Carpe Consensus

This week, “Opinionated” hosts Ben Schiller, Anna Baydakova and Danny Nelson talk to Angela Walch, a professor at St. Mary’s University School of Law in San Antonio and a research associate at the Centre for Blockchain Technologies at University College London.

This episode is sponsored by Unique One Network.

An original and independently minded commentator on the crypto industry, Walch was a key voice in the recent debate over the infrastructure bill and its cryptocurrency-related tax-reporting provision. Walch testified before the U.S. Senate about the increasingly systemic role played by cryptocurrencies and why the legislation shouldn’t be rushed.

She wrote an op-ed for CoinDesk saying the “process being used to regulate crypto through an unrelated bill on infrastructure is deeply flawed and risks increasing rather than reducing harms to the public.”

On our show, Walch shared her experience talking to the legislators and why the most controversial part of the bill may not have been as unfair as the industry has claimed. The bill suggests that anyone who facilitates crypto transactions should be considered a broker for the legal and tax purposes. 

Should crypto miners actually be considered brokers? Are large crypto celebrity investors doing the industry a favor in their advocacy? What is the best way forward for crypto regulation in the U.S.?

Listen to Ben, Anna and Danny discuss these and some other burning questions with Angela Walch and watch out for her new coming op-eds on CoinDesk.

Angela Walch handle in Twitter: @angela_walch 

Mentioned in this episode:

Angela Walch’s op-ed for CoinDesk: Congress, Don’t Rush Regulating Crypto

Angela Welch’s testimony in Congress, July 27, 2021: Cryptocurrencies: What are they good for?

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Unique One Network is an interoperable Platform for DeFi enabled NFT Marketplaces, in a variety of sectors, built on Polkadot Parity Substrate. Unique One Network’s crosschain NFT hub facilitates transfers between a variety of blockchains and ecosystems, unleashing the power of NFTs with myriad innovative capabilities. Find out more at Unique One Network.

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This week, “Opinionated” hosts Anna Baydakova, Danny Nelson and Ben Schiller,  are talking to Anita Posch, an Austria-based bitcoin educator, advocate and bilingual podcaster. Anita has just published a book about the leading cryptocurrency basics entitled “(L)earn Bitcoin.”

This episode is sponsored by Unique One Network.

We invited Anita to talk about the topic she knows so well – cryptocurrencies in Africa. 

LocalBitcoins said that Africa delivered 12% of its $600 million in  global volume between January and March and that demand is growing. Countries like Nigeria are seeing an increased interest in crypto even as the banks block crypto-related transactions in the country. 

Anita traveled Africa and interviewed crypto influencers there like no other bitcoiner has. She knows what people think about bitcoin in Ghana, Senegal, South Africa, Eritrea, Nigeria and Zimbabwe, and is keen to share her insights. 

What can crypto do in a country where less than a half of the population has access to the internet? Why is it easier for Africans abroad to send money back home via crypto? The KYC/AML (know-your-customer/anti-money-laundering) policies in crypto around the world are getting stricter – how will that affect people in Africa, where personal IDs aren’t widespread?

Anita shares her thoughts on how crypto use in Africa is different from that in Europe and the U.S., and a possible future for African central bank digital currencies under China’s influence, and she gets into a heated debate with Ben on bitcoin’s viability as a form of payment given its volatility. 

Listen to Anita, Ben, Anna and Danny discuss the optimistic – and disturbing things about crypto in Africa.

Anita Posch’s Twitter handle is @AnitaPosch

Mentioned in this episode:

Anita’s podcast “The Anita Posch Show”

Anita’s book “(L)earn Bitcoin”

Anita’s YouTube channel 

LocalBitcoins: Bitcoin in Africa: Top 5 Countries

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Unique One Network is an interoperable Platform for DeFi enabled NFT Marketplaces, in a variety of sectors, built on Polkadot Parity Substrate. Unique One Network’s crosschain NFT hub facilitates transfers between a variety of blockchains and ecosystems, unleashing the power of NFTs with myriad innovative capabilities. Find out more at Unique One Network.

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This week, “Opinionated” hosts Ben Schiller, Anna Baydakova and Danny Nelson are talking to Grant Gulovsen, a private attorney specializing in crypto space.

This episode is sponsored by Unique One Network.

Grant is fascinated by the story of Tether, and so are we. Tether is the $62 billion stablecoin powering much of the liquidity in the crypto markets. What would happen if that mammoth project went belly-up? 

Grant has been watching Tether for years and has a few thoughts on the checkered history and unclear future of crypto’s favorite controversy. Why is tether’s backed/unbacked status so contentious? Why are so many in the crypto space skeptical of its centralized issuer? Why aren’t so many others?

Listen to Grant sharing his thoughts on Tether’s recent (and long awaited) treasury disclosure, how it looks compared to other stablecoins, rumors about bank fraud allegations, what actually can happen if USDT loses its peg to the U.S. dollar, and more.

Mentioned in this episode:

CoinDesk: Tether’s First Reserve Breakdown Shows Token 49% Backed by Unspecified Commercial Paper

CoinDesk: Tether Executives Facing Criminal Bank Fraud Charges: Report

Unchained podcast: Is Tether a Fraud? Its Bank Says It's Not

CoinDesk: Tether Confirms Its Relationship With Auditor Has 'Dissolved'

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Unique One Network is an interoperable Platform for DeFi enabled NFT Marketplaces, in a variety of sectors, built on Polkadot Parity Substrate. Unique One Network’s crosschain NFT hub facilitates transfers between a variety of blockchains and ecosystems, unleashing the power of NFTs with myriad innovative capabilities. Find out more at Unique One Network.

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This week, “Opinionated” hosts Ben Schiller and Anna Baydakova are talking to Sebastian Serrano, who is the CEO of Ripio, a popular crypto wallet and exchange in Latin America.  

This episode is sponsored by Unique One Network.

Ripio was founded in 2013 and since then has been expanding in the region with offices in Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay as well as Mexico and Spain. Ripio bought Brazil’s second-largest exchange, BitcoinTrade, in January. (Full disclosure: One of Ripio’s early investors was Digital Currency Group, CoinDesk’s parent company.)

Latin America has been in the middle of the crypto community’s attention after El Salvador adopted bitcoin as a legal tender. But is it actually a good thing for bitcoin and for El Salvador, and will it benefit the country’s citizens? Serrano has his own take on this.

Listen as Ben and Anna talk to Sebatian about crypto use cases in Latin America, his thoughts on whether other countries would follow El Salvador’s lead and accept bitcoin as money, and what Latin American nations should do about bitcoin.

Sebastian Serrano’s Twitter handle: @sserrano44

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Unique One Network is an interoperable Platform for DeFi enabled NFT Marketplaces, in a variety of sectors, built on Polkadot Parity Substrate. Unique One Network’s crosschain NFT hub facilitates transfers between a variety of blockchains and ecosystems, unleashing the power of NFTs with myriad innovative capabilities. Find out more at Unique One Network.

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This week, “Opinionated” hosts Ben Schiller, Anna Baydakova and Danny Nelson are talking to Jameson Lopp, developer and chief technology officer of Casa, a bitcoin custodian.

This episode is sponsored by Unique One Network and Mimo.

Lopp is a vocal bitcoin advocate and one of those people you probably think about when you hear “bitcoin maximalist.” In this conversation, Jameson explains his attitude toward non-bitcoin projects, DeFi projects and how he, himself, likes to kick the tires of various new projects to see what they are worth.

Lopp is a hardcore crypto anarchist. He believes that bitcoin is the kind of “F-you money” that allows financial autonomy unparalleled by any other financial tools. But are there many people ready to take the risks and responsibility of bitcoin self-custody for the sake of this freedom? For Lopp, it’s a “billion-dollar question” and a matter of constant work and improvement.

Listen to Ben, Anna and Danny talk to Lopp about his views on the challenges of bitcoin adoption, the quality of the DeFi projects he’s involved in and the most exciting project he is working on now.

Jameson Lopp’s Twitter handle: @lopp 

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Unique One Network is an interoperable Platform for DeFi enabled NFT Marketplaces, in a variety of sectors, built on Polkadot Parity Substrate. Unique One Network’s cross chain NFT hub facilitates transfers between a variety of blockchains and ecosystems, unleashing the power of NFTs with myriad innovative capabilities. Find out more at Unique One Network.

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Mimo is home of the world’s #1 euro-algorithmically pegged token minted at an interest rate of just 2%. Lock in your crypto assets, access their liquidity, and stabilize your portfolio by hedging against inflating coins. Open a Vault and experience the power of Mimo today at mimo.capital.

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This week on “Opinionated,” Ben Schiller and co-host Anna Baydakova are joined by Paul Brody, head of blockchain at consulting powerhouse EY.

This episode is sponsored by Unique One Network and Mimo.

If you read CoinDesk in 2017 and 2018, you’d have come across many stories like this: 

Big Company joins Big Industry Blockchain Consortium to work on technology set to shake up Everything.

These days, many of those consortia are closed, others are barely issuing press releases, and “enterprise blockchain” is often struggling to take off. 

In recent months, IBM has laid off most of its blockchain services staff and Microsoft has shuttered its Azure-based blockchain-as-a-service platform.  

What happened?

Blockchain industry veteran Paul Brody unpacks why many corporate blockchain projects fail, and what works and doesn’t work when companies adopt decentralized technology.  

He pinpoints where blockchain is having a dramatic impact, the validation that comes from DeFi and how blockchains can re-engineer enterprises in the years ahead. 

Brody’s Twitter is: @pbrody

CoinDesk stories mentioned in this episode:

Brody: Web 3.0 Is Coming for the Sharing Economy

Brody: Public Blockchains Are Set to Reshape Global Commerce

IBM Blockchain Is a Shell of Its Former Self After Revenue Misses, Job Cuts: Sources

Microsoft to Shutter its Azure Blockchain Service This Autumn

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Unique One Network is an interoperable Platform for DeFi enabled NFT Marketplaces, in a variety of sectors, built on Polkadot Parity Substrate. Unique One Network’s cross chain NFT hub facilitates transfers between a variety of blockchains and ecosystems, unleashing the power of NFTs with myriad innovative capabilities. Find out more at Unique One Network.

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Mimo is home of the world’s #1 euro-algorithmically pegged token minted at an interest rate of just 2%. Lock in your crypto assets, access their liquidity, and stabilize your portfolio by hedging against inflating coins. Open a Vault and experience the power of Mimo today at mimo.capital.

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This week, “Opinionated” co-hosts Ben Schiller and Anna Baydakova are talking to Dovey Wan, partner at San-Francisco-based VC Primitive Ventures. 

This episode is sponsored by PumaPay.io.

China is getting serious about banning crypto. In a fresh onslaught on the industry this month, the country has blocked bank transfers related to crypto, and five regions, including the key hydropower province of Sichuan, have shut down the local miners. OTC desk operators are getting arrested en masse and mentions of crypto exchanges are getting censored on social media.

The market responded with another downfall starting June 21, Chinese miners are reportedly relocating to other countries, including the U.S., and crypto firms are looking for ways to survive in China without serving Chinese clients.

Dovey Wan has a good grasp of the way things operate in China, and she aptly unpacks the intricacies of the country’s power structure and the main forces behind the political and economic events.

Listen to the “Opinionated” co-hosts Ben Schiller and Anna Baydakova talking with Dovey about this latest crackdown, what it might be driven by and why it should be taken very seriously. Is China letting its crypto dominance go? How can this change the global crypto market, for good or bad?

Dovey Wan’s Twitter handle is: @DoveyWan.

CoinDesk stories mentioned in this episode:

• China Says Banks Must Block Crypto Transactions; Market Falls
• Sichuan Becomes Latest Chinese Province to Order Bitcoin Miner Shutdown
• Chinese Police Arrest 1.1K People on Crypto-Related Money Laundering Charges
• Chinese Internet Services Are Censoring Binance, Huobi and OKEx-Related Keywords
• Ether Drops Below $2K, Bitcoin Wilts as China Tells Banks to Cut Off Crypto Transactions
• Chinese Logistics Firm Airlifting Bitcoin Mining Machines to Maryland: Report
• Chinese Brokerages Look Overseas to Offer Crypto Trading: Report

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750,000,000 PMA tokens are now up for grabs. By depositing today, you will become part of the next evolution of DeFi payments. Go to PumaPay.io.

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This week, “Opinionated” co-hosts Ben Schiller, Anna Baydakova and Danny Nelson are talking to Jonathan Koomey, researcher and book author.

This episode is sponsored by PumaPay.io.

Koomey, the author of “Turning Numbers into Knowledge: Mastering the Art of Problem Solving” and “Cold Cash, Cool Climate: Science-Based Advice for Ecological Entrepreneurs,” spent a lot of time studying and debunking the current narrative around bitcoin’s impact on the environment. 

In 2019, he conducted a study for CoinCenter, titled “Estimating Bitcoin Electricity Use: A Beginner’s Guide,” where he separates real numbers from baseless assumptions. Koomey likes to run numbers and he’s indifferent to bitcoin, so he stays cool above the raging fire of the bitcoin climate debates. 

How much electricity does bitcoin actually consume? Is it a lot, and compared to what? What are the most reliable sources of actual numbers? Is buying carbon offsets a good way to make your bitcoin “green”? 

Listen as Anna, Ben and Danny discuss these complicated topics with Jonathan.  

Jonathan Koomey’s Twitter handle is: @jgkoomey.

Materials mentioned in this episodes:

• Jonathan Koomey’s research for CoinCenter: “Estimating Bitcoin Electricity Use: A Beginner’s Guide”
• Jonathan Koomey’s books: “Turning Numbers into Knowledge: Mastering the Art of Problem Solving” and “Cold Cash, Cool Climate: Science-Based Advice for Ecological Entrepreneurs”
• Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index (CBECI) 
• Danny Cullenward and David G. Victor, Making Climate Policy Work

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750,000,000 PMA tokens are now up for grabs. By depositing today, you will become part of the next evolution of DeFi payments. Go to PumaPay.io.

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This week, “Opinionated” co-hosts  Ben Schiller, Anna Baydakova and Danny Nelson dig deep into two of the biggest storylines in crypto: the proliferation of ransomware (and what crypto’s got to do with it) and El Salvador’s upstart bid to become a global bitcoin capital.

This episode is sponsored by PumaPay.io.

Just over a month after ransomware group DarkSide held gas company Colonial Pipeline hostage for $4.4 million in bitcoin, there’s been a major development. The feds say they’ve gotten most of the payment back – an almost unheard of feat, and one shrouded in mystery.

How did they pull it off? The gang runs through some of the most popular theories, from FBI honeypot mixing services to good old police work. Then, they hash out what it might take to pull off the perfect crypto crime.

Even as the U.S. is moving to (possibly) crack down on bitcoin, another nation, El Salvador, is racing to embrace it. President Nayib Bukele closed out Miami’s crazed bitcoin conference with the blockbuster news that he’d make bitcoin legal tender. It's being framed as a means to give El Salvador’s majority unbanked population access to financial services – but is that really the case?

Ben, Anna and Danny discuss these and other topics, plus an update on where the ESG movement stands. 

Ben Schiller’s Twitter handle is: @btschiller

Anna: @baidakova

Danny: @realDannyNelson

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750,000,000 PMA tokens are now up for grabs. By depositing today, you will become part of the next evolution of DeFi payments. Go to PumaPay.io.

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This week, “Opinionated” co-hosts Ben Schiller, Anna Baydakova and Danny Nelson are discussing one of the most interesting topics raised during CoinDesk’s Consensus 2021 virtual conference – bitcoin’s ESG (environmental, social and governance) moment.

This episode is sponsored by PumaPay.io.

The question of bitcoin’s impact on the environment has been hovering over the industry for years, but recently, it got a real momentum after Elon Musk first sent bitcoin prices surging, then plunging, then going up again, by tweeting about bitcoin’s environmental impact. 

After showing disapproval of bitcoin’s ecological impact, Musk soon returned with a new message: he met with the North American bitcoin miners to get them to adopt greener standards of work. 

Cathie Wood, the founder of Ark Investment Management, believes the move was dictated by some very pragmatic reasons, as she said in a Consensus interview with Nathaniel Whittemore: 

“Elon probably got a few calls from institutions,” Wood said. “I noticed that BlackRock is [Tesla]’s number three shareholder and Larry Fink is the CEO. He is focused on ESG and especially on climate change. I’m sure BlackRock registered some complaints and perhaps there are some very large holders in Europe who are extremely sensitive to this.”

In setting up the Bitcoin Mining Council, some wondered if Musk and his fellow founder-whale Michael Saylor wanted to centralize bitcoin mining. This is hardly possible (for now). However attempts to create various white lists and black lists for bitcoin, depending on how green or dirty, sanctioned or politically clean they are, and so on, might harm bitcoin’s core value: borderless money with no rulers to control it. 

Ben, Anna and Danny discuss these and other topics related to the heavily controversial bitcoin environmental agenda.

Ben Schiller’s Twitter handle is: @btschiller

Anna: @baidakova

Danny: @reaDannyNelson

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750,000,000 PMA tokens are now up for grabs. By depositing today, you will become part of the next evolution of DeFi payments. Go to PumaPay.io.

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