Alex Benfield

🧠 Breaking down Bitcoin, Crypto, NFTS, macro & internet money
💰 Helping you earn + learn in the BTC economy
📨 Join my substack: @alexbenfield

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

Stop the bleeding already

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

@WDadd75 @MrAndyNgo @ucsc @RyleyNiemi_ Even the leftist women have balls nowadays

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

Man, this is just flat out depressing. Regardless of price action, this is the worst sentiment in the Ethereum side of web3 I’ve ever seen

[RYAN SΞAN ADAMS - rsa.eth 🦄 @RyanSAdams]

- we laid off a portion of our team and slimmed down to a smaller core

- i'm stepping into passive mode and @TrustlessState is now leading team and content (though I'll keep doing our weekly rollup)

- i expect David will expand content beyond our previous 6 years of strong ethereum focus, but he'll figure it out as he goes

I need to touch grass, David has energy for a second era, crypto and media have changed and Bankless needed to adapt

I'm still bullish ETH, though I think the window of success is now slimmer than it once was

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

@aakashgupta Give us a show about the adventures of Arya Stark and west of Westeros

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

These Netflix MMA fights were god awful. Will never waste my time watching Netflix fights again

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

@cprkrn @AnthropicAI @DarioAmodei Hell yeah man, good for you!

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

@fballforeverhq Ravens fans, we dodged a bullet 😮‍💨

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

So… is this the end of AAVE? If so, that’s a major blow to the trust of DeFi

[US Department of the Interior @Interior]

Built for the wild. Built for the moment.

Wolverines roam remote wilderness and dominate the hardwood. 

Congratulations to the Michigan Wolverines on their NCAA championship. 🏆 🏀

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

Another level. Michigan basketball 2026 is goated

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

Michigan basketball is in a league of its own

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

2026 is wild

[Polymarket @Polymarket]

BREAKING: Anthropic CEO says Claude may or may not have gained consciousness, as the model has begun showing symptoms of anxiety.

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

AI is going to disrupt so much of what we thought were safe jobs… adapt or die

[jack @jack]

we're making @blocks smaller today. here's my note to the company.

####

today we're making one of the hardest decisions in the history of our company: we're reducing our organization by nearly half, from over 10,000 people to just under 6,000. that means over 4,000 of you are being asked to leave or entering into consultation. i'll be straight about what's happening, why, and what it means for everyone.

first off, if you're one of the people affected, you'll receive your salary for 20 weeks + 1 week per year of tenure, equity vested through the end of may, 6 months of health care, your corporate devices, and $5,000 to put toward whatever you need to help you in this transition (if you’re outside the U.S. you’ll receive similar support but exact details are going to vary based on local requirements). i want you to know that before anything else. everyone will be notified today, whether you're being asked to leave, entering consultation, or asked to stay.

we're not making this decision because we're in trouble. our business is strong. gross profit continues to grow, we continue to serve more and more customers, and profitability is improving. but something has changed. we're already seeing that the intelligence tools we’re creating and using, paired with smaller and flatter teams, are enabling a new way of working which fundamentally changes what it means to build and run a company. and that's accelerating rapidly.

i had two options: cut gradually over months or years as this shift plays out, or be honest about where we are and act on it now. i chose the latter. repeated rounds of cuts are destructive to morale, to focus, and to the trust that customers and shareholders place in our ability to lead. i'd rather take a hard, clear action now and build from a position we believe in than manage a slow reduction of people toward the same outcome. a smaller company also gives us the space to grow our business the right way, on our own terms, instead of constantly reacting to market pressures.

a decision at this scale carries risk. but so does standing still. we've done a full review to determine the roles and people we require to reliably grow the business from here, and we've pressure-tested those decisions from multiple angles. i accept that we may have gotten some of them wrong, and we've built in flexibility to account for that, and do the right thing for our customers.

we're not going to just disappear people from slack and email and pretend they were never here. communication channels will stay open through thursday evening (pacific) so everyone can say goodbye properly, and share whatever you wish. i'll also be hosting a live video session to thank everyone at 3:35pm pacific. i know doing it this way might feel awkward. i'd rather it feel awkward and human than efficient and cold.

to those of you leaving…i’m grateful for you, and i’m sorry to put you through this. you built what this company is today. that's a fact that i'll honor forever. this decision is not a reflection of what you contributed. you will be a great contributor to any organization going forward.

to those staying…i made this decision, and i'll own it. what i'm asking of you is to build with me. we're going to build this company with intelligence at the core of everything we do. how we work, how we create, how we serve our customers. our customers will feel this shift too, and we're going to help them navigate it: towards a future where they can build their own features directly, composed of our capabilities and served through our interfaces. that's what i'm focused on now. expect a note from me tomorrow.

jack

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

It's been talked about for years, but bringing in TradFi to crypto was really a double-edged sword. These guys are in this space for their own interests and have no problem max extracting from everyone else.

[Bark @barkmeta]

Jane Street was running an algorithm that dumped Bitcoin every single morning at 10am. Every day. For months. Crashing the price. Liquidating retail. Buying back lower. Rinse and repeat.

The second they got sued it stopped. The 10am dump disappeared. Now Bitcoin just had the best day in months.

One trading firm... That’s all it took to suppress the entire crypto market for months.

Now ask yourself how much of the crypto price action is even real. How many people panic sold because the charts look terrible. How many people got liquidated. How many billions were taken from regular people by a single trading desk.

And this is just the first one to get caught so far… it’s about to get VERY interesting.

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

@AmeliaRodrigJan @grok did these two end up dating?

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

@Zimmersbadeye @steveydaniels @2HighCoverage Man, you are dim

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

You think crypto holders are at max pain? Not even close

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

@NFL @NFLPlus Was I the only one expecting to see a clip of Joe Flacco?

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

@nicoops @PharmDRogers87 @TVL7 @countmfer @Tred_Lifestyle @METAMONST3R @TRUSTAMUNDO @KangSchwepe @anonchain @resnepsid LFG, Coops

[Alex Benfield @cryptobenfield]

The pain and misery of being a crypto holder these last 2 years is unmatched.