Ep 54 - October 8, 2025 - Major crypto ETF wave has started
Welcome to another episode of the weekly crypto check-in recorded on 10/08/2025. I'm your host, Robert Swerthout. In general, my cohost, Andres Sanate. How's it going, Andres?
Andres Sandate:Good, Robert. It's good to see you. Hope the week is going well.
Robert Swarthout:Yeah. I am back in town. Was out of town last week, but back in town enjoying this admittedly beautiful weather we're having in Atlanta. Would like a little bit of rain. It's a little dry, but otherwise, it's been great.
Andres Sandate:Yeah. What's been happening in crypto from your your perch?
Robert Swarthout:You know, it's we we've been busy with a lot of different things in crypto, but in particular, the ETFs really seem to be taking off, and then we're gonna talk a lot about that here as we start.
Andres Sandate:Yeah.
Robert Swarthout:You know, it's we were just talking before we started recording, and I think what I find interesting about all this ETF news is a lot of it's happening right now with the government shutdown. And I assume the SEC would not be approving or doing anything, but maybe there's some kind of, like, auto, auto approval process that continues to run. I don't know. Well, maybe we have to dig in on that some other time to report back. But, so let's get started here.
Robert Swarthout:Our first topic is ETFs are getting staking, specifically the Ethereum ones. That's the ones we often talked about not having staking, but the Solana ones that are out there also are getting staking as of this last Monday, so two days ago. Kind of a big deal because it's it's it's the first crypto product that is publicly traded that has the has the ability to have yield, and that's what some people are really interested in. So Yeah. The, you know, four, five years ago, I don't know if
Andres Sandate:it was that far back, but there there was so much, craze in crypto around yield. And you saw all of these sponsors and issuers come to market selling high net worth investors and advisers around the idea of crypto yield. Mhmm. Is this another version of that same
Robert Swarthout:No. This this is different. That was yield farming. That's like you would add two assets into a pool, and there was, like, crazy percentages. You know, like, too good to be true type situation, and we saw a lot of those come flaming and crashing on the ground.
Robert Swarthout:I think that was Yeah. 2021, so when we're all locked in our houses during COVID.
Andres Sandate:Okay.
Robert Swarthout:Got it. But so this is specifically, you know, as part of the Ethereum blockchain or as part of Solana. If you couldn't put lockup value in the network, so you hold tokens, you can mark them as staked in some cases, and they they earn yield. So there's inflation built on the network because they're constantly creating more tokens to able to do this. But it does provide a yield that, you know, we went from zero to something.
Robert Swarthout:So and I don't know what the exact yield is. I think it fluctuates depending on how many people are staking. So so there is, I guess, the benefit to be a long term staker. You may end up with a higher reward as people get disinterested or interested in it. So it's but I I think we should point out, there's a couple different ways the yield could be received.
Robert Swarthout:Right? So for the e e ETF, so that's e t h e, that would be paid out directly. So that's gonna be in dollars back to the holders of those ETFs. But for the ETH and the GSOL, which is the Solana one by Grayscale, those rewards may be built into the share price of the fund over time. So you don't necessarily have to deal with I think it's probably more efficient from a tax perspective that it happens that way.
Robert Swarthout:I think it's what some people will like choosing that one for. So
Andres Sandate:You think that there's a who's gonna educate? I'm curious about the advisers. Who's gonna educate the advisers around all this in in in terms of these crypto Mhmm. ETF issuers?
Robert Swarthout:I don't know, man. Like, crypto's already hard enough, and then you're adding this layer in on top of it. It crypto's moving quite quickly, and I appreciate that. But to your point, education's a challenge already, and it's only gonna get more difficult. I think what happens over time is you're gonna see people not holding specific token ETFs.
Robert Swarthout:Right? You're not gonna have just a Bitcoin. You're not gonna have just an Ethereum. You're not gonna have just XRP or whatever. You're gonna be holding an index of some type, which admittedly is our, one of our next topics.
Robert Swarthout:But, like, it's I think because you just need to kind of abstract all that away from the user. They just need to know that I'm holding the top 15 or whatever it is, And, you know, they they watch the price go up or down in their in their brokerage account. Mhmm.
Andres Sandate:I think Yeah.
Robert Swarthout:Because it's not like people care about the taxation of underlying assets and ETFs now for the alternatives. Like, I mean, maybe some people do, but most people don't even think no to ask the question. Right. So Yeah. I I I think to your point, it's we may care about it because we just talk about it as news, but I think long term, it's something that most people will never ever consider.
Robert Swarthout:So Mhmm. Yep. So our second topic is kind of this we we kinda just hinted at it, but multi asset ETF. So we're quickly seeing and there's already one trading out there, the top five crypto index. So that's the top five biggest tokens subtracting away stablecoins.
Robert Swarthout:And that that's cool. Over time, it's not gonna be five. I know Bitwise, I believe, has a product they see that is top 10 or 15, something like that coming soon. Even that, I don't think really cuts it. But right now, there's too many crappy, tokens out there that could end up in an ETF, in my opinion.
Robert Swarthout:So it's kinda like it cuts both ways. But over time, I think you end up with a broad market index one, or, you know, maybe even vertical specific. You know? We're we're all about utility tokens. So maybe there ends up being a utility token one or one that's all about meme coins or whatever.
Robert Swarthout:I think we're barely scratching the surface of what ETFs will be. But the, you know then you blend in, and this is the topic of the second point, multi asset. So not just crypto. So there's a there's a Cyber Hornet is the sponsor. They have an S and P 500 plus Ethereum or an S and P 500 plus Solana or an S and P 500 plus XRP.
Robert Swarthout:They file for three different ones, and they've got their own tickers. I don't think they're quite active yet. It looks like they think they may go active in December, but it just seems like an interesting mix. I I don't know why you would choose the S and P 500, which is a huge overload of the economy with one crypto, but who knows? And they do have the percentages.
Robert Swarthout:The S and P 500 will make up 75% of that, and 25 will be whatever respective token, the the one you're looking at. So
Andres Sandate:Yeah. We are product, I guess there's this product craze that's happening right now now that their regulators have, made the approval and at least the formation process for these index products, easier. Yeah. You'd you know, going back to what you said about the, you know, the the composition of these exchange traded products, and it is now I believe you said there's there's a product out there where you can have five of the largest, tokens minus, you know, stablecoins, then maybe we go to 10 and maybe we go to 20 Right. Etcetera over time.
Andres Sandate:But, yeah, it makes it it really begs the question as you we have seen with the the stock market where you you have day trading and you have the meme coins and or the meme stocks, you know, where they can become quite popular quite quickly. Mhmm. And it doesn't, you know, it doesn't mean that they're bad, holdings or or or securities, but it does, you know, beg the question, is there gonna have to be an active management component to some of these exchange traded products so that you don't end up with, you know, fartcoin in your utility index just because a bunch of people went and bought it?
Robert Swarthout:Right. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. I there there's a lot of questions here and not tons of answers immediately.
Robert Swarthout:Yeah. But they you know? But even, like, another example of a multi asset one is the S and P. And I guess it's S and P Group. I'm not quite sure what that exactly means, but they they're launching an ETF that is a crypto index consisting of 15 cryptocurrencies, I assume, by market cap, with 35 crypto related stocks.
Robert Swarthout:First of all, I didn't realize there was 35 crypto related stocks. That's the part that surprised me of this headline. I guess maybe there's some, you know, maybe some liners or some ancillary things out there that kinda got put in this group. But, you know, you're starting to get, like, a I wouldn't call it an S and P 500 because I don't believe that's the right thing to call this thing, but, like, that of crypto. They're that they're trying at least.
Robert Swarthout:So with what what they have, been given so far. So
Andres Sandate:Yeah. Lot of innovation, lot of product.
Robert Swarthout:Right. And then and then, you know, he go even further, which is gonna be our our third topic, and you have GraniteShares, a different issuer, out there launching for Bitcoin, Ether, Solana, and XRP, a three x long and three x short ETFs. Like, crypto is volatile enough to think that we need a three x. But, I mean, there's already two x, but, like, to think a three x is, like, what the market needs. There's there's some literally some out there that are probably just, like, foaming at the mouth or something like this.
Andres Sandate:So They're definitely day trading and or highly highly speculative, positions where you could be wiped out or could have big returns in a single day. These are not generally products, you know, and I think these disclosures are all over these prospectuses. Typically, when you see these three times leveraged, you know, whatever publicly traded company, they typically say they're not really for long term.
Robert Swarthout:Well, because they reset each day. Right? So it's like it's like hold it. I mean, you you get a reset each day, which isn't exactly helpful.
Andres Sandate:So Yeah. So it requires a lot more active management and time and, understanding. So Mhmm. Yeah. But there is there is probably like you said, there's an audience out there, who are looking for ways to express the risk and view, in a very, very, you know, unique and different way.
Andres Sandate:So you have to think there's an asset management firm that is gonna build that product if if they feel like there's an audience to support it, it can break even.
Robert Swarthout:Yeah. Absolutely. So I believe our last topic about ETFs, which is gonna basically consist of half the show today, is about ETFs. And, basically, this the the launching of many of them are waiting on the government shutdown. The government's been shut down, what, for almost a week now?
Robert Swarthout:I don't know quite the number of days, but it's a good number of days. And the SEC must be on on hold effectively. I saw somebody compare the this to a rain delay to baseball game. So it's not like it's not gonna happen. It's just gonna happen later.
Robert Swarthout:And but but, I guess, the point of bringing this up is is, you know, these things are coming so rapid fire. It kinda gave us a chance to slow down and look at and kind of do a little bit of research on fees, which, you know, the Bitcoin ETFs where it was a race to the bottom effect. I mean, you have I think it's the BlackRock one or maybe in the first place or something, but, like, down there at, like, 20 basis points in fees. But so there's a Litecoin in an HBAR ETF waiting to get approved, and they're gonna be at 95 basis points, which I was like, okay. You know, a little more esoteric out on their reservation there.
Robert Swarthout:But, yeah, they're apparently waiting on this approvals. I don't know if for the fees, but but from the SEC. So I imagine Grayscale still leads the pack with the highest fees when when possible. Those are
Andres Sandate:high fees by adviser standards for an ETF product. I mean, those those are starting to get into the territory of what you'd historically would have paid for a mutual fund and even some alternative asset managers have brought their fees down from a traditional two and twenty to, you know, now a 100 basis points or 1%. So advisers and and buyers, as they've gotten more experienced looking at nontraditional strategies and products have put pressure. And part of it is just the innovation and or the copycat aspect of Wall Street when, you know, somebody starts raising a lot of assets. The one that comes to mind is Blackstone's, you know, BREIT.
Andres Sandate:When they, you know, decided to really go all in, with their push into retail and created BREIT, you know, the one of the the many things that they did beyond just being a a very large, successful, historically respected franchise is they brought the fees for non traded REITs down substantially, and that put tons of pressure on everybody that had a product and or was thinking about bringing a product to either match it or be competitive, because there are a lot of folks out there that do, you know, make the investment on fees as one of
Robert Swarthout:the real
Andres Sandate:important criteria when in the end, you know, if you're paying an extra fifteen, twenty basis points, but you get really great performance, I think a lot of people would say it's it's it's worth it. But, yeah, 95 basis points, today in an ETF definitely puts them on the high end, but it is an emerging new space, asset class, etcetera. So maybe they would make the argument there's a lot more costs in running the product. You have to think those are gonna come down over time, particularly if they gather assets.
Robert Swarthout:Right. You know, and you you can contrast this with if you're if say you wanted to buy the HBAR ETF once it launches. Well, you could go to Coinbase. You could go to Kraken. You could buy those.
Robert Swarthout:But as a retail trader, you're likely paying over 1% in those exchanges to for the right to buy them. Right? So, yes. And it's not you know, it's a one time thing versus ongoing with these ETFs, but it's you know, I I don't know. It's long term interesting to see where these fees go.
Robert Swarthout:I would assume they go approach zero, but I think we're a good ways away from that for most of these. Yeah.
Andres Sandate:I think there's some runway for the manufacturers. Right? The whole the the whole industry is short of, you know, I think education. When I say the whole industry, I mean, the the buyer, right, the adviser and investor short around education. Most advisers still are pretty gun shy when you think about, are they recommending crypto?
Andres Sandate:If if if they are, it's generally been, you know, around the Bitcoin ETFs. I think that's gonna evolve over the coming years for a variety of different reasons, but I think fees will, come down more slowly. The the margins are always protected as long as they possibly can be. Oh, a 100%.
Robert Swarthout:Yeah. That is true. So moving on, our next topic is one that I got excited about, but it seemed like no one else was paying attention to. So BNY, obviously, the oldest bank in the country, the biggest custodian in the country by far, announced that they're exploring tokenized deposits with blockchain payments. Okay.
Robert Swarthout:I've done enough research over the years to know that this is not the first time they've been thinking about this. They've been thinking about practicing on this for years. This is the first time they're talking publicly about it. And, you know, it's not like they're they're gonna be like, tomorrow decide this is not a thing. This is happening.
Robert Swarthout:And this is like you know, when the biggest custodian, again, when the oldest bank decides to do it, everyone else is gonna follow suit. This is, one of the I guess, if I had made a list, in the past, the things in the future I wanted to see to kind of validate crypto was happening, this would have been on the list. This would have high on the list, and we, are now there. So this was a big deal.
Andres Sandate:We'll play this out for the, you know, the listener adviser everyday individual who let's say they, you know, they have deposits at a traditional brokerage firm or money center bank, one of the big, you know, one of the big major too big to fail banks. When we when we read this headline about the bank or the financial institution tokenizing deposits, so they're they're looking at, you know, short term deposits, you know, the equivalent of somebody's checking account.
Robert Swarthout:Right.
Andres Sandate:And they're gonna do when they when they say they're gonna tokenize them, talk to talk to the audience about what that looks like from a technology perspective.
Robert Swarthout:I I think it can mean, you know, maybe a handful of different things, but the two big ones, I believe, are in some ways, you know, if you have a brokerage account, you're gonna if you have deposits there, so if you have cash effectively, it'll turn into a function of stable coin, and then you could, you know, move that in or out of there $24.07, $3.65. You start to BNY's old school bank starts to act like a crypto exchange in some sense. Right? And, you know, BNY is very much leading the charge in a lot of things. They are the custodian for Ripple's stablecoin.
Robert Swarthout:So they they house all that cash and cash treasuries and stuff like that. But so that's one. And the other one is just like, over time, you know, the other things they custodian, so whether it's stocks and different things, those will become tokenized too, and those will able to go $24.07, $3.65 in and out, seeing transfer. So we almost live in a world where you don't think about the time anymore. Right now, you might think about, oh my gosh.
Robert Swarthout:Is it 04:00? Can I get a wire done? Right? Wires will bleed past that right now, but only in the last couple years, that's really been a thing, at least at least on, weekdays. If it bleeds in the weekend, you might as well just you wait till Monday.
Robert Swarthout:But it's a it's a world that, doesn't sleep, good or bad. And I think initially, it may be scary for some people, and the new cycles will change and different things. But I think, generally, this is a a huge step forward in making money more portable. The skeptic in
Andres Sandate:me would say the person who's, you know, 70, 80 years old, has, money at BNY, gets a notice in the mail. They still get snail mail. They don't have you know, they don't use Internet. They don't use email much. And they get an email saying, mister and missus, you know, Jones, we've tokenized your $4,000,000 in your account.
Andres Sandate:Like, I think that person has a different reaction than
Robert Swarthout:the
Andres Sandate:person who has been doing crypto on Coinbase. And so but most of the assets are with the 70 year old mister, missus Jones. So how do you envision these firms rolling out this technological change?
Robert Swarthout:Meaning, they they can roll it out. It doesn't mean that mister and missus She owns need to do anything about it or do anything with it. Right? They can continue to write checks assuming somebody likes to take checks or they can use their debit card or whatever it may be. I I I think that banks are smart enough to realize they can't force technology down, people's throats to the point where, like, it would make them want to move their deposits elsewhere.
Robert Swarthout:They may try heavy with marketing, but at the end of the day, people don't have to do it. And, again, tokenized deposits are a very fundamental building block. That doesn't really mean that, a, again, mister and mister Jones are gonna use it, but it would allows other people to do other things on top of that. And I think that is the exciting part that, again, mister and mister Jones won't care about. They won't understand it.
Robert Swarthout:But at the end of the day, it's again, it is kind of like that first building block, much like stablecoin legislation was for from a regulation standpoint.
Andres Sandate:Yeah. And it's only when we have a, I guess, a financial crisis or a run on the bank or we have a bank failure where we realize how interconnected all of the financial institutions and, in many cases, markets are.
Robert Swarthout:Right.
Andres Sandate:And so it could be more of a technological advancement than it is a practical advancement for most consumers and most, you know, depositors.
Robert Swarthout:Yeah. And I I think get this exact number offhand, but you just mentioned the financial crisis that made me think. There was a study done by people that understand under deeply understood the financial crisis after the fact and people that understood blockchain. They kinda had this, like, panel. And they talked about had the blockchain been in place and been used in a widespread, you know, I guess, perspective during that time, there's a very good chance that Lehman would've gone under, but we would not have had a financial crisis because we would have known all the liabilities and he was touched.
Robert Swarthout:There was so much assumptions going on and so much, I guess, over assumptions that it kinda turned into this, you know, the GFC that it was, and it didn't necessarily need to be that much. So maybe in the future, we can kind of, prevent something like that from happening because we have more visibility and blockchain will allow that. Or you can say, if we ever get to that point in blockchain, we're really screwed. Like, it it got really bad. So
Andres Sandate:Well, there's no doubt about that these bigger institutions, you know, BNY and and, you know, the next headline is Vanguard, Zyme Crypto. So these are big, you know, household names. They're the stalwarts of the financial services industry, from the standpoint of custody, banking, asset management, insurance, all of the above. And, clearly, they all are very much, and like you said at the opening with this last headline, like, they've been deep in doing tokenization at their firms. Think now and we continue to talk about this still, the regulation and the clarity from, you know, the the the government and the legislators around being able to bring this out to customers and or, you know, their their operating and technological infrastructure.
Robert Swarthout:Correct. Yeah. And it's, you know, it's just you know, there's weeks where it feels like, oh my gosh. We moved two years into the future, and other times, it slows down. But right now, there's a lot of these weeks that are two years into the future, it seems.
Andres Sandate:Yeah.
Robert Swarthout:Or or or we've been waiting so long. It seems like we finally got what we're asking for or the start of it that it feels like a big big win, and, I guess, at some level of this. So
Andres Sandate:Well, Vanguard is is obviously a household name, like I said, when it comes to retirement. So for advisers and people, you know, listening that, you know, that is not a name that most of them wouldn't be familiar with. But I remember a year ago when we talked about Vanguard, they had come out the leadership said, you know, we're not doing anything crypto at this point. That looks like it might be changing.
Robert Swarthout:Yes. And that with an asterisk, I suppose. So it sounds like they're eyeing allowing crypto ETFs on their brokerage on their brokerage platform, probably not in retirement accounts. I think it's the line you're gonna see first from them. And then I would imagine they start to see the ability to make money off this, and then everyone gets it because they they are, again, you know, a business looking to make money.
Robert Swarthout:But it's a I figured Vanguard was gonna be the last one of all the major ones, and they're gonna be pulled into this kicking and screaming. But may maybe they're not gonna be the last one. They're be close to the last one. So we'll see.
Andres Sandate:Yeah. Yeah. It makes sense that they would start with the brokerage accounts because there's just a lot less risk there. I think as advisers, whether they're, you know, brokers or they're fiduciary advisers, you know, that line is blurred a lot. But I think that's where a lot of firms from a compliance perspective, I think, still have a lot of work to do around getting comfortable and therefore giving the green light to their advisers to go and recommend strategies.
Andres Sandate:And I think that's one of the reasons why, you know, BlackRock and some of the other bigger firms have reported on the hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars held away from, you know, these, brokerage and advisory firms because they won't, you know, support crypto yet. So I think a lot of that, like you said, is gonna come down to business decisions once there's regulation, and those firms are gonna bring those assets back under the umbrella
Robert Swarthout:Mhmm.
Andres Sandate:So they can bill on them and, and advise on them. So, yeah, I I I wouldn't be surprised if it starts a brokerage and then eventually makes its way to retirement.
Robert Swarthout:Yeah. And I think you made this point a couple episodes ago. Even if, say, Vanguard flipped the switch tomorrow, it's all the trustees and everything of, four one k plans. They're gonna have to basically be willing to turn it on too. So it's not like we we're multiple steps away from it showing up in somebody's as a Vanguard option in somebody's retirement account.
Andres Sandate:Yeah. So
Robert Swarthout:Yeah. Yep. So I guess a a a thread that kind of ties that last one to this one, again, is regulation. So real estate tokenization is something that I have long thought made total sense, and I've used it as an example when I'm talking to people about crypto about how we can change things. And Robinhood CEO was on Bloomberg recently and said, the quote is real estate tokenization is a freight train.
Robert Swarthout:We figured out how to do it. We're waiting on regulations. I I didn't expect it to come from him. I'll say that upfront. But, yeah, I guess, with it as a tech company, you can be in any business you wanna be if if you're, passionate about it.
Robert Swarthout:So it's a I'd be interested to see how quickly this comes to be after regulation, you know, assuming we get it this fall. There was some progress made, then, obviously, the government shutdown has not helped that. But it's a it it could be an exciting fall just due to, like, regulation and then allowing tokenization, stuff that's nonmonetary, just to kinda allow the system to grow a little bit. So
Andres Sandate:Yeah. I was having coffee earlier this week with a self directed IRA custodian. And one of the things that person told me that they went to their manager and very seasoned executive, been in the financial services industry twenty five, thirty years, and said, what is our company doing around tokenization? And they they do self custody for individuals who have, an IRA. Maybe it's been held at one of the major custodians like a Schwab or Fidelity.
Andres Sandate:Well, they wanna go invest in crypto and or oil and gas or real estate, and they can't do that at some of these custodians because those assets are not on an approved list or they're not they're not approved for various reasons. So they have to go open up if they wanna use qualified money, meaning retirement money, they have to go open up a self directed account, giving them a lot more flexibility around where they put that money. And he said when he asked the question of management, and I'll keep them nameless, what are we doing in tokenization? He said he got a blank stare. And for somebody that's in custody, to your point, and competing with BNY and competing with, you know, these major, top 10 custodians, the, you know, the idea that, these firms are not yet or are, you know, unfamiliar with with why tokenization matters, I think you're gonna get left behind.
Andres Sandate:And that was his implication was we we need to have a business strategy because all of our customers are gonna wanna know that their securities or limited partnership interests or what have you when it comes to these illiquid assets can be and are tokenized.
Robert Swarthout:Right. Absolutely.
Andres Sandate:Yeah. Yeah.
Robert Swarthout:It's you know? And and people obviously have they're in positions of decision making at some of these bigger institutions, but they also have personal beliefs that could be clouding or not clouding, the judgments for a much bigger group of people, which is just you know, it's gotta play out as human nature, but, makes it more challenging. So
Andres Sandate:Yeah. Yeah. A lot lot to come around tokenization. It's been something that's popped up a lot more frequently, I feel like, this year in '25. And I think a lot of that is obviously due to the conversations and some of the progress that's been made around, around regulation, but, you know, more to go.
Robert Swarthout:Absolutely. So I guess as a, I guess, a tangent to, regulation, so the SEC, issued a no action letter as our next topic on, crypto custody, specifically saying, the letter stating that investment advisers can use state chartered trust companies as qualified custodians for crypto assets. It used to have to be at at a national level. This is a big deal because it it gives more flexibility for, you know, things to develop. And, know, some states, Wyoming, New York, other places have got some decent, rules in place, to be, I guess, utilized in this case.
Robert Swarthout:So cool to see the SEC trying to get out of the way a little bit.
Andres Sandate:Yeah. And this this very same coffee meeting, one of the topics that came up that I thought was pretty unique was this, custodian is launching its own trust company. And they are very pro crypto and digital asset from the standpoint of some of the custodians in their space have been more reluctant, to embrace, custody of crypto and other digital assets. This particular firm is not only receptive to it, but they're also going forward, with with creating a trust company. And so for me as an adviser, when I think about individuals who have their assets, you know, in a retirement account, they've retired from a company, and they're looking for ways to diversify beyond just the, you know, handful of mutual funds or handful of, you know, target date retirement funds that are available to them because those are the big names that have been approved by their record keepers and by their four zero one k administrators.
Andres Sandate:Like, when they want more agency. Mhmm. And they learn about what are their options with respect to self directed custody or they're an entrepreneur business owner and they open a solo four zero one k, like, I'm I'm trying to educate them around how do you use the, you know, the options at your disposal around self directed and four zero one k, self custody. And, you know, to me, this headline, like, allowing, you know, these custodians to embrace other asset classes like like crypto, I think, is a sign of progress. Yep.
Robert Swarthout:Yeah. I agree. So move on to our last topic here. The this is we don't have tons to talk about here, but the SWIFT, the organization that runs the wire system around the world Mhmm. That's, you know, a lot of crypto likes to make fun of and put you know, it is effectively trying to replace in many cases, announced that they're doing a blockchain initiative.
Robert Swarthout:What I found kind of just ironic about this is for years, they said that blockchain wasn't gonna do anything. And then they kind of added it as as an option to do funding, but kinda not as a great way. But in this case, they said they're doing it with consensus, which is part of Ethereum or kind of, I guess, is the is the business around Ethereum. I you know, I there's probably about four or five other blockchains you could have picked that would be better than Ethereum if you're gonna deal with payments, especially the volume that they do it. So I don't know what this is.
Robert Swarthout:I did see that Brad from Ripple said that this felt more like a marketing stunt than actual, like, initiative. So, you know, obviously, he has a vested interest in believing so, but it's interesting to kinda see it happen. And they announced at the week that they're doing their own, like, I guess, developer conference of sorts. So I don't know. It's I I want to see Swift kind of figure out how to evolve because I think it's important for the world.
Robert Swarthout:It doesn't need to just all a go away one day because I think that would be a very rough day unless it was gradual over time. But we can it's well to stay on the sidelines and watch this one play out. So
Andres Sandate:Well, what's what what grabbed my attention about this one was just the number of institutions worldwide who rely on the system for sending, you know, payment, like and and institutions and individuals who rely on the system to receive payments. So you just assume you wake up every day, at least in The United States, and think, oh, okay. I'm gonna send a wire or I'm gonna receive a wire. Like, everything is working in the background when we know that the technology and the infrastructure behind it, you know, every year wires are lost and funds are funds are are delayed. And, and so it's it's long overdue.
Andres Sandate:Right? I don't wanna out over overstep the comment, but, like, I think it's viewed by people in technology within blockchain that it's overdue for an upgrade. And there's a lot of opportunity to say the least, in terms of improving funds that are unaccounted for, lost, you know, sent in mistake, etcetera. So I I think, yeah, I I think it's the number of institutions and the size of institutions and the number of people that impacts to me that this one's gonna come up again. It'll be interesting to see how far they go Mhmm.
Robert Swarthout:And if
Andres Sandate:it is a marketing stunt or they're real serious about, you know Right. This partnership with consensus or somebody else.
Robert Swarthout:Exactly. Awesome. I think that's a wrap. So thanks for joining us on this episode of the weekly crypto check-in. To stay updated on future episodes, you can find us in any podcast player by searching T Time Crypto Capital or the weekly crypto check-in.
Robert Swarthout:Take care.
Disclaimer:The information presented in this podcast is for educational, informational, and entertainment purposes only and does not constitute financial investment, trading, or any other advice. The content provided is general in nature and not tailored to any individual specific circumstances. Always conduct your own due diligence and consult with a professional financial adviser before making any investment decisions. Cryptocurrency trading involves significant risks, including, but not limited to, the potential for loss of all or a portion of your investment market volatility and regulatory uncertainty. The host, guests, and producers of this podcast are not responsible for any decisions or actions taken based on the information discussed herein.
Disclaimer:Cryptocurrency is not legal tender in many jurisdictions and is subject to market risks. Past performance does not guarantee future results. This podcast does not endorse or guarantee any investment outcomes or results. Use of this podcast implies your acceptance of this disclaimer.
Creators and Guests
