CoinDesk Podcast Network - The Blockspace Pod: The Conspiracy Was True: Operation Chokepoint 2.0

A new House report confirms the Biden Administration's coordinated, extralegal "Operation Chokepoint 2.0" to debank the crypto industry. We review the timeline & confirmed shadow debanking conspiracies


We discuss the bombshell report from the House Committee on Financial Services that confirms the existence of **Operation Chokepoint 2.0**—a coordinated, extralegal effort by the Biden Administration to push the crypto industry out of the US banking system. Review Nic Carter's original exposes, how the "conspiracy" became formal documentation, and the shift from an existential threat to a clearer path for conducting business in the United States. We also discuss the political "reckoning" ahead for the industry's single-issue campaign spending.

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**Notes:**

* House report confirms debanking conspiracy.

* Extralegal effort to cut crypto banking.

* Nick Carter published OCP 2.0 exposes.

* Existential risk to US crypto is not near-term.

* Crypto actively supported Trump's campaign.

* "Single issue PAC" raised biggest money ever.

Timestamps:

00:00 Start

01:25 Chokepoint 1.0

04:08 Regulation as maze

07:14 FDIC letter

11:06 Charlie gets de-banked

13:12 Fed letter SR226

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👋The Blockspace Pod is produced Blockspace Media, Bitcoin’s first B2B publication in Bitcoin. Follow us on Twitter and check out our newsletter for the best information in Bitcoin mining, Ordinals and tech!

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CoinDesk Podcast Network - Bitcoin Dips Below ‘Fair Value’: Will It Go Up From Here? | CoinDesk Daily

Bitcoin dipped below "fair value" for the first time in two years.

Bitcoin briefly slipped below its network value based on Metcalfe value modeling for the first time in nearly two years, according to network economist Timothy Peterson. Historically, periods when bitcoin trades below its Metcalfe value have delivered strong forward returns. Will the pattern repeat itself this time? CoinDesk's Jennifer Sanasie hosts "CoinDesk Daily."

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This episode was hosted by Jennifer Sanasie. “CoinDesk Daily” is produced by Jennifer Sanasie and edited by Victor Chen.

Code Story: Insights from Startup Tech Leaders - The Railsware Way – Mistakes & Lessons in Product Evolution, with Oleksii Ianchuk

Today, we are dropping our final episode in the series "The Railsware Way", sponsored by our good friends at Railsware. Railsware is a leading product studio with two main focuses - services and products. They have created amazing products like Mailtrap, Coupler and TitanApps, while also partnering with teams like Calendly and Bright Bytes. They deliver amazing products, and have happy customers to prove it.

In this series, we are digging into the company's methods around product engineering and development. In particular, we will cover relevant topics to not only highlight their expertise, but to educate you on industry trends alongside their experience.

In today's episode, we are speaking with Oleksii Ianchuk, Product Lead at Railsware, specifically for Mailtrap. Thought he doesn't like to limit his activities to product development, Oleksii has spent six years in product and project management, and is keen on searching for insights and putting them to work, as well as gauging the effects of his input.

Questions:

  • The story of Mailtrap starts with accidentally sending test emails to real users in 2011. How did Mailtrap evolve from an internal "fail" to a platform serving hundreds of thousands of users? How did that mistake spark the creation of Mailtrap, and what lessons did you learn about turning problems into opportunities?
  • What made you decide to expand from email testing into Email API/SMTP delivery - and why was it harder than expected? What specific challenges around deliverability, spam fighting, and infrastructure caught you off guard?
  • Can you walk us through the "splitting the product" mistake and its long-term consequences? Your team decided to separate testing and sending into different repositories and isolated VPC projects. What seemed like a good engineering decision at the time - how did this create problems as you scaled, and what would you do differently?
  • You spent a year struggling with Redshift before switching to Elasticsearch - what did that teach you about technology decisions? You ran tests, evaluated alternatives, and still picked the wrong database for your use case. How do you balance thorough research with the reality that you can't always predict what will work until you're in production?
  • When do you buy external expertise versus rely on your internal team? How do you decide when to hire outside knowledge, and how do you find the right consultants for niche problems?
  • Why didn't existing Mailtrap users immediately adopt the Email API/SMTP feature, and what did that teach you?
  • You expected current users to quickly transition to the new sending functionality. What did you learn about switching costs, user perception, and the challenge of changing how people think about your product?
  • What business insights around deliverability, spam prevention, and compliance surprised you most?
  • Email delivery isn't just about infrastructure - there's a whole ecosystem of postmasters, anti-spam systems, and compliance requirements. What aspects of this business were most unexpected, and how did they shape your product strategy?
  • Looking at Mailtrap's 13-year journey, what's your philosophy on "failing fast" versus "building solid foundations"?

Links




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The Intelligence from The Economist - Stars and strikes: was America’s ship-bomb illegal?

America’s attacks on possible drug boats in the Caribbean is already controversial. Now critics are questioning the legality of one particular strike in September. What does this mean for the US secretary of war, Pete Hegseth? Why American firms are raising funding to explore gene-editing babies. And women in Japan face a long fight to play the national sport: sumo


In “Babbage” earlier this year we interviewed Chinese scientist He Jiankui, whose use of gene-editing technology on babies landed him a three-year prison sentence.


Listen to what matters most, from global politics and business to science and technology—Subscribe to Economist Podcasts+


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Headlines From The Times - Questions Mount Over Alleged U.S. Kill Order in Venezuela Strikes, Trump Pardons Ex–Honduran President, How ‘Stranger Things’ Became Netflix’s ‘Star Wars,’ $10 Billion One Beverly Hills Project Breaks Ground

Lawmakers are demanding answers after reports that U.S. forces striking alleged Venezuelan drug boats were directed to kill survivors — an order Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth denies as conflicting statements from the administration fuel concern over legality and oversight. President Trump’s pardon of former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernández sparks regional uncertainty and potential political repercussions amid Honduras’ Presidential election.  generating billions in revenue and driving major economic impact as its final season rolls out. In business, Netflix’s Stranger Things cements itself as the company’s most powerful franchise. and construction begins on the $10-billion One Beverly Hills development.

60 Songs That Explain the '90s - “Hallelujah” — Jeff Buckley

Today, Rob returns with a gift in time for the holidays, breaking down what many would call the voice of an angel. He takes us back to the ’90s, when one of the most covered songs on the planet was merely a forgotten, horny track from Leonard Cohen’s catalog. While many artists cover songs in an attempt to replicate the original (or just sing it more loudly), Rob explains how Jeff Buckley covered the song and made it new. Later, Rob is joined by documentary filmmaker Amy J. Berg to discuss her new project ‘It’s Never Over, Jeff Buckley.’ She describes the intimate moments of Buckley’s mother she captured, how Buckley’s father affected his relationship with success and music, and the difficulties of what to do with an artist’s unfinished discography posthumously.


Host: Rob Harvilla

Guest: Amy J. Berg

Producers: Justin Sayles, Chris Sutton, and Olivia Crerie

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The Daily - Did a U.S. Boat Strike Amount to a War Crime?

Over the past three months, the U.S. military has been firing on boats from South America, killing more than 80 people and prompting Democrats to raise urgent questions about their legality.

Now, one of these operations, which killed survivors with a second missile, has prompted congressional Republicans to join those calls for accountability.

Charlie Savage, who covers national security for The New York Times, explains the renewed debate and how the administration is justifying its actions.

Guest: Charlie Savage, who covers national security and legal policy for The New York Times.

Background reading: 

Photo: Tierney L. Cross/The New York Times

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday. 

Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

Up First from NPR - Russia Rejects Peace Proposal, Hegseth Defends Boat Strikes, Tennessee House Election

A five-hour meeting between Vladimir Putin and U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff ends without a breakthrough, as the Kremlin rejects key parts of the updated Ukraine peace plan.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth shifts his account of the U.S. strike on an alleged drug boat, saying he didn’t order the second, lethal attack as lawmakers press for answers.
And a special House election in deep-red Tennessee district tightened far more than expected, offering both parties clues about voter energy heading into the 2026 midterms.

Want more comprehensive analysis of the most important news of the day, plus a little fun? Subscribe to the Up First newsletter.

Today’s episode of Up First was edited by Rebecca Rossman, Jason Breslow, Megan Pratz, Mohamad ElBardicy and Alice Woelfle.

It was produced by Ziad Buchh, Nia Dumas and Christopher Thomas.

We get engineering support from Stacey Abbott. And our technical director is Carleigh Strange.

Our Supervising Producer is Michael Lipkin.

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Start Here - Compliance of the Caribbean: Hegseth Defends Strikes

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth defends a pair of deadly strikes, while distancing himself from a key decision. A former Honduran leader is pardoned by President Trump, 40 years before his drug trafficking sentence is up. And ICE prepares for a crackdown on Somali immigrants in Minnesota.  

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