Bros filing for ETFs to trade the exact same market #JustinSun was indicted by the #SEC for manipulating last year.

#TRX is the “gas” on Justin Sun’s #Tron blockchain, which exists primarily to allow the movement of #Tether's #USDT token on a blockchain that is less scrutinized than ethereum. Roughly half of Tether’s ~$140 billion market cap lives on Tron and that’s the blockchain preferred by drug cartels, #pigbutchering fraudsters, and #sanctions evaders, which is why a lot of people call it “the crime chain”.

Nothing else of substance has ever happened on the Tron blockchain. For more on Tether see my post linked below.

* Filing: https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/2064768/000199937125004423/canary-s1_041825.htm
* More on Tether: https://cryptadamus.substack.com/p/trumps-transition-team-is-tethered

oh look, another #fintech bankruptcy involving Evolve Bank & Trust.

some other fun places Evolve has popped up:

1. issuer of #FTX and #BlockFi debit cards (before those companies blew up and customers lost all their money)
2. #GeorgeSantos and #AndyOgles held their campaign money at Evolve
3. #Synapse bankruptcy which cost customers of a bunch of fintech "banks" like #Yotta most if not all of their money
4. Partnered with "anti-woke" fintech #GloriFi
5. Got hacked by Russia midway through Synapse bankruptcy proceedings
6. Anonymous crypto debit card issuer for #ZELF
7. Frequently found to be the bank used by #pigbutchering fraudsters
8. Sanctioned by federal reserve for #moneylaundering

The fact that Evolve has not been shut down is insane. Banking system cannot survive if these kinds of bad actors roam free like the wind.

* more on Evolve: https://fintechbusinessweekly.substack.com/p/evolves-problematic-partners-bankruptcies
* even more: https://fintechbusinessweekly.substack.com/p/evolve-hit-with-fed-enforcement-action

Good overview of the insanity that is #MichaelSaylor's "buy billions of dollars worth of bitcoin with borrowed money" approach to financial engineering.

> "If #MicroStrategy's strategy is so brilliant, why isn't every company doing it? Should Apple stop making iPhones and just convert its cash to Bitcoin? Should Coca-Cola abandon soda production and become a Bitcoin holding company?"

https://basedtoschi.substack.com/p/inside-microstrategys-bitcoin-pyramid

#Ripple, a shitcoin pump and dump company convicted of massive securities law violations, buying a tradfi ("traditional finance") prime broker is a perfect example of the crypto industry making big moves to take over and integrate with america's existing financial system in a way that will be very hard if not impossible to unravel.

All of the money for this corporate takeover came from dumping Ripple's #XRP tokens on retail suckers.

Also Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse was one of the 2024 election's biggest donors.

https://ripple.com/ripple-press/ripple-acquires-prime-broker-hidden-road/

Senator Tommy Tuberville is introducing legislation to allow Americans to invest their #pension money in cryptocurrency.

People should understand that companies going forward will just issue crypto tokens instead of deal with the securities regulations that have protected investors for a century. There will be no disclosure of things like income, assets, ownership structure, and risks.

The #SEC has already changed the rules so that a company that wants to issue a token to raise money can just say "this is not a security and thus is unregulatable" and if the SEC does not object within 60-90 days then that company is in the clear permanently.

Mark my words, we're going to see #SpaceX, #Tesla, #OpenAI, and all the other opaque private companies burning insane amounts of money issuing tokens in the not to distant future.

https://x.com/BanklessHQ/status/1906753486659920045

Great interview on @CryptoCriticPod with a former SEC official about what went wrong w/crypto enforcement. My favourite quote:

> “Crypto is a machine where fraud and money laundering go in one side and campaign contributions come out the other end.”

He also makes an important point about how crypto scams functionally DDoS'ed America's regulators.

> "Having 15,000 nationally available non-compliant securities [that want to litigate every step of the way] issued [within such a short time span] is not something that’s ever happened before."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aF7gR-1MHbw

New paper from #Yale and the #FederalReserve blames the 2023 banking crisis on (you guessed it) #crypto and Nerd Reich #VCs.

> "A clearer commonality between the six banks [that failed], the paper argues, is their exposure to risky depositor bases that other banks shied away from: #crypto firms and [tech] venture capitalists."

* American Banker: https://www.americanbanker.com/news/new-paper-hangs-march-2023-failures-on-business-model-risks
* Paper: https://www.chicagofed.org/publications/working-papers/2025/2025-04

Good article in The Prospect about the coming STABLE and GENIUS acts, which will give an implicit bail out guarantee to crypto money laundering firms - sorry, i mean "stablecoins" - like #Tether and #Circle (#Coinbase). One of the two would also let #ElonMusk print his own dollars.

Senate #Democrats like #KirstenGillibrand, #ElissaSlotkin, and #RubenGallego, whose election campaigns were supported by incredible amounts of crypto money, will probably make sure these bills become laws (because they are corrupt).

Note that stablecoins are currently incredibly profitable businesses. After all a stablecoin is basically a bank where you spend nothing on anti-money laundering & other regulations, refuse to assist customers who have been scammed, and collect 5% interest from the US government while passing absolutely none of it on to your customers.

https://prospect.org/power/2025-03-10-some-democrats-endorse-bill-allowing-elon-musk-create-own-currency/

tfw when #LauraLoomer and #MattGaetz start sticking up for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau against #ElonMusk and #MarcAndreessen's predations.

(Loomer was herself debanked until the #CFPB intervened to force banks to give her accounts)

"may you live in interesting times"

there's a of a lot of new #X URLs with the words "#payments" and "#money" in them when you load the bird app (in addition to #Plaid), just in time for the administration to remove #CFPB oversight of payments apps...

* sdn.payments-dev.x.com/assets/loader.min.js
* sdn.payments-staging.x.com/assets/loader.min.js
* sdn.payments-prod.x.com/assets/loader.min.js
* sdn.money-dev.x.com/assets/loader.min.js
* sdn.money-staging.x.com/assets/loader.min.js
* sdn.money.x.com/assets/loader.min.js

Good WSJ article about the war between #Tether and #Circle to capture America's financial regulations on crypto stablecoins.

- Tether has on its side #HowardLutnick (Secretary of Commerce) and #JustinSun (Trump's business partner)

- Circle has on its side #MarcAndreessen and the rest of the American #NerdReich like Coinbase CEO #BrianArmstrong

* WSJ: https://www.wsj.com/finance/currencies/who-is-giancarlo-devasini-tether-jeremy-allaire-circle-90a408b9
* no paywall: https://archive.ph/FQ9hI

New nightmares from Dan Davies for @bert_hubert , about

“the Lovecraftian horror of [European Banks’] IT outsourcing…

the Euro area banking system is highly dependent on server farms which might be physically located in Europe, but whose owners might ultimately answer to a foreign power.”

https://on.ft.com/3XpKOzA

Former chair of the US House Financial Services Committee #PatrickMcHenry just got hired by #MarcAndreessen’s #a16z.

#Broligarchy revolving door so bright you gotta wear shades.

america's coming #stablecoin regulations are being legislated via the STABLE and GENIUS acts.

you can't even make this stuff up...
https://x.com/OccamiCrypto/status/1894529763672560054

the meeting logs of #DavidSacks and #a16z's "Crypto Task Force" that is I guess now running american financial regulation via the #SEC contain many incredible things, but only a single meeting with anyone trying to advocate for the public interest (#BetterMarkets, who deserve a lot of credit for trying).

* SEC page: https://www.sec.gov/about/crypto-task-force/crypto-task-force-meeting-logs
* archived meeting notes: https://legacy.www.documentcloud.org/app?q=%2Btag%3A%22crypto%20task%20force%22

live look at #a16z’s #MarcAndreessen after killing off the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (#CFPB), making sure americans will be paying extortionate junk fees and usurious interest rates on payday loans in addition to having zero protection from crypto scams:

The Trump administration will drop all securities fraud charges against #Coinbase (with prejudice so they can't be brought again).

It only cost #BrianArmstrong $75 million in campaign contributions, which are much, much more cost effective than lawyers.
https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2025/02/20/sec-poised-to-drop-coinbase-lawsuit-marking-big-moment-for-u-s-crypto

a bro from the largest american crypto VC firm #a16z is going to be running the #CFTC which in turn will be the agency "regulating" crypto now that the #SEC (also now run by crypto bros) has decided cryptocurrency is not a "security" (like a share of stock or a bond) but instead a "commodity" (like corn or pork bellies). which makes sense, as long as you don't think about it.

fun fact: the CFTC was the agency that regulated (and still regulates) financial derivatives and is more or less directly responsible for 2008's Great Financial Crisis and the Great Recession.

https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2025/02/11/trump-taps-former-cftc-commissioner-a16z-policy-head-brian-quintenz-for-cftc-head