DeCus Satoshi

David Canellis

Pete Rizzo

This is a segment from the Supply Shock newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Few things are built to stand the test of time. Bitcoin is.



Engineers design bridges to last only around 100 years. Modern-day dams might be built that only make it to half that. 



Perhaps regular maintenance could stretch those numbers by a few decades. They would still crumble much sooner than Bitcoin was ever intended to.



Today is the 11th anniversary of a testament to exactly that: BIP-42, the clutch proposal that averted a potential supply crisis 240 years from now.



Bitcoin Core contributor <a href="https://x.com/pete_rizzo_/status/1880616287363059980">Pieter Wuille</a> submitted BIP-42 on April Fool’s Day, 2014, years after Satoshi Nakamoto’s last post. BIP-42 was based on a solution proposed by <a href="https://x.com/pete_rizzo_/status/1878079505052413965">Gregory Maxwell</a>. Fittingly, it was both very serious and deeply unserious at the same time.



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" src="https://lh7-rt.googleusercontent.com/docsz/AD_4nXcxexSwe6D6Dhm0k2ObNvIs8ip8LXwulYlpFsHj7RnslBpy5T5ITyr6oDzmLEi3sbexIIAONmCO811Ta6XOTdTHKQs3rrpRmcZefPRMGtkb3l6KGj_7NtHThZ5Bcf8c6oqRP_j-Mg?key=OWOEEWME-Gq6nfqaq74dza6b" alt=""/><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">BIP-42 doubled as a roast of Satoshi Nakamoto (<a href="https://github.com/bitcoin/bips/blob/master/bip-0042.mediawiki">source</a>).</figcaption></figure>



As it turns out, Satoshi had made a grave but obscure error when coding the logic for bitcoin halvings.&nbsp;



The block reward had been correctly set to halve every 210,000 blocks, all the way down to an unspendable fraction of a sat by the year 2140 or so. This is what makes the BTC supply predictably and provably finite.



But the code was written in such a way that it determines the mining reward using the current block height. And when the block height gets too high — much higher than it is today — Satoshi would’ve had to write special rules informing the software how to process such a calculation safely.



The exact impact of the bug isn’t really knowable, but the largest of unintended consequences would have been that the block reward reverted to its original state of 50 BTC. BTC’s supply issuance curve would be rebooted to 2009.



Left unchecked, the bug would return again and again every two and a half centuries, making for potentially infinite bitcoins over the millennia.



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" src="https://lh7-rt.googleusercontent.com/docsz/AD_4nXdjMI40BjNZZ0vsmV8py9UXnvBjp6ClH_kHUnIPe0yIFLdhoOvkQZAYWKbJSYMnUuzBWoQ5kxzAVX8e3-lUPN-agTUHcKfVj9BLdg38Y-zX1f0AgKB8PJlh3SUh8rzlbmSEk_-Riw?key=OWOEEWME-Gq6nfqaq74dza6b" alt=""/><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Bitcoin’s circulating supply would hit 126 million in the year 3417, without fixing the supply bug.</figcaption></figure>



“Although it is widely believed that Satoshi was an inflation-hating goldbug, he never said this, and in fact programmed Bitcoin&#8217;s money supply to grow indefinitely, forever,” Wuille wrote.



What’s humbling is that BIP-42 aborted a cataclysmic event that would’ve occurred 10 generations from now — in the approximate year 2265, when the block height should reach 13.44 million (today, it’s under 890,000). That’s over a century after the last slice of spendable bitcoin is expected to be mined, in 2140.&nbsp;



So, I suppose our great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great grandchildren will have Wuille and Maxwell to thank for making sure that’s so.



— David



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Rizzo’s view, as the Bitcoin Historian</h2>



It’s nice that David can have a laugh over BIP-42. It is one of the more objectively quirky events in Bitcoin development history. That said, a more sober assessment raises thorny questions about the management of the Bitcoin software.&nbsp; One that I always linger on is the natural tension over what defines a “bug” in Bitcoin. Should we consider BIP-42 through the lens of jurisprudence, it helped enshrine two interesting views.&nbsp;



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>First is the assertion that the code which BIP-42 patches is indeed a “bug” because it contradicts what Satoshi wrote, namely, that Bitcoin would have a fixed supply. </li>



<li>Second is the view that the code is a “bug” because it contradicts what he told users to expect (creating a kind of social contract). </li>
</ul>



There’s a truth to both assertions, but it seems to get more problematic when compared to how other code debates were handled. Take the infamous “block size,” for instance. In this case, Satoshi said it would be raised over time, and it’s also what most (if not all early users) expected.



Ergo, the unchanged block size checks similar boxes as BIP-42. Yet no action was ever taken to change it. How to square this circle? Perhaps there’s the issue of safety. It’s true that eliminating the block size could lead to DDOS attacks, block withholding attacks, and potentially contribute to Bitcoin’s ultimate centralization. Equally, it could be said that rebooting the Bitcoin supply would constitute economic attacks. So, perhaps this was what swayed the decision.



I talked to Luke Jr. about this, and here’s what he had to say: “It was the behaviour everyone expected. And also there was no guarantee future CPUs would have the previous behavior for the existing code either.” Unfortunately, due to the tone of the patch, however, we might never know what all the participants had to say.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: The newsletter that helps thousands of investors understand crypto and the markets, by Byron Gilliam.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Empire</a>: Start your morning with the top news and analysis to inform your day in crypto.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: Reporting and analysis on the growing intersection of crypto and macroeconomics, policy and finance.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox. Market highlights, data, degen trade ideas, governance updates, token performance and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: Built for Solana investors, developers and community members. The latest from one of crypto&#8217;s hottest networks.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: For crypto collectors and traders, covering apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Tracking Bitcoin’s rise from internet plaything worth less than a penny to global phenomenon disrupting money as we know it.</li>
</ul>

126 million BTC? How Bitcoin’s absolute scarcity was saved

Katherine Ross

This is a segment from the Empire newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



There’s no denying that North Korea’s Lazarus Group is a threat, especially as crypto works overtime to be seen as a safe and acceptable industry (sorry degens, there are still corners for you).&nbsp;



Paradigm’s samczsun <a href="https://www.paradigm.xyz/2025/03/demystifying-the-north-korean-threat">highlighted</a> the good, the bad, and the ugly, a month after the Lazarus Group pulled off the biggest digital heist in history. Oof, that hurt to write.&nbsp;



The upside is that only one bad actor (which, I guess on the downside, is North Korea) has been so successful in stealing funds.&nbsp;



But “there’s more to the DPRK than just the Lazarus Group,” he warned.



Unfortunately, the team would later find out that the group had managed to compromise SafeWallet’s own infrastructure, deploying “a malicious payload specifically targeting Bybit. This was a level of sophistication that no one had considered or been prepared for, and it was a major update to many of our threat models.”



But there are ways to stay safe, samczsun noted. He urges caution across the board for individual folks like us. And organizations should “install Mobile Device Management (MDM) and Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) software” on work devices for security prior to any hack and to ensure visibility afterwards.&nbsp;



Samczsun’s tune was slightly more optimistic than Paradigm advisor ZachXBT, who earlier this month said the effort to try to freeze funds tracked to the Bybit attack had been an “eye-opening” experience.&nbsp;



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" src="https://lh7-rt.googleusercontent.com/docsz/AD_4nXet4pzhRcDbBuh26UAGIlTfK496-5aWkZP-pf6T7Co25HZfgKVz4kLRHLtch_p3Gc5YKjdRtaQNedw7fmsNMUeVj-1mDgM_yQfYjAWiz3t9a4u9wPRIn1otLodLOr-hOdc4O1VmYw?key=Uyw_GkgyI-NUIl5ahE5nEq4m" alt=""/><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">From ZachXBT’s Telegram group.</figcaption></figure>



“The industry is unbelievably cooked when it comes to exploits/hacks,” he wrote.&nbsp;



Samczsun’s holding out hope that the FBI’s unit dedicated to both tracking and preventing DPRK attacks is strong, an encouraging sign given his recent work with them.



Whether or not the FBI paired with super sleuths such as ZachXBT and samczsun — alongside members of Seal 911 — remains to be seen.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: The newsletter that helps thousands of investors understand crypto and the markets, by Byron Gilliam.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Empire</a>: Start your morning with the top news and analysis to inform your day in crypto.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: Reporting and analysis on the growing intersection of crypto and macroeconomics, policy and finance.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox. Market highlights, data, degen trade ideas, governance updates, token performance and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: Built for Solana investors, developers and community members. The latest from one of crypto&#8217;s hottest networks.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: For crypto collectors and traders, covering apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Tracking Bitcoin’s rise from internet plaything worth less than a penny to global phenomenon disrupting money as we know it.</li>
</ul>

Paradigm’s Samczsun warns there’s ‘more to the DPRK than just the Lazarus Group’

Bill Barhydt, the CEO of Abra and an early Bitcoin adopter who famously bought bitcoin when it was <a href="https://x.com/pete_rizzo_/status/1763544742862762180">trading below $5</a>, has sharply criticized Michael Saylor&#8217;s plan to render his substantial personal bitcoin holdings inaccessible to anyone else forever. In a new interview on the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/mastercard-building-venmo-crypto-blockchain-digital-assets-2025-3">Supply Shock podcast</a> with <a href="https://x.com/pete_rizzo_">Pete Rizzo</a>, Barhydt expressed his frustration, stating Saylor&#8217;s strategy &#8220;makes absolutely no sense whatsoever.



Saylor, known for his bullish stance on Bitcoin and his company Strategy&#8217;s substantial bitcoin investments, recently hinted <a href="https://x.com/pete_rizzo_/status/1904555177077514482">in a CoinDesk interview</a> that he might send his personal stash of over 17,000 BTC to an &#8220;unsendable wallet&#8221; for eternity.



Barhydt acknowledged Saylor&#8217;s perspective that this move would benefit the Bitcoin community by reducing the total supply (and potentially increasing the value of remaining coins) but offered a spirited rebuttal.&nbsp;



&#8220;His perspective is that this is a gift to the Bitcoin community because if you lower the denominator and the numerator, it helps everybody else in terms of the purchasing power. My take is, the Bitcoin community does not need that gift,” he asserted.



<iframe loading="lazy" width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/496uF9L7LOg?si=AnlW8s4OALbq0xfd" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>







Before founding Abra, a global cryptocurrency wealth management platform, Barhydt held roles at companies like Goldman Sachs and Netscape. He gave the first-ever Bitcoin TED Talk when the price of Bitcoin was just $5.



Instead, Barhydt suggested Saylor could use his bitcoin to fund educational services for low-income individuals, establish bitcoin-based banking operations in developing markets, or develop bitcoin-based remittance services.&nbsp;



He emphasized that these initiatives would provide long-term benefits in terms of increasing the total number of the technology’s users.&nbsp;



Barhydt drew a comparison to the early days of Bitcoin, when enthusiasts like himself gave away bitcoin to promote its use and understanding. &#8220;When we were giving away bitcoin, it wasn&#8217;t like we were telling people, ‘Here, go build your financial fortune.’ It was like, no, you need to understand how this decentralized system allows you to move value between two parties without some trusted third party in the middle,&#8221; Barhydt explained.



He contrasted this with Saylor&#8217;s plan, which he sees as primarily focused on increasing the value of existing bitcoin holdings. &#8220;[Using the money] is a very different perspective than saying, ‘I&#8217;m gonna help the value of your bags by burning my bags,’&#8221; Barhydt stated.



Elsewhere Barhydt questioned Saylor&#8217;s comparison between his own actions and those of Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto, arguing that Michael Saylor doesn’t need to make a benevolent exit from the software project in quite the same way.&nbsp;



&#8220;Saylor is not perceived to be a benevolent dictator of Bitcoin,&#8221; Barhydt said, arguing that Saylor&#8217;s decision carries different implications for the network.



Listen to the full interview on <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=496uF9L7LOg">YouTube</a>, <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/supply-shock/id1558223079">Apple Podcasts</a>, or <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/2yFL2nSsQucf1rzdEKbFZY">Spotify</a>.&nbsp;



Editor’s note: This article was produced with the assistance of AI tooling.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: The newsletter that helps thousands of investors understand crypto and the markets, by Byron Gilliam.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Empire</a>: Start your morning with the top news and analysis to inform your day in crypto.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: Reporting and analysis on the growing intersection of crypto and macroeconomics, policy and finance.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox. Market highlights, data, degen trade ideas, governance updates, token performance and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: Built for Solana investors, developers and community members. The latest from one of crypto&#8217;s hottest networks.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: For crypto collectors and traders, covering apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Tracking Bitcoin’s rise from internet plaything worth less than a penny to global phenomenon disrupting money as we know it.</li>
</ul>

Investor who bought bitcoin at $5 says Saylor is making a $1.5B mistake

Jeff Albus

This is a segment from the Lightspeed newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Following Hyperliquid&#8217;s $13 million <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/hyperliquid-jelly-short-blockworks-research">brush with disaster</a>, some in Solana&#8217;s orbit are wondering: Could Jupiter&#8217;s JLP vault — a similar product to Hyperliquid’s vulnerable vault — face a similar exploit?



Nope.



That&#8217;s my short but genuinely confident answer. Let&#8217;s unpack why.



To recap briefly: Last week, some unknown trader thought they&#8217;d get cute by manipulating the price of thinly-traded Jelly-my-Jelly (JELLY) memecoin on decentralized perp exchange Hyperliquid. The presumed goal was to mobilize a massive short squeeze, allowing them to profit from leveraged long positions while forcing the protocol to absorb the loss from their short.&nbsp;



The attacker’s leveraged long positions quickly created over $13 million in unrealized losses to Hyperliquid’s HLP risk vault and an emergency shutdown that forcibly closed all JELLY positions at a price favorable to Hyperliquid&#8217;s balance sheet.



Now, we can argue <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/hyperliquid-decentralization-validator-put">whether it was a bailout</a>, anathema to a decentralized ethos, or just pragmatic damage control another time. The point is, it worked.



By forcibly settling all JELLY positions at the exploiter’s short entry of $0.0095, the protocol basically reversed the attack. Which is to say that Hyperliquid actually, hilariously, ended up posting a profit of around $700,000 while the attacker walked away with less than they deposited. The Hyperliquid team promptly assured users they would be made whole through the Hyper Foundation, and everyone lived happily ever after.



Hooray.



But if perps DEXs can be attacked, that raises questions about Jupiter, Solana&#8217;s biggest DEX aggregator and perps exchange. Like Hyperliquid, Jupiter&#8217;s platform is powered by a vault that acts as the counterparty to all trades. This would be the very creatively named (/s) Jupiter Liquidity Provider pool, or JLP. The JLP collects trading fees and earns big when traders lose but takes a hit when they win.



HLP. JLP. It sounds pretty same-same. So with that in mind, could this vault be squeezed in a similar way? In theory, yes. Anything&#8217;s possible. I&#8217;m not going to call the Titanic unsinkable. But Jupiter&#8217;s architecture makes it an improbable outcome in practice.



First, consider its asset list. No offense to JELLY, but the token had very little liquidity, making price manipulation easier. Hyperliquid listed it because it prioritized volume, novelty, and a wide-open asset strategy to attract degens.&nbsp;



Jupiter doesn&#8217;t do that. Its perpetuals are limited to major assets like SOL, ETH, and wrapped BTC. That decision alone eliminates the kind of thin-market vulnerability that made JELLY so exploitable. A Jupiter representative said the platform’s maximum order size is much smaller than Hyperliquid’s as well.



Second, price execution. Hyperliquid relies on its internal orderbook to match traders directly against each other. Users submit their own limit orders, giving them more flexible, dynamic pricing. However, that also leads to a plethora of exploitable scenarios. A motivated attacker can influence the price displayed on the platform, setting up artificial moves that trigger cascading liquidations and/or dislocations. No bueno, compadres.



Jupiter&#8217;s perp markets operate in a totally different way, choosing instead to execute at oracle prices from external sources like Pyth. Even if a trader tried to pump the spot price of SOL on another exchange, they&#8217;d still be trading against the median on-chain price, not a manipulated in-platform quote.



Frankly, it&#8217;s just harder to game the house when the pricing comes from outside the casino.



Third, Jupiter handles risk with guardrails, not emergency exits. JLP is always the counterparty. If a trade gets liquidated, the levers for that would pull automatically at the set Oracle price. As far as we know, there&#8217;s no handoff to a second vault, no delay that a bad actor can game, and no pause for a team call or validator vote. Losses go straight to the pool.



Again, one could argue this makes the system blunt or unforgiving, but it&#8217;s something LPs accept as part and parcel (and the reasons why should now be pretty clear).



That&#8217;s not to say that JLP is immune to risk, because it&#8217;s not. It regularly takes losses in the case of a one-sided market where most traders win, for instance. But Jupiter bakes in defenses for that, too. Traders pay borrow fees to open leveraged positions, which go straight to the pool. If everyone piles into longs, funding rates rise to balance the associated risks.&nbsp;



Could some unforeseen scenario force Jupiter to intervene someday in a way that its users find questionable? Yes. Every protocol has an edge case. But in this specific scenario, Jupiter seems to have designed JLP to absorb such hazards. While Hyperliquid had to delist a token to save its vault, Jupiter has taken the opposite approach: limit risk at the door.



So, with that in mind — rest easy, Lightspeeders.&nbsp;



Jupiter isn’t playing the same game Hyperliquid nearly lost.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: The newsletter that helps thousands of investors understand crypto and the markets, by Byron Gilliam.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Empire</a>: Start your morning with the top news and analysis to inform your day in crypto.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: Reporting and analysis on the growing intersection of crypto and macroeconomics, policy and finance.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox. Market highlights, data, degen trade ideas, governance updates, token performance and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: Built for Solana investors, developers and community members. The latest from one of crypto&#8217;s hottest networks.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: For crypto collectors and traders, covering apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Tracking Bitcoin’s rise from internet plaything worth less than a penny to global phenomenon disrupting money as we know it.</li>
</ul>

Jupiter’s risk vault unlikely to face Hyperliquid-style attack

This is a segment from the Empire newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



There’s a new institutional-grade DeFi yield platform in town, we’ve exclusively learned.&nbsp;



Upshift, which aims to give retail access to yield opportunities typically available for hedge funds, is being spun out of prime brokerage firm August and is coming out of stealth.&nbsp;



The platform already has around $250 million in deposits, the team told me.



“If you look at the value prop today, DeFi’s super complicated,” Upshift CEO and August co-founder Alexandre Elkrief explained to me.&nbsp;



“It&#8217;s across three main axes: It&#8217;s fragmented, it&#8217;s hard to access, and it&#8217;s a lot more complex to manage fragments, obviously, because we&#8217;ve gone from one chain to a gazillion chains. It&#8217;s clear that it&#8217;s not gonna stop today. [August supports] 15 chains, right? And so the retail user is not gonna rebalance their position across that many different opportunities, and it&#8217;s becoming a full-time job,” Elkrief continued.



Elkrief and fellow co-founder and CEO of August, Aya Kantorovich, are no strangers to this space. Kantorovich was part of the founding team for brokerage firm FalconX, and Elkrief spent some time running the books for a DeFi hedge fund. The two initially started working on Fractal, later rebranded as August, and began fundraising right before the FTX collapse and closed the deal “the week that FTX collapsed,” Kantorovich told me.



She admitted both founders felt like they lost a couple of years off their lives after that, but it also solidified their belief in the need for both an August and an Upshift in crypto.



And so far, their work has paid off. August <a href="https://fortune.com/crypto/2025/03/06/crypto-prime-brokerage-august-raises-10-million-dragonfly-ventures/">raised</a> $10 million in a round led by Dragonfly earlier this month. It focuses on giving institutions DeFi access by connecting them to networks like Aave or Uniswap, and facilitates roughly $7 billion in monthly volume.&nbsp;



Upshift, which has been in beta since last September, is focused on the retail side of things. That was a focal point for me given that we haven’t seen retail activity levels return just yet.



“Our hypothesis is that it’s a question of complexity,” Elkrief said. Retail’s really been forced to focus on things like memecoins, which are obviously out of style now.&nbsp;



And this market is focused on “rewarding simple products,” Kantorovich noted.



“If you just zoom out for a second, the value proposition of yield is generally the onboarding mechanism for all types of new financial products. Crypto aside, Marcus by Goldman Sachs started attracting users by having a 4% savings account, right? … We&#8217;re giving every asset issuer the opportunity to augment their product with a yield-bearing option.”



Essentially, asset issuers can then partner with hedge funds or managers to curate and package the product to offer yield. Hopefully, on the flip side, also driving onboarding to said product.&nbsp;



While the August roadmap is about integrating a custodian, Elkrief said, Upshift’s going to become a product by itself. The team is “working through” the motions to split the August and Upshift teams apart currently, with Elkrief taking the helm.&nbsp;



Thanks to the lack of regulation currently, Upshift isn’t something that can be offered to US users, though both Kantorovich and Elkrief are eager for the day that path opens up.



But for now, Upshift’s focused on “making some noise” and getting to $1 billion in deposits. Then, in the next 18 months, the plan is to hit $2 billion or $3 billion.&nbsp;



Easy peasy.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: The newsletter that helps thousands of investors understand crypto and the markets, by Byron Gilliam.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Empire</a>: Start your morning with the top news and analysis to inform your day in crypto.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: Reporting and analysis on the growing intersection of crypto and macroeconomics, policy and finance.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox. Market highlights, data, degen trade ideas, governance updates, token performance and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: Built for Solana investors, developers and community members. The latest from one of crypto&#8217;s hottest networks.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: For crypto collectors and traders, covering apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Tracking Bitcoin’s rise from internet plaything worth less than a penny to global phenomenon disrupting money as we know it.</li>
</ul>

Exclusive: DeFi yield platform Upshift exits stealth

Ben Strack

This is a segment from the Forward Guidance newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



The word “bitcoin” appeared once in BlackRock CEO Larry Fink’s 2024 letter to investors.&nbsp;



The asset (and tokenization too) got a bigger shoutout this time around.



Fink’s sole mention of BTC last March came when bringing up BlackRock’s recent bitcoin ETF launch. That was part of a broader effort to “bring better liquidity and price discovery to more opaque markets,” he wrote.



The CEO’s 2025 letter, published today, included seven “bitcoin” references. He again addressed the aforementioned IBIT product, which has notched net inflows of $40 billion to date.



More than half of that demand has been from retail investors, Fink noted, with three-quarters of those investors never owning an iShares product before.



But more interestingly, Fink wrote there’s no guarantee that the dollar will forever serve as the world’s reserve currency.  



“If the US doesn’t get its debt under control, if deficits keep ballooning, America risks losing that position to digital assets like bitcoin,” he explained.



He added: “Decentralized finance is an extraordinary innovation. It makes markets faster, cheaper and more transparent. Yet that same innovation could undermine America&#8217;s economic advantage if investors begin seeing bitcoin as a safer bet than the dollar.”



Fink gives this warning while clarifying that he’s “obviously not anti-digital assets.” He has, after all, called <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/blackrock-tokenization-investment">tokenized securities</a> “the next generation for markets.” And we’ve reported on BlackRock’s tokenized money market fund, which earlier this month <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/tokenized-yield-funds-complement-stablecoins">hit $1 billion in AUM</a>.



Fink reaffirmed this sentiment, arguing that <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/stablecoins-tokenization-blackrock-galaxy-das">tokenizing</a> every stock, bond and fund would “revolutionize” investing.



“Markets wouldn&#8217;t need to close,” Fink wrote. “Transactions that currently take days would clear in seconds. And billions of dollars currently immobilized by settlement delays could be reinvested immediately back into the economy, generating more growth.”



Solving for digital verification will be critical if tokenized funds are to become as familiar to investors as ETFs, he added. A TradFi giant like BlackRock continuing to focus on these categories should no doubt make such a thing possible.&nbsp;



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: The newsletter that helps thousands of investors understand crypto and the markets, by Byron Gilliam.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Empire</a>: Start your morning with the top news and analysis to inform your day in crypto.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: Reporting and analysis on the growing intersection of crypto and macroeconomics, policy and finance.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox. Market highlights, data, degen trade ideas, governance updates, token performance and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: Built for Solana investors, developers and community members. The latest from one of crypto&#8217;s hottest networks.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: For crypto collectors and traders, covering apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Tracking Bitcoin’s rise from internet plaything worth less than a penny to global phenomenon disrupting money as we know it.</li>
</ul>

Could USD lose to BTC? BlackRock’s Fink says it’s possible

Casey Wagner

This is a segment from the Forward Guidance newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



In a fitting end to a rocky first quarter, US stocks fell back into correction territory Monday.&nbsp;



The S&amp;P 500 was trading 0.2% lower at 2 pm ET, putting it around 4.8% in the red since the start of 2025. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite is slated to close out Q1 almost 12% lower.&nbsp;



It’s the worst first quarter performance for the Nasdaq Composite since 2020.&nbsp;



One silver lining in Q1: gold. The precious metal is about to notch its best-performing quarter since 1986. Analysts attribute the rally to the Trump tariff-induced trade war. (More on that later.)&nbsp;



Digital gold, though, is a different story. Bitcoin is slated to close out its worst Q1 since 2018. The narrative of bitcoin as a <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/investors-bitcoin-narrative-confusion">safe-haven asset</a>, apparently, has not taken.



Looking ahead, things could get worse before they get better.&nbsp;



Tariffs are set to remain a dominant market narrative in Q2. President Trump is slated to announce his global tariff plans on Wednesday, which he’s dubbed “Liberation Day.”&nbsp;



To Team Trump, April 2 will mark a turning point for domestic manufacturing. To some analysts, “Liberation Day” could also bring salvation to US equity prices (at least in the short term).&nbsp;



The logic goes: If Trump announces a comprehensive reciprocal tariff regime, investors will gain clarity. Hopefully the daily headlines will slow down and markets can stop wondering whether a levy will be delayed or amended. Concrete answers on the tariff front would leave investors free to focus on impacts of other Trump administration economic policies, like tax cuts.&nbsp;



In the long term, I’m less optimistic. Even Trump’s closest Cabinet members <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2025/03/29/trump-aides-tariffs-liberation-day-fears-00259081">reportedly</a> aren’t fully up-to-speed on what the president will say on Wednesday, so I’d imagine markets will also be shocked. If the announcements lead to a significant escalation in the trade war, any “clarity” bump will quickly be reversed.



I’d also argue that these reciprocal tariffs are not priced-in, so expect some short-term volatility later in the week as investors digest the announcements from the White House.&nbsp;



OK, I’m putting the crystal ball down now. Keep an eye on your inbox later this week to see how my predictions hold up.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: The newsletter that helps thousands of investors understand crypto and the markets, by Byron Gilliam.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Empire</a>: Start your morning with the top news and analysis to inform your day in crypto.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: Reporting and analysis on the growing intersection of crypto and macroeconomics, policy and finance.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox. Market highlights, data, degen trade ideas, governance updates, token performance and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: Built for Solana investors, developers and community members. The latest from one of crypto&#8217;s hottest networks.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: For crypto collectors and traders, covering apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Tracking Bitcoin’s rise from internet plaything worth less than a penny to global phenomenon disrupting money as we know it.</li>
</ul>

Investors hope for clarity on tariffs after Q1 downturns

Kate Irwin

This is a segment from The Drop newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Gunzilla Games’ GUN token — for its Off The Grid game and Avalanche subnet Gunz — is now live.&nbsp;



GUN climbed up 12% since its launch early Monday morning, but has since fallen slightly. As of 11:30 am ET Monday, its price was $0.09. The token had a market cap of roughly $60 million at that time, with 604 million GUN in circulation out of a possible 10 billion.&nbsp;



GUN already has a trading volume of $126 million just a few hours after launch, per CoinGecko data.



The Gunz chain has already seen over 487 million transactions across 14.5 million wallets, according to Avascan <a href="https://testnet.avascan.info/blockchain/gunz/home">data</a> and Gunzilla’s Director of Web3 Theodore Agranat.



“Unlike most Web3 projects, we&#8217;ve spent five years now building everything first and testing it in testnet for over a year,” Agranat said in an interview with Blockworks, noting that the team chose to launch the token on Binance because it’s the biggest crypto exchange.



Agranat says he’s seen crypto exchanges engaging with gaming projects less over the past year — but says those projects that did launch have largely missed the mark.



Off The Grid is free to play on PC and console — and doesn’t require a wallet or any crypto. The game is largely a skill-based shooter, though some characters’ “cyberlimbs” grant special abilities. Items can also be bought and used in the game.&nbsp;



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" src="https://lh7-rt.googleusercontent.com/docsz/AD_4nXeEE9mf7TDDXNwtDpxGWAaM8DzbkoDP8gzkb1e2W7RrG35rkx26w_ebsyrJltaAU0AH-FujHnIV_FwgGhzc1nryOqcSRwotQyKpazi6FBop8RHhH_0JdUQUA8kMgNpiBX71Tqqx?key=85KaLESEJlio0CfvG8yaPPXA" alt=""/></figure>



Those wishing to pour money into the game can pay for Off The Grid’s Pro membership ($12 a month) to use the game’s marketplace, which uses blockchain on the backend. But even if you’re playing for free, you’ll slowly earn GUN as you go.&nbsp;



If you’ve already been playing the game, though, those GUN token numbers you’re seeing won’t be turned into actual GUN tokens, Gunzilla has confirmed.&nbsp;



“Their main benefits are the rare items that they earned or received with OTG Pro — many of which no one will ever be able to access in the future,” Agranat explained on the benefits for early players in a message.



“Hexes” and other items earned early on will transfer over, though. And though it’s challenging, extracting hexes while playing the game will get you more loot (each hex can be decoded to reveal an item). Agranat noted during our interview that over 380,000 hexes had been extracted in just one day last week.&nbsp;



I’ve sunk some hours into the game so far, and I like both solo mode and trios mode. This game is fast — more like Call of Duty: Warzone than Apex Legends in terms of time-to-kill and overall speed. But even without its crypto elements, Off The Grid brings something unique to the extraction battle royale shooter genre with its cyberlimbs and gritty, futuristic aesthetic.&nbsp;



A little scoop: Tomorrow, on April 1, expect a “very, very fun new skin activation,” Agranat shared. There’ll be a new skin coming out — could it be April Fool’s-themed?



Bigger picture, Off The Grid is just the beginning for Gunzilla.



“It is just the first of many games that we will launch in our ecosystem,” Agranat said.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: The newsletter that helps thousands of investors understand crypto and the markets, by Byron Gilliam.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Empire</a>: Start your morning with the top news and analysis to inform your day in crypto.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: Reporting and analysis on the growing intersection of crypto and macroeconomics, policy and finance.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox. Market highlights, data, degen trade ideas, governance updates, token performance and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: Built for Solana investors, developers and community members. The latest from one of crypto&#8217;s hottest networks.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: For crypto collectors and traders, covering apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Tracking Bitcoin’s rise from internet plaything worth less than a penny to global phenomenon disrupting money as we know it.</li>
</ul>

Gunzilla Games’ GUN token hits $68M market cap within hours of launch

Macauley Peterson

This is a segment from the 0xResearch newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



In the realm of macro risks, this week is stacked with market-moving events — particularly relevant to risk assets.&nbsp;



“Liberation Day” on Wednesday could trigger sweeping tariffs and exacerbate trade war fears, while Friday’s US jobs report will test the resilience of the labor market and offer clues into future Fed policy moves. Throw in Eurozone CPI, Fed Chair Powell’s post-jobs-report remarks, and a Congressional hearing on the future of stablecoins, and you have a volatile mix of economic, political and regulatory items converging at once.



Oh, and don’t overlook Japan, where a new fiscal year on April 1 <a href="https://x.com/acrossthespread/status/1906591368765681835">could trigger</a> large-scale capital redeployment, notwithstanding headline-driven US tariff chatter. I’m tired, boss!



DeFi, on the other hand, has its own set of risks to worry about. Navigating the part of the crypto game where risks are too often opaque and inconsistent leads the degens among us to simply ignore them. Yet, as protocols like Morpho scale into multi-billion dollar platforms, that problem compounds. The risks aren’t just about smart contracts anymore; they span asset types, market design and human factors like governance and custody.



But things are improving. The latest tool in the toolbox is Credora’s <a href="https://x.com/CredoraNetwork/status/1905614429183791337">recent launch</a> of risk ratings for Morpho vaults. These aren’t merely marketing labels — they’re probabilistic, institutional-grade assessments that break down risk at the collateral, market and vault level.



A vault rated A+ should be more than a vibe; it should be a signal derived from a consensus process involving crypto-native and traditional credit experts that simulate real-world defaults and loss probabilities.



This move towards pushing risk transparency forward reminds me of other standout projects:



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>Bluechip.org is one <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/liquity-v2-staked-ether">source</a> for stablecoin analysis, providing transparent and curated risk profiles for fiat-backed and decentralized assets alike. Its community-first model prioritizes credibility over hype — though it’s hard to keep up with all the new launches these days.</li>
</ul>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>Serenity Research <a href="https://serenityresearch.substack.com/">brings</a> a similar rigor to stablecoin yield hunters. Its risk-adjusted yield rankings aim to standardize a discount rate for constructing risk-reward profiles.</li>
</ul>



Risk curators like Gauntlet and Chaos Labs have spent years advising protocol governance on risk parameters using agent-based simulations. It’s critical work but advice that often stays inside governance forums or within core teams.



What’s new here is the shift toward user-facing, accessible risk signals. A Credora score is an accessible way to help users understand and trade-offs. That opens the door to something bigger: risk-aware capital flows. Firms can build structured products with embedded risk scores. Wallets can surface safer options by default. Insurance markets can price policies with real inputs.



Risk, in other words, becomes composable. DeFi players have spent years optimizing for yield. The next phase is about risk-adjusted yield — and how to verify it. By translating complexity into standardized, transparent metrics, we can set the stage for more intelligent capital allocation.



The dream isn’t risk-free DeFi. It’s know-your-risk DeFi.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: The newsletter that helps thousands of investors understand crypto and the markets, by Byron Gilliam.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Empire</a>: Start your morning with the top news and analysis to inform your day in crypto.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: Reporting and analysis on the growing intersection of crypto and macroeconomics, policy and finance.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox. Market highlights, data, degen trade ideas, governance updates, token performance and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: Built for Solana investors, developers and community members. The latest from one of crypto&#8217;s hottest networks.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: For crypto collectors and traders, covering apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Tracking Bitcoin’s rise from internet plaything worth less than a penny to global phenomenon disrupting money as we know it.</li>
</ul>

From vibes to value: DeFi risk gets a new rating system

This is a segment from the Supply Shock newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



In this week&#8217;s roundup, David Canellis looks at a 13-year-old job post that transformed crypto, a Kenyan startup combining crypto mining with hydroelectric power, and Gamestop&#8217;s bitcoin buying spree.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Opportunity knocks</h2>



The year is 2012. Skrillex’s &#8220;Bangarang&#8221; is playing somewhere in the background, and you’re debating whether to see The Hunger Games or 21 Jump Street at the cinema.



You decide to scroll Hacker News instead. A new <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/CryptoCurrency/comments/1jka50f/job_post_for_the_role_of_coinbase_cofounder/">post</a> catches your eye — “Apply with me to YC [Y Combinator] in the next 3 days and change the world.”



Brian Armstrong, pre-Coinbase, wrote this 13 years ago. “I’m throwing a hail mary here &#8211; because desperate times call for desperate measures.”



Armstrong had a prototype, “PayPal for bitcoin,” an open-source Android wallet called Bitbank that let users send bitcoin via email addresses. Y Combinator showed interest, Armstrong said, but he’d deferred the meeting until he’d found a ride-or-die co-founder.



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" src="https://lh7-rt.googleusercontent.com/docsz/AD_4nXdgW-seq22agzzS2DCIZX_InpnCZnHQYgEhFfx5O_f9eo_oRuFepMH4jLvLB_BuWCQJ0sqq2ZI-OPBXUWFBQ9wsgcdTj7tlNOolG-vxN0c7IfjPZ3pCDg_STJLZi8LQkZOwjatKSA?key=bBulffZfSB5fG7bmsTZGRzxR" alt=""/></figure>



“The killer app will be in disrupting transaction fees that are a tax on every transaction in our economy,” Armstrong wrote. “This is going to be super fucking hard, but the payoff is that we have a non-zero chance of really changing the world in big way. This isn&#8217;t another photo-sharing app.”



He wasn’t wrong. While Armstrong didn’t find co-founder Fred Ehrsam until after he’d graduated from Y Combinator, Bitbank did eventually become Coinbase, which is today a $48-billion stock trading on the Nasdaq.&nbsp;



Conviction clearly pays.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Remote work</h2>



Legendary Bitcoiners have famously gone to great lengths in pursuit of the network.



Kenya-based startup Gridless is no different: It’s been busy in northwest Zambia, hauling a shipping container full of 120 mining rigs “across bumpy narrow roads 14 hours from the nearest major city,” <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cly4xe373p4o">reported</a> the BBC last week.



The goal was to hook those rigs — which are each making around $5 per day — directly to a hydroelectric power plant harnessing the might of the Zambezi river.&nbsp;



Bitcoin mining now makes up about 30% of the plant’s revenue, and a revenue-sharing agreement with the company that built the plant means cheap power for the machines and cheaper electricity for locals. 



<iframe loading="lazy" width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/wfwLy8MWbe4?si=9yt8C9iPCpxX3Z_2" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>







Increased revenue for the plant has also led to more reliable power for the people that live there — living proof that proof-of-work can turn stranded energy into real-world progress.



&#8220;Every day we were wasting over half of the energy we could generate, which also meant we [weren’t] earning from that to meet our operating expenses. We needed a major user of power in the area, and that&#8217;s where the game-changing partnership with Gridless came in,&#8221; plant operator Daniel Rea told the BBC.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Game-Start</h2>



GameStop gearing up to run the Strategy playbook is a turning point.



Ignore the mixed market reaction. The original meme stock will be the second large-scale firm to attempt an extreme bitcoin buying spree (mirroring Strategy), after Japanese holding company MetaPlanet.



And that includes issuing 0% convertible notes to the tune of $1.3 billion — cash it will use to buy bitcoin — the exact same move that Strategy has perfected over the past five years or so.&nbsp;



All while GameStop will continue closing its physical stores en masse.



<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="550" data-dnt="true">An announcement regarding Bitcoin <a href="https://t.co/gG8JRarIok">pic.twitter.com/gG8JRarIok</a>&mdash; GameStop (@gamestop) <a href="https://twitter.com/gamestop/status/1904628096705454308?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 25, 2025</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
</div></figure>



GME initially jumped by about 10% after it announced its bitcoin plan, but then dropped 25% on details of the financing.



All noise. The stock might be a very different beast to Strategy and MetaPlanet, but the three will soon share one common denominator.&nbsp;



Forget Denzel — Bitcoin is the real equalizer.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: The newsletter that helps thousands of investors understand crypto and the markets, by Byron Gilliam.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Empire</a>: Start your morning with the top news and analysis to inform your day in crypto.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: Reporting and analysis on the growing intersection of crypto and macroeconomics, policy and finance.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox. Market highlights, data, degen trade ideas, governance updates, token performance and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: Built for Solana investors, developers and community members. The latest from one of crypto&#8217;s hottest networks.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: For crypto collectors and traders, covering apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Tracking Bitcoin’s rise from internet plaything worth less than a penny to global phenomenon disrupting money as we know it.</li>
</ul>

Bitbank to Coinbase: Brian Armstrong’s $48 billion job post

This is a segment from the Empire newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Remember Mesh’s Bam Azizi from our chat <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/mesh-crypto-payments-fundraise-82m">earlier this month</a>, after his firm raised a whopping $82M?



Azizi and Paradigm’s Charlie Noyes joined Yanowitz on <a href="https://blockworks.co/podcast/empire/46ed96f4-0bf7-11f0-b319-cfe252b998dc">this week’s episode of Empire</a> to chat about the raise and crypto’s killer app — stablecoins (sorry if you’re tired of hearing that).&nbsp;



But the thing is, as Noyes put it: “Stablecoins deserve all of the attention and excitement they’re garnering,” especially when we’re in such an awkward spot market-wise.&nbsp;



Not only does Noyes think that stablecoins offer up a viable and understandable use case on crypto rails (something the industry sometimes struggles with) — there’s also an additional add-on:&nbsp;



The talent pool is much bigger. Because a lot of these projects have FinTech qualities, they can seek out talent that’s not just crypto-native.&nbsp;



And, as the competition grows fiercer and fragmentation starts to occur, Mesh stands to potentially add more value, Azizi added.&nbsp;



While the dream would be for folks to use stablecoins for everyday payments, Azizi thinks that we’re more likely to see stablecoins leveraged for cross-border payments right now. Certain hyperinflation areas like Turkey or Colombia could see more retail stablecoin use cases, given that they don’t have the same access to bank accounts and credit cards as the US does.&nbsp;



Next stop for stablecoins? Getting the Netflixes and Amazons of the world to accept USDC, USDT, etc. That’s when real adoption happens.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: The newsletter that helps thousands of investors understand crypto and the markets, by Byron Gilliam.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Empire</a>: Start your morning with the top news and analysis to inform your day in crypto.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: Reporting and analysis on the growing intersection of crypto and macroeconomics, policy and finance.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox. Market highlights, data, degen trade ideas, governance updates, token performance and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: Built for Solana investors, developers and community members. The latest from one of crypto&#8217;s hottest networks.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: For crypto collectors and traders, covering apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Tracking Bitcoin’s rise from internet plaything worth less than a penny to global phenomenon disrupting money as we know it.</li>
</ul>

Stablecoins ‘deserve all the attention’: Paradigm

This is a segment from the Empire newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



We’re heading into the second quarter of the year, and — <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/grayscale-memecoins-impact-crypto">as I wrote last week</a> — this last quarter was a doozy.&nbsp;



But some folks are feeling kind of good about this next quarter…so far.



<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="550" data-dnt="true">Q2 starts tomorrow and it looks like the crypto retirement dreams are on hold You better close twitter and lock in&mdash; Alex (@AlexOnchain) <a href="https://twitter.com/AlexOnchain/status/1906616710372683848?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 31, 2025</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
</div></figure>



Unfortunately, with fresh tariffs on the US horizon, this morning is not off to a great start for crypto or equities.



Federico Brokate, head of US business at 21Shares, took away a silver lining to last quarter, which is that 21Shares saw “fantastic flows” for the ETFs. For Brokate, that gives an idea of how much client demand exists.



The continued volatility, especially out of Trump’s White House, may continue to spook some of the more risk-on investors. But Brokate remains pretty positive.&nbsp;



“I think we&#8217;re seeing all the right tailwinds. And so, yes, the volatility at a macro level is impacting performance here in this asset class — like every other asset class — but investors are taking this opportunity to come into the market even at a lower cost basis, which I think is the absolute right move,” he said.&nbsp;



None of this, unfortunately, is going to be enough to move us out of the wait-and-see moment we seem stuck in. The big tailwinds are still up in the air: actual regulation, word from the SEC on the slew of crypto ETF filings, and further clarity from the SEC (hopefully from the roundtables they’re hosting).&nbsp;



I know it’s not a surprise to any of you, but it’s where we remain. However, this quarter could get us out of this rut, if folks like Empire co-host and Blockworks co-founder Jason Yanowitz are right and we have <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/roadblocks-stablecoin-adoption-foresight">stablecoin legislation in the next few months</a>.&nbsp;



Funnily enough, though, Brokate thinks we’re actually going to become more narrative-driven as institutions continue to pile in. That’s not to say fundamentals won’t play a huge part, but he thinks that investing itself is narrative-driven, and the more crypto aligns with macro, the more important headlines and news events will be.&nbsp;



“I think the constant capital [that’s] trickling into the industry is certainly changing the way that prices react to different news. But at the end of the day, all investing, especially when it&#8217;s so regulatory and geopolitical — [given that] crypto is a global asset — so all these things are very narrative-driven,” he said.



Guess we’ll always have a narrative to fall back on.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: The newsletter that helps thousands of investors understand crypto and the markets, by Byron Gilliam.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Empire</a>: Start your morning with the top news and analysis to inform your day in crypto.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: Reporting and analysis on the growing intersection of crypto and macroeconomics, policy and finance.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox. Market highlights, data, degen trade ideas, governance updates, token performance and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: Built for Solana investors, developers and community members. The latest from one of crypto&#8217;s hottest networks.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: For crypto collectors and traders, covering apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Tracking Bitcoin’s rise from internet plaything worth less than a penny to global phenomenon disrupting money as we know it.</li>
</ul>

Crypto’s seeing the ‘right tailwinds’: 21Shares

Jack Kubinec

This is a segment from the Lightspeed newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">subscribe</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



In 2023 and 2024, a number of Solana startups <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/jito-airdrop-value">generated native tokens</a> to reward users and let investors and early contributors book returns.



Much of the attention surrounding these tokens went to how lucrative they were for recipients of so-called airdrops — and actual utility took a backseat, especially with a US regulatory regime eager to classify tokens as securities. Now with a <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/washington-dc-blockchain-summit-takeaways">friendlier regulatory outlook</a> and the airdrop flow being stemmed, some are looking to how these new native tokens can become valuable assets.&nbsp;



One such example is early Solana investor Multicoin Capital, which recently published an asset report for JTO, the native token of its portfolio company Jito. Multicoin’s forward-looking base case priced JTO at $6.80, roughly three times its current price. I had the report’s author, Multicoin investment partner Shayon Sengupta, as a guest on the Lightspeed podcast this week to discuss his valuation further.



<iframe loading="lazy" width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Oz2uew_I9PI?si=uuQ2mnt6lO3MB-Fb" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>







“If you assume Solana <a href="https://app.blockworksresearch.com/analytics/solana">REV</a> is going to increase and you assume that demand for priority blockspace is going to increase, Jito is going to be the direct beneficiary of that,” Sengupta said.



That’s likely true. 93% of the Solana network’s stake runs on the Jito-Solana client, which offers off-chain blockspace auctions that maximize economic returns for validators and makes it easier for users to land transactions. Jito tips from these auctions made up around 56% of Solana’s total REV in February. That’s not to mention Jito offering Solana’s largest LST in JitoSOL — a product it seems to be angling to have included in Solana staking ETFs.



What I’m less convinced of is the concept that Jito’s success as a company will trickle down to the JTO token. JTO’s price-to-earnings ratio swung wildly this year when Jito’s revenue greatly increased and its token price stayed roughly the same. That’s probably because there is currently no direct connection between Jito revenue and the JTO token.&nbsp;



The Jito Foundation — which oversees Jito’s stake pool as well as JTO — takes in revenue, but if the foundation were to do things like distribute its revenue to token holders, JTO might start to look uncomfortably like a security. That’s likely part of why the Uniswap Foundation is still yet to distribute fee revenue to UNI holders. Sengupta hinted to me that this may change.



“Our general framing is that as capital markets mature, you end up in a stage where revenues are going to matter,” Sengupta said, vaguely citing “changing policy dynamics” as one potential reason why.



Donald Trump’s presidency has brought previously unheard of legal possibilities to the crypto industry. Can it make native tokens great again?



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: The newsletter that helps thousands of investors understand crypto and the markets, by Byron Gilliam.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Empire</a>: Start your morning with the top news and analysis to inform your day in crypto.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: Reporting and analysis on the growing intersection of crypto and macroeconomics, policy and finance.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox. Market highlights, data, degen trade ideas, governance updates, token performance and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: Built for Solana investors, developers and community members. The latest from one of crypto&#8217;s hottest networks.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: For crypto collectors and traders, covering apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Tracking Bitcoin’s rise from internet plaything worth less than a penny to global phenomenon disrupting money as we know it.</li>
</ul>

Multicoin estimates a 3x for Jito’s token

This is a segment from the Forward Guidance newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



The Fed’s preferred inflation gauge ticked higher in February while consumer spending continued to disappoint, painting an uncertain picture for future monetary policy moves.&nbsp;



Annual core Personal Consumption Expenditures Index (PCE) came in at 2.8%, a far cry from central bankers’ 2% target. Economists had projected a 12-month reading of 2.7%. Month over month, core PCE increased 0.4% — again higher than estimates, which were 0.3%. 



Inflation-adjusted consumer spending increased only 0.1% last month, coming in on the lower end of estimates. Analysts had hoped that warmer weather would jumpstart spending after a severe winter across most of the country.&nbsp;



Spending came in below expectations, even as personal income increased 0.8%, compared with projections of a 0.4% increase.&nbsp;



Expectations for longer-term inflation were also on the rise. The University of Michigan’s one-year projection for inflation is now 5%. It’s the third-straight month the index has increased.&nbsp;



Fed funds futures markets are now pricing in a 13% chance the Fed opts to lower interest rates in May.&nbsp;



Stocks, unsurprisingly, did not take the inflation news well. The S&amp;P 500 lost as much as 1.5% in the first few hours of Friday’s session. The index is poised to end Q1 with its worst quarterly performance since 2023. The Nasdaq Composite slid almost 2% in the first half of the trading day.&nbsp;&nbsp;



The doom and gloom may not last too long, though, eToro analyst Bret Kenwell said.



“Historically speaking, the S&amp;P 500 tends to perform pretty well in mild inflationary environments where annual core PCE is between 2% and 4%,” he explained. “But investors don’t seem to care about historical statistics right now.”



You can say that again. Have a good weekend, everyone; here’s to hoping for a better performance next week.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: The newsletter that helps thousands of investors understand crypto and the markets, by Byron Gilliam.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Empire</a>: Start your morning with the top news and analysis to inform your day in crypto.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: Reporting and analysis on the growing intersection of crypto and macroeconomics, policy and finance.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox. Market highlights, data, degen trade ideas, governance updates, token performance and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: Built for Solana investors, developers and community members. The latest from one of crypto&#8217;s hottest networks.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: For crypto collectors and traders, covering apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Tracking Bitcoin’s rise from internet plaything worth less than a penny to global phenomenon disrupting money as we know it.</li>
</ul>

Inflation, consumer spending misses push US stocks lower 

This is a segment from the Forward Guidance newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Felix noted he came out of the Digital Asset Summit <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/forward-guidance-stablecoins-bullish-institutional-das">“incredibly bullish”</a> on stablecoins. He’s not the only one expecting big things around that sector and the broader tokenization category.



After Galaxy CEO Mike Novogratz addressed the firm’s <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/galaxy-terra-luna-200m">$200 million settlement</a> with the New York Attorney General during this morning’s earnings call, he answered a question on where the firm would focus most of its resources in 2025.



“The first obvious answer is stablecoins, both here and abroad,” he said — for payments, cross-border transactions and beyond.



Stablecoins are “the first real-world asset that’s been tokenized,” he added. And the tokenization of mortgages, collectibles, equities, etc. is coming. “I keep saying it’s going to be like bankruptcy — it happens real slow, then real fast,” Novogratz said. “It hasn’t happened real fast, but every single TradFi participant is gearing up for that [tokenization stage], and I think the crypto world is working on that.”



The promise of crypto boosting efficiency and transparency has been held back by a lack of regulatory clarity. That’s changing.



Galaxy said it’s “close” to the euro-denominated stablecoin it <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/euro-denominated-ethereum-stablecoin-launch">plotted to bring</a> with DWS and Flow Traders. Galaxy’s <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/galaxy-eyes-custody-platform-buy-from-bankrupt-celsius">investment in GK8</a> is a way for the firm to serve as “an infrastructure technology provider” in this category as adoption picks up, firm executives added.&nbsp;



Those comments came after NYSE parent Intercontinental Exchange said it plans to explore using Circle’s stablecoin (and Hashnote’s tokenized money fund USYC) within its derivatives exchanges, clearinghouses and data services.



“We believe Circle’s stablecoins and tokenized digital currencies can play a larger role in capital markets as digital currencies become more trusted by market participants as an acceptable equivalent to the US dollar,” NYSE president Lynn Martin said in a statement.



Fidelity is reportedly exploring a stablecoin launch. And we won’t rehash <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/bitgo-to-custody-wlfi-usd1">World Liberty Financial’s USD1</a> here, but the point is there’ve been ample developments with US stablecoin legislation expected as soon as this summer.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">A focus at DAS</h2>



There was plenty of talk around stablecoins and RWAs at DAS, too.



I was on stage with Securitize chief operating officer Michael Sonnenshein last week. It happened to be the one-year anniversary of BlackRock (with help from Securitize) launching its tokenized money market fund, BUIDL. 



<iframe loading="lazy" width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/D_e0UHWm_qI?si=88O5k333U7A5g1mh&amp;start=7925" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>







BUIDL recently hit the $1 billion AUM mark and, this week, launched a new share class on Solana. While stablecoins have “made the crypto system go ’round,” Sonnenshein said, you now have assets onchain that offer a stable value and are yield-bearing. People are waking up to that. “That conversation, I think, is well underway, and you’re starting to see OTC desks, market makers, and all kinds of participants in crypto beginning to think about these assets in a new way — in many cases the same way they historically relied on stablecoins,” Sonnenshein said.&nbsp;



Ondo Finance’s Ian De Bode noted that BUIDL and Ondo’s OUSG display the benefits of onchain assets — i.e. 24/7 movement, programmability —&nbsp; to legacy institutions who may want to follow suit with their own offerings.



Rather than believing tokenized MMFs/Treasurys (a roughly ~$5 billion market) will replace stablecoins (with a market cap of nearly $230 billion), industry execs have noted the <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/tokenized-yield-funds-complement-stablecoins">powerful combo</a> of the two. Circle alluded to the demand for moving between <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/circle-hashnote-deal-tokenized-money">yield-bearing collateral and cash</a> when acquiring Hashnote in January.



“Tokenization cannot exist without stablecoins,” Alogrand Foundation CEO Staci Warden told me on the DAS main stage. “Because if you have tokenized the asset side but you haven’t tokenized the money side, it just doesn’t work.”



Combining yield with quick transferability is “incredibly potent,” she added. And every TradFi player “will no longer tolerate that their money is just sitting there doing nothing.”



After talking about less-liquid tokenization segments (like real estate rental income or <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/nft-airline-tickets-revolutionize-travel">airline tickets</a>), she reverted to money market funds when imagining future transactions.&nbsp;



Perhaps a decade from now, she envisioned, one could buy a coffee with a tokenized MMF sliver. The person being paid then starts earning the yield tied to that fund.



“Cash is an asset, [an] apartment building’s an asset, they’re all assets,” Warden said. “This continuum will get just completely blurred and more liquid.”



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: The newsletter that helps thousands of investors understand crypto and the markets, by Byron Gilliam.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Empire</a>: Start your morning with the top news and analysis to inform your day in crypto.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: Reporting and analysis on the growing intersection of crypto and macroeconomics, policy and finance.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox. Market highlights, data, degen trade ideas, governance updates, token performance and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: Built for Solana investors, developers and community members. The latest from one of crypto&#8217;s hottest networks.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: For crypto collectors and traders, covering apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Tracking Bitcoin’s rise from internet plaything worth less than a penny to global phenomenon disrupting money as we know it.</li>
</ul>

Talk around stablecoins, tokenization picking up

This is a segment from The Drop newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Just last week at the Game Developers Conference, I caught up with two key members of the Arbitrum Gaming Catalyst Program (GCP): Daniel Peng, founding partner, and Rick Johanson, founding partner and VP.&nbsp;



During the interview, they shared a glowing vision for a gaming-focused future on Arbitrum. They said they were talking to <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/blockchain-gaming-reckoning-gdc">100 different gaming projects</a> to see which ones might build on their chain.&nbsp;



“I think where we are in the life cycle of gaming and Web3, is trying to figure out what the biggest value adds that we can provide with our resources…in order to ensure there’s some successes in our industry, right?” Peng told me.&nbsp;



“[It’s] still very much early. At the same time, I think we provide a pretty mature toolkit compared to a lot of other networks,” he added.



Arbitrum also had the largest (and therefore priciest) crypto booth at the gaming conference, featuring about a half-dozen different titles using Arbitrum in various stages of development and a challenge where you could play those games to earn Arbitrum merch.



But this week, things have gone cold. The Arbitrum DAO, which greenlit the GCP in the first place, is now considering a proposal that would claw back all unused ARB tokens allotted to fund the GCP’s ambitions. The program had previously been <a href="https://forum.arbitrum.foundation/t/catalyze-gaming-ecosystem-growth-on-arbitrum/22368">granted 200 million</a> ARB tokens last year, which was worth about $215 million at the time.&nbsp;



ARB’s now down over 76% in the past year.&nbsp;&nbsp;



“The GCP has repeatedly shown a reluctance to adequately document its activities and performance. Instead of embracing transparency, the program has recently sought to increase contributor compensation and lower its own reporting requirements,” part of the <a href="https://forum.arbitrum.foundation/t/non-constitutional-gcp-clawback/28809">proposal</a> reads.&nbsp;



“Given these failures, the risks associated with a lump-sum allocation of funds, and the mounting concerns raised by the community, it is time to cut our losses.”



Arbitrum DAO member Nathan van der Heyden co-published the proposal to kill GCP funding.&nbsp;



“The GCP was created in overly optimistic times. With key backers now gone, it’s clear the program isn’t delivering on its promises,” Heyden <a href="https://x.com/NathanVDH0x/status/1904164040261415183">argued</a>.



“The GCP was a failure,” wrote DAO participant Argonaut in agreement with the proposal.



“I fully agree with this clawback,” another participant wrote. “For the amount allocated, what has it gotten us? Arbitrum gaming will grow, but this amount of ARB was always outrageous when DeFi is what has gotten this L2 where it is.”



While some DAO participants agreed with the proposal, others — like GCP councilmember and Offchain Labs Head of Gaming and Consumer Partnerships David Bolger — <a href="https://forum.arbitrum.foundation/t/non-constitutional-gcp-clawback/28809/18">believe</a> the program is worth saving.



“No chain can remain competitive without allocating financial resources to attract and support builders,” Bolger <a href="https://forum.arbitrum.foundation/t/non-constitutional-gcp-clawback/28809/18">wrote</a>. “The industry is fiercely competitive, with rival chains routinely offering grants ranging from $5M to $100M.”



He’s not wrong about that, for sure — I’ve recently heard rumblings that other gaming-focused chains are paying game developers anywhere from $10 million to $30 million just to “partner” with them to build a game in their ecosystem.



“To date, over 50 deals have been put forward to the GCP, yet fewer than 5% have reached the final stages — demonstrating a clear commitment to due diligence,” Bolger added.



After the clawback was proposed, the GCP hired Castle Labs as its “DAO Relations partner” to see if more communication could change hearts and minds.&nbsp;



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" src="https://lh7-rt.googleusercontent.com/docsz/AD_4nXfqoH9PJMS6XbVzWcKOiGr6NBt3SbL5IYbrVJWEqdNL5PHUHocQVaimAfv1Wxay75I15SIVo2hUjU6GBcxMM79ABlIp1aXFWgt2lX028sLZxk3KcovUPbRKwjz9aze5Sau21q4q7Q?key=kaLfTTzvcXuvmsuUhwhA5Yyn" alt=""/></figure>



On the Arbitrum Foundation forums, Johanson said the team is taking action to improve communications between the GCP and the DAO — hiring Castle being one of those actions.&nbsp;



I reached out to Peng and Johanson for their thoughts on this proposal.&nbsp;



Johanson said: “We currently don’t have anything to share on this topic, but if that changes, we’ll be sure to update you.”&nbsp;



Overall, I’m not sure that the juice is worth the squeeze for every chain that decides it wants a gaming ecosystem.&nbsp;



Arbitrum is also an open, permissionless ecosystem, so devs don’t need the GCP’s permission — or anyone’s — to just launch a game there without getting paid.&nbsp;



Is it worth spending a hundred million just to convince some devs to make crypto games that are more likely to flop than not, some of which may ultimately leave the chain or never even launch?&nbsp;



Maybe it would be a better idea to narrow that scope to reduce risk and start small but focused — instead of trying to be the biggest player at the poker table.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: The newsletter that helps thousands of investors understand crypto and the markets, by Byron Gilliam.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Empire</a>: Start your morning with the top news and analysis to inform your day in crypto.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: Reporting and analysis on the growing intersection of crypto and macroeconomics, policy and finance.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox. Market highlights, data, degen trade ideas, governance updates, token performance and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: Built for Solana investors, developers and community members. The latest from one of crypto&#8217;s hottest networks.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: For crypto collectors and traders, covering apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Tracking Bitcoin’s rise from internet plaything worth less than a penny to global phenomenon disrupting money as we know it.</li>
</ul>

DeCus SatoshiSATS

DeCus Satoshi Stats

What is the market cap of DeCus Satoshi?

What is the current trading activity of DeCus Satoshi?

What is the current price of DeCus Satoshi?

How many DeCus Satoshi are there?

What is the relative popularity of DeCus Satoshi?

market data

latest DeCus Satoshi news