The U.S. crypto order treats Bitcoin differently from other tokens

Transcript

Transcribed by machine (Whisper) from the episode’s audio, so a word may be off here and there.

1. 40:12

   We're back with ProfG Markets. I want to pivot us to crypto. Trump has established this national crypto reserve that will include Bitcoin, but also many other cryptocurrencies, Ether, XRP or Ripple, Solana, Cardano. He intends to keep buying those cryptocurrencies in regular installments. I know you've written a lot and done a lot of research on crypto, especially Bitcoin. I know that you are a bitcoin bull yourself what do you make of this national crypto reserve and do you think it's a good idea well so there are a couple different phases of this there's that um he posted on on true social that they would have bitcoin ethereum and then those the three others That got some backlash, not just among Bitcoin proponents, but also some CEOs of major exchanges that are involved in multiple cryptos.

2. 41:04

   There's one of the projects in particular that is not well-liked by the rest of the space, and that's probably what encouraged some of that backlash. Which one is that? XRP is particularly controversial in this space. The way that the executive order actually came out seemed to include or take into account a lot of that criticism and probably behind-the-scenes lobbying, which is they separated bitcoin from other cryptos so bitcoin's part of a reserve uh whereas crypto the other other crypto is part of a stockpile and those two pools at least as far as its executive order remains in effect it could be undone by a later executive order either by this president or a later one but under this current framework um the bitcoin is instructed not to be sold and that um uh besent and letnik are authorized uh to find budget neutral ways to accumulate more of it that's how

3. 41:54

   it's worded. Whereas the crypto stockpile, the Treasury Secretary, so Besant, has discretion on how to handle those, which could include sales, and that they're not really meant to accumulate more other than through the normal course of seizures and forfeitures, which is how they have all these holdings in the first place. So I actually think that the executive order came out better than it could, because instead of going out and buying crypto XYZ that probably passes the how we test and make certain insiders and vcs rich and was pre-mined and you know has an issuer and it's kind of like if the u.s picks certain stocks to own and not other stocks to own that that is that's right for the all sorts of conflict i actually think that they separate it out pretty well um and you know the the thing i wrote about before this all happened is my base

4. 42:43

   case is they ring fenced the bitcoin they already have which is basically what they did they're capitalizing it with the the bitcoin they already have from seizures and forfeitures they'll see if any of those should legally be returned to certain entities there's a particularly big bucket of those that is you know probably owed to an exchange um that you know they got hacked it's not really they weren't involved in criminal stuff so we'll see what happens there but other than maybe that big chunk i think they hold that they might accumulate a little bit more i generally take the under on the idea that they're going to go out and buy like a million bitcoin uh as some of the proposals have said so i tend to assume that it'll it'll it'll be roughly the size it is now maybe a little bit larger because they probably want to get some optical winds of hey

5. 43:25

   look, we sold this crypto and we put the proceeds toward a budget neutral acquisition of a little bit more Bitcoin, or we did this and we bought a little bit of Bitcoin, but, you know, we'll see. I was just going to say, is this not exactly that an obstacle win? Because what you're