Linda Xie, cofounder at Scalar Capital, reads her essay on how the crypto community can successfully use memes to help people understand the technology. Thank you to our sponsors! CipherTrace: http://ciphertrace.com/unchained Crypto.com : http://crypto.com/ Kraken: http://kraken.com/ Episode links: Linda Xie: https://twitter.com/ljxie Scalar Capital: https://scalar.capital/ Read Linda's full essay at: https://unchainedpodcast.com/how-memes-can-help-crypto-go-mainstream/ Learn more about your ad ...
Feb 04, 2020•25 min•Ep. 157
Jonathan Levin, co-founder and CSO of Chainalysis, and Kim Grauer, head of research, discuss the company's 2020 Crypto Crime Report, which explores how cryptocurrency criminals, who perpetrate hacks and scams and send out ransomware and more, cash out. We cover how criminals are turning their illicit crypto into fiat currency, why exchanges are a prime avenue for money laundering, and how over-the-counter brokers are playing a large role. They talk about a group of OTC brokers they describe as t...
Jan 28, 2020•1 hr 8 min•Ep. 156
Brendan Eich, CEO and president of Brave, discusses his history in tech prior to crypto, including working at Netscape, how he created Javascript in 10 days and his short stint as CEO of Mozilla, what problems with ads that Brave is trying to solve, and why Brave needs the Basic Attention Token. He explains why Bitcoin wouldn't work for cryptocurrencies on the platform, why they use BAT over stablecoins, and how Brave strips ads from publishers' webpages, but doesn't from Facebook or Google, and...
Jan 21, 2020•1 hr 10 min•Ep. 155
Catherine Coley, the CEO of Binance US, talks about her background as a foreign exchange trader, how and why she made the leap into crypto, and how she became the CEO of Binance US. We discuss how Binance US differs from Binance, who Binance US's target customers are, how Binance decides which coins to list, what's on Catherine's wish list to regulators, and whether Binance US will be connected to or cut off from the global, open financial system Binance is building. We also cover why Binance US...
Jan 14, 2020•1 hr 12 min•Ep. 154
Alex Pack, founding partner of Dragonfly Capital, and Haseeb Qureshi, Dragonfly managing partner, talk about why Dragonfly has a global focus, how they choose investments, and why they try to be as agnostic as possible about asset type. They also discuss why most protocols, including Bitcoin, still look like venture bets, why, at the moment, Bitcoin looks like a better investment than anything built on top of Bitcoin, and why Lightning hasn't yet taken off and why they think it won't. We also co...
Jan 07, 2020•1 hr 11 min•Ep. 153
In this Best of 2019 episode, I selected the clips that seemed most representative of what crypto was about this year, which I call, The Year Things Got Geopolitical. My only regret is that none of the clips about DAOs lent themselves well to this episode. However, years from now, after we’ve got global stablecoins pinging around the world at a high transactions-per-second rate, the crypto community has made peace with U.S. regulators, and more of our lives seems to take place in the borderless ...
Dec 31, 2019•1 hr 8 min•Ep. 152
This fall, I had an idea to do a crypto show for my normie friends, and figured I’d release it over the holidays, when maybe my regular listeners would be with the very people in their lives who could benefit from such an episode. I solicited questions from my own real-life friends, edited down the repeats and tried my best to make the explanations as simple as possible. I cover basic explanations of Bitcoin, blockchain and Ethereum, plus we go into questions around mining and electricity usage,...
Dec 24, 2019•49 min•Ep. 151
Priscilla Moriuchi, director of strategic threat development at Recorded Future and non-resident fellow at Harvard Kennedy School, explains North Korean usage of the internet and how it has changed over time, how it is reserved only for the few most senior people in the regime, and what the mobile devices of the other 25 million citizens connects to, and who is watching the activity on those devices. She also describes the various ways North Korea has shown an interest in cryptocurrency, how it'...
Dec 17, 2019•1 hr 4 min•Ep. 150
In light of the questions around whether or not Virgil Griffith's talk at a blockchain conference in Pyongyang could have helped everyday North Koreans, Yeonmi Park, a North Korean defector, human rights activist, board member of the Human Rights Foundation and author of “In Order to Live, A North Korean Girl's Journey to Freedom,” talks to Unchained. She tells us about her life growing up in North Korea, how she thought the "dear leader" could read her thoughts, why freedom of thought is not al...
Dec 10, 2019•1 hr 16 min•Ep. 149
Kain Warwick, founder of Synthetix, talks about synthetic asset issuance platform, which enables people to create tokens that track the price of assets in traditional and crypto finance. We discuss the various types of assets available, why changing the monetary policy helped the ecosystem take off, why people would buy synthetic Bitcoin over Bitcoin itself, and why Uniswap has been pivotal to Synthetix's success. He covers the role the SNX token plays, why people minting synths must be over-col...
Dec 03, 2019•1 hr 2 min•Ep. 148
Carylyne Chan, chief strategy officer at CoinMarketCap, and Gerald Chee, head of research, discuss the history of CoinMarketCap, why the founder Brandon Chez initially focused on circulating supply to calculate market cap, how the ICO craze has changed the way CoinMarketCap defines circulating supply and how the kimchee premium on the Bitcoin price in Korea at the end of 2017 is influencing the future direction of the website. We cover why CoinMarketCap is branching out into other areas such as ...
Nov 26, 2019•1 hr 10 min•Ep. 147
Martin Chorzempa, research fellow the Peterson Institute, and Dovey Wan, founding partner at Primitive Ventures, discuss China's new blockchain push and the forthcoming DCEP. They cover how the blockchain initiative is part of an effort to set global blockchain standards, how it fits into the larger U.S.-China trade war as well as the threat from Facebook's Libra, and why part of the motivation behind the DCEP may stem from the shadow banking system in China. They also talk about how the DCEP mi...
Nov 19, 2019•1 hr 12 min•Ep. 146
Former CFTC chairman Christopher Giancarlo talks about how his experience of the financial crisis piqued his interest in blockchain technology, why the CFTC thought the introduction of Bitcoin futures would help pop the 2017 Bitcoin bubble, and how "there's no simple answer" to explain when a token goes from being a security to a commodity. He discusses why he believes there needs to be a "refresh" of regulations written decades ago that are difficult to apply in a digital world, why he thinks L...
Nov 12, 2019•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 145
Christian Catalini, co-creator of Libra and chief economist at Calibra, explains why Facebook made the design choices it made for Libra, reveals whether the team was prepared for the regulatory blowback it received after publishing the white paper, and talks about what it means for Libra now that nearly all the initial payment company members have left the Association. He describes how Facebook defined stability for Libra, whether the Chinese renminbi could ever be added to the reserve the way i...
Nov 05, 2019•1 hr 10 min•Ep. 144
Hunter Horsley, cofounder and CEO of Bitwise Asset Management, and Matt Hougan, global head of research at Bitwise, describe their vision for Bitwise, its current funds and indices, as well as how it handles things like forks and airdrops. Then they give their reaction to and interpretation of the SEC disapproval of their Bitcoin ETF proposal, as well as what their focus will be now to try to get a Bitcoin ETF approved. We also discuss their general thesis around how the crypto space will develo...
Oct 29, 2019•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 143
Congressman Patrick McHenry, or 'Mr. Fintech' to his peers in the House, is announcing the reintroduction of the Financial Services Innovation Act, a bill that would create what he calls "permanent beta testing," or many jurisdictions call "regulatory sandboxes," in which entrepreneurs can apply for regulatory approval to conduct innovative experiments. The bill is intended to get regulators into a position where their default leans more toward yes than no. He describes how this would affect tea...
Oct 22, 2019•32 min•Ep. 142
Mariano Conti, the head of smart contracts for MakerDAO and creator of SelloutDAO, and Peter Pan, the summoner for Metacartel DAO, discuss all things DAOs, including how Peter started Metacartel DAO after being rejected from MolochDAO, and why Mariano initially voted against Peter joining. (Peter eventually joined.) They also discuss how they came to form YangDAO, why Mariano almost rage quit MolochDAO after the YangDAO formed, and how other MolochDAO members felt about SelloutDAO, which Mariano...
Oct 15, 2019•1 hr 8 min•Ep. 141
David Andolfatto, senior vice president at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, gives his thoughts on Facebook's Libra, including why regulatory issues will make it hard to compete with the US dollar, and why Bitcoin wouldn't have such issues. He also says, "who cares?" about the US dollar losing global reserve status, pointing out that many prosperous countries have currencies that don't function as global reserves. He tells us how he would design a central bank digital currency, and why, eve...
Oct 08, 2019•1 hr 3 min•Ep. 140
Emily Parker, cofounder of Longhash, describes what the company, which has an Asia-focused incubator and data media site does, how she ended up launching an Asia-focused company, why she’s seeing US crypto teams and ICOs going to Singapore, why the Chinese government cracked down on crypto, and what misconceptions she sees about crypto in China. She explains how the Chinese still trade Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies despite the ban, why Tether plays a big role, how the China ban has affected crypt...
Oct 01, 2019•1 hr 1 min•Ep. 139
Spencer Bogart, general partner at Blockchain Capital, the first VC firm to tokenize one of its funds, talks about how well offering tokenized shares has worked out, why it didn't do so for the following fund, the appeal of security tokens generally and what advantages tokenized securities offer over non-blockchain platforms like Second Market, in which investors can trade shares in private companies. He also explains what entrepreneurs are looking for from VCs now that they have more ways to ra...
Sep 24, 2019•1 hr 7 min•Ep. 138
Olga Feldmeier, CEO of SmartValor, describes how her upbringing in Ukraine when it was undergoing 10,000% and 5,000% annual inflation helped her understand the potential in Bitcoin years later, and helped her connect with Wences Casares, CEO of Xapo. She also talks about how Xapo was able to get regulated in Switzerland, without having to get a banking license, and why she believes Switzerland has been open to the crypto industry. She explains why she is now focused on security tokens and tokeni...
Sep 17, 2019•1 hr 2 min•Ep. 137
Sebastian Sonntag, the new CEO of LocalBitcoins, and Mika Impola, software developer at LocalBitcoins, explain why the peer-to-peer bitcoin trading company has a new CEO, why it stopped cash trades and what kind of response they've received from the community about it. They describe how the service works, how it has changed over time, the range of payment options available amongst sellers on the site, and how peer-to-peer trading differs from country to country. Plus, we cover why it suspended b...
Sep 10, 2019•1 hr•Ep. 136
Luis Cuende, the CEO of Aragon One, describes the Aragon Network, how it aims to create new systems better for human coordination and the roles of the various parts of the ecosystem, such as Aragon One, the Aragon Association, the Aragon Court, Aragon Nest and the Aragon Network token. He describes the various parts of the Aragon Network, such as a finance app and voting app, how the network can be used both by decentralized organizations as well as centralized companies, and how he thinks decen...
Sep 03, 2019•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 135
Jonathan Zeppettini, international ops lead and chief evangelist for Decred, aka "Decred Jesus," announces the launch of the coin's privacy feature. He first describes how Decred came out of some developers' frustrations of trying to work with Bitcoin Core developers, and how that led them to realize a couple of issues with Bitcoin's governance around the funding of development and giving other stakeholders a say in the development of the coin. He explains how Decred addresses those issues, how ...
Aug 27, 2019•1 hr 7 min•Ep. 134
Sandra Ro, the CEO of the Global Blockchain Business Council and former head of digitization at CME, explains what the GBBC does, how it chooses partners, and what level of involvement they have with projects under the GBBC umbrella. We discuss some of the more controversial projects, such as the Voatz pilot that conducted election voting using blockchain technology, as well as how she responds to people saying many "blockchain" projects could instead use a database. She also reveals why she bel...
Aug 20, 2019•1 hr 10 min•Ep. 133
Dong He, deputy director of the monetary and capital markets department of the IMF, and Yan Liu, Assistant General Counsel at the legal department of the IMF, talk about central bank digital currencies (CBDCs): the current level of interest among central banks in issuing them, what concerns they need to address when designing them, and how commercial banks might be affected, depending on the design of the CBDC. We discuss how privacy could be built into such a currency while also fulfilling anti...
Aug 13, 2019•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 132
Jake Chervinsky, general counsel at Compound, goes over a plethora of crypto regulatory issues, such as those related to securities law such as the SEC vs. Kik case, Ripple, stablecoins, no-action letters, Blockstack and more. We also discuss whether there should be one regulator for crypto matters in the US, whether it makes sense to create a new category for digital assets instead of applying laws for securities, commodities, etc., to digital tokens, and why he thinks Libra will likely not lau...
Aug 06, 2019•1 hr 9 min•Ep. 131
Juthica Chou, chief operating officer of LedgerX, talks about the company's new license to offer its derivatives to retail investors and the resulting platform, Omni. She walks through what call and put options are, how they work and why people and companies purchase them as opposed to just buying or selling bitcoin directly. We discuss why LedgerX believes physically settled bitcoin options are superior to cash-settled ones, how LedgerX handles hard forks, and other contracts focused on the tec...
Jul 30, 2019•1 hr 4 min•Ep. 130
Dan Morehead, founder and CEO of Pantera Capital, and Joey Krug, co-chief investment officer of Pantera and founder of Augur, discuss where we are in the development cycle of blockchain technology, how Bitcoin, if stays on past trend lines, could hit $42,000 by year's end and $356,000 a couple years after that, and why the biggest challenges now are around scaling and onboarding. We also cover what the adoption of the technology will mean long-term — how creating assets and markets will no longe...
Jul 23, 2019•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 129
Rich Sanders, cofounder and chief security officer of CipherBlade, and Harry Denley, director of security of MyCrypto.com , discuss the phone porting phenomenon: who's behind these thefts, how they perpetrate them, who is targeted, how to recognize the signs you're a victim and how to the hackers are adapting to people protecting themselves. They cover how you can protect yourself, which accounts to protect, what kinds of email addresses and numbers to set up, how to set them up, how to separate...
Jul 16, 2019•1 hr 2 min•Ep. 128
