Join me today for Episode 880 of Bitcoin And . . .
Topics for today:
- Binance Out, NoOnes in
- Binance Gets Board of Directors
- Tether Adds 8.9K BTC to Treasury
- Bull Bitcoin Gets Clipped by Canada Post
- Mutiny Wallet: Massive Update
#Bitcoin #BitcoinAnd
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Articles:
https://bitcoinmagazine.com/culture/noones-helping-nigeria-after-binance-exit-
https://cointelegraph.com/news/binance-board-of-directors
https://decrypt.co/224309/bitcoin-miner-iren-stock-price-surges-ahead-halving
https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2024/04/01/tether-added-nearly-89k-bitcoin-to-holdings-in-first-quarter-on-chain-data/
https://primal.net/e/note16ndxfu3l08zlm9khahqc4v009wacvtqt6g5hrqknv4j88t290m3su9kx9c
- https://www.cnbc.com/futures-and-commodities/
- https://www.cnbc.com/bonds/
- https://dashboard.clarkmoody.com/
- https://mempool.space/
- https://fountain.fm/show/eK5XaSb3UaLRavU3lYrI
https://www.nobsbitcoin.com/argentina-mandatory-registry-for-bitcoin-service-providers/
https://www.nobsbitcoin.com/bull-bitcoins-in-person-bitcoin-purchases-via-canada-post-to-require-identity-verification/
https://www.nobsbitcoin.com/mutiny-wallet-v0-6-1/
https://www.nobsbitcoin.com/hrf-launches-webinar-to-help-nonprofits-integrate-bitcoin/
https://www.nobsbitcoin.com/bitmain-launches-antminer-s21-pro/
(01:44) Strange Things Are Afoot at the Circle P
(03:50) Binance leaving Nigeria and NoOnes Steps in
(10:33) Binance Board of Directors
(19:48) Bitcoin miner IREN Expands Mining Capacity
(25:20) Tether Added 8.9K BTC to Holdings
(28:00) Argentina Cheeses Out: Bows to FATF Requiring Mandatory Registry for Bitcoin Companies
(40:00) Ser Sleepy's 24 Hour Broadcast
(43:39) Bull Bitcoin Gets Hosed by Canada Post
(54:38) Integration of Fedimint with Mutiny wallet
(54:43) Human Rights Foundation's Webinar
(56:16) Bitmain's launch of Antminer S21 Pro
(57:30) Dad Joke
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Good morning. This is David Bennett, and this is Bitcoin Ant, a podcast where I try to find the edge effect between the worlds of Bitcoin, gaming, permaculture, casting, and education to gain a better understanding of all. Edge effect is a concept from ecology describing a greater diversity of life where the edges of two systems overlap. While species from either system can be found at the edge, it is important to note there are species in the overlap that exist in neither system. And that is what I seek to uncover. So join me in discovering the variety of things being created as Bitcoin rubs up against other systems. It is 9:30 on the dot Pacific Daylight Time.
This is episode 880 of bitcoin and on this second day of April 2024, decided not to do one, for yesterday because it was April fools and I couldn't trust a single thing that I saw anywhere on any internet, on any social media, the interwebs were filled with garbage as is tradition on April Fools Day. I cannot stand it. It is just such a waste of a day. You can't trust what anybody says. You can't trust any news story. Of all the people in the world that you would think would just say, you know what, we're we're just not gonna do it, would be news agencies. But alas, yeah, it was just it was awful.
Absolutely awful. So that's the reason why I did not bring you a show yesterday, but I am doing it today and we're starting with the circle p. The circle p is open for business. It is where I bring you news about plebs and their goods and services because most plebs can't afford advertising. So I'm doing my part to create the circular economy for plebs. Hence, the name, the circle p. Strange things are afoot at the circle p. And today, it is maple trade aka beisnerds at beisnerds, both on Noster as well as on dead birdsite. And what does he sell? He sells maple syrup, and it's the maple syrup that he makes from hand. He's an artisan man. He does it the old fashioned way. He's not drop shipping it. Nope. He's making it himself. He's tapping the trees. He's hauling the sap. He's boiling it down and he's throwing it into bottles, which you can buy for $27 a quart.
Yes. It's good. I've had it. I it's it's amazing maple syrup. And it's I think it's more amazing because he takes Bitcoin for his maple syrup. If he didn't take Bitcoin, Beisnerds would not be in the circle p. He's also known as maple trade over there on the social media forums, but his handle is beisnerds, b e I s n e r d s. A quart for 27. You can get 3 of them for $68, a half gallon for 45, or a full gallon for 80, or you can just get 4 pints for $50. Remember, once you open these things, please please please remember to store them in the refrigerator because he doesn't use preservatives.
He's not using artificial stuff in his maple syrup. He's doing it, like I said, the old fashioned way because he is an artisan now. If you mention that you heard about him and his product here on Circle B, he will give me some sweet sweet satoshis for his sweet sweet maple syrup and the advertising that I try to provide for the plebs around the world. Now let's get to it. Bitcoin Magazine, Ray Youssef is first up because Binance has left the African building. That's right. So no one's n o o n e s, no one's is helping Nigeria after the Binance exit.
Some Nigerians were shocked shock and awe when crypto exchange Binance announced that they would discontinue all services in Nigeria by March 8th Despite facing scrutiny from regulators before the announcement, many people still asked how the biggest exchange in the crypto world could just disappear from the world's fastest growing market for Bitcoin adoption. I wasn't shocked because I've been predicting this for years. Entrepreneurs in the Global South are under attack. And the front lines is a currency war being played out right now before our very eyes. The I founded No One's, a peer to peer Bitcoin trading platform based in the global south because, well, I foresaw the problems facing the crypto industry. And 3 years ago, I saw this day coming. I knew it was coming because I was the CEO of a Bitcoin company based in the United States, and I saw the financial apartheid and all the regulatory problems up close.
American regulators hold Africans in such low regard that they make rules to suit Westerners and don't care too much about anyone else. I knew it would be more and more difficult to serve Africans and the rest of the global south if my company was based in the US, and that's why I created No One's. My only option was to turn my back on a business I had built into a Bitcoin P2P platform with over 10,000,000 users. The problems I saw back then are exploding right now. But blaming governments alone is not the path forward. We must understand that the pressures our leaders are under because only only when we do that can we come to the table with them to forge a new path ahead. And right now, all we have is a bunch of people cursing each other and that's not really the way forward.
This war is about the financial system and the power to control the levers that decide whose money is good and whose money is bad. Entrepreneurs in the Global South are trapped in their own markets so that even making payments or doing business with countries next door is difficult. For the average African entrepreneur to scale any business by expanding outside the African continent, it's basically impossible. And now that Binance has left Nigeria, some businesses based here are wondering what's next. To be able to truly unlock the potential for the global south entrepreneurs to create value, we have to nurture them and create an environment that allows them to flourish.
That's only possible if we do what I've been advocating for for years ensure that there is free trade by having free flowing money systems. Making it happen is not going to be easy and that's why I had to make some tough decisions. I had to leave the United States. I had to give up a successful company that I founded, and I had to start all over again in the global south. I know why Binance was forced to leave Nigeria, and I'm sure it will happen to other crypto companies and in other countries. It's almost impossible to run a crypto business or a Bitcoin marketplace serving Africa from another continent because you have to be on the ground to see the problems and find the solutions.
I knew we couldn't achieve our mission to help the unbanked if we didn't have boots on the ground in the Global South. And that's why we based no one's right here from the start. I'm not some mad guy who gave 8 years of my life to a company and then left on a whim. I set up no one so I could be here for this moment. Binance might have pulled up stakes and gone home, but no one's won't do that. We are already home. I know Nigeria and I know the global south because my business have been active here for years. We live and work here now and we listen to what people on the ground tell us. We hire local Africans to handle moderation for Africans, for example, and that's partly what boots on the ground means. Instead of a bunch of Americans passing judgement, we use local Africans to make moderation safer and fairer.
We are not looking at Africa, or any of the global south where we operate, as places to plunder. We see Africans as partners, and fellow human beings. That's why we created our partner program to share our profits with the people who are part of our business. I've met thousands of tech savvy Nigerians, entrepreneurs and I know there is a reason for the high level of Bitcoin adoption here. For too long, they have been shackled by an unfair global financial system, by a financial apartheid that creates money prisons and stifles economic growth. Bitcoin and no one's gives those entrepreneurs the opportunity to show what they can do when markets are free and money is allowed to flow.
All they need to grow is a level playing field. They just need a shot a path towards success. And when we open up any window of opportunity, they bust right through it. That's why no one's is not simply creating the best site to buy Bitcoin. We are going all out to them life changing opportunities. When I speak in auditoriums around Africa and explain what is possible with Bitcoin and our peer to peer platform, I see people's eyes light up when I talk to them 1 on 1. I am astonished at the amount of hustle and business acumen that they have. Our next step is to make it easier for these entrepreneurs to take their business to the next level.
We're building a product that will give local entrepreneurs a massive opportunity to build businesses in their own country for their own citizens and ultimately to keep the profits inside their own country. Despite the withdrawal of Binance Nigeria, tons of opportunities remain. No one's was built for these times and we are ready to pick up the slack to help dynamic, savvy Nigerians who see the value of Bitcoin and want to be part of the new era of prosperity in the Global South. The battles we have to fight might be tough, but the opportunities on the fastest growing continent on the planet are worth it.
Again, this is Ray Youssef. Now, he he mentioned a couple of places about the company that he founded. Hold on for just one second. I forgot. I forgot to say good morning to all the people in the ZapStream. Good lord. Giant red candles will will make you make you not think straight. Good morning. Yeah. There you go. Thank you, Uno, who's zapped multiple times. Wow. A 1,000, a 121, and 3 21 zaps. No. Nice, dude. Thanks, Uno. I appreciate that. So Ray Youssef
[00:11:12] Unknown:
and I can't remember the name of the company.
[00:11:15] Unknown:
But the company that he's referring to, he didn't just leave it just because he was going over to Africa, although I guarantee that that was part of part of his calculus. He left it or one of the other reasons main reasons why he left it is that his business partner was being a dick He just was. That's really the only that's the most polite way that I can put it. So that actually also figured into the calculus, but Ray is not wrong The exit of Binance from Nigeria is a huge deal. And I don't I honestly don't think many people are aware of just how big of a deal that is.
Nigeria is sort of is is at this this weird precipice where there's it's like it's as far as Bitcoin is concerned, and legacy financial aspects are concerned, and growth of markets are concerned. Nigeria as a country is the most buoyant country that there is, at least on the on the continent of Africa, if not a complete poster child for this situation around the world. What do I mean by buoyant? It means the downward force of gravity, in this case, financial legacy markets, corrupt individuals and governments, are weighing down on it at the exact same force that the that Bitcoin and the marketplace that's developing in Nigeria, whether it's for Bitcoin itself or just entrepreneurial in nature, is lifting it. So, it's like a balloon it's like a like you let go of a helium balloon and it goes up to a certain elevation in the sky and then it just stops.
And that's because it's gotten to a point where it's 100% buoyant. It just floats. It doesn't go up anymore, but it doesn't go down anymore. Because the force of gravity is completely equal to the amount of helium and its upward force generated given the pressure in the atmosphere. It just I'm just saying that it's at this make or break kind of situation. The whole country of Nigeria is exactly a poster child for what we work what for what humanity is trying to escape from and what we're trying to build for the future. And the Nigerian government is probably being told by IMF World Bank UN the rest of the people that just refuse to let a new financial system in the world develop.
Telling them that they will squash this thing and they will do it to sweet and forthwith and all that kind of jazz.
[00:14:06] Unknown:
So, understand that Ray Youssef
[00:14:10] Unknown:
is one of the guys that has given his all to this mission. Not just for Africa, not just to Bitcoin, but to humanity. And I have heard people say he's a scammer. I've heard people, you know, talk talk crap about him. He's a good guy. Have I met him personally? No. But one of these days I'm going to because he's one of my favorite people in the African Bitcoin space. I just wanted to make sure that I said that for everybody to hear. Now we're not done with Binance because now we've got this situation where Binance is forming a board of directors for the very first time. After all these years after all these years, Binance, I think what they're seeing is that the writing is on the wall and that they are so locked in to legacy finance that they better play ball or they're going to go away 100%.
So let's find out what's going on from Turner Wright. Binance Holdings, which operates the cryptocurrency exchange of the same name, has formed a 7 person board of directors filled with company executives and independent members. According to their website, the firm's board of directors is now chaired by Gabriel Abed, the former ambassador to Barbados to the United Arab Emirates. Other members include Binance CEO Richard Tang, cofounder Hannah Chin, Bayview Acquisition Corporation CEO Xin Wang, Gojo and Company managing partner, Arnaud Ventura, Roger Wang, and Rock He.
Quote, we're pleased to share that Binance has established a new board of directors. The board consists of 7 total directors, 3 of whom are independent directors, and we're proud to have some of the world's strongest web 3 leaders advising our company as we enter our next chapter. Pausing just to mention that the fact that they read or, said the word web 3 and formed a board of directors, This does not bode well for the direction of Binance. Please be aware. If you're keeping any of your wealth on Binance, get it off now if you haven't already, please. Anyway, continuing on, the formation of the board is likely one of the most significant changes to Binance leadership since Tang moved from his position as head of regional markets to become CEO in November.
Former CEO, CZ or Changpeng Zhao resigned to CEO at roughly the same time as part of the settlement agree agreement with the United States authorities. Founded in China in 2017, Binance became one of the largest crypto exchanges in the world under Zao, who largely kept the firm's operations and personnel decentralized. The firm runs out of the UAE for its Middle East and North African operations and in France for its European business. Finance's agreement with US authorities required the firm to form a board of directors with independent members and compliance and audit committees, Tang said in November of 20 or December of 2023 that he intended to report to the board.
Okay. So there you go. Binance is falling under the hammer of the United States even though that they are not a United States company. They have an outlet in the United States or what that they did, Binance US, that thing is gone now. But here's this is what we see. We keep telling ourselves, oh, we're decentralized and we're gonna win. And eventually, we will, but it's not going to be through people like Binance, certainly not through Coinbase. Right? So please keep that in mind. It's going to be the scrappy little piglets running around everywhere that are feral, that are mean, you know, that that build their own small companies that do not do not get large enough to come under the ire of European Union, the United States regulatory authorities, the United Nations, the IMF, the World Bank. It's gonna take a whole bunch of small guys that understand that there is an upward limit to the amount that you can grow as a business before people take notice.
And what is so hard about that for the it sounds easy, but if you're making money, you're programmed as a human especially in the West that you must make more money the next year. Otherwise, you're either a failure or you're not honoring your fiduciary commitment to anybody who could be affected by your decision not to grow your customer base, not to grow your national or international reach It's a hard road to hoe But if we do not hoe that road there will be no road. There will be no escape hatch. And Christine Lagarde, who does not like the concept of any escape hatch for any, part of humanity whatsoever, will be gladdened and she will smile with her fake tan.
Which leads me to wonder why nobody makes fun of the fact that she also is an orange person like Trump. Have you not have you seen her? She's very orange. She's a very orange woman. I think her and Trump should get together, honestly. Anyway, so okay. Let's continue on, with Bitcoin miner, Iran. Their stock price has surged ahead of the halving, and this is important because it's a Canadian mining company. Andrew Thorvallis has it. British Columbia based Bitcoin mining firm, Iron's stock price surged Monday ahead of the Bitcoin halving and after the company said that it had fully funded its 2024 expansion plans that will more than double its computer fleet's power to yield new units of the leading digital currency.
In an update on Monday, the company confirmed that its current mining capacity of 8 exahashes per second would rise to 20 exahashes per second over the next 9 months. Its data center capacity which powers both Bitcoin mining and AI cloud services will also more than double from 220 megawatts to 460 megawatts this year Following the announcement, shares of Iran rose 19%. Damn. That's almost 20¢ for every dollar. Okay? That's all that's a almost 20% rise, guys. On Monday to a current price of $6.42 per share and briefly rose to $6.50 apiece, the highest price since February.
The rise bucked the trend of sliding crypto stock prices across the board, including rival miner CleanSpark, crypto exchange Coinbase and MicroStrategy. The latter 3 stocks have performed exceptionally alongside Bitcoin since the start of the year, enjoying an influx of capital spurred by the launch of Bitcoin spot ETFs in January While the same cannot be said for most Bitcoin miners, Iran, I r e n, and and most industry firms began to rebound last month, reclaiming their market position as a higher volatility BTC investment play. Over the past 3 months, headwinds for miners have been twofold.
On one hand, many firms no longer need to use mining stocks as a proxy for BTC with ETFs now available. On the other hand, the upcoming Bitcoin halving, expected on April 20th, will cut the BTC reward for mining a block in half, threatening to wipe out miners who currently operate on thin margins. Now, that's all we need to know about that. It's important to understand that there is still some mining play going on in Canada. They haven't just made it illegal. I for the life of me, with all the things that Justin Trudeau is doing in Canada, I'm very surprised about that.
I I feel good about it. I I think that there should be more more Bitcoin mining in in, countries other than the United States. We don't need as much mining as we have.
[00:22:36] Unknown:
Because if we really want it to be decentralized,
[00:22:39] Unknown:
then everything has to spread out. The mining has to spread out. We need to run more Bitcoin full nodes. We need to run more full lightning nodes. We need to have smaller marketplaces where plebs just like you and me are trying to make a living for us and our families by doing what it is that we do. But not getting so damn big for our britches that we start having the stink eye cast at us from, you know, the IMF and corrupt governments. The smaller we stay, but the more of us that there are. That's armor. If you just have one company doing everything and it's so big that all you have to do is say, you know what?
We know exactly where you are. We know what your phone lines are. We know what your mail is saying. We know everything about you. We know exactly where you're gonna be at 3:15 PM in Nigeria, and we're just gonna come pick your ass up. Well, that's not defensible. That's not protective. That's not armor. It takes a bunch of the small people working locally to be able to do this. And if we do that if we finally learn to throw off the shackles of all the the stupid things that we've been told on how to live and what to believe and who to believe, if we can get rid of that, if we can disrobe from all of that, then we're gonna get to know our neighbors better. We're gonna be part of, like, the the smaller clubs in our in our communities.
We're gonna be able to do a lot more. But we've been fooled into believing that you just get a 9 to 5, 5 days a week job, you get your 401k, You get your couple of weeks paid time off vacation and you just you just do that until you retire and then wall, you know, wander around your backyard until either you go full belligerent and, you know, demented or you just die. And it's just a sad state of affairs for humanity. I believe that this gives us the opportunity to reconnect with our neighbors and our friends and real human beings.
[00:24:50] Unknown:
And maybe it won't be so bad, you know, having to stand at a farmers market. There's so many people that just they think that that's just a terrible thing. Maybe it's not. Maybe it's not.
[00:25:02] Unknown:
But we need to be accepting Bitcoin. We need to be accepting lightning payments. We need to be working and seeing if eCash is is is, you know, not gonna be a a
[00:25:12] Unknown:
a a a shit show. Just saying. Right? So there's that. Now what else do we got? Oh, Tether.
[00:25:20] Unknown:
Oh, for god's sakes. Real Joad, thank you for joining the chat over in zap.stream. CoinDesk has this one from Stephen Stephens. No, Stephen. That's how you pronounce that Stephen Alfer. Tether has added nearly 8,900 Bitcoin to holdings in the Q1 according to on chain data. And this is what I mean before I get into this. I'm not reading this because, hurrah hurrah, Tether is a behemoth, which makes it what? A target. A target. That's all it's become is a target. So let's figure out how big of a target it is. Tether, the issuer of USDT, the world's largest stable coin based on market cap, added just shy of 8,889 bitcoin in the Q1 according to Onchain Trackers.
Though Tether made no official announcement on the action, a wallet believed to belong to the company shows as having 8,888.888 bitcoin moved to it on March 31st. Tether, of course, has made no secret of its intentions to use a portion of its profits to acquire Bitcoin. That wallet is now the holder of 75 1,354 Bitcoin worth $5,200,000,000 at the current price of $69,000 Putting Tether's profits at roughly $3,000,000,000 So what happens to Tether at this point? They want to get bigger. And the bigger they get, the harder they fall. Except this time, it affects everybody that's a Bitcoin holder.
Now, I'm not predicting that they will fall. I don't have any inside baseball on Tether or what they're doing or if they're, you know, what their disposition is as far as are they gonna get launched. But I think it's inevitable. I think it's gonna be a Binance scale issue. They're gonna start arresting people there at Tether. They're gonna find some kind of charge that they can levy against them. It's probably going to be money laundering. It's probably going to be, you know, not honoring AML KYC even though they do. Even though they do, there's gonna be some trumped up charge. They're gonna come after them like they came after Binance.
And then 1 by 1, the little satellite units that depend on the great big behemoth that is Tether, the company, they're going to blink out like little lights like people are going to bed. Good night, John Boy. Good night, little Sarah. You know,
[00:28:01] Unknown:
turn out the light and go to bed. Except never to return. Again, before we run the numbers,
[00:28:10] Unknown:
it's not going to be the big companies that change the landscape for the future that we want to see. It's gonna be you. It's gonna be your Bitcoin buddies. It's going to be the small guys the small fry the little dudes the tiny businesses but we need many of them. How that works, I don't know. I wish I could tell you. But I know where it begins. It begins with us. Let's run the numbers. CNBC Futures and Commodities, they got oil. West Texas Intermediate is up 3 quarters of a point to damn $84.36. Brenton, North Sea is up almost a full point to $88.15. Natural gas is also up, which is unusual.
2.18 percent to a buck 80 7 per 1,000 cubic feet, and gasoline is up a half a point, getting to $2.72 a gallon. Every shiny metal rock is doing very well today, including gold, which is up over a full point to $2280.90 That's an all time high. Silver is up 3.32%. Platinum is up 2 a half percent. Copper is up almost a half, and palladium is up a quarter of a point. Ag is red across the board except for coffee, which is up 3.1% today, and the biggest loser that I can see is chocolate, 2.78 percent to the downside, which is odd. And the reason I say that is that we're starting to find out that there may be a fungus affecting worldwide production and people are starting to look at the coming chocolate shortage. Now, you might think that that's funny and it doesn't really affect shit.
But cocoa and cocoa butter, especially, do you have any idea how much cocoa butter is in healthcare products? Makeup, lotions, shampoo, body butter, you name it dude, there's cocoa butter all over the place. So healthcare products are going to go where? Through the roof. Which is why I think it's a little odd that I'm seeing cocoa prices down almost 3 damn points. But it is what it is. Live cattle up 0.11%. Lean hogs down almost a half. Feeder cattle are up a third. The Dow, now this is funny. Everybody's looking at the red candles on Bitcoin. If you were to overlay today's hourly chart of Bitcoin on top of the Dow, it's almost the same chart.
Which leads me to believe, and I'll get to it here in a minute. Let me make sure that I've got something that's gonna remind me of that shit. Hold on. No. So I'm gonna do it I'm gonna do it right here. Let's let's let's talk about the red candles. We had a giant one last night, Right? Like, last for me, I'm in Pacific Daylight Time. Right now, for me, it's 10 o'clock AM Pacific Daylight Time. So yesterday, I don't know, I guess it was around, 7 o'clock, maybe 6 pm for me yesterday. Giant candle to the downside. And then I woke up this morning and there's just all these little candles to the downside.
The Dow Jones
[00:32:04] Unknown:
Industrial Index.
[00:32:06] Unknown:
Exact same pattern, which leads me to believe the following. When somebody asked the questions, why Bitcoin? Why? Well, it's the 1st of the second quarter of this year, 2024. Right? We we we bailed out of the Q1 at the end of March. Yesterday, the April April's Fools Day or April Fools Day or whatever, April 1st, nobody really did a whole lot until the evening. Right? So maybe it was just because they didn't everybody was like, you know what? Not not gonna do anything. And then after everything cleared up, then all of a sudden we got the plunge. We got it in Bitcoin and we got it in the rest of the legacy markets, which means that as of yesterday and today, we're pretty much correlated.
Bitcoin is pretty much correlated with legacy markets. And I think that that's for two reasons. 1, and I told y'all this last week and the week before, do not do not do not expect the Federal Reserve to cut rates this quarter either. They're not going to do it. They have no reason to do it. There's no reason whatsoever that they need to lower rates. The metrics that they look at is suggesting that things are getting better. Now me and you both know that they aren't. Be that as it may, that's what they're going on. Now it's not I don't even think that they believe it. They're just saying, look, Here's what the numbers that all the rubes out there believe for us considering that 80% will tell will believe anything that we tell them to believe.
We're just gonna leave it the same. So they're not going to lower interest rates at the Fed this quarter. It's not gonna happen. That, for whatever reason, started being flashed as new stories yesterday. Don't expect the Fed lower rates. Don't expect federal lower rates. Like all Barron's and Financial Times and all of a sudden, we knew this shit last quarter. Right? We knew it last quarter. I told you about it last quarter, and yet it's like these guys are like, oh my god. It's it's it's mayhem. No. It's not. They're just not going to lower rates. So that's reason number 1 we're seeing a fall.
Because there's not gonna be easy money. That's what always fires these markets up. Easy money. Getting, like, just, like, speculative tax all the way around, just borrowing cheap dollars to throw into the Dow, throw into Bitcoin, to throw into whatever. Right? Because the money is not easy, anything that's even remotely looking hot or possibly volatile or whatever, next thing you know people don't want to go into it. Here's the second thing. There are lots of people that rebalance their portfolios, and I'm not talking just retail. I'm talking corporate as well. Industrial size portfolios.
They rebalanced their portfolios every quarter. They made a lot of money off the ETFs last quarter. Just from January 11th to the end of March, they made a shit ton of money. They are linked and always will be with the financial legacy markets. The thinking of the financial legacy markets the way you operate in the financial legacy markets That's not going away anytime soon. They're stuck in the paradigm Expect to be affected Okay? So that's my 2¢ as to why you saw giant red candles. Now the price is sitting at $65,520 That is $1,290,000,000,000 of market cap. There's 19,671,136.74 BTC in circulation.
Over the last 2016 blocks, the hash rate has averaged just over 600 exahashes per second. 0.21btc being taken on average in fees per block, which means that fees are going down slowly. The halving estimate is still locked in as April 20, 2024, and block space percentage for taking out ordinal garbage is 1.6%, which is what it was last week. Now blocks in the mempool are totaling a 176, and they are carrying with them a 124,000 unconfirmed transactions waiting to clear at high priority rates of 18 satoshis per vbyte, low priority is at 16.
Anything under 2.38 satoshis per vbyte are being squeezed from mempools around the world. And the hash rate shown by mempool.spaceforward/mining is 609 exahashes per second, so very close to what Clark Moody's dashboard was telling us. Now on to episode 879, which I titled chained liabilities for good reason. Wise Hoddle with 2112, that's a that's a rush boost right there, says always a great show. I appreciate that. Dubravco with 1610 says we are all satoshi except for Craig Wright. Because Peland with a 1,000 says IPFS test boost.
Kaz, I'm I'm showing on all of my screens that I am indeed giving a cut of all the proceeds that I make from boosting and streaming satoshis over to IPFS podcasting. I will continue to monitor that because I'm you're telling me that it's not working. I don't know. I don't know what the hell is going on. But I want to be able to give to you guys over there or to the guys over there at IPFS, podcasting because I think it's an important project. Owen, 21, 500 says, always appreciate your show. Not as much as I always appreciate the people listen. Uncle.swimwith421 says thank you, sir. No. Thank you. Pies with 420. Thank you, sir. No. Thank you. God's death with 337. Thank you, sir. No. Thank you.
And Absurdient with 222, a short row of ducks says nothing. That's the weather report. Welcome to part 2 of the news you can use. I'd like to take a moment to ask for donations for the show. If you like what I do, if you find it, you know, if I'm helping you understand what the hell is going on throughout the day while you're driving to work, or on the train, or going to lunch, or just, you know, doing housework or, you know, washing the dishes because that's generally when that's when I listen to a lot of podcasts is when I'm washing dishes. Because I got a family of 4, so God knows there's a lot of them. I listen to podcasts.
And one of the people that I listen to the most is Adam Curry, who basically came up with podcasting. And then again, he came up with podcasting 2.0, which is a value for value proposition. If you think that I'm bringing you value, then value it at what you think it's valued at. I'm not asking for a subscription. I'm not asking for a minimum donation. I'm not asking for anything, but I am asking. It does help me figure out that I'm doing something that is worthwhile. It helps me understand that you're getting something out of it. And without that signaling and without that those those satoshis coming in, it's becomes much harder to do another show.
I love doing this show. I love hanging out with you guys. I love when you say thank you, sir, so that I can say thank you, sir back. It's it's an amazing experience. A lot of people don't understand it.
[00:40:00] Unknown:
But with
[00:40:01] Unknown:
when when I I don't normally ask for donations. But one of the things that Adam Curry said is that if you don't ask, you're not gonna get anything. It's not that people don't want to donate to you and you shouldn't be embarrassed to ask. But if you don't
[00:40:18] Unknown:
if you don't, you're not gonna get Jack. So
[00:40:23] Unknown:
I'm going to start doing that. I'm going to start asking for donations to the show. You can either boost with a boostagram, you can stream me more satoshis than you're already streaming, or you can go to well, I actually have a patreon. Patreon, it's forward slash Bitcoin and podcast. If you want to do it in fiat, I'm not going to turn my nose up to your dollars. I will convert them to Bitcoin, however, so just be aware. But I'm not not not going to not accept fiat. Just because I'm a Bitcoiner, I think that that's just kinda dumb. Anyway, I do appreciate your donations.
I do appreciate you being here. I hope I'm bringing you value, and I'm taking my hat off here to sir Sleepy. Sir Sleepy over on Noster. If you don't know sir Sleepy, he does every once in a while, he does a 24 hour, Nostr nest or, zap dot stream sometimes. I can't remember exact. It's basically it's on Nostr though. And it's 24 hours long, and he's done them a couple times. So he says this on this note. There's nothing set in stone yet, just entertaining the idea a bit. If we do this again, it would be our 3rd time, so I'd want to do something special and different. Was thinking maybe we could have different hosts for every 5 hours.
These hosts could be Odell, The Guy Swan, Walker, me, noneya business, GS or G sovereignty and Marty Bent or anyone you guys think would be a good host for 5 hours with 0 preparation. I I am guilty as charged, my friend. Any other suggestions to make it more special? And that was actually generated by or that that entire, post was was a response to g sovereignty who said or who asked sir Sleepy if he was doing a 24 hour show for the halving, which is due again on April 20th. I am more than happy to give over 5, 6 hours of my day to help Sir Sleepy do a 24 hour show for the having. I would love to be a part of that.
So, you guys find Sir Sleepy, s e r s l e e p y, And I've got I will have a link to this particular note in the show notes. And since the show notes are working now that I moved over to podhome.fm, then you'll be able to link exactly to this note and you'll be able to find Sir Sleeper from there. So if you have suggestions or a host that you, you know, would think would be better than anybody listed here, you know, please get a hold of him and tell him what's up. Also, sir Sleepy, thank you for including me in that list of the heaviest hitters and the people that I respect in this space.
So some of those people the most. I I respect a lot of people very heavily in this space. Those guys that I'm listed with are a handful of the people that I respect the most. And being listed among them is beyond an honor. So thank you, sir Sleepy. I appreciate it. Now, Argentina, bad news, guys. So hold on to your britches. Argentina creates mandatory registry for Bitcoin service providers operating in the country. Damn it. Companies and individuals doing that activity, those other people, I guess, that activity now will be asked to comply with the registration approved on March 14th by the Argentine Senate as part of the amendments to the current regulatory framework to address the financial action task force recommendations.
So, I had the highest hopes for this new president in Argentina. And the fact that they are actually going to listen to what the financial action task force says means that he was just LARPing all along. I don't expect anything, I don't expect anything spectacular out of Argentina anymore. They had a chance. They blew it. And if they had elected the other guy, they would have blown their chance too because the other guy was even worse. But Javier or whatever this cat's name is, he's not going to do anything but service the UN, the World Bank, the IMF, the Financial Action Task Force, and any of the other idiots that beg him to make sure that their people have no future in finance.
So I'm sorry. I had my hopes. I really wanted to trust the guy, but my trust has been broken. Hopefully, somebody will obsolete him. If you know, you know. In late March, the Commission Nacional de Velores in Argentina announced a new mandatory registry of virtual asset service providers for those operating with crypto assets in the company or country. The new requirement will affect businesses dedicated to providing several services such as buying, selling, sending, receiving, lending, and trading cryptocurrency. Those who are not registered will not be able to operate in the country.
Every provider should complete the registration and the regulation is not just for locally based companies, but also for those operating in the market but based elsewhere. So even if you have business in Argentina and you're based in, like, I don't know, the Maldives, forget about it. You're gonna have to register too. Quote, I used to pay contractors in Argentina in Bitcoin via lightning until a few months ago. Now, since this new libertarian government is an office, all custodial apps cease to allow transfers using BTC, including Bello app, Strike and many, many others.
So much about freedom, said 21millonsbtc
[00:46:31] Unknown:
on Twitter. And here is the press release from our friend, Jack Mallers
[00:46:38] Unknown:
at Stripe. He says, hi. We're reaching out to inform you that as of Friday, March 29, 2024, we will no longer support send globally transactions between the United States and Argentina. This is due to our payments partner in Argentina winding down operations. They're shutting down, guys. Shutting down. While sending cash to be converted into local currency to a bank account in Argentina is no longer an option, you can still send both Bitcoin and cash directly to Strike users in the country through the app. We apologize for the inconvenience.
If you got problems, write them at supportstrike. Me. This is sad. This is just sad. So this libertarian government, one of their first actions is to bow down to the financial action task force, which is totally totally not even, elected. They're just appointed by governments. It's just it it's so sad. They had Argentina had such a shot. No more. No more. Not looking at Argentina to do anything but whatever the IMF wants them to do. So much for the libertarian government. We knew about this stuff in Canada though. We knew we know how Canada likes to operate. Well, bull bitcoins in person bitcoin purchases via the post office in Canada.
Yeah. Now you're gonna have to identity verify yourself with, you know, ID cards. We'll get into it. Bull bitcoin's in person payments at Canada Post will now require identity verification. Starting April 15, 2024, Bull Bitcoin customers using the in person payments at Canada Post account funding option to buy Bitcoin will have to perform identity verification before they can complete a transaction. The decision is entirely out of our hands and was mandated to us as a condition to continue offering the account funding service at Canadian post offices.
We understand that this adds a level of friction to the previously flawless user experience that bull Bitcoin was offering. The feedback we received from the bull bitcoin community about this feature was extraordinary. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused, added the CEO. So this is not good. This is that was basically right from their press release out of all Bitcoin. It used to be that what they're talking about is it, as a Canadian citizen, you could go AML or go purchase AML KYC free Bitcoin at a post office in Canada by using essentially money orders. You just gave them cash, they wrote a money order, you sent the money order like via post, Canadian post or Canada post over to bull bitcoin, and they would, you know, they would take the money and they would like, you know, put Bitcoin in your in your wallet. You know, I guess you had to give them a wallet address too. Price said it with a QR code.
I don't know exactly how it it worked because I'm not Canadian. But minute they had talked about bull bitcoin and made many press releases about how to do that. And I guess somebody in the Canadian government got pissed because they stopped that shit right now. You can no longer do that in Canada. Do you see what's going on here? We cannot rely on anything but ourselves going forward. The smaller we get and the more we are, the better things will be. The less we are, but the bigger we get is going to play into the hands of the financial legacy markets, regulators, and all of that crap.
We cannot operate in that mindset any longer. It'll take people like Mutiny and the guys over at Mutiny Wallet to do cool stuff. And they're doing cool stuff with version 0.6.1. They've got a new home screen. They've got a nostril profile setup. They got a federation discovery, as well as federation recommendations. Okay. Let's get into it. Release time in our biggest update yet. We've completely redesigned the home screen, added a NostraBase profile setup walkthrough, and have finished our initial Fedimint integrations by adding a federation discovery and recommendations.
Coming up shortly after this release, we'll be adding federated lightning addresses that lock incoming payments to your key, which you may redeem at any point by coming back online. We'll be rolling this out to mutiny plus users first. Stay tuned. There's a feedback button in the app if you'd like to share with us anonymously or you can join our Discord service to hang out with the rest of the community.
[00:51:46] Unknown:
So what's new?
[00:51:48] Unknown:
Well, you have a new social home screen experience. We've redesigned our home screen to put people first. We now include a row of recent profiles. You've paid for quick access. We also now have tabs on the home screen for looking at the payment activity your friend Zap activity on Nostr as well as your payments request. New wallet creation flow. Most lightning wallets these days have what we call in are are what's called invoice oriented. We wanna go back to basics to solve what people are really trying to do. Pay a person.
We've added a new wallet creation flow to make the wallet all about you. And then there's nostr identities and chat. The new version of Mutiny now allows you to create a new nostr profile or import a nostril private key from an existing profile. From there, you can now DM other mutiny and nostril users to send or request money directly from the app. No more copy pasting invoices. You can find a federation, and they're talking about Federated Mints. Quote, Mutiny has had beta support for the Fedimint protocol for a couple of months. Instead of opening a lightning channel on your first receive with a minimum of 100,000 sats, you can get started on a Fediment with just a few sats.
This new update adds a way to discover available Fedimans to join. Naturally, the discovery process is powered by an open protocol built on Nostr. You can see who recommends a federation and add it with one click. You'll automatically receive funds to that FEDIMENT as long as the amount is smaller than 200,000 satoshis and you'll automatically spend out of that Fedimint with a fallback to your regular lightning balance. You can also swap from Fedimint to your lightning balance at any time. This is awesome news. This looks to me like the very first instance of a full scale Fedimint integration with a wallet that actually works the way you think it's going to work.
One of the problems that's always been here is that when you're using a lightning wallet that is custodial and you're depending on somebody else's payment channels like, this is one of the reasons why I won't use a well, I won't even try. Oh, I can't remember the name of the wallet, but it's so expensive to do just, you know, to send a few sats that it doesn't make any sense because they are opening a lightning channel for you just to do that sent, and then they close it after. I don't think that that makes any sense. The mutiny solution looks awesome.
If you're going to send, like, $500 then, yeah, pay a buck to get that shit done on lightning. But if you're just testing something out or wanna send, like, somebody a zap, then Fedimint looks to me like the way to go. And they've integrated that directly with their wallet. Thank you to the guys over there at Mutiny. And thank you to the Human Rights Foundation. They've launched a webinar to help nonprofits integrate Bitcoin. So Human Rights Foundation is teaching people like how Sailor taught a whole bunch of businesses how to get on the bit or how to get Bitcoin into their finances and keep it on their balance sheet. The HRF is doing the same thing with non profit The course is designed for individuals with no previous knowledge of bitcoin.
It will be helpful for nonprofits interested in expanding their organization's capabilities and may also be valuable to independent media outlets, anti corruption investigators, and environmental and labor advocates. This is going to be awesome. The Human Rights Foundation is delighted to announce a free quarterly webinar to teach nonprofits, particularly human rights organizations, how to integrate Bitcoin into their work to challenge state censorship and confiscation. The first course will take place from April 22nd to April 26th. It will consist of 5 1 hour long lectures starting at 10:30 am Eastern Daylight Time in the United States, and it's taught by Bitcoin educator BTC Sessions.
I love BTC Sessions. He's been around the space as a as a teacher and an educator for years. Honestly, they couldn't have gotten anybody better to do this job. So hats off to the Human Rights Foundation. And last up, bitmain launches Antminer S21 Pro. This son of a bitch has a hash rate of 234 terahashes per second and an energy efficiency ratio of 15 joules per terahash. The miner has the ability to deal with challenging environments because it can withstand temperatures of up to 45 degrees Celsius or 113 degrees Fahrenheit.
And they will start shipping the device Q3 of this year. 15 joules per terahash is a hell of a ratio, guys. This is if that number is true, and you don't need to know what it means it's just how much raw energy is used to produce a single terahash if 15 joules per terahash is actually correct and they're not fudging their numbers
[00:57:11] Unknown:
this is the most efficient miner that's ever been created. Just
[00:57:16] Unknown:
just say it. Alright. That's gonna do it for the morning roundup.
[00:57:30] Unknown:
Dad says jokes. Germany has just warned its population of an upcoming sausage and cheese shortage. They're calling it the worst case scenario. Get it?
[00:57:45] Unknown:
Okay. Maybe not. It's okay if you don't if you don't speak German. I don't speak German either, but I do know that worst stand is a word for, sausage and case, k a s e, is what you use for cheese. So worst case scenario, get it? Okay. There you go. Alright, Again, my apologies for not bringing you a show on Monday yesterday, but it was April fools. Not gonna do it. I'm never going to do a show on April Fools. I'm going to stay as far away from electronic equipment as I can. Going forward. This has become ridiculous. It's just become ridiculous. When you've got full scale news outlets running April Fools jokes about politics and shit.
Yeah, that does you know the West the West is is spiraling down like a duck in winter, so that's never gonna happen. I'm not even gonna try. I've tried a couple of times. I I keep getting my ass lit up. It's never gonna happen. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry. So next, next April fools. I hope it's on a Sunday or something like that because it's just not gonna be something that I do. Also again, please donate to the show. It really helps.
[00:59:06] Unknown:
It really does. With that said, I'll see you on the other side.
[00:59:10] Unknown:
This has been Bitcoin, and and I'm your host, David Bennett. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and hope to see you again real soon. Have a great day.
Integration of Fedimint with Mutiny wallet
Dad Joke