Join me today for Episode 1066 of Bitcoin And . . .
Topics for today:
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Episode 726: https://fountain.fm/episode/15491737864
https://cointelegraph.com/news/metaplanet-buys-696-bitcoin-10-for-1-stock-split
https://bitcoinmagazine.com/news/human-rights-foundation-donates-1-billion-satoshis-to-fund-bitcoin-development
https://cointelegraph.com/news/tether-buys-bitcoin-q1-2025-holdings-top-8-billion
https://decrypt.co/312522/openai-release-open-weight-model-reasoning-capabilities
https://atlas21.com/brazil-blocks-bitcoin-investments-for-pension-funds/
https://lightning.news/fold-and-crowdhealth-partner/
https://bitcoinmagazine.com/industry-events/the-mit-bitcoin-expo-2025-freedom-tech
Find the Bitcoin And Podcast on every podcast app here:
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Topics for today:
- Metaplanet's BTC Buy
- HRF Donates 10 BTC For Bitcoin Development
- Teather Buys 8,888 BTC
- Rhode Island Mulls Tax Free BTC Payments
Step into the Circle P Economy, where Bitcoin fuels artisanal mastery!
https://ditto.pub/@[email protected] (faster)email: [email protected] (slower)
Product: Comfrey
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Episode 726: https://fountain.fm/episode/15491737864
Articles:
https://primal.net/e/nevent1qqstzhenfx4n37jehx9gw4sgk3vmfx8nfy47epxrsxfnsgl3per984c90c7twhttps://cointelegraph.com/news/metaplanet-buys-696-bitcoin-10-for-1-stock-split
https://bitcoinmagazine.com/news/human-rights-foundation-donates-1-billion-satoshis-to-fund-bitcoin-development
https://cointelegraph.com/news/tether-buys-bitcoin-q1-2025-holdings-top-8-billion
https://decrypt.co/312522/openai-release-open-weight-model-reasoning-capabilities
- https://www.cnbc.com/futures-and-commodities/
- https://dashboard.clarkmoody.com/
- https://mempool.space/
- https://value4value.info/
- https://fountain.fm/show/eK5XaSb3UaLRavU3lYrI
- https://geyser.fund/project/thebitcoinandpodcast
https://atlas21.com/brazil-blocks-bitcoin-investments-for-pension-funds/
https://lightning.news/fold-and-crowdhealth-partner/
https://bitcoinmagazine.com/industry-events/the-mit-bitcoin-expo-2025-freedom-tech
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Find the Bitcoin And Podcast on every podcast app here:
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[00:00:02]
David Bennett:
It is 09:26AM Pacific Daylight Time. It's the April. That means it's April Fools' Day where you don't trust anyone saying anything, you don't read anything and believe a damn thing, you don't listen to people and believe what they say. This is the day to shut off your eyes and your ears because you can't trust nothing. Except you can trust me when I say this is episode ten sixty six of Bitcoin and what what is the date of October? That's the Battle of Hastings, which many people, including myself, kind of look at as the date where Western Europe and the rest of the world came out of what was known as the dark ages, which is, like, from 500 to roughly the tenth century. Right? So somewhere around October is a good place to actually say, yeah, we're the dark ages were kinda over.
And it was also the end of the Anglo Saxon reign in Britain and that little, you know, that whole part. It was it was the conquest of the Duke of Normandy, in case anybody wants to know, and that was the rise of the Normans taking over pretty much, you know, what would now be The United Kingdom, Britain, England, whatever. There's I I want to get somebody on the show just for no other reason than to tell me what the hell the difference if Britain versus England. I'm pretty sure I know what The United Kingdom is, but I the Britain versus England, I I guess I could ask ChatGPT, but I'd rather talk to an actual live human being about it.
However, I may not be able to for very much longer because Europe well, ladies and gentlemen, Europe is kinda lost. And it's right. United States ain't doing all that great either, and neither is a whole bunch of countries in Latin America. I'm not picking on Europe. And I'm generally speaking, I will always tell you that I don't have any beef with the European people. Right? It's not the citizenry. It's really the governments that cause all the problems. However, the citizenry is implicated in allowing those problems to occur.
And why am I even going into this? Well, yesterday, I alluded to the fact that, in France, Le Pen was sentenced and banned from participating in elections. And I said that there was a whole bunch of other stuff. It was something that I'd seen in a note on Noster, and I found it. It was a note from a man named Chris Rossini, and he begins his note by saying, democracy is showing itself to be a huge con. The ones who forced it on the world, see World War one, are no longer in hiding in the shadows, but are showing their teeth. And then he's got a screenshot. Then it says, Putin is a dictator.
Europe, in the meantime, colon. And then there's this list. France. Le Pen sentenced and banned from participating in elections. This is true. I I I looked I looked these up, and these are pretty much true. Right? And this and the Le Pen thing, nobody on I have not heard a single thing. I didn't hear a single thing about the Le Pen issue anywhere except for this note by Chris Racine. No. Everybody seems to be tight lipped about it. I it's baffling because you would think because Le Pen is constantly, like, the number two woman that wants to actually be the leader of France, and she has ideals that are more in line with sovereignty, freedom, independence.
Yes. She could be lying. She could just it could just be talk and lip service and all that, but all I know is what she says. Okay? I I don't have drinks with her at at the club, so I don't know what she actually really thinks. So I only have to go on what she actually says, and what she actually says is freedom, sovereignty, liberty, these types of things. Well, she's never gonna be able to run-in elections again because embezzlement, which I don't know. I my gut feeling says this is all the setup that there was no embezzlement actually performed. But I again, I don't know. I've never had beers and cocktails with Le Pen at a French bar, so I, you know, I've never gotten her hammered and and and get the real truth out of her, so I will never know. But my gut feeling just tells me it's all bullshit. And then on to Romania where elections were annulled, and the winning candidate was arrested and then imprisoned.
So this dude, he wins the Romanian elections. The elections are called bullshit, and then the guy that won the election is then arrested and imprisoned. This does not sound good. In Germany, apparently, and I don't know this one as a fact, but Germany is preparing a similar scenario with the AFD. And if you don't know, the AFD is what they're calling the far right. Oh my god. The far right. They're all proud boys over there at the AFD, apparently, which I don't actually believe for a single second. But that this this does not look good. And and then we get Slovakia, where the assassination attempt of the anti war prime minister FICO occurred.
Didn't hear shit about that. Hungary, there's constant attacks against prime minister Orban and pressure to exclude Hungary from all European Union decisions. This is what I'm talking about. This is what these are the things that are just these are just, like, more hallmarks of what when I say that Europe is being lost, it's this. This is what I'm talking about. And I I don't have any beef against the English. I don't have any beef against the French or Spaniards or Romanians or anything like that. I it's like it's not the people. It's it's their governments and and and the people that are in control of those governments that aren't necessarily elected officials. And because, you know, if you still believe that governments are controlled only by those who got elected by the people, well, I got bridges all over Arizona, I'd like to sell you.
We are entering into the weirdest timelines. It's just ugly as shit. So be prepared for everything. Now I will say this. Everything that I've just read you was written before today, which is April Fool's Day. So I don't blame you if you take everything I'm about to tell you with a grain of salt. Let's go to Zoltan Vardai out of Cointelegraph with this very confusing piece about Meta Planet, and it's not the fact that they actually bought $67,000,000 worth of Bitcoin that they said that they were going to do. Yesterday, I told you about their $13,300,000, bond raise.
They had not actually purchased the Bitcoin, but they did between the time I told you about it yesterday and today. The confusing part is the stock split that's explained in this particular story, and I'm still not all that, I I am I am not any less confused after trying to research this. So let just bear with me. Okay? Meta Planet adds 67,000,000 in Bitcoin following the ten two one stock split. Japan based Meta Planet has expanded its Bitcoin holdings, purchasing almost 700 Bitcoin for 10,200,000,000.0 yen or $67,000,000, the company announced today, April on Twitter.
The investment lifts Meta Planet's total Bitcoin stash to 4,046 BTC valued at over $341,000,000 at the time of writing. Okay. So far, so good. Now let's just dump a truckload of confusion on this whole thing where we get into this one. The stock split targets investor accessibility. The acquisition comes shortly after Meta Planet issued 2,000,000,000 Japanese yen or $13,300,000 worth of bonds to buy more Bitcoin, Cointelegraph reported on March. The move also comes shortly after Meta Planet's ten to one reverse stock split.
This is where the confusion sets in. The company had previously warned in a February 18 filing that its share price had risen significantly, creating a high barrier to entry for retail investors. Quote, we implemented a reverse stock split, consolidating 10 shares into one. Since then, our stock price has risen significantly, and the minimum amount required to purchase our shares on the market has now exceeded 500,000 yen, creating a substantial financial burden for investors according to a February 18 notice. So this is back in February. The stock split aims to reverse or no. Hold on. The stock split aims to lower the price per trading unit to improve liquidity and expand the firm's investor base.
So in February, February of twenty thirteen, they had a 100 to one stock split. And on March, which was just a few days ago of this year, they had a 10 to one stock split, but they're calling it a reverse stock split. They're saying they're consolidating 10 shares of Meta Planet into one share of Meta Planet, and they're doing so apparently to make it cheaper to buy their stock. See, this is where I get very confused. So I'm gonna go ahead and finish this out. Meta Planet, off all often referred to as Asia's micro strategy, aims to accumulate 21,000 BTC by 2026 as part of a plan to lead Bitcoin adoption in Japan.
And with 4,046 BTC in its treasury, it currently ranks as the ninth largest corporate Bitcoin holder globally according to Bitbo data. Okay. So and then they, of course, go into talking about strategy and Michael Saylor and whatnot like that. I wanna get back to this very confusing piece as to whether or not they split their stock by 10. So if you held one share of Meta Planet, you now have 10 shares of Meta Planet, which would, in fact, take the price of each stock down by to 10%. So it would cost you 10% of what like, if you paid a thousand yen for one share of Meta Planet, it will now cost you a hundred yen for a share of Meta Planet. But to get the value you that you actually originally had, you'd actually have to buy 10 shares. Right? But you already got those because you got the stock split. But they're saying that they did a reverse stock split. Alright. So after some research on this, it looks like this particular article is completely wrong.
From everything that I can tell, Meta Planet took one share of their stock that I remember costing around 4,000 between 4,000 and 5,000 yen apiece, and they turned it into 10 shares. So I don't know what these people are talking about when they say that they've done a reverse stock split. I had no I it doesn't make any sense. So just let's just forget about that part and just realize that Meta Planet has yet bought way more Bitcoin. And if somebody's got, like, you know, like, detailed information on the Meta Planet stock split that can alleviate my confusion, dude, throw me a boostagram or something and let me know what the hell this means because that shit's confusing right there.
Now Human Rights Foundation, this is not confusing. They have donated 10 Bitcoin or 1,000,000,000 satoshis to fund Bitcoin development. Bitcoin magazine, Vivek Send Bitcoin is writing it. Human reef human research. The Human Rights Foundation has announced a new round of grants from its Bitcoin development fund distributing 1,000,000,000 satoshis or 10 BTC to over 20 projects worldwide. The grants aim to support open source Bitcoin development, mining decentralization, privacy tools, and educational initiatives for individuals living under authoritarian regimes with a focus, of course, on Latin America, Africa, and Asia. The latest cohort includes diverse projects advancing Bitcoin's role as a financial and human rights empowerment tool.
So they are funding the following people, NetBlocks, Tollgate, Vintium, BTC pay server, which we all already know and love, African Bitcoin Institute supported by Rwandan activist, Annie and and I'm just gonna say, Anise Kanimba. And then we've got Bitcoin Core, g u I q m l. We've got r Crux has gotten some stuff. LSAT is a developer contributing to the Nostr ecosystems. So Nostr is getting a little bit of love here. RelayWizard, which I believe, yes, is also a Nostr toolset. Wayne is a is a support initiative cofounded by Bitcoin core developer, Amiti Atawar, and operational architect, Anna Seides, and it provides psychosocial support for open source developers building FreedomTech.
Psychosocial support. Like, I I I read that as, do you need therapy? And I'm not making fun of it either. I mean, think about it. You're giving up a huge salary because you could go code at Google to help people be free, and you're living under authoritarian regimes where every single day you could be black backed and thrown into a van. Think about what that does to your psychology after a while. Could you I mean, that's the thing. Most of the people, including me, within the reach of my voice cannot understand that kind of stress. So thank god somebody's taking care of the mental health of some of these people. Hashpool has gotten some. Cashew kvac, let's see. And Brandon Back.
Stable channels is a project by Tony Clawson. He's getting some love. Bitaco from Okay Jotam is a Fediment based platform that modernizes Kenya's SACO or otherwise known as savings and credit cooperative organization models using Bitcoin and Fediments. The Core has gotten a grant. Bitcoin Babies has gotten a grant. East Asia Bitcoin Developer apprenticeship program. Talent Land twenty twenty five. Base fifty eight's Bitcoin live action role play. BTSEN Espanol or BTCN Espanol. Daniel Batten for increasing non profit adoption of Bitcoin has gotten a grant. Hadiya Mesilla, then HRF's Bitcoin Development Fund has distributed more than $7,800,000 worth of Bitcoin to 284 projects in 62 countries.
The next round of grants will be announced at the seventeenth annual Oslo Freedom Forum taking place between May in Oslo, Norway. Dude, 10 BTC is nothing to sneeze at, and the fact that so many grantees are able to extend their lifeline just a little bit is a huge testament to what Human Rights Foundation has been doing ever since they fully embraced Bitcoin. I've I I have never seen this level of activity out of the Human Rights Foundation, And it all for you know, may maybe they did. I don't know. I I was very much aware of HRF well before I got into Bitcoin. However, it just seems like ever since the HRF just stepped out of kicked open the door and said Bitcoin, they have been going full freaking bore. Alright. So we got Meta Planet adding Bitcoin. We know Sailor adds Bitcoin.
Who else is adding Bitcoin? That we we we we talk about them, but we don't really talk about the the amount of Bitcoin that they have. That's Tether. Yep. Yeah. The stablecoin, USDT. Tether adds 8,888 Bitcoin in the first quarter as holdings exceed $8,400,000,000. Cointelegraph, Adrian Zmunsky, Tether, issuer of USDT, acquired 8,888 Bitcoin in the first quarter of this year. On chain transaction data shows that Tether moved its newly acquired Bitcoin worth roughly $750,000,000 at the time of writing from a Bitfinex address to a wallet that it controls itself. Data provided by on chain analytics platform, Arkham Intelligence, shows that the firm currently holds a hundred thousand 521 Bitcoin worth $8,460,000,000.
The news follows mid February's reports that Tether could be forced to sell part of its Bitcoin holdings to comply with proposed US regulations. JPMorgan wrote in a report that potential stablecoin regulation could consider a significant portion of the firm's current reserve as, quote, noncompliant. Quote, under the proposed bills, Tether would have to implicitly replace its noncompliant assets with compliant assets. This would imply sales of their noncompliant assets such as precious metals, Bitcoin, corporate paper, and secured loans, end quote.
Good god. Still, Tether argued against the conclusion of the JPMorgan analyst. A Tether spokesperson criticized the analyst in correspondence sent to Cointelegraph saying, quote, they understand neither Bitcoin nor Tether, end quote, and highlighting that The United States' Stablecoin laws have yet to be finalized. Tether reported $13,000,000,000 of profit in 2024, leading to a significant capital reserve that the firm funneled into large scale investment ventures. As a result of this explosive growth, the stablecoin issuer became the world's seventh largest buyer of United States treasuries, surpassing Canada, Taiwan, Mexico, Norway, and Hong Kong. Guys, last year, they weren't the seventh largest buyer of US treasuries. They were the sixteenth.
Right? If you're a physicist or or a mechanical engineer or know anything about derivatives, like, things like acceleration versus velocity, it's not how fast you're going, it's how much faster you can go over a period of time given your initial velocity. Alright? That that's like the integral of your velocity. These guys have picked up so much pace that they went from the sixteenth largest buyer of US treasuries to the seventh. They made what was, like, almost $14,000,000,000 last year. It's no wonder Jeremy Allaire wants to cripple this company. And, again, not cheerleading for Tether. I don't use the product.
I I don't feel any need whatsoever to have a Tether wallet. I've never used it, and I don't plan on using it. If I have used it, it's completely without my knowledge. Like, if I use Strike or something like that and somehow or another, they were using tether rails, then I would have I would have no clue if that actually occurred. Right? So whether you love tether or hate tether, you're gonna have to watch this company. These are gonna be the people that bring Latin America probably out of the fucking dark ages. I mean, they're investing in agriculture.
They've got a huge treasure trove of cash. They're the seventh largest buyer of the largest nation on the planet that issues debt as a main instrument for their viability going forward in the future, this this is something to watch. You if you're not watching Tether, then it's like what it's like what I tell you. If you're not watching Latin America, you're missing out. If you're not watching the continent Of Africa and Bitcoin, you're missing out. If you're not watching, like, so like Eastern European into getting into some of the Southeast Asian countries, you're missing out because this is where Bitcoin adoption is going to happen. And here's what I expect to happen. Tether's going to jump. Not it it's not going to leave Latin America, but it's going to it's I guarantee you they have their eyes set on the Continent Of Africa.
That's gonna be the that's gonna be their next stronghold is the Continent Of Africa. And I'll bet you see it. I'll bet you see a major move by I mean, major major move by Tether into Africa before the end of this year. I guarantee it. Okay. So Tether's USDT is the world's largest leading stablecoin and the third digital asset by market cap according to CoinMarketCap data. And at the time of writing, USDT's total supply stands at just under $148,000,000,000. Well, considering that they're talking about the token, but the token's backed by US dollars. So, well, so they say, blah blah blah. So that's a hundred and $48,000,000,000.
Ignoring the minor deviations from the US dollars value, that supply would place the current market cap at, you know, a hundred and $48,000,000,000. And Whale Alert data shows that on March, Tether minted a billion dollars worth of USDT on the Tron blockchain. That's because they bought a billion dollars worth of US treasuries. And what are US treasuries made out of? Debt. Debt. It's like, you know, that old that old thing, like, girls are made out of, I don't know, bows and candy and everything sweet and spice and boys are made out of puppy dog tails. You know what treasuries are made out of? Treasuries are made out of bullshit.
Debt, unrestricted hubris of the human spirit that is unbound by greed. That's what a US Treasury is made of. Didn't used to be that way, but that's what it is today. And we can just look at the emission of Tether and know what the hell's going on in the Treasury markets closer and closer and closer. We're we're we're able to look at what's going on in US treasuries given what tether does. So again, if you're not watching tether like a hawk, you're missing out on an entire story worth of data. Bitcoin's price has historically trended upward following upticks in USDT minting, and large scale USDT minting has usually followed significant Bitcoin price increases.
David Packham, managing partner at crypto native investment firm, CoinFund, recently said that the global stablecoin supply could surge to $1,000,000,000,000 by the end of this year, potentially becoming a key catalyst for broader cryptocurrency market growth. They're gonna go into Africa. Guys, it's going to happen. I I am betting, and I am not a betting man. I'm betting you that they hit Africa in a huge way, not a little bitty way, a massive way before the end of this year. And maybe they'll take some comfrey with them. Hey. Do you want comfrey? Do you even know what it is? It's a plant. It's a magic plant, and I tell you all about it in episode 726 of Bitcoin. And that's why you will know that you need to get your comfrey from the circle p and our featured vendor today, SheShe21.
That's right. SheShe21M. You can find him at She She twenty one m at protonmail dot com. Just, hey, say, I want comfrey. And you're gonna ask me, how much does comfrey cost? Well, you can get a full root for $20, and that will give you an immediate massive plant. And once you plant it, you cannot unplant it. It is a perennial. It comes back year after year. It's drought tolerant. Almost no pests like it. It's like it's like indestructible. And it's medicine. It is a nutrient miner out of the soil, so it mines nutrients deep because its tap root goes so far down. It mines minerals way down there and brings them up and puts them in their leaves, and you cut all the leaves off and you either make you throw it in your compost pile.
You or what I do is I just chop it and I drop it right next to the plant that I want to have fertilized for, like, long periods of time because those leaves will break down and essentially melt all those minerals into the soil and a whole bunch of nitrogen. This thing is, like, 40% nitrogen. It's it's this is an amazing plant, and you want it. So you can get root cuttings for a buck a piece. You're gonna pay the shipping. Right? So no matter where you are in The United States, at least, I'm not sure if he does, like, you know, worldwide, but at least in The United States, get your comfrey from She She. Tell him that you heard about him here on the circle p. And the Bocking four, he has two varieties. He's got Bocking 14 and Bocking four, and the Bocking four he got from me. Those are my genetics that I was taking care of for, like, seven, probably, like, ten years.
He has all of my genetics because I wasn't able to take them with me. So I sold him for Bitcoin, a whole bunch of my balking four, and I knew that he was going to keep my Bocking four safe for me. Go get my Comfrey from Shishi. You can also get him at [email protected] on ditto dot pub, which is a Nostra client. She she twenty one, that's the [email protected]. He'll get back to you, but it will be slower. But make absolutely certain if you buy anything from him that you heard about it here on the Circle p. Again, if you wanna learn more about comfrey, and you should because it's a miracle plant, and it will it will it will mine minerals for for longer than you live, and it will provide nitrogen fertilizer for longer than you live. I've chopped the leaves off of my plants at least 14 times in one single season, and it keeps growing back, and then it dies in winter, and then it comes back in spring, and cycle starts all over again. If you wanna know more about it, go to episode seven twenty six of the Bitcoin and, Bitcoin and podcast where you will find Bitcoin and ComFree.
I do a whole, like, forty minutes on the history of and what you can do with ComFree. The URL directly to the show that I'm talking about will be in the show notes. So just do that and make sure you tell XiXi that you heard about it on Circle p. Now OpenAI plans to release what they're calling open wait models with reasoning capabilities. So what's their revenue model now? I don't know. Jose Antonio Lans for Decrypt dot c o. Tell us more. AI enthusiasts. Your prayers have been heard, I guess, by the by the god that is Sam Altman. OpenAI is jumping back into the OpenText AI arena with plans to release a powerful open weight language model with reasoning abilities in the coming months according to Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI.
Quote, we are planning to release our first open weight language model since GPT two. Altman wrote in a post on Twitter, quote, we've been thinking about this for a long time, but other priorities took precedence. Now it feels important to do. What what was taking precedence? Okay. What fine. Whatever. The announcement comes as OpenAI faces growing competition from rivals that include Meta and its llama family of open source models, Google's Gemma, which comes with multimodal capabilities, and Chinese AI Lab DeepSeek, which recently released an open source reasoning model that reportedly outperformed OpenAI's zero one.
I'm using DeepSeek on Venice, AI, which if if you have it if you if you don't wanna use chat GPT and you want encrypted communications between what the model well, according to Venice AI, it it's I like it. It's it's it's a company created by somebody who I don't like because they were on the wrong side of the block size wars. But I'm here to tell you, man, I hit Venice AI a lot, and the DeepSeek model is pretty damn good. So go look for Venice AI and see what you think. It's and it's a lot cheaper. It's a hell of a lot cheaper than Sam Altman's model. Anyway, a model is open source when its developer shares with the public everything about it. Users have access to the code, the training dataset, and architecture, among other things.
That gives users the ability to modify and redistribute the model. An open weight model is less open. Users have the ability to fine tune it, but cannot build it from scratch because they don't have access to key elements such as the training dataset nor the architecture. To gather input on what developers actually want, OpenAI published a feedback form on its website and announced plans for developer events starting in San Francisco within weeks, followed by sessions in Europe and the Asia Pacific regions. Quote, we're excited to collaborate with developers, researchers, and the broader community to gather inputs and make this model as useful as possible, the company said in a in a statement.
Steven Heidel, who works on the API team at OpenAI, also shared that this model will be able to run locally. Quote, we're releasing a model this year that you can run on your own hardware. Oh. He didn't exactly specify how many parameters it would have, the token context window, the dataset, techniques used in the training, or the release license, which could restrict actions like reverse engineering or fine tuning in specific countries, for example. The announcement today marks a significant departure from OpenAI's recent strategy of keeping its most advanced models locked behind APIs. It also aligns with Altman's recent comments during a Reddit q and a where he first shared that the company was pondering the idea of releasing a full open source model. Quote, yes. We are discussing releasing some model weights and publishing some research.
I personally think we have been on the wrong side of history here and need to figure out a different open source strategy. Not everyone at OpenAI shares this view, and it's also not our current highest priority. Oh, he said it again. Kinda makes me wonder where their priorities lie. Anyway, the upcoming model will feature reasoning capabilities comparable to OpenAI's o three Mini according to Altman's post. This would make it the most capable open reasoning model to date, beating DeepSeq r one. Okay. Well, so look for that, I guess. And I I have literally no idea what kind of equipment you would need to have. I mean, how big of a graphics card do you need? How much how much memory? There's no specifics on what yeah. You can run it on your own hardware.
I'm not gonna mention that that's gonna cost you 15 k, but, yeah, you can run it on your own hardware. Who knows? It'll be interesting to see, though. But before I forget, go check out Venice AI. If if you were somebody who just really doesn't the thought of hanging out with Sam Altman and his bunch of miscreants really rankles you, go check out Venice AI. Sure. Not exactly my favorite person behind that particular project, but I gotta say, it's a high quality product. And if I when I find high quality products that I think are worthwhile, I don't give a shit who did it. I really don't freaking care. Like, for instance, everybody's mad at Ben Stiller for, like, I don't know, basically being a little patsy boy that they sent over to Ukraine.
I'm not exactly happy about it either, but you know what show he's in charge of right now that's, like, literally me and my wife's favorite? Freaking Severance. That thing is a masterpiece, and I don't care if people don't like Ben Stiller. I don't give a shit. I don't give a shit if he's a Democrat or a Republican. Severance is one of the best television shows I've ever seen. God knows I've seen a lot of them. Let's run the numbers. Futures and commodities. Oil is down a third of a point. However, it was kicking ass this morning, so we are still well above 70 to the $71.18 mark. Brent Norsee down a third to $74.53.
Natural gas is following suit down three and a half points to $3.97 per thousand cubic feet. Gasoline steadily rising. This time, it's a quarter point to the upside, $2.29 a gallon. All of your shiny metal rocks are doing not good. Gold is down a third to but yet still at $3,139. So there you go. Hey. Congrats, Peter Schiff. Silver is down almost a full point. Platinum is down two and a quarter. Copper crawling sideways as is palladium because no one seems to care. Agricultural futures are all in the green. Yay. For ag, let's see. Biggest loser today and the only one in the red is 2.06% to the downside, and that would be rough rice. Biggest winner is chocolate by a mile, 5.6% to the upside.
Live cattle doing well too, up point 88%. Lean hogs up a third, and feeder cattle up just over one full point. And looky here, the indices are in the green as well. Yay. It's good news today. Dow is up point 09%. S and P is up a third. Nasdaq is up two thirds, and the S and P Mini crossing the one half percentile point to the upside. And we're at $85,120. That is a $1,690,000,000,000 market cap for Bitcoin, and we can purchase 27.1 ounces of the shiny metal rock Peter Schiff loves so much with our one Bitcoin of which there are. 19,844,860.3 of an average fees per block are excessively low.
0.03 taking the fees on a per block basis probably because there's only, like, five blocks. 8,595 unconfirmed transactions and the crowd is chanting that Bitcoin is going to die. How many freaking times have we been here? Oh, there's too many transactions. Bitcoin's gonna die. Oh, there's not enough transactions. Bitcoin's gonna die. No. Block every ten minutes. Doesn't matter if it's full. Not doesn't matter if there's a hundred of them. Doesn't matter if there's two of them. It just goes on and on and on. High priority rates, five. Satoshis per v byte. Low priority is gonna get you in at three. And the mining hash rate, no capitulation here, 828.2 exahashes per second. The miners are mining like mad. And from Eric's Corn Man, yesterday's episode of Bitcoin and I got Graham with 2,000 satoshis.
Thank you, sir, for the news I can use. Well, sir, you are welcome. Baked potato with a thousand says v four v. Yodel with 444 sat says, what's a favorite movie of yours? Okay. Well, so I've told you about Severance, but that's a TV show. Favorite movie. Favorite movie. Well, that's like picking a favorite child. Favorite movie? I don't know, man. I I don't think I actually have one. I mean, Alien comes to mind. That's a great flick. I will sit through, like, you know, quite a bit of 2,001 A Space Odyssey, but, honestly, it's a it's a space opera. It gets really freaking boring. And then, let's see. I'm I'm a heavy science fiction fan, honestly. Man, I'd be big, big into science fiction, but I can't really name movies. But I but I'll tell you this. When it comes to me and movies, I will absolutely 100% sit down and just watch all manner of, like, nineteen eighties movies like Demolition Man. I think that may have been the early nineties. You get my drift, though. I love that movie. That movie is freaking great. I mean, it's got Sylvester Stallone.
It's got the dude from Blade. It's it Wesley Snipes. It's it's an amazing flick, but it's cheap. It it's campy. It's but it's great, man. I mean, it's like and things like that. The movies that were coming out along the along those lines, like running man, demolition man, all all the stuff that was coming out around those times. Man, I Terminator freaking do love that stuff. So I hope that answers your question. Pies, four hundred and twenty says, thank you, sir. No thank you. Hashtag 40 h p w, god's depth with two thirty seven. Thank you, sir. No. Thank you. And that's the weather report.
Welcome to part two of the news that you can use Rhode Island. Starting out starting out with Rhode Island and their proposed bill for tax exemptions on Bitcoin payments from atlas21.com. Rhode Island, 1 of the smallest states in The United States, actually, I think it is the smallest, is considering a bill that could exempt certain Bitcoin transactions from state capital gains taxes. The Rhode Island Senate is reviewing senate is reviewing bill s zero four five one introduced last February by senator Peter Apollano, which specifically aims to exempt small Bitcoin transactions from state capital gains taxes.
The proposed rather, the proposal provides for an exemption of up to ten ten monthly transactions, each valued at less than $1,000. Oh, come on. 10? I could wow. I get I can buy things 10 times a month with my Bitcoin. Gee. Thanks Rhode Island. What a bunch of wussies, dude. The bill introduces modifications to the existing state income tax regulations. The legislation states, and I quote, any sale of Bitcoin by an individual or business in Rhode Island shall be exempt from state taxation if the total value of the sale is less than $1,000 per day.
The limit of the state tax exempt Bitcoin transaction shall not exceed 10 sales per a thirty day cycle, end quote. This initiative represents an effort to reduce bureaucratic and tax barriers that currently complicate the use of Bitcoin in everyday transactions. The stated goal is to facilitate digital asset payments, making it easier for citizens to use Bitcoin for small purchases without worrying about state level tax implications. It is important to note that the exemption would apply exclusively to state taxes while federal tax obligations would remain unchanged. Well well, duh. Taxpayers would still need to maintain accurate records of their transactions and remain subject to potential audits by state tax authorities. Jesus Christ. See, I never even thought about that because I've never lived in a state where I had where I had state income tax.
Texas, no state income tax. Washington state, amazingly enough, given the political environment up here, no state income tax. So all I have to worry about is federal tax auditors. I never once thought about state tax auditors. We've got to stop this attitude of just crushing everybody, not just by stealing their money, but by wasting their fucking time. I don't wanna waste my time worrying about whether or not I'm okay with the feds versus the state. This is how have we come here? Well, at least we're not in Brazil where they've blocked Bitcoin investments for pension funds altogether, and this is out of Atlas21.com.
On March, a Brazilian National Monetary Council officially shut the door on cryptocurrency markets for the country's closed pension funds. With the issuance of resolution 5.202, the regulatory body explicitly prohibited I cannot pronounce that much Spanish all in a row. Brazil's closed pension entities, that's the name of the thing that I cannot pronounce, They cannot invest in Bitcoin nor can they invest in other digital assets, citing excessive volatility and the associated risk thereof. The new rule affects tens of thousands of unionized workers and employees whose retirement savings are managed by EFPC.
As reported in a note from the Ministry of Finance circulated among local media, quote, the resolution also prohibits investments in virtual assets, considering their specific investment characteristic and the risks involved, end quote. The CMN justified its decision with the intent to protect Brazilian citizens' retirement savings from the high volatility of the cryptocurrency market. Nope. We're pausing. That's not why you're doing it. You need that retirement money to flow into your stock market. You have to have that. Otherwise, people are gonna know that yet you too, like Western Europe and The United States stock market, is one great big casino, and even the waitresses have quit their jobs. They're like, fuck this. I'm out of here, pal.
No. They're not protecting citizens. They're they what they're doing is they're making sure that nobody else can milk their cattle. That's what they're doing. Screw you, Brazil. Screw you. By preventing closed pension funds from investing savings of Bitcoin and digital assets, the authority aims to safeguard the long term financial stability of pensions. And, again, that's bullshit. They need those pensions to support their stock market and the rest of their capital markets. It's important to note that the ban does not seem to apply to open pension funds, oh, or individual retirement products sold by banks and insurers. These are regulated separately and may still allow indirect investments in cryptocurrencies through exchange traded funds or other platforms.
In Brazil, the main difference between closed and open pension funds concerns concerns membership and management. Closed pension funds, also called negotiated funds, are established through agreements between employers and trade unions or professional associations. They are reserved for specific categories of workers such as public employees, private sector employees, or freelancers, and membership is therefore collective. Open pension funds, on the other hand, are accessible to anyone regardless of employment status. They can be individually subscribed to by anyone, including students, unemployed individuals, self employed workers, and they're managed by banks, insurance companies, and financial firms.
Last year in The UK, Pension Specialist Cartwright led the first British pension fund to invest in Bitcoin allocating 3% of its assets. In The United States, several states have begun experimenting with Bitcoin allocations for their pension systems. One example is Wisconsin, where the state investment committee revealed it had invested $340,000,000 in Bitcoin through BlackRock spot ETF, ticker symbol is iBit. So Brazil basically telling their public employees to go pound sand. Everybody else is okay, I guess, for now. Fold and Crowd Health have partnered together to revolutionize healthcare with bitcoin integration.
Now, this is a little bit older, but it's still I think it's still important because crowd health is sort of fallen off the map. I don't see many people talking about crowd health, and I think it's an important company. So I'm just gonna give even though this was written March, it actually represents something that occurred between Fold and Crowd Health that occurred months ago. Alright? So this is kind of old news, and if you know about it, my apologies. But hell, eve I I'm not sure if even I remember this deal between Fold and CrowdHealth. So let's get into it. Fold, a leader in Bitcoin powered financial solutions and CrowdHealth, the innovative healthcare crowdfunding platform, recently announced a groundbreaking partnership.
This alliance merges two disruptive models offering an escape from overpriced, opaque systems while empowering users to save, earn Bitcoin, and take control of their health and their wealth. Quote, crowd health is an alternative to health insurance in the same way that Fold is an alternative to fiat only checking accounts, said Will Reeves, CEO of Fold. Quote, both platforms dismantle legacy systems that profit from confusion and inefficiency. Together, we're giving people the tools to reclaim autonomy. Traditional health insurance often leaves families underinsured, burdened by high deductibles, and restricted to in network providers. And similarly, conventional banking traps users into inflationary fiat systems with minimal transparency.
CrowdHealth and Fold tackles these issues head on. CrowdHealth replaces health insurance with community powered crowdfunding eliminating deductibles and network restrictions. Fold bypasses traditional banks by integrating Bitcoin rewards into everyday spending, converting savings into a deflationary asset. Fold plus membership included all crowd health members now receiving fold plus, which is a $10 a month value at no extra cost. So if you were a crowd health member, then you're getting fold plus and you're not paying anymore for it. There's automated Bitcoin savings that'll link fold and crowd health accounts together to convert unused health care funds directly into Bitcoin. Oh, man. That's good. Seamless enrollment.
A simplified process for new and existing users. So why does it even matter? For crowd health members, Fold plus transforms idle health care funds into long term Bitcoin savings. The features include a Visa debit card with Bitcoin cashback on purchases, gift cards, and bill payments. There's zero fees on Bitcoin purchases and insured deposits. And up to three authorized user cards for family flexibility. Now for the Bitcoin curious, Fold simplifies entry with the intuitive tools that has always had. Quote, Bitcoin isn't just an investment. It's a lifeline against inflation, said Reeves. We make stacking sats as easy as buying coffee.
Who benefits the most? Well, the under insured paying out of pocket for care. Freelancers and gig workers without employer sponsored insurance. Families prioritizing health autonomy, you know, using out of network providers because they don't want they don't want their doctors under the thumb of the insurance companies because they are. Like, you go in and they say, oh, since you're here, you've gotta get your COVID vaccine, and let's say your family doesn't want it. Well, you could lose that provider because they have a there's some evidence that suggests that if they don't rack up a quota on the COVID vaccination, they're just gonna drop you from their doctor's office. So you gotta you're you're pounding sand, pal.
So if you want out of network care and that's just that COVID thing. That's just one example. You may just have a shitty doctor. You may you may be in a a group of doctors and they're all shitty, and you need somebody that kind of thinks outside of the box. Well, chances are good that's gonna be out of network, and your insurance won't cover it. And then anyone seeking financial resilience via Bitcoin, that's who benefits the most from this. CrowdHealth has helped fund $10,000,000 worth of medical bills with an estimated $10,000,000 in savings during the same time frame.
Fold members have stacked over $66,000,000 in rewards since 2019. So you there there's the URL for this particular story from lightning.news, I forgot to tell you that, is gonna be in the show notes. And inside this, you'll have URLs or or little, you know, underlined places that represent URLs for where to enroll and where to go look for more information. But here's the other thing about crowd health, and I asked this to the guys over at crowd health early on when I first heard about them. Because I'd heard that what they did, is, like, if you were a crowd health member, they would not only crowdsource the funding the way the the whole the way the whole system works is you get your shit paid for.
And but your premiums when nothing's going on with you goes to pay for somebody else. So it's it's like health insurance. It's just done a little bit differently. But the way that they make it work is really important. And it's not just about using Bitcoin. It's not just about crowdsourcing. It's about having a team of people that will get on the phone with your health insurance company, and they know all these medical codes. Like, when you get an IV, it's code like 50 three 80 six and nobody can read that shit. A Tylenol, you would never even know it's a fucking Tylenol. It's just coded as 86812B or something like that. Right? You can't negotiate, like, by saying you're charging me a hundred bucks for a Tylenol three.
Bullshit. That's not right. See, that's where your negotiation skill starts coming in line. You but you can't even begin a negotiation if you don't know what you're paying for. And here's the thing. When you try to do that anyway and try to get them to explain the codes, they are purpose built to give you a headache. And I'm talking about the other person on the other end of the phone. You are not going to be able to be functional at negotiating your own medical bill. CrowdHealth solves that. That's the that's the flavor that they're not talking about in this story. They've got men and women that can get on the phone that know the codes and go, no. You're not charging our client $600 for a liter of saline. And there's the code. I know it's a liter of saline.
Let's talk about getting that down to $60. That's one of the ways that CrowdHealth is able to actually help their customers. Yeah. I know it sounds like an advertisement. I I've never even talked to the guys at CrowdHealth. I just it's it's like it's like the circle p in me. I cannot help but try to find really high quality stuff that you guys might be able to actually use and then tell you about it. I'm not they're not in the circle p. Right? I'm just telling you what I already know about crowd health. And them partnering with Fold, that's kind of a big deal.
So just go look. Just honestly, just go look. Alright. Now the MIT Bitcoin Expo twenty twenty five is all about Freedom Tech. And, yes, we're talking about Massachusetts Institute of Technology just down the street from Harvard, Bitcoin Magazine and this is actually written by the MIT Bitcoin Club who's hosting it. The MIT Bitcoin Club, a passionate collection of students, alumni, researchers, and community members presents the twelfth annual MIT Bitcoin Expo. They've been doing it for twelve years. The MIT Bitcoin Club has been into Bitcoin for twelve years.
This is MIT, so just be aware. Anyways, from April, it's a landmark event exploring how Bitcoin and Freedom Technologies empower individuals worldwide. With just five days remaining, the student led initiative continues its decade long tradition of bridging academia, activism, and technical innovation. Born from MIT's twenty fourteen Bitcoin project, which distributed Bitcoin to undergraduates to study adoption, the expo has evolved into a critical forum for sovereignty focused dialogue. This year's agenda is Freedom Tech focuses on physical liberation through technology. Speakers like Zimbabwean activist Evan Merawi, and Lightning Network creator Taj Dreyja will dissect Bitcoin's role in resisting authoritarian control and enabling real world escape from oppression.
This is not about the crypto economics nor about the meme coins. This is about life, liberty, and Bitcoin. So on day one, you'll dive into freedom tech fundamentals with, Marawi's keynote, quote, why freedom tech matters and Dreyja's analysis of Bitcoin's resilience against nation states. On day two, shift to global impact with Mauricio Bartolomeo, exfiltration via Bitcoin, and panels featuring activists from Venezuela, Russia, and Togo. Technical deep dives include MIT's Neha Narula on scaling self custody and Stephen Rouse's Covenant Soft Fork proposals.
Other topics include future of freedom technology, quantum resistance, Covenant Soft Forks, Tor projects, or rather, the Tor project, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. Running parallel to all this is beyond theory. It's a $10,000 prize event challenges developers to build tools for privacy, censorship resistance, and financial sovereignty. Past projects have secured funding from industry leaders, proof of m IT's mind and hand ethos in action four, and I have no idea what the hell action four is. Additionally, Anna Chernovich or Chekovich from the HRF will run a workshop on Bitcoin self custody 01/2001.
So HRF will be there. I was wondering why they weren't, like, mentioned at the first start of the or the start of that article, but thank God they've got HRF is gonna be represented there. If you're in the Boston area, you you might wanna go to this. If I was in the Boston area, I would go to this. So, again, April 5 through the sixth. So, dude, I mean, here for, you know, four days. Four days from now will be April. So just be be aware and and get into your registration. Again, the URL for this story and all of the stories are gonna be in the show notes. So go find the URL. It should be at the very bottom, of all the articles that I read, and you'll be able to get into here, and you'll be able to register and get all that good stuff. And, honestly, man, that's the end of the show.
Sixty minutes on the dot. Brothers and sisters, I will see you on the other side. This has been Bitcoin and and I am 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 09:26AM Pacific Daylight Time. It's the April. That means it's April Fools' Day where you don't trust anyone saying anything, you don't read anything and believe a damn thing, you don't listen to people and believe what they say. This is the day to shut off your eyes and your ears because you can't trust nothing. Except you can trust me when I say this is episode ten sixty six of Bitcoin and what what is the date of October? That's the Battle of Hastings, which many people, including myself, kind of look at as the date where Western Europe and the rest of the world came out of what was known as the dark ages, which is, like, from 500 to roughly the tenth century. Right? So somewhere around October is a good place to actually say, yeah, we're the dark ages were kinda over.
And it was also the end of the Anglo Saxon reign in Britain and that little, you know, that whole part. It was it was the conquest of the Duke of Normandy, in case anybody wants to know, and that was the rise of the Normans taking over pretty much, you know, what would now be The United Kingdom, Britain, England, whatever. There's I I want to get somebody on the show just for no other reason than to tell me what the hell the difference if Britain versus England. I'm pretty sure I know what The United Kingdom is, but I the Britain versus England, I I guess I could ask ChatGPT, but I'd rather talk to an actual live human being about it.
However, I may not be able to for very much longer because Europe well, ladies and gentlemen, Europe is kinda lost. And it's right. United States ain't doing all that great either, and neither is a whole bunch of countries in Latin America. I'm not picking on Europe. And I'm generally speaking, I will always tell you that I don't have any beef with the European people. Right? It's not the citizenry. It's really the governments that cause all the problems. However, the citizenry is implicated in allowing those problems to occur.
And why am I even going into this? Well, yesterday, I alluded to the fact that, in France, Le Pen was sentenced and banned from participating in elections. And I said that there was a whole bunch of other stuff. It was something that I'd seen in a note on Noster, and I found it. It was a note from a man named Chris Rossini, and he begins his note by saying, democracy is showing itself to be a huge con. The ones who forced it on the world, see World War one, are no longer in hiding in the shadows, but are showing their teeth. And then he's got a screenshot. Then it says, Putin is a dictator.
Europe, in the meantime, colon. And then there's this list. France. Le Pen sentenced and banned from participating in elections. This is true. I I I looked I looked these up, and these are pretty much true. Right? And this and the Le Pen thing, nobody on I have not heard a single thing. I didn't hear a single thing about the Le Pen issue anywhere except for this note by Chris Racine. No. Everybody seems to be tight lipped about it. I it's baffling because you would think because Le Pen is constantly, like, the number two woman that wants to actually be the leader of France, and she has ideals that are more in line with sovereignty, freedom, independence.
Yes. She could be lying. She could just it could just be talk and lip service and all that, but all I know is what she says. Okay? I I don't have drinks with her at at the club, so I don't know what she actually really thinks. So I only have to go on what she actually says, and what she actually says is freedom, sovereignty, liberty, these types of things. Well, she's never gonna be able to run-in elections again because embezzlement, which I don't know. I my gut feeling says this is all the setup that there was no embezzlement actually performed. But I again, I don't know. I've never had beers and cocktails with Le Pen at a French bar, so I, you know, I've never gotten her hammered and and and get the real truth out of her, so I will never know. But my gut feeling just tells me it's all bullshit. And then on to Romania where elections were annulled, and the winning candidate was arrested and then imprisoned.
So this dude, he wins the Romanian elections. The elections are called bullshit, and then the guy that won the election is then arrested and imprisoned. This does not sound good. In Germany, apparently, and I don't know this one as a fact, but Germany is preparing a similar scenario with the AFD. And if you don't know, the AFD is what they're calling the far right. Oh my god. The far right. They're all proud boys over there at the AFD, apparently, which I don't actually believe for a single second. But that this this does not look good. And and then we get Slovakia, where the assassination attempt of the anti war prime minister FICO occurred.
Didn't hear shit about that. Hungary, there's constant attacks against prime minister Orban and pressure to exclude Hungary from all European Union decisions. This is what I'm talking about. This is what these are the things that are just these are just, like, more hallmarks of what when I say that Europe is being lost, it's this. This is what I'm talking about. And I I don't have any beef against the English. I don't have any beef against the French or Spaniards or Romanians or anything like that. I it's like it's not the people. It's it's their governments and and and the people that are in control of those governments that aren't necessarily elected officials. And because, you know, if you still believe that governments are controlled only by those who got elected by the people, well, I got bridges all over Arizona, I'd like to sell you.
We are entering into the weirdest timelines. It's just ugly as shit. So be prepared for everything. Now I will say this. Everything that I've just read you was written before today, which is April Fool's Day. So I don't blame you if you take everything I'm about to tell you with a grain of salt. Let's go to Zoltan Vardai out of Cointelegraph with this very confusing piece about Meta Planet, and it's not the fact that they actually bought $67,000,000 worth of Bitcoin that they said that they were going to do. Yesterday, I told you about their $13,300,000, bond raise.
They had not actually purchased the Bitcoin, but they did between the time I told you about it yesterday and today. The confusing part is the stock split that's explained in this particular story, and I'm still not all that, I I am I am not any less confused after trying to research this. So let just bear with me. Okay? Meta Planet adds 67,000,000 in Bitcoin following the ten two one stock split. Japan based Meta Planet has expanded its Bitcoin holdings, purchasing almost 700 Bitcoin for 10,200,000,000.0 yen or $67,000,000, the company announced today, April on Twitter.
The investment lifts Meta Planet's total Bitcoin stash to 4,046 BTC valued at over $341,000,000 at the time of writing. Okay. So far, so good. Now let's just dump a truckload of confusion on this whole thing where we get into this one. The stock split targets investor accessibility. The acquisition comes shortly after Meta Planet issued 2,000,000,000 Japanese yen or $13,300,000 worth of bonds to buy more Bitcoin, Cointelegraph reported on March. The move also comes shortly after Meta Planet's ten to one reverse stock split.
This is where the confusion sets in. The company had previously warned in a February 18 filing that its share price had risen significantly, creating a high barrier to entry for retail investors. Quote, we implemented a reverse stock split, consolidating 10 shares into one. Since then, our stock price has risen significantly, and the minimum amount required to purchase our shares on the market has now exceeded 500,000 yen, creating a substantial financial burden for investors according to a February 18 notice. So this is back in February. The stock split aims to reverse or no. Hold on. The stock split aims to lower the price per trading unit to improve liquidity and expand the firm's investor base.
So in February, February of twenty thirteen, they had a 100 to one stock split. And on March, which was just a few days ago of this year, they had a 10 to one stock split, but they're calling it a reverse stock split. They're saying they're consolidating 10 shares of Meta Planet into one share of Meta Planet, and they're doing so apparently to make it cheaper to buy their stock. See, this is where I get very confused. So I'm gonna go ahead and finish this out. Meta Planet, off all often referred to as Asia's micro strategy, aims to accumulate 21,000 BTC by 2026 as part of a plan to lead Bitcoin adoption in Japan.
And with 4,046 BTC in its treasury, it currently ranks as the ninth largest corporate Bitcoin holder globally according to Bitbo data. Okay. So and then they, of course, go into talking about strategy and Michael Saylor and whatnot like that. I wanna get back to this very confusing piece as to whether or not they split their stock by 10. So if you held one share of Meta Planet, you now have 10 shares of Meta Planet, which would, in fact, take the price of each stock down by to 10%. So it would cost you 10% of what like, if you paid a thousand yen for one share of Meta Planet, it will now cost you a hundred yen for a share of Meta Planet. But to get the value you that you actually originally had, you'd actually have to buy 10 shares. Right? But you already got those because you got the stock split. But they're saying that they did a reverse stock split. Alright. So after some research on this, it looks like this particular article is completely wrong.
From everything that I can tell, Meta Planet took one share of their stock that I remember costing around 4,000 between 4,000 and 5,000 yen apiece, and they turned it into 10 shares. So I don't know what these people are talking about when they say that they've done a reverse stock split. I had no I it doesn't make any sense. So just let's just forget about that part and just realize that Meta Planet has yet bought way more Bitcoin. And if somebody's got, like, you know, like, detailed information on the Meta Planet stock split that can alleviate my confusion, dude, throw me a boostagram or something and let me know what the hell this means because that shit's confusing right there.
Now Human Rights Foundation, this is not confusing. They have donated 10 Bitcoin or 1,000,000,000 satoshis to fund Bitcoin development. Bitcoin magazine, Vivek Send Bitcoin is writing it. Human reef human research. The Human Rights Foundation has announced a new round of grants from its Bitcoin development fund distributing 1,000,000,000 satoshis or 10 BTC to over 20 projects worldwide. The grants aim to support open source Bitcoin development, mining decentralization, privacy tools, and educational initiatives for individuals living under authoritarian regimes with a focus, of course, on Latin America, Africa, and Asia. The latest cohort includes diverse projects advancing Bitcoin's role as a financial and human rights empowerment tool.
So they are funding the following people, NetBlocks, Tollgate, Vintium, BTC pay server, which we all already know and love, African Bitcoin Institute supported by Rwandan activist, Annie and and I'm just gonna say, Anise Kanimba. And then we've got Bitcoin Core, g u I q m l. We've got r Crux has gotten some stuff. LSAT is a developer contributing to the Nostr ecosystems. So Nostr is getting a little bit of love here. RelayWizard, which I believe, yes, is also a Nostr toolset. Wayne is a is a support initiative cofounded by Bitcoin core developer, Amiti Atawar, and operational architect, Anna Seides, and it provides psychosocial support for open source developers building FreedomTech.
Psychosocial support. Like, I I I read that as, do you need therapy? And I'm not making fun of it either. I mean, think about it. You're giving up a huge salary because you could go code at Google to help people be free, and you're living under authoritarian regimes where every single day you could be black backed and thrown into a van. Think about what that does to your psychology after a while. Could you I mean, that's the thing. Most of the people, including me, within the reach of my voice cannot understand that kind of stress. So thank god somebody's taking care of the mental health of some of these people. Hashpool has gotten some. Cashew kvac, let's see. And Brandon Back.
Stable channels is a project by Tony Clawson. He's getting some love. Bitaco from Okay Jotam is a Fediment based platform that modernizes Kenya's SACO or otherwise known as savings and credit cooperative organization models using Bitcoin and Fediments. The Core has gotten a grant. Bitcoin Babies has gotten a grant. East Asia Bitcoin Developer apprenticeship program. Talent Land twenty twenty five. Base fifty eight's Bitcoin live action role play. BTSEN Espanol or BTCN Espanol. Daniel Batten for increasing non profit adoption of Bitcoin has gotten a grant. Hadiya Mesilla, then HRF's Bitcoin Development Fund has distributed more than $7,800,000 worth of Bitcoin to 284 projects in 62 countries.
The next round of grants will be announced at the seventeenth annual Oslo Freedom Forum taking place between May in Oslo, Norway. Dude, 10 BTC is nothing to sneeze at, and the fact that so many grantees are able to extend their lifeline just a little bit is a huge testament to what Human Rights Foundation has been doing ever since they fully embraced Bitcoin. I've I I have never seen this level of activity out of the Human Rights Foundation, And it all for you know, may maybe they did. I don't know. I I was very much aware of HRF well before I got into Bitcoin. However, it just seems like ever since the HRF just stepped out of kicked open the door and said Bitcoin, they have been going full freaking bore. Alright. So we got Meta Planet adding Bitcoin. We know Sailor adds Bitcoin.
Who else is adding Bitcoin? That we we we we talk about them, but we don't really talk about the the amount of Bitcoin that they have. That's Tether. Yep. Yeah. The stablecoin, USDT. Tether adds 8,888 Bitcoin in the first quarter as holdings exceed $8,400,000,000. Cointelegraph, Adrian Zmunsky, Tether, issuer of USDT, acquired 8,888 Bitcoin in the first quarter of this year. On chain transaction data shows that Tether moved its newly acquired Bitcoin worth roughly $750,000,000 at the time of writing from a Bitfinex address to a wallet that it controls itself. Data provided by on chain analytics platform, Arkham Intelligence, shows that the firm currently holds a hundred thousand 521 Bitcoin worth $8,460,000,000.
The news follows mid February's reports that Tether could be forced to sell part of its Bitcoin holdings to comply with proposed US regulations. JPMorgan wrote in a report that potential stablecoin regulation could consider a significant portion of the firm's current reserve as, quote, noncompliant. Quote, under the proposed bills, Tether would have to implicitly replace its noncompliant assets with compliant assets. This would imply sales of their noncompliant assets such as precious metals, Bitcoin, corporate paper, and secured loans, end quote.
Good god. Still, Tether argued against the conclusion of the JPMorgan analyst. A Tether spokesperson criticized the analyst in correspondence sent to Cointelegraph saying, quote, they understand neither Bitcoin nor Tether, end quote, and highlighting that The United States' Stablecoin laws have yet to be finalized. Tether reported $13,000,000,000 of profit in 2024, leading to a significant capital reserve that the firm funneled into large scale investment ventures. As a result of this explosive growth, the stablecoin issuer became the world's seventh largest buyer of United States treasuries, surpassing Canada, Taiwan, Mexico, Norway, and Hong Kong. Guys, last year, they weren't the seventh largest buyer of US treasuries. They were the sixteenth.
Right? If you're a physicist or or a mechanical engineer or know anything about derivatives, like, things like acceleration versus velocity, it's not how fast you're going, it's how much faster you can go over a period of time given your initial velocity. Alright? That that's like the integral of your velocity. These guys have picked up so much pace that they went from the sixteenth largest buyer of US treasuries to the seventh. They made what was, like, almost $14,000,000,000 last year. It's no wonder Jeremy Allaire wants to cripple this company. And, again, not cheerleading for Tether. I don't use the product.
I I don't feel any need whatsoever to have a Tether wallet. I've never used it, and I don't plan on using it. If I have used it, it's completely without my knowledge. Like, if I use Strike or something like that and somehow or another, they were using tether rails, then I would have I would have no clue if that actually occurred. Right? So whether you love tether or hate tether, you're gonna have to watch this company. These are gonna be the people that bring Latin America probably out of the fucking dark ages. I mean, they're investing in agriculture.
They've got a huge treasure trove of cash. They're the seventh largest buyer of the largest nation on the planet that issues debt as a main instrument for their viability going forward in the future, this this is something to watch. You if you're not watching Tether, then it's like what it's like what I tell you. If you're not watching Latin America, you're missing out. If you're not watching the continent Of Africa and Bitcoin, you're missing out. If you're not watching, like, so like Eastern European into getting into some of the Southeast Asian countries, you're missing out because this is where Bitcoin adoption is going to happen. And here's what I expect to happen. Tether's going to jump. Not it it's not going to leave Latin America, but it's going to it's I guarantee you they have their eyes set on the Continent Of Africa.
That's gonna be the that's gonna be their next stronghold is the Continent Of Africa. And I'll bet you see it. I'll bet you see a major move by I mean, major major move by Tether into Africa before the end of this year. I guarantee it. Okay. So Tether's USDT is the world's largest leading stablecoin and the third digital asset by market cap according to CoinMarketCap data. And at the time of writing, USDT's total supply stands at just under $148,000,000,000. Well, considering that they're talking about the token, but the token's backed by US dollars. So, well, so they say, blah blah blah. So that's a hundred and $48,000,000,000.
Ignoring the minor deviations from the US dollars value, that supply would place the current market cap at, you know, a hundred and $48,000,000,000. And Whale Alert data shows that on March, Tether minted a billion dollars worth of USDT on the Tron blockchain. That's because they bought a billion dollars worth of US treasuries. And what are US treasuries made out of? Debt. Debt. It's like, you know, that old that old thing, like, girls are made out of, I don't know, bows and candy and everything sweet and spice and boys are made out of puppy dog tails. You know what treasuries are made out of? Treasuries are made out of bullshit.
Debt, unrestricted hubris of the human spirit that is unbound by greed. That's what a US Treasury is made of. Didn't used to be that way, but that's what it is today. And we can just look at the emission of Tether and know what the hell's going on in the Treasury markets closer and closer and closer. We're we're we're able to look at what's going on in US treasuries given what tether does. So again, if you're not watching tether like a hawk, you're missing out on an entire story worth of data. Bitcoin's price has historically trended upward following upticks in USDT minting, and large scale USDT minting has usually followed significant Bitcoin price increases.
David Packham, managing partner at crypto native investment firm, CoinFund, recently said that the global stablecoin supply could surge to $1,000,000,000,000 by the end of this year, potentially becoming a key catalyst for broader cryptocurrency market growth. They're gonna go into Africa. Guys, it's going to happen. I I am betting, and I am not a betting man. I'm betting you that they hit Africa in a huge way, not a little bitty way, a massive way before the end of this year. And maybe they'll take some comfrey with them. Hey. Do you want comfrey? Do you even know what it is? It's a plant. It's a magic plant, and I tell you all about it in episode 726 of Bitcoin. And that's why you will know that you need to get your comfrey from the circle p and our featured vendor today, SheShe21.
That's right. SheShe21M. You can find him at She She twenty one m at protonmail dot com. Just, hey, say, I want comfrey. And you're gonna ask me, how much does comfrey cost? Well, you can get a full root for $20, and that will give you an immediate massive plant. And once you plant it, you cannot unplant it. It is a perennial. It comes back year after year. It's drought tolerant. Almost no pests like it. It's like it's like indestructible. And it's medicine. It is a nutrient miner out of the soil, so it mines nutrients deep because its tap root goes so far down. It mines minerals way down there and brings them up and puts them in their leaves, and you cut all the leaves off and you either make you throw it in your compost pile.
You or what I do is I just chop it and I drop it right next to the plant that I want to have fertilized for, like, long periods of time because those leaves will break down and essentially melt all those minerals into the soil and a whole bunch of nitrogen. This thing is, like, 40% nitrogen. It's it's this is an amazing plant, and you want it. So you can get root cuttings for a buck a piece. You're gonna pay the shipping. Right? So no matter where you are in The United States, at least, I'm not sure if he does, like, you know, worldwide, but at least in The United States, get your comfrey from She She. Tell him that you heard about him here on the circle p. And the Bocking four, he has two varieties. He's got Bocking 14 and Bocking four, and the Bocking four he got from me. Those are my genetics that I was taking care of for, like, seven, probably, like, ten years.
He has all of my genetics because I wasn't able to take them with me. So I sold him for Bitcoin, a whole bunch of my balking four, and I knew that he was going to keep my Bocking four safe for me. Go get my Comfrey from Shishi. You can also get him at [email protected] on ditto dot pub, which is a Nostra client. She she twenty one, that's the [email protected]. He'll get back to you, but it will be slower. But make absolutely certain if you buy anything from him that you heard about it here on the Circle p. Again, if you wanna learn more about comfrey, and you should because it's a miracle plant, and it will it will it will mine minerals for for longer than you live, and it will provide nitrogen fertilizer for longer than you live. I've chopped the leaves off of my plants at least 14 times in one single season, and it keeps growing back, and then it dies in winter, and then it comes back in spring, and cycle starts all over again. If you wanna know more about it, go to episode seven twenty six of the Bitcoin and, Bitcoin and podcast where you will find Bitcoin and ComFree.
I do a whole, like, forty minutes on the history of and what you can do with ComFree. The URL directly to the show that I'm talking about will be in the show notes. So just do that and make sure you tell XiXi that you heard about it on Circle p. Now OpenAI plans to release what they're calling open wait models with reasoning capabilities. So what's their revenue model now? I don't know. Jose Antonio Lans for Decrypt dot c o. Tell us more. AI enthusiasts. Your prayers have been heard, I guess, by the by the god that is Sam Altman. OpenAI is jumping back into the OpenText AI arena with plans to release a powerful open weight language model with reasoning abilities in the coming months according to Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI.
Quote, we are planning to release our first open weight language model since GPT two. Altman wrote in a post on Twitter, quote, we've been thinking about this for a long time, but other priorities took precedence. Now it feels important to do. What what was taking precedence? Okay. What fine. Whatever. The announcement comes as OpenAI faces growing competition from rivals that include Meta and its llama family of open source models, Google's Gemma, which comes with multimodal capabilities, and Chinese AI Lab DeepSeek, which recently released an open source reasoning model that reportedly outperformed OpenAI's zero one.
I'm using DeepSeek on Venice, AI, which if if you have it if you if you don't wanna use chat GPT and you want encrypted communications between what the model well, according to Venice AI, it it's I like it. It's it's it's a company created by somebody who I don't like because they were on the wrong side of the block size wars. But I'm here to tell you, man, I hit Venice AI a lot, and the DeepSeek model is pretty damn good. So go look for Venice AI and see what you think. It's and it's a lot cheaper. It's a hell of a lot cheaper than Sam Altman's model. Anyway, a model is open source when its developer shares with the public everything about it. Users have access to the code, the training dataset, and architecture, among other things.
That gives users the ability to modify and redistribute the model. An open weight model is less open. Users have the ability to fine tune it, but cannot build it from scratch because they don't have access to key elements such as the training dataset nor the architecture. To gather input on what developers actually want, OpenAI published a feedback form on its website and announced plans for developer events starting in San Francisco within weeks, followed by sessions in Europe and the Asia Pacific regions. Quote, we're excited to collaborate with developers, researchers, and the broader community to gather inputs and make this model as useful as possible, the company said in a in a statement.
Steven Heidel, who works on the API team at OpenAI, also shared that this model will be able to run locally. Quote, we're releasing a model this year that you can run on your own hardware. Oh. He didn't exactly specify how many parameters it would have, the token context window, the dataset, techniques used in the training, or the release license, which could restrict actions like reverse engineering or fine tuning in specific countries, for example. The announcement today marks a significant departure from OpenAI's recent strategy of keeping its most advanced models locked behind APIs. It also aligns with Altman's recent comments during a Reddit q and a where he first shared that the company was pondering the idea of releasing a full open source model. Quote, yes. We are discussing releasing some model weights and publishing some research.
I personally think we have been on the wrong side of history here and need to figure out a different open source strategy. Not everyone at OpenAI shares this view, and it's also not our current highest priority. Oh, he said it again. Kinda makes me wonder where their priorities lie. Anyway, the upcoming model will feature reasoning capabilities comparable to OpenAI's o three Mini according to Altman's post. This would make it the most capable open reasoning model to date, beating DeepSeq r one. Okay. Well, so look for that, I guess. And I I have literally no idea what kind of equipment you would need to have. I mean, how big of a graphics card do you need? How much how much memory? There's no specifics on what yeah. You can run it on your own hardware.
I'm not gonna mention that that's gonna cost you 15 k, but, yeah, you can run it on your own hardware. Who knows? It'll be interesting to see, though. But before I forget, go check out Venice AI. If if you were somebody who just really doesn't the thought of hanging out with Sam Altman and his bunch of miscreants really rankles you, go check out Venice AI. Sure. Not exactly my favorite person behind that particular project, but I gotta say, it's a high quality product. And if I when I find high quality products that I think are worthwhile, I don't give a shit who did it. I really don't freaking care. Like, for instance, everybody's mad at Ben Stiller for, like, I don't know, basically being a little patsy boy that they sent over to Ukraine.
I'm not exactly happy about it either, but you know what show he's in charge of right now that's, like, literally me and my wife's favorite? Freaking Severance. That thing is a masterpiece, and I don't care if people don't like Ben Stiller. I don't give a shit. I don't give a shit if he's a Democrat or a Republican. Severance is one of the best television shows I've ever seen. God knows I've seen a lot of them. Let's run the numbers. Futures and commodities. Oil is down a third of a point. However, it was kicking ass this morning, so we are still well above 70 to the $71.18 mark. Brent Norsee down a third to $74.53.
Natural gas is following suit down three and a half points to $3.97 per thousand cubic feet. Gasoline steadily rising. This time, it's a quarter point to the upside, $2.29 a gallon. All of your shiny metal rocks are doing not good. Gold is down a third to but yet still at $3,139. So there you go. Hey. Congrats, Peter Schiff. Silver is down almost a full point. Platinum is down two and a quarter. Copper crawling sideways as is palladium because no one seems to care. Agricultural futures are all in the green. Yay. For ag, let's see. Biggest loser today and the only one in the red is 2.06% to the downside, and that would be rough rice. Biggest winner is chocolate by a mile, 5.6% to the upside.
Live cattle doing well too, up point 88%. Lean hogs up a third, and feeder cattle up just over one full point. And looky here, the indices are in the green as well. Yay. It's good news today. Dow is up point 09%. S and P is up a third. Nasdaq is up two thirds, and the S and P Mini crossing the one half percentile point to the upside. And we're at $85,120. That is a $1,690,000,000,000 market cap for Bitcoin, and we can purchase 27.1 ounces of the shiny metal rock Peter Schiff loves so much with our one Bitcoin of which there are. 19,844,860.3 of an average fees per block are excessively low.
0.03 taking the fees on a per block basis probably because there's only, like, five blocks. 8,595 unconfirmed transactions and the crowd is chanting that Bitcoin is going to die. How many freaking times have we been here? Oh, there's too many transactions. Bitcoin's gonna die. Oh, there's not enough transactions. Bitcoin's gonna die. No. Block every ten minutes. Doesn't matter if it's full. Not doesn't matter if there's a hundred of them. Doesn't matter if there's two of them. It just goes on and on and on. High priority rates, five. Satoshis per v byte. Low priority is gonna get you in at three. And the mining hash rate, no capitulation here, 828.2 exahashes per second. The miners are mining like mad. And from Eric's Corn Man, yesterday's episode of Bitcoin and I got Graham with 2,000 satoshis.
Thank you, sir, for the news I can use. Well, sir, you are welcome. Baked potato with a thousand says v four v. Yodel with 444 sat says, what's a favorite movie of yours? Okay. Well, so I've told you about Severance, but that's a TV show. Favorite movie. Favorite movie. Well, that's like picking a favorite child. Favorite movie? I don't know, man. I I don't think I actually have one. I mean, Alien comes to mind. That's a great flick. I will sit through, like, you know, quite a bit of 2,001 A Space Odyssey, but, honestly, it's a it's a space opera. It gets really freaking boring. And then, let's see. I'm I'm a heavy science fiction fan, honestly. Man, I'd be big, big into science fiction, but I can't really name movies. But I but I'll tell you this. When it comes to me and movies, I will absolutely 100% sit down and just watch all manner of, like, nineteen eighties movies like Demolition Man. I think that may have been the early nineties. You get my drift, though. I love that movie. That movie is freaking great. I mean, it's got Sylvester Stallone.
It's got the dude from Blade. It's it Wesley Snipes. It's it's an amazing flick, but it's cheap. It it's campy. It's but it's great, man. I mean, it's like and things like that. The movies that were coming out along the along those lines, like running man, demolition man, all all the stuff that was coming out around those times. Man, I Terminator freaking do love that stuff. So I hope that answers your question. Pies, four hundred and twenty says, thank you, sir. No thank you. Hashtag 40 h p w, god's depth with two thirty seven. Thank you, sir. No. Thank you. And that's the weather report.
Welcome to part two of the news that you can use Rhode Island. Starting out starting out with Rhode Island and their proposed bill for tax exemptions on Bitcoin payments from atlas21.com. Rhode Island, 1 of the smallest states in The United States, actually, I think it is the smallest, is considering a bill that could exempt certain Bitcoin transactions from state capital gains taxes. The Rhode Island Senate is reviewing senate is reviewing bill s zero four five one introduced last February by senator Peter Apollano, which specifically aims to exempt small Bitcoin transactions from state capital gains taxes.
The proposed rather, the proposal provides for an exemption of up to ten ten monthly transactions, each valued at less than $1,000. Oh, come on. 10? I could wow. I get I can buy things 10 times a month with my Bitcoin. Gee. Thanks Rhode Island. What a bunch of wussies, dude. The bill introduces modifications to the existing state income tax regulations. The legislation states, and I quote, any sale of Bitcoin by an individual or business in Rhode Island shall be exempt from state taxation if the total value of the sale is less than $1,000 per day.
The limit of the state tax exempt Bitcoin transaction shall not exceed 10 sales per a thirty day cycle, end quote. This initiative represents an effort to reduce bureaucratic and tax barriers that currently complicate the use of Bitcoin in everyday transactions. The stated goal is to facilitate digital asset payments, making it easier for citizens to use Bitcoin for small purchases without worrying about state level tax implications. It is important to note that the exemption would apply exclusively to state taxes while federal tax obligations would remain unchanged. Well well, duh. Taxpayers would still need to maintain accurate records of their transactions and remain subject to potential audits by state tax authorities. Jesus Christ. See, I never even thought about that because I've never lived in a state where I had where I had state income tax.
Texas, no state income tax. Washington state, amazingly enough, given the political environment up here, no state income tax. So all I have to worry about is federal tax auditors. I never once thought about state tax auditors. We've got to stop this attitude of just crushing everybody, not just by stealing their money, but by wasting their fucking time. I don't wanna waste my time worrying about whether or not I'm okay with the feds versus the state. This is how have we come here? Well, at least we're not in Brazil where they've blocked Bitcoin investments for pension funds altogether, and this is out of Atlas21.com.
On March, a Brazilian National Monetary Council officially shut the door on cryptocurrency markets for the country's closed pension funds. With the issuance of resolution 5.202, the regulatory body explicitly prohibited I cannot pronounce that much Spanish all in a row. Brazil's closed pension entities, that's the name of the thing that I cannot pronounce, They cannot invest in Bitcoin nor can they invest in other digital assets, citing excessive volatility and the associated risk thereof. The new rule affects tens of thousands of unionized workers and employees whose retirement savings are managed by EFPC.
As reported in a note from the Ministry of Finance circulated among local media, quote, the resolution also prohibits investments in virtual assets, considering their specific investment characteristic and the risks involved, end quote. The CMN justified its decision with the intent to protect Brazilian citizens' retirement savings from the high volatility of the cryptocurrency market. Nope. We're pausing. That's not why you're doing it. You need that retirement money to flow into your stock market. You have to have that. Otherwise, people are gonna know that yet you too, like Western Europe and The United States stock market, is one great big casino, and even the waitresses have quit their jobs. They're like, fuck this. I'm out of here, pal.
No. They're not protecting citizens. They're they what they're doing is they're making sure that nobody else can milk their cattle. That's what they're doing. Screw you, Brazil. Screw you. By preventing closed pension funds from investing savings of Bitcoin and digital assets, the authority aims to safeguard the long term financial stability of pensions. And, again, that's bullshit. They need those pensions to support their stock market and the rest of their capital markets. It's important to note that the ban does not seem to apply to open pension funds, oh, or individual retirement products sold by banks and insurers. These are regulated separately and may still allow indirect investments in cryptocurrencies through exchange traded funds or other platforms.
In Brazil, the main difference between closed and open pension funds concerns concerns membership and management. Closed pension funds, also called negotiated funds, are established through agreements between employers and trade unions or professional associations. They are reserved for specific categories of workers such as public employees, private sector employees, or freelancers, and membership is therefore collective. Open pension funds, on the other hand, are accessible to anyone regardless of employment status. They can be individually subscribed to by anyone, including students, unemployed individuals, self employed workers, and they're managed by banks, insurance companies, and financial firms.
Last year in The UK, Pension Specialist Cartwright led the first British pension fund to invest in Bitcoin allocating 3% of its assets. In The United States, several states have begun experimenting with Bitcoin allocations for their pension systems. One example is Wisconsin, where the state investment committee revealed it had invested $340,000,000 in Bitcoin through BlackRock spot ETF, ticker symbol is iBit. So Brazil basically telling their public employees to go pound sand. Everybody else is okay, I guess, for now. Fold and Crowd Health have partnered together to revolutionize healthcare with bitcoin integration.
Now, this is a little bit older, but it's still I think it's still important because crowd health is sort of fallen off the map. I don't see many people talking about crowd health, and I think it's an important company. So I'm just gonna give even though this was written March, it actually represents something that occurred between Fold and Crowd Health that occurred months ago. Alright? So this is kind of old news, and if you know about it, my apologies. But hell, eve I I'm not sure if even I remember this deal between Fold and CrowdHealth. So let's get into it. Fold, a leader in Bitcoin powered financial solutions and CrowdHealth, the innovative healthcare crowdfunding platform, recently announced a groundbreaking partnership.
This alliance merges two disruptive models offering an escape from overpriced, opaque systems while empowering users to save, earn Bitcoin, and take control of their health and their wealth. Quote, crowd health is an alternative to health insurance in the same way that Fold is an alternative to fiat only checking accounts, said Will Reeves, CEO of Fold. Quote, both platforms dismantle legacy systems that profit from confusion and inefficiency. Together, we're giving people the tools to reclaim autonomy. Traditional health insurance often leaves families underinsured, burdened by high deductibles, and restricted to in network providers. And similarly, conventional banking traps users into inflationary fiat systems with minimal transparency.
CrowdHealth and Fold tackles these issues head on. CrowdHealth replaces health insurance with community powered crowdfunding eliminating deductibles and network restrictions. Fold bypasses traditional banks by integrating Bitcoin rewards into everyday spending, converting savings into a deflationary asset. Fold plus membership included all crowd health members now receiving fold plus, which is a $10 a month value at no extra cost. So if you were a crowd health member, then you're getting fold plus and you're not paying anymore for it. There's automated Bitcoin savings that'll link fold and crowd health accounts together to convert unused health care funds directly into Bitcoin. Oh, man. That's good. Seamless enrollment.
A simplified process for new and existing users. So why does it even matter? For crowd health members, Fold plus transforms idle health care funds into long term Bitcoin savings. The features include a Visa debit card with Bitcoin cashback on purchases, gift cards, and bill payments. There's zero fees on Bitcoin purchases and insured deposits. And up to three authorized user cards for family flexibility. Now for the Bitcoin curious, Fold simplifies entry with the intuitive tools that has always had. Quote, Bitcoin isn't just an investment. It's a lifeline against inflation, said Reeves. We make stacking sats as easy as buying coffee.
Who benefits the most? Well, the under insured paying out of pocket for care. Freelancers and gig workers without employer sponsored insurance. Families prioritizing health autonomy, you know, using out of network providers because they don't want they don't want their doctors under the thumb of the insurance companies because they are. Like, you go in and they say, oh, since you're here, you've gotta get your COVID vaccine, and let's say your family doesn't want it. Well, you could lose that provider because they have a there's some evidence that suggests that if they don't rack up a quota on the COVID vaccination, they're just gonna drop you from their doctor's office. So you gotta you're you're pounding sand, pal.
So if you want out of network care and that's just that COVID thing. That's just one example. You may just have a shitty doctor. You may you may be in a a group of doctors and they're all shitty, and you need somebody that kind of thinks outside of the box. Well, chances are good that's gonna be out of network, and your insurance won't cover it. And then anyone seeking financial resilience via Bitcoin, that's who benefits the most from this. CrowdHealth has helped fund $10,000,000 worth of medical bills with an estimated $10,000,000 in savings during the same time frame.
Fold members have stacked over $66,000,000 in rewards since 2019. So you there there's the URL for this particular story from lightning.news, I forgot to tell you that, is gonna be in the show notes. And inside this, you'll have URLs or or little, you know, underlined places that represent URLs for where to enroll and where to go look for more information. But here's the other thing about crowd health, and I asked this to the guys over at crowd health early on when I first heard about them. Because I'd heard that what they did, is, like, if you were a crowd health member, they would not only crowdsource the funding the way the the whole the way the whole system works is you get your shit paid for.
And but your premiums when nothing's going on with you goes to pay for somebody else. So it's it's like health insurance. It's just done a little bit differently. But the way that they make it work is really important. And it's not just about using Bitcoin. It's not just about crowdsourcing. It's about having a team of people that will get on the phone with your health insurance company, and they know all these medical codes. Like, when you get an IV, it's code like 50 three 80 six and nobody can read that shit. A Tylenol, you would never even know it's a fucking Tylenol. It's just coded as 86812B or something like that. Right? You can't negotiate, like, by saying you're charging me a hundred bucks for a Tylenol three.
Bullshit. That's not right. See, that's where your negotiation skill starts coming in line. You but you can't even begin a negotiation if you don't know what you're paying for. And here's the thing. When you try to do that anyway and try to get them to explain the codes, they are purpose built to give you a headache. And I'm talking about the other person on the other end of the phone. You are not going to be able to be functional at negotiating your own medical bill. CrowdHealth solves that. That's the that's the flavor that they're not talking about in this story. They've got men and women that can get on the phone that know the codes and go, no. You're not charging our client $600 for a liter of saline. And there's the code. I know it's a liter of saline.
Let's talk about getting that down to $60. That's one of the ways that CrowdHealth is able to actually help their customers. Yeah. I know it sounds like an advertisement. I I've never even talked to the guys at CrowdHealth. I just it's it's like it's like the circle p in me. I cannot help but try to find really high quality stuff that you guys might be able to actually use and then tell you about it. I'm not they're not in the circle p. Right? I'm just telling you what I already know about crowd health. And them partnering with Fold, that's kind of a big deal.
So just go look. Just honestly, just go look. Alright. Now the MIT Bitcoin Expo twenty twenty five is all about Freedom Tech. And, yes, we're talking about Massachusetts Institute of Technology just down the street from Harvard, Bitcoin Magazine and this is actually written by the MIT Bitcoin Club who's hosting it. The MIT Bitcoin Club, a passionate collection of students, alumni, researchers, and community members presents the twelfth annual MIT Bitcoin Expo. They've been doing it for twelve years. The MIT Bitcoin Club has been into Bitcoin for twelve years.
This is MIT, so just be aware. Anyways, from April, it's a landmark event exploring how Bitcoin and Freedom Technologies empower individuals worldwide. With just five days remaining, the student led initiative continues its decade long tradition of bridging academia, activism, and technical innovation. Born from MIT's twenty fourteen Bitcoin project, which distributed Bitcoin to undergraduates to study adoption, the expo has evolved into a critical forum for sovereignty focused dialogue. This year's agenda is Freedom Tech focuses on physical liberation through technology. Speakers like Zimbabwean activist Evan Merawi, and Lightning Network creator Taj Dreyja will dissect Bitcoin's role in resisting authoritarian control and enabling real world escape from oppression.
This is not about the crypto economics nor about the meme coins. This is about life, liberty, and Bitcoin. So on day one, you'll dive into freedom tech fundamentals with, Marawi's keynote, quote, why freedom tech matters and Dreyja's analysis of Bitcoin's resilience against nation states. On day two, shift to global impact with Mauricio Bartolomeo, exfiltration via Bitcoin, and panels featuring activists from Venezuela, Russia, and Togo. Technical deep dives include MIT's Neha Narula on scaling self custody and Stephen Rouse's Covenant Soft Fork proposals.
Other topics include future of freedom technology, quantum resistance, Covenant Soft Forks, Tor projects, or rather, the Tor project, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. Running parallel to all this is beyond theory. It's a $10,000 prize event challenges developers to build tools for privacy, censorship resistance, and financial sovereignty. Past projects have secured funding from industry leaders, proof of m IT's mind and hand ethos in action four, and I have no idea what the hell action four is. Additionally, Anna Chernovich or Chekovich from the HRF will run a workshop on Bitcoin self custody 01/2001.
So HRF will be there. I was wondering why they weren't, like, mentioned at the first start of the or the start of that article, but thank God they've got HRF is gonna be represented there. If you're in the Boston area, you you might wanna go to this. If I was in the Boston area, I would go to this. So, again, April 5 through the sixth. So, dude, I mean, here for, you know, four days. Four days from now will be April. So just be be aware and and get into your registration. Again, the URL for this story and all of the stories are gonna be in the show notes. So go find the URL. It should be at the very bottom, of all the articles that I read, and you'll be able to get into here, and you'll be able to register and get all that good stuff. And, honestly, man, that's the end of the show.
Sixty minutes on the dot. Brothers and sisters, I will see you on the other side. This has been Bitcoin and and I am 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 April Fools' Day
Historical Context: Battle of Hastings
Tether's Influence in Global Markets
