The Fed Is Turning Hawkish. What Does That Mean for Bitcoin and Strategy?

The Fed dropped its easing bias and half the FOMC penciled in rate hikes. Zach Pandl on what Kevin Warsh's first meeting means for Bitcoin, gold, and Strategy. Sponsors Fidelity: Fidelity has been building in crypto and DeFi since 2014 — now they're hiring. Explore career opportunities at one of the most forward-thinking names in finance here: https://crypto.fidelitycareers.com. Cape: Your biggest crypto vulnerability isn't your wallet, it's your phone number. Cape is America's privacy-first mobile carrier that rotates your SIM identity daily and blocks SIM swaps before they happen. Get 33% off your first six months at https://cape.co/unchained (use code: UNCHAINED). Kevin Warsh held rates steady at his first FOMC meeting but removed the committee's easing bias — and nine of eighteen participating members wrote down a rate hike for 2026, a bigger shift than markets expected. Zach Pandl, Head of Research at Grayscale Investments and a former Goldman Sachs economist, joins Steven Ehrlich to discuss. Pandl argues that rising real rates are a constraint equity markets are not pricing correctly, and that AI euphoria makes the downside case, not blunts it. The conversation covers the SpaceX IPO's low-float mechanics, why perpetual futures outperformed tokenized stocks around the IPO, Strategy's preferred equity cracking below $90, and why speculative flows explain gold and Bitcoin's recent turbulence better than fundamentals. Pandl closes with a buy-the-dip case for both stores of value and argues the DeFi revenue story, anchored in Hyperliquid and Aave, will define the second half of 2026. Host: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Steven Ehrlich⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, Head of Research, SharpLink Guest: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Zach Pandl - Head of Research at Grayscale Investments Timestamps 🏛️ 02:32 The Warsh era begins: what the Fed just signaled without saying it 📈 14:39 Rising rates and irrational markets: where this breaks down 💹 16:47 The SpaceX IPO and a crypto déjà vu moment 🎓 22:56 Fidelity's message to crypto's next generation 🏆 25:55 Perpetual futures just proved something important about the SpaceX test ❄️ 27:27 Pandl just made the crypto winter official—here's why ⚠️ 31:30 The problem with Bitcoin as collateral (and no one's talking about it) 🥇 37:03 Gold and Bitcoin diverge: what the Iran conflict reveals 💰 40:01 The DeFi revenue shift nobody saw coming