# Crypto Tax Dynamics, Stablecoin Yields, and Institutional Adoption Trends

**Podcast:** The Milk Road Show
**Published:** 2026-03-24

## Transcript

I think it snicks out risk, and then on the upside, it sniffs out increased liquidity.
I think it's the most sensitive measure of forward increases in liquidity, which then trickle down into other assets.
Oh, what's up, everybody?
It's LG Du Set here, and welcome to the Milk Road Show, the daily crypto show that saves you 10 hours of scrolling and three bad trades.
Today is March 24th, 2026.
We're recording late on March 23rd.
And by the time you're listening or watching this, who knows where we will be?
Gold is down.
Bitcoin is the same.
The war might not be over yet, but things are maybe starting to feel a little bit different.
A bit of a taco going on the last couple days.
There's only two paths from here, it feels like.
And we are gonna go down one of those very soon, especially for crypto.
Maybe we hope.
And there's one very sneaky date coming up that one of our guests today has circled that no one else has even considered until he brought it up to me right before we started recording.
Plus, there's an obvious play out there in the world of stable coins that we are not nearly bullish enough on.
All that and more today on the show with Matt Hogan and Ryan Rasmussen from Bitwise.
Today's episode is brought to you by Cherylan, trade real estate like stocks and nexo, earn interest, borrow, and trade crypto.
Matt, Ryan, welcome back to the show, guys.
LG, it's great to be here, man.
Thanks for having us.
Okay, I asked you a sneaky question before we started recording, and you both had kind of mixed answers.
And it was bullish or bearish.
I gave you the most broad question possible.
You asked me the time frame, and I said between now and the end of April.
And Matt, you said something I did not expect.
Yeah, I split the difference.
I said that I thought crypto would trade sort of broadly down and sideways until April 15th, after which we would start the rally that pushes us into crypto spring and to new all-time highs.
Uh April 15th is a magic day here in the US.
It's tax day.
It's the day where everyone who delayed filing their taxes has to send in their forms and their check to the IRS.
My experience uh historically, I haven't looked at the data.
So this is pure anecdote, just came up in our conversation.
But my experience historically is that crypto is often weak heading into tax day and then starts to rally right around then.
The reason is that people like Ryan who cashed in on profits in 2025 potentially now have to pay their gains.
They sell some crypto to do so.
That's put pressure.
But once we're on tax freedom day and we're on the other side of April 15th, I'm feeling pretty bullish.
So that was my TED take, LG.
Circle it on the calendar.
So hold on.
You're telling me that people to pay off the money that they owe from their gains from last year, they then have to sell more stuff.
I guess this year they won't incur a gain.
Well, remember, I don't know.
Yeah, maybe straight up until October.
It doesn't matter if your net portfolio was down, if you sold and harvested gains, you have to pay taxes on that unless you sold and harvested losses to offset that.
And people are bad at selling losers, they don't tax lost harvest as much as they should.
And, you know, and there's also outside of crypto, you might just owe more tax.
That happens too.
A lot of crypto people are entrepreneurs.
They don't necessarily pay their quarterly taxes the way they can or the way they should.
And then you get to April 15th, you got to write a big old check to the IRS.
So I do think that that can create a dynamic in the crypto market.
Uh, I just got a hunch about it, LG.
Oh, Ryan, is this true?
Are you are you gonna be uh offsetting a lot into April 15th or selling a lot to pay off some gains?
Or is this is this is Matt's assumption right?
Yeah, look, I think a lot happened in 2025 that probably created uh some taxable events for many investors.
If you think about what happened in 2025, the election ended November 2024.
Markets absolutely ripped through inauguration day.
You had the Trump meme coin in January 2025.
I'm sure a ton of people made a ton of money in that.
And uh, whether they like it or not, if you made money on those, you in 2025, you have to pay taxes in 2026.
So I actually I do think that Matt's theory holds water here.
I think uh, you know, what one of the reasons why people have financial advisors and uh financial planners is to help them account for taxes, and many people in crypto, uh particularly retail investors don't leverage, you know, those kind of professional services.
And so yeah, I think we could head that way.
I'm particularly more bullish.
I don't think we chop sideways.
I think that we uh are are pretty near the bottom here.
And uh, you know, I think that the the conflict in the Middle East is is uh going to end sooner rather than later.
And once that happens, uh I think markets will rip and Bitcoin and uh Ethereum and other crypto assets and crypto equities will go with it.
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Ryan, I think you you just like admitted indirectly that you you you somehow made money on Trump coin.
I'm pretty sure that's what you just said.
That's the only example you used.
That's the only example you used.
You didn't talk about the rally from the bottom of the of last year's tariffs, which is also around the same date, Matt, which is also around the bottom was like April 9th or 10th.
So not too far off.
But Ryan didn't talk about anything else except for Trump token.
Yeah.
So uh, you know, whether I harvest those intentionally uh or got rugged into a harvest uh situation, which may or may not have happened with certain coins.
Uh I think I think it uh yeah, there's some winners and losers.
Let's just say that.
I discussed this with uh with John Gillen, uh my my fellow host on the show yesterday, and I asked him, and he he has a macro background, BlackRock background.
I asked him, you know, in this volatile time of geopolitical theater and war and everything that's going on.
Have you guys been surprised at how almost little crypto has moved and how it kind of feels like it's uh it's on its own agenda, whereas everything else seems a little shakier or like it's moving more dramatically than crypto is crypto is not.
Do you agree with that?
And and have you been surprised that by that?
Matt, we'll start with you.
Yeah, uh, I haven't been surprised by it.
We've certainly see crypto march to its own drummer during periods of geopolitical stress in the past.
I think crypto is moving according to some idiosyncratic themes.
I think it's moving according to the rolling four-year cycle.
I think it's moving mostly according to institutional sales and adoption.
And I just think those are more important to it than what's happening in the Middle East.
I often hear people talk about like uh ask questions, is crypto a geopolitical hedge asset or not?
Is it a risk asset or not?
And I often think that's just a wrong question.
It's like asking if an orange is black or white.
The reality is it's neither.
And crypto is like moving according to crypto specific theme.
So it doesn't surprise me.
Look, what's happening in the Middle East with oil definitely has an immediate effect on the economy, an immediate effect on earnings, an immediate effect on yield.
It has a very long-term effect on Bitcoin because it will lead to more money printing and debt.
But that effect is attenuated over years, whereas the the earnings hit is is, you know, you're talking about months.
So it's not surprising to me that it's being impacted much less because the the mechanism of impact plays out over a much longer time period, much less direct than it does for other assets.
So I just think almost it's just not doesn't care.
You had also told me a long time ago, Matt, and I and I quoted this yesterday on the show as well, that Bitcoin seems to front-run a lot of other things.
You know, it seems to be the first mover in crypto in general, because it kind of falls Bitcoin anyways, and that that, you know, the the kind of collapse and price all the way back to the start of Q4 last year.
It was a long time ago now, six months, uh, was a precursor of things to come potentially.
Yeah, I think it sniffs out risk.
I think it sniffs out risk, and then on the upside, it sniffs out increased liquidity.
I think it's the most sensitive measure of forward increases in liquidity, which then trickle down into other assets.
I think it's a very sensitive measure of emerging risk, which then gets felt by other assets.
So just like the geopolitical impact is like delayed on Bitcoin, I think its sensation of risk and its sensation of uh liquidity uh is maybe more immediate than other assets, which is why it plays that canary in the coal mine uh scenario.
Ryan, how about you?
Have you been surprised by the the lack of volatility, let's call it on crypto last couple weeks?
Yeah, I just think it's a clear sign that we are in the depths of a bear market.
And, you know, one thing that I find so interesting about the role that Bitcoin's playing right now in terms of uh, you know, whether it's a leading indicator, like Matt was just mentioning, is that uh, you know, what when Trump tweeted on Saturday that they were going to bomb the uh power infrastructure of Iran within 48 hours, unless uh, you know, a bunch of concessions were made, it was almost like a textbook move that you saw happen.
It's like, okay, well, Bitcoin's gonna sell off.
Like I read that.
It's like, okay, I'm sure Bitcoin's down.
Great, yeah, Bitcoin's down 2%, uh, you know, uh in collapsing, as some people would would say.
And then it was like by Monday, what's gonna happen is they're either going to have the struck a deal, and so markets gonna rip, or Trump's gonna kind of roll back a little bit of this threat.
And like that's exactly what I turned on on TV this morning.
It's exactly what was happening.
It was Trump saying, oh, yeah, we had great talks.
We want to make a deal, you know, the strikes didn't happen.
And in that time period, Bitcoin, you know, just sold down and then recovered.
And so I think like the fact that we're seeing a lot of this play out in real time, 24-7, 365 in Bitcoin is actually very incredible.
Uh, but the fact that you're not seeing these 10% spikes and 10% uh, you know, uh uh upside moves to me indicates that we are in the kind of the depths of this bear market.
And I think that uh it's a coiled spring.
And once the uncertainty starts to fade, which I believe it will fade sooner rather than later, I think that that spring gets released and markets go significantly higher.
Oh, man.
Yeah, and maybe that spring's released right on tax day.
Just right all the way back to what Matt's saying.
I mean, there's also, you know, some of the news today as well is that there's been progress made on the Clarity Act, right?
And we've been, it's been very timely.
I feel like almost every single time there's news on the Clarity Act this year, you guys are on.
It's happened, it's all almost like clockwork from the first draft uh that was that was rejected largely by the industry because of the yields and everything like that, to even today, right?
This is just kind of a funny, funny coincidence.
So uh I I think what I've been uh trying to understand, and maybe by tomorrow it'll be a little clearer, and maybe you guys can can help outline this if you've read much about it, is what what exactly is being potentially agreed to.
Um if you guys know, if you guys know the top of your head, if not, we can just kind of cut this part, but I feel like you guys already guys already have a pretty good idea.
Um, I feel like there's some different stuff that's being relatively agreed to there.
And also, I think what's most important is the timing.
And Matt, you and I talked about this last time.
That it's like if this thing can't pass by the end of April, it has no chance of happening this year.
Is that still the case?
On the timing front, and then I'll let Ryan talk about the stablecoin yield compromise.
The all-time tweet, by the way, of Senator Lumbus posting a yield sign on X, I thought was absolutely phenomenal.
Oh, that's right.
That was that on the weekend?
I think it was on the weekend.
A few days ago, I don't remember exactly when, but that was it's just such a great understanding of social media just to post that yield sign.
A beautiful, beautiful job.
Um yeah, I think it's really important that it passes by April.
You know, if you if you start to get into May, politicians stop caring about uh legislators and start legislation and start caring about themselves.
So um, and re-election.
So I do think now is the time.
That's not like a definitive guideline.
Um, but I think that's directionally right.
And look, if we get the Clarity Act and we get past tax day, and Ryan is right that uh we get an improvement in the Middle East.
That's a really good lineup with the sort of moving four-year cycle.
There it is.
What a classic.
What a what an awesome um that's amazing, right?
Just no commentary, just some eyes.
It's so good.
If we get those three three things lining up, I think it's it's going to be a great second half of the year.
So, Ryan, what's can you just detail for me?
We talked about it again yesterday on the show, but what what exactly is the compromise that's being made on yield?
And keep it keep it basic for me, please.
Uh yeah, I I've um I've been on the road a bit.
So so perhaps in your guys' conversation yesterday, you may have more details than I do on it.
But uh, as far as I understand it, uh Senator Senator Lumis and and a few other folks uh said that they are nearly there when it comes to agreeing on how to treat yield uh on stable coins in terms of the Clarity Act, which which is huge.
This was like a non-starter two months ago, uh, and the market was reacting pretty dramatically to that.
So if in fact the banks and the crypto industry have uh come to an agreement on how to treat yield, then that's that's huge.
Uh and and you know, I I saw a former CFTC employee said that uh look, regardless of what happens here, the traditional system isn't at risk of a deposit flight.
And I think that's absolutely correct.
And so um, I think you know, bank lobbyists are making a bigger deal out of it uh because they want to you know maintain their moat, but I don't think that they're at having an existential threat to their business model if like stablecoin yield gets passed on to to consumers.
Uh it already is being passed on to consumers through things like USDC on Coinbase.
So yeah, I would just add two nuances to that.
In classic Washington fashion, what appears to have happened if they've spent like three months and countless news cycles and an infinite amount of lobbying dollars to arrive right back to right where they were roughly when they passed the Genius Act last year.
So this is like the most Washington thing ever that we could have seen.
Obviously, that's not a done deal.
That's just what I'm reading about it.
But um, it does appear that we've gone full circle.
I narrowly agree with Ryan that stable coins alone will not lead to deposit flight for banks.
But I would point out that that general business strategy of people having money in low-yielding accounts is a dead man walking business strategy.
I think that started to die with Silicon Valley's bank's collapse when we saw how fast people would move money.
The the reason banks have been able to offer zero is it's been hard frictionally to move money out of that.
Whether you use stablecoin yields or anything else, it's becoming much easier to access those yields.
So this may like delay the collapse of that business model, but that business model is going to have to change over the next five to 10 years, just because all forms of money movement are becoming easier.
Money's not just gonna sit there earning zero anymore.
Yeah, I guess that I guess that's the real, the real thing that the banks are gonna really have to brace for, right?
Is that there's just gonna be something, a much better spot to park your money.
Uh Ryan, I want to ask you as well, you said you've been on the road a lot.
Um, and I'm assuming because you guys are really busy, and this is a really busy meeting season.
What are what are the what are what are investors saying these days?
What are institutional investors saying these days?
I always love asking you guys this question because you guys have such a good window into it.
You're so busy meeting so many of these people.
Uh, does is clarity even matter to them?
Is that is that important for them that this passes and and what else is top of mind for them?
Yeah, yeah, I would love to I'll share what I've been seeing in the field.
Uh, and then would love to hear what Matt's seeing.
Uh, you know, last week spoke about and presented crypto to more than 700 professional investors.
These are financial advisors, uh, financial planners, lawyers, estate planners, uh, et cetera.
And across the board, engagement was very, very high.
Uh, like the number of questions we got from the audience was probably 3x what we typically see.
And to me, that's a great signal of how engaged they are.
And they weren't questions of isn't the government just gonna regulate this thing out of existence, or isn't it worthless and there's no value behind Bitcoin or whatever.
It was actually questions around regulations.
Like I had multiple questions about what's happening with regulation on crypto because they're seeing news that the SEC and the CFTC have agreed on how to treat crypto assets and that certain crypto assets starts to curiosity.
They're seeing news around uh Congress debating different types of crypto legislation.
And so I think those are signs uh that this is what they're asking about, and this is what they're seeing that crypto really is crossing the chasm into institutional adoption.
And the fact that we have really high engagement when there are so many other things that financial professionals are thinking about in the world right now on a day-to-day basis.
AI, uh geopolitical uncertainty, will there be interest rate hikes or cuts in the coming months, et cetera.
The fact that they're coming to sessions about crypto, they're engaged and they're asking questions about Bitcoin mining.
They're asking about regulations, they're asking about stable coins.
I got a bunch of questions about XRP last week and uh and tokenization.
Like this is uh a much different level of engagement than we had two years ago.
And there's this institutional level of uh of excitement around crypto that we've never seen before.
And so I think it's uh you know, really positive from the field uh from where I'm sitting, but would love to hear what what Matt's been seeing on his side.
Yeah, I absolutely agree.
I mean, it is night and day versus previous winners.
I know I've heard people say like this winter is worse than 2022.
I can tell you from the institutional meeting world, it was much harder to get a meeting after FTX than it is when we're debating whether the Clarity Act will pass or not.
It was much harder to get a meeting in 2018 when literally no one cared that crypto existed for about 18 months than right now when David Solomon is hiring aggressively to build out tokenization and stable coins at Goldman Sachs.
It is, it's not like marginally different from past winners, it is massively different from past winners.
I do think the Clarity Act is really important though, because the two words that slow down institutional adoption the most are yeah, but you convince people to allocate, and then someone's like, yeah, but is tether real.
Yeah, but what about environmental problems?
Yeah, but criminal use.
And we slap down all of those things.
One of the yeah, buts right now is what if there's a democratic sweep in 2028 and we get a very hostile SEC.
The Clarity Act sort of crushes that objection, right?
You can work your way around that objection right now.
BlackRock is a huge asset manager.
They're building in this space.
Every major Wall Street firm is building in their space.
They won't let this go backwards.
But having the Clarity Act will just shut down that yeah, but the more yeah, buts that we shut down, the faster people allocate.
So I do think it's really important.
What are some of the newest yeah buts?
What are the ones that have popped up?
Quantum, of course.
Quantum.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Quantum and uh regime shift or administration shift.
Those, I don't wonder if Ryan's been running into others, but those are the two, they're only two, yeah, buts that I've been getting.
Quantum, definitely.
I even a meeting today, I heard this is kind of the biggest thing that a large institutional allocator is thinking about when it comes to managing their existing allocation crypto that they already have is uh what which assets and protocols are building towards quantum resistance and are going to be okay if that risk surfaces.
A couple other uh yeah, buts to use Matt's nomenclature that I heard this past week uh were uh, you know, what's gonna happen to Bitcoin if the cost of mining continues to rise because energy costs are going up so much, like and and everyone stops mining.
That was a question.
Yeah, but what if tether uh it blows up and has to sell a hundred billion worth of treasuries and uh tanks the bond market was another one uh that I that I heard.
And so uh, you know, these are these are things that people start to think about when uh when when they're look fishing for, in my opinion, reasons to to not believe in crypto, which means that they're getting along on their journey.
They've they've started thinking about it and they're trying to hang on to the last thing uh that they can hang on to that will convince them that this is bad uh and they'll eventually get past that.
I think there's one more, Ryan, that I'm waiting for this to be the focus, because I think it's the it's the end but and boss of yeah, but what about value accrual?
I think the focus once all these other considerations are washed away and you're left with a financial ecosystem that is moving fully on chain, is going to be how does that translate into value for ETH?
How does that translate into value for Seoul?
What should those valuations be?
That's the again, that's the that's the end but of these objections.
We haven't gotten there yet.
I don't get those questions, to be honest.
Um, I wish I did because they're very good questions.
That's the that's the best question you can ask as an objection.
I think it's the final one.
And I suspect that will start popping up later this year.
Do you get that question when when at all time highs, Matt?
Uh or is it obvious, or is that obvious at all time highs?
Is like this is the value accruing.
That's definitely right.
Yeah, no, definitely only at bottoms.
That is definitely true.
Yeah.
I also think it's two different two different things in a way.
Like there is the um if stable coins are going to four trillion, if tokenization is going to impact every asset class in the world and grow to a hundred trillion plus, where is that value, that creation and where is that growth captured?
Is like the question that I think Matt's referring to, uh, which is different than you know, why does Bitcoin have value?
Like those are two different, two different questions.
And so uh, you know, of course, the why does Bitcoin have value is always being asked, and there's always going to be naysayers that say it's it's uh you know a Ponzi scheme, et cetera.
And Bitcoin is just probably not for them, or maybe someday they'll come around.
But I think the my understanding is to what Matt's getting at is that the the long-term question that we expect investors to be asking is if these markets are growing into the tens and hundreds of trillions of dollars, where does that value accrue?
Is it to the stable coin issuers and tokenization platforms?
Is it to Chain link?
Is it to Ethereum?
Is it to XRPs to Solana?
And and those are really great questions because they're starting to form theses in their mind of how to think about the growth trajectory of these assets and where should they fit them in a portfolio and how should they allocate across their their different buckets between these different layers of the infrastructure stack?
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So here's a question from Matt.
If stables do grow from 300 billion to a couple trillion in the next however many years, where's a good place to try and capture that?
Yeah.
Well, the the the base, the base case is just to own all possible places that will accrue.
Because the scale of that opportunity is so large that you want to own ETH and Solana and Chainlink and Tron.
And you want to own Circle and Coinbase and everyone else who is launching in this space.
Because it doesn't really matter where the value accrues if you take that approach, you get significant upside.
You know, I have been doing a lot of work.
Happy to share some thoughts on Circle, which is the pure play, the easiest way to gain exposure in a way many people uh do gain exposure.
I think it's a very interesting opportunity.
But my base answer to that would be just own both sides, own the tokens, own the uh companies, and assume that the rising tide is large enough that it will lift it will lift you up.
So you had a very interesting theory that I feel like maybe we can get a preview of right now.
Because I know it's going on in one of your memos.
It should be out by the time people are listening to this.
So, so so but I'll leave it to you how much you share.
Um, specifically about Circle.
And Circle to me, I'll give you kind of like an outsider perspective, somebody who who hasn't, I've I've never traded it and and um I'm still I'm still morphing from DGen to normal personal investor.
Uh it's been a long trend, it's been a long evolution of the last uh six, six to ten months.
Um, but for me, something like Circle and stable coins is generally boring.
You know what I mean?
I and I get it that it's it's like it's a huge part of the the tokenization of everything, right?
And even now in AI, we're saying that, well, this AI is good, they're gonna use stable coins, right?
That it makes sense for them to use it.
There's so many good bull cases.
Um, but for me, it's been really hard to understand like where do I actually attribute value?
And especially when you do look at the leaders in stable coins, the top three being all substantially different from each other.
It's kind of hard for someone like me, I think, to kind of understand, be like, okay, well, what what like where do I place a bet between like tether, you can't place a bet, right?
They're not public.
Um, something like circle is public, but that stock is gone, went nuts, they crashed all the way back down, and now it's all feel like we missed our entry.
Um, and now it's back in the middle.
And then, and then you have, and then on the decentralized front, you have something like Sky, which is a whole other bag of tricks to unpack that we've we've we've covered that plenty on the show, uh, kind of in the the lagging number three uh in terms of total supply.
You've got a really good theory on circle, and I and I love getting these because I think that this is this is where it's really helpful for people like me, they're kind of a passive investor, to understand where exactly their strategic advantages uh in this market.
Yeah, well, so so I'm a very simple thinker.
I I think as you know, I I don't think complex thoughts.
I have a very simple thought about circle, which I think speaks to that place.
I see all these complex analyses of circle that boil down to either it's dramatically overvalued because as you mentioned, it's gone up a hundred percent.
It's trading at a high PE, or it's this generational buy and hold because it's the largest pure play stable coin provider with no financial analysis.
I think it's easy to imagine the future of Circle by answering just three questions.
It's all the analysis you need to do.
How big do you think the stable coin market will be?
It's $300 billion today.
Scott Bessant says it's going to four trillion dollars by 2030.
So let's just take four trillion dollars.
All right, let's imagine we're in a four trillion dollar stable coin market.
The next question, which gets to what you're pointing at, is what is Circle's market share?
Now there are two ways people look at this.
I actually think they're both wrong.
One is it's going to get crushed because JP Morgan is going to come in and Wells Fargo is going to come in, and all these brands are going to come in.
Every data point I look like says that that is probably untrue.
Now, maybe it's true, but probably untrue.
What do I mean by that?
PayPal came in, one of the largest digital payments platforms in the world.
How much market share has PayPal taken?
Effectively, zero.
If you look at other financial innovations like ETFs, it was the early providers that captured the bulk of the market, uh, not the big names that came in later, right?
BlackRock's iShares wasn't originally from BlackRock.
It was from a tiny company called Barclay Global Investors.
And BlackRock had to buy it after the financial crisis for billions of dollars.
So I think the idea that they'll get squished is wrong.
And then people, the other way people look at it is like their market, they have like 28% of the market.
Maybe that's their share going forward.
But I think that's wrong too, because the bulk of the market is tether, which is directed toward offshore investing.
If you look at circle specifically, they're playing in the regulated stablecoin market.
If you think that's the big part that's going to grow, you think its market share will increase from the 20s to the 30s or the 40s.
But let's just say it stays the same.
Let's say it's about 25%.
You have a $4 trillion stablecoin market.
It has 25% share.
So somewhere in the middle of those two arguments, it has a trillion dollars of AUM.
What's its take rate?
Right now its take rate is 3.5%.
That's what it makes if you divide the assets by its revenues.
It's making 3.5%.
If it makes three and a half percent of a trillion dollars, that's $35 billion in revenue a year.
Its market cap is $33 billion.
So it's not going to trade at a price to revenue below one.
What's its take rate after earnings?
Is it 2%?
Is it 1%?
Even at 1%, you're talking about $10 billion a year in profits.
You throw a multiple on that, and the stock looks really cheap.
So the reason I raise this is it's just really easy to get a valuation that's measured north of 100 billion dollars.
It could be wrong, but there are only three questions you have to ask to figure out if that's wrong.
Do you think stable coins will be less than $4 trillion?
Do you think its market share will be lower than it is today?
Or do you think that its take rate will ultimately go to zero?
And my base case is something like it'll be $4 trillion, it'll stay its same market cap, and it'll take like about a percent.
And that's a really attractive company.
I just think people overcomplicated.
It's really just the that those three questions.
Do you think Circle needs to diversify their products, or do you think that this is this is just like the is an asymmetric bet?
Just they have their thing, they they're well positioned in the institutional side and then just or the regulated side, I guess you call it, and just let it rip.
If you have secretariat, why are you betting the field?
I don't know.
I'm not driving corporate strategy.
But uh, but they have they have the dominant stable coin in the regulated part of the stablecoin market at exactly the moment everyone says that market is going to 10x.
So should they diversify?
Maybe, maybe focus on growing that.
I think they have a good chance just on that alone.
Now they have to do things to protect that take rate.
That's the last piece.
So they like the work they're doing on their own blockchain and on integrating with payments, all of that is really important.
But it's not important because idiosyncratic revenues.
I think it's important because it protects that that take rate down from the trillion dollars in assets that I think they might have in a few years.
Um, so they need to do that work, but they don't need to like, I don't know, buy Mr.
Beast or or things that we see in the crypto ecosystem.
I think they need to stay focused.
So, how does their how does the take rate work for something like a stable coin?
Like what they take how much of every transaction has.
The way it works right now, of course, is that they have to take all the yield and then they pay some of it out to their partners like Coinbase, right?
Right that pays it off to investors.
And the take rate that I'm talking about is the difference between that which they charge and that which they accrue to their bottom line, sort of netting out the payments that they're making.
And their business, the real question in their business is both how can they scale their market share and then how can they constrain the amount that they're forced to pass on to other people?
Um, I just think that that the assumption that it goes from three and a half percent on the revenue basis and and maybe maybe about half of that or a little bit less on the the take rate basis to zero, I bet is probably wrong.
That's just not what we see in other areas of the market.
And I think if they do good job executing, they can grow into their valuation and then some look.
I think it's an asymmetric stock.
I think it's unlikely to be worth $33 billion in the future.
Could it be worth $100 billion?
Absolutely.
Could it really lose this market and be worth much less?
Definitely.
But asymmetric bets can be pretty interesting in a portfolio setting.
Ryan, how how often is Matt right on these types of uh hunches or evaluations, let's call them or analysis?
Yeah, I think these analysis the mental model here uh is pretty accurate.
Uh and you know, Matt's experience in the I ETF market is, I think telling when it comes to this.
He made the the analogy that the early issuers of ETFs uh, you know, were able to build larger markets and become the dominant players relative to the later adopters.
I think you see that across a number of different sectors.
Like there's a reason uh that even though Tesla should not be worth more than uh Toyota's Prius division and whatever other manufacturers who are shuttering their uh electric vehicle divisions are, but it's because the early adopters build out big market share, build it, filled out specialties, and then they, you know, grow uh that that dominance over time.
And I think it's exactly what is happening with Circle.
I actually think, you know, the the fact that they're growing their business beyond just the USCC stablecoin is uh incrementally bullish.
They have tokenized money market fund, they have other stablecoin infrastructure.
I mean, MasterCard just paid over a billion dollars for stablecoin infrastructure company.
Stripe paid over a billion dollars for a stablecoin infrastructure company.
Now, Circle's market cap at 33 billion, that's just a small piece of it.
But when you think about the entire, you know, financial services stack of stable coins, one big piece of that pie, of course, is the stable coin uh reserves income.
But I think there's other elements of stable uh circles business that they are growing uh at a at a pretty incredible rate if you look at their financials, and it's turning into a very well-rounded crypto financial services company at the exact time that regulations with the Genius Act and ultimately with the Clarity Act are going to be uh fuel on that growth.
Uh, and so I think that's a really bullish picture.
So I think Matt has got this one right, but only time will tell.
I like that.
And I think, I mean, again, there's nothing on the show's trading advice here, guys.
And if you want to read that memo from Matt, it'll be it'll be from from the Bitwise uh account.
I will link it below uh down.
But I do like this kind of stuff.
And I think personally for me, and I think for a lot of people, it's you know, if we are in a if we've been in the bear market for over a year, like you've said before, Matt, uh, or the bear market's been around since October.
Either way, we're deep in it.
And I think we're starting to look ahead to be like when we do come out of it, when things get better, clarity's passed, and uh midterms, who knows what is done or whatever, however long it takes.
I think we're looking for companies that have a lot or companies and tokens that have a lot of upside, right?
Things that things that it's like, well, this is doing well and it's building and and there's revenue, and we want we want to look at some of those.
Speaking of revenues, one of my last questions for you guys before our our uh you know tradition at the end of the show.
But before we get to that, has anybody here been tempted to trade commodities on the weekends on hyperliquid in the last couple weeks?
Uh looking at you, maybe Matt.
Matt, we talked about this last time.
So actually, I'll ask Ryan first.
Ryan, is this is the hyperliquid uh trade, which now hyperliquid has more volume for its for its uh like SP and and TradFi assets, uh TradFi derivatives, then the rest of crypto, uh the rest of its crypto offering.
I think over the last week we've seen that.
Ryan, are you tempted?
Trade the SP futures on a Saturday morning.
Yes, I I am tempted to do that.
Uh, and I find it remarkable that we've seen this level of adoption over the past month in terms of um on-chain uh futures or indices.
I think it's a a sign that tokenization is here to stay.
And it's like one of the initial catalysts that will push assets on chain faster than people were thinking.
So it's a remarkable development.
You need these uh kind of shock moments like we had with with oil that led uh led to the demand for being able to access oil prices over the weekend 247, 365 that the traditional market couldn't satisfy.
And that's exactly what uh you know, hyperliquid was able to do, and that's why you've seen demand for that.
And now all of a sudden you're seeing demand for other asset classes uh on-chain 247365.
Can you buy ETFs over the weekend?
I don't think so.
Can you?
No, not yet.
Not yet.
Maybe one day.
They're working on tokenizing them.
Maybe maybe there are a few that you can buy.
The whole world's gonna be 247, 365.
It's gonna happen in the next couple of years.
It's it's a feta complete.
Um, but this will be a this will be remembered as a really important moment that drove us to that.
Yeah, we'll we'll look back on this and say the market changed fundamentally.
It's pretty historic, right?
Like this was one of the moments that the market went from not 24-7 to 24-7.
That only happens once in the history of mankind.
And we sort of experienced it.
That's pretty that's pretty cool.
And it comes at a time when commodities are doing things that they've never done before.
Anyways, so it's uh it's all it's all one big, one big change uh to the to the way things are done.
Um, all right, great.
Thanks for the thoughts there, guys.
Uh, let's jump over to Polymarket.
Oh, this is not a poly.
We, you know, they should really sponsor us because we always feature them.
So uh Polymarket, if you're listening, uh, you know, we we we we we like your product.
Kalchi, you're cool too.
Anyways, let's look at a couple polymarkets I wanted to pull up.
It's our it's our usual tradition when we have you guys on the show.
Um, what I wanted to see, what will gold hit by the end of June?
And the leaders right now, gold right now sitting at 4400, uh, a major downturn over the last couple days.
Uh, by end of June, that it's gonna hit at least 50 or uh 4200, and that there is oh there's still a 25% chance it goes back to 5,500.
Matt, do you do you think that's even possible at this point?
Uh I think it's probably not the base case, but 25% chance doesn't seem uh doesn't seem impossible.
You could imagine a series of geopolitical events that really catalyze a level of panic, particularly among nation states that drive it back.
I think the gold fever is past.
I think it's gonna need to base for a while.
We've seen it come way down, so I wouldn't make that bet.
But the 25% doesn't seem absurd to me.
Yeah, absolutely.
Ryan.
What do you think?
Would we anything here that you would attract you in terms of probability?
Uh, it's tough.
There's a wide spread here between 4200 and 5500.
I think uh I think I would be you know by June would would take the middle there.
Yeah, I think I think it can get above 5,000.
Look, I think we're uh headed towards a wonderful macro setup uh for for risk assets and financial assets and for crypto.
And so uh I I'm overall bullish, slanted 5,500 by June.
Uh uh feels a little aggressive to me though.
Yeah, I definitely think uh it feels like that uh that gold fever.
I think uh Matt, maybe you said that at some point is uh has broken a little bit.
Um let's look over to Bitcoin though.
A little bitcoin prediction uh action here.
And this one is will Bitcoin hit 60k or 80k first.
Feels like we're right in the middle right now.
And this chart kind of reflects that.
Even if you look at the last week, uh, we're creeping up to the 60k.
So any any thoughts on this one, guys.
We're sitting right at 51%, 60k or 80k first.
Ryan, I'll hit I'll let you go first.
I think we hit 80k first.
Oh I actually agree with that.
If I had if I had to be a betting man here, I would agree with that.
Because all the way down to 60k is a pretty like the mood in crypto would be really bearish.
That's a series of negative, negative events.
Uh, if it were 60k, people would be crying in the streets.
So I I think 80k is easier from here.
Okay, okay, okay, good one.
And then I mean, listen, Matt, this is the one we always do, but there's nothing happening anymore.
This it's boring now.
Is the presidential election winner 2028?
There's not there's no news.
Rubio was ripping last time we talked, but now he's back down.
He's back down to a humble, he was up to 16%.
I think last time we were chatting, but now he's back down to to a humble 12%.
Uh and there's not there's not really anything that exciting here.
Still, I guess a good bet on your long-term uh your your dark horse bet of Josh Shapiro.
But he now Tucker Carlson is up here tied with him.
Oh my god.
If I could short Tucker long, Josh, I would put a house on it.
Um I I think the Rubio thing, I I bet that comes back.
I think there's a high chance something uh unusual happening happens with Cuba in the next handful of months.
They're dealing with really dramatic blackouts.
I think there's there's risk of upheaval there, and that will cast uh particularly uh America's foreign policy back into the center.
And I think Rubio shines there.
So I think there may be a catalyst play on that Rubio bet.
Uh, if you if you think that's gonna happen.
Okay, I like that.
I like that.
Ryan, anything anything catch your eye here?
This it seems like this doesn't even add up to 100% anymore.
It feels like there's like a candidate or two missing.
Like there's no one here.
There we go.
I was gonna say, show me the rock.
I gotta see where the rock is here.
Uh is it below two percent, 1.6.
I I would I I love the rock, but I would short this one.
There's a funny emergence of hedge funds that I get pitched every once in a while that effectively goes short these lottery tickets on polymarket and Calcium because there are people who will speculate uh in ways that aren't aligned with the real probability, just because, like, yeah, the rock for two cents.
Um, and you can actually historically capture some pretty good, relatively low risk concerns by a diversified side of taking the 98 cents on that and just waiting it out.
If it's like a sure thing, then yeah, why why wait?
I don't know, man.
Listen, I was telling you guys before the show, I saw the new Moana live action trailer.
And if The Rock wears his wig from that movie, he has a pretty good chance.
Looking pretty debonair uh in the latest Loana trailer.
Uh we'll talk about movies next time, Matt.
We'll save that.
We'll save the highest grossing film of 2026 for next time.
Uh gentlemen, another fantastic episode.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts.
Uh, have a great time this week.
I think you guys are on the road.
You're at uh the digital asset uh summit.
Summit you're called New York.
So enjoy it and keen to hear what uh what goes down there as well.
Keen to chat with you guys after that, hear what kind of conversations you've been having.
Uh, it's a pretty loaded one this year.
Lots of great speakers.
So uh and Matt, I think you're among them.
Ryan, maybe you're speaking as well.
I'm not sure.
Are you speaking?
Are you gonna say anything?
Yes, I'll be I'll be in the crowd cheering everyone on.
You will be cheering.
Okay, you'll be speaking by by by by cheering.
Uh oh, actually, hold on.
There's one more polymarket we could pull up.
Matt, just the last second entrant from Matt.
Oh, yeah, I know.
Who will be confirmed as Fed chair?
So, what I find fascinating here is that Warsh is at 95%.
And the expectation of confirmation is like the next two months.
If you annualize the return of taking the long on that, and you think he will be confirmed, it's really high, which tells me that there is like a non-zero market perception that he won't, in fact, be the Fed chair.
I would have thought a priori this would be 88 or 98 or 99.
And I think it's interesting that it's sort of stuck on 95.
I think that's a that's an interesting fact for you.
Yeah, that's a strange.
There's a strange wheels are turning.
I can see it.
Yeah, that is a funny one.
What would cause what would cause that to not happen?
You you have the senator who who wants to block it unless they remove the lawsuit against uh the Fed.
Uh I don't know the status of that.
Um, you have confirmation hearings, which are always unknown.
Look, 95 is a very high probability.
That's 19 out of 20 times.
Of course.
You know, but I do if if this starts to go to like 93, 92, um that'll say something.
I don't think it's going to.
I haven't heard anything.
And I think he'd be a phenomenal Fed chair.
But it was just curious to me that it was at 95.
Maybe that 5% is just the market pricing in that Trump could change his mind uh at any given moment about about anything.
Anyway, totally.
Then that is what I'm doing.
It's fun.
You never know what you want.
I like that.
I bet that's something something for everybody.
Uh great.
Gentlemen, thank you.
Thanks for that last second entry there, Matt.
Um, and uh and have a great time, guys.
We'll see you back in a couple weeks.
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