James Wester

Analyst and writer covering tech, payments, and crypto. Expect opinions on baseball, culture, Saturday morning cartoons, and breakfast cereals.

I run slowly.

[James Wester @jameswester]

Life can be very difficult sometimes. This is my dog eating a cucumber. You’re welcome.

[Austin Campbell @austincampbell]

I disagree strongly with Max on this.

I think it's far funnier.

I think IL *did*, in fact, just subject all bank transfers (incl. moving your own money between a checking and savings account), securities transactions, and more to a 0.2% tax.

The language is: “Digital asset” means a digital representation of value that is used as a medium of exchange, unit of account, or store of value, and that is not fiat currency, whether or not denominated in fiat currency.

Bank deposits are not fiat, and all banking is digital. Banks are explicitly NOT issuers of US currency nor are they performing transactions in physical money. They are very definitely a digital representation of value that is used as a medium of exchange, and they are not fiat currency themselves, though they are denominated in it.

So, Max, this does capture all electronic money, because the drafters don't understand banks are private money, just like stablecoins, not literally issuers of US currency themselves.

[Patrick McKenzie @patio11]

"Patrick, did you really put YOUR BANKING INFORMATION into AN LLM?

Yes I did.

"Don't you know that anyone with your account number and routing number can move money?"

They *can* try to. Previously, on Bits about Money...

"So isn't that insane."

Let me tell you about checks.

[James Wester @jameswester]

People who worked in law enforcement and who now work in crypto signed an open letter saying they worked in law enforcement and now work in crypto and thus have an opinion on something based on having worked in law enforcement and now working in crypto.

[Brendan Pedersen @BrendanPedersen]

Crypto advocates sent this “law enforcement” letter to Congress last night supporting Clarity

Cursory search and you’ll find dozens of folks here who are currently paid by or repping the crypto industry. I found nine Coinbase employees in like 15 minutes

[Blockchain Association @BlockchainAssn]

1/ Today, we’re sending a letter to Senate Majority Leader Thune and Senate Democratic Leader Schumer signed by 160 former national security, intelligence, and law enforcement professionals in support of the Clarity Act.

https://t.co/1lSQkoaaXI

[James Wester @jameswester]

Woo hoo!

Thanks, @Garmin.

[James Wester @jameswester]

I’m genuinely a little mystified by this. I’ve mostly shrugged at stablecoins being called a “$330B market” because I know what is meant. But calling this an “addressable” market implies revenue opportunity for custody, issuance, admin, trading, etc.

[James Wester @jameswester]

I'm reading the Citi report. It's good, but it has an issue illustrated by this chart. A TAM is the revenue opportunity available to providers. That's the "addressable" part. The chart shows the value of assets that may sit inside tokenized wrappers.

Those are not the same.

[James Wester @jameswester]

I'm reading the Citi report. It's good, but it has an issue illustrated by this chart. A TAM is the revenue opportunity available to providers. That's the "addressable" part. The chart shows the value of assets that may sit inside tokenized wrappers.

Those are not the same.

[Frank Chaparro @fintechfrank]

Citi sees tokenization becoming a multi-trillion-dollar market, projecting $5T in tokenized assets by 2030 in a base case and as much as $8T in a bull case.

U.S. equities and Treasuries are expected to lead adoption.

[James Wester @jameswester]

Remember when conferences had the artist drawing pictures on a white board? Do they still do that? (I think puppies and shelter dogs is the new thing. Much better.)

[James Wester @jameswester]

I'm back.

[James Wester @jameswester]

I always assumed this was punishment.

"Put Bort Skivins in the space gibbet for mocking the Force again."

[Jacen @JacenSolo645]

@agraybee There’s no way this guy is doing anything useful

[James Wester @jameswester]

@agraybee No one says "Freeze!" in combat.

[James Wester @jameswester]

No one says "Freeze" in combat.

[Everything Price Sufferer (but especially eggs) @agraybee]

Give me your best Star Wars nitpicks. No reasonable criticisms or analysis, I'm talking real pedantic here.

[James Wester @jameswester]

@GenTXer2 @BigtrainRR Maria McKee's appearance in Robbie Robertson's "Somewhere Down the Crazy River" always got me.

https://t.co/FJAOE5RBKd

[James Wester @jameswester]

"Sorry, but we were just burying one of our party. What was it you were saying about your travel experience? It sounds awful."

[Ben Thompson @benthompson]

I’m gonna delete this thread because I think people complaining about airlines on Twitter are pretty lame, including myself!

That said, I think the takeaway is that the reason I was upset is precisely because of dashed expectations. If this were American I would have shrugged my shoulders. So I guess that’s a compliment to United, but also a reminder that it’s risky to advertise things (like Starlink) when you can’t yet confidently deliver on them.

Anyhow, 28B on Southwest. Let’s go! 😅

[James Wester @jameswester]

@CynicalPublius I posted an anodyne memory of painting fire hydrants in 1976. It went mildly viral (at least as far as my tweets are measured). I was genuinely surprised at how many "Yeah, well times didn't suck like now!" replies I received. Grumps.

[James Wester @jameswester]

@CDrakeFairTrade So go do something positive. It can start with Celeste! Maybe you're the catalyst your portion of "society" needs to decynicize. We have time.

Happy June.

[James Wester @jameswester]

I genuinely feel like we missed out on recreating one of the more enjoyable parts of the the bicentennial celebrations from 1976: painting fire hydrants.

[James Wester @jameswester]

The Great Old Ones awake...

[Alex Thorn @intangiblecoins]

satoshi era coins moved this AM (not suspected of being satoshi’s coins though)

happy sunday, anon OG person ☀️

[James Wester @jameswester]

After weeks of finding a new primary machine, I'm going to admit to some skepticism. The Neo is barely able to meet the demands of a Mac. A Windows variant sounds like something you have to replace every two years. (Like I just had to do with a skinny laptop.)

[Mark Gurman @markgurman]

Dell introduced a redesigned XPS 13 laptop, positioning the device as a direct answer to Apple’s popular MacBook Neo, which stunned the budget PC market upon its debut in March with its features and price.

https://t.co/coq4Wm8aZO

[James Wester @jameswester]

Folks, don't be dumb. Don't try to be funny. Don't name your phone or computer something stupid.

[FOX Business @FoxBusiness]

United flight returns midair after Bluetooth device name reportedly sparks security scare https://t.co/erbKGnsIXZ

[James Wester @jameswester]

@ChrisBarrett Dude. You are kind of my hero right now. (I'm trying to get back on my feet, and it has been hard to be consistent. 2900 days makes it seem much, much easier!)