WEEKLY - media censorship, 2025 predictions

also, favourite non-crypto books, movies, series from 2024

Hello everyone, and HAPPY NEW YEAR TO YOU ALL!!!

You’re reading the free weekly Crypto is Macro Now, where I reshare/update a couple of posts from the week, and include something from outside the crypto/macro sphere that is currently inspiring me (it’s a fascinating world out there).

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In this newsletter:

• Censorship resistance and the lens of accountability

• 2025 predictions

• Best of: 2024’s books, movies, series

Some of the topics discussed this week:

Monday, Dec 30

• The strength in narrative conflict

• Censorship resistance and the lens of accountability

Tuesday, Dec 31

• 2025 predictions

• Best of: 2024’s books, movies, series

Friday, Jan 3

• Tether and Rumble: what’s really going on?

• IBIT and pent-up BTC demand

Censorship resistance and the lens of accountability

The implosion of CoinDesk – one of the first media labels to exclusively focus on the emerging blockchain industry – is sad for the entire ecosystem, and for me personally.

I started researching and writing about Bitcoin and blockchain back in 2014, and in 2016 CoinDesk gave me my first “real” job in the sector. I began as a one-person newsletter team, and ended up creating and leading what I still think was the best research team in the industry at the time. In late 2021, I moved on, but stayed close to the people and the drama as the company searched for a saviour amidst the Genesis-triggered chaos at CoinDesk’s then owner, DCG. (Disclosure, I was Head of Market Insights for Genesis between July 2021 and September 2022.)

In November 2023, crypto exchange Bullish bought CoinDesk, promising to respect its editorial integrity and appointing Wall Street Journal veteran Matt Murray as head of an editorial committee.

It didn’t keep that promise. In early December, the editorial staff was forced to take down an innocuous article about Justin Sun (which you can read here – yes, it’s still circulating on syndicated websites) because the Tron founder was reportedly unhappy with the tone. Tron is a sponsor of CoinDesk’s Consensus conference series.

That was bad enough, and seems to have triggered Murray’s resignation as well as a collective plea in the form of an email from the newsroom to Bullish leadership to respect the journalists’ work and ethics.

In response, Bullish went a giant step further. To compound the injury, the crypto exchange then fired CoinDesk’s three most senior editors. And with that, it ended the reputation for impartiality and integrity that CoinDesk had worked hard to earn over the past 11 years.

Yes, CoinDesk made mistakes over the years. But what media site hasn’t? I can vouch that it was home to blue-blood journalists with unimpeachable integrity, as well as visionaries dazzled by what it could become. Crypto could use more of each.

Zooming out, this highlights an issue with media business models – generally, when the product clashes with revenue source, it’s obvious which would win. But in media, giving in to revenue prioritization means degrading the product, which could weaken future revenue. This is especially relevant in an increasingly competitive space.

Of course, independence plus a drive to uncover stories can be expensive, as CoinDesk found out when its reporting uncovered the fraud at FTX, leading to an industry implosion that hurt its own revenue stream, led to the bankruptcy of a sister company and damaged operations at its then parent. But that story, however painful, cleansed the hype and strengthened those still standing. Bad actors were held accountable. CoinDesk, since inception, has told stories that needed to be told. Confidence has been weakened that it will be able to continue doing so.

What’s more, without independence, media brands become souped-up marketing arms, undermining the reputation of the entire profession. This matters when reputation in turn drives the product. Consensus was interesting back in the day because of CoinDesk’s journalism, led by people who truly cared about the technology’s potential and the overlooked stories. The media arm’s reputation brought in the speakers and the attendees. Now, with conferences getting increasingly commoditized, what is Consensus’ value-add to the industry? And how can other media/conference businesses avoid being tarnished with the same brush?

We need to know that stories, even unpleasant ones, will be covered. We need whistleblowers to confide in high-integrity journalists, we need media sources with reach, we need trustworthy points of reference.

And when it comes to conferences, high-signal speakers and attendees need to feel they are not being used to boost a specific business whose “mission” is their bottom line.

This is especially the case in crypto, which struggles with its image as it is. Mainstream commentators have long accused the entire ecosystem of being “shady”, controlled by hype, in it only for the money. We need more independent voices.

It is especially jarring that Bullish chose to censor content at a website forged in an industry whose origin was censorship resistance.

The good people remaining at CoinDesk will probably not struggle much to find outlets eager to support their reputation and give their talent scope, especially now that high-impact blockchain-related news flow is likely to not just multiply in volume, but also increasingly cross over into mainstream consciousness. Maybe some will start independent newsletters, I hope so.

And who knows, maybe the CoinDesk brand can be revived by a sale to an entity willing to invest in its recovery – a mainstream media name, perhaps, although it would probably be cheaper to hire its top journalists and forget about the conference hassle.

For now, it looks like Bullish’s destruction of CoinDesk will go down as a case study of how industry doesn’t understand media – it sees it as a megaphone, rather than a lens of accountability.

And in the end, as long as this goes on, we all lose.

2025 predictions

In previous years, I’ve been reluctant to write out a list of predictions as they’ve always felt more like guesses given how young (yes, still) and therefore also fast-moving the industry is. This is especially true given what feels like a rapidly approaching inflection point for both regulation and development. Put differently, next year will see a lot of change, even more than usual, and it’s anyone’s guess as to its form and impact.

That said, I enjoy reading the lists of others, even if the following year it turns out that most are wrong. Venture investor Nic Carter bravely shared his 2024 predictions scorecard – he got around half right, which is actually pretty good. It’s also a reminder that even those of us who have been in the industry for a long time don’t have anything even close to a crystal ball.

So, it is in the spirit of list-shaped fun that I share my expectations for 2025, keeping it to 15 – and, this time next year, I hope I’m not excruciatingly embarrassed when it comes time to confess my lack of accuracy. Some of these may feel easy, but we’ve learnt that consensus expectations have a way of being yanked out from underneath us.

Still, here goes:

1) No Strategic Bitcoin Reserve. I’ve written before about why I don’t think it will happen: too complex for Congress to get behind, too controversial to get enough buy-in for the necessary investment of time and political capital, too low on the Administration’s priority list. Longer-term, this is good news – the concentration risk is real. Short-term, it could be that approval was priced in which will be unwound as hopes wane. But I sincerely doubt that conviction in this idea extends much beyond a handful of blinkered Bitcoin enthusiasts.

2) The US will hold on to most of its current BTC stash, as well as crypto assets seized in future law-enforcement operations. This removes a potential sell overhang, and could offer some valuation upside while setting a precedent for other countries to follow.

3) At least three more nation states will reveal holdings of BTC.

4) Stablecoin legislation is passed in the US. This is the “low hanging fruit” of crypto-related regulation, with the concepts relatively limited and widely understood. What’s more, it will allow participation from non-banks, and Tether will find a way to comply, paving the way to offering USDT issuance and redemption in the US.

5) At least one US bank will issue a stablecoin or a form of tokenized deposit either on or linked to a public blockchain.

6) A comprehensive crypto bill will be proposed and will possibly pass through the House, but will not get through the full approval process until 2026.

7) The ETH spot ETFs will be allowed to distribute staking rewards.

8) No other spot ETFs will be listed next year from the large tradfi houses. We could see some for LTC and others that are obviously not securities, but these will come from crypto-native players, and demand will be limited. For other assets, there are a lot of questions that need clearing up first: which are securities, which are commodities and who regulates the markets for the underlying assets? Is a lively derivatives market a pre-requisite? Is there enough institutional demand to warrant the attention of large tradfi ETF issuers?

9) The EU will decide to go ahead with the launch of a retail CBDC, even though there is no evidence consumers or commercial banks are on board with the idea.

10) We’ll start to see Russia and China use wholesale CBDCs for cross-border trade.

11) China will start to talk about a licensing regime for crypto exchanges.

12) Japan will allow the listing of crypto spot ETFs.

13) M&A will pick up as traditional financial institutions scramble to acquire blockchain talent for the trials and transformations that lie ahead. We’ll also see more prominent investment from legacy firms in blockchain startups, filling the gap left by VCs who are now playing in the AI sandbox. There will be a pickup in VC investment, but it will be a fraction of 2021-22 levels.

14) The NFT market will come back to life, but with less hype and more utility than in 2021.

15) BTC reaches $170,000, ETH touches $6,000.

Best of: 2024’s books, movies, series

Moving away from crypto, these were some of my favourite mind pursuits this year. The lists are by no means exclusive, I have to limit myself to three per category else I’d be here all day:

Books: non-fiction (outside of crypto)

• The Twilight Before the Storm – Victor Shvets

• Age of Revolutions – Fareed Zakaria

• Paper Soldiers – Saleha Mohsin

Books: fiction

• A Gentleman in Moscow – Amor Towles

• Karla’s Choice – Nick Harkaway

• What you are looking for is in the library – Michiko Aoyama

Movies (seen for the first time this year):

• The Hit Man

• Wolfs

• Paddington 2

Series:

• The Diplomat

• Slow Horses

• The Brothers Sun

HAVE A GREAT WEEKEND!

(in this section, I share stuff that has NOTHING to do with macro or crypto, ‘cos it’s the weekend and life is interesting)

People around the world celebrate many things over the year, but only one brings us together in universal agreement: the end of the year.

It’s humbling to realize that, today, virtually no religious holiday, national commemoration and public observance is met with uncontroversial and universal support, except one: New Years’ Eve.

It’s the only holiday that impacts everyone, everywhere, and while there are many, many different ways to acknowledge the big-number calendar shift, we can’t pretend it doesn’t happen, and we can’t deny there is generally some emotional reaction. Relief, regret, excitement, determination, frustration, gratitude, even awe – wherever we are in the world, whatever we are doing, whoever we’re with, when the clock strikes 12 on December 31st, we feel something.

That makes the New Years’ Eve celebration special. Whether you’re at home alone, toasting yourself, whether you’re at a large bash, or whether you’re working, you feel a connection with everyone in your time zone, all watching the same countdown. No political stance, no personal faith, no beef with local administrations changes the universality of the progress of time – we’re all in it together.

And I totally love sparkle and cheers and the idea of eyes looking up to the sky in appreciation. (My dog hates it, though, and spends the fireworks part crying in the kitchen, but even that has a poignant effect as the whole family’s attention then pivots to giving comfort.)

Reuters, as usual, has shared some spectacular images of the inauguration of 2025 from around the world.

We may not celebrate it at the same moment, as the earth’s rotation does its thing. But we are united in our recognition of a change that on the one hand is no more than a number, but on the other hand puts a new marker on our lives.

Bianca de Marchi – Sydney

Isabel Infantes – London

Evgenia Novozhenina – Moscow

Ahmed Saad – Baghdad

Florion Goga – Tirana

(These images and more can be seen here, on Reuters.)

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DISCLAIMER: I never give trading ideas, and NOTHING I say is investment advice! I hold some BTC, ETH and a tiny amount of some smaller tokens, but they’re all long-term holdings – I don’t trade.

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