Last week was marked by bitcoin’s resilience and worries about mining centralization. Fartcoin’s rise to an all-time high added an unexpected layer of humor.
This editorial is from last week’s edition of the Week in Review newsletter. Subscribe to the weekly newsletter to get the editorial the second it’s finished.
From Mining Centralization Worries to Fartcoin Frenzy
Does anyone remember that last week started with a sharp sell-off, resulting in $1.5 billion in liquidations? Since then, we’ve tested near the lows of that sell-off and bounced. If we test the lows and bounce again, I think the chances of moving higher are favorable.
I and a handful of my colleagues at Bitcoin.com attended Bitcoin MENA in Abu Dhabi this week. I came away with two major thoughts. First, bitcoin mining is an important focus right now due to centralization risks. A statistic stuck in my head from an interview with Alejandro De La Torre, cofounder of DEMAND and over ten years of experience in the bitcoin mining space, was that 80% of all Bitcoin blocks are created by just five entities. In another interview with the Editor-in-Chief of Bitcoin Magazine, Aaron van Wirdum, told me that he is currently focused on bringing attention to bitcoin mining as he believes it’s the most important issue right now. Both of those interviews were great, and will be coming soon!
Second, the institutional adoption of bitcoin is still just beginning. I interviewed Ralph Gebran of Onramp MENA, who impressed upon me the fact that it will take time and more tooling and expertise for these entities to deploy in any meaningful way. I also spoke with Eric Trump, whose mere presence demonstrates that wealthy and powerful people are entering the space, not just as speculators, but as believers.
Meanwhile, the Democrats and Biden administration appear to be ignoring the will of the American people, who clearly voted for change from what the Dems have been doing. Outgoing SEC chair Gary Gensler is orchestrating a last-minute push to cement aggressive crypto enforcement via secret promotions. Alexander Grieve, VP of Government Affairs at Paradigm, brought to my attention that Senate Democrats, led by Sherrod Brown and Elizabeth Warren, in an eleventh-hour backroom deal, temporarily added Senators Adam Schiff and Andy Kim to the Senate Banking Committee to secure votes for advancing controversial anti-crypto nominee Crenshaw.
The current Department of Justice is attempting to extradite Roger Ver from Spain on alleged crypto tax evasion from 2014, with a possible 109-year prison sentence. Roger, a polarizing figure in crypto due to his role in the Bitcoin Block War, has nevertheless been gathering supporters. Recently, he was on Tucker Carlson. Tucker is the latest, and biggest, personality to cover Ver’s predicament, which hinges on crypto tax laws that even today are nebulous at best.
Let’s end with some funny news – Fartcoin. Fartcoin, the second coin Truth Terminal talked about, outperformed Bitcoin this week. After plummeting more than 60% in 11 days, Fartcoin has fully recovered and hit all-time highs roughly 25% above the previous ATH. Even serious X accounts, like The Giver, have been buying Fartcoin: “I like that it doesn’t really fit into any theme. There’s also an inertia with how stupid it sounds & how upset Gen X / Boomers get when they see it.” He likes the farts, and who doesn’t for that matter?