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Bits + Bips

Unchained

Exploring how crypto and macro collide one basis point at a time.


Hosted by Ram Ahluwalia, Austin Campbell and Chris Perkins.

Livestream: Every Monday at 4:30 pm ET.

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  • 27 episodes
  • Avg 48 min
  • English

Episodes 27

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  • June 19 · 43 min

    The Fed Is Turning Hawkish. What Does That Mean for Bitcoin and Strategy?

    The Fed dropped its easing bias and half the FOMC penciled in rate hikes. Zach Pandl on what Kevin Warsh's first meeting means for Bitcoin, gold, and Strategy. Sponsors Fidelity: Fidelity has been building in crypto and DeFi since 2014 — now they're hiring. Explore career opportunities at one of the most forward-thinking names in finance here: https://crypto.fidelitycareers.com. Cape: Your biggest crypto vulnerability isn't your wallet, it's your phone number. Cape is America's privacy-first mobile carrier that rotates your SIM identity daily and blocks SIM swaps before they happen. Get 33% off your first six months at https://cape.co/unchained (use code: UNCHAINED). Kevin Warsh held rates steady at his first FOMC meeting but removed the committee's easing bias — and nine of eighteen participating members wrote down a rate hike for 2026, a bigger shift than markets expected. Zach Pandl, Head of Research at Grayscale Investments and a former Goldman Sachs economist, joins Steven Ehrlich to discuss. Pandl argues that rising real rates are a constraint equity markets are not pricing correctly, and that AI euphoria makes the downside case, not blunts it. The conversation covers the SpaceX IPO's low-float mechanics, why perpetual futures outperformed tokenized stocks around the IPO, Strategy's preferred equity cracking below $90, and why speculative flows explain gold and Bitcoin's recent turbulence better than fundamentals. Pandl closes with a buy-the-dip case for both stores of value and argues the DeFi revenue story, anchored in Hyperliquid and Aave, will define the second half of 2026. Host: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Steven Ehrlich⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, Head of Research, SharpLink Guest: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Zach Pandl - Head of Research at Grayscale Investments Timestamps 🏛️ 02:32 The Warsh era begins: what the Fed just signaled without saying it 📈 14:39 Rising rates and irrational markets: where this breaks down 💹 16:47 The SpaceX IPO and a crypto déjà vu moment 🎓 22:56 Fidelity's message to crypto's next generation 🏆 25:55 Perpetual futures just proved something important about the SpaceX test ❄️ 27:27 Pandl just made the crypto winter official—here's why ⚠️ 31:30 The problem with Bitcoin as collateral (and no one's talking about it) 🥇 37:03 Gold and Bitcoin diverge: what the Iran conflict reveals 💰 40:01 The DeFi revenue shift nobody saw coming

  • June 16 · 58 min

    Why the Anthropic Export Ban Should Worry the Crypto Industry

    A Friday-night directive banned Anthropic's Fable 5 with no public explanation — Sam Enzer on what it means for AI, crypto, and who controls the national security card next. --- Thank you to our sponsors: ⁠Fidelity⁠: Fidelity has been building in crypto and DeFi since 2014 — now they're hiring. Explore career opportunities at one of the most forward-thinking names in finance here: ⁠crypto.fidelitycareers.com⁠. ⁠Cape⁠: Your biggest crypto vulnerability isn't your wallet, it's your phone number. Cape is America's privacy-first mobile carrier that rotates your SIM identity daily and blocks SIM swaps before they happen. Get 33% off your first six months at cape.co/unchained (use code: UNCHAINED). Heads up! If you haven't yet, be sure to subscribe to Bits + Bips on its dedicated channels. Follow us on Apple Podcasts, YouTube, Spotify, X, Unchained and wherever you get your podcasts. 🔥 Apple Podcasts - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/bits-bips/id1827931786 🔥 YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuKiSkbYrUOOEEiYQEVPniQ 🔥 Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/6aSBMrOyi33aVDCULJ9mjN?si=NTLk-jl5QGeytA6-2kxMVQ&nd=1&dlsi=42f0b13dd53c4ba0 🔥X - https://x.com/bitsandbips 🔥 Unchained - https://unchainedcrypto.com/bitsandbips/ ---- The US government issued a Friday-night export ban on Anthropic's Fable 5, citing a jailbreak that could expose the underlying Mythos model's cyber capabilities, with no disclosure of statutory authority and no comment period. Sam Enzer, Partner and CahillNXT Co-Chair at Cahill Gordon & Reindel, joins Austin Campbell, Ram Ahluwalia, and Chris Perkins to assess the directive's legal standing. Enzer draws a parallel to Gensler-era regulation by enforcement and warns that, absent a transparent framework, export controls could reach APIs, DeFi protocols, and blockchain front ends serving foreign nationals, raising First Amendment questions that echo the 1990s encryption wars. Austin frames SpaceX's $1.77 trillion debut as a classic low-float, high-FDV token: a squeeze at open, then a bleed. Ram cites the 135x price-to-sales ratio and the coming VC unlock wave as reasons to avoid it. The hosts close on the SEC's proposed Reg NMS rescission, which Chris calls a generational unlock for tokenized equities and DeFi, and which could rewrite two decades of equity market structure. Hosts: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Austin Campbell⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, Host of Bits + Bips, Zero Knowledge Consulting ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Ram Ahluwalia⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, Co-Host, CEO of Lumida ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Chris Perkins⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, Co-Host, President of CoinFund Guest: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Sam Enzer - Partner and CahillNXT Co-Chair at Cahill Gordon & Reindel Timestamps 🤖 02:48 What the Fable 5 export ban says, what Anthropic disputes, and why neither side has released the full directive ⚖️ 04:39 Sam Enzer on why restricting software is restricting speech 🌐 07:16 Sam Enzer on whether export controls can reach APIs and DeFi protocols 🏛️ 09:55 Austin on the Choke Point parallel and why the limiting principle matters 📜 15:09 Ram on the First Amendment: why restricting software is restricting speech 📣 26:12 Fidelity: Explore crypto careers that could change your future at https://crypto.fidelitycareers.com 🌐 26:54 Cape: Get 33% off your first six months at https://cape.co/unchained 🚀 29:00 SpaceX's $1.77T IPO: bull case, bear case, and what the onchain perps showed 📉 31:05 Why Ram calls SpaceX a bad investment: 135x revenue and VC unlocks incoming 💰 37:22 Austin on SpaceX as a low-float, high-FDV token: where this chart always goes 📋 49:48 Why Reg NMS rescission unlocks tokenized equities for onchain markets 💸 56:15 Ram on Robinhood and PFOF brokers as the biggest Reg NMS losers

  • June 9 · 58 min

    Was the SpaceX IPO Really to Blame for Bitcoin's Worst Week Since FTX?

    Strategy owes $3.4 billion over two years on its preferreds. Austin maps the three exits: issue more stock, sell Bitcoin, or suspend dividends. None are good. --- Thank you to our sponsors: Fidelity: Fidelity has been building in crypto and DeFi since 2014 — now they're hiring. Explore career opportunities at one of the most forward-thinking names in finance here: crypto.fidelitycareers.com. Cape: Your biggest crypto vulnerability isn't your wallet, it's your phone number. Cape is America's privacy-first mobile carrier that rotates your SIM identity daily and blocks SIM swaps before they happen. Get 33% off your first six months at cape.co/unchained (use code: UNCHAINED). ---- Bitcoin logged its worst week since the FTX collapse, falling 17%, while Ethereum dropped 22% and the total crypto market cap shed roughly a third of a trillion dollars. The looming SpaceX IPO seems like an easy explanation. But Ram Ahluwalia argues that's not the real culprit: STRF and STRC, Strategy's preferred securities, have slipped below par, stalling the capital engine that funds Bitcoin buys. Austin Campbell, Ram, and Chris Perkins cover three distinct crises in this episode. A Claude Opus 4.8 agent found a live counterfeiting bug in Zcash's Orchard Shielded Pool, undetected since 2022, prompting the group to map how AI is rewiring the threat landscape for financial services. Back on Strategy, Ram applies Hyman Minsky's three market phases and argues the company was built for the final phase — where price appreciation is the only bailout. Austin closes by framing Strategy's $3.4 billion in preferred obligations as an SVB-style depositor flight problem with no clear resolution in sight. Hosts: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Austin Campbell⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, Host of Bits + Bips, Zero Knowledge Consulting ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Ram Ahluwalia⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, Co-Host, CEO of Lumida ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Chris Perkins⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, Co-Host, President of CoinFund Timestamps 💣 03:02 What caused crypto's worst week since the FTX collapse 🌍 09:46 Why retail still drives crypto volatility and why Chris thinks the market misread incoming Fed chair Warsh 🤖 18:33 AI tools discovering critical crypto vulnerabilities faster than devs can patch them 🐛 24:25 How Claude Opus 4.8 found a live counterfeiting bug in Zcash's Orchard pool ₿ 31:02 Austin on whether Bitcoin's Lindy effect survives the quantum-refactoring problem 💼 32:42 Fidelity: Explore crypto careers that could change your future at https://crypto.fidelitycareers.com 📱 33:24 Cape: Get 33% off your first six months at https://cape.co/unchained 🏦 34:23 Strategy's preferred problem and the math on 32 BTC sold and 1,550 bought 📊 38:03 Ram on Minsky's three market phases, and why Strategy was built for the riskiest one ⏰ 44:00 Why Austin says introducing preferreds turned Strategy from a Bitcoin play to a clock 🇺🇸 52:56 Is Hunter Biden's crypto interest genuine conviction or attention play

  • June 7 · 8 min

    Strategy Sold Bitcoin. Polymarket Can't Agree on When

    Strategy sold Bitcoin in May and disclosed the sale via SEC filing in June. The Polymarket market on that sale resolved to no sale in May, with tens of millions of dollars on one question: does the trade date control, or the disclosure date? Sam Enzer and Steven Ehrlich map the dispute, the oracle governance concentration risk behind it, and the practical checklist for diligencing any prediction market bet before placing it. Host: Steven Ehrlich, Host of Bits + Bips and Head of Research at Sharplink - https://x.com/Steven_Ehrlich Guest: Sam Enzer - Partner and CahillNXT Co-Chair at Cahill Gordon & Reindel This clip is from a longer conversation on prediction market law, insider trading, and oracle risk. Full episode here: https://youtube.com/live/Lo6g6VBF46U We go live every Thursday at 12:00pm ET - subscribe to catch it live. Sponsor: Unchained Daily: Subscribe for free at https://unchainedcrypto.com/newsletters Heads up! If you haven’t yet, be sure to subscribe to Bits + Bips, since the show will migrate there in a few weeks. Follow us on Apple Podcasts, YouTube, Spotify, X, Unchained and wherever you get your podcasts. 👉 https://linktr.ee/bitsandbips

  • June 3 · 12 min

    Why Strategy's Capital Stack Is Starting to Show Cracks

    Strategy sold Bitcoin for the first time since 2022 — a small sale, but a meaningful signal. Ram, Austin, and Chris work through the capital stack math: $15 billion in preferred stock needs Bitcoin to appreciate 11.5% annually just to cover dividends. What happens if it doesn't? With: Austin Campbell, Founder, Zero Knowledge Consulting; Adjunct Professor, NYU Stern - https://x.com/austincampbell Ram Ahluwalia, Co-Host, CEO of Lumida - https://x.com/ramahluwalia Chris Perkins, Co-Host, CEO of 250 Digital Asset Management - https://x.com/perkinscr97 This clip is from a longer conversation on Strategy's Bitcoin capital stack, the Anthropic IPO, and crypto's political fight with the banking lobby. Full episode here: https://youtube.com/live/eIarmme4Jvc We go live every Monday at 4:30pm ET. Subscribe to catch it live. If you haven’t yet, be sure to subscribe to Bits + Bips, since the show will migrate there in a few weeks. Follow us on Apple Podcasts, YouTube, Spotify, X, Unchained and wherever you get your podcasts. 🔥 Apple Podcasts - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/bits-bips/id1827931786 🔥 YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuKiSkbYrUOOEEiYQEVPniQ 🔥 Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/6aSBMrOyi33aVDCULJ9mjN?si=NTLk-jl5QGeytA6-2kxMVQ&nd=1&dlsi=42f0b13dd53c4ba0 🔥X - https://x.com/bitsandbips 🔥 Unchained - https://unchainedcrypto.com/bitsandbips/

  • May 31 · 12 min

    Why Crypto Is Losing the Momentum Trade to AI Stocks Right Now

    Bitcoin’s implied volatility just hit a nine-month low. ETF outflows have been running for weeks. And a memory chip ETF may have matched IBIT for the fastest ETF launch in history. So what’s happening to crypto? Steve Sosnick, chief strategist at Interactive Brokers, and Steve Ehrlich break down the structural forces working against crypto right now: AI stocks doing the heavy lifting in portfolios, upcoming SpaceX, OpenAI, and Anthropic IPOs pulling momentum capital, Kraken and Ledger delaying their own listings, and the ‘crypto tourist’ problem — ETF buyers who bought on momentum and will sell on momentum the moment something else outperforms. Is this a cleansing moment, or is crypto just one sector now? Guests: Steve Sosnick, Chief Strategist at Interactive Brokers. Host: Steve Ehrlich, Head of Research at SharpLink. This clip is from a longer conversation. Full episode here: https://youtube.com/live/H31JcAM0evI If you haven’t yet, be sure to subscribe to Bits + Bips, since the show will migrate there in a few weeks. Follow us on Apple Podcasts, YouTube, Spotify, X, Unchained and wherever you get your podcasts. 🔥 Apple Podcasts - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/bits-bips/id1827931786 🔥 YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuKiSkbYrUOOEEiYQEVPniQ 🔥 Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/6aSBMrOyi33aVDCULJ9mjN?si=NTLk-jl5QGeytA6-2kxMVQ&nd=1&dlsi=42f0b13dd53c4ba0 🔥X - https://x.com/bitsandbips 🔥 Unchained - https://unchainedcrypto.com/bitsandbips/

  • May 28 · 16 min

    Why Arjun Sees a Link Between Pope Leo and Bitcoin

    What does Pope Leo's first AI encyclical have to do with the Bitcoin white paper? Arjun Sethi, co-CEO of Kraken, traces a philosophical thread from Augustine's City of God through Catholic social teaching's subsidiarity principle to Satoshi's monetary architecture. Austin Campbell finds the same argument in the Federalist Papers. Ram Ahluwalia brings in Immanuel Kant and the Tower of Babel. And Chris Perkins asks the question the whole room is thinking: is the Pope into DeFi? Hosts: @austincampbell, @perkinscr97, @ramahluwalia Guest: @arjunsethi This clip is from a longer conversation on Kraken's global strategy, tokenized equities, and the SEC's paused innovation exemption. Full episode here: https://youtube.com/live/KKec65JyBjw We go live every Monday at 4:30 pm ET. Subscribe to catch it live. If you haven’t yet, be sure to subscribe to Bits + Bips, since the show will migrate there in a few weeks. Follow us on Apple Podcasts, YouTube, Spotify, X, Unchained and wherever you get your podcasts. 🔥 Apple Podcasts - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/bits-bips/id1827931786 🔥 YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuKiSkbYrUOOEEiYQEVPniQ 🔥 Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/6aSBMrOyi33aVDCULJ9mjN?si=NTLk-jl5QGeytA6-2kxMVQ&nd=1&dlsi=42f0b13dd53c4ba0 🔥X - https://x.com/bitsandbips 🔥 Unchained - https://unchainedcrypto.com/bitsandbips/

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