The Bitcoin Layer

In this episode, Nik and TBL's Demian Schatt cover a breaking security situation: a seed-generation vulnerability in Coldcard hardware wallets that has exposed some bitcoiners to theft, with reports of wallets being swept over the last twenty-four hours. Nik, speaking as a researcher rather than a cryptographer, explains how bitcoin seed phrases are generated, why the entropy behind a seed is what keeps it safe, and how Coldcard's default seed generation left certain users vulnerable while those who added dice-roll entropy or a passphrase are better protected. He explains why bitcoin ETF holders are not affected and why he has long favored diversified storage. The video is a call to action: check your wallet and how your seed was generated.

The Bitcoin Layer and its guests do not provide investment advice.

In this Global Macro Update, Nik covers today's FOMC decision and Kevin Warsh's press conference, where the new Fed chair reaffirmed the 2% inflation target as a firm goal and made clear he is steering the Fed away from forward guidance. Nik explains why Warsh took credit for the recent rise in Treasury yields, calling it healthy price discovery, and why Warsh now says the Fed will look to the Treasury market for signal rather than telling markets what it will do. He also covers the yield curve steepening on the day, the Nasdaq correction and Korea's stock market crash, and why he thinks Treasury yields have left their four-year anchor for good.

The Bitcoin Layer and its guests do not provide investment advice.

In this episode, Nik welcomes back Matt Dines to lay out his thesis that the global order built after World War Two is being reset. Matt walks through the signals he is watching: the Kuwaiti pipeline deal with Blackstone, KKR, and Brookfield that reroutes energy toward Europe, the US-China rare earths truce and its expiring clock, and the chokepoints from Hormuz to the Red Sea. He connects rising real yields, a flattening curve, and dollar strength to that same reconfiguration, then turns to the Paramount and Warner Brothers fight over Oracle bonds and why he believes the November elections will resolve much of it.

The Bitcoin Layer and its guests do not provide investment advice.

In this episode, Nik walks through the latest bitcoin research from Johan Bergman, head of bitcoin research at The Bitcoin Layer, using the charts inside TBL Pulse. He explains Johan's state grid, which plots bitcoin on valuation and trend, and why the framework currently places bitcoin in disbelief territory, a zone where, together with capitulation, bitcoin has spent roughly 40% of its life. Nik covers why bulls bracing for $45,000 are facing data that makes it less likely, and why the 200-day moving average near $73,000 stands as the final boss of the downtrend. He closes on why not retesting the realized price this cycle would signal a maturing bitcoin market.

The Bitcoin Layer and its guests do not provide investment advice.

In this Global Macro Update, Nik returns from teaching his summer bitcoin and AI course at USC to a market waking up after the World Cup lull. He makes the case for a global dollar shortage behind the dollar's continued strength, with stress surfacing across Asia: India's push to pull in overseas dollars, a sharp correction in Korea's KOSPI, and the Japanese yen at its weakest level since 1990. He then turns to the pressure building in hyperscaler and AI corporate bonds, Apple overtaking Nvidia as the world's largest company, and SpaceX slipping below its IPO valuation. Cooling CPI and PPI, treasury yields, gold, and where bitcoin sits in deep-value territory round out the update.

The Bitcoin Layer and its guests do not provide investment advice.

In this episode, Nik welcomes CoinDesk analyst James Van Straten to discuss why he believes bitcoin's bear market may be nearing its end. James walks through ETF flows that have held firm despite months of outflows, the rotation of capital out of AI and semiconductor names like NVIDIA, and where that money could head next. The conversation turns to Michael Saylor's decision to sell bitcoin near the lows, the role hedge funds played in pressuring Strategy through STRC, and on-chain data showing roughly 330,000 bitcoin accumulated between the high fifties and low sixties since February. James and Nik also examine this cycle's unusually shallow 54% drawdown and the case for a bottom ahead of October.

The Bitcoin Layer and its guests do not provide investment advice.

In this global macro update, Nik asks whether bitcoin has finally bottomed after tagging 58k and reclaiming 60,000. He walks through the bullish divergences forming on bitcoin's daily and weekly charts, why a grinding-higher dollar has been weighing on liquidity and bitcoin all year, and why he now sees Asia, particularly yen and Korean won weakness, as the most likely spot for trouble. Nik also covers new Fed chair Kevin Warsh and his read that Warsh is playing junior to Scott Bessent on taming volatility, the state of Michael Saylor's STRC dividend and MSTR, and what TBL liquidity is signaling now

The Bitcoin Layer and its guests do not provide investment advice.

In this episode, Nik welcomes Peter McCormack, host of the Peter McCormack Show, for a conversation on how he is using AI in his own business. Peter, who has no coding background, walks through the full podcast-management system he built with Claude in 11 days, work he says would once have taken a 14-person team over a year and cost around a million pounds. He covers how he got started, how he learned to prompt, and why he now thinks of himself as a software engineer. Peter and Nik also discuss why this is the printing-press moment for software, how AI threatens aggregators like hotels.com, and why he believes there is a short window to stake your claim in this new world.

The Bitcoin Layer and its guests do not provide investment advice.

In this episode, Nik welcomes Charlie Hu, founder of Coco AI and a bitcoiner since 2012, for a wide-ranging conversation on where AI is heading. Charlie shares takeaways from the Super AI conference in Singapore, walks through SpaceX's $60 billion acquisition of Cursor and what it signals about AI capital and exits, and gives his read on the US government's suspension of Anthropic's Fable and Mythos models. He then lays out his core thesis: that AI is ultimately a process of converting energy into intelligence, which reframes data centers, the US-China race, and even SpaceX's valuation as an energy story. Drawing on his background as a bitcoiner and former Web3 builder, Charlie explains why he sees this as the most important paradigm shift of our era.

The Bitcoin Layer and its guests do not provide investment advice.

In this episode, Nik welcomes Michael Sullivan, a bitcoin researcher who analyzes market sentiment through language. Michael explains how he runs natural language models across thousands of tweets, cohorting bitcoiners into newer retail accounts versus longer-term holders, to measure moods like anger, conviction, optimism, and apathy over time. He covers why bitcoin is in one of the most prolonged anger regimes on record, why Michael Saylor has become the main target of that disapproval, and how the current mix of low engagement, fading excitement, and apathy resembles the conditions you tend to see near a market bottom. Nik and Michael also discuss the AI trade pulling mindshare from bitcoin.

The Bitcoin Layer and its guests do not provide investment advice.