There’s a question I hear a lot: Are we on top?
In a joking response to Bitwise’s Ryan Rasmussen, I said that I did not want TRUMP as the number one and that is still my position. I admit that, maybe wishfully hoping, we won’t be the number one until later this year.
The two Empire stars, Jason Yanowitz and Jason Yanowitz sound like they’re on the same page. “funky” He developed a theory based on price movements. Strategy, previously known as MicroStrategy, propped the price of Bitcoin.
We would have seen bitcoin prices much lower if Michael Saylor and his company hadn’t gone on a $20 billion spending spree at the end of 2017 into 2018.
Yanowitz says that we are now at an earlier point in the cycle. Dan Matuszewski from CMS Holdings supports Yanowitz’s theory.
Yanowitz said in today’s Round Up that we still haven’t seen a lot of venture capital. “very PvP.”
“I don’t know why this is different this time around or if I’m just off on where we are in the cycle but my guess is the overhang of 2021 is still with us. Liquid basically doesn’t exist and therefore can’t materially drive flows or collect inflows and venture remains the big yardstick for alts,” Matuszewski wrote.
Santiago Santos said that we must see “more flows coming in,” We haven’t seen that outside of the a “selective” few.
We might ask the question, “Are we there yet?” as we continue to debate. We must acknowledge, no matter what stage we are at in the cycle. Some of these actions may act as catalysts moving forward.
In terms of regulatory issues, yesterday I attended the Operation Chokepoint 1.0 hearing on Capitol Hill.
All parties seemed to be ready to move forward.
Likewise, I hope that we will be able to move on and find out what exactly happened. If you’re not sure, Operation Chokepoint was a coordinated effort by the FDIC and other regulators to prevent or debank crypto companies.
Initially, I was unsure how much this was the fault of vague regulations or the absence of any, but now the hard evidence, like the transcripts of the courts, shows that the intention was there.
You can find the full transcript in Scott Johnsson’s post below.
Grewal testified at the hearing, along with WSPN USA CEO Austin Campbell & Better Markets Banking Policies Director Shayna Olesiank.
Campbell said that at one time regulators had decided to shut down crypto companies just because some bad actors were involved (cough, cough FTX). Grewal also argued against the debanking of crypto firms. “discourages” The banks should refrain from attempting to finance companies operating in the sector.
“What we saw in the documents that were produced yesterday, case after case, when the bank stepped forward and raised their hands and asked for permission to offer basic services, they were either ignored or they were given detailed examination and re-examination and re-examination until they simply gave up,” Grewal, said.
While we’re in friendlier waters, I think it’s fair to say that we need to see some changes — beyond the changing of the guard at the FDIC — before we can fully say we’re past Operation Chokepoint 2.0.
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