Blockspace: DeFi’s $13B Exodus, OPNEXT 2026 Recap, NYDIG Eyes Alcoa Plant for BTC Mining

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4.7 • 698 Ratings

🗓️ 21 April 2026

⏱️ 77 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The latest Lazarus Group-led DeFi exploit set off a $13 billion exodus from DeFi platforms, and we cover the spiciest talk on Bitcoin and quantum computing at OPNEXT. Get your tickets to OPNEXT 2026 before prices increase! Join us on April 16 in NYC for technical discussions, investor talks, and intimate conversation with the brightest minds in Bitcoin. Welcome back to The Blockspace Podcast! Today, Jay Patel, the CEO of Lygos Finance, and Aydin Kilic, CEO of HIVE Digital, join us to respectively discuss risk in crypto credit markets and Hive’s latest $100M senior note. For news, we break down the $293 million Kelp DAO hack by the Lazarus Group and the $13 billion ripple effect this had on other DeFi platforms like Aave. Plus, we give a recap of one of the most salient talks at Blockspace’s OPNEXT conference and break down NYDIG’s incipient deal to purchase an aluminum smelting site from Alcoa that has been dormant since 2014. Subscribe to the newsletter! https://newsletter.blockspacemedia.com Notes: • $13.8 billion unwound from DeFi in 48 hours. • Kelp DAO exploit led to $293 million loss. • Aave protocol facing $195 million in bad debt. • Bitcoin rallied back above the $75,000 level. • NYDIG eyes Alcoa smelting site for BTC mining Timestamps 00:00 Start 03:26 DeFi is NOT ok 13:58 Jay Patel, Lygos Finance 34:31 Aydin Kilic, HIVE 58:46 OPNEXT recap 1:11:33 NYDIG to buy defunct aluminium smelter 1:14:09 Strategy buying more BTC 👉CleanSpark CleanSpark (Nasdaq: CLSK) is a market-leading data center developer with a proven track record of success. We own a portfolio of power, land, and data centers across the United States powered by globally competitive energy prices. Sitting at the intersection of Bitcoin, energy, operational excellence and capital stewardship, we optimize our infrastructure to deliver superior returns to our shareholders. Monetizing low-cost, high reliability energy by producing a global emerging critical resource – compute – positions us to prosper in an ever-changing world. 👉Luxor, Blockspace's preferred mining pool Bitcoin mining revenue changes every day. Difficulty adjusts. Fees move. Prices shift. And that makes it hard to plan. Luxor Pool’s Fixed Payouts let miners lock in revenue at a guaranteed daily rate for up to 18 months. According to Hashrate Index, miners who used rolling fixed payout strategies since the last halving have outperformed FPPS mining by up to 15 percent. Fixed Payouts give you predictable daily revenue, so you can plan, budget, and grow with confidence. With Luxor, uncertainty is optional. Learn more at luxor.tech/mining

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome back to Blockspace Live, brought to you by CleanSpark for today's top story.
0:11.2	The North Koreans are making everyone in crypto poor again after one of the most damning
0:16.6	defy exploits to date that led to a $13 billion cascade of withdrawals from various
0:23.6	defy protocols. For interviews today, we have Jay Patel of LIGO's finance on to talk about
0:29.0	risk within crypto, a perfect, very timely interview given that defy exploit, specifically as it
0:36.8	relates to some of these lending protocols
0:38.3	and also the Bitcoin digital credit instruments we've seen from Microstrategy and Strive.
0:45.3	We also have Hive CEO Iden Killicon to talk about their most recent convertible note and the state
0:51.6	of some of the M&A that we're seeing in the Bitcoin mining landscape.
0:55.8	And we'll also be doing a recap of our Opnex conference after the interviews.
0:59.8	Charlie's going to take that one away.
1:01.2	We're going to be giving y'all a lowdown on the most important talks after our week in New York City.
1:05.5	And for our final two stories, we will be covering how aluminum smelter and industrial company
1:10.0	Alcoa is apparently looking
1:11.7	at Nidig to purchase one of its currently defunct aluminum smelting sites. And for our final story,
1:19.2	strategy and bitmine are the only ones buying crypto right now. That's kind of an exaggeration,
1:23.7	but they had two monster buys last week and they were some of the only crypto treasury
1:28.3	companies still actively hoarding coins right now. That's right. We talk about aluminum smelting
1:36.1	on our Bitcoin show. Blockspace goes live, Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and noon Eastern
1:42.0	featuring quick hits on the latest in Bitcoin mining,
1:44.3	AI, and emerging tech. Make sure to hit like and subscribe, especially if you're on YouTube,
1:48.7	hit that notification bell. So you get the mobile push notifications when we go live.
	...

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