Unchained

By Laura Shin

Tech News Business News

What's Unchained about?

Crypto assets and blockchain technology are about to transform every trust-based interaction of our lives, from financial services to identity to the Internet of Things. In this podcast, host Laura Shin, an independent journalist covering all things crypto, talks with industry pioneers about how crypto assets and blockchains will change the way we earn, spend and invest our money. Tune in to find out how Web 3.0, the decentralized web, will revolutionize our world. Disclosure: I'm a nocoiner.

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Here’s How Sam Bankman-Frie...

09.29.2023

The trial of Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder and former CEO of bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange FTX, is set to begin on October 3. The 31-year-old is accused of committing wire fraud and conspiracy to commit other types of fraud, in relation ...

Unchained episodes:

09.29.2023 Here’s How Sam Bankman-Fried’s High-Stakes Trial Could Play Out - Ep 549 The trial of Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder and former CEO of bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange FTX, is set to begin on October 3. The 31-year-old is accused of committing wire fraud and conspiracy to commit other types of fraud, in relation ...
09.26.2023 Why All 10,000 OnChainMonkey NFTs Will Move From Ethereum to Bitcoin - Ep. 548 Bitcoin Ordinals have exploded in popularity since their launch by developer Casey Rodarmor in January, changing the NFT game with millions of inscriptions to date. But what comes next for Bitcoin-based digital artifacts? Danny Yang and Bill Tai, cofounders of ...
09.22.2023 Why FTX Might Try to Claw Back Funds From Retail Customers- Ep. 547 As lawsuits continue to pile up in the FTX saga, FTX chief John Ray III is focused on clawing back funds from former affiliates to pay back creditors. But how might that play out in court? Founder of 117 Partners ...
09.21.2023 The Chopping Block: Will Warren of 0x on Its Settlement With the CFTC - Ep. 546 Welcome to The Chopping Block – where crypto insiders chop it up about the latest news. This week, Haseeb Qureshi and Tom Schmidt speak to Will Warren, cofounder of 0x Labs, to discuss why the CFTC issued them a Wells ...
09.19.2023 Zeke Faux's Crypto Adventures and His Relationship With Former FTX CEO SBF - Ep. 545 Zeke Faux, author of 'Number Go Up,' shares his findings after making a deep dive into the world of crypto. From skepticism to a full-blown investigation, Faux recounts his journey that led him to the heart of crypto, meeting some ...
09.15.2023 With Execs Leaving and Market Share Declining, Can Binance Survive? - Ep. 544 In the wake of FTX’s collapse, Binance – already the biggest exchange in the world by a large margin – has continued to grow. But a series of challenges, including billions of dollars worth of customer outflows, the winding down ...
09.12.2023 Jeremy Allaire on Circle's ‘Multi-Decade’ Strategy and Where Stablecoin Regulation Is Headed - Ep. 543 It’s been a busy year for USDC issuer Circle, with several new product launches and partnerships, a crypto banking crisis to contend with, the entry of PayPal into the stablecoin business, and plenty of new global regulatory developments, including a ...
09.08.2023 Could This Vitalik-Backed Protocol Bring Privacy to a Regulated Crypto World? - Ep. 542 Earlier this week, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin and four co-authors published a paper describing a smart contract protocol called privacy pools that would enable crypto users to associate their funds with those being used for legitimate purposes versus those being ...
09.07.2023 The Chopping Block: Why Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire Is So Optimistic About Stablecoins' Future - Ep. 541 Welcome to The Chopping Block – where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tarun Chitra, and Robert Leshner chop it up about the latest news. This week, the group sits down with Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire to discuss how the USDC stablecoin ...
09.05.2023 Friend.tech: The Legal and Tax Ins and Outs of This Year’s Hottest Crypto App - Ep. 540 Friend.tech, a decentralized social media platform in which you can buy and sell “keys” in your friends on X (formerly known as Twitter) whose value can go up and down, has become a viral sensation, racking up as many as ...
09.01.2023 Does Grayscale’s Win Against the SEC Mean a Spot Bitcoin ETF Will Be Approved? - Ep. 539 This week’s emphatic ruling in favor of Grayscale in its suit against the SEC to convert its massive bitcoin trust into an ETF generated plenty of hopium among the bitcoin faithful that a spot bitcoin ETF will get approved soon ...
08.31.2023 The Chopping Block: Coinbase’s Paul Grewal on Why the SEC Is Going After Crypto So Aggressively - Ep. 538 Welcome to The Chopping Block – where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, and Tarun Chitra, chop it up about the latest news. This week, the gang goes in depth with Coinbase chief legal officer Paul Grewal to discuss Grayscale’s ...
08.29.2023 Oracles: Does the Backbone of DeFi Need Fixing? - Ep. 537 Oracles are all about bringing important data (mostly asset prices) onto the blockchain. As such, they’re a key part of decentralized finance. But oracle provider Pyth sees room for improvement as it relates to being more real-time than crypto incumbents ...
08.25.2023 Is This the End of DeFi? Why the US Government Is Going After Tornado Cash - Ep. 536 On Wednesday, the U.S. Government indicted Tornado Cash developers Roman Storm and Roman Semenov for three counts of conspiracy involving a staggeringly large number: $1 billion in criminal proceeds. The U.S. Department of Justice attached North Korean hackers to a ...
08.24.2023 The Chopping Block: All About That Base With Jesse Pollak - Ep. 535 Welcome to The Chopping Block – where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, Tarun Chitra, and Robert Leshner chop it up about the latest news. This week, Coinbase’s Jesse Pollak talks about the ambitious goals of Base, the new Optimism–based ...
08.22.2023 Can Maker’s Rune Christensen Fix the Sad State of DAO Governance? - Ep. 534 The height of the last bull run was when MakerDAO cofounder Rune Christensen felt most disillusioned by DeFi and DAOs. “I didn’t even see how Maker was going to survive,” Christensen tells Laura Shin in the latest episode of Unchained. ...
08.18.2023 SBF Behind Bars: Why Revoked Bail Is a Big Deal for Crypto’s Biggest Trial - Ep. 533 Lawyer Brian Klein joins the show to explain why Sam Bankman-Fried being locked up makes it “much tougher” for his legal team. This week, the judge presiding over the case said SBF went too far in attempting to intimidate key ...
08.17.2023 The Chopping Block: How Wintermute Avoids ‘Zombie’ Exchanges, Base’s Early Success, Bank Fraud in the AI Era - Ep. 532 Welcome to The Chopping Block – where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tarun Chitra, and Robert Leshner chop it up about the latest news. This week, Wintermute CEO Evgeny Gaevoy joins the show to discuss market making when the crypto markets ...
08.15.2023 Anita Posch on Why ‘Bitcoin Is a Tool for Freedom’ – Especially in Africa - Ep. 531 Educator Anita Posch has spent months on the ground in Africa onboarding new users into the world of Bitcoin. In the West, bitcoin may seem extraneous; but in her telling, bitcoin in Zimbabwe, Zambia, and other African countries is essential. ...
08.11.2023 Will PayPal's PYUSD Steal Market Share From Tether and Circle? - Ep. 530 A major player has entered the stablecoin wars. PayPal went deeper down the crypto rabbithole this week with the launch of its Ethereum-based PYUSD. The dollar-backed stablecoin now puts PayPal in competition with the likes of Tether and Circle for ...
08.10.2023 The Chopping Block: Curve Crisis Concludes With a Whimper, PayPal’s PYUSD Raises New Questions - Ep. 529 Welcome to The Chopping Block – where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, Tarun Chitra, and Robert Leshner chop it up about the latest news. This week, a quiet conclusion to that Curve thing everyone was animated about. Plus, major ...
08.08.2023 Orb Outrage: Worldcoin Cofounder Defends Project Amid Backlash - Ep. 528 Worldcoin is getting hit from all sides. Following a popular launch in late July, critics from the crypto community and public sector alike are coming out in droves with concerns about privacy, data protection, and tokenomics. Worldcoin co-founder Alex Blania ...
08.04.2023 What Does the Curve Crisis Say About DeFi? - Ep. 527 While it’s now mostly contained, the Curve crisis has exposed some of the systemic risks in the world of DeFi. Sam Kazemian, founder of Frax Finance, joins the show to discuss what DeFi needs to do to get better – ...
08.03.2023 The Chopping Block: Who’s to Blame for the Curve Hack? - Ep. 526 Welcome to “The Chopping Block” – where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, and Tarun Chitra chop it up about the latest news. This week, Laurence Day, smart-contract sleuth and co-founder of Wildcat Finance, joins the show to discuss the ...
08.01.2023 Why CoinFund Believes Worldcoin Could Become More Popular Than Bitcoin - Ep. 525 CoinFund’s Jake Brukhman and Chris Perkins join Unchained to dissect their recent $158 million seed round and the transformation of the investment landscape following the 2022 crypto carnage. As backers of Worldcoin, they confront criticisms about the project's approach of ...
07.28.2023 Rep. Ritchie Torres on Why Congress Should Make Clear Crypto Laws - Ep. 524 Crypto markets are under the gun from SEC Chairman Gary Gensler’s ‘regulation by enforcement’ policy. Meanwhile, a divided political landscape creates gridlock on Capitol Hill. Democratic Representative Ritchie Torres (NY-15) claims regulators have overstepped their bounds, while generational divide in ...
07.27.2023 The Chopping Block: NFA for Founders, Worldcoin and UniswapX Launch, Hamster Racing - Ep. 523 Welcome to The Chopping Block – where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, Tarun Chitra, and Robert Leshner chop it up about the latest news. This week, they debate whether infrastructure is being over-invested in, explore the potential of UniswapX ...
07.25.2023 Two VCs on Why This Is the Perfect Time to Invest in Crypto - Ep. 522 Despite the doom and gloom, Placeholder VC partners Chris Burniske and Joel Monegro are highly bullish on the present moment. “We’re all going to look back on this period and remember it as fondly as we remember ‘18 and ‘19,” ...
07.21.2023 Why the SEC Doesn’t Want the Ripple Case to Go to the Supreme Court - Ep. 521 If the SEC wants to appeal last week’s judgment in the Ripple case, it better act fast. So says Bill Hughes, regulatory chief at Ethereum booster ConsenSys and one of the many crypto policy pros assessing the ramifications of U.S. ...
07.18.2023 Why the SEC vs. Ripple Order Is Now About 2 Things: Coinbase and Congress - Ep. 520 XRP isn’t itself a security; it depends on how it’s sold. So said a federal judge last Thursday in the SEC vs. Ripple case and the implications are significant. Jake Chervinsky, chief policy officer at the Blockchain Association, and lawyer ...
07.15.2023 The Chopping Block: Should XRP Holders Really Be Rejoicing? - Ep. 519 Welcome to “The Chopping Block” – where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, Tarun Chitra, and Robert Leshner chop it up about the latest news. This week, crypto lawyer Stephen Palley joins an emergency live show to unpack Thursday’s judgment ...
07.14.2023 New Order in SEC vs. Ripple Over XRP Is a Win for Crypto: What Happens Now? - Ep. 518 The SEC and Ripple have been locked in a legal tug of war for years, stirring up waves of controversy and debate in the crypto community. Finally, Judge Analisa Torres has given an order establishing that XRP buyers trading on ...
07.13.2023 The Chopping Block: Will Tokenizing RWAs Finally Click This Time? - Ep. 517 Welcome to “The Chopping Block” – where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, Tarun Chitra, and Robert Leshner chop it up about the latest crypto news. This week, the crew is joined by Goldfinch co-founder Blake West to talk about ...
07.11.2023 When AI and Blockchain Meet, How Can Each Technology Benefit? - Ep 516 In recent months, ChatGPT, Bard and other new artificial intelligence (AI) products have revolutionized numerous industries. But how this nascent technology can work with crypto and blockchain technology is still relatively unexplored. In this episode, Illia Polosukhin and Jason Warner ...
07.07.2023 Circuit Breakers: Is ERC-7265 the Solution dApps Were Waiting For? - Ep. 515 In 2022, crypto crime hit an all-time high. A staggering $3.8 billion in crypto was stolen, with DeFi protocols bearing the brunt of these thefts, accounting for 82% of the total losses. Amid this alarming scenario, has a beacon of ...
07.04.2023 ERC-6551: Is This the Next Big Leap in NFT Innovation? - Ep. 514 The ERC-721 token standard on Ethereum ignited the frenzied world of NFTs. Yet, as the dust settled, their limitations became apparent. Enter ERC-6551, a new standard designed to overcome these challenges. Benny Giang and Jayden Windle, cofounder and founding developer ...
06.30.2023 Will FTX Reboot? Here’s John Ray’s Internal Deadline for Making a Decision - Ep. 513 From “hush money” allegations to a prospective FTX relaunch, it’s been a crazy week for those following the legal saga of Sam Bankman-Fried’s collapsed crypto empire. Perhaps few are following it more closely than 507 Capital founder Thomas Braziel, who ...
06.29.2023 The Chopping Block: Why the Azuki Elementals Drop Was a Big Flop - Ep. 512 Welcome to “The Chopping Block” – where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, Tarun Chitra, and Robert Leshner chop it up about the latest crypto news. Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, Podcast Addict, Pocket Casts, Stitcher, ...
06.27.2023 Prometheum and Paradigm in Debate: Can the Status Quo Work for Crypto? - Ep. 511 Aaron Kaplan, co-CEO of Prometheum, the trading platform that recently acquired a special-purpose broker dealer license for digital asset securities, has become a major lightning rod in the crypto community. Does the firm represent, as Kaplan has argued, a compliant ...
06.24.2023 The Chopping Block: Is BlackRock’s ETF Proposal Breathing Life Into Bitcoin? - Ep. 510 Welcome to “The Chopping Block” – where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, Tarun Chitra, and Robert Leshner chop it up about the latest crypto news. With BTC topping $30,000, the gang tackles the apparent surge in institutional bitcoin interest, ...
06.23.2023 Why It Looks Like BlackRock Could Win America’s First Spot Bitcoin ETF - Ep. 509 The SEC has swatted down so many spot bitcoin ETF applications that crypto diehards simply gave up caring. Then comes TradFi giant BlackRock – at the height of the SEC’s crypto crackdown, no less – with an ETF application that ...
06.20.2023 Uniswap Founder Hayden Adams on How ‘Hooks’ Make v4 Different - Ep. 508 The announcement of the upcoming launch of Uniswap v4 sparked fresh versions of old debates. Is it OK for DeFi’s leading DEX to not be fully open source at launch? What counts as composability and what counts as plagiarism? Is ...
06.16.2023 SEC’s Hester Peirce Tackles ‘Frustrating’ Crypto Regulation – And Why It’s So Slow - Ep. 507 SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce has a reputation in the industry for being more supportive of crypto than her peers. After a rough year for the industry, Peirce weighs in on whether the agency was right in recently naming several crypto ...
06.15.2023 The Chopping Block: Why Uniswap V4 Creates a Bigger Attack Surface Area - Ep. 506 Welcome to “The Chopping Block” – where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, Tarun Chitra, and Robert Leshner, chop it up about the latest news. In this episode, Robert stirs the debate over Hinman's 2018 speech and what it means ...
06.13.2023 Hong Kong's New Crypto Regulation: Will It Attract the Industry? - Ep. 505 On June 1, Hong Kong implemented new crypto regulations to license exchanges. Two experts – Angelina Kwan, CEO of Stratford Finance (and former COO of BitMEX), and Adrian Lai, founder and managing partner of Newman Capital – weigh in on ...
06.09.2023 SEC Sues Binance, Coinbase: ‘This Is Not the End of Crypto in the United States’- Ep. 504 On Monday, it was Binance. On Tuesday, Coinbase. Electric Capital General Counsel Emily Meyers joins the show to read between the lines of an action-packed week for Gary Gensler’s SEC. Meyers lends her lawyerly eye to the key differences between ...
06.08.2023 The Chopping Block: Jake Chervinsky on How the SEC Has Lost Credibility - Ep. 503 Welcome to “The Chopping Block” – where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, Tarun Chitra, and Robert Leshner, chop it up about the latest news. In this episode, the Blockchain Association’s Jake Chervinsky breaks down the cases against Binance and ...
06.06.2023 What’s Next for Wallets After Ledger Recover Outrage? - Ep. 502 Wallet security was in the spotlight after the announcement of Ledger Recover, but the crypto community doesn’t need to “freak out,” according to Itai Turbahn, co-founder and CEO of Dynamic Labs, and Ouriel Ohayon, CEO of ZenGo. The two CEOs ...
06.03.2023 The Chopping Block: Will Modular Blockchains Win? - Ep. 501 Welcome to “The Chopping Block” – where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, Tarun Chitra, and Robert Leshner, chop it up about the latest news. In this episode, the gang answers audience questions, digs into the discourse around rollups, and ...
06.02.2023 Laura Shin Reflects on 500 Episodes of ‘Unchained’ - Ep.500 If a year in crypto is like a decade in other industries, then Laura Shin has seen a lot. To commemorate the 500th episode of “Unchained” (actually, there’s about 150 more under a different brand name), Laura hops on the ...

Older episodes

Unchained

What's Unchained about?

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Unchained episodes:

Here’s How Sam Bankman-Fried’s High-Stakes Trial Could Play Out - Ep 549

Why All 10,000 OnChainMonkey NFTs Will Move From Ethereum to Bitcoin - Ep. 548

Why FTX Might Try to Claw Back Funds From Retail Customers- Ep. 547

The Chopping Block: Will Warren of 0x on Its Settlement With the CFTC - Ep. 546

Zeke Faux's Crypto Adventures and His Relationship With Former FTX CEO SBF - Ep. 545

With Execs Leaving and Market Share Declining, Can Binance Survive? - Ep. 544

Jeremy Allaire on Circle's ‘Multi-Decade’ Strategy and Where Stablecoin Regulation Is Headed - Ep. 543

Could This Vitalik-Backed Protocol Bring Privacy to a Regulated Crypto World? - Ep. 542

The Chopping Block: Why Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire Is So Optimistic About Stablecoins' Future - Ep. 541

Friend.tech: The Legal and Tax Ins and Outs of This Year’s Hottest Crypto App - Ep. 540

Does Grayscale’s Win Against the SEC Mean a Spot Bitcoin ETF Will Be Approved? - Ep. 539

The Chopping Block: Coinbase’s Paul Grewal on Why the SEC Is Going After Crypto So Aggressively - Ep. 538

Oracles: Does the Backbone of DeFi Need Fixing? - Ep. 537

Is This the End of DeFi? Why the US Government Is Going After Tornado Cash - Ep. 536

The Chopping Block: All About That Base With Jesse Pollak - Ep. 535

Can Maker’s Rune Christensen Fix the Sad State of DAO Governance? - Ep. 534

SBF Behind Bars: Why Revoked Bail Is a Big Deal for Crypto’s Biggest Trial - Ep. 533

The Chopping Block: How Wintermute Avoids ‘Zombie’ Exchanges, Base’s Early Success, Bank Fraud in the AI Era - Ep. 532

Anita Posch on Why ‘Bitcoin Is a Tool for Freedom’ – Especially in Africa - Ep. 531

Will PayPal's PYUSD Steal Market Share From Tether and Circle? - Ep. 530

The Chopping Block: Curve Crisis Concludes With a Whimper, PayPal’s PYUSD Raises New Questions - Ep. 529

Orb Outrage: Worldcoin Cofounder Defends Project Amid Backlash - Ep. 528

What Does the Curve Crisis Say About DeFi? - Ep. 527

The Chopping Block: Who’s to Blame for the Curve Hack? - Ep. 526

Why CoinFund Believes Worldcoin Could Become More Popular Than Bitcoin - Ep. 525

Rep. Ritchie Torres on Why Congress Should Make Clear Crypto Laws - Ep. 524

The Chopping Block: NFA for Founders, Worldcoin and UniswapX Launch, Hamster Racing - Ep. 523

Two VCs on Why This Is the Perfect Time to Invest in Crypto - Ep. 522

Why the SEC Doesn’t Want the Ripple Case to Go to the Supreme Court - Ep. 521

Why the SEC vs. Ripple Order Is Now About 2 Things: Coinbase and Congress - Ep. 520

The Chopping Block: Should XRP Holders Really Be Rejoicing? - Ep. 519

New Order in SEC vs. Ripple Over XRP Is a Win for Crypto: What Happens Now? - Ep. 518

The Chopping Block: Will Tokenizing RWAs Finally Click This Time? - Ep. 517

When AI and Blockchain Meet, How Can Each Technology Benefit? - Ep 516

Circuit Breakers: Is ERC-7265 the Solution dApps Were Waiting For? - Ep. 515

ERC-6551: Is This the Next Big Leap in NFT Innovation? - Ep. 514

Will FTX Reboot? Here’s John Ray’s Internal Deadline for Making a Decision - Ep. 513

The Chopping Block: Why the Azuki Elementals Drop Was a Big Flop - Ep. 512

Prometheum and Paradigm in Debate: Can the Status Quo Work for Crypto? - Ep. 511

The Chopping Block: Is BlackRock’s ETF Proposal Breathing Life Into Bitcoin? - Ep. 510

Why It Looks Like BlackRock Could Win America’s First Spot Bitcoin ETF - Ep. 509

Uniswap Founder Hayden Adams on How ‘Hooks’ Make v4 Different - Ep. 508

SEC’s Hester Peirce Tackles ‘Frustrating’ Crypto Regulation – And Why It’s So Slow - Ep. 507

The Chopping Block: Why Uniswap V4 Creates a Bigger Attack Surface Area - Ep. 506

Hong Kong's New Crypto Regulation: Will It Attract the Industry? - Ep. 505

SEC Sues Binance, Coinbase: ‘This Is Not the End of Crypto in the United States’- Ep. 504

The Chopping Block: Jake Chervinsky on How the SEC Has Lost Credibility - Ep. 503

What’s Next for Wallets After Ledger Recover Outrage? - Ep. 502

The Chopping Block: Will Modular Blockchains Win? - Ep. 501

Laura Shin Reflects on 500 Episodes of ‘Unchained’ - Ep.500

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