The Breakdown

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Narrative Watch: The Future of Crypto FUD Jan 28, 2020

Show notes

We’re over $9,000! That means a lot of good things, of course. But any price increase brings with it increased scrutiny and, yes, increased FUD. The question for this time around is whether the FUD is the same old same old or something new.

In this episode, @nlw looks at three emergent (and continued) areas of FUD, including: 1) accusations that the bitcoin community is rooting for calamity as the safe haven narrative takes hold; 2) an updated “crypto is for criminals” narrative with more emphasis on state-level enemies; 3) a new, more economically vindictive green/energy waste narrative.

Importantly, the question isn’t so much whether these new categories of FUD will come to fruition, but what can be done about them.

The Breakdown Weekly Recap | Jan 25 2020 Jan 24, 2020

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A single long-form episode with all the week's content + a TL;DR. This week was all about macro frame-setting coming out of Davos.

Monday - 4 Reasons Crypto Should Care About Davos
Tuesday - Gitcoin's Kevin Owocki on Controversy and the Future of Open Source Funding
Wednesday - Why Vodafone’s Defection Won't Matter For Libra
Thursday - Will Mass Adoption Be More PayPal or Pornhub?
Friday - Davos Takeaways, CBDCs & the Rise of Bitcoin Art featuring Brekkie von Bitcoin

Davos Takeaways, CBDCs & the Rise of Bitcoin Art featuring Brekkie von Bitcoin Jan 24, 2020

Show notes

That’s a wrap! The World Economic Forum is over, and the key ideas coming out of Davos for our industry are: 1) a continued ‘blockchain, not crypto’ narrative; 2) a believe in the inevitability of cashless futures (without much concern about the negative implications); and 3) the rise of CBDCs.

On the CBDC front, the WEF put out a toolkit for governments that are considering their own currency; Japan announced a project to explore a digital currency as a counterweight to the influence a digital yuan might bring China; and a BIS study says 1 in 10 governments anticipate having a digital currency within 3 years.

Finally, we close asking prolific bitcoiner and artist Brekkie von Bitcoin about the state of bitcoin art and why even the hardcore financially-minded folks in the space should care.

Will Mass Adoption Be More PayPal or Pornhub? Jan 23, 2020

Show notes

There is an ongoing debate in the crypto community about where mainstream adoption. One point of view is that it will be the slow steady acceptance of digital assets. On that front, Bakkt president Adam White said in Davos yesterday that the company is on track to launch their app this year.

Another perspective is that the main use case of crypto is to enable otherwise censored transactions. Lending credence to this perspective is the case of Pornhub, which saw payouts to its more than 100,000 performers blocked unexpectedly by PayPal in November, and which announced cash outs via Tether (USDT) today.

In this episode, @nlw breaks down these two arguments and asks whether they’re mutually exclusive.

Also discussed is the new BCH mining group (cartel?) insisting on a 12.5% block reward dev fund, as well as interesting insights and data from research from CoinDesk and The Block today.

Why Vodafone’s Defection Won't Matter For Libra Jan 22, 2020

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News broke yesterday that the Libra Association had seen it’s 8th high profile defection, this time from the telecom giant Vodafone. In today’s episode of the breakdown, @nlw argues that Association members are far less of a factor in Libra’s success than key regulatory questions around domiciling, the value peg, and the US’s fear of a Chinese digital currency.

Also in this episode, Square Crypto announces its plans for a Lightning Development Kit while Square also announced a new patent that could make crypto easier to use. In regulatory battles, meanwhile, both the Blockchain Association and the Chamber of Digital Commerce have filed amicus briefs around the SEC-Telegram lawsuit.

Gitcoin's Kevin Owocki on Controversy and the Future of Open Source Funding Jan 21, 2020

Show notes

Ever since announcing their fourth round of grants, Gitcoin has been a major subject of conversation across the Twittersphere. In addition to all the excited buzz from both technical projects and media creators vying for grants matched based on E. Glen Weyl and Vitalik Buterin’s quadratic funding model, there has been controversy. Some of that controversy has been from outside the Ethereum community, pointing to Consensys and Ethereum Foundation support as an example of centralization. Some of the controversy has come from within, as debates rage about what is or isn’t an acceptable use of “public” resources.

No matter what one’s position, it’s hard to deny that Gitcoin is one of the most interesting experiments in open source funding to date. Listen as @nlw askes the projects founder Kevin Owocki about the history of the project, the controversy, and what makes this round of grants such a big jump forward.

4 Reasons Crypto Should Care About Davos Jan 20, 2020

Show notes

The World Economic Forum kicks off today. CoinDesk and The Block both have representatives there. Numerous panels relate to topics around the industry. At the same time, the centralized power structure is something of an anathema to the world crypto is trying to build. The question is: should crypto even care?

The Breakdown Weekly Recap | Jan 18 2020 Jan 18, 2020

Show notes

A single long-form episode with all daily episodes of The Breakdown along with a TL;DR on the week:

Monday - Tokenized NBA Contracts & The Hunt For Crypto’s Killer App
Tuesday - Mati Greenspan on the Technical and Macro Roots of Bitcoin’s Price Surge
Wednesday - Why DeFi Is Surging As The Market Pumps
Thursday - Why ‘Crypto Dad’ Is Building the Digital Dollar Foundation
Friday - Tyrone Ross On The Next Million Crypto Investors

Tyrone Ross On The Next Million Crypto Investors Jan 17, 2020

Show notes

One man. Three piping hot takes. In this special interview episode of The Breakdown, financial advisor and crypto advocate Tyrone Ross shares his thoughts on:

Why Financial Advisors are the key to bringing in the next wave of crypto investors
Why DeFi is an even bigger deal than you think - and not just to the hackers and entrepreneurs building on it
Why Square’s CashApp - not Binance, not Coinbase, not any one else - is the most important company in Crypto

Why ‘Crypto Dad’ Is Building the Digital Dollar Foundation Jan 16, 2020

Show notes

As Libra continues to spur discussions among regulators around the world, and China’s digital yuan comes ever closer to fruition, the U.S. Federal Reserve seems disinclined to look seriously at a digital dollar. Ex-CFTC Chair Chris Giancarlo - aka “Crypto Dad” - isn’t waiting around. He has teamed with Accenture to launch the nonprofit Digital Dollar Foundation.

As crypto continues to evolve, it does so in sometimes divergent directions. Gemini announced a new insurance company designed to make big institutions more comfortable with the space. Zcash, meanwhile, released an updated SDK to make it easier to shield transactions via mobile. Can the privacy-preserving side of crypto co-exist, ultimately, with the sanguine institutional side?

Finally, we revisit our discussion of personal tokens and ISAs, as well as look at the latest research from Coinmetrics on whether bitcoin is behaving like a safe haven asset.

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