Lyn Alden joins Gwart to talk about the Coldcard security incident, changing self-custody heuristics, game theory behind Bitcoin soft forks, and the true addressable market for stablecoins. She shares insights on MicroStrategy's reserve guidance, her new private equity holding company Orange Juice, early-stage venture thesis, and whether Bitcoin can outperform gold as the ultimate store of value.

Timestamps:

The Gwart Show is sponsored by Ellipsis Labs. Ellipsis Labs builds the most efficient on-chain markets. Their orderbook and Prop AMM products have delivered price improvement to hundreds of billions of dollars in retail volume. Now, they are bringing their expertise to build Phoenix, the best on-chain perpetuals platform.

Ellipsis Labs is hiring New York-based engineers. If you're an engineer looking to work with a proven team in making DeFi better, go to ellipsislabs.xyz/careers

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lucas V. Schuermann, Co-Founder of Variational, joins us to talk about building a high-performance crypto brokerage model on Arbitrum. Lucas explains how Variational routes execution to TradFi venues, eliminates external market maker extraction through its in-house LP, introduces flat-rate swaps to fix funding rate volatility, and builds isolated smart contracts to protect user capital.

The Gwart Show is sponsored by Ellipsis Labs. Ellipsis Labs builds the most efficient on-chain markets. Their orderbook and Prop AMM products have delivered price improvement to hundreds of billions of dollars in retail volume. Now, they are bringing their expertise to build Phoenix, the best on-chain perpetuals platform.

Ellipsis Labs is hiring New York-based engineers. If you're an engineer looking to work with a proven team in making DeFi better, go to ellipsislabs.xyz/careers

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

John Wang, Lead of Crypto & Perps at Kalshi, joins us to talk about bringing CFTC-regulated crypto perpetual futures and prediction markets to the US. John shares insights on growing Kalshi's crypto business, expanding across 140 countries, institutional liquidity, standardized compute indices, and why regulatory compliance scales better than offshore exchanges.

The Gwart Show is sponsored by Ellipsis Labs. Ellipsis Labs builds the most efficient on-chain markets. Their orderbook and Prop AMM products have delivered price improvement to hundreds of billions of dollars in retail volume. Now, they are bringing their expertise to build Phoenix, the best on-chain perpetuals platform.

Ellipsis Labs is hiring New York-based engineers. If you're an engineer looking to work with a proven team in making DeFi better, go to ellipsislabs.xyz/careers

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

John Wang, Lead of Crypto & Perps at Kalshi, joins us to talk about bringing CFTC-regulated crypto perpetual futures and prediction markets to the US. John shares insights on growing Kalshi's crypto business, expanding across 140 countries, institutional liquidity, standardized compute indices, and why regulatory compliance scales better than offshore exchanges.

The Gwart Show is sponsored by Ellipsis Labs. Ellipsis Labs builds the

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Christian Catalini, Co-founder of Lightspark joins us to talk about his journey from the MIT Bitcoin experiment to co-founding Libra. Christian breaks down why regulators killed Libra, the limits of the Lightning Network, and why Bitcoin needs new opcodes. He also shares his framework for AI value accrual, the power of verifiable open-source models, and the reality of agentic payments.

The Gwart Show is sponsored by Ellipsis Labs. Ellipsis Labs builds the

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ivo Crnkovic-Rubsamen, Co-Founder of Pascal Trading joins us to talk about building the next generation of prediction markets. Ivo shares insights from his time at Bridgewater, D.E. Shaw, and dYdX, explaining how Pascal is solving major capital efficiency issues in DeFi. We dive deep into oracle-free price discovery, order book design, and how to scale robust leverage extension outside the core matching loop to protect trading venues.

The Gwart Show is sponsored by Ellipsis Labs. Ellipsis Labs builds the

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ethan Marcus, CEO of Flashnet joins us to talk about how Flashnet is building a global pool of liquidity for Bitcoin. Ethan explains why the Lightning Network falls short for multi-asset scaling and how Spark's state-chain architecture enables instant, zero-fee swaps. We dive into Flashnet’s B2B integrations with neobanks and merchant platforms, the trend toward on-chain retail execution, and their upcoming expansion into liquidations and Bitcoin-denominated financial services.

The Gwart Show is sponsored by Ellipsis Labs. Ellipsis Labs builds the

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Udi Wertheimer, Founder of Taproot Wizards joins us to talk about the shifting narratives of Bitcoin, the structural flaws of layer-2 scaling solutions, and how stablecoins enable Hyperliquid and Polymarket. He critiques Michael Saylor’s aggressive financial engineering tactics, explaining why MicroStrategy stopping its Bitcoin buying spree is a far greater systemic risk to the market than Saylor actually selling his bags.

The Gwart Show is sponsored by Ellipsis Labs. Ellipsis Labs builds the

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Alexander Leishman, CEO and Founder of River, joins us to talk about his vision for building a Bitcoin bank. We dive deep into why Coinbase pursued a local maximum with altcoin trading, the stickiness of traditional banking despite 0.01% yields, and why stablecoins lack product-market fit for Americans. Alex also shares his perspective on the limits of Lightning Network for global commerce, the necessity of proof of reserves after the FTX collapse, and why Bitcoin's terminal state is to become a boring treasury asset.
Subscribe to the newsletter! [https://newsletter.blockspacemedia.com](https://newsletter.blockspacemedia.com)
Notes:
* River started in 2019 as a Bitcoin bank.
* Coinbase charged retail 2% for altcoin trades.
* Major banks pay 0.01% interest on savings.
* Proof of reserves adopted after FTX collapse.
* Zombie nodes have near-zero running costs.
Timestamps:
00:00 Start
00:34 Starting River
01:51 Before River
02:59 From altcoins to Bitcoin
05:15 Save in BTC
08:17 Coinbase trajectory
10:13 Stablecoins
14:10 Yield, and other fun distractions
17:45 Lightning
24:24 Proof of reserves
26:39 Paper BTC
28:08 10/10/25 fallout?
33:19 Current cycle vibes
36:10 Portfolio allocation
39:47 Self custody
42:06 Self custody unlocks
45:07 Hyperliquid & others
50:44 Admitting you were wrong
56:05 Quantum

The Gwart Show is sponsored by Ellipsis Labs. Ellipsis Labs builds the

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Rahul Jain, Head of Trading at Ellipsis Labs, joins us to talk about the reality of market making on Solana. Rahul breaks down why spot order books fail against toxic makers, how transactional introspection protects liquidity, and the economics of running modern prop execution systems. He dives into the mechanics of Phoenix's new perps platform, managing oracle attacks on illiquid tokens, the structural advantages of owning user flow on-chain, and whether decentralized perps are a winner-take-most game.

The Gwart Show is sponsored by Ellipsis Labs. Ellipsis Labs builds the

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices