Unchained

The Aave DAO collapsed — but might that be good for Aave? (But bad for the token?) Plus, how the feud between the U.S. government and Anthropic helped the AI company.

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The Aave civil war appears to be at an end with key members of the DAO rage quitting and leaving Aave Labs standing as the sole protocol contributor. 

Uneasy Money hosts Kain Warwick, Luca Netz, and Taylor Monahan explain why the Aave DAO's messy collapse is a death knell for the DAO system. Ironically, they wonder — could this be good for Aave, but bad for the token?

The crew also wades into ZachXBT's recent Axiom investigation and how the on-chain detective has become “a vigilante for hire.” 

They also cover all the insider trading claims and fights around prediction markets involving the Iran War and Mr. Beast, and “Kalshi jail.” Kain suspects another reason for the U.S. government's rift with Anthropic. Luca, an Anthropic investor, says he wished Dario had taken the government's deal, but that Sam Altman needs to “take the Zuck playbook.”

Meanwhile, is Anthropic nerfing OpenClaw?

Hosts:

⁠⁠⁠Kain Warwick⁠⁠⁠, Founder of Infinex and Synthetix

⁠⁠⁠Taylor Monahan⁠⁠⁠, Security Expert

⁠⁠⁠Luca Netz, CEO of Pudgy Penguins

Links:

Unchained:

⁠⁠⁠⁠Aave Governance Fight Escalates Ahead of $51 Million Funding Vote

Uneasy Money: Why the AI Singularity May Already Be Out of Our Hands

How Aave Labs and the DAO Should Split Ownership of the Brand – Uneasy Money

ZachXBT Alleges Axiom Employee Misused Internal Data

Uneasy Money: Why Peter Steinberger and Non-Crypto People Hate the Crypto Mob

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Analysts Will Clemente, Joe Vezzani and Marcus Wu share their Bitcoin outlook amidst war. Plus, Will shares his thesis on Gen Z’s future, and Marcus previews his Bitcoin game theory model.

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Bitcoin's price has largely held steady despite President Donald Trump's escalation of hostilities with Iran. Is this the bottom signal the market has been waiting for?

STIX investments chief Will Clemente, LunarCrush co-founder Joe Vezzani and Delphi Digital Research Analyst Marcus Wu explain why it looks like Bitcoin is bottoming, why a 10/10-style crash would have happened in crypto even without the Binance glitch, and why, regardless of the Jane Street rumors, it’s not beyond Wall Street to manipulate an asset.

They also address speculation that Jane Street has been suppressing Bitcoin's price and how AI's rapid advancement could impact crypto in light of Citrini Research's article and Jack Dorsey's Block layoffs.

Don't miss Joe's reasoning on why Trump could come to the market's rescue and Will's thesis on why zoomers face four unique financial and technological challenges. Plus Marcus also previews his new game theory model for trading the Bitcoin market.

Guest:

⁠Marcus Wu, Research Analyst at Delphi Digital

Joe Vezzani, Co-founder and CEO of LunarCrush

Will Clemente, Investments at STIX

Previous appearances on Unchained:

Bitcoin Crashed Below $100K, But Smart Money Is Buying the Dip

Strong Hands Aren't Selling Bitcoin. So Who Is? - Ep. 183

Arthur Hayes and Will Clemente on the 2024 Bitcoin Halving

Links:

Unchained:⁠⁠

Why Gold Rose and Bitcoin Tumbled on Japan Bond Turmoil

Is Nic Carter Exaggerating Bitcoin’s Quantum Risk? Yes, Says One Core Dev

Bitcoin Rebounds as ETF Inflows Return, Jane Street Speculation Swirls

Terraform Estate Targets Jane Street in Explosive Terra Collapse Lawsuit

Crypto’s Black Friday Was Its Largest Liquidation Ever. What the Hell Happened?

Will’s essay

Climbing a Broken Ladder: A message to my fellow Zoomers

Marcus’s Bitcoin game theory model

Bitcoin Game Theory on Delphi Digital

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The crew discusses whether prediction markets enable “Bloomberg terminal espionage,,” wonder how to regulate markets that could be on anything, dive into why the OCC is saying no to stablecoin yield and more.

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Prediction markets are in the spotlight again. On one hand adoption appears to be growing as the Nasdaq has announced plans of entering the space. On the other hand, they scrutinize markets that pose a national security risk. 

In this DEX in the City episode, hosts Jessi Brooks, Katherine Kirkpatrick Bos and TuongVy Le discuss suspected insider trading activity around a market tied to the strikes on Iran. Beyond ethical concerns about betting on war, they grapple with the definition of “a death market” and ask whether all prediction markets around an individual are death markets. 

The big question: How can these markets on literally any possible event be policed?

Plus, is Jane Street manipulating the Bitcoin market? Why the OCC is saying NO to stablecoin yield and the takeaway from Jack Dorsey's Block layoffs.

Hosts:

⁠⁠⁠Jessi Brooks⁠⁠⁠, General Counsel at Ribbit Capital

⁠⁠Katherine Kirkpatrick Bos⁠⁠, General Counsel at StarkWare

⁠⁠TuongVy Le, General Counsel at Veda

Links:

Unchained:

Nasdaq Eyes Prediction Markets With SEC Filing

Bitcoin Rebounds as ETF Inflows Return, Jane Street Speculation Swirls

ZachXBT Alleges Axiom Employee Misused Internal Data

White House Talks Make Progress on Stablecoin Yields but No Deal Yet

DEX in the City: Insider Trading and Crypto: What the Law Actually Says

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Crypto’s vibe check time: Jez (izebel_eth) joins the crew to dissect whether idealism is RIP, if cypherpunks should abandon hope, how Memecoins and asset mayhem changed the game, why prediction markets are both truth engines and regulatory minefields, and where real permissionless finance is actually winning in the middle of global chaos.

Welcome to The Chopping Block — where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, Tarun Chitra, and Robert Leshner chop it up about the latest in crypto. This week the gang is joined by super-perpetuals-junkie Jez for a spicy look at whether crypto has lost its soul — or if things are just getting interesting. Is crypto’s vibe shift just growing pains, or did Memecoins and jaded traders nuke our idealism for good? The crew rehashes dreams of cypherpunk glory, debates the “death of the dream,” and gets existential about crypto’s place in a world where everything is either a commodity, a meme, or a permissionless financial machine. Plus: War in Iran sends TradFi running, but DeFi markets are live, and prediction markets step up just as the regulators get weird. Enough nostalgia — let’s get into it.

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pods, Fountain, Podcast Addict, Pocket Casts, Amazon Music, or on your favorite podcast platform.

Show highlights

🔹 Jez and Tarun’s crypto origin story: from MIT outcast to NFT party degens.

🔹 Has crypto really lost its soul, or just shed its rose-tinted glasses? The hosts debate.

🔹 The rise and rise of Memecoins, rampant speculation, and Solana’s culture shift.

🔹 Do “return to cypherpunk” calls matter—or is this what crypto winning looks like?

🔹 Why stablecoins, perps, and DeFi are actually success stories (despite maximalist whining).

🔹 AI eating crypto’s lunch: the “everything on the blockchain” promise gets a reality check.

🔹 Real world chaos, onchain price discovery: Iran war, commodities, and DeFi’s 24/7 edge.

🔹 Prediction markets—Kalshi vs. Polymarket—tripped up by the ambiguous reality of war and death.

🔹 CFTC, insider trading, and whether banning informed bets is just protecting “the fish.”

🔹 The future: agents, open-source AI, and keeping the door open for true permissionless finance.

Hosts

⭐️Haseeb Qureshi, Managing Partner at Dragonfly

⭐️Tarun Chitra, Managing Partner at Robot Ventures

⭐️Tom Schmidt, General Partner at Dragonfly 

Guest

⭐️ Jez, Legend
Disclosures

Timestamps

00:00 Intro

01:07 Jez x Tarun Lore

03:24 Cynicism & Rug Culture

09:00 Back To Cypherpunk Roots?

14:37 Compromises & Reality

23:36 Intermediaries Coexist

25:23 Gates Closing Fears

28:10 Stablecoins & Policy

29:24 Agents As Middlemen

30:28 Microfinance to DeFi Agents

31:57 Open Source AI and Crypto Control

32:41 Iran War DeFi Price Discovery

33:57 Why Perps Beat TradFi

37:21 Kalshi vs Polymarket Dispute

44:31 Are Prediction Markets Just Toys?

50:50 Insider Trading Crackdown

54:15 Adverse Selection and Market Design

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A major war broke out in the Middle East, but Bitcoin didn’t break. One veteran investor says that price action reveals something important about where crypto stands today.

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The U.S. and Israel have struck Iran, killing Ayatollah Khamenei, and markets are still calibrating. Oil is climbing toward $100, yields are confounding textbook expectations, and when news first broke, Bitcoin dropped to around $63,000 before recovering to roughly $70,000 during Monday's session. Equity futures that opened sharply lower also reversed, ending roughly flat vs. Friday's close. What does that price action actually mean? Is the crypto bounce a sign of structural resilience, or is it moving in lockstep with a broader risk recovery? 

In this episode, Steven Ehrlich sits down with Rob Hadick, General Partner at Dragonfly Capital, a veteran crypto venture investor managing hundreds of millions of dollars to work through what the Iran conflict actually means for digital assets. They also get into the stalled Clarity Act that could be crypto's biggest catalyst of the year, the rise of on-chain derivatives markets, and why one of the largest crypto-focused funds believes now is one of the best moments in history to be building in this space.

Host:

Guest:

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US and Israeli strikes killed Iran's Supreme Leader and initially rattled markets. But does the subsequent market calm reflect genuine resilience or a dangerous underpricing of what comes next?

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Bits + Bips is spreading its wings

Starting soon, new episodes will only be published on our brand‑new feeds.

Here’s what you need to do:

Click the links below.

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🎉 Done.

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Over the weekend, US and Israeli forces conducted coordinated strikes on Iran under an operation called Epic Fury, killing Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and triggering retaliatory missile attacks across the Gulf region. 

Markets absorbed the shock in ways that surprised almost everyone: bitcoin briefly dropped and recovered to $70,000, gold touched $5,400, oil surged, and the VIX held in the low 20s while equities finished roughly flat. 

In this episode of Bits + Bips, Austin Campbell, Ram Ahluwalia, and Chris Perkins discuss whether the market is correctly pricing this as a contained regional conflict, or is something larger being missed? What does crypto's stability in a weekend war say about its role as an asset class? And with the Clarity Bill stalling again over stablecoin yield, and Anthropic handing the Pentagon to OpenAI, is the window for principled positioning in both crypto and AI closing faster than anyone admits?

Hosts:

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A former Clinton and Biden foreign policy advisor saw it before it happened. Now the question is what investors do next.

Charles Myers, Founder and CEO of Signum Global Advisors and a former senior foreign policy advisor to Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden, had just sat down with Steven Ehrlich to discuss the geopolitical landscape and what it means for investors. 

What he said about Iran during that conversation is now raising serious questions about what comes next, and the investment implications are far from settled.

In this episode, Myers also addresses whether the "sell America" trade is overdone, where oil is heading, the future of AI funding, and whether Bitcoin can actually function as a safe haven when the world is on fire.

Hosts:

Guests:

Links:

Iran strike / military action:

US strikes Iran — https://www.cnn.com/world/live-news/israel-iran-attack-02-28-26-hnk-intl 

US-Iran nuclear talks — https://www.nbcnews.com/world/iran/us-iran-nuclear-talks-trump-military-buildup-attack-missiles-rcna260764 

Largest US military buildup in the Middle East since the early 2000s — https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2026/02/26/us-military-assembles-largest-force-of-warships-aircraft-in-middle-east-in-decades/ 

Oil markets:

Oil prices surge after Iran strike — https://www.cnbc.com/2026/02/28/iran-us-attack-oil-market-economy.html 

Trump’s energy strategy: targeting oil in the low $50s — https://www.axios.com/2026/02/28/us-iran-attack-energy-oil-prices 

Sell America / US safe haven:

Global investors question US safe haven status — https://www.cnbc.com/2026/02/28/markets-brace-for-impact-following-us-military-strikes-against-iran.html 

The “Sell America” trade, explained — https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-02-02/sell-america-trade-why-investors-are-questioning-us-assets 

Venezuela / Monroe Doctrine:

Maduro government and the US oil deal — https://www.cnbc.com/2026/01/05/maduro-overthrow-could-pave-the-way-for-us-oil-companies-to-recover-venezuela-assets.html 

The return of the Monroe Doctrine under Trump — https://www.cfr.org/articles/oil-power-and-the-climate-stakes-of-the-u-s-move-in-venezuela 

OpenAI / AI:

OpenAI raises $110 billion — https://www.cnbc.com/2026/02/27/open-ai-funding-round-amazon.html 

Stargate: OpenAI and SoftBank’s AI moonshot — https://openai.com/index/announcing-the-stargate-project/

Prediction Markets:

Polymarket Iran strike odds — https://polymarket.com 

Insider trading on Polymarket: the Maduro bet — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_United_States_strikes_in_Venezuela 

Stablecoins / GENIUS Act:

The GENIUS Act and stablecoin regulation — https://www.gibsondunn.com/the-genius-act-a-new-era-of-stablecoin-regulation/

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As miners approach historical stress zones, Bitcoin’s correlation with tech stocks is hitting at the worst possible moment. Enter AI.

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Public mining companies are once again approaching breakeven territory, a zone that in prior cycles preceded forced selling and capitulation. But unlike past downturns, balance sheets today are cleaner, leverage is lower, and many operators are pivoting toward AI data center hosting as a structural offramp.

At the same time, Bitcoin has been trading alongside frontier technology stocks. That correlation is resurfacing at precisely the wrong moment, as growth equities face renewed pressure. If growth portfolios were the marginal buyers during the rally, they may now be the marginal sellers.

In this episode, Steven Ehrlich speaks first with John Todaro about miner economics, hash rate dynamics, and whether another round of selling could emerge if Bitcoin remains near breakeven levels. Then Zach Pandl joins to examine Bitcoin’s correlation with tech stocks, the mechanics behind recent gold volatility, and why the next phase for crypto may be driven by differentiation rather than broad beta.

Hosts:

Guests:

Links:

Bitcoin Miner Danger Zone

Major Bitcoin Miners Face Shutdown Risk If BTC Falls Below $70,000

Miner Pivot to AI

America’s Biggest Bitcoin Miners Are Pivoting to AI

The Tech Selloff

Wall Street’s Anything-But-Tech Trade Shakes Up US Stock Market

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MegaETH's Namik Muduroglu joins the Uneasy Money crew to discuss how the industry can fix token incentives, the continued escalation of the Aave civil war and more.

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An article from Boost CEO Brian Flynn sparks conversation about whether tokens are dead. The Aave civil war continues to escalate. China is trying to reverse engineer Claude even as Anthropic faces off against the U.S. government.

In this episode of Uneasy Money, hosts Kain Warwick and Taylor Monahan are joined by MegaETH founding team member Namik Muduroglu to discuss how to fix token incentives, whether there is a happy ending in sight for Aave. 

They also discuss the geopolitical risks that come with AI and the technology's rapid rate of advancement. Is the Singularity already out of our hands?

Plus, ZachXBT's teased announcement and Ethereum's “strawmap.”

Don't miss Kain's plan to fuse Claude with his Unitree dog and why Namik is a closet AI doomer.

Hosts:

⁠⁠Kain Warwick⁠⁠, Founder of Infinex and Synthetix

⁠⁠Taylor Monahan⁠⁠, Security Expert

Guest:

Links:

Unchained:

⁠Uneasy Money: Why Token Holders Have No Rights & Why Every DAO ‘Has Failed’

⁠Why MegaETH Is Delaying Its Token and Rejecting Credible Neutrality

⁠Aave Governance Fight Escalates Ahead of $51 Million Funding Vote

How Aave Labs and the DAO Should Split Ownership of the Brand – Uneasy Money

Uneasy Money: Why Peter Steinberger and Non-Crypto People Hate the Crypto Mob

⁠Ethereum Researchers Outline Seven Forks Through 2029 in New “Strawmap”

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Tushar Jain and Mike Ippolito make the bull case for Solana as competition heats up.

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With Ethereum refocusing on L1 and Hyperliquid adoption growing, Solana is arguably facing stronger competition than ever. Can it thrive still?

Multicoin co-founder Tushar Jain and Blockworks co-founder Mike Ippolito share several reasons to be excited about Solana, including Alpenglow and anticipated market microstructure design flexibility.

Find out why Tushar and Mike say Firedancer has not been a flop despite seemingly low adoption, why they don't see block building issues stopping Solana from challenging Hyperliquid, and why they say the network doesn't have to do anything to specifically attract AI agents. Plus, why they both believe that the RWA race is too early to call despite Ethereum's dominance.

Meanwhile, with Alpenglow still months away, Mike says the wait doesn’t matter — for the next 12 to 18 months BD and marketing matter more than tech for adoption.

#UN1047

Guest:

Tushar Jain, Co-Founder & Managing Partner at Multicoin Capital

Previous appearances on Unchained:

Solana Rejected Inflation Reduction-Here's Why

CoinFund's Jake Brukhman and Multicoin's Tushar Jain on Generalized Mining 

Binance Hack: Should the Threat of Reorgs Be Used to Deter Hackers?

Multicoin on the 1 Thing Crypto Teams Miss in Their Quests for Success

Links:

Unchained:

Ethereum Lets Go of the Rollup Story. Here Are the 6 Tokens That Benefit

Jump Crypto’s Firedancer Goes Live on Solana Mainnet

BlackRock Just Chose Uniswap. The Market Didn’t Care. Here’s Why.

When AI Agents Take Over, What Does a Post-Human Economy Look Like?

Uneasy Money: How the Increasingly Better AI Agents Are Being Used Onchain

Pump.fun Cashed Out $436M Since Mid-October: Lookonchain

Zora Shocks Base Community With Solana Pivot

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