On The Brink with Castle Island

Matt and Nic return for news and deals of the week. In this episode:  Circle launches an early stage venture fund SEC targets American CryptoFed DAO LLC The SEC references Nic's paper on DeFi risks Should DeFi teams be more aggressive in disclosing admin key risks? What would a DeFi disclosure regime look like? BlockFi files for a spot Bitcoin ETF Bitwise withdraws its futures-based ETF NYC mayor...

Core Weave cofounder and CSO Brannin McBee joins the show to talk GPU mining and high performance computation. In this episode:  Details on the Core Weave's latest fundraise Core Weave's hybrid data center model which combines Ethereum mining and generalized computation Transitioning from just crypto mining to the specialized compute market Why the hyperscale cloud providers aren't always suitable...

Nic and Matt return for deals and news of the week. In this episode:  The President's Working Group report on Stablecoins comes out Should stablecoins really require a bank charter? Would a red wave in the midterms be good for the crypto industry Two congressmen ask the SEC to approve a spot Bitcoin ETF The TungstenDAO buys the Midwest Tungsten 14 inch cube Where was the Neeraj kitchen photo taken...

Nikos Andrikogiannopoulos. the founder of Metrika joins the show. In this episode we discuss: Nikos' journey to the blockchain industry and how we came to see the opportunity to found Metrika How Metrika thinks about monitoring public blockchains for reliability and downtime Perspectives on the common reasons that blockchains go down Nikos's perspective on the use cases that are driving blockchain...

Matt and Nic return for another week of deals and news. In this episode:  The SEC wants to regulate stablecoins El Salvador buys 420 BTC River launches a mining product Direxion wants to launch a short BTC ETF The FATF guidance isn't as bad as we thought it might be Facebook is now Meta Is 'the metaverse' going to stick around? We unretire China FUD Content mentioned:  The NFT Tax Guide Coin Cente...

Ray Cline,  Lancium  CTO, and  Shaun Connell , EVP Power at  Lancium , join the show. We cover the changing Texas grid, several models for renewable based mining, and how miners can serve as a controllable load. In this episode: Personal backgrounds and crossing the threshold from energy to Bitcoin Origins of Lancium Features of Texas grid Why Texas is so suitable for renewables How Texas is the '...

Matt and Nic are back for a monster week of deals and news. In this episode:  CBOE acquires ErisX FTX raises a monster round Worldcoin launches with their eyeball scanner The Proshares futures-based ETF goes live and sets a record Why are futures-based ETFs expensive? the Proshares ETF starts to max out its futures exposure What will be the fate of GBTC? Grayscale announces a $1b buyback of GBTC H...

Tom Chippas, the CEO of ErisX and Chris Isaacson, Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer at Cboe Global Markets join the show. In this episode we discuss: CBOE's acquisition of ErisX Details of the acquisition and the rationale for the deal CBOE's current and future plans in the digital assets industry The market structure implications for the broader digital assets ecosystem and why...

We had the pleasure of hosting NFT collector, Gmoney , on the show. He is a former equities trader turned NFT collector, educator, and expert. In this episode, we unpack the community, stories, and experiences Gmoney has amassed during his time in the NFT space and discuss the following: Gmoney's "aha" moment about the massive supercycle taking place in digital goods The shift in ownership and val...

Nic and Matt are back for our 250th episode! We discuss:  ETF chatter heats up Where the Tungsten memes come from Why tungsten is good Coinbase launches an NFT platform Ribbon airdrop controversy How DeFi airdrops are like the McDonalds monopoly game Does the token industry need a disclosure framework? Miami plans to pay employees in Bitcoin Stripe is getting back into crypto Jamie Dimon wants to...

Mark Coe, the founder and CIO of Intrinsic Edge Capital Management joins the show. In this episode we discuss: Mark's professional career and path to founding Intrinsic How he came to see blockchain/crypto as an investable category His personal journey on understanding the various blockchain thesis areas How he thinks about the taxonomy of publicly traded companies in the blockchain space How Intr...

Nic and Matt are back for more deals and news. In this episode: Our podcast SNAFU Can you wear a suit with sneakers How to offset your Bitcoin emissions (without buying offsets) Soc Gen asks Maker for a loan Bloomberg's Tether bombshell Are stablecoins like money market funds? Sponsor notes:  This show supported by  Coinbase Prime , an integrated solution that provides advanced multi-venue trading...

Esteban Castaño, the cofounder and CEO of TRM Labs, joins the show. In this episode we discuss: The founding story of TRM Labs and the methodical approach the team took to finding product market fit Esteban's perspectives on the NFT landscape and the growth potential in this category How regulators and public sector clients are approaching blockchain forensics How TRM is engaging with crypto nativ...

Matt and Nic return for another week. In this episode:  Is fasting lindy? Ripple's 250m NFT fund Kraken reaches a $1.25m settlement with the CFTC Could Ripple win their case against the SEC? Wyoming gives a tax break to flare gas miners Coinbase adds direct deposits to their platform Should stablecoins be issued by banks? China is tapped out of their Bitcoin FUD Compound suffers an exploit Bitcoin...

In this episode, Chris Maurice , co-founder and CEO of pan-African crypto platform Yellow Card , joined us to talk about his background, the business, and the state of crypto adoption in Africa. The company's goal is to provide a seamless on and off ramp to anyone in Africa. We also discuss: Yellow Card's recently announced fundraise The diversity in culture, language, history, and economy across...

Christian Dittmeier, cofounder and CEO of Evaluate Market joins the show. In this episode we discuss: How Christian and his cofounders Alex and Cody came to find themselves spending their free time analyzing NFTs The insight that led them to start Evaluate Market, a platform for discovering, search for, and evaluating NFTs Christian's perspective on the emerging taxonomy of NFTs and how Evaluate p...

Nic and Matt return for another week of news and deals. In this episode:  Latest on the infrastructure bill The latest on the platinum coin Zany things that financial regulators said this week Gensler continues to misrepresent the free banking era How bad was the wildcat banking era really? Why are financial regulators so interested in free banking? The SEC and CFTC are nearing the end of their fi...

Matt and Nic return to recap a tumultuous week. In this episode:  Matt's ongoing war against the turkeys Fidelity thinks the SEC should approve a spot ETF The Futures based Bitcoin ETFs are nearing approval The SEC stonewalling an ETF is a political choice The OpenSea insider scandal Elizabeth Warren's critiques of the industry get more and more specific and niche Do we event want to know which to...

Matt and Nic are back for another week. In this episode:  El Salvador's bitcoin launch Was the Chivo rollout really that bad? Bukele buys the dip Did El Salvador's bitcoin day cause a 20% selloff? McDonalds supports lightning in El Salvador SEC v Coinbase Introducing the Reves test Takeaways from the Miami Bitmain conference What is the NFL planning with NFTs? Oil majors are getting into bitcoin m...

We welcome Alex Svanevik, CEO of  Nansen.ai  to On the Brink to provide color on Nansen's unique approach to on-chain data and analysis. We discuss: The evolution of Nansen from a wallet labelling tool to an end-to-end analytics platform How Nansen provides actionable insights from its analysis of individual addresses, transactions, and contracts Nansen's process to scale the collection of individ...

Nic and Matt are back for another week.  Patriots choose Mac Jones Kanye releases Donda Two year anniversary of OTB The fate of the OTB lost episode Matt's peculiar NFT acquisition strategy What the hell is Loot Punks weren't the first NFTs Square is making a Bitcoin DEX The SEC sues Bitconnect Sponsor notes  This episode is brought to you by  Withum , a top 25 accounting firm with a cutting-edge...

Matt and Nic return for another week. In this episode:  Nic sells an NFT to Von Miller  OnlyFans and financial inclusion Visa buys a cryptopunk Do stablecoins have a future outside of the banking sector?  The history of Choke Point and what it means today Our merch supply chain issues  Tungsten talk Content mentioned  Iain Murray's OTB appearance on Choke Point Nic in Coindesk, OnlyFans Shows How...

Nic and Matt are back for news and deals. In this episode:  Our current sentiment on the Senate infrastructure bill The controversial Flipside/Uniswap portfolio MIT's 2014 Bitcoin airdrop Chainalysis' new data on Bitcoin adoption shows that it's a developing markets phenomenon Is there a conflict between good stablecoins and a competitive market for stablecoins? Are lossmaking stablecoins anti-com...

Nic and Matt return for more deals and news of the week. In this episode:  Where we stand on the Senate infrastructure bill Is Bitcoin a bipartisan issue? What the prospects for the House to change the language in the infrastructure bill? The crypto lobby shows its teeth Why is Bitcoin rallying in the presence of this bill? What is Gensler cooking up for the crypto industry? The Economist publishe...

Nic and Matt return for another week. In this episode: Gensler makes a landmark speech Gensler asks for a futures-based ETF Will the crypto taxation in the infrastructure bill be sufficient to pay for the new spending? What explains the 11th hour language in the infra bill? When does the Bitcoin lobby become a meaningful voter bloc? BSV gets 51% attacked Sponsor notes: This episode is brought to y...