While the technology may be interesting, while there may be relevant enabling efficiencies

that come from central bank currencies, you have to kind of view them if you're in the

crypto space as first and foremost surveillance money, because I think that's what they are.

I hope I'm wrong, but I fear that I'm not.

Welcome back to The Breakdown with me, NLW.

It's a daily podcast on macro, Bitcoin, and the big picture power shifts remaking our world.

The breakdown is sponsored by crypto.com, nexo.io, an elliptic, and produced and distributed by CoinDesk.

What's going on, guys? It is Monday, October 5th, and today we are discussing whether central bank coins mean

the end of financial privacy.

First up, however, let's do the brief.

First on the brief today, a quick market update.

Things were getting a little turbulent at the end of last week, given that the normal

election issues and volatility therein were greatly exacerbated when Donald Trump, President

of the United States, came down with COVID-19. This morning, the Wall Street Journal says that

stocks rise on signs of muted political risk,

and the original subheading included both Trump's health condition, as well as a growing

Biden lead, although the second part has now been removed from that subheader.

Regardless of the argument, the S&P 500 rose 1%, the NASDAQ rose 1.4%, and the Dow rose 0.9%.

Now, even though that Biden part might have been removed from the subheader, the main body of the

article does reinforce the idea of a contested election being a factor in market volatility.

In other words, the more it looks clear that one candidate is going to win, whichever one it is, the more markets settle down.

That said, there's also an interesting new narrative that markets are starting to wonder

...