UpOnly: Chats with Crypto Experts

Cobie & Ledger are joined by Rebecca (Chief Legal and Policy at Aave) and Peter (Director of Research at Coin Center) discuss the regulatory landscape in the wake of the FTX failure.

In this episode of UpOnly, Cobie & Ledger talk to Mark Karpelès, the former CEO of Mt. Gox, at the time the world's largest crypto exchange that failed and went through Bankruptcy. He talks about that process, and his thoughts on today's iteration of a similar situation with FTX.

Cobie & Ledger talked to Zane Tackett, who directed institutional sales at FTX until just a couple days ago, and was working to help find solutions for the gap directly with top team members. And while we're getting the story of what's happened the last week, wallets start getting drained. We streamed for three hours and didn't always say a lot, but here's the whole thing.

Cobie and Ledger join Ryan and David of Bankless to cope together and try and put some of the pieces back in order.

In this episode of UpOnly, Cobie & Ledger talk the rapid downfall of FTX and acquisition announcement by Binance. We're joined by the CEO of Wintermute, Jim Talbot, Gainzy, Do Kwon, and Martin Shkreli.

Thanks for listening :)

Presented by FTX: https://uponly.tv/ftx

Presented by FTX: https://uponly.tv/ftx

Presented by FTX: https://uponly.tv/ftx

presented by FTX: https://uponly.tv/ftx

In this episode of UpOnly, Cobie & Ledger talk to Keyboard Monkey and Flood Capital about what to do and how to manage through the bear market.

Presented by FTX: https://uponly.tv/ftx

LinksFrank TwitterThe ScoopShow PartnerThis episode is presented by FTX. Trade on an awesome mobile interface fee-free, and still get all the great portfolio tracking features you know and love: https://uponly.tv/ftxShow NotesWhy Shave Mustache?– “It’ll come back”– Cousins getting married, doesn’t wanna steal the showThe Block– Scoops has been there since 2018– Soon to be 4 year anniversary– 100+ people– Have data, research content, consulting/ advisory– Subscription products for all these legacy folksVenture Capital– Last year there was 32B that poured into crypto VCNFTs– Bored Apes/ Larva Labs– Some people outside of crypto may not think apes are impressive from an art standpoint– “this price is ridiculous!”– But there are so many things that are like that, handbags for exampleEnvironmental Impact of NFTs?– There is a lag between what we know in crypto vs what the outside world knows– Even when there are changes to make it better, it takes a long time for the public to accept a net narrative– It’s just a viral narrativeLarva Labs Deal– Scoops was surprised– He never expected M&A among NFT entities– Might even be a bit of a risk arbitrage– Mike Dudas talked about how LinksDAO was in the cross hairs of regulatorsCrypto Politics– “If it quacks like a duck and it walks like a duck, then its a security!” -Franky Scoops– People will likely get voted out of office if they take an anti crypto stance– Ryan Selkis potentially running– There are a few other crypto natives thinking about running– Free market resonates with the right– Protect the power of the dollar pushes away the right– “Banking the unbanked” resonates with the left– Environmental concerns pushes away the left– Ted Cruz will do anything for a vote– Ledger: “I think we need to get Dan Matuszewski to run up there in Boston”– “He’d hate it so much that he’d be a good politician”– Frank: “He’d be a great politician”– Ledger: “Can you imagine Dan up there getting grilled by congress”– “He’s start grilling them back give them the Boston treatment”Exciting Trends– Excited about NFTs moving separately from the other markets– Interest rates in cryptoInsane Wealth– SBF and CZ just have unheard of money– More scared of normal multimillionaires than crypto billionaires– The crypto billionaires have just been super humble – SBFs story is classic– Scoops: “Comparison is often the thief of joy”– Why can people not hang on to their Bored Apes?!– Just targeted much more oftenTerra and Do Kwon– Do Kwon is very relaxed– They want to make UST the largest stablecoin across various different chains– Sometimes he wakes up, puts on pants, and just buys $1B worth of BitcoinFINAL ALPHA– When prices are going down, just remember to count all of the blessings that you have in your life. Things could be a lot worse 🙂Notes by Kevin and LukeMusic by GiovanniPickle

Introduction- Kanav is the President of Jump Crypto (@JumpCryptoHQ)- Jump Trading is one of the largest quant trading firms in the world and moved into crypto ~6 years ago- Grew into what Jump Crypto is today with 140 employees- Jump Crypto has been trading, building and investing in the space- Ledger: Who wins in a cage match, Alameda or Jump? Kanav: Depends on the rules!- Crypto was a trading problem to solve at first, sandbox environment for people to play with without messing up existing systems- As the space started to grow and as DeFi emerged there was a similarity to traditional environments and they got more involved- Own crypto on the their balance sheet not just when making plays Intern to President- Jump is a very flat organisation usually three levels at most away from the top- A lot of freedom to work on things and push it further with more resources for what works- Kanav worked early on crypto projects that performed well and it led to getting his position and still building out the team- All in, all of the time. Always looking for engineers and ops people- Recently brought on a CMO Sophisticated Competition- Jump and most traders are playing on different time horizons e.g. seconds to minutes- Smart contracts and aspects of DeFi are less competitive as firms are still apprehensive Trading Systems- Some are highly automated others have more manual intervention. Alpha building process to build prediction models then plug it into an execution system- However there are things about the markets the models aren’t aware about that someone with pulse on the market would know- Mature risk management is in place taken from Jumps historical experience. A lot of it is hard coded in to prevent people putting on over sized positions- Not a lot going on with options markets, much smaller than everything else. Just because it hasn’t worked in the past doesn’t mean it won’t so will continue to watch Narrative Surprises?- Built the first highly electronic OTC desk but the narrative didn’t play out to the expected extent. Institutional narrative was slower to play out - a lot of red tape to get through for institutions and waiting for regulatory clarity but believes it’s still going to happen- How long Uniswap V2 has continues to be incentivised continues to be surprising Wormhole- CertusOne built the V1 and they were acquired by Jump. Wormhole connects 7 chains now transferring a lot of different information. Governed by 19 guardians, of which Jump Crypto is one- Wormhole had a 120K ETH hack recently- Developer noticed some discrepancies and they all jumped on a call to confirm the vulnerability then it was all hands on board to deal with it- Jump Crypto made the decision to backstop the funds Hopes for the future- Phantom and Solana pay type stuff- You see the uses on twitter, looks great- No on knows what a seed phrase is! We need better UX- On the gaming and metaverse side - i just want to have fun and be able to play a game- On the research side - ZK seems promising would like stuff there FINAL ALPHA- Harness the power of asymmetric upside- If you can see asymmetric upside and then place a lot of bets, you gmi

Cobie, Zion, Meltem, and Avi talk about nothing for two hours, again.

Cobie, Meltem, Z, & Avi

LinksSaylor TwitterWebShow PartnerThis episode is presented by FTX. Trade on an awesome mobile interface fee-free, and still get all the great portfolio tracking features you know and love: https://uponly.tv/ftxShow NotesBitcoin Journey– First tweeted about Bitcoin in 2013, was skeptical– Would comment on early tech, very unknown at the time– Would tweet about Bitcoin and people find his old tweets– Learned about Bitcoin through poker and online gamblingDiversifying– DON’T DIVERSIFY– Diversifying is selling the winners to buy the losers– Amazon wins– Walmart kinda treads water– and 15,000 companies lose– It’s nearly impossible to beat a digital monopolyBanking Experience– Lost $1M in a bank rug– Lost $1M in an Argentina rug as well– Banks wouldn’t let him move his money around– He got crushed by Argentina inflation– Kept getting smoked – “can we buy a yacht, float it to the US, then sell it here?”– Couldn’t do that, eventually gave upCurrent Bitcoin Experience– Then had $1B company with $500M cash on balance sheet– Knew it was gonna get inflated away– Saylor: “It’s like losing half your body – like amputating your left arm and left leg”– Now has like $5B worth of Bitcoin– If you’re on main street you had the worst year of your life– If you’re on Wall Street you had the best year of your life– First Bitcoin buy in August was defensive– Bought first amount at like $11k BTC ($250M buy)– Then got $600M loan at 1% interest…and just bought Bitcoin lmao– Saylor: “All time high is just the all time high to date”Business and Bitcoin– Cobie: “Given the cyclical nature of crypto, I’ve seen life ruining bear markets and pre up only euphoria bull markets. Will you keep buying bitcoin forever?”– Saylor: “Yeah” LMAO– Devaluing currency is crushing basically every small business– Saylor: “It’s like you’re rowing 7 knots, but the current is moving against you at 7 knots”– Michael Sailor! *credit to CryptoCred*– Saylor: “It is true that if I deal you double aces, you have an advantage in the poker game. But if I put a gun to your head, you don’t have that advantage anymore!” think he’s saying zoom out, think bigger lol– More war/ poker/ boating analogiesBitcoin vs Other Cryptos– The others are very complicated, there’s likely a crypto economy in the future– Bitcoin is not like them it is simple– Once a sovereign wealth fund owns $5B of it, then its OK for big companies to own $5B of it, and there’s a domino effect– One regulator could wake up tomorrow and put out a press release that doubles the market– There are 10,000 big institutions that can start to pour in and that tips everyone in– Saylor: “If you’re Apple, you can take your market cap up $2 trillion. Do you want $2 trillion???”– The real Bitcoin bond – borrow $1B at 1% interest and buy BitcoinCountries Buying Bitcoin– Cobie: “So El Salvador did it and now there are rumors of Honduras doing it – I do think the second person to follow is a strong form of leadership”– Ledger: “Your top job as a large holder of Bitcoin is to convince others to buy Bitcoin to increase the network effects”Bitcoin Maximalism– Ledger: basically asked if there is any chance Saylor buys anything besides Bitcoin?– Satoshi disappeared, price was a penny, there’s no pre-mine, its PoW, there’s no yield– Basically, it’s pure– Saylor: “Every proof of stake coin is a security”– If you are a person of any fame, you cannot endorse a security– However, you can endorse property– “Saylor Coin, Saylor Moon Coin, Son of Shiba Moon Coin”– China could create China Coin (only legal to mine in China)– There is risk in property, but its heavy and sound– You want property to be heavy and durableCrypto Future– The first decade of crypto was off shore, entrepreneurial– The second will be on shore, institutional– We are in the middle, and will be there for 3-5 years– Cobie (summarizing): “you buy Bitcoin because you know what Bitcoin will be in 50 years”– Other coins not so muchLife Advice– Saylor: “Stay in your lane”– You start trying to express a nuanced opinion and next thing you know your debating a nobel prize winner in that field– There are black swan tail risks that can crush everything so can’t worry about them much– If you think there’s a 95% chance Bitcoin goes to 0 then alright put 5% of your money in– Misc. good quotes:– “Bitcoin could be a $100 trillion asset without L2s without Lightning Network or anything”– “The block of granite under Manhattan doesn’t move. It still has value”Do you own Bitcoin as well personally?– Yes, Michael Saylor owns 17,732 BTCFINAL ALPHA– “Focus.”– “Just because you can acquire a thing doesn’t mean you can maintain a thing, and just because you can maintain a thing doesn’t mean you can enjoy a thing” referring mostly to a boat– “The hardest thing is to compete forever, profitably”Notes by Kevin and LukeMusic by GiovanniPickle

LinksVitalik Twittervitalik.ca blogShow PartnerThis episode is presented by FTX. Trade on an awesome mobile interface fee-free, and still get all the great portfolio tracking features you know and love: https://uponly.tv/ftxShow NotesWdyd Besides Crypto?– Vitalik reads a lot– Fascinated in how languages have evolved– Vitalik: Like you know how gate used to mean a structure that lets things in and out…now “gate” means a media scandal!– Ledger: “Favorite high fantasy?”– Vitalik: “Early Game of Thrones were great. Early high fantasy was very much good vs. evil, like in Lord of the Rings Elves and men are good, and Orcs are evil”– It’s possible Vitalik would run a book club in the future given Cobie would want it10 years ago what’d you see yourself doing?– Wasn’t thinking too deeply– Then Bitcoin came along and turned into something– Vitalik was the first writer for Bitcoin magazine– Cobie: “Did you at one point apply for a job at Ripple?”– Vitalik: “Yes”– Jed McCaleb said yes, but Visa trouble prevented him from joiningEthereum Beginnings– Too many co-founders at first (there are 8 for those of you who just pretend you like crypto)– Some coding changes too– Vitalik: “Sometimes I wonder how things would’ve turned out if Ethereum had different distribution”– Cobie: “Do you see Ethereum now as your life’s work or is there a future where you don’t work on Ethereum?”– Will be a large part of future– Might do some writings and other stuff in the future– Vitalik: “There’s a part of me that just wants to troll the market and repeat that stunt again [faking death lol]”Family– Vitalik’s dad is like a crypto influencer– Mom getting involved in crypto, optimistic rollupProof-of-Stake– When did PoS become obvious as the path forward?– Vitalik: “2014” holy chad– Eventually had a proper understanding of the tradeoffs and got convinced it was the way forward– ZEC and DOGE also switching to PoSNFTs– Why are they so good at onboarding and what’s the future?– There are huge desires for inclusion and collectibles– Vitalik: “Even like 10 years ago privatejet.com was more valuable than a private jet”– Virtual property is a thing– NFTs could be the big first use cases for crypto besides currencies and DeFi– Its an easy way for artists to get money– Vitalik: “Sometimes there is certain value in trading of things being hard”*Vitalik cuts out*”He needs to pay more gas!”Research– Most research prob already done– zk is really amazing technology but needs to be improved til we can use it– MEV could use some more researchWallet Improvements– Wallet security and multisig– Most wallets just have 1 password, can be dangerous– Alternatives:– Multisig – 3 keys, need at least 2 to transfer funds– Social recovery – on Vitalik’s cold wallet there are 6 individuals who have power, 4 out of 6 needed to move fundsMost likely to be Satoshi?– Craig Wright, Charles Hoskinson, Elon Musk, Loomdart– Vitalik: Blueberry– Cobie: “If you had to choose someone who’s your best guess?”– Vitalik: “If I had to choose someone I’d guess Hal Finney… between 1-20% chance it’s Hal Finney”Vitalik Memes– Vitalik has replied to deranged vitalik memers hahaha– Vitalik: “FTX – does that stand for FiTalik Exchange?”Multi-chain but not Cross-Chain– There are too many risks with bridging– Can just create same assets and use on 1 chain– In single chain, you can always revert chain and everyone gets assets back to at least initial state– With multi-chain, if stuff breaks, the problem is way larger (double spending etc)Ethereum Roadmap– Goal is still to have $0.05 per transaction– Hard to scale without sacrificing on security or centralization– With Rollups and sharding Ethereum can scale immensely– Within a couple of years Ethereum fees will be back under 5 centsFuture of Ethereum– Progress on zk EVM is going very well– Most nodes won’t store full chain– There will be a few who do*wifi cut out 5 min miss*Privacy– Blockchain isn’t “true privacy” just pseudonymous– Regulators ok with that– Once its on ETH… where do we go?– Vitalik: “People are really underestimating the risks/ downsides of no privacy”– Ledger: “I want to know the craziest thing Vitalik ever bought with crypto”– Vitalik: “Metformin probably”– Anti-aging drugAnti-aging– Ledger: “How long do you think someone born today will live?”– Vitalik: “I think more than a 50% chance someone will see the year 3,000”– SIR!– How does equality come into play? Just the rich live forever?– Vitalik: “I think it will shortly evenly distribute”– Not just billionaires get to live forever– Anti-aging stuff should be part of the plan for countries that have universal health care– Vitalik: “COVID vaccines should have been offered as a choice for those who wanted it in summer 2020”– More towards very conservative for mandates, very liberal for choice– Vitalik: “If people start to live to be 500 years old psych will be bad – this is a fair critique”– Not all tech solves all problemsWorld Stuff– It will take a long time before we actually populate Mars– Think about Antartica…we aren’t there yet and its way easierNon-crypto Area of Investment– Biotech– Really thinks there will be a long arc of progress over next 70 years– Same way computers had a long arc of progress over last 70 yearsFINAL ALPHA– Vitalik: “Come out of every day a better person than when you went into that day”– Vitalik: “Whether its math or cryptography or working out, whatever it is do something”– It puts you in a frame of mind of progress which is really good for mental healthNotes by Kevin and LukeMusic by GiovanniPickle

LinksTetranode TwitterShow PartnerThis episode is presented by FTX. Trade on an awesome mobile interface fee-free, and still get all the great portfolio tracking features you know and love: https://uponly.tv/ftx

LinksCobieWebShow PartnerThis episode is presented by FTX. Trade on an awesome mobile interface fee-free, and still get all the great portfolio tracking features you know and love: https://uponly.tv/ftxShow NotesUpOnlyTV NotesIntroduction & Early Days ⁃ Bought Bitcoin first in 2012 but really down the rabbit-hole through 2013 onwards ⁃ Only other original CT person still active is Bob Laxative (formerly KingBTC) ⁃ Being early turned people into survivors. Cryptsy, MtGox etc hacked. Everything going to zero, only self custody BTC felt safe ⁃ Started with £200-300 ($500) and didn’t put any more fiat in other than one investment in 2020 (that went to zero) ⁃ Got shilled QuarkCoin by Bill Still on cryptsy and accidentally sold the top. Got a DM from Jebus911 about another coin that went 70x ⁃ Up significantly in BTC early but down in USD in bear market. Lost a lot of BTC on things like BTCBuilder ⁃ Sold Cryptsy listings via API for months while at uni for free multiples before the alpha got leaked ⁃ Saw BTC as the solution following the financial crisis and levels of corruption and incompetenceMtGox ⁃ Gox was the main exchange and allegedly had a bot to buy back BTC that had been lost ⁃ Constant buy pressure caused the price to run ⁃ Unsure what the outcome would have been on the state of the market if it hadn’t happened ⁃ Some friends got completely wiped by Gox ⁃ Psychologically put a lot of people off BTC having to consider the cost of buying the BTC they had lostTrading & Making It ⁃ Wouldn’t consider ever having been a full time trader ⁃ It was more of a hobby or side hustle. Decisions mostly based on instinct and prior cycle behaviour ⁃ It’s become much harder to call cycle bottoms and tops ⁃ People create narratives to rationalise things it’s easier to learn from your own mistakes with time looking back ⁃ Above average at most things when actually trying, except League of Legends ⁃ Deep down believed he would eventually be a millionaire. Without crypto this would still have happened from acquisitions/startups ⁃ Opens you to being more risk tolerant in other areas of life e.g. taking stock vs salary ⁃ Easier to have conviction when you don’t sit through large drawdowns and can gauge risk. “HODL is for poor people” unless disciplined you’ll let your gains evaporate and might become a forced seller at the bottom ⁃ Tries to estimate probability of it being over on every dip. Wants to sell as close to the top as possible, can buy back higher if wrong. Won’t work if you do this on every dipSupercycle ⁃ Idea of a Supercycle described by Su in earlier episode is probably right ⁃ If crypto becomes integrated into society and BTC becomes the store of value then it’s the only thing that makes sense ⁃ Thinks it’s not the right time for it to happen, integration is tertiary ⁃ If crypto disappears now how many lives are actually impacted ⁃ Unless you run …say a crypto podcast? (pls sir my family) ⁃ Maybe it is now but maybe it needs another boom/bust first before it reaches that level ⁃ Top 10/20 assets on CoinGecko right now – are we really ready for a supercycle??ETH ⁃ ETH DAO hack, ETC fork, ICOs put off. Didn’t buy more ETH because conviction was low with all of this. Still held original ETH but could have rotated into buying much more ⁃ Instead of focusing on ponzification it’s best to focus on change in products available e.g. genuine use case like lending on chain being built ⁃ Building blocks add value to the ecosystem because they enable future building blocks. OG DeFi protocols and things like MetaMask responsible for leading that changeFounding Lido & ETH 2.0 ⁃ Co-founded Lido but says Konstantin and Vasily are the real brains behind everything along with the core teams. Fought to not call it dPool. (Fought with Ledger to not have UpOnly called TokenTalk) ⁃ When PoS was created there was no real concept of DeFi ⁃ Staking Ethereum is just a better form of wrapped Ethereum and risk free yield is the bottom brick of DeFi ⁃ Thinks merge will be Q2/Q3 or later. Beacon chains have been live for a whole ⁃ People will think it’s bullish but $35B on the beacon chain will become unlocked too⁃ Wider ETH community attitude to scaling is bad in level of acknowledgement it’s atrociously bad right now. Optimistic roll ups have felt like a disappointment so far and ZK aren’t EVM compatible yet ⁃ Misaligned incentives between people who got rich holding ETH and the usability of the network ⁃ Equally sceptical of alternative L1s. Fragmented liquidity and most will fail to sustain ecosystems without incentives ⁃ Easier to trust that ETH will be around in future vs a coin flip on some other L1s. Max 5% survive and likely still struggle. Maybe new L1s just keep getting funded forever?Identifying the Meta ⁃ Used to be buying things before it got listed on exchange, playing on APIs ⁃ Moved to buying when it listed on smaller exchanges before it hit the bigger exchanges ⁃ Shifted again to how to get coins before they hit any exchange and people would monitor BitcoinTalk and cloud mining was popular ⁃ 2017 was ICO meta trying to get in before main token sale ⁃ 2020 was DeFi farming ⁃ 2021 was BTC -> ETH -> DeFi complacency -> meme coins -> NFTs -> L1s and OHM forks ⁃ What’s next? There is no crystal ball, you can guess the narrative that makes sense or watch what’s happening and being aggressive when you spot it ⁃ Short term playing the meta it doesn’t have to make sense a lot of the time it’s just a game of chicken anyway. Narrative just needs PMF ⁃ People assume they’re already late rather than factoring in if the narrative really takes off ⁃ Narrative can drive both supply and demand and people underestimate how it can get out of hand ⁃ Figuring out the meta game is the most important thing and how to make money in crypto. Avoid things like YouTube they’re good at content marketing not crypto ⁃ Have to avoid maximalism and accept these trades and rotationsBear Market Predictions ⁃ Metaverse and GameFi have crazy valuations but a couple with war chests that will enable them to keep building in a bear market ⁃ Main goal can possibly become preserving the treasury vs delivering ⁃ Meme coins all to zero ⁃ Anything with a constant token emission requirement all to zero ⁃ Regulations could cause decentralised in name only projects to disappear ⁃ Young hungry teams will keep building ⁃ 60% of people who made life changing money this cycle will lose it allWorking in Crypto & DAOs ⁃ Shift recently between keeping a normal job alongside crypto to now. It’s become much more mainstream and more risk effective to now join a crypto project or protocol. In crypto it can be better to be an early employer vs founder which is quite different to traditional tech ⁃ DAO currently a type of regulatory arbitrage which operates worse but can have a token. There are examples of very good and very bad DAOs ⁃ Best DAOs won’t be the ones people like in a bull market, maybe even those with concentrated ownership like 15 addresses vs retail owners getting angry at teams over token economics ⁃ DAOs will demand a new type of VC. More contributor type VC involvement e.g. what Paradigm and Delphi are moving towardsFinding a Crew ⁃ Early days had a TG group called 27 club to talk about the markets and probably wouldn’t have made it in crypto without it. 70/80% of the members did not make it in crypto ⁃ Most people who make it have a group like this to share alpha. Essential to have people in your life who are all inMaximalism ⁃ Picking a group and hating an opposing group is historically quite common for humans ⁃ BTC and ETH maxi people are very similar people that would be friends irl but project hatred at each other online instead ⁃ BTC maximalism used to be people speculate on new things while quietly all knowing that BTC was the only thing really worthwhile but could experiment to see if there was value elsewhere ⁃ Fees similarly now except it’s expanded beyond just BTC to a small number of other coins ⁃ Maximalism now has changed similarly to political influencers and become inflammatory and toxic ⁃ See it a lot now in BTC and ETH with the same talking points, it’s counterproductive⁃ Staying open minded is only positive for you as a person within this space. On a long enough timeline all maximalists are wrong at some pointFuture Prediction ⁃ Most probable future is maybe a KYC country chain with DeFi, but without governance tokens, with the base currency being a CBDCRisk Management Pyramid Changes ⁃ Reason it’s wrong is that if you take a 5% entry in something risky that performed really well, by constantly taking off the position to keep it at 5% you’d ruin your upside ⁃ Pyramid makes sense as an entry tool and rebalancing once the trade actually ends makes more sense ⁃ There’ll be an updated version coming soonFinal Alpha ⁃ “Tyranny is the deliberate removal of nuance” – Albert Maysles ⁃ Be wary of anyone intentionally removing or ignoring nuance from a conversation as often they have an agenda ⁃ Being a structured critical thinker is probably the most important thing going into 2022 and the following decadeNotes by Kevin and LukeMusic by GiovanniPickle