tl;dr
Kevin Warsh is talking sense, an accomplishment few central bankers have ever achieved. Are we seeing the start of a pivot in the UK towards embracing cryptos? There is progress being made to advance the CLARITY Act, but not nearly enough.
Market Snap
Market Wrap
A tidy inflow of over $600mm into spot BTC ETFs on Friday, was a nice end to the TradFi trading week. However, that wall of sellers at $79k (https://www.curiouscryptos.com/post/1st-may-2026-glassnode-meta-senate) is proving resilient:
Curious Cryptos’ Commentary – Kevin Warsh, incoming Chair of the Fed
Kevin has given us our first insight into how he is going to approach his new job, and you’re going to like it:
"What we call AI in a couple years; we'll just call business and AI is going to make almost everything cost less and the US can be a big winner. And, and it's a hugely exciting moment. If I were to step back for a minute, if I were the President, what I would be worried about is a central bank that doesn't see any of that, a central bank that is stuck with models from 1978, governance from a prior period, and don't recognize we could be at the front end of a productivity boom. And if I were the President, I’d be worried that they might not see it, and they might think that economic growth is somehow going to be inflationary. I think that we are probably in the early innings in a structural decline in prices.” (Emphasis mine).
https://x.com/cryptodotnews/status/2048070781741986279
Kevin, unlike the hapless Andrew Bailey, is looking through the current oil-induced spike in inflation, which is recessionary about nine to twelve months from now, whilst also laying the groundwork for incoming rate cuts to counter the deflationary impact of A.I.
If he delivers, risk assets are going to love Kevin.
Curious Cryptos’ Commentary – UK politics
The CCC always remains fiercely apolitical, but we cannot ignore the environment in which cryptos operate.
The UK has forever been antagonistic towards cryptos. Indeed, the UK is in favour of the “Britcoin”, a CBDC, an instrument whose only purpose is coercion and control.
One of the five main parties (it doesn’t matter which) has promised a more favourable regulatory regime for cryptos, combined with a reduction in CGT on crypto gains from 24% to 10%.
Could this herald the start of a competition between the UK’s political parties to appeal to the crypto vote?
One can only hope so.
Curious Cryptos’ Commentary – The CLARITY Act
Despite the CCC’s downbeat assessment of the likelihood of the CLARITY Act making it onto the statute book (https://www.curiouscryptos.com/post/28th-april-2026-btc-strategic-reserve-the-clarity-act) there has been some constructive progress, and it would be remiss of me not to keep you up-to-date.
You will recall that the key sticking point – but not the only one – is TradFi’s objection to stablecoin issuers paying yield on holders of those stablecoins. After all, it is far more important to preserve banking executives’ fat bonuses funded by ripping off retail clients rather than embracing the vast opportunities to improve productivity offered by blockchain technology. TradFi’s position that paying yield on stablecoin balances is too great a competitive threat is a self-defeating argument in my view.
On Friday, a compromise text was issued with bipartisan (hurrah!) support from Senators Thom Tillis and Angela Alsobrooks. The text is a little dense:
"No covered party shall, directly or indirectly, pay any form of interest on yield (whether in cash, tokens, or other consideration) to a restricted recipient — (A) solely in connection with the holding of such restricted recipient's payment stablecoins; or (B) on a payment stablecoin balance in a manner that is economically or functionally equivalent to the payment of interest or yield on an interest-bearing bank deposit."
The compromise is that users of stablecoins can be paid rewards for using them, not just for holding.
I think we should expect a strong pushback from TradFi.