Insights into the past, present and future of crypto with Erik Voorhees.

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Venice.ai founder Erik Voorhees joins "CoinDesk Spotlight" to discuss his prediction of a sovereign bond market collapse and the predominant role of bitcoin in that future. Voorhees explains why he is fundamentally against a U.S. strategic bitcoin reserve, why crypto lobbying is "gross," and his thesis that cryptocurrency was actually built for AI agents.

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Timestamps:

01:20 - Voorhees' First Memory of Money Mattering
04:00 - Discovering Bitcoin As a Solution to the Financial Crisis
06:13 - Could Bitcoin Replace Gold Completely?
07:17 - When Will There Be A Complete Financial Collapse?
10:47 - The Separation of Money and State
13:57 - Why Voorhees is Divided on Governments Holding Bitcoin
15:53 - Crypto Industry Engagement with Politicians Is "Gross"
19:49 - Voorhees' History with the SEC
21:48 - From Satoshi Dice to Prediction Markets
24:09 - What Does "Sufficiently Decentralized" Actually Mean?
27:35 - Ethereum's Trajectory
29:07 - Voorhees Predicts Base Will End Up the Predominant L2
32:01 - Sci-Fi and Technological Optimism
34:06 - Learnings from ShapeShift's DAO Structure
38:01 - Venice AI: Separation of Mind and State
40:24 - How Do We Avoid a Dystopian Future?
43:19 - How Venice AI Differs from ChatGPT and Gemini
47:46 - Unprogramming Human Instincts for Privacy
50:24 - The VVV Token
54:25 - Crypto is Built for AI Machines
56:56 - How He Lost 50K BTC Fighting The SEC

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This episode was hosted by Jennifer Sanasie. “CoinDesk Spotlight” is produced by Sam Ewen, Jennifer Sanasie, Taylor Fleming and Victor Chen.