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Ethereum may be one of the most underappreciated assets.

In this conversation, Michael McGuiness and Vivek Raman lay out the case for ETH as “productive money”, a monetary asset with the store-of-value properties of gold and Bitcoin, plus the ability to compound through network activity.

We unpack the $250K ETH thesis, why traditional DCF models miss the bigger picture, and why Ethereum’s role as the settlement layer for a tokenized economy could unlock massive monetary premium.

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💰NEXO | YIELD + CREDIT LINE

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🧭OKX | TRADE, EARN, PAY

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🌐BRIX | EMERGING MARKET YIELD

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TIMESTAMPS

0:00 Intro

4:45 $250K ETH?

6:04 How to Price ETH

8:15 ETH’s Monetary Premium

10:25 What Differentiates ETH

13:54 The Path to $250K ETH

16:35 Menger’s Monetary Attributes

20:28 Scarcity

24:58 Fungibility

26:43 Divisibility

27:45 Portability

28:28 Durability

34:30 Verifiability

35:27 Censorship Resistance

37:00 ETH is Productive Money

41:39 How is ETH Productive?

46:40 Ethereum’s Tollbooth

51:28 Counterparty Risk

53:48 Productive Money vs Dead Capital

58:03 Pitching Productive Money to Wall Street

1:00:08 Why is ETH Underappreciated?

1:04:19 Wall Street ETH Investors

1:11:28 Other L1s

1:14:06 Why Not Just Buy the S&P?

1:15:00 Ethereum Technical Risks

1:17:20 How Does ETH Get to $250K?

1:23:18 Closing & Disclaimers

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RESOURCES

ETH is Productive Money

https://www.productivemoney.org/ 

Michael McGuiness

https://x.com/mikemcg0 

Vivek Raman

https://x.com/VivekVentures 

Etherealize

https://www.etherealize.com/ 

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Not financial or tax advice. See our investment disclosures here:

https://www.bankless.com/disclosures⁠

Austen Allred joins Bankless to unpack Kelly Claude, the AI agent he has given an LLC, bank accounts, a token, and even a human employee. They explore how Kelly finds software opportunities, ships apps to the App Store, learns through orchestration and factory-style workflows, and why crypto rails may be the missing layer for agent-to-agent commerce.

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🦊 METAMASK | DOWNLOAD NOW
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💰NEXO | YIELD + CREDIT LINE
https://bankless.cc/nexo

🧭OKX | TRADE, EARN, PAY
https://bankless.cc/OKX

🌐BRIX | EMERGING MARKET YIELD
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TIMESTAMPS
0:00 Intro
1:05 Meet Kelly
4:46 Why Kelly needed an LLC, bank account, and token
10:27 The real goal is a zero-human company
15:46 The apps Kelly is already shipping
18:33 Can taste be replicated?
21:53 Why AI defaults to consensus
30:04 What orchestration and factories actually mean
34:21 How autonomous is autonomous?
38:20 The marketing factory and why AI ads must look worse
46:47 Why Ryan and David’s agent Daniel keeps failing
54:43 Can there be a generic template for AI companies?
59:14 If everyone can build over a weekend, what are the moats?
1:06:08 Why crypto finally clicks for AI agents
1:12:32 The missing crypto product is distribution
1:14:57 Advice for builders experimenting with agents

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RESOURCES

Austen Allred
https://x.com/Austen

Kelly Claude
https://x.com/kellyclaudeai

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Not financial or tax advice. See our investment disclosures here:
https://www.bankless.com/disclosures

Markets are ripping back to all-time highs, but crypto still isn’t following suit.

Ryan and David break down the V-shaped recovery driven by Iran de-escalation, why Bitcoin is still stuck in range, and the growing bull vs bear divide across macro and onchain data. They also unpack Saylor’s STRC “money printer,” the World Liberty DeFi controversy, and the SEC’s surprise ruling that just gave DeFi a major win.

Plus: the Bitcoin community’s plan to freeze Satoshi’s coins and what it means for the future of the network.

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🦊 METAMASK | DOWNLOAD NOW

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🌐BRIX | EMERGING MARKET YIELD

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🎯THE DEFI REPORT | ONCHAIN INSIGHTS

https://thedefireport.io/bankless

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TIMESTAMPS & RESOURCES

0:00 Intro

2:04 Markets at ATHs / Iran De-Escalation

https://x.com/KobeissiLetter/status/2044507788961894462 

https://x.com/TheStalwart/status/2044045804596346931

https://x.com/KobeissiLetter/status/2041728989119529307

https://x.com/KobeissiLetter/status/2043285255931441306

https://x.com/KobeissiLetter/status/2043323635671179641

https://x.com/AndrewBeckUSA/status/2043136650478301245

https://x.com/zerohedge/status/2044426813544255859

https://x.com/KobeissiLetter/status/2044055049882476961

https://x.com/KobeissiLetter/status/2044435422944649651

https://polymarket.com/event/us-x-iran-permanent-peace-deal-by/?via=bankless?

https://x.com/RaoulGMI/status/2043832901121331527 

https://x.com/Matt_Hougan/status/2044095946334843168

https://x.com/JustDeauIt/status/2044127128296313079

https://x.com/benjamincowen/status/2044114246187851783

https://x.com/JoshKale/status/2044425507203166292

https://x.com/RyanSAdams/status/2044423401763127512

https://x.com/LizAnnSonders/status/2043664934559420916

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/UMCSENT

https://x.com/perry8888_/status/2044168141148655773

https://x.com/WatcherGuru/status/2044375033909264873

https://polymarket.com/event/how-many-fed-rate-cuts-in-2026/?via=bankless?

30:41 Saylor STRC / Bitcoin Bid & ETH Treasury Race (Tom Lee / Bitmine)

https://x.com/LynAldenContact/status/2043736183578972443

https://x.com/AdamBLiv/status/2043809798035255790

https://x.com/STRC_live/status/2044029951410635132

https://x.com/pythianism/status/2044425651890147507

https://x.com/nic_carter/status/2044461949895819559

https://x.com/AltcoinDaily/status/2044492873803116649 

https://x.com/fundstrat/status/2043683094914335191

https://www.strategicethreserve.xyz/

https://cointelegraph.com/news/ether-machine-spac-ethm-cancelled-dynamix-merger

https://x.com/CryptosR_Us/status/2044507049648697717

46:24 World Liberty Financial (FTX-style risk)

https://x.com/DefiIgnas/status/2042520040562639186

55:22 SEC DeFi Ruling (Bull Case) 

https://x.com/SECGov/status/2043739582273855635 

https://x.com/RyanSAdams/status/2043754533545746884

https://x.com/intangiblecoins/status/2043709926556492190

58:39 Bitcoin Quantum Plan (BIP-361)

https://x.com/BitcoinArchive/status/2044319025711255985

https://github.com/bitcoin/bips/blob/master/bip-0361.mediawiki

https://www.bip361.org/

https://x.com/lopp/status/2044406134178795748

1:02:53 Closing & Disclaimers

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Not financial or tax advice. See our investment disclosures here:

https://www.bankless.com/disclosures

Why has the dollar remained dominant despite rising debt, geopolitical strain, and growing challengers?

Barry Eichengreen joins Bankless to trace the history of global reserve currencies. From Spanish silver and the Byzantine solidus to sterling and the modern dollar, Barry explains the conditions that make a currency rise, endure, and eventually fall.

We explore fiscal discipline, rule of law, military power, gold, China, and crypto to understand what history suggests about the dollar’s future.

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🦊 METAMASK | DOWNLOAD NOW

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🏅BITGET TRADFI | TRADE GOLD WITH USDT

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🎯THE DEFI REPORT | ONCHAIN INSIGHTS

https://thedefireport.io/bankless

🌐BRIX | EMERGING MARKET YIELD

https://bankless.cc/brix

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TIMESTAMPS

0:00 Intro

5:11 Spanish Pieces of ape

14:58 Solidus

18:56 International Currency Status

29:32 The Fall of International Currencies

33:27 The Fall of The US Dollar

41:38 What’s Special about the Dollar?

47:39 Theoretical Currencies

51:09 US Dollar Dominance Consequences

59:39 When will the Dollar Fall?

1:03:09 US Dollar Competitors

1:08:32 Gold

1:14:08 Bitcoin & Crypto

1:18:23 Closing & Disclaimers

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RESOURCES

Barry Eichengreen

https://x.com/B_Eichengreen

Money Beyond Borders: Global Currencies from Croesus to Crypto

https://www.amazon.com/Money-Beyond-Borders-Currencies-Croesus/dp/0691280533 

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Not financial or tax advice. See our investment disclosures here:

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Has crypto already bottomed, or is more pain still ahead? Mike and Ryan break down the bull and bear case in full, from Bitcoin fair value and market structure to global liquidity, AI demand, and the macro risks still hanging over markets. Mike explains why he thinks the setup still looks more like a bear market than a new uptrend, even if the odds are close. It’s a sharp episode on how to navigate a market that could break either way.

Michael Nadeau & The DeFi Report:

https://x.com/JustDeauIt
https://thedefireport.io/bankless 

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BANKLESS SPONSOR TOOLS:

🔮POLYMARKET | #1 PREDICTION MARKET

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🪐GALAXYONE | SOLANA STAKING

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🦊 METAMASK | DOWNLOAD NOW

https://go.metamask.io/BL-Pod-Download 

🏅BITGET TRADFI | TRADE GOLD WITH USDT

https://bankless.cc/bitget

🎯THE DEFI REPORT | ONCHAIN INSIGHTS

https://thedefireport.io/bankless

🌐BRIX | EMERGING MARKET YIELD

https://bankless.cc/brix

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TIMESTAMPS

0:00 Intro

1:18 Understanding the crypto cycle

3:23 The wealth destruction phase

5:30 Defining the current market conditions

8:14 Reflecting on past market battles

11:15 The four-year cycle explained

13:19 The impact of liquidity cycles

17:12 Analyzing the S&P and market health

20:34 The bullish case for crypto

24:07 Exploring on-chain metrics

27:16 The bear case outlined

32:14 The difficulty of market navigation

44:26 Summarizing the bearish perspective

48:12 Market uncertainty

59:54 Closing & disclaimers

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Not financial or tax advice. See our investment disclosures here:

https://www.bankless.com/disclosures