Episode 1214 of Bitcoin And . . . is LIVE!
Topics for today:
Oshi
Artisan pecan butter, date bars and chocolates
Website: https://www.oshigood.us/products
nostr Profile: https://primal.net/p/nprofile1qqswp94gnm4epqsgjkndl4lnd8krzdj5u4mzuppdtxksdymkty63g7gdurlfc
https://bitcoinmagazine.com/news/u-s-regulator-allows-banks-to-hold-crypto
https://cointelegraph.com/news/hsbc-to-bring-tokenized-deposits-to-us-and-uae-amid-stablecoin-race
https://decrypt.co/349217/crypto-exchange-kraken-files-ipo-following-800-million-raise
https://www.theblock.co/post/379500/senate-banking-advances-trumps-fdic-travis-hill-agency-shifts-crypto-approach
https://lightning.news/nostr-wallet-connect-unlocks-new-features/
https://cointelegraph.com/news/kenya-bitcoin-atms-vasp-law-warning
Get You're Free Comfrey Owner's Manual Here:
https://www.bitcoinandshow.com/the-comfrey-owners-manual-is-here/
Topics for today:
- US Banks Can Hold 'Crypto' For Fees
- HSBC Brings US and UAE Tokenized Deposits
- FDIC Nominee Advances
- nostr Wallet Connect Is 1st Amendment Territory
Circle P:
Oshi
Artisan pecan butter, date bars and chocolates
Website: https://www.oshigood.us/products
nostr Profile: https://primal.net/p/nprofile1qqswp94gnm4epqsgjkndl4lnd8krzdj5u4mzuppdtxksdymkty63g7gdurlfc
Today's Articles:
https://bitcoinmagazine.com/news/u-s-regulator-allows-banks-to-hold-crypto
https://cointelegraph.com/news/hsbc-to-bring-tokenized-deposits-to-us-and-uae-amid-stablecoin-race
https://decrypt.co/349217/crypto-exchange-kraken-files-ipo-following-800-million-raise
https://www.theblock.co/post/379500/senate-banking-advances-trumps-fdic-travis-hill-agency-shifts-crypto-approach
https://lightning.news/nostr-wallet-connect-unlocks-new-features/
https://cointelegraph.com/news/kenya-bitcoin-atms-vasp-law-warning
Get You're Free Comfrey Owner's Manual Here:
https://www.bitcoinandshow.com/the-comfrey-owners-manual-is-here/
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Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License
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[00:00:02]
David Bennett:
It is 08:37AM Pacific Standard Time. It is the November 2025, and this is episode twelve fourteen of Bitcoin, and that sounds like some kind of weird police code. Hey. Calling all cops. It's a 12:14 out there. One thing that I can say about today's show is it is gonna be definitely much shorter than normal. We're gonna talk about, regulators allowing banks to hold crypto, and then we're gonna talk about another bank. This one everybody knows, HSBC. They're we're gonna talk about, tokenized deposits again and HSBC. I'm telling you, we cannot just close our eyes and bury our heads in the sands about tokenized deposits because they are here, and they are gonna get much bigger than they are already.
Kraken has filed for something. We're gonna find out what for, but one thing that it is is pretty big news. Senate banking panel is advancing a Trump pick for someone to, you know, sit in a chair and sign things and reach for stuff. And then there's some Nostril Wallet Connect news that we're gonna get into, and then we're gonna run over to the continent of Africa and the country of Kenya. But first, let's start with this one. US regulator has allowed banks to hold crypto for blockchain fees. I have no idea what that means. Micah Zimmerman from Bitcoin Magazine, please help me out.
The US office of the comptroller of the currency has given national banks the green light to hold crypto on their balance sheets for the purpose of play paying blockchain network fees. The guidance issued in interpretive letter letter number 1186 today also allows banks to keep crypto on hand to test internal and third party crypto platforms. Blockchain networks require native tokens to process transactions. These fees, often called gas fees, are unavoidable. The OCC said banks can hold the tokens they reasonably anticipate needing.
This could include paying fees as part of crypto custody services or facilitating client transactions. The goal is to reduce reliance on third party providers and lower operational risk. Quote, paying network fees is a necessary part of doing business on blockchain networks, the OCC said. Holding crypto for this purpose is permissible when it supports otherwise lawful banking activities, end quote. The guidance emphasizes that these activities are incidental to the business of banking. That phrase has weight in regulatory language.
That phrase they're talking about is, quote, incidental to the business of banking. It means banks can do it legally as long as the activity helps them serve customers or operate efficiently. The OCC even drew parallels to historical banking practices like holding foreign currency, bank notes, or shares and payment systems to facilitate transactions. In other words, banks have already needed to hold certain assets to do their business. Crypto is just the latest form. Banks are expected to manage risks carefully. They must track operation, markets, liquidity, cybersecurity, and legal risks. The amount of crypto held should remain minimal relative to the bank's capital.
The letter comes under the leadership of comptroller Jonathan Gould, a Trump appointee confirmed back in July. And under his tenure, the OCC has become more crypto friendly. Earlier guidance allowed banks to act as nodes on blockchain networks, offer crypto custody services, and work with stablecoins. Meanwhile, broader rules for stablecoin issuers under the Genius Act are still being drafted. But the OCC's move signals that US regulators are already willing to let banks participate in cryptocurrency safely and efficiently. It's it's it's safe and effective, y'all. It's like a shot in the arm. Have you gotten your 12 booster shots yet? Well, don't. I'm just saying. As more banks explore digital assets, this guidance could accelerate adoption. It bridges traditional finance and blockchain, giving banks a clearer path to integrate crypto into everyday operations.
And earlier this year, the OCC issued guidance in interpretive letter number eleven eighty four, allowing national banks and federal savings associations to offer cryptocurrency custody and trading services. So, essentially, banks can buy and sell digital assets on behalf of customers. They can outsource crypto activities to third parties, and now provide related services like record keeping, tax reporting, and compliance. This is a lot larger issue than I think we're giving it credit for because we're being distracted by price action. And the woah and dismay that everybody, you know, feels in the market, this is important.
At this point, United States regulated banks are 100% able to swim in the waters that just last year, just last year, completely unallowed to do, or at least that was their interpretation of all laws because there was no clarity. And now things have become so much more clear that they're able to do pretty much everything that Kraken can do or Binance can do. Almost. I mean, almost. But, dude, the the the walls that that keep those two entities apart, banking and crypto exchanges are dissolving, and they're dissolving real fast. And, honestly, I think this was always going this was always gonna happen, but this was always part of the plan of people like Jamie Dimon pushing back so hard against Bitcoin so that it could buy them time because they realized they made a mistake when they spent ten years pointing at us and laughing instead of wrapping their heads around this issue.
They thought that they could wish it away. They thought that they could laugh it away. They thought that they could regulate it away, but now the tables have turned. And banks now, one year later, are in a completely different operational environment, and it's probably going to continue. So HSBC, massive bank. They are going to bring tokenized deposits to United States and The United Arab Emirates as the stablecoin race heats up. Alright. The two huge financial markets, The United States and The UAE. Helen Parts from Cointelegraph. Global mega bank HSBC is doubling down on tokenization over stablecoins as global banks rush to keep pace in the stablecoin race. HSBC Holdings will stop start offering tokenized deposits to its corporate clients in The United States and The United Arab Emirates in the 2026.
That's just next year, according to Bloomberg. The tokenized deposit service by HSBC enables clients to send money domestically and abroad in seconds around the clock, said Manish Kohli, HSBC's global head of payment solutions, quote, the topic of tokenization, stablecoins, digital money, and digital currencies has obviously gathered so much momentum, we are making big bets in this space, Kohli said. Tokenized deposits are digital representations of bank deposits issued on a blockchain by regulated banks, allowing for instant twenty four seven transfers and programmable payments. Unlike stablecoins, which are often linked to fiat currencies like the US dollar and backed by assets like government debt, deposit tokens are created using the issuer's balance sheets.
While stablecoin issuers like Circle and Tether are not allowed to pay yields on stablecoin holdings by users, Tokenized deposits offer interest payouts among their key features. Let's pause and remember all of the banking lobby groups in The United States that have been and will continue to and are, on this very day, begging regulatory commissions around the world, especially in The United States, to not allow Tether to be able to offer yield on stablecoin holdings. This is the only thing these banks can come up with to be able to fight where they are right now. And, by the way, they're probably gonna be fairly successful at it. They will definitely be able to compete.
Right? Plus, they're bringing with it, you know, anywhere between decades or hundreds of years of name recognition, you know, brand recognition. So the fight heats up, and we'll see how, you know, Tether and and Circle respond. But continuing with this, according to Coley, HSBC plans to expand the use cases of tokenized deposits and programmable payments and autonomous treasuries or systems that deploy automation and AI to independently manage cash and liquidity risk. Nearly every large company that we have a conversation with, we are seeing a big theme around treasury transformation, the HSBC executive said.
The products expansion in The US and The UAE is the latest by HSBC following its debut of the offering in Hong Kong back in May with Ant International becoming the very first client to utilize the TDS solution. That's that tokenized deposit service. The bank has since expanded the offering in multiple markets, including Singapore, The United Kingdom, and Luxembourg. HSBC's choice to move forward with tokenized deposits comes amid major banks like JPMorgan doubling down on the technology. On November 12, JPMorgan rolled out JPM Coin, which you heard about here on the Bitcoin and podcast, a deposit token representing US dollar deposits at the bank.
The company opposed the token to traditional stablecoins with JPM Morgan's blockchain executive, Naveen Malaha Malala, whatever, highlighting that deposit tokens operate within traditional banking frameworks. While pushing tokenized deposits, HSBC does not rule out the potential issuance of a stablecoin. Quote, it's something that we would continue to evaluate. There are a few things that need to happen, which is the legal framework needs to be clear according to Coley. So that's the end of that article, and the gravity of this should should impact you because HSBC is arguably one of the largest, probably, top three banks in the world.
Most likely top three. It's it is a bank that has enough gravity that it can swing markets a long way just by wagging its little tail. So now they are fully embracing tokenized deposits outside of their, you know, markets that they're very much used to, and they're getting into now going into The UAE and The United States. I mean, Singapore, yeah, we get that. Hong Kong, yeah, we get that. But The United States UAE, yeah, I could almost see it. They they've got a lot of hooks and, you know, hooks into UAE. They've and, yes, they've got hooks into The United States. It's It's not like that we don't do banking with HSBC here in The States.
I'm just saying that this is a service that they are now offering to The United States and The UAE, and it solidifies the fact of what I was saying earlier. Banks, the walls between them, and the world that we've inhabited for well over a decade are dissolving and they're dissolving fast. And they're bringing with it decades, if not centuries, worth of brand recognition and the ability to well and and they're they're bringing all of their networking. All the people that the bankers know, all their friends, all the people that they go to fancy parties with and, you know, put on fancy tuxedos and spats.
If you remember what a spat is, then spats and monocles and top hats and walking around the lovely ladies holding their chilled martini glasses. This is the kind of bullshit that we're gonna have to deal with. They're getting in and they're getting in fast. So just be prepared to deal with it. Now on to oshigood.us, it is the circle p. It is open for business, and it's where I bring plebs with goods and services just like you to plebs just like you who want to buy, say, goods and services in Bitcoin. If you're not selling your goods and services in Bitcoin, you're not in the circle p, oshigood.us is definitely in the circle p of the spotlight vendor of the day. Oshigood.us, that's oshigood.us.
And he's got what does he got today? He's got some stuff in stock today. Let's find out. Let's go over here. Oh, good old fashioned hotel butter. Now this isn't the the one with the coffee in it. This is just his regular base hotel butter. It's made from ground up pecans. It's got maple sugar, sea salt flakes, cinnamon, and black pepper. This stuff is freaking awesome. I've got I've got the you know, well, I had the coffee version before my wife ate it all on toast. Next time I order from Oshi, it's gonna be basically be this stuff. But oshi good dot u s, you can buy this for Satoshis. If I remember right, Oshi only sells his goods and services in Satoshis because, well, we're trying to kick start a Bitcoin economy. And with these banks running around like they're running around, we need to really double down on learning how to use Bitcoin for one of its primary intended purposes, money.
I give you Satoshis. You give me huddle butter from oshigood.us. That's oshigood.us. Use the coupon code bitcoin and so that Oshi knows that I made a sale for him and then Oshi can decide whether or not to get me back on the other side with whatever he feels that sale was worth in the form of Bitcoin, because that's how the value for value advertising model works here in the circle p on the Bitcoin and podcast. 0shegood.us0shegood.us. Remember to use the code Bitcoin. And crypto exchange, Kraken, has filed for their IPO following a successful $800,000,000 raise.
Decrypt.co, Sander Lutz is writing. Kraken filed to go public on Wednesday, the cryptocurrency exchange said, just hours after announcing a massive fundraising round, which has valued the company at $20,000,000,000. The company said it confidentially submitted a draft s one registration form with the SEC to make an initial public offering on Wall Street. Kraken said it has not yet determined the number of shares it plans to offer nor the anticipated price range for those shares. It added that it expects the IPO to take place soon. Soon, t m, like two weeks, t m, as the SEC completes its review process, and it's all subject to market conditions, of course. The move has been widely anticipated all the way since March when the SEC under Trump administration's control dropped a lawsuit against Kraken over its staking services.
Then in the following months, reports circulated that the crypto exchange was aiming to raise hundreds of millions of dollars ahead of some public offering. Well, on Tuesday, the deal materialized. A whopping $800,000,000 of fundraising led by major traditional finance players, including Ken Griffin's Citadel, which valued Kraken at $20,000,000,000. The Wyoming based exchange said the new funds will fuel a global expansion into territories well beyond The United States. Prior to president Donald Trump's return to office in January, Coinbase was the only crypto exchange trading publicly on Wall Street.
In a year of frenzied crypto related activity in traditional finance, other exchanges, including Gemini and Bullish, have both successfully made IPOs or initial public offerings. While those offerings initially blasted past Wall Street expectations largely on crypto related hype, They have since fizzled. Bullish, which blasted past a $118 per share during its August IPO, has since cratered, as everything else has, to $35.66. Gemini, meanwhile, rattled by a poor q three performance, has seen its own stock decline significantly from its September Wall Street debut.
It's now down over 68% to $11.70 at writing. Well, everybody is having a bad day, and we'll get into more of it when we run the numbers. CNBC futures and commodities, energy not having a good day. Brent North Sea is down two and a third percent to $63.34. West Texas Intermediate down damn near two and a half percent to $59.25. But on the upside, we always have to have the hedge that is natural gas, which is up four and a quarter points to $4.55 per thousand cubic feet. Gasoline is down three and a third to a buck 93 a gallon in Murbaughn crude itself finds finds it itself in the red at 2.38%.
It is now chilling out at $64.84. One thing that is going on is that tomorrow, we have FOMAC minutes. This is one of the reasons why we're getting a price depression on on Bitcoin today. It's why markets are rattled. Everybody always does this. The day before the FOMC meeting minutes are presented to the public, we have a sell off in in in the broader markets because no we what we're doing here is we're feeling the effects of a bunch of people who get paid, literally get paid to see how Jerome Powell is dressed, what color his suit is, what color his tie is, what his body language is, how he says certain sentences, what those sentences contain as vocabulary and grammar, and the intonation.
I shit you not. All of the it's not really as much what he says as much as how he says it. Both of them together play the message that we're gonna get tomorrow when the FOMAC minutes comes out. That's why we're seeing most of the bullshit that we're seeing today, price action across all markets, whether it's Bitcoin or not. And it always happens. It always will happen. Just be aware this is always a sort of a sell the news event kind of thing. So just understand, Foback Minutes come out tomorrow, and everybody is pretty much I think everybody is pretty much firmly plant has their feet planted that Jerome Powell is still going to be using rather hawkish language, and we are not going to feel good about getting another point 25% Fed rate cut come December.
And that language will probably be reflected tomorrow during the minutes, and that's one of the reasons why you're seeing market sell off, including in metals. I mean, it's mostly in the green, but palladium is down 1.6%. Gold is up point 17%, but still it's just $4,073 and 6 dimes. So it's not it's sort of flat, you know, a little bit. Platinum is down a third. Silver's up point one seven as well to fifty sixty, and copper is up point 41%. Ag is all in the red, except for sugar, which is unchanged. But, man, talk about a hit. We're talk we're looking at chocolate being the biggest loser, but but by six full percentage points, coffee's down 2.6, soybeans down one and a quarter. I mean, it sounds to me like some agricultural trade deals might have gone sideways, and I don't know about it because I haven't heard about it yet. But lumber's down three and, three and a half. Corn is down one and a half. Wow. I mean, everything is just getting freaking lunched.
Live cattle, also not doing well this morning. 2.2% to the downside. Lean hogs, however, are up point eight three. Feeder cattle down 1.77%. S and P is in the green by point one three. Nasdaq is up a third of a point, but the Dow is down a third of a point, and the S and P Mini is down by a quarter. And, of course, we have Bitcoin, which is doing $89,970. We're now at a $1,790,000,000,000 market cap. We can only purchase two point or 22.1 ounces of shiny metal rocks with our one Bitcoin, of which there are 19,950,763.66 of an average fees per block or low 0.02.
BTC taking the fees on a per block basis. It's about 35 blocks carrying 42,000 unconfirmed transactions waiting to clear at high priority rates of three sats per vbyte. Low priority gets you in at one. Still in Zeta Hash range, so the miners aren't unplugging their machines. Through all of this, the miners are not unplugging their machines. You gotta ask yourself why. We are still at 1.08 zeta hashes per second on the hash rate, which represents the amount of machine power securing the Bitcoin network. This number tells me it's very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very secure. I mean, shit, man. In in July, yeah, I'll just pick July 1.
The hash rate was 794 x of hashes per second. So it would be point seven nine zed of hashes per second, and we're up pretty much well above one. And we haven't come back down in weeks, especially the weeks that have contained this sell off. So you gotta kinda wonder what's going on with the miners that they're not unplugging their machines and going all in on AI. From Mel Salvador Eats, yesterday's episode of Bitcoin and I got bit gust too. Wow. 15,000 sat says, here's another brother. I haven't been able to donate on my fountain app for a few months for whatever reason. Keep up the good work. Thank you, BitGus. I will. Jason High with seven seven seven says, thanks for the news that we can use. You are welcome, sir. KT 1,200 sat says, very interesting that my first Bitcoin that has grassroots in El Salvador spoke out against the government's BTC reserve benefiting its citizens.
I I remember that. This very shortly after announcing that they would no longer be headquartered in the country. Curious what the rift is there. That's a thank you, KT, for connecting those two points. That is true. They have, like, basically shuttered their headquarters in El Salvador, and they have gone global. Maybe we should be looking at El Salvador a little bit more cautiously. There's no reason not to be cautious. It doesn't it doesn't mean that everything's gonna die. It just means, hey, look. If you're walking on the rim of the Grand Canyon, you might wanna watch where you're going.
That's all I'm saying. KT with another 500, I guess. Oh, so he looks like he donated twice with the exact same thing, so he may have had a failure on the first one. KT, I appreciate the total of 1,700 sats. Perma Nerd with two ten says, hello, sir. There is an online market on Friday, the twenty first, from six to seven Central Standard Time. It is Bitcoin only, and we'll feature some Circle p vendors. Come by and let us know what you heard or that you heard it on Bitcoin and podcast. Check with at the bullish Bitcoiner for more details. That's the bullish Bitcoiner at the bullish Bitcoiner at the bullish Bitcoiner.
Probably that on both Noster as well as x. So just understand that. I appreciate that, Perminer. Again, that's Friday, the twenty first, from six to seven Central Standard Time. Friday, the twenty first, that's would be this Friday. Yeah. This Friday from six to seven Central Standard Time, Circle P vendors will be there. Contact at the bullish Bitcoiner at the bullish Bitcoiner. Nick Dose with the +1 06 says approximately 33 times the area of El Salvador can fit within Texas. There you go. El Salvador covers about 21,040 square kilometers or 8,124 square miles, while Texas spans approximately 696,241 square kilometers or 286,597 square miles. This means that nearly 33 El Salvadors could fit inside Texas based on land area. That is awesome. Thank you, dude. Nick Dose with another +1 05 says, cheers.
And Nikaz 210 says, live aloha with yeah. With 210. Oh, Buced coming from bit gust two again. He gives me another 5,000 sats due. Thank you. I appreciate it. Pies with +1 21 says thank you, sir. No thank you. That's the weather report. Welcome to part two of the news that you can use Senate Banking Paddle Panel Paddle. It's it's an S and M session over here, man. Session Banking Panel advances Trump's FDIC pick of Travis Hill as agency shifts its crypto approach, Sarah Wynne, writing this one from the block. President Donald Trump's pick to lead the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation or FDIC is headed to a full senate vote after lawmakers voted to push through Travis Hill's nomination.
So the bank the senate banking committee voted 13 to 11 on Wednesday to have Travis Hill chair the FDIC. Next, the full senate will vote on his nomination. Hill is currently acting chair of the FDIC, which is tasked with insuring bank deposits in The United States. All 13 Republicans on the committee voted for his nomination, while all 11 Democrats on the committee voted no, pausing to say, grow the fuck up. It's not that I like Travis Hill. I don't know a damn thing about Travis Hill, but this is clearly a vote where everybody that's on the side of Trump, or at least in that party, voted along party lines, and everybody that hates Trump and hates the Republicans voted on their party lines.
This is a signal of being a 12 year old juvenile. You cannot tell me that every single Republican voted yes because they think Travis Hill is awesome. And you cannot tell me that every single Democrat voted no because they have fundamental disagreements with Travis Hill, his abilities, his cognition, his math. Bullshit. It's bullshit. And I'm honestly sick of these fucking people. We have just allowed the sickest, most ridiculous. It's you know, they always said that that, politics that Hollywood was where good looking people from high school went. Politics is where the ugly sons of bitches went. The geeks, the guys the people that were wearing headgear as a sophomore because their jaws were all jacked, whatever.
What would I be like, the the goons, the nerds, the geeks, the people that are, like, zits all over their face. Right? They go that's that's sort of the the trope, if you will. But a lot of these people, like, for instance, Hillary Clinton, when she was young, I'm sorry, dude. Chick was hot. She was. Go look go look at her when she was in college at the I think she went to University of Chicago. I think that's where she met Bill Clinton at. By the way, spook school, but that's that's a different story altogether. She's a good looking woman.
She was a good looking woman when she was first lady at the White House. I don't know what the hell happened to her. She looks like I think she's I think she got herself into the darkest, deepest pits while she was inhabiting, you know, Washington DC and at probably in in, Lou was it Alabama? I can't remember. Kentucky. No. It was the but Kentucky. Was it where Arkansas? Gov when he was governor of Arkansas and they were married, maybe she was getting into some you know, well, actually, I know that they were getting into some funky shit back there. After a while, that kinda evil, you can it it'll it'll mess your body up, and that's probably why she looks the way she looks now. But back then, back in the day, that was a beautiful woman. Right? So it's not exactly true, but you can see where the trope comes from. Right?
These people that go there, I I I'm suggesting here that it's not their physical attributes that get them there. It's this the way that they were treated in high school maybe program them to where they go to Washington, and it's really just a place where it can be all about them. And that's what we have in Washington now. It's all about them, and it's nothing about us. And that's not what was supposed to happen, was it? Well, we can blame ourselves for this shit. Our apathy in letting other people tell us who we get to vote for is the first place that my train of bullshit stops. Who the fuck tells us who we could vote? Here's, like, here's your choices. Who gets to make those?
And why are we not yelling at the top of our lungs that you don't get I'll put what I will put vote for whoever I damn well please and don't say write in. You you can just write it in. No. No. That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying the way that these people are marketed as your choices preprogram anybody who actually watches the fucking news thinks that that's the only choices they have regardless of what's on the write in ballot or that there there's a write in place on the ballot. What we're being presented with from NPR to CNN to Fox News to any other major media outlet, we are given these are your choices. And we just say, okay.
There's no pushback at all. Our apathy is so complete that we'll just think anything we're told is true. These are your seven choices. The presidential debates are starting, and here's your 14 people. I'm pretty sure there's more than 14 people that are qualified for that job. But no. No. Sorry. I didn't mean to go off on that much of a tangent, but this is bullshit. 13 Republicans, all of them voted yes. 11 Democrats, all of them voted no. Clearly along party lines, our best interests are not being represented. That should be clear even at the level of picking an FDIC chair.
Over the past year, Hill has said that the agency is actively working on a new direction on digital assets policy. And in particular, he is focused on reputational risk and has said that banking regulators should not use reputational risks as a way for supervisory criticism. In March, the FDIC took steps to put an end to reputational risk following criticism from some in the crypto industry who say they have been blocked from key financial services. In an earlier hearing in October, Hill got some heat from senator John Kennedy, when he asked about former FDIC chair Martin Gruenberg. Gruenberg announced plans to step down last year following the release of an independent investigation that found continued discrimination, bullying, as well as sexual harassment at the agency. Really?
We're still doing this? Anyway, Kennedy said he had not heard from Hill about next steps and asked Hill to send a report about what's been done at the FDIC since. Hill said that he would. Okay, man. Quote, you better because I'm gonna tell you, I'm not sure I'm gonna vote for you, Kennedy said at the time. Holy crap. Kennedy later said that he would confirm Hill after receiving the report and said that he was indeed satisfied with the agency's progress. So I guess he'll went in there and kick some people in the ass. Who knows? Still, the only thing about this story that is, you know, interesting is the fact that we may get a permanent FDIC chair and the fact that we have little kids running our lives. And it's sad, and we should blame ourselves as much as anybody else. Alright. Gnoster Wallet Connect unlocks brand new features for Bitcoin wallets without regulatory friction.
This is from lightning.news. The Bitcoin lightning network has solved the scalability problem. But a new challenge emerged. How can applications integrate payments without becoming regulated financial intermediaries? Nostril Wallet Connect provides an elegant solution that enables sophisticated payment features while remaining outside the scope of traditional financial regulations. So what is Nasr Wallet Connect? Well, it's an open protocol, open source, open, open, open protocol that allows Lightning wallets to connect to any application through a standardized interface.
And unlike traditional payment integrations, Nostra Wallet Connect operates as a pure communication layer, enabling sustained interaction between Bitcoin Lightning wallets and applications via Nostra relays. The protocol uses end to end encrypted direct messages over Nostra relays to facilitate communication between a client application and a wallet service. When a user wishes to make a payment, their application sends an encrypted payment request through Nostr relays to their connected wallet, which then authorizes or rejects the transaction directly.
So the features that NWC or Nostra Wallet Connect enables. First, universal wallet integration. Then recurring payments and subscriptions. Seamless in application payments, then payment gateway infrastructure. So a little bit about the regulatory arbitrage here. The most revolutionary aspect of NWC is not really technical, it's regulatory. By architecting payments as a communication protocol rather than a custody or intermediation service, Nasr WalletConnect enables payment features that would traditionally require extensive licensing and compliance infrastructures.
In both the European Union under Mica, markets and crypto assets regulation, and The United States under the money transmission laws, entities that provide certain payment services must obtain licenses, maintain substantial capital reserves, and comply with extensive AML KYC requirements. Micah directly regulates custodial wallet providers who provide custody and administration of crypto assets on behalf of third parties. In The United States, money transmitters must register with FinCEN and acquire licenses in every state they wish to operate, typically requiring around $8,000,000 in surety bonds and $100,000 in application fees.
Pausing to say my question is, is that for every state or all the states put together? That's not answered here. Anyway, the regulatory trigger is clear. If you receive hold or transmit funds on behalf of others, you're operating a regulated financial services. So this is how NWC sidesteps all those requirements. Its architecture is fundamentally avoiding the activities that trigger regulatory classification. First, there is no custody. Because at no point does the NWC protocol or any application that uses it gain any amount of control at all over funds or the private keys controlling those funds.
The protocol operates with zero custody architecture where no user funds are held by the app. There's also no intermediation. The applications don't receive funds and then distribute them. Instead, they send a simple encrypted payment request that users' wallets execute directly. The funds flow peer to peer via the Lightning Network, never touching the application's infrastructure. We're all we're treating all of the these payment requests as basically hot potatoes. Nobody wants to touch it because the second you touch it, you're in trouble, unless you're the sole owner of the funds being transferred or the one receiving it.
This is actually kinda beautiful the way that they're describing it. There's also user controlled authorization. Payment authorization happens wallet side, not application side. Users and only users maintain complete control through their self custodial wallets, whether running on their own nodes or using trusted wallet providers. Pure communications layer functions as communication infrastructure, similar to how email protocols facilitate message delivery without reading or storing contents. Okay. Hold on. Did have you seen Gmail? You know they're reading every single email. Right?
Just just just yes. Yes. Gmail reads every single thing. ProtonMail, I don't know. Probably not. But Gmail, yeah. So I think this is a this is a a bad sentence here. But the protocol transmits payment requests and responses to those payment requests and nothing more. Micah notably excludes from its scope undertakings that provide crypto asset services in a fully decentralized manner without enter in any intermediary. Unhosted self custodial wallets are not directly regulated under MICA currently. Yeah. Good luck if they try. Similarly, US money transmission laws define the regulated activity as receiving funds for the purpose of transmitting them to another place or person. If you never receive the funds, if they flow directly from payer to payee via lightning channels, you're not transmitting money in the legal sense.
So this now creates a clear distinction. A traditional payment processor basically receives funds and then holds those funds and then distributes those funds. That requires licensing. NWC enabled services, however, sends a payment request. The user wallet pays that request directly. The service never touches funds. It's a communication service. It is not a payment service, therefore, no license required. And by the way, might I add that my interpretation, at least in The United States, is that this is a first amendment issue. Good luck trying to regulate that because the first amendment is a free speech.
Part of it is not only is it free association with people that you wanna associate with, you can say whatever the hell you want. We already have multiple layers of precedence around the first amendment when it comes to things like code. Yes, I know. I'm I'm thinking about the guys at Samurai and and and Whirlpool and all those guys. I I get it. But cryptography, I think it was it ninth circuit court of appeals is where we finally found out from the federal government at that level, at the ninth circuit. It never went to the Supreme Court. But in the eighties and the early nineties, when the government was saying, you can't use cryptography because it's a it is a munition, and you certainly can't transport messages that were encrypted with cryptography across the state or United States boundaries because it is the export of munitions.
Cryptography won that case, and it was under the first amendment. Me sending you a message saying that I require payment, and I use, let's say, seven services that it has to go through, but all I'm sending is a message and no funds are ever sent, only you owe me this and here's where you pay. That is freedom of speech. That is a first amendment issue, and anybody that goes after it is a loser. The case would be a loser. It's impossible. That's why Nasr Wallet Connect is such a critical part of not only the Bitcoin infrastructure, Lightning infrastructure, Nasr infrastructure, but as a proving ground that there's nobody required to be in my business when I'm simply sending somebody an invoice.
The NWC ecosystem has grown to encompass over 80 integrated services across multiple categories, content monetization, subscription services, gaming and digital goods, and donation platforms. Beyond the regulatory benefits, NWC offers technical advantages that traditional payment integration struggle to match, like interoperability, speed, privacy, resilience. For developers, Nostra Wallet Connect represents a paradigm shift in payment integration and complexities. Traditional payment processor integration requires lengthy approval processes and due diligence, complex compliance and reporting, maintenance of PCI DSS standards for card payments, multi jurisdictional licensing for international operations, and substantial capital reserves and insurance requirements NWC integration requires implementing the open protocol spec connecting to nonster relays and handling encrypted messages exchange That's it The reduction in friction is dramatic.
The developer can implement sophisticated payment features in days rather than months without legal consultations about licensing requirements or compliance obligations. But there's always a caveat. While Nostra WalletConnect's current regulatory positioning appears favorable, several important caveats apply. There is an evolving regulatory landscape. Dude, shit can change. Wallet provider regulations. For the wallet providers that use natural wallet connect, their shit can change too. Then there's jurisdictional variations.
And the use cases, why are you using it? Hey, I may be sending you a message about, hey, I require payment and sure, AMC k y or AML k y c and all that shit doesn't apply for all the reasons we listed, but if I'm re if I am requiring payment for an illegal good or service, Well, now that changes shit now, doesn't it? Because that's not no longer a free speech issue. Like, if I'm requiring payment because I herded 40 people over the border and they're all gonna be sex workers now or something really terrible, then that that supersede that kinda supersedes free speech because other people are going to be harmed.
Right? It's illegal. Like, my like, me selling drugs to school kids is not protected free speech. I'm engaging in a physical activity that is probably going to harm somebody. Alright? So it doesn't supersede the first amendment on that one. So use cases matter. And clearly, none of this is legal advice. They have to put that in there. But dude, if you haven't really looked at Nostril Wallet Connect, you're missing out. I use Albi. Those are the guys that did Nostra Wallet Connect, by the way. The people over at Albi, Albi Go, whatever you wanna say, you know, call them anymore. They've kinda changed their, you know, the they even changed their, they're no longer they're they're, what do they call it? Their their brand is no longer a little b. It's something else. So they've done some changes internally, but they're the guys that developed Nostra Wallet Connect, and they basically gave it to everybody.
They just said, hey. We developed this entire infrastructure of, you know, payment messaging. Here. Use it. And 80 different applications and wallets and all kinds of stuff are using it. It's Nostra Wallet Connect ecosystem is huge. And if you make zaps on nostr, there's a very good chance that either you or somebody receiving the zap that you send on nostr is going through the wallet connect infrastructure and ecosystem. Alright. Let's get on to Kenya, where the new crypto law faces a stress test as bitcoin ATMs begin to appear in malls. Ezra Reguera from Cointelegraph.
Bitcoin ATMs were spotted across major shopping malls in Nairobi days after Kenya implemented its first comprehensive cryptocurrency law, creating an immediate stress test for regulators who claimed that no crypto provider is yet authorized to operate. Local media outlet, Capital News, reported that several major malls across Nairobi had new machines branded bankless Bitcoin installed beside traditional banking kiosks offering cash to crypto services to all the locals. This is not the first time Kenya has since seen Bitcoin ATMs. In 2018, the East African reported that ATM provider, BitClub, installed Bitcoin ATMs in Nairobi, although adoption remained minimal and the devices did not reach mainstream retail spaces.
Coin ATM radar data indicates that there are currently only two reported Bitcoin ATMs in Kenya. The arrival of those ATMs comes just weeks after Kenya's virtual asset service providers act of 2025 came into effect. On November 4, Kenya implemented its first formal licensing framework for wallet operators, exchanges, custodians, and other crypto platforms. Under the new law, the Central Bank of Kenya will be responsible for overseeing payment and custody functions. In contrast, the capital markets authority will regulate investment and trading activities.
While the law is in effect, the regulations required to initiate licensing of VASPs have not yet been issued. And that means that providers are currently operating without the licenses. They're it's illegal. In a joint notice issued on Tuesday, the CBK and the CMA stated that neither regulator has licensed a single v a s p under the new laws to operate in or from Kenya. The regulators warned that companies claiming authorization are doing so illegally. Currently, CBK and CMA have not licensed any VASPs under the act to operate in or from Kenya, the central bank said, adding that the national treasury is already developing and then will issue regulations that determine when the licensing can actually start.
The situation creates a mismatch. On the one hand, visible crypto infrastructure is entering mainstream retail spaces, excuse me, while regulators are warning that public, the public that no operator has any authorization whatsoever. So it raises questions about how enforcement occurs and the compliance of crypto businesses in that country. The arrival of Bitcoin ATMs in high end malls signals that Kenya's informal crypto ecosystem is expanding despite operating in regulatory gray areas. Capital News reported that while Bitcoin ATMs are only just starting to reach more upscale malls, Bitcoin usage has flourished in lower income neighborhoods such as Kibera, where people use BTC as a form of banking.
Quote, in many cases, people in Kibera do not have an opportunity to secure their lives with normal savings. Afrobit Africa cofounder Ronnie Maduada told the local outlet. I butchered that name, by the way. He said that with Bitcoin, residents can hold value without documentation and banking paperwork, which he said was financial freedom for people living on $1 a day. So there you go. Kenya has got Bitcoin ATMs and malls in Nairobi. They're clearly illegal because there's no licensing has been actually set forth for any of these guys. It'll be interesting to see how Kenya authorities react.
There's only two of them according to according to this. There's only two ATMs. So what happens? You know, which way Kenyan man? You you gonna are you gonna force the removal of the ATMs or you just gonna go, you know what? Dude, there's two of them. They're in the mall. Who's gonna use them? Let's find out. I don't know. It it'll be interesting to see how they react totally. Alright. So that's it. I wow. It was a longer show than I thought it was gonna be today, probably because I was ranting too much. But, hey, it happens.
I'll see you on the other side. This has been Bitcoin, and and I'm your host, David Bennett. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and hope to see you again real soon. Have a great day.
It is 08:37AM Pacific Standard Time. It is the November 2025, and this is episode twelve fourteen of Bitcoin, and that sounds like some kind of weird police code. Hey. Calling all cops. It's a 12:14 out there. One thing that I can say about today's show is it is gonna be definitely much shorter than normal. We're gonna talk about, regulators allowing banks to hold crypto, and then we're gonna talk about another bank. This one everybody knows, HSBC. They're we're gonna talk about, tokenized deposits again and HSBC. I'm telling you, we cannot just close our eyes and bury our heads in the sands about tokenized deposits because they are here, and they are gonna get much bigger than they are already.
Kraken has filed for something. We're gonna find out what for, but one thing that it is is pretty big news. Senate banking panel is advancing a Trump pick for someone to, you know, sit in a chair and sign things and reach for stuff. And then there's some Nostril Wallet Connect news that we're gonna get into, and then we're gonna run over to the continent of Africa and the country of Kenya. But first, let's start with this one. US regulator has allowed banks to hold crypto for blockchain fees. I have no idea what that means. Micah Zimmerman from Bitcoin Magazine, please help me out.
The US office of the comptroller of the currency has given national banks the green light to hold crypto on their balance sheets for the purpose of play paying blockchain network fees. The guidance issued in interpretive letter letter number 1186 today also allows banks to keep crypto on hand to test internal and third party crypto platforms. Blockchain networks require native tokens to process transactions. These fees, often called gas fees, are unavoidable. The OCC said banks can hold the tokens they reasonably anticipate needing.
This could include paying fees as part of crypto custody services or facilitating client transactions. The goal is to reduce reliance on third party providers and lower operational risk. Quote, paying network fees is a necessary part of doing business on blockchain networks, the OCC said. Holding crypto for this purpose is permissible when it supports otherwise lawful banking activities, end quote. The guidance emphasizes that these activities are incidental to the business of banking. That phrase has weight in regulatory language.
That phrase they're talking about is, quote, incidental to the business of banking. It means banks can do it legally as long as the activity helps them serve customers or operate efficiently. The OCC even drew parallels to historical banking practices like holding foreign currency, bank notes, or shares and payment systems to facilitate transactions. In other words, banks have already needed to hold certain assets to do their business. Crypto is just the latest form. Banks are expected to manage risks carefully. They must track operation, markets, liquidity, cybersecurity, and legal risks. The amount of crypto held should remain minimal relative to the bank's capital.
The letter comes under the leadership of comptroller Jonathan Gould, a Trump appointee confirmed back in July. And under his tenure, the OCC has become more crypto friendly. Earlier guidance allowed banks to act as nodes on blockchain networks, offer crypto custody services, and work with stablecoins. Meanwhile, broader rules for stablecoin issuers under the Genius Act are still being drafted. But the OCC's move signals that US regulators are already willing to let banks participate in cryptocurrency safely and efficiently. It's it's it's safe and effective, y'all. It's like a shot in the arm. Have you gotten your 12 booster shots yet? Well, don't. I'm just saying. As more banks explore digital assets, this guidance could accelerate adoption. It bridges traditional finance and blockchain, giving banks a clearer path to integrate crypto into everyday operations.
And earlier this year, the OCC issued guidance in interpretive letter number eleven eighty four, allowing national banks and federal savings associations to offer cryptocurrency custody and trading services. So, essentially, banks can buy and sell digital assets on behalf of customers. They can outsource crypto activities to third parties, and now provide related services like record keeping, tax reporting, and compliance. This is a lot larger issue than I think we're giving it credit for because we're being distracted by price action. And the woah and dismay that everybody, you know, feels in the market, this is important.
At this point, United States regulated banks are 100% able to swim in the waters that just last year, just last year, completely unallowed to do, or at least that was their interpretation of all laws because there was no clarity. And now things have become so much more clear that they're able to do pretty much everything that Kraken can do or Binance can do. Almost. I mean, almost. But, dude, the the the walls that that keep those two entities apart, banking and crypto exchanges are dissolving, and they're dissolving real fast. And, honestly, I think this was always going this was always gonna happen, but this was always part of the plan of people like Jamie Dimon pushing back so hard against Bitcoin so that it could buy them time because they realized they made a mistake when they spent ten years pointing at us and laughing instead of wrapping their heads around this issue.
They thought that they could wish it away. They thought that they could laugh it away. They thought that they could regulate it away, but now the tables have turned. And banks now, one year later, are in a completely different operational environment, and it's probably going to continue. So HSBC, massive bank. They are going to bring tokenized deposits to United States and The United Arab Emirates as the stablecoin race heats up. Alright. The two huge financial markets, The United States and The UAE. Helen Parts from Cointelegraph. Global mega bank HSBC is doubling down on tokenization over stablecoins as global banks rush to keep pace in the stablecoin race. HSBC Holdings will stop start offering tokenized deposits to its corporate clients in The United States and The United Arab Emirates in the 2026.
That's just next year, according to Bloomberg. The tokenized deposit service by HSBC enables clients to send money domestically and abroad in seconds around the clock, said Manish Kohli, HSBC's global head of payment solutions, quote, the topic of tokenization, stablecoins, digital money, and digital currencies has obviously gathered so much momentum, we are making big bets in this space, Kohli said. Tokenized deposits are digital representations of bank deposits issued on a blockchain by regulated banks, allowing for instant twenty four seven transfers and programmable payments. Unlike stablecoins, which are often linked to fiat currencies like the US dollar and backed by assets like government debt, deposit tokens are created using the issuer's balance sheets.
While stablecoin issuers like Circle and Tether are not allowed to pay yields on stablecoin holdings by users, Tokenized deposits offer interest payouts among their key features. Let's pause and remember all of the banking lobby groups in The United States that have been and will continue to and are, on this very day, begging regulatory commissions around the world, especially in The United States, to not allow Tether to be able to offer yield on stablecoin holdings. This is the only thing these banks can come up with to be able to fight where they are right now. And, by the way, they're probably gonna be fairly successful at it. They will definitely be able to compete.
Right? Plus, they're bringing with it, you know, anywhere between decades or hundreds of years of name recognition, you know, brand recognition. So the fight heats up, and we'll see how, you know, Tether and and Circle respond. But continuing with this, according to Coley, HSBC plans to expand the use cases of tokenized deposits and programmable payments and autonomous treasuries or systems that deploy automation and AI to independently manage cash and liquidity risk. Nearly every large company that we have a conversation with, we are seeing a big theme around treasury transformation, the HSBC executive said.
The products expansion in The US and The UAE is the latest by HSBC following its debut of the offering in Hong Kong back in May with Ant International becoming the very first client to utilize the TDS solution. That's that tokenized deposit service. The bank has since expanded the offering in multiple markets, including Singapore, The United Kingdom, and Luxembourg. HSBC's choice to move forward with tokenized deposits comes amid major banks like JPMorgan doubling down on the technology. On November 12, JPMorgan rolled out JPM Coin, which you heard about here on the Bitcoin and podcast, a deposit token representing US dollar deposits at the bank.
The company opposed the token to traditional stablecoins with JPM Morgan's blockchain executive, Naveen Malaha Malala, whatever, highlighting that deposit tokens operate within traditional banking frameworks. While pushing tokenized deposits, HSBC does not rule out the potential issuance of a stablecoin. Quote, it's something that we would continue to evaluate. There are a few things that need to happen, which is the legal framework needs to be clear according to Coley. So that's the end of that article, and the gravity of this should should impact you because HSBC is arguably one of the largest, probably, top three banks in the world.
Most likely top three. It's it is a bank that has enough gravity that it can swing markets a long way just by wagging its little tail. So now they are fully embracing tokenized deposits outside of their, you know, markets that they're very much used to, and they're getting into now going into The UAE and The United States. I mean, Singapore, yeah, we get that. Hong Kong, yeah, we get that. But The United States UAE, yeah, I could almost see it. They they've got a lot of hooks and, you know, hooks into UAE. They've and, yes, they've got hooks into The United States. It's It's not like that we don't do banking with HSBC here in The States.
I'm just saying that this is a service that they are now offering to The United States and The UAE, and it solidifies the fact of what I was saying earlier. Banks, the walls between them, and the world that we've inhabited for well over a decade are dissolving and they're dissolving fast. And they're bringing with it decades, if not centuries, worth of brand recognition and the ability to well and and they're they're bringing all of their networking. All the people that the bankers know, all their friends, all the people that they go to fancy parties with and, you know, put on fancy tuxedos and spats.
If you remember what a spat is, then spats and monocles and top hats and walking around the lovely ladies holding their chilled martini glasses. This is the kind of bullshit that we're gonna have to deal with. They're getting in and they're getting in fast. So just be prepared to deal with it. Now on to oshigood.us, it is the circle p. It is open for business, and it's where I bring plebs with goods and services just like you to plebs just like you who want to buy, say, goods and services in Bitcoin. If you're not selling your goods and services in Bitcoin, you're not in the circle p, oshigood.us is definitely in the circle p of the spotlight vendor of the day. Oshigood.us, that's oshigood.us.
And he's got what does he got today? He's got some stuff in stock today. Let's find out. Let's go over here. Oh, good old fashioned hotel butter. Now this isn't the the one with the coffee in it. This is just his regular base hotel butter. It's made from ground up pecans. It's got maple sugar, sea salt flakes, cinnamon, and black pepper. This stuff is freaking awesome. I've got I've got the you know, well, I had the coffee version before my wife ate it all on toast. Next time I order from Oshi, it's gonna be basically be this stuff. But oshi good dot u s, you can buy this for Satoshis. If I remember right, Oshi only sells his goods and services in Satoshis because, well, we're trying to kick start a Bitcoin economy. And with these banks running around like they're running around, we need to really double down on learning how to use Bitcoin for one of its primary intended purposes, money.
I give you Satoshis. You give me huddle butter from oshigood.us. That's oshigood.us. Use the coupon code bitcoin and so that Oshi knows that I made a sale for him and then Oshi can decide whether or not to get me back on the other side with whatever he feels that sale was worth in the form of Bitcoin, because that's how the value for value advertising model works here in the circle p on the Bitcoin and podcast. 0shegood.us0shegood.us. Remember to use the code Bitcoin. And crypto exchange, Kraken, has filed for their IPO following a successful $800,000,000 raise.
Decrypt.co, Sander Lutz is writing. Kraken filed to go public on Wednesday, the cryptocurrency exchange said, just hours after announcing a massive fundraising round, which has valued the company at $20,000,000,000. The company said it confidentially submitted a draft s one registration form with the SEC to make an initial public offering on Wall Street. Kraken said it has not yet determined the number of shares it plans to offer nor the anticipated price range for those shares. It added that it expects the IPO to take place soon. Soon, t m, like two weeks, t m, as the SEC completes its review process, and it's all subject to market conditions, of course. The move has been widely anticipated all the way since March when the SEC under Trump administration's control dropped a lawsuit against Kraken over its staking services.
Then in the following months, reports circulated that the crypto exchange was aiming to raise hundreds of millions of dollars ahead of some public offering. Well, on Tuesday, the deal materialized. A whopping $800,000,000 of fundraising led by major traditional finance players, including Ken Griffin's Citadel, which valued Kraken at $20,000,000,000. The Wyoming based exchange said the new funds will fuel a global expansion into territories well beyond The United States. Prior to president Donald Trump's return to office in January, Coinbase was the only crypto exchange trading publicly on Wall Street.
In a year of frenzied crypto related activity in traditional finance, other exchanges, including Gemini and Bullish, have both successfully made IPOs or initial public offerings. While those offerings initially blasted past Wall Street expectations largely on crypto related hype, They have since fizzled. Bullish, which blasted past a $118 per share during its August IPO, has since cratered, as everything else has, to $35.66. Gemini, meanwhile, rattled by a poor q three performance, has seen its own stock decline significantly from its September Wall Street debut.
It's now down over 68% to $11.70 at writing. Well, everybody is having a bad day, and we'll get into more of it when we run the numbers. CNBC futures and commodities, energy not having a good day. Brent North Sea is down two and a third percent to $63.34. West Texas Intermediate down damn near two and a half percent to $59.25. But on the upside, we always have to have the hedge that is natural gas, which is up four and a quarter points to $4.55 per thousand cubic feet. Gasoline is down three and a third to a buck 93 a gallon in Murbaughn crude itself finds finds it itself in the red at 2.38%.
It is now chilling out at $64.84. One thing that is going on is that tomorrow, we have FOMAC minutes. This is one of the reasons why we're getting a price depression on on Bitcoin today. It's why markets are rattled. Everybody always does this. The day before the FOMC meeting minutes are presented to the public, we have a sell off in in in the broader markets because no we what we're doing here is we're feeling the effects of a bunch of people who get paid, literally get paid to see how Jerome Powell is dressed, what color his suit is, what color his tie is, what his body language is, how he says certain sentences, what those sentences contain as vocabulary and grammar, and the intonation.
I shit you not. All of the it's not really as much what he says as much as how he says it. Both of them together play the message that we're gonna get tomorrow when the FOMAC minutes comes out. That's why we're seeing most of the bullshit that we're seeing today, price action across all markets, whether it's Bitcoin or not. And it always happens. It always will happen. Just be aware this is always a sort of a sell the news event kind of thing. So just understand, Foback Minutes come out tomorrow, and everybody is pretty much I think everybody is pretty much firmly plant has their feet planted that Jerome Powell is still going to be using rather hawkish language, and we are not going to feel good about getting another point 25% Fed rate cut come December.
And that language will probably be reflected tomorrow during the minutes, and that's one of the reasons why you're seeing market sell off, including in metals. I mean, it's mostly in the green, but palladium is down 1.6%. Gold is up point 17%, but still it's just $4,073 and 6 dimes. So it's not it's sort of flat, you know, a little bit. Platinum is down a third. Silver's up point one seven as well to fifty sixty, and copper is up point 41%. Ag is all in the red, except for sugar, which is unchanged. But, man, talk about a hit. We're talk we're looking at chocolate being the biggest loser, but but by six full percentage points, coffee's down 2.6, soybeans down one and a quarter. I mean, it sounds to me like some agricultural trade deals might have gone sideways, and I don't know about it because I haven't heard about it yet. But lumber's down three and, three and a half. Corn is down one and a half. Wow. I mean, everything is just getting freaking lunched.
Live cattle, also not doing well this morning. 2.2% to the downside. Lean hogs, however, are up point eight three. Feeder cattle down 1.77%. S and P is in the green by point one three. Nasdaq is up a third of a point, but the Dow is down a third of a point, and the S and P Mini is down by a quarter. And, of course, we have Bitcoin, which is doing $89,970. We're now at a $1,790,000,000,000 market cap. We can only purchase two point or 22.1 ounces of shiny metal rocks with our one Bitcoin, of which there are 19,950,763.66 of an average fees per block or low 0.02.
BTC taking the fees on a per block basis. It's about 35 blocks carrying 42,000 unconfirmed transactions waiting to clear at high priority rates of three sats per vbyte. Low priority gets you in at one. Still in Zeta Hash range, so the miners aren't unplugging their machines. Through all of this, the miners are not unplugging their machines. You gotta ask yourself why. We are still at 1.08 zeta hashes per second on the hash rate, which represents the amount of machine power securing the Bitcoin network. This number tells me it's very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very secure. I mean, shit, man. In in July, yeah, I'll just pick July 1.
The hash rate was 794 x of hashes per second. So it would be point seven nine zed of hashes per second, and we're up pretty much well above one. And we haven't come back down in weeks, especially the weeks that have contained this sell off. So you gotta kinda wonder what's going on with the miners that they're not unplugging their machines and going all in on AI. From Mel Salvador Eats, yesterday's episode of Bitcoin and I got bit gust too. Wow. 15,000 sat says, here's another brother. I haven't been able to donate on my fountain app for a few months for whatever reason. Keep up the good work. Thank you, BitGus. I will. Jason High with seven seven seven says, thanks for the news that we can use. You are welcome, sir. KT 1,200 sat says, very interesting that my first Bitcoin that has grassroots in El Salvador spoke out against the government's BTC reserve benefiting its citizens.
I I remember that. This very shortly after announcing that they would no longer be headquartered in the country. Curious what the rift is there. That's a thank you, KT, for connecting those two points. That is true. They have, like, basically shuttered their headquarters in El Salvador, and they have gone global. Maybe we should be looking at El Salvador a little bit more cautiously. There's no reason not to be cautious. It doesn't it doesn't mean that everything's gonna die. It just means, hey, look. If you're walking on the rim of the Grand Canyon, you might wanna watch where you're going.
That's all I'm saying. KT with another 500, I guess. Oh, so he looks like he donated twice with the exact same thing, so he may have had a failure on the first one. KT, I appreciate the total of 1,700 sats. Perma Nerd with two ten says, hello, sir. There is an online market on Friday, the twenty first, from six to seven Central Standard Time. It is Bitcoin only, and we'll feature some Circle p vendors. Come by and let us know what you heard or that you heard it on Bitcoin and podcast. Check with at the bullish Bitcoiner for more details. That's the bullish Bitcoiner at the bullish Bitcoiner at the bullish Bitcoiner.
Probably that on both Noster as well as x. So just understand that. I appreciate that, Perminer. Again, that's Friday, the twenty first, from six to seven Central Standard Time. Friday, the twenty first, that's would be this Friday. Yeah. This Friday from six to seven Central Standard Time, Circle P vendors will be there. Contact at the bullish Bitcoiner at the bullish Bitcoiner. Nick Dose with the +1 06 says approximately 33 times the area of El Salvador can fit within Texas. There you go. El Salvador covers about 21,040 square kilometers or 8,124 square miles, while Texas spans approximately 696,241 square kilometers or 286,597 square miles. This means that nearly 33 El Salvadors could fit inside Texas based on land area. That is awesome. Thank you, dude. Nick Dose with another +1 05 says, cheers.
And Nikaz 210 says, live aloha with yeah. With 210. Oh, Buced coming from bit gust two again. He gives me another 5,000 sats due. Thank you. I appreciate it. Pies with +1 21 says thank you, sir. No thank you. That's the weather report. Welcome to part two of the news that you can use Senate Banking Paddle Panel Paddle. It's it's an S and M session over here, man. Session Banking Panel advances Trump's FDIC pick of Travis Hill as agency shifts its crypto approach, Sarah Wynne, writing this one from the block. President Donald Trump's pick to lead the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation or FDIC is headed to a full senate vote after lawmakers voted to push through Travis Hill's nomination.
So the bank the senate banking committee voted 13 to 11 on Wednesday to have Travis Hill chair the FDIC. Next, the full senate will vote on his nomination. Hill is currently acting chair of the FDIC, which is tasked with insuring bank deposits in The United States. All 13 Republicans on the committee voted for his nomination, while all 11 Democrats on the committee voted no, pausing to say, grow the fuck up. It's not that I like Travis Hill. I don't know a damn thing about Travis Hill, but this is clearly a vote where everybody that's on the side of Trump, or at least in that party, voted along party lines, and everybody that hates Trump and hates the Republicans voted on their party lines.
This is a signal of being a 12 year old juvenile. You cannot tell me that every single Republican voted yes because they think Travis Hill is awesome. And you cannot tell me that every single Democrat voted no because they have fundamental disagreements with Travis Hill, his abilities, his cognition, his math. Bullshit. It's bullshit. And I'm honestly sick of these fucking people. We have just allowed the sickest, most ridiculous. It's you know, they always said that that, politics that Hollywood was where good looking people from high school went. Politics is where the ugly sons of bitches went. The geeks, the guys the people that were wearing headgear as a sophomore because their jaws were all jacked, whatever.
What would I be like, the the goons, the nerds, the geeks, the people that are, like, zits all over their face. Right? They go that's that's sort of the the trope, if you will. But a lot of these people, like, for instance, Hillary Clinton, when she was young, I'm sorry, dude. Chick was hot. She was. Go look go look at her when she was in college at the I think she went to University of Chicago. I think that's where she met Bill Clinton at. By the way, spook school, but that's that's a different story altogether. She's a good looking woman.
She was a good looking woman when she was first lady at the White House. I don't know what the hell happened to her. She looks like I think she's I think she got herself into the darkest, deepest pits while she was inhabiting, you know, Washington DC and at probably in in, Lou was it Alabama? I can't remember. Kentucky. No. It was the but Kentucky. Was it where Arkansas? Gov when he was governor of Arkansas and they were married, maybe she was getting into some you know, well, actually, I know that they were getting into some funky shit back there. After a while, that kinda evil, you can it it'll it'll mess your body up, and that's probably why she looks the way she looks now. But back then, back in the day, that was a beautiful woman. Right? So it's not exactly true, but you can see where the trope comes from. Right?
These people that go there, I I I'm suggesting here that it's not their physical attributes that get them there. It's this the way that they were treated in high school maybe program them to where they go to Washington, and it's really just a place where it can be all about them. And that's what we have in Washington now. It's all about them, and it's nothing about us. And that's not what was supposed to happen, was it? Well, we can blame ourselves for this shit. Our apathy in letting other people tell us who we get to vote for is the first place that my train of bullshit stops. Who the fuck tells us who we could vote? Here's, like, here's your choices. Who gets to make those?
And why are we not yelling at the top of our lungs that you don't get I'll put what I will put vote for whoever I damn well please and don't say write in. You you can just write it in. No. No. That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying the way that these people are marketed as your choices preprogram anybody who actually watches the fucking news thinks that that's the only choices they have regardless of what's on the write in ballot or that there there's a write in place on the ballot. What we're being presented with from NPR to CNN to Fox News to any other major media outlet, we are given these are your choices. And we just say, okay.
There's no pushback at all. Our apathy is so complete that we'll just think anything we're told is true. These are your seven choices. The presidential debates are starting, and here's your 14 people. I'm pretty sure there's more than 14 people that are qualified for that job. But no. No. Sorry. I didn't mean to go off on that much of a tangent, but this is bullshit. 13 Republicans, all of them voted yes. 11 Democrats, all of them voted no. Clearly along party lines, our best interests are not being represented. That should be clear even at the level of picking an FDIC chair.
Over the past year, Hill has said that the agency is actively working on a new direction on digital assets policy. And in particular, he is focused on reputational risk and has said that banking regulators should not use reputational risks as a way for supervisory criticism. In March, the FDIC took steps to put an end to reputational risk following criticism from some in the crypto industry who say they have been blocked from key financial services. In an earlier hearing in October, Hill got some heat from senator John Kennedy, when he asked about former FDIC chair Martin Gruenberg. Gruenberg announced plans to step down last year following the release of an independent investigation that found continued discrimination, bullying, as well as sexual harassment at the agency. Really?
We're still doing this? Anyway, Kennedy said he had not heard from Hill about next steps and asked Hill to send a report about what's been done at the FDIC since. Hill said that he would. Okay, man. Quote, you better because I'm gonna tell you, I'm not sure I'm gonna vote for you, Kennedy said at the time. Holy crap. Kennedy later said that he would confirm Hill after receiving the report and said that he was indeed satisfied with the agency's progress. So I guess he'll went in there and kick some people in the ass. Who knows? Still, the only thing about this story that is, you know, interesting is the fact that we may get a permanent FDIC chair and the fact that we have little kids running our lives. And it's sad, and we should blame ourselves as much as anybody else. Alright. Gnoster Wallet Connect unlocks brand new features for Bitcoin wallets without regulatory friction.
This is from lightning.news. The Bitcoin lightning network has solved the scalability problem. But a new challenge emerged. How can applications integrate payments without becoming regulated financial intermediaries? Nostril Wallet Connect provides an elegant solution that enables sophisticated payment features while remaining outside the scope of traditional financial regulations. So what is Nasr Wallet Connect? Well, it's an open protocol, open source, open, open, open protocol that allows Lightning wallets to connect to any application through a standardized interface.
And unlike traditional payment integrations, Nostra Wallet Connect operates as a pure communication layer, enabling sustained interaction between Bitcoin Lightning wallets and applications via Nostra relays. The protocol uses end to end encrypted direct messages over Nostra relays to facilitate communication between a client application and a wallet service. When a user wishes to make a payment, their application sends an encrypted payment request through Nostr relays to their connected wallet, which then authorizes or rejects the transaction directly.
So the features that NWC or Nostra Wallet Connect enables. First, universal wallet integration. Then recurring payments and subscriptions. Seamless in application payments, then payment gateway infrastructure. So a little bit about the regulatory arbitrage here. The most revolutionary aspect of NWC is not really technical, it's regulatory. By architecting payments as a communication protocol rather than a custody or intermediation service, Nasr WalletConnect enables payment features that would traditionally require extensive licensing and compliance infrastructures.
In both the European Union under Mica, markets and crypto assets regulation, and The United States under the money transmission laws, entities that provide certain payment services must obtain licenses, maintain substantial capital reserves, and comply with extensive AML KYC requirements. Micah directly regulates custodial wallet providers who provide custody and administration of crypto assets on behalf of third parties. In The United States, money transmitters must register with FinCEN and acquire licenses in every state they wish to operate, typically requiring around $8,000,000 in surety bonds and $100,000 in application fees.
Pausing to say my question is, is that for every state or all the states put together? That's not answered here. Anyway, the regulatory trigger is clear. If you receive hold or transmit funds on behalf of others, you're operating a regulated financial services. So this is how NWC sidesteps all those requirements. Its architecture is fundamentally avoiding the activities that trigger regulatory classification. First, there is no custody. Because at no point does the NWC protocol or any application that uses it gain any amount of control at all over funds or the private keys controlling those funds.
The protocol operates with zero custody architecture where no user funds are held by the app. There's also no intermediation. The applications don't receive funds and then distribute them. Instead, they send a simple encrypted payment request that users' wallets execute directly. The funds flow peer to peer via the Lightning Network, never touching the application's infrastructure. We're all we're treating all of the these payment requests as basically hot potatoes. Nobody wants to touch it because the second you touch it, you're in trouble, unless you're the sole owner of the funds being transferred or the one receiving it.
This is actually kinda beautiful the way that they're describing it. There's also user controlled authorization. Payment authorization happens wallet side, not application side. Users and only users maintain complete control through their self custodial wallets, whether running on their own nodes or using trusted wallet providers. Pure communications layer functions as communication infrastructure, similar to how email protocols facilitate message delivery without reading or storing contents. Okay. Hold on. Did have you seen Gmail? You know they're reading every single email. Right?
Just just just yes. Yes. Gmail reads every single thing. ProtonMail, I don't know. Probably not. But Gmail, yeah. So I think this is a this is a a bad sentence here. But the protocol transmits payment requests and responses to those payment requests and nothing more. Micah notably excludes from its scope undertakings that provide crypto asset services in a fully decentralized manner without enter in any intermediary. Unhosted self custodial wallets are not directly regulated under MICA currently. Yeah. Good luck if they try. Similarly, US money transmission laws define the regulated activity as receiving funds for the purpose of transmitting them to another place or person. If you never receive the funds, if they flow directly from payer to payee via lightning channels, you're not transmitting money in the legal sense.
So this now creates a clear distinction. A traditional payment processor basically receives funds and then holds those funds and then distributes those funds. That requires licensing. NWC enabled services, however, sends a payment request. The user wallet pays that request directly. The service never touches funds. It's a communication service. It is not a payment service, therefore, no license required. And by the way, might I add that my interpretation, at least in The United States, is that this is a first amendment issue. Good luck trying to regulate that because the first amendment is a free speech.
Part of it is not only is it free association with people that you wanna associate with, you can say whatever the hell you want. We already have multiple layers of precedence around the first amendment when it comes to things like code. Yes, I know. I'm I'm thinking about the guys at Samurai and and and Whirlpool and all those guys. I I get it. But cryptography, I think it was it ninth circuit court of appeals is where we finally found out from the federal government at that level, at the ninth circuit. It never went to the Supreme Court. But in the eighties and the early nineties, when the government was saying, you can't use cryptography because it's a it is a munition, and you certainly can't transport messages that were encrypted with cryptography across the state or United States boundaries because it is the export of munitions.
Cryptography won that case, and it was under the first amendment. Me sending you a message saying that I require payment, and I use, let's say, seven services that it has to go through, but all I'm sending is a message and no funds are ever sent, only you owe me this and here's where you pay. That is freedom of speech. That is a first amendment issue, and anybody that goes after it is a loser. The case would be a loser. It's impossible. That's why Nasr Wallet Connect is such a critical part of not only the Bitcoin infrastructure, Lightning infrastructure, Nasr infrastructure, but as a proving ground that there's nobody required to be in my business when I'm simply sending somebody an invoice.
The NWC ecosystem has grown to encompass over 80 integrated services across multiple categories, content monetization, subscription services, gaming and digital goods, and donation platforms. Beyond the regulatory benefits, NWC offers technical advantages that traditional payment integration struggle to match, like interoperability, speed, privacy, resilience. For developers, Nostra Wallet Connect represents a paradigm shift in payment integration and complexities. Traditional payment processor integration requires lengthy approval processes and due diligence, complex compliance and reporting, maintenance of PCI DSS standards for card payments, multi jurisdictional licensing for international operations, and substantial capital reserves and insurance requirements NWC integration requires implementing the open protocol spec connecting to nonster relays and handling encrypted messages exchange That's it The reduction in friction is dramatic.
The developer can implement sophisticated payment features in days rather than months without legal consultations about licensing requirements or compliance obligations. But there's always a caveat. While Nostra WalletConnect's current regulatory positioning appears favorable, several important caveats apply. There is an evolving regulatory landscape. Dude, shit can change. Wallet provider regulations. For the wallet providers that use natural wallet connect, their shit can change too. Then there's jurisdictional variations.
And the use cases, why are you using it? Hey, I may be sending you a message about, hey, I require payment and sure, AMC k y or AML k y c and all that shit doesn't apply for all the reasons we listed, but if I'm re if I am requiring payment for an illegal good or service, Well, now that changes shit now, doesn't it? Because that's not no longer a free speech issue. Like, if I'm requiring payment because I herded 40 people over the border and they're all gonna be sex workers now or something really terrible, then that that supersede that kinda supersedes free speech because other people are going to be harmed.
Right? It's illegal. Like, my like, me selling drugs to school kids is not protected free speech. I'm engaging in a physical activity that is probably going to harm somebody. Alright? So it doesn't supersede the first amendment on that one. So use cases matter. And clearly, none of this is legal advice. They have to put that in there. But dude, if you haven't really looked at Nostril Wallet Connect, you're missing out. I use Albi. Those are the guys that did Nostra Wallet Connect, by the way. The people over at Albi, Albi Go, whatever you wanna say, you know, call them anymore. They've kinda changed their, you know, the they even changed their, they're no longer they're they're, what do they call it? Their their brand is no longer a little b. It's something else. So they've done some changes internally, but they're the guys that developed Nostra Wallet Connect, and they basically gave it to everybody.
They just said, hey. We developed this entire infrastructure of, you know, payment messaging. Here. Use it. And 80 different applications and wallets and all kinds of stuff are using it. It's Nostra Wallet Connect ecosystem is huge. And if you make zaps on nostr, there's a very good chance that either you or somebody receiving the zap that you send on nostr is going through the wallet connect infrastructure and ecosystem. Alright. Let's get on to Kenya, where the new crypto law faces a stress test as bitcoin ATMs begin to appear in malls. Ezra Reguera from Cointelegraph.
Bitcoin ATMs were spotted across major shopping malls in Nairobi days after Kenya implemented its first comprehensive cryptocurrency law, creating an immediate stress test for regulators who claimed that no crypto provider is yet authorized to operate. Local media outlet, Capital News, reported that several major malls across Nairobi had new machines branded bankless Bitcoin installed beside traditional banking kiosks offering cash to crypto services to all the locals. This is not the first time Kenya has since seen Bitcoin ATMs. In 2018, the East African reported that ATM provider, BitClub, installed Bitcoin ATMs in Nairobi, although adoption remained minimal and the devices did not reach mainstream retail spaces.
Coin ATM radar data indicates that there are currently only two reported Bitcoin ATMs in Kenya. The arrival of those ATMs comes just weeks after Kenya's virtual asset service providers act of 2025 came into effect. On November 4, Kenya implemented its first formal licensing framework for wallet operators, exchanges, custodians, and other crypto platforms. Under the new law, the Central Bank of Kenya will be responsible for overseeing payment and custody functions. In contrast, the capital markets authority will regulate investment and trading activities.
While the law is in effect, the regulations required to initiate licensing of VASPs have not yet been issued. And that means that providers are currently operating without the licenses. They're it's illegal. In a joint notice issued on Tuesday, the CBK and the CMA stated that neither regulator has licensed a single v a s p under the new laws to operate in or from Kenya. The regulators warned that companies claiming authorization are doing so illegally. Currently, CBK and CMA have not licensed any VASPs under the act to operate in or from Kenya, the central bank said, adding that the national treasury is already developing and then will issue regulations that determine when the licensing can actually start.
The situation creates a mismatch. On the one hand, visible crypto infrastructure is entering mainstream retail spaces, excuse me, while regulators are warning that public, the public that no operator has any authorization whatsoever. So it raises questions about how enforcement occurs and the compliance of crypto businesses in that country. The arrival of Bitcoin ATMs in high end malls signals that Kenya's informal crypto ecosystem is expanding despite operating in regulatory gray areas. Capital News reported that while Bitcoin ATMs are only just starting to reach more upscale malls, Bitcoin usage has flourished in lower income neighborhoods such as Kibera, where people use BTC as a form of banking.
Quote, in many cases, people in Kibera do not have an opportunity to secure their lives with normal savings. Afrobit Africa cofounder Ronnie Maduada told the local outlet. I butchered that name, by the way. He said that with Bitcoin, residents can hold value without documentation and banking paperwork, which he said was financial freedom for people living on $1 a day. So there you go. Kenya has got Bitcoin ATMs and malls in Nairobi. They're clearly illegal because there's no licensing has been actually set forth for any of these guys. It'll be interesting to see how Kenya authorities react.
There's only two of them according to according to this. There's only two ATMs. So what happens? You know, which way Kenyan man? You you gonna are you gonna force the removal of the ATMs or you just gonna go, you know what? Dude, there's two of them. They're in the mall. Who's gonna use them? Let's find out. I don't know. It it'll be interesting to see how they react totally. Alright. So that's it. I wow. It was a longer show than I thought it was gonna be today, probably because I was ranting too much. But, hey, it happens.
I'll see you on the other side. This has been Bitcoin, and and I'm your host, David Bennett. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and hope to see you again real soon. Have a great day.
Opening, episode setup, and today’s agenda
Banks vs. exchanges: dissolving walls and industry shift
Why deposit tokens matter; treasury automation and global rollout
Editorial: banks’ brand power meets crypto rails
Markets check: energy, metals, ags, equities, and Bitcoin metrics
Wrap-up and sign-off
