Unchained

Galaxy's Alex Thorn argues Bitcoin bottomed in late June. While macro funds exit, sovereign wealth funds buy and AI pushes debasement, he says now makes a good entry point.

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Quick favor: We're deciding what Unchained does next; new shows, stream times, what's worth paying for.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Our listener survey⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ takes five minutes, it's anonymous, and I read the write-in answers myself. Everyone who takes it can enter a drawing for a free year of Unchained Premium or Bits + Bips Premium. Open through Sunday, October 18.

— Laura

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Bitcoin has now traded five or six weeks above its 50-week moving average. In every prior bear market, Alex Thorn says, that signal meant the bottom was already in, and he believes this one came in late June.

Thorn, Head of Firmwide Research at Galaxy, walks Laura Shin through his essay "Why Now Is the Time to Add and Hold BTC," including 13F filings showing Millennium and D.E. Shaw cutting Bitcoin ETF exposure while Mubadala and Morgan Stanley Wealth Management added, and long-dormant coins waking up at 34,000 BTC a month in 2026, down from 67,000 in 2024.

He argues a $40 trillion national debt and a credit-funded AI buildout make the debasement case stronger than at the October high, then names the tripwires that would break his thesis, from a sustained drop below the 50-week average to a quantum computer. With conferences full of tokenization panels, being long Bitcoin may be the contrarian trade.

Host:

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Laura Shin⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, Host / Unchained

Guest:

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Alex Thorn - Head of Firmwide Research at Galaxy

Timestamps

🎬 00:00 Intro

📋 00:29 Unchained Survey: complete the listener survey at https://unchainedcrypto.com/survey

🎙️ 01:28 Bits + Bips: search Bits + Bips and subscribe at https://www.youtube.com/@Bitsandbips

🧭 01:50 Why Alex says retaking the 50-week average means Bitcoin bottomed in June

🏦 06:36 Who sold and who bought: macro funds out, sovereign wealth funds in

💳 12:19 Nexo: Generate daily interest on your crypto or borrow funds against your assets at https://unchainedcrypto.com/go/nexo-podcast-yt

🐋 13:09 Why fewer old coins are waking up in 2026, and what that means for supply

💵 16:42 Why Alex says the debasement case is stronger than at the October high

🕵️ 19:56 Why Alex sees Bitcoin as an exit from an AI-powered surveillance state

🧱 23:48 Why Alex sees the tokenization boom as a contrarian signal to buy Bitcoin

⚠️ 29:31 The tripwires that would invalidate Alex's bottom call

🎯 34:09 Alex's $125K target and his $250K call for the end of 2027
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Anthropic's S-1 shows the company is still burning cash. Kain Warwick and Taylor Monahan say the bigger risk is a founder voting bloc that has to vote together.

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Thank you to our sponsor!

Put your crypto to work with Nexo: earn daily interest or borrow funds against your assets on one platform trusted by more than 10 million clients.

Find out more at⁠⁠ Nexo⁠⁠.

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========================================================

Quick favor: We’re deciding what Unchained does next; new shows, stream times, what’s worth paying for.

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Our listener survey⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ takes five minutes, it’s anonymous, and I read the write-in answers myself. Everyone who takes it can enter a drawing for a free year of Unchained Premium or Bits + Bips Premium. Open through Sunday, October 18.

— Laura

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Anthropic has filed its S-1, and Kain Warwick stacks it up against Google's 2004 IPO: $12 billion in revenue in Q2 2026 alone and $8.7 million in revenue per employee. What jumped out at him, though, was governance: 7 founders holding 50% of the voting shares in a side pot that has to vote together.

Warwick, Taylor Monahan, and Austin Griffith say crypto has run this experiment before. Monahan calls the founders' sense of moral superiority Anthropic's biggest risk, and Griffith compares the bloc to every multisig that stalled once the incentives to coordinate faded.

The hosts also cover how AI models started sending bug bounty disputes to SEAL 911, an AI result that says "ETH is false," Keystone's leaked device signing key, phishing emails sent from Foundation's own mail system, and why Ethereum's Glamsterdam upgrade was cancelled.

In what Warwick calls one of the most dangerous times to be in crypto, the safest move may be doing less.

Hosts:

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Kain Warwick⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ - Host of Uneasy Money and Founder of Infinex and Synthetix

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Taylor Monahan⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ - Co-host of Uneasy Money and Security Expert

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Austin Griffith⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ - Co-host of Uneasy Money and Builder Enablement at Ethereum Foundation

Timestamps

🎬 00:00 Intro

📋 00:38 Unchained Survey: complete the listener survey at https://unchainedcrypto.com/survey

🎙️ 01:40 Bits + Bips: search Bits + Bips and subscribe at https://www.youtube.com/@Bitsandbips

📈 02:08 Anthropic's S-1: how $12B in Q2 revenue stacks up against Google's IPO

🗳️ 10:27 Why Kain thinks Anthropic's 7-founder voting bloc is destined to blow up

🤖 23:24 Austin on why AI answers could become winner-take-all like Google search

🚨 27:41 How AI models started sending bug bounty disputes to SEAL 911

🏦 30:50 Nexo: generate daily interest on your crypto or borrow funds against your assets at https://unchainedcrypto.com/go/nexo-podcast-yt

🧮 31:32 'AI says ETH is false': why AI chipping away at hard math matters

🎓 46:06 Will kids still go to college? Austin, Tay, and Kain on parenting with AI

🔑 49:52 Are hardware wallets bad again? Keystone's leaked device signing key

☎️ 54:13 Why nobody legit in crypto will ever call you, and Kain's OTC scam story

📧 01:01:17 Foundation's hacked mail system and a phishing site too polished to be real

🧘 01:07:50 Don't panic: Kain's 'personal Lindy' and Tay's case for doing less

⛽ 01:11:12 Austin's 'smooth brain take' on why Glamsterdam was cancelled

🐜 01:18:33 OpenAI's Terra 6.1 and the agent armies battling on AntWars.ai
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Can the US fight AI-powered hackers and North Korea by deputizing its private sector? Two government veterans explain why the answer is yes and no.

========================================================

Thank you to our sponsor!

Put your crypto to work with Nexo: earn daily interest or borrow funds against your assets on one platform trusted by more than 10 million clients.

Find out more at ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://unchainedcrypto.com/go/nexo-podcast-sn⁠⁠⁠⁠.

Geo-restrictions, eligibility and terms apply.

========================================================

Quick favor: We're deciding what Unchained does next; new shows, stream times, what's worth paying for.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Our listener survey⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ takes five minutes, it's anonymous, and I read the write-in answers myself. Everyone who takes it can enter a drawing for a free year of Unchained Premium or Bits + Bips Premium. Open through Sunday, October 18.

— Laura

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North Korea has stolen more than $1 billion in crypto this year, AI-driven ransomware attacks have run with no human in the loop, and a single week exposed weak keys and bugs buried in old internet infrastructure. One answer gaining traction in Washington dates to the age of sail: privateering.

Chris Giancarlo, former chairman of the CFTC and author of The New Adventures of CryptoDad, proposed reviving letters of marque and reprisal in a Cointelegraph op-ed with Chris Perkins, then pitched it at a White House crypto summit. Giancarlo and Ari Redbord, global head of policy at TRM Labs, join Laura Shin to unpack the August presidential memo that followed.

They cover why the memo lets vetted contractors target scam compounds, cartels, and ransomware gangs but leaves Lazarus Group to the government, how the Prince Group's $15 billion forfeiture shows stolen funds can be clawed back, and how deepfake interviews put DPRK IT workers inside US companies. The final question: does hitting back make the problem bigger?

Host:

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Laura Shin⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, Host / Unchained

Guest:

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠J. Christopher Giancarlo - Former Chairman of the US CFTC

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Ari Redbord - Global Head of Policy at TRM Labs

Timestamps

🎬 00:00 Intro

📋 01:01 Unchained Survey: take the listener survey for a free month of Premium at https://unchainedcrypto.com/survey

🎙️ 02:02 Find Bits + Bips’ new channels and subscribe at https://www.youtube.com/@Bitsandbips

🚨 02:40 Why Redbord says AI-run ransomware is now a civilization-level threat

📜 05:29 Letters of marque: how Giancarlo and Perkins proposed reviving them

💰 10:24 Nexo: Generate daily interest on your crypto or borrow funds against your assets at https://unchainedcrypto.com/go/nexo-podcast-yt

🏛️ 11:14 How crypto privateering went from an op-ed to a White House memo

🛑 16:50 Why the memo bars privateers from going after Lazarus Group

🕸️ 23:04 What hacking back looks like: scam compound infrastructure and clawbacks

🔓 35:24 PHP bugs and weak eMudhra keys: privateering as risks multiply

🇰🇵 42:14 North Korea: why the government, not privateers, pulls the trigger

🎭 48:59 How companies can catch North Korean IT workers using deepfakes
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Welcome to The Chopping Block, where crypto insiders Tom Schmidt, Tarun Chitra, and Robert Leshner chop it up about the latest in crypto. This week Rob Hadick of Dragonfly sits in for Haseeb as part of a podcast host swap.

Tom walks through Black October, 48 hours in which top-severity vulnerabilities dropped across PHP, Node, Railway, and more, and Tarun runs down the rest of the damage, from Linux kernel exploits to Finland shutting down its internet services. Robert argues the blast radius was small for the worst day the web has had, Tarun says crypto was ironically ready first and closed source is the less safe bet, and he explains why defenders had to patch with open source models. Then banks start blocking AI agents: Robert says anything that can click a button terrifies them, Tarun reads Bernie Sanders' call to pause AI, and Rob asks what happened to Occupy Wall Street. Finally, Joe Weisenthal comes around on Hyperliquid, Tom is outed as the onion futures guy, and the hosts weigh a rumored $2.5 billion Visa deal for Fireblocks, 2021's bubble valuations, and where an AI financial crisis would start.



Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pods, Fountain, Podcast Addict, Pocket Casts, Amazon Music, or on your favorite podcast platform.



Show highlights

🔹 Rob Hadick guest-hosts as part of a host swap with Empire's Weekly Roundup, and Tarun says the hosts are finally free of the dictatorship of Haseeb.

🔹 Black October: in 48 hours, critical vulnerabilities hit PHP, Node, and Railway, Cloudflare saw millions of exploit attempts, and European governments took sites offline.

🔹 Tarun adds Linux kernel exploits with no responsible disclosure, a QUIC zero day, a GitLab flaw, and a Chinese state-aligned agent caught exploiting the CVEs in the wild.

🔹 Robert calls it the doomsday batch of security vulnerabilities, and says not that much broke.

🔹 Tarun says crypto was ironically prepared first, and that closed source is the less safe bet because every binary can now be reverse engineered.

🔹 Defenders tried to patch with Claude and got blocked, so open source models were the only way to rotate keys fast, the same reason AI trading agents took off.

🔹 JPMorgan, Wells Fargo, Bank of America, Schwab, and Citi are restricting AI agents in customer accounts, after a month of talk about an agentic bank run.

🔹 Robert says banks took a decade to accept read-only Plaid, so anything that can click a button is 10 times as terrifying, and the friction is deliberate.

🔹 Bernie Sanders wants to pause AI to protect your bank account. Robert says he drew the exact opposite conclusion he should have.

🔹 Tarun says everything is crypto now: banks can't tell you from your agent, and that is the point.

🔹 Robert would short health insurance companies, the industry AI should hurt most.

🔹 Joe Weisenthal comes around on Hyperliquid 11 years after blockchain, not Bitcoin. Tom points out that Hyperliquid is not TradFi in any way.

🔹 Visa is rumored to be buying Fireblocks for about $2.5 billion, down from an $8 billion valuation. Robert says January 2022 prices were bubble prices.

🔹 Character.ai burned $16 in compute for every dollar of revenue, and Tarun maps the duration mismatch where an AI financial crisis would start.

Hosts

⭐️Rob Hadick, General Partner at Dragonfly

⭐️Tom Schmidt, General Partner at Dragonfly

⭐️Tarun Chitra, Managing Partner at Robot Ventures

⭐️Robert Leshner, Founder & CEO of Superstate



Disclosures
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Traders tried to lose money fast to earn PAPER. Now the token may never be transferable, and one tracker shows staking revenue fell 93% in a day.

========================================================

Thank you to our sponsor!

Put your crypto to work with Nexo: earn daily interest or borrow funds against your assets on one platform trusted by more than 10 million clients.

Find out more at ⁠⁠⁠https://unchainedcrypto.com/go/nexo-podcast-sn⁠⁠⁠.

Geo-restrictions, eligibility and terms apply.

========================================================

Quick favor: We're deciding what Unchained does next; new shows, stream times, what's worth paying for.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Our listener survey⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ takes five minutes, it's anonymous, and I read the write-in answers myself. Everyone who takes it can enter a drawing for a free year of Unchained Premium or Bits + Bips Premium. Open through Sunday, October 18.

— Laura

========================================================

PaperTrade drew $140 million in pre-deposits and for one day flipped Nasdaq's daily notional volume by letting traders take up to 1,000x leverage against the house, with a PAPER token as the rebate for losing. Then the team announced it no longer plans to make PAPER transferable.

Jason Pagoulatos, Head of Markets at Delphi Research, joins Laura Shin to unpack how the protocol works and why the reversal landed so badly. He walks through the house pool that pays winners from losers' margin, the launch-day trader who pushed ETH around on Hyperliquid to move PaperTrade's price feed, and why a transferable PAPER would invite a larger attack.

Pagoulatos says the team's reasoning holds up but calls the change a bait and switch for everyone who deposited under the original rules. With one tracker showing staking revenue down 93% in a day, the conversation ends on what makes any token worth holding: a business that would work without it.

Host:

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Laura Shin⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, Host / Unchained

Guest:

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Jason Pagoulatos - Head of Markets at Delphi Research

Timestamps

🎬 00:00 Intro

⚡ 02:01 What PaperTrade is and why it briefly flipped Nasdaq's daily volume

🎰 06:46 How PaperTrade's house pool pays winners and mints PAPER for losers

🚀 10:32 Launch week: $140M in pre-deposits and a price-feed play on day one

💰 15:12 Nexo: Generate daily interest on your crypto or borrow funds against your assets at https://unchainedcrypto.com/go/nexo-podcast-yt

🔒 15:59 Why promise transferability if the risk was already in the docs?

🔄 17:31 Why PaperTrade shelved plans to make PAPER transferable

📉 24:07 Is PaperTrade over after a 93% one-day drop in staking revenue?

🧱 27:52 Why Jason says tokens should be judged like equity in a real business
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