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Markets get rattled by Iran tensions, oil fears, and big questions around Bitcoin’s next move. Then the conversation shifts to the Clarity Act, stablecoin yield battles, and why banks are nervous. There’s also tokenized stocks on the NYSE, crypto-backed mortgages, giant ETH staking plans, Tether audit pressure, and looming quantum risk.

MIT economist Christian Catalini joins Ryan and David to unpack his new paper, "Some Simple Economics of AGI," which argues that the scarce resource in the AI economy is no longer intelligence but verification: the human capacity to check, judge, and certify that AI output is correct. Christian walks through the two cost curves reshaping every industry (cost to automate vs. cost to verify), explains why entry-level jobs are collapsing first through what he calls the "missing junior loop," why even top experts are unknowingly training their replacements (the "codifier's curse"), and maps out the three roles that survive the transition: Directors, Meaning Makers, and Liability Underwriters.---📣SPOTIFY PREMIUM RSS FEED | USE CODE: SPOTIFY24https://bankless.cc/spotify-premium---BANKLESS SPONSOR TOOLS:🔮POLYMARKET | #1 PREDICTION MARKEThttps://bankless.cc/polymarket-podcast🪐GALAXY | INSTITUTIONAL DIGITAL FINANCEhttps://bankless.cc/galaxy-podcast🏅BITGET TRADFI | TRADE GOLD WITH USDThttps://bankless.cc/bitget🎯THE DEFI REPORT | ONCHAIN INSIGHTShttps://thedefireport.io/bankless🐇MEGAETH | 1ST REAL-TIME BLOCKCHAINhttps://bankless.cc/megaeth---TIMESTAMPS0:00 Intro3:42 The Low-Grade Panic6:43 Who Gets Hit First, and Hardest?13:06 Coding as Canary, or Exception?16:21 Human Cognition Was the Binding Constraint19:59 What Is Verification, Exactly?29:10 The Codifier's Curse31:21 The Expanding Iceberg: Non-Measurable Work38:32 The Two Racing Cost Curves41:59 Trojan Horse Externality48:46 The Four Quadrants: Where Do You Want to Be?54:12 Liability Underwriters and the Venture Capital Parallel55:41 Directors: Navigating Unknown Unknowns59:49 60-80% of Your Job Can Be Displaced1:06:24 Button Pushers vs. Founders: The Great Resorting1:12:08 The Luddite Risk: Political Backlash Against AI1:17:30 What Companies and Investors Should Do1:22:56 The Crypto Connection1:25:11 Don't Panic: A Closing Playbook---RESOURCESChristian Catalinihttps://x.com/ccataliniSome Simple Economics of AGIhttps://arxiv.org/html/2602.20946v2Christian’s thread on his paperhttps://x.com/ccatalini/status/2026311784421036223---Not financial or tax advice. See our investment disclosures here:https://www.bankless.com/disclosures

Illia Polosukhin, NEAR co-founder and Transformer paper co-author, digs into why AI agents still feel clumsy. He explores trust, security, privacy, and context limits holding them back. The conversation also dives into IronClaw, AI as the new interface, blockchains as the backend, and the rise of autonomous businesses and digital life forms.

Justin Drake, Ethereum researcher and key architect behind its consensus roadmap, maps out the race to get crypto ready for Q-Day. He digs into why 2032 matters, how Bitcoin could face the first real quantum attacks, and why lost coins create a brutal dilemma. Then he breaks down Ethereum’s three-layer post-quantum overhaul and how AI, quantum, and crypto may collide fast.

Crypto gets a jolt from new SEC and CFTC classifications, while Bitcoin’s strength during global turmoil sparks regime shift talk. There’s also a brewing fight over agentic payments, prediction markets pushing deeper into mainstream attention, and a strange cultural spotlight from magazine features to the coming SBF Netflix drama.

Brendan Ryan, Tempo engineer focused on payments infra, joins Georgios Konstantopoulos, a crypto infrastructure builder behind Ethereum tooling. They dig into machine payments, MPP vs x402, and why AI agents may need wallets. Also on the table: paid APIs, agent identity and reputation, wallet security, stablecoin-first design, and how machine-to-machine commerce could reshape the web.

Kamran Bokhari, a geopolitical analyst at the New Lines Institute, maps Trump’s grand strategy through Iran, China, and Russia. He digs into retrenchment, burden-sharing, and why limited force can fit an anti-war posture. The conversation also hits Venezuela, Cuba, Israel’s aims, Marco Rubio’s rise, and why AI, space, and Ukraine are key signals to watch.

A fresh Ethereum Foundation manifesto sparks a clash over crypto’s oldest tension: cypherpunk ideals or mass adoption. The conversation circles around CROPS, self-sovereignty, ETH as money, market share, product urgency, and whether Ethereum should protect its soul, ship faster, or somehow do both.

Vlad Tenev, Robinhood co-founder and CEO, joins for a fast-paced look at where finance is headed. He talks about the great wealth transfer, why 24/7 markets and tokenization feel inevitable, and why Gen Z may be far more retirement-savvy than people think. They also dig into prediction markets, stablecoins, private market access, and AI-driven financial tools.

Markets go chaotic as oil spikes, gold fails, bonds sell off and crypto bucks the trend. Tokenized stock plans with Nasdaq and Kraken get unpacked. BlackRock’s staked ETH structure and private credit strains loom large. Legal fights over privacy tech and surveillance, plus AI partnerships and political moves, shape the regulatory backdrop.