to actually vote on them. This is no longer in the realm of a could be or possibly could be introduced into legislature. No. Both Texas and Oklahoma have taken the steps to put the bills on the desks of the legislature and now they have to do something with it. So a new bill to establish Bitcoin as a strategic reserve asset was introduced to the Oklahoma house of representatives on January 15th by state representative, Cody Maynard.
House bill 1203, known as the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve Act, would allow Oklahoma's pension funds and their state savings accounts to allocate a portion of their assets to bitcoin as a hedge against inflation. Representative Maynard said, Bitcoin represents freedom from bureaucrats printing away our purchasing power. As a decentralized form of money, Bitcoin cannot be manipulated or created by government entities. It is the ultimate store of value for those who believe in financial freedom and sound money principles. Several US states have pending legislation to establish bitcoin strategic reserves and several state pension funds have already diversified into Bitcoin as the digital asset gains mainstream and institutional adoption.
Pennsylvania lawmakers submitted a proposal for a Bitcoin strategic reserve in the state back in November of last year allowing the state treasury to invest up to 10% of its assets into Bitcoin. State Representative Mike Cabell argued that Pennsylvania should adopt the Bitcoin diversification employed by private sector asset managers like BlackRock and Fidelity which used bitcoin to shield their investments from macroeconomic risks. Cabell added that bitcoin was a way to protect state purchasing power against inflation and through turbulent economic times.
And then we just talked about what was going on in Texas. North Dakota and New Hampshire followed suit, both introducing Bitcoin strategic reserve bills on January 10th. The New Hampshire bill uses the blanket term digital assets, a signal that the state may diversify crypto holdings beyond Bitcoin. That means Pennsylvania is headed down the shitcoin rabbit hole. So good luck. According to Dennis Porter, co founder and CEO of the Bitcoin advocacy group, Satoshi Action Fund, the North Dakota bill already has 11 cosponsors. So Texas, Oklahoma, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, I think Ohio is playing around with it. And we all know that Wyoming is has been knee deep into Bitcoin for years now. I mean, that's where Caitlin Long is, and that's where, Cynthia Lummis is. And, actually, is Cynthia Lummis yeah. Senator Cynthia Lummis, like I said, is, she's from Wyoming and she's rattling cages.
Let's find out what old Cynthia is up to today. Vince Quill again from Cointelegraph. Senator Lummis probes US Federal Law Enforcement about the Bitcoin Sale. Finally, finally, somebody is holding somebody else's feet to the fire on why now. It this could have been done at any time, but they pushed it through right before Trump's inauguration. Why right now? This is this is a politically motivated action. Thank god. At I mean, you may not I I don't completely trust Cynthia Lummis. Don't don't think for a second that I trust any of these guys, but still at least she's doing something about this kind because this is just bullshit. None of this should have happened until after Trump takes the chair.
None of this none of this should even be discussed. It's like everything should be on hold until we figure out what the hell orange man is gonna do when he sits down. Right? Well, Wyoming senator Cynthia Lummis has sent a letter to the United States Marshals Service on January 15th demanding answers for the government's potential sale of 69,370 Bitcoin seized in the Silk Road asset forfeiture. Lummis characterized attempts to sell the United States government's Bitcoin holdings as a form of political spite. In an excerpt from the letter provided by Politico, the senator wrote, this rushed approach, occurring during the presidential transition period, directly contradicts the incoming administration's stated policy objectives regarding the establishment of a national Bitcoin Stockpile.
The potential sale of the Silk Road BTC was given the green light after Judge Richard Seaborg denied a petition to block the asset forfeiture. While the forfeiture still needs more approvals, I'll say it again. The forfeiture still needs more approvals before it can be finalized. Selling the government's Bitcoin holdings conflicts with plans to establish a Bitcoin strategic reserve in the United States. Guys, I wanna I'm pausing here because it's really important for us to figure this one out. I have seen zero evidence of any sale of any bitcoin by the United States government when it comes to these particular Silk Road coins.
And yet, I see headline after headline after headline that says that the United States is actively selling that bitcoin right now. That is bullshit. They are not selling that Bitcoin right now. This has many more hoops to go through before they can even do that. And in fact, I actually believe that they won't be able to jump through all those hoops until Trump sits down in the chair on January 20th. That is this Monday. It's coming quick. What will he do after he sits down? I don't know. Is he going to like is he going to free Ross on day 1? I don't know. I certainly hope so because he's going to get a whole earful of crap from a bunch of Bitcoiners if he doesn't. But then is he going to actually do the strategic Bitcoin reserve?
Hell, guys, I'm hearing that he's talking about maybe diversifying that strategic Bitcoin reserve into shit coinery. This is a problem for me, but I'm not going to get into it right now because we have to actually wait until he does the thing. I can't conjecture, which is why I'm bringing this up. We cannot conjecture about things that are not happening. And news story after news story after headline after headline is suggesting that the United States government is actually selling those coins right now. That is not happening.
There has not been a single Bitcoin sold out of the Silk Road stack of this particular 69,370 coin. Not a single one has been sold. They may have moved them, but they're not selling them. They don't have the ability to sell them right now because they need yet more approvals. Please, please stop buying in to this crap. Right? So, let's move on. Proposals for Bitcoin strategic reserves are gaining momentum around the world, not just the United States, but the idea still faces considerable political opposition due to the novelty of cryptocurrencies as an asset class.
Fidelity Digital Assets research analyst Matt Hogan recently predicted that several nation states, central banks and sovereign wealth funds would diversify into Bitcoin this year 2025. The analyst added that sovereign powers may begin quietly accumulating BTC once it becomes more apparent that the downside of not having an allocation is worse than the perceived risk of holding the digital asset. In November of 2024, Senator Lummis suggested the US Treasury should convert some of its gold holdings into Bitcoin for the National Bitcoin Strategic Reserve. The Senator said conversion of gold to Bitcoin would minimize short term effects of the United States government's balance sheet rather than outright purchasing or mining 5% of bitcoin's maximum supply.
Several analysts and industry executives predict that establishing a bitcoin strategic reserve in the United States will drive the price of Bitcoin to $1,000,000. We'll see. Following Donald Trump's electoral victory in the United States, legendary cypherpunk, Adam Bak, said that a Bitcoin reserve in the United States could take BTC to 7 figures per coin during this market cycle. As to okay. That's the end of the article. As to whether or not that happens, we have to see. Because everybody and their dog has a Bitcoin price prediction. And I'm, honestly, I'm getting tired of all these people being dead wrong.
And I'm not saying that I'm right. I have no price prediction. I have absolutely no idea what the hell Bitcoin is going to do price wise. Honestly, I kinda don't care anymore. I'm kinda numb. But we need to move on. The SEC, the Securities and Exchange Commission, has appealed the Ripple ruling and seeks reversal on XRP classification according to Sebastian Sinclair, decrypt.co. The US Securities and Exchange Commission has formally filed an appeal in its legal battle with Ripple Labs challenging a July 2023 ruling that partially dismissed claims against the company.
Filed late Wednesday, the appeal focuses on whether Ripple's XRP sales to retail investors qualify as unregistered security transactions under federal law. Citing the Howey test, the SEC argues that Ripple's promotional efforts created an expectation of profit among investors, and that makes XRP an investment contract. While the regulator already filed its appeal in mid October 2024 following the district court's partial ruling in favor of Ripple in July of 2023, Wednesday's opening brief represents a formal step in the appellate process where the SEC outlines its arguments to challenge the court's prior decisions.
The agency disputes the district court's finding that sales on crypto exchanges did not meet this standard, emphasizing that investor expectations hinge on the issuer's actions and not the identity of the seller. The brief also challenges the lower court's decisions to exclude XRP distributed and non cash transactions such as employee compensation and business incentives from securities laws. The SEC asserts that labor and services received in exchange for XRP satisfy the investment of money criterion outlined in the Howey Test framework. Ripple's legal team has consistently rejected the SEC's claims, maintaining that XRP is a digital currency and not a security.
On Wednesday, chief legal officer, Stuart Alder OT, al Aldarati. Yeah. There Stuart Alderotti labeled SEC's latest filing as a rehash of failed arguments, predicting the case will lose momentum under a Trump administration. The outcome of the appeal could have far reaching implications for the crypto industry. Industry stakeholders view the case as a bellwether for regulatory clarity on digital asset classifications. A reversal could embolden the SEC to pursue similar cases while a defeat may curtail its enforcement authority. The dispute, which began in late 2020, has drawn significant attention from investors and lawmakers alike. Ripple has described the SEC's enforcement actions as an impediment to innovation, framing the case as part of a broader debate over the future of US crypto regulation.
A resolution in the appeals court is not expected until sometime later this year. So the fight between the SEC and Ripple is ongoing. Ripple is a security. It passes the Howey test with flying colors. Yes, this is my opinion, and yes, I think I'm 100% correct. For those of you that know people that think Ripple is the shit, I feel sorry for them. I really do. But Ripple is a security. And even if it's not, what does it actually do? I nobody actually needs this shit coin. This is nothing but a very large amount of bag holders who got suckered into buying this crap and they don't want to feel like they failed. They don't want to feel stupid. They don't want to feel like they got that they bought into a pipe dream.
But that's what it is. Does it mean that in the short term they won't make a shitload of money if they know when to punch out? Sure. But that money is blood money because you're stealing it from somebody else who was too stupid to understand that XRP is an unregistered security and most of the altcoins actually are. And I don't know if XRP was ever traded on BitMEX, but doesn't really matter. BitMEX has been slapped with an additional $100,000,000 fine over Bank Secrecy Act violations. What the hell? BitMEX has been issued an additional $100,000,000 fine for violations of the Bank Secrecy Act that occurred between 2015 2020.
That's when they were active. That's when BitMEX was an active exchange. Anyway, the exchange admitted to these offenses in July of 2024 and had earlier agreed to settle with a $110,000,000 penalty, but the United States district judge, John j Coitel, deemed the $110,000,000 BitMex fine had agreed to last year as insufficient. K. That's interesting. Prosecutors then sought a penalty of $417,000,000 arguing that Bitmex hasn't truly accepted responsibility and only pleaded guilty after its founders did. Plaintiffs claim BitMex earned approximately $1,300,000,000 while ignoring US regulations over those 5 years.
Quote, whilst we are disappointed to learn of the imposition of an additional financial penalty, the amount is substantially less than what the Department of Justice have been pursuing us for over 3 years, said the company in a blog post. The additional fines in the criminal case are separate from civil charges brought by the CFTC and FinCEN in 2022 against BitMEX and its senior executives, including co founder Arthur Hayes, for similar violations. BitMEX's parent company, HDR Global Trading Incorporated, will also face a 2 year probationary period.
Given that the court has determined an amount substantially below these levels in a justification of our stance and we query whether U. S. Taxpayer resources could have been better applied over this period. We are glad to move past this matter and look forward to continuing to focus on innovation and delivering the best products and services to our users without further distraction, added BitMEX. So here's the thing. Okay. Now I had to go I'm sorry. I had a little pause there, because I had to wanted to make sure that I knew what I was talking about. And I keep forgetting that BitMEX is actually still active as a trading platform, but just not for United States citizenry.
Right? Because, you know, as I say all the time, nobody wants to do business with the United States citizens because everybody that does apparently gets into trouble. And BitMEX is still in trouble, but they are still an active derivatives trading platform. So if you're a degenerate with a VPN in the United States or live outside the United States, if you wanna lose all your money by trading leverage, then by all means, go over there to BitMex and lose everything that you have and make certain that you mortgage your house 2 or 3 times to to get money to leverage that shit. But Bitmex still in trouble with the United States, so we'll have to we'll have to see what they do. I mean, I I don't really know what to say about Bitmex.
The thing about it is is that I like Arthur Hayes, but I can't I can't really say yay for BitMex still being a a trading platform across the world except for the United States because people lose their money. We we still see everybody losing losing their butts on longs and shorts just on regular trading and and and on the trading platforms that are allowed in the United States. I just don't wanna see what's actually still going on on BitMex because, like I said, back in the day, BitMex was one of the things that allowed people to get in so much trouble that they would post to Reddit how they lost their house, their family, their cars.
This was and it's still very serious. This is still very serious situation for people that are trading this crap. But in between 2015 and 2020, the amount of suicide hotline numbers that I saw posted into, like, r slash I lost it all on crypto or whatever it is was immense. I mean, it was, like, all over the place. There were there was, like, pinned notes by moderators on Reddit to the places where people were saying, hey. I lost my house because I was trading some shit coin. There there were notes that were pinned to the top of the page that said, here's the suicide hotline number. And it wasn't a joke. It was very serious, and it still is. It's just it doesn't seem to be quite as bad as it was back then, but I just I can't rah rah BitMex or Arthur Hayes because they were part of the problem.
And from what I understand now, they may not be part of the problem in the United States unless you got a v you know, really good VPN, but they are probably still part of a problem of people that still think that they're going to be able to trade their way into wealth and riches. And it's just it's just not gonna happen. The the house is always going to win and pretty much everybody except the top half of 1% is gonna lose on trading. So please don't trade your Bitcoin. Let's run the numbers. CNBC Futures and Commodities. West Texas Intermediate Oil is down almost a full point and a half.
$78.91 a barrel. Brent Norsee down just under a full point to 81.27. Natural gas down 3 quarters of a point to $4.05 per 1,000 cubic feet, and gasoline down 1 and a half to $2.12.2.2.2.2. Metals are all in the green except for palladium, which is down 1 and a half. Gold is up 1 and well well, 1.39 percent to 27.55 and 60¢. Silver is up just over a point. Platinum is up a half, and copper is up 1.14%. Ag is pretty much in the red today. Biggest winner is sugar, 2.22% to the upside. Biggest loser is chocolate, down just over a full 3 points. Live cattle, down a point. Lean hogs, down 2 thirds of a point.
Feeder cattle, down just over a full point. The Dow moving straight sideways as is the S and P, as is the Nasdaq. But the S and P mini is up 2 thirds of a point. And Bitcoin is up to a $100,040, that is a $1,980,000,000,000 market cap, but we can only get 36.8 ounces of shiny metal rocks with our 1 Bitcoin, of which there are 19,810,795.06. And average fees per block are slightly higher today, 0.06 BTC taken in fees on a per block basis. And there are 41 blocks carrying a 139,000 unconfirmed transactions waiting to clear at high priority rates of 8 satoshis per vbyte. Low priority is gonna get you in at 6. And hash rate chilling out at 793.9 exahashes per second on a 1 week rolling average.
From no trespassing, yesterday's episode of bitcoin and we got pies, 21100 sats. Thank you sir, no thank you. God's death with 537 says thank you sir, no thank you. And block 869-321 with 250 says thanks. Wartime with 333 says take this dust, sir. Cheers. Anonymous with, 321 says, awesome show. Thanks, man. I appreciate that. Martigno with a 100 says, hey. How do I find that Nostra onboarding website mentioned in the pod, please? I have responded to him, by the way, just just so you know, I actually responded to him. It is start dot njump dot me. That is start dot n jump.
Njump.me. Start dot n jump dot me. Send that around to your friends and family. Try to get them on Nostr. We need we need all the people that we can get to be on Nostr because things are just looking really pathetic out there with TikTok and Instagram and Meta and threads and Facebook and whatever. And it's just sad and just, god forbid, Twitter get into the mix. If you did if you didn't hear, I've lost my access to my last Twitter account, and that's more my fault than I think Twitter. I don't think I got banned. I think I just lost access because I didn't I didn't I didn't do what I should have been doing with my password.
It's not that I lost my password. It's just that I I I accidentally started that Twitter account with, my instead of putting in an email, I just use my Google account and that was actually tied to one of my earlier, Twitter accounts. So now it's like it's confusing the Twitter guys as to who is who, so I'm not able to get in. So my Twitter account, which is davidb84576 or whatever, 4 567 is jacked. So don't look for me over there anytime soon. BTC master with a 121 says all sats matter at all satsmatter.com, and that's the weather report.
Welcome to part 2 of the news you can use. I think I'm turning Japanese with the block and Brian McGlean in writing, Bank of Japan rate hike threatens the yen carry trade unwind, shaking Trump trade optimism and Bitcoin markets according to analysts. Let's find out what they gotta say about it. As the global market shifts its focus towards the upcoming US presidential inauguration on January 20th, analysts have flagged a potential risk that could disrupt market sentiment. The unwinding of the yen carry trade, a key driver of global liquidity. Quote, a Bank of Japan rate hike would likely trigger a significant unwind of the yen carry trades, which could dampen Trump trade market enthusiasm, Redstone Oracle COO, Marcin Khomisarek, told the block.
WeFi head of growth, Agni Ling, echoed this view saying that a potential hike in the Bank of Japan's interest rate at its policy meeting at the end of next week could impact risk assets if they need to be sold off to cover the carry trade loans. We saw the same thing happen last summer. The exact same thing happened last summer. So just be aware. The yen carry trade, a long standing strategy where investors borrow yen at low interest rates to invest in in higher yielding assets worldwide, faces significant risk due to the Bank of Japan signaling potential interest rate hikes.
And such a move could have wide reaching consequences affecting not only equities but also risk assets like bitcoin. The impact of a BOJ rate hike. Market participants are closely watching the policy meeting of the Bank of Japan's next Thursday Friday meeting in anticipation of an interest rate hike. Hawkish remarks from BOJ governor Kazuo Ueda have fueled anticipation driving Japanese government bond yields to multiyear highs. The Bank of Japan raised its short term rate target to 0.25% back in July, citing progress toward meeting its 2% inflation target. A further hike to 0.45% is now widely expected.
If rates rise, the yen could appreciate further increasing the cost for global investors who borrowed yen at low rates to maintain their positions. And this could prompt a large scale unwind of the carry trade, potentially forcing investors to liquidate assets to cover their positions. A similar situation occurred in August of 2024 when market volatility triggered significant Bitcoin liquidations. Quote, if the BOJ raises rates, this could strengthen the yen and force rapid unwinding of risk asset positions potentially causing a ripple effect across global markets as we saw in early August of 2024 when Bitcoin fell from 66,000 to 55,000 in a week.
While a yen carry trade unwind could moderate the Trump trade optimism, Kamizarek said the impact would likely be gradual rather than immediate. Quote, the key will be watching how they balance domestic inflation targets against global market stability, he noted. I don't know. I think that's sort of a cop out, but whatever. Bitcoin may experience noticeable price volatility due to market uncertainty surrounding the US presidential inauguration. However, risk on sentiment has been bolstered by the latest US consumer price index data. This raised investor expectations that the US Federal Reserve could implement 2 rate cuts in 2025 rather than adopting a more hawkish stance.
The positive reaction to the CPI report led to a rise in stocks and a decline in 10 year treasury yields. Quote, the core CPI data showed that inflation rose less than expected, Ling explained to the bloc, Quote, with the upcoming US presidential inauguration, there is a high likelihood that the so called Trump trade effect could trigger a breakthrough in Bitcoin's price, pushing it closer to its all time high, Despite the sharp fall in U. S. Bond yields following Wednesday's inflation data, the U. S. Dollar remained steady on Thursday. Market attention has now shifted to the inauguration.
With speculation growing about the potential inflationary impact of Trump's policies and their effects on Bitcoin and other assets. The derivatives market has also reflected this shift in sentiment. Bitcoin options saw a surge in end of January options trading volume with sorry. With traders increasingly purchasing calls with strike prices ranging from 100,000 to 110,000 and the puts at 90,000 according to Darabits. So there are your longs and your shorts. 100 100 to 110 on the long side and $90,000 on the short side. Who will win? God only knows. I'm not going to speculate. Let's move on to what have we got up here? Oh, oh, Nomura backed Kaminu received $75,000,000 Bitcoin investment from Blockstream Capital. All the lizardmen are at it again. CoinDesk, Will Canny is writing.
Komenu, a crypto custody joint venture between Nomura, Ledger, and Coinshares has raised $75,000,000 in a strategic investment from Blockstream Capital Partners, the company said in a press release on Thursday. The deal is novel in that it is funded with Bitcoin. Kominu will establish its own BTC Treasury to manage the crypto supply by Blockstream, the company said. And the investment will be used to expedite the custody firm's strategic growth plans and for the adoption and integration of Blockstream Technologies, Komaenu said.
By using Blockstream's liquid network, Komaenu will be able to significantly reduce off exchange margining and settlement times. Blockstream executives Adam Back, Peter Paul Pardi, and Nicholas Brand will join Kamineu's board of directors. Oh, my. Quote, we are delighted that Kamineu is adopting Blockstream's various technology streams to enhance its institutional service offering, said Adam Back, CEO and cofounder of Blockstream Corporation in the release. Quote, this is a testament to the fundamental veracity of Bitcoin related technologies and applications and marks the first time that these have entered the institutional arena, he added. So Adam backs Blockstream dumping $75,000,000 of straight up bitcoin into Kaminu, a crypto custody venture.
I'm not really quite sure what to say about that. Where did Blockstream get that cash? That's a lot of bread. So, here's my thinking. Is that Adam Back was buying a shit ton of Bitcoin when it was, like, $5. And he just has a lot of it laying around. Because I don't know how how else block, you know, a company like Blockstream is coming up with that much cash. I I I don't think that their revenues are all that high. I mean, I'm sure that they have revenue that's in the positive arena, but $75,000,000 that's kind of a lot of bread to just be dumping on one company. And I have not heard of a number higher than this coming out of Blockstream.
If I'm wrong about that, please please please make sure that you correct me and tell me what else it is that Blockstream is invested in that's more than $75,000,000 Alright. Noster. I talked about it yesterday. Aaron von Weerdom also has a take from Bitcoin Magazine on Noster, and he's talking about the story I read yesterday from Frank Korva. So Adam Van Weertum says or Aaron von Weertum says in his take from yesterday, Frank invited Bitcoiners to join Nostr, the world's biggest Bitcoin circular economy. I endorse this invitation.
Nostr aligns much better with Bitcoin's original values than specifically Elon Musk's Twitter. I'm never gonna call it x. That's me talking right there. I'm I'm just I refuse. It's Twitter. In much the same way that the money in your bank account isn't really yours, your posts on Twitter aren't either. In contrast, your Nostr posts are connected to your own public key. Like PayPal blocking money transfers, Twitter can decide to censor what you have to say, but no single entity has that power on Nostra. And while Twitter manipulates its algorithm to steer the conversation like the Fed's manipulation of interest rates to steer the economy, Nostra gives this power back to the users.
Now that President Musk is de facto entering the White House, you could even argue that Twitter is becoming part of the government. Twitter is fiat. Perhaps even more importantly, at least for me personally, my experience on Nostr is by now superior to what I encounter on Twitter. Admittedly, a low bar. Whereas I sometimes find something interesting on Nostr, most of what I see on the platform formerly known as Twitter these days are generic TikTok style memes, rage bait, and shit takes from Caicus Maximus himself. Caicius Maximus, k e k. I I guess he's referring to Trump. I don't know. I I do still post on Twitter sometimes, but I've increasingly disengaged from the conversation over there and will likely continue to do so.
Meanwhile, I found myself spending more time on Nostr, specifically through Domus and Amethyst, and I expect this to only increase. Sure, Nostra is still niche for now, and perhaps it will remain niche compared to Twitter. Judging by the hype around ETFs, MicroStrategy and strategic Bitcoin reserves, trusting central parties is pretty hip among many Bitcoiners nowadays, anyways. But I will gladly take Noster's niche signal over Twitter's noisy masses. Alright. So I this this whole thing of president Musk, guys, we've gotta stop. That's gotta stop. I'm I I thought we were sort of growing up out of this where we're starting where we call each other republicards and libtards.
Are are we still 4 years old? Musk is not president. He's not will he have influence on the presidency? Yeah. And he's gonna have to take a number of all the other people that will have the ear of the president. And that this president, this second term for president Trump, that will have to take a number to all the presidents in the United States history who had people who had influence over the president of the United States, beginning with George Washington. The fuck do you think is going on here? Do you I mean, do you think these people operate inside of a bubble where once they become president, they don't have friends? They don't have any kind of people who influence them whatsoever?
If you think that, that's bullshit. But to say that Musk is actually the president is not only shortsighted. It's juvenile. And it needs to stop. It's embarrassing when I see people of high intellectual prowess like Aaron von Wertham say shit that is honestly just mirroring or or echoing public radio. National public radio in the United States, that's all you hear. President Musk, he's not president. He has the ear of the president. So does every single one of his cabinet members. So does every single one of his friends. I'm sorry, but that's the way that shit is.
Unless unless we come up with the following, this will what I just described will always be the case. Friends of the president will have the ear of the president. Funders of the president's presidential campaign will always have the ear of the president unless the following is done. If you're elected president, you may not speak to any one of your friends. And if you're caught speaking to any of any one of your friends, it's automatic impeachment and it's automatic conviction on that impeachment. If you don't do that and sequester physically sequester the president to where he cannot have any contact with any of his family, with any of his friends, then guess what?
The president will have been influenced by anyone that he talks to. In his family, any of his friends, any of his donors, any any of the people that that think they can get something out of Trump by offering something, him something while he's a president. It's going to happen. It's always happened. You might as well have said, like, whatever best friend of Gerald Ford when he got to be president. You might as well said president, that guy's name. You might as well have said President Carter, the other President Carter. You know, Carter's wife, the first lady. You know, when Jimmy Carter was president? Because she had his ear.
We didn't elect her. I guarantee you, missus Carter had the president's ear when Jimmy Carter was sitting in in chair. This president Musk shit is beyond juvenile. It shows a an 8 year old's mentality because president Musk is a term that is 100% generated out of MSNBC, CNBC, PBS, NPR, Yes. All of the left. I'm sure I'll hear it on Fox. Well, actually, I won't hear it on Fox because I don't watch any of this shit. The only thing that I monitor at this point is when I'm in my car and before my phone kicks in to my Bitcoin podcast, I'm listening to a little bit of NPR so that I can get whatever today's talking points are going to be from that end of the spectrum.
And all I hear is president Musk. We gotta do better, guys. We gotta do better. Now Bitcoin safe looks like they may be doing better, not politically, but from the app on the app front for securing your bitcoin. Bitcoin safe version 1.0 has been released. Secure Bitcoin storage made easy. Bitcoin safe is a free and open source Bitcoin Savings Wallet designed for security and ease of use, available on Windows, macOS, and Linux. Bitcoin Safe is a fully featured Bitcoin Savings Wallet. Built with Bitcoin Development Kit, it aims to simplify single sig and multisig wallet management for non technical users while retaining some power user features through an intuitive and an attractive user interface.
The key features of Bitcoin Safe include easy multisig wallet setup for non technical users hardware signers only and we'll expand on this a little bit. All wallets require hardware signers for secure seed storage. And as of version 1.0, bitcoin safe supports all major bitcoin hardware signers. It includes screenshot instructions for each hardware signer to guide users through every step there are easy multi party, multisig collaboration and syncing that is, once a multisig wallet is created Bitcoin Safe sets up an encrypted Nostra group chat for collaboration and partially signed Bitcoin transaction sharing.
For security, each participant must authenticate every other user with a simple click. It also includes encrypted cloud backup, via Nostr, of labels and label synchronization between different computers. There's simplified wallet management features including labeling via categories like k y c, non k y c, work, friends, etcetera. There's automatic coin selection within categories, easy coin categories and label backups via a short backup key, one click fee selection and mempool block preview, ability to automatically merge UTXO's when fees are low. Holy shit. Cancel and bump fee on transaction via replace by fee encrypted wallet store wallet storage and more.
There's global search and filtering options. There's import and export capabilities like in Bitcoin Safe including CSV export for all lists. You can import for all back batch transactions. You can label import and export via the bip 329, label import from Electrum wallet, exporting of money flow diagrams to svg, and drag and drop interface for transactions, PSBTs, and CSV files. There's multi language support, English, Chinese, Spanish, Japanese, Russian, Portuguese, Hindi, Arabic, Italian, French, and German so far, and power user friendly features including the ability to use your own Electrum, Esplora server, mempool instance, and nostril relay, editing of finalized PSBTs and more.
Guys, this is insane, man. There's you can, interact with your USB hardware signer via USB tools. There's a QR scanner. You can scan and decode any Bitcoin QR code. Full support for bbqr and u r. Packaged binaries are now available for windows, macos and Linux. Improved graphical wallet explorer that allows you to navigate through transactions by clicking on inputs and outputs. Sync and chat improvements, include label synchronization, backup, and multi party, multi sig collaboration. They can now be enabled in the last wallet setup wizard, and you can choose your own custom relay. PSBT creation now features a beautiful fee selection by clicking on mempool blocks.
Oh, I have I have I've never heard of Bitcoin safe before and this is amazing. Now, when it down here at the end where it says, let's see. But where was that? Where was that? Something about the buy packaged binaries are available for, list wherever it was. Package binaries were available for Windows, Linux and Mac. Be careful with those. Binaries are the compiled code, of whatever's going on in their GitHub. And that that can cause some problems, but only in so far as security. Like like it could be a, you pick up a binary, you download a binary, but you got spoofed and you pick up the wrong binary and it's got a backdoor in it because you didn't compile the code yourself. So just be aware of the security issues.
If you're going to try this out, use it maybe use it on testnet if they allow that or just use a fundamentally low amount of bitcoin to play around with. But, honestly, this looks awesome. So that's bitcoin safe, s a f e, like put it in the safe. Bitcoin safe version 1.0 is now available. You might wanna go check that thing out. This is this entire thing that I just read to you is from nobsbitcoin.comforward/bitcoinsafevone0. That link, that URL, will be in the show notes. So if you have any questions about this or want to go look at it for yourself and figure out where to go get it, just click that link in the show notes and you will go directly to this story and this story will take you exactly where you need to go. Alright? So that's it for the day. Ladies and gentlemen, we are still we are chilling out at $99,893 right now.
So we had a brief dip around 6 o'clock this morning my time. 4 hours later, that dip has completely been erased. So we'll have to see. I'm just waiting on Monday. At this point, I put nothing past the idiocy of these markets. I'm just going to wait until orange man sits in the chair and utters his first words, and it better be I'm freeing Ross. I'll see you on the other side of that.
[00:53:24] Unknown:
This has been Bitcoin, 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.
It is 9:15 AM Pacific Standard Time. It's the 16th day of January 2025, and this is episode 1,000 20, 10/20 of Bitcoin. And Texas is in the news as well as Oklahoma. Senator Lummis is, ah, rattling some cages out there. Thank God Almighty. And the SEC is appealing a ripple ruling, and we'll find out how that's probably gonna fall on its face and bit Mex. Yes. If you were ever around in the early days of Bitcoin, you might remember something called BitMex. It was one of the earliest earliest exchanges and famously allowed things like 100 times leverage on futures contracts.
And it was, great fun watching people get wiped out. Yeah. I know. Shouldn't be praising that. But, hey, man. If you're gonna be a degenerate when it comes to this kind of stuff, you should be prepared to get wiped out. And bitmex was one of the it was like a garbage scowl. It took out the trash all the time. Because when you're doing leverage at like a 100x, year, should you were playing with with nuclear explosive material, not just gas, not just lighter fluid, not just matches. No, no, no. People were getting wiped out. And yet, they were told and had complied.
They're no longer in exchange. And yet, they're in trouble again. We'll get into that one. The Bank of Japan is also rattling some cages this morning. It may not look good for the yen carry trade again. And if you were around, I don't know, about a year and a half ago well, was it was it last summer? I I think it was last summer. Yeah. It was last summer. We saw, some real issues when the Bank of Japan started making moves the way that they are saying they're making today. We got a piece about Nostr and we've got a new item up for a wallet but it is kind of unlike any wallet that I've ever seen just the sheer amount of offerings that this one application has is kind of mind boggling but let's kick it off with Texas who has kicked off its 89th legislative session with a new strategic Bitcoin reserve bill.
Now, I have reported on this. It has now been introduced into the 89th legislative session. Whereas when I was talking about it before, it was just a draft. It's happening, ladies and gentlemen. Martin Young from Cointelegraph says that the Texas state senator Charles Schwertner has introduced the bill in the new legislative session to establish a strategic Bitcoin reserve in the Lone Star State. Quote, it's time for Texas to lead the way in establishing a strategic Bitcoin reserve, the republican politician and physician said while announcing the senate bill, which is titled s b 778 on Twitter on January 16th.
That would be today. Quote, if passed and signed into law, it would make Texas the 1st state in the nation to establish a strategic Bitcoin reserve. This would position our state at the forefront of the digital economy, driving growth and securing economic freedom in our great state. The Texas Strategic Bitcoin Reserve Act aims to establish a special fund outside of the General Revenue Fund allowing the state to own and custody bitcoin as a financial asset and to accept Bitcoin donations from the public. Look, I love Texas, guys. I was born there. You will never get the Texas out of my bones. But why the hell would you donate to a state?
No. No. No. Don't donate your Bitcoin to Texas. Don't donate it to the United States. Stop donating your Bitcoin. Keep it for yourself. We're all gonna need our Bitcoin. It recognized the bill recognized BTC as a valuable digital asset with strategic potential for enhancing this state's financial resilience while acknowledging its decentralized nature and finite supply, which are unique qualities that can serve as a hedge against inflation and economic volatility. The bill proposes implementing secure storage and management systems while mandating cold storage and regular audits for transparency and security.
Legislature can appropriate funds to purchase Bitcoin with funding limited to 1% of the general revenue. SB 778 is not the 1st legislation proposed to establish a strategic Bitcoin reserve in the Lone Star State. Back in December, Texas representative Giovanni Capri Giuliani proposed a draft Texas strategic Bitcoin reserve bill that would allow residents and government entities to donate BTC to the reserve. Again, don't do that. I love Texas, but there's no reason to donate your bitcoin to the Texas strategic reserve. That's kinda idiotic, but whatever. Cointelegraph reached out to senator Schwertner for clarification on the differences between these two bills but has not received a response.
Meanwhile, Texas is not the only state angling for a strategic Bitcoin reserve. On January 15th, representative Cody Cody Maynard proposed HB 1203, the strategic Bitcoin Reserve Act for the state of Oklahoma, which shares a northern border with Texas. And that is next on the list. We've got it right here. And the story is written by Vince Quill from Cointelegraph as well. Bitcoin strategic reserve bill has been introduced in the great state of Oklahoma. Yay. It's second state. I mean, these are actual introductions to the state legislator. These are not drafts.
These are not wish list. These are actually now forced upon the legislature. They have to read them. They have to analyze them, and they have to talk about them. And then they're gonna have to actually vote on them. This is no longer in the realm of a could be or possibly could be introduced into legislature. No. Both Texas and Oklahoma have taken the steps to put the bills on the desks of the legislature and now they have to do something with it. So a new bill to establish Bitcoin as a strategic reserve asset was introduced to the Oklahoma house of representatives on January 15th by state representative, Cody Maynard.
House bill 1203, known as the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve Act, would allow Oklahoma's pension funds and their state savings accounts to allocate a portion of their assets to bitcoin as a hedge against inflation. Representative Maynard said, Bitcoin represents freedom from bureaucrats printing away our purchasing power. As a decentralized form of money, Bitcoin cannot be manipulated or created by government entities. It is the ultimate store of value for those who believe in financial freedom and sound money principles. Several US states have pending legislation to establish bitcoin strategic reserves and several state pension funds have already diversified into Bitcoin as the digital asset gains mainstream and institutional adoption.
Pennsylvania lawmakers submitted a proposal for a Bitcoin strategic reserve in the state back in November of last year allowing the state treasury to invest up to 10% of its assets into Bitcoin. State Representative Mike Cabell argued that Pennsylvania should adopt the Bitcoin diversification employed by private sector asset managers like BlackRock and Fidelity which used bitcoin to shield their investments from macroeconomic risks. Cabell added that bitcoin was a way to protect state purchasing power against inflation and through turbulent economic times.
And then we just talked about what was going on in Texas. North Dakota and New Hampshire followed suit, both introducing Bitcoin strategic reserve bills on January 10th. The New Hampshire bill uses the blanket term digital assets, a signal that the state may diversify crypto holdings beyond Bitcoin. That means Pennsylvania is headed down the shitcoin rabbit hole. So good luck. According to Dennis Porter, co founder and CEO of the Bitcoin advocacy group, Satoshi Action Fund, the North Dakota bill already has 11 cosponsors. So Texas, Oklahoma, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, I think Ohio is playing around with it. And we all know that Wyoming is has been knee deep into Bitcoin for years now. I mean, that's where Caitlin Long is, and that's where, Cynthia Lummis is. And, actually, is Cynthia Lummis yeah. Senator Cynthia Lummis, like I said, is, she's from Wyoming and she's rattling cages.
Let's find out what old Cynthia is up to today. Vince Quill again from Cointelegraph. Senator Lummis probes US Federal Law Enforcement about the Bitcoin Sale. Finally, finally, somebody is holding somebody else's feet to the fire on why now. It this could have been done at any time, but they pushed it through right before Trump's inauguration. Why right now? This is this is a politically motivated action. Thank god. At I mean, you may not I I don't completely trust Cynthia Lummis. Don't don't think for a second that I trust any of these guys, but still at least she's doing something about this kind because this is just bullshit. None of this should have happened until after Trump takes the chair.
None of this none of this should even be discussed. It's like everything should be on hold until we figure out what the hell orange man is gonna do when he sits down. Right? Well, Wyoming senator Cynthia Lummis has sent a letter to the United States Marshals Service on January 15th demanding answers for the government's potential sale of 69,370 Bitcoin seized in the Silk Road asset forfeiture. Lummis characterized attempts to sell the United States government's Bitcoin holdings as a form of political spite. In an excerpt from the letter provided by Politico, the senator wrote, this rushed approach, occurring during the presidential transition period, directly contradicts the incoming administration's stated policy objectives regarding the establishment of a national Bitcoin Stockpile.
The potential sale of the Silk Road BTC was given the green light after Judge Richard Seaborg denied a petition to block the asset forfeiture. While the forfeiture still needs more approvals, I'll say it again. The forfeiture still needs more approvals before it can be finalized. Selling the government's Bitcoin holdings conflicts with plans to establish a Bitcoin strategic reserve in the United States. Guys, I wanna I'm pausing here because it's really important for us to figure this one out. I have seen zero evidence of any sale of any bitcoin by the United States government when it comes to these particular Silk Road coins.
And yet, I see headline after headline after headline that says that the United States is actively selling that bitcoin right now. That is bullshit. They are not selling that Bitcoin right now. This has many more hoops to go through before they can even do that. And in fact, I actually believe that they won't be able to jump through all those hoops until Trump sits down in the chair on January 20th. That is this Monday. It's coming quick. What will he do after he sits down? I don't know. Is he going to like is he going to free Ross on day 1? I don't know. I certainly hope so because he's going to get a whole earful of crap from a bunch of Bitcoiners if he doesn't. But then is he going to actually do the strategic Bitcoin reserve?
Hell, guys, I'm hearing that he's talking about maybe diversifying that strategic Bitcoin reserve into shit coinery. This is a problem for me, but I'm not going to get into it right now because we have to actually wait until he does the thing. I can't conjecture, which is why I'm bringing this up. We cannot conjecture about things that are not happening. And news story after news story after headline after headline is suggesting that the United States government is actually selling those coins right now. That is not happening.
There has not been a single Bitcoin sold out of the Silk Road stack of this particular 69,370 coin. Not a single one has been sold. They may have moved them, but they're not selling them. They don't have the ability to sell them right now because they need yet more approvals. Please, please stop buying in to this crap. Right? So, let's move on. Proposals for Bitcoin strategic reserves are gaining momentum around the world, not just the United States, but the idea still faces considerable political opposition due to the novelty of cryptocurrencies as an asset class.
Fidelity Digital Assets research analyst Matt Hogan recently predicted that several nation states, central banks and sovereign wealth funds would diversify into Bitcoin this year 2025. The analyst added that sovereign powers may begin quietly accumulating BTC once it becomes more apparent that the downside of not having an allocation is worse than the perceived risk of holding the digital asset. In November of 2024, Senator Lummis suggested the US Treasury should convert some of its gold holdings into Bitcoin for the National Bitcoin Strategic Reserve. The Senator said conversion of gold to Bitcoin would minimize short term effects of the United States government's balance sheet rather than outright purchasing or mining 5% of bitcoin's maximum supply.
Several analysts and industry executives predict that establishing a bitcoin strategic reserve in the United States will drive the price of Bitcoin to $1,000,000. We'll see. Following Donald Trump's electoral victory in the United States, legendary cypherpunk, Adam Bak, said that a Bitcoin reserve in the United States could take BTC to 7 figures per coin during this market cycle. As to okay. That's the end of the article. As to whether or not that happens, we have to see. Because everybody and their dog has a Bitcoin price prediction. And I'm, honestly, I'm getting tired of all these people being dead wrong.
And I'm not saying that I'm right. I have no price prediction. I have absolutely no idea what the hell Bitcoin is going to do price wise. Honestly, I kinda don't care anymore. I'm kinda numb. But we need to move on. The SEC, the Securities and Exchange Commission, has appealed the Ripple ruling and seeks reversal on XRP classification according to Sebastian Sinclair, decrypt.co. The US Securities and Exchange Commission has formally filed an appeal in its legal battle with Ripple Labs challenging a July 2023 ruling that partially dismissed claims against the company.
Filed late Wednesday, the appeal focuses on whether Ripple's XRP sales to retail investors qualify as unregistered security transactions under federal law. Citing the Howey test, the SEC argues that Ripple's promotional efforts created an expectation of profit among investors, and that makes XRP an investment contract. While the regulator already filed its appeal in mid October 2024 following the district court's partial ruling in favor of Ripple in July of 2023, Wednesday's opening brief represents a formal step in the appellate process where the SEC outlines its arguments to challenge the court's prior decisions.
The agency disputes the district court's finding that sales on crypto exchanges did not meet this standard, emphasizing that investor expectations hinge on the issuer's actions and not the identity of the seller. The brief also challenges the lower court's decisions to exclude XRP distributed and non cash transactions such as employee compensation and business incentives from securities laws. The SEC asserts that labor and services received in exchange for XRP satisfy the investment of money criterion outlined in the Howey Test framework. Ripple's legal team has consistently rejected the SEC's claims, maintaining that XRP is a digital currency and not a security.
On Wednesday, chief legal officer, Stuart Alder OT, al Aldarati. Yeah. There Stuart Alderotti labeled SEC's latest filing as a rehash of failed arguments, predicting the case will lose momentum under a Trump administration. The outcome of the appeal could have far reaching implications for the crypto industry. Industry stakeholders view the case as a bellwether for regulatory clarity on digital asset classifications. A reversal could embolden the SEC to pursue similar cases while a defeat may curtail its enforcement authority. The dispute, which began in late 2020, has drawn significant attention from investors and lawmakers alike. Ripple has described the SEC's enforcement actions as an impediment to innovation, framing the case as part of a broader debate over the future of US crypto regulation.
A resolution in the appeals court is not expected until sometime later this year. So the fight between the SEC and Ripple is ongoing. Ripple is a security. It passes the Howey test with flying colors. Yes, this is my opinion, and yes, I think I'm 100% correct. For those of you that know people that think Ripple is the shit, I feel sorry for them. I really do. But Ripple is a security. And even if it's not, what does it actually do? I nobody actually needs this shit coin. This is nothing but a very large amount of bag holders who got suckered into buying this crap and they don't want to feel like they failed. They don't want to feel stupid. They don't want to feel like they got that they bought into a pipe dream.
But that's what it is. Does it mean that in the short term they won't make a shitload of money if they know when to punch out? Sure. But that money is blood money because you're stealing it from somebody else who was too stupid to understand that XRP is an unregistered security and most of the altcoins actually are. And I don't know if XRP was ever traded on BitMEX, but doesn't really matter. BitMEX has been slapped with an additional $100,000,000 fine over Bank Secrecy Act violations. What the hell? BitMEX has been issued an additional $100,000,000 fine for violations of the Bank Secrecy Act that occurred between 2015 2020.
That's when they were active. That's when BitMEX was an active exchange. Anyway, the exchange admitted to these offenses in July of 2024 and had earlier agreed to settle with a $110,000,000 penalty, but the United States district judge, John j Coitel, deemed the $110,000,000 BitMex fine had agreed to last year as insufficient. K. That's interesting. Prosecutors then sought a penalty of $417,000,000 arguing that Bitmex hasn't truly accepted responsibility and only pleaded guilty after its founders did. Plaintiffs claim BitMex earned approximately $1,300,000,000 while ignoring US regulations over those 5 years.
Quote, whilst we are disappointed to learn of the imposition of an additional financial penalty, the amount is substantially less than what the Department of Justice have been pursuing us for over 3 years, said the company in a blog post. The additional fines in the criminal case are separate from civil charges brought by the CFTC and FinCEN in 2022 against BitMEX and its senior executives, including co founder Arthur Hayes, for similar violations. BitMEX's parent company, HDR Global Trading Incorporated, will also face a 2 year probationary period.
Given that the court has determined an amount substantially below these levels in a justification of our stance and we query whether U. S. Taxpayer resources could have been better applied over this period. We are glad to move past this matter and look forward to continuing to focus on innovation and delivering the best products and services to our users without further distraction, added BitMEX. So here's the thing. Okay. Now I had to go I'm sorry. I had a little pause there, because I had to wanted to make sure that I knew what I was talking about. And I keep forgetting that BitMEX is actually still active as a trading platform, but just not for United States citizenry.
Right? Because, you know, as I say all the time, nobody wants to do business with the United States citizens because everybody that does apparently gets into trouble. And BitMEX is still in trouble, but they are still an active derivatives trading platform. So if you're a degenerate with a VPN in the United States or live outside the United States, if you wanna lose all your money by trading leverage, then by all means, go over there to BitMex and lose everything that you have and make certain that you mortgage your house 2 or 3 times to to get money to leverage that shit. But Bitmex still in trouble with the United States, so we'll have to we'll have to see what they do. I mean, I I don't really know what to say about Bitmex.
The thing about it is is that I like Arthur Hayes, but I can't I can't really say yay for BitMex still being a a trading platform across the world except for the United States because people lose their money. We we still see everybody losing losing their butts on longs and shorts just on regular trading and and and on the trading platforms that are allowed in the United States. I just don't wanna see what's actually still going on on BitMex because, like I said, back in the day, BitMex was one of the things that allowed people to get in so much trouble that they would post to Reddit how they lost their house, their family, their cars.
This was and it's still very serious. This is still very serious situation for people that are trading this crap. But in between 2015 and 2020, the amount of suicide hotline numbers that I saw posted into, like, r slash I lost it all on crypto or whatever it is was immense. I mean, it was, like, all over the place. There were there was, like, pinned notes by moderators on Reddit to the places where people were saying, hey. I lost my house because I was trading some shit coin. There there were notes that were pinned to the top of the page that said, here's the suicide hotline number. And it wasn't a joke. It was very serious, and it still is. It's just it doesn't seem to be quite as bad as it was back then, but I just I can't rah rah BitMex or Arthur Hayes because they were part of the problem.
And from what I understand now, they may not be part of the problem in the United States unless you got a v you know, really good VPN, but they are probably still part of a problem of people that still think that they're going to be able to trade their way into wealth and riches. And it's just it's just not gonna happen. The the house is always going to win and pretty much everybody except the top half of 1% is gonna lose on trading. So please don't trade your Bitcoin. Let's run the numbers. CNBC Futures and Commodities. West Texas Intermediate Oil is down almost a full point and a half.
$78.91 a barrel. Brent Norsee down just under a full point to 81.27. Natural gas down 3 quarters of a point to $4.05 per 1,000 cubic feet, and gasoline down 1 and a half to $2.12.2.2.2.2. Metals are all in the green except for palladium, which is down 1 and a half. Gold is up 1 and well well, 1.39 percent to 27.55 and 60¢. Silver is up just over a point. Platinum is up a half, and copper is up 1.14%. Ag is pretty much in the red today. Biggest winner is sugar, 2.22% to the upside. Biggest loser is chocolate, down just over a full 3 points. Live cattle, down a point. Lean hogs, down 2 thirds of a point.
Feeder cattle, down just over a full point. The Dow moving straight sideways as is the S and P, as is the Nasdaq. But the S and P mini is up 2 thirds of a point. And Bitcoin is up to a $100,040, that is a $1,980,000,000,000 market cap, but we can only get 36.8 ounces of shiny metal rocks with our 1 Bitcoin, of which there are 19,810,795.06. And average fees per block are slightly higher today, 0.06 BTC taken in fees on a per block basis. And there are 41 blocks carrying a 139,000 unconfirmed transactions waiting to clear at high priority rates of 8 satoshis per vbyte. Low priority is gonna get you in at 6. And hash rate chilling out at 793.9 exahashes per second on a 1 week rolling average.
From no trespassing, yesterday's episode of bitcoin and we got pies, 21100 sats. Thank you sir, no thank you. God's death with 537 says thank you sir, no thank you. And block 869-321 with 250 says thanks. Wartime with 333 says take this dust, sir. Cheers. Anonymous with, 321 says, awesome show. Thanks, man. I appreciate that. Martigno with a 100 says, hey. How do I find that Nostra onboarding website mentioned in the pod, please? I have responded to him, by the way, just just so you know, I actually responded to him. It is start dot njump dot me. That is start dot n jump.
Njump.me. Start dot n jump dot me. Send that around to your friends and family. Try to get them on Nostr. We need we need all the people that we can get to be on Nostr because things are just looking really pathetic out there with TikTok and Instagram and Meta and threads and Facebook and whatever. And it's just sad and just, god forbid, Twitter get into the mix. If you did if you didn't hear, I've lost my access to my last Twitter account, and that's more my fault than I think Twitter. I don't think I got banned. I think I just lost access because I didn't I didn't I didn't do what I should have been doing with my password.
It's not that I lost my password. It's just that I I I accidentally started that Twitter account with, my instead of putting in an email, I just use my Google account and that was actually tied to one of my earlier, Twitter accounts. So now it's like it's confusing the Twitter guys as to who is who, so I'm not able to get in. So my Twitter account, which is davidb84576 or whatever, 4 567 is jacked. So don't look for me over there anytime soon. BTC master with a 121 says all sats matter at all satsmatter.com, and that's the weather report.
Welcome to part 2 of the news you can use. I think I'm turning Japanese with the block and Brian McGlean in writing, Bank of Japan rate hike threatens the yen carry trade unwind, shaking Trump trade optimism and Bitcoin markets according to analysts. Let's find out what they gotta say about it. As the global market shifts its focus towards the upcoming US presidential inauguration on January 20th, analysts have flagged a potential risk that could disrupt market sentiment. The unwinding of the yen carry trade, a key driver of global liquidity. Quote, a Bank of Japan rate hike would likely trigger a significant unwind of the yen carry trades, which could dampen Trump trade market enthusiasm, Redstone Oracle COO, Marcin Khomisarek, told the block.
WeFi head of growth, Agni Ling, echoed this view saying that a potential hike in the Bank of Japan's interest rate at its policy meeting at the end of next week could impact risk assets if they need to be sold off to cover the carry trade loans. We saw the same thing happen last summer. The exact same thing happened last summer. So just be aware. The yen carry trade, a long standing strategy where investors borrow yen at low interest rates to invest in in higher yielding assets worldwide, faces significant risk due to the Bank of Japan signaling potential interest rate hikes.
And such a move could have wide reaching consequences affecting not only equities but also risk assets like bitcoin. The impact of a BOJ rate hike. Market participants are closely watching the policy meeting of the Bank of Japan's next Thursday Friday meeting in anticipation of an interest rate hike. Hawkish remarks from BOJ governor Kazuo Ueda have fueled anticipation driving Japanese government bond yields to multiyear highs. The Bank of Japan raised its short term rate target to 0.25% back in July, citing progress toward meeting its 2% inflation target. A further hike to 0.45% is now widely expected.
If rates rise, the yen could appreciate further increasing the cost for global investors who borrowed yen at low rates to maintain their positions. And this could prompt a large scale unwind of the carry trade, potentially forcing investors to liquidate assets to cover their positions. A similar situation occurred in August of 2024 when market volatility triggered significant Bitcoin liquidations. Quote, if the BOJ raises rates, this could strengthen the yen and force rapid unwinding of risk asset positions potentially causing a ripple effect across global markets as we saw in early August of 2024 when Bitcoin fell from 66,000 to 55,000 in a week.
While a yen carry trade unwind could moderate the Trump trade optimism, Kamizarek said the impact would likely be gradual rather than immediate. Quote, the key will be watching how they balance domestic inflation targets against global market stability, he noted. I don't know. I think that's sort of a cop out, but whatever. Bitcoin may experience noticeable price volatility due to market uncertainty surrounding the US presidential inauguration. However, risk on sentiment has been bolstered by the latest US consumer price index data. This raised investor expectations that the US Federal Reserve could implement 2 rate cuts in 2025 rather than adopting a more hawkish stance.
The positive reaction to the CPI report led to a rise in stocks and a decline in 10 year treasury yields. Quote, the core CPI data showed that inflation rose less than expected, Ling explained to the bloc, Quote, with the upcoming US presidential inauguration, there is a high likelihood that the so called Trump trade effect could trigger a breakthrough in Bitcoin's price, pushing it closer to its all time high, Despite the sharp fall in U. S. Bond yields following Wednesday's inflation data, the U. S. Dollar remained steady on Thursday. Market attention has now shifted to the inauguration.
With speculation growing about the potential inflationary impact of Trump's policies and their effects on Bitcoin and other assets. The derivatives market has also reflected this shift in sentiment. Bitcoin options saw a surge in end of January options trading volume with sorry. With traders increasingly purchasing calls with strike prices ranging from 100,000 to 110,000 and the puts at 90,000 according to Darabits. So there are your longs and your shorts. 100 100 to 110 on the long side and $90,000 on the short side. Who will win? God only knows. I'm not going to speculate. Let's move on to what have we got up here? Oh, oh, Nomura backed Kaminu received $75,000,000 Bitcoin investment from Blockstream Capital. All the lizardmen are at it again. CoinDesk, Will Canny is writing.
Komenu, a crypto custody joint venture between Nomura, Ledger, and Coinshares has raised $75,000,000 in a strategic investment from Blockstream Capital Partners, the company said in a press release on Thursday. The deal is novel in that it is funded with Bitcoin. Kominu will establish its own BTC Treasury to manage the crypto supply by Blockstream, the company said. And the investment will be used to expedite the custody firm's strategic growth plans and for the adoption and integration of Blockstream Technologies, Komaenu said.
By using Blockstream's liquid network, Komaenu will be able to significantly reduce off exchange margining and settlement times. Blockstream executives Adam Back, Peter Paul Pardi, and Nicholas Brand will join Kamineu's board of directors. Oh, my. Quote, we are delighted that Kamineu is adopting Blockstream's various technology streams to enhance its institutional service offering, said Adam Back, CEO and cofounder of Blockstream Corporation in the release. Quote, this is a testament to the fundamental veracity of Bitcoin related technologies and applications and marks the first time that these have entered the institutional arena, he added. So Adam backs Blockstream dumping $75,000,000 of straight up bitcoin into Kaminu, a crypto custody venture.
I'm not really quite sure what to say about that. Where did Blockstream get that cash? That's a lot of bread. So, here's my thinking. Is that Adam Back was buying a shit ton of Bitcoin when it was, like, $5. And he just has a lot of it laying around. Because I don't know how how else block, you know, a company like Blockstream is coming up with that much cash. I I I don't think that their revenues are all that high. I mean, I'm sure that they have revenue that's in the positive arena, but $75,000,000 that's kind of a lot of bread to just be dumping on one company. And I have not heard of a number higher than this coming out of Blockstream.
If I'm wrong about that, please please please make sure that you correct me and tell me what else it is that Blockstream is invested in that's more than $75,000,000 Alright. Noster. I talked about it yesterday. Aaron von Weerdom also has a take from Bitcoin Magazine on Noster, and he's talking about the story I read yesterday from Frank Korva. So Adam Van Weertum says or Aaron von Weertum says in his take from yesterday, Frank invited Bitcoiners to join Nostr, the world's biggest Bitcoin circular economy. I endorse this invitation.
Nostr aligns much better with Bitcoin's original values than specifically Elon Musk's Twitter. I'm never gonna call it x. That's me talking right there. I'm I'm just I refuse. It's Twitter. In much the same way that the money in your bank account isn't really yours, your posts on Twitter aren't either. In contrast, your Nostr posts are connected to your own public key. Like PayPal blocking money transfers, Twitter can decide to censor what you have to say, but no single entity has that power on Nostra. And while Twitter manipulates its algorithm to steer the conversation like the Fed's manipulation of interest rates to steer the economy, Nostra gives this power back to the users.
Now that President Musk is de facto entering the White House, you could even argue that Twitter is becoming part of the government. Twitter is fiat. Perhaps even more importantly, at least for me personally, my experience on Nostr is by now superior to what I encounter on Twitter. Admittedly, a low bar. Whereas I sometimes find something interesting on Nostr, most of what I see on the platform formerly known as Twitter these days are generic TikTok style memes, rage bait, and shit takes from Caicus Maximus himself. Caicius Maximus, k e k. I I guess he's referring to Trump. I don't know. I I do still post on Twitter sometimes, but I've increasingly disengaged from the conversation over there and will likely continue to do so.
Meanwhile, I found myself spending more time on Nostr, specifically through Domus and Amethyst, and I expect this to only increase. Sure, Nostra is still niche for now, and perhaps it will remain niche compared to Twitter. Judging by the hype around ETFs, MicroStrategy and strategic Bitcoin reserves, trusting central parties is pretty hip among many Bitcoiners nowadays, anyways. But I will gladly take Noster's niche signal over Twitter's noisy masses. Alright. So I this this whole thing of president Musk, guys, we've gotta stop. That's gotta stop. I'm I I thought we were sort of growing up out of this where we're starting where we call each other republicards and libtards.
Are are we still 4 years old? Musk is not president. He's not will he have influence on the presidency? Yeah. And he's gonna have to take a number of all the other people that will have the ear of the president. And that this president, this second term for president Trump, that will have to take a number to all the presidents in the United States history who had people who had influence over the president of the United States, beginning with George Washington. The fuck do you think is going on here? Do you I mean, do you think these people operate inside of a bubble where once they become president, they don't have friends? They don't have any kind of people who influence them whatsoever?
If you think that, that's bullshit. But to say that Musk is actually the president is not only shortsighted. It's juvenile. And it needs to stop. It's embarrassing when I see people of high intellectual prowess like Aaron von Wertham say shit that is honestly just mirroring or or echoing public radio. National public radio in the United States, that's all you hear. President Musk, he's not president. He has the ear of the president. So does every single one of his cabinet members. So does every single one of his friends. I'm sorry, but that's the way that shit is.
Unless unless we come up with the following, this will what I just described will always be the case. Friends of the president will have the ear of the president. Funders of the president's presidential campaign will always have the ear of the president unless the following is done. If you're elected president, you may not speak to any one of your friends. And if you're caught speaking to any of any one of your friends, it's automatic impeachment and it's automatic conviction on that impeachment. If you don't do that and sequester physically sequester the president to where he cannot have any contact with any of his family, with any of his friends, then guess what?
The president will have been influenced by anyone that he talks to. In his family, any of his friends, any of his donors, any any of the people that that think they can get something out of Trump by offering something, him something while he's a president. It's going to happen. It's always happened. You might as well have said, like, whatever best friend of Gerald Ford when he got to be president. You might as well said president, that guy's name. You might as well have said President Carter, the other President Carter. You know, Carter's wife, the first lady. You know, when Jimmy Carter was president? Because she had his ear.
We didn't elect her. I guarantee you, missus Carter had the president's ear when Jimmy Carter was sitting in in chair. This president Musk shit is beyond juvenile. It shows a an 8 year old's mentality because president Musk is a term that is 100% generated out of MSNBC, CNBC, PBS, NPR, Yes. All of the left. I'm sure I'll hear it on Fox. Well, actually, I won't hear it on Fox because I don't watch any of this shit. The only thing that I monitor at this point is when I'm in my car and before my phone kicks in to my Bitcoin podcast, I'm listening to a little bit of NPR so that I can get whatever today's talking points are going to be from that end of the spectrum.
And all I hear is president Musk. We gotta do better, guys. We gotta do better. Now Bitcoin safe looks like they may be doing better, not politically, but from the app on the app front for securing your bitcoin. Bitcoin safe version 1.0 has been released. Secure Bitcoin storage made easy. Bitcoin safe is a free and open source Bitcoin Savings Wallet designed for security and ease of use, available on Windows, macOS, and Linux. Bitcoin Safe is a fully featured Bitcoin Savings Wallet. Built with Bitcoin Development Kit, it aims to simplify single sig and multisig wallet management for non technical users while retaining some power user features through an intuitive and an attractive user interface.
The key features of Bitcoin Safe include easy multisig wallet setup for non technical users hardware signers only and we'll expand on this a little bit. All wallets require hardware signers for secure seed storage. And as of version 1.0, bitcoin safe supports all major bitcoin hardware signers. It includes screenshot instructions for each hardware signer to guide users through every step there are easy multi party, multisig collaboration and syncing that is, once a multisig wallet is created Bitcoin Safe sets up an encrypted Nostra group chat for collaboration and partially signed Bitcoin transaction sharing.
For security, each participant must authenticate every other user with a simple click. It also includes encrypted cloud backup, via Nostr, of labels and label synchronization between different computers. There's simplified wallet management features including labeling via categories like k y c, non k y c, work, friends, etcetera. There's automatic coin selection within categories, easy coin categories and label backups via a short backup key, one click fee selection and mempool block preview, ability to automatically merge UTXO's when fees are low. Holy shit. Cancel and bump fee on transaction via replace by fee encrypted wallet store wallet storage and more.
There's global search and filtering options. There's import and export capabilities like in Bitcoin Safe including CSV export for all lists. You can import for all back batch transactions. You can label import and export via the bip 329, label import from Electrum wallet, exporting of money flow diagrams to svg, and drag and drop interface for transactions, PSBTs, and CSV files. There's multi language support, English, Chinese, Spanish, Japanese, Russian, Portuguese, Hindi, Arabic, Italian, French, and German so far, and power user friendly features including the ability to use your own Electrum, Esplora server, mempool instance, and nostril relay, editing of finalized PSBTs and more.
Guys, this is insane, man. There's you can, interact with your USB hardware signer via USB tools. There's a QR scanner. You can scan and decode any Bitcoin QR code. Full support for bbqr and u r. Packaged binaries are now available for windows, macos and Linux. Improved graphical wallet explorer that allows you to navigate through transactions by clicking on inputs and outputs. Sync and chat improvements, include label synchronization, backup, and multi party, multi sig collaboration. They can now be enabled in the last wallet setup wizard, and you can choose your own custom relay. PSBT creation now features a beautiful fee selection by clicking on mempool blocks.
Oh, I have I have I've never heard of Bitcoin safe before and this is amazing. Now, when it down here at the end where it says, let's see. But where was that? Where was that? Something about the buy packaged binaries are available for, list wherever it was. Package binaries were available for Windows, Linux and Mac. Be careful with those. Binaries are the compiled code, of whatever's going on in their GitHub. And that that can cause some problems, but only in so far as security. Like like it could be a, you pick up a binary, you download a binary, but you got spoofed and you pick up the wrong binary and it's got a backdoor in it because you didn't compile the code yourself. So just be aware of the security issues.
If you're going to try this out, use it maybe use it on testnet if they allow that or just use a fundamentally low amount of bitcoin to play around with. But, honestly, this looks awesome. So that's bitcoin safe, s a f e, like put it in the safe. Bitcoin safe version 1.0 is now available. You might wanna go check that thing out. This is this entire thing that I just read to you is from nobsbitcoin.comforward/bitcoinsafevone0. That link, that URL, will be in the show notes. So if you have any questions about this or want to go look at it for yourself and figure out where to go get it, just click that link in the show notes and you will go directly to this story and this story will take you exactly where you need to go. Alright? So that's it for the day. Ladies and gentlemen, we are still we are chilling out at $99,893 right now.
So we had a brief dip around 6 o'clock this morning my time. 4 hours later, that dip has completely been erased. So we'll have to see. I'm just waiting on Monday. At this point, I put nothing past the idiocy of these markets. I'm just going to wait until orange man sits in the chair and utters his first words, and it better be I'm freeing Ross. I'll see you on the other side of that.
[00:53:24] Unknown:
This has been Bitcoin, 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.
Introduction and Episode Overview
SEC's Ripple Ruling Appeal
BitMEX's Troubles and History
