Michael

[Riley Coyote @RileyRalmuto]

this is simultaneously the funniest and most absurdly niche video I've watched in a long, long time.

hahahaha bro, God dang I'm still laughing way too hard.

"becuh thehh stooooooped. because thehh so stoooooopeddd that they akshullee smahht 😌

🫳....dah make sen guys? dah make sen? 🫳..."

lololol

absolute S tier professor Jiang impression.
absolute S tier content.

it actually *might* be a better Jiang Xueqin than Jiang Xueqin himself could even do. truly.

[asparagoid @asparagoid]

2026 is the year I undo all the damage “Powerlifting” and Mark Rippetoe did to me

No man has harmed more young men than Mark. He turned a whole generation of men into fat unaesthetic >30% bodyfat human pears with huge asses and wide birthing hips

He is going to hell

[Bob Loukas 🗽 @BobLoukas]

The singularity is approaching and I’m still using Gmail to transfer files from my phone to PC.

[John Loeber 🎢 @johnloeber]

https://t.co/zAdYyDTjMV

[Parker @TheOtherParker_]

This was the highest volume day on $IBIT, ever, by a factor of nearly 2x, trading $10.7B today. Additionally, roughly $900M in options premiums were traded today, also the highest ever for IBIT. Given these facts and the way $BTC and $SOL traded down in lockstep today (normally SOL trades with beta) + the relatively lower liquidations on CeFi exchanges, this leads me to believe that the nexus of the problem lies with a large IBIT holder. IBIT has become the #1 venue for BTC options trading, so my guess is that a hedge fund trading IBIT options is the culprit.

If you look at the 13F filings for IBIT (I like whalewisdom dot com), you'll find a number of interesting names that have the majority of their fund in IBIT. In fact, there are a few in there (not naming names) that have 100% of their fund in IBIT, which likely means no cross margin. In fact, the biggest reason to set up a fund to hold a single asset would be to isolate margin, so that if the trade blew up, the brokers wouldn't have claim to any other assets.

Interestingly, most of these giant, single asset funds are based in HK.

We know that Asian traders, particularly in China, have been deeply involved in the Silver and Gold trade. Silver was down 20% today, which was the 2nd largest 1 day move in a very long time (largest on Jan 30). We also know that the JPY carry trade has been unwinding at an increasingly rapid pace.

This leads me to think that the culprit for the IBIT blowup today was 1 or more HK-based non-crypto hedge funds. As @FranklinBi pointed out, the fund(s) being non-crypto would explain why no one sniffed them out. They would likely have few/no crypto counterparties, meaning complete isolation from CT.

The last small piece of evidence I have is that I personally know a number of HK-based hedge funds that are holders of $DFDV, which had the worst single down day ever, with a meaningful mNAV decline. The mNAV had been holding steady surprisingly well throughout this pull back until today. One of these fund(s) could have been connected to the IBIT culprit, as I highly doubt a fund taking that large of a position in IBIT and using a single entity structure would only have the one fund.

Now, I could easily see how the fund(s) could have been running a levered options trade on IBIT (think way OTM calls = ultra high gamma) with borrowed capital in JPY. Oct 10th could very well have blown a hole in their balance sheet, that they tried to win back by adding leverage waiting for the "obvious" rebound. As that led to increased losses, coupled with increased funding costs in JPY, I could see how the fund(s) would have gotten more desperate and hopped on the Silver trade. When that blew up, things got dire and this last push in BTC finished them off.

I have no hard evidence here, just some hunches and bread crumbs, but it does seem very plausible. Let's see if some more concrete evidence floats to the surface here soon. The smoking gun will be a large fund fitting this profile filing a 13F showing a giant IBIT holding going to zero. Unfortunately, if a fund had their IBIT position liquidated today, they wouldn't have to disclose the position change until 45 days after the quarter end, so we'd be looking at mid May for the smoking gun from 13F filings most likely.

Hopefully some of you out there with too much time on your hands this weekend can snoop around more. My guess is that word will start to get out, because something of this size is just too hard to hide. Additionally, if the broker was not able to liquidate the fund in time, the broker may have a hole in their balance sheet, which would be even more difficult to hide.

[Ping @DegenPing]

One day, not too long from now, the anons of crypto twitter will disappear one by one until your feed is nothing but bots and scams. A deserted island once populated with endless entertainment. One will wonder, was it all just a dream?

[owen cyclops @owenbroadcast]

uncarved out niche in weird health internet is spicy pepper maxxing. there is no ‘capsaicin mindset’ or ‘capsaicin bro’ account. perhaps this is me.

[goodalexander @goodalexander]

rant (stablecoin hypergambling AI police state supercycle)

[Michael @asphosf]

@TheCryptoNexus If colder climate or AC/temp control is available, recommend St Geneve Embassy and Sferra Giza 45 Luxe.

[𝐄𝐟𝐟𝐢𝐜𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐌𝐚𝐫𝐤𝐞𝐭 𝐇𝐲𝐩𝐞 @EffMktHype]

"Mommy, how did we get so rich?"

"Your dad kept betting that nothing ever happens"

[Heart @heart_]

nobody is atheist at 50x leverage

[Galois Kevin @Galois_Capital]

The US strategy right now is to make deals with allies and then approach China together for leverage in negotiations. The issue is that China’s response is to do the same thing, gather allies and isolate the US as we are seeing with the Spain headline and the EVs in the EU headline.

Ironically, this gives other countries the ability to play both sides to get the most out of their own deals. Of course, there is a limit to this because if the US and China both believe other countries are being too extractive, they can just do a deal with each other and leave everyone else hanging.

In my view, this last outcome has a meaningful chance because 1) US-China PvP hurts both countries and benefits other countries, 2) high US tariffs on China but low tariffs on other countries means these other countries can extract rents by serving as passthroughs for Chinese goods to the US and 3) in the long run, but not short run, the US and China have the same objective which is to have China export more services and less goods and import more goods as the US gives up some of its exorbitant privilege as the hegemon with the reserve asset.

It was always the plan of the Chinese to let some of their people get rich first and then others can get rich later. This happens when China finally allows the Yuan to appreciate. Similarly, the US is looking for a way to get out of the Triffin Dilemma. The only issue is timing. China would prefer to wait because they cannot transition out of their heavy infrastructure for manufacturing overnight and they are facing deflation right now. The US prefers to pull things forward in time because debt refi is heavy for 2025 and to have more negotiating power in the new global order before China gets stronger and has more relative say.

I think Putin is right that the US is 15 years too late to prevent the rise of China. But 15 more years from now, if the US carried on with business as usual, then the US wouldn’t even have a good negotiating position in the new global order. So better to press the issue now than later.

Speaking of Russia, in the long game, China’s neighboring countries are natural allies to the US pole due to imperialism fears. China rightly reassures the world that it does not seek domination or expansion. This is partially believable because China has historically been more concerned with domestic affairs than international affairs. This is also partially unbelievable because, historically, all hemispheric hegemons have been imperialistic.

When it comes to Ukraine being unwilling to sign the minerals deal, the US must be willing to or at least seem willing to, at some breaking point, make a minerals deal with Russia directly and then abandon Europe to its fate. When the US and Russia burn money and resources in this war while Ukraine suffers devastation, who benefits? The EU and China.

When it comes to Nixonian madman (or Nixonian madlad as I call it) strategy, you have to thread the needle very carefully. If you underplay it, no one will believe you and your bluffs will get called every time. It’s also less effective because there is already a name for this strategy. If you are too convincing, everyone gets scared and starts selling off all your assets and asking for their gold back. This is why it’s good to have a diverse mix of doves and hawks in the admin. You need some reasonable people and you need some John Boltons.

tldr: It’s basically FFA Starcraft or Civ.

[peepeepoopoo @DeepDishEnjoyer]

it just died? the dollar as the reserve currency died?

[Peter Harrell @petereharrell]

Breaking down the biggest tariff increase since 1930, which Trump announced this afternoon. (Also likely the largest tax increase of *any kind* in modern U.S. history).

1. Most US imports, with a number of exceptions that I'll come to, will be subject to *substantial* new tariffs. This includes a new 10% "universal" tariff on almost all imports. For 60 named countries there is also a new "discounted reciprocal rate" that Trump specified for each of the 60. For example, for Vietnam the "discounted reciprocal rate" is 46%. For the UK, it is 10%. It appears that the "reciprocal rates" in the charts Trump published *include* the 10% universal tariff. Trump has not released whatever math went into the reciprocal tariff calculations, but the Administration previously said the calculation would include foreign tariffs, non-tariff barriers, and value-added taxes.

2. 10% applies to all imports starting Saturday (April 5). "Reciprocal" rates kick in April 9.

3. The new tariffs are generally additive on top of existing tariffs, such as U.S. MFN tariffs. Many Chinese products, for example, will now be subject to a 25% Section 301 tariff, 20% "fentanyl" tariffs; and now a 34% "discounted reciprocal tariff," plus whatever the US MFN rate is. E.g., total tariffs of 79%+

4. There are two major exceptions to the new tariffs.

4a. First, products that are subject to 232 tariffs, such as steel and aluminum, and autos and auto parts, or to planned 232 tariffs, such as pharmaceuticals and semiconductors, are *exempt* from the additional reciprocal/universal baseline tariffs.

4b. USMCA-qualifying goods from Canada and Mexico, which are currently exempt from Trump's previous 25% Canada and Mexico tariffs, are exempt from the new tariffs.

5. For products that include US content, the US content is exempt from the new tariffs, as long as the US content is at least 20% of the value of the imported product. E.g., a Korean car that includes 30% US content will only be tariffed at 70% of the import price.

6. All of these tariffs are done pursuant to IEEPA, a 1977 emergency powers act, that, prior to Trump, had never been used for tariffs. The basis for these tariffs is a newly declared national emergency related to the trade deficit and the loss of the U.S. industrial base. I remain very dubious of the legality here. *SOMEONE SHOULD SUE!*

7. These tariffs are *very* large. I suspect that by the end of next week the average US tariff rate will be north of 20%, which would raise maybe $500+ billions of dollars over the next 12 months, putting aside demand destruction due to higher prices. Of course, that revenue will come at least in good part from increases in prices, and I bet estimates will soon coalesce at a typical household cost of $3,000-$5,000/year.

[arun @xprunie]

iconic tech pics - studio ghibli edition 🧵

[Patrick McKenzie @patio11]

The Atlantic has an interesting piece on credit card processing. The thesis is that interchange fees redistribute money from poor to rich.

I do not subscribe to this thesis.

https://t.co/KE9AEyTipP

[SBF @SBF_FTX]

1) I have a lot of sympathy for gov’t employees: I, too, have not checked my email for the past few (hundred) days

And I can confirm that being unemployed is a lot less relaxing than it looks

[Eric Wall @ercwl]

If you want to understand what happens to funds after they’re stolen by North Korea/Lazarus Group, the Chainalysis 2022 report is great

Step 1: Swap any ERC20s (like stETH) into ETH

Step 2: Swap any ETH into BTC

Step 3: Cash out BTC to cash (Chinese Renminbi) using Asian exchanges

This process can take years. They are in no hurry.

In 2022, it was noted how North Korea was still sitting on $55 worth of funds from hacks that happened six years earlier (2016).

[goodalexander @goodalexander]

long form rant (watch at 2x) -- fringe views expressed, invest at your own risk etc etc

[Angelica 🌐⚛️🇹🇼🇨🇳🇺🇸 @AngelicaOung]

Elon Musk now have enough baby mamas that they are starting to conform to Chinese imperial drama stereotypes.

Grimes is the Beloved But Defiant concubine. She is the emperor’s actual favorite, but because she refuses to conform, she suffered exile, ridicule and repeated betrayals.

Grimes’ historical analog is the Pearl Consort, clearly adored by Emperor Guangxu but eventually thrown down a well and drowned for disrespecting the the Empress Dowager.