The Breakdown First Five - Wednesday, October 30, 2024

Welcome back to The Breakdown First Five — the 5 most interesting and/or important stories in bitcoin, crypto, and markets to start your day.

5. Kamala Should Embrace Crypto

Industry mainstay Laura Shin has penned a thoughtful piece explaining why Harris should embrace crypto. Written from Laura’s perspective as a progressive, the piece lays out the left wing case for Bitcoin. More importantly, it explains that Bitcoin should be no more partisan than other technologies, like the internet. The article seemed to hit home for long time crypto skeptics who have never been able to look past the monkey pictures and fraud. 

4. Gensler’s Folley

Elizabeth Lopatto of the Verge has written up a fantastic summary of the battle between Gensler and the industry. She draws particular attention to the fact that Coinbase have been asking for clear rules of the road for years and has been unable to get anywhere. Speaking to an audience outside of the industry, the piece highlights how misleading the SEC’s narrative has been. No one is asking for deregulation, in fact it’s quite the opposite. 

3. Consensys Layoffs

Ethereum infrastructure firm Consensys, who are cutting 20% of staff. CEO Joe Lubin said the decision was made to maintain financial sustainability and to become a smaller, more agile organization. He also blamed Gensler for going to war with an industry, insisting Consensys didn’t have much of a choice in paying up for the legal battle. Thoughts and best wishes to the staff affected. 

2. ETFs on Fire

Bitcoin ETFs put in their strongest day months as boomers smashed the top. Blackrock dragged in $640M, it’s third best day ever while the group totalled $870M for the biggest day since June. Total trading volume was a mind-bending $4.75B. Bitcoin FOMO is the same regardless of the wrapper. 

1. Wen Moon

After a sleepless and range bound night, Bitcoin is still trading within 3% of all time highs. Nothing happened. Bitcoin spent most of the night stuck between $72k and $73k, coiled for another run. The timeline is silent, no one wants to jinx it. But with no appetite for selling, new all time highs as soon as the bell rings in New York seems predestined.