ROLLUP: Gold & Silver ATHs | Fidelity’s Stablecoin | Ethereum’s Quantum Pivot | Tether Buys Gold

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Tech News, Technology, News

4.7 • 1.2K Ratings

🗓️ 30 January 2026

⏱️ 65 minutes

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Summary

Markets wobble as gold and silver hit all time highs, raising the big question of what comes next for crypto. Ryan and David unpack the macro shock driving the move, from Fed independence and shutdown risk to a weaker dollar narrative, and why Tether is quietly becoming one of the world’s largest gold holders. They make the case for Ethereum’s comeback, from surging usage to serious quantum resistance efforts, break down Fidelity’s new onchain dollar, and dig into MegaETH’s eye popping stress test. Plus: prediction markets go mainstream, a bizarre $40 million government crypto theft, and a new Vitalik meme to close it out. --- 📣KRAKEN | DEFI EARN https://bankless.cc/Kraken --- BANKLESS SPONSOR TOOLS: 🔮POLYMARKET | #1 PREDICTION MARKET https://bankless.cc/polymarket-podcast ⚡EUPHORIA | REAL-TIME ONE-TAP TRADING https://bankless.cc/euphoria 🏅BITGET TRADFI | TRADE GOLD WITH USDT https://bankless.cc/bitget 👑BANKLESS PREMIUM | AD-FREE & BONUS EPISODES https://bankless.cc/spotify-premium 🎯THE DEFI REPORT | ONCHAIN INSIGHTS https://bankless.cc/TDR-pro 💰ICO WATCH | UPCOMING PUBLIC TOKEN SALES https://bankless.cc/ico-watch --- TIMESTAMPS & RESOURCES 0:00 Intro 3:22 Markets https://x.com/Vivek4real_/status/2014721850937380963 https://imgur.com/vumkykb https://x.com/longstcc/status/2016429742904508789 https://www.cnbc.com/2026/01/28/fed-meeting-today-live-updates.html https://polymarket.com/event/lisa-cook-out-as-fed-governor-by-september-30/?via=bankless https://polymarket.com/event/how-many-fed-rate-cuts-in-2026/?via=bankless. https://polymarket.com/event/will-there-be-another-us-government-shutdown-by-january-31/?via=bankless 16:25 Gold & Silver All-Time Highs https://www.tradingview.com/chart/1RYLG2gC/?symbol=TVC:GOLD https://companiesmarketcap.com/assets-by-market-cap https://x.com/KobeissiLetter/status/2016890828925313192 https://x.com/philippilk/status/2016089604588290348 https://x.com/historydefined/status/2016360674058760269 https://x.com/fintechfrank/status/2015596117195444375 https://x.com/DegenerateNews/status/2016870767426707457 https://thedefireport.io/research/why-is-bitcoin-underperforming-gold 28:11 Dollar Reserve Currency Discussion & Tether Gold Reserves https://x.com/FluentInFinance/status/2015424544333328808 https://x.com/KobeissiLetter/status/2016259771616444454 https://x.com/barkmeta/status/2016351131727770107 https://x.com/WatcherGuru/status/2016307227158601780 https://cryptonews.com/news/tether-quietly-becomes-one-of-the-biggest-global-gold-market-players-holds-140-tons-of-gold 33:15 Ethereum Usage Scaling & Ethereum Quantum Resistance & ETH Bull Case https://x.com/JasonYanowitz/status/2016128371755811109 https://x.com/riley_gmi/status/2016193883764371469 https://sergeenkov.com/record-high-activity-ethereum-2026 https://x.com/drakefjustin/status/2014791629408784816 https://x.com/VivekVentures/status/2015510724244611168 https://x.com/LorenzoARK/status/2015594553579868566 43:47 Fidelity Digital Dollar https://x.com/DegenerateNews/status/2016505433322635443 https://x.com/sytaylor/status/2016569801678704807 45:40 Tether Onshore Stablecoin (USA₮) https://x.com/paoloardoino/status/2016151121522204953 46:46 MegaETH Mainnet & Stress Test https://x.com/megaeth/status/2016511667644064164 https://x.com/megaeth/status/2014376592378888503 https://www.growthepie.com https://app.hyperliquid.xyz/trade https://x.com/NamikMuduroglu/status/2016909695609364917 53:27 Uniswap Auctions https://x.com/Uniswap/status/2016513436771922218 https://x.com/Benjamin918_/status/2016515467960016958 54:34 Robinhood & Talos https://www.coindesk.com/business/2026/01/29/robinhood-is-investing-in-crypto-trading-platform-talos-at-usd1-5-billion-valuation 57:15 Prediction Markets Expansion https://x.com/brian_armstrong/status/2016593041532870677 https://x.com/shayne_coplan/status/1989005876611461429 57:42 OpenAI & Human Verification https://x.com/forbes/status/2016622235902234794 1:00:24 Government Contractor Theft Story https://x.com/zachxbt/status/2015430549846777964 https://x.com/zachxbt/status/2014685299025060154 1:03:11 Meme of the Week https://x.com/0xcyp/status/2016556046697779495 1:04:01 Closing & Disclaimers --- Not financial or tax advice. See our investment disclosures here: https://www.bankless.com/disclosures

Transcript

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0:00.0	Bankless Nation is the last week of January.
0:06.1	It's time for the bankless weekly roll-up.
0:09.2	We got markets and a little bit of a tumble right now, David.
0:12.1	I was getting ready to say gold and silver are unstoppable because they have been on the week.
0:17.1	But now things are reversing course.
0:18.3	But then they stopped.
0:19.6	At least for a moment.
0:20.6	At least for a moment. But we do got to talk about gold and silver, all-time highs this week. Peter Schiff taking victory laps, of course. Also, he's earned it. Did you know David Tether has a nuclear-resistant Cold War bunker where they're stacking a tremendous amount of gold, maybe even buying more gold than they are Bitcoin right now? You know what?
0:37.7	What does Tether not have?
0:40.2	You know, if you told me Tether had bought a private army, I would be like, you know what,
0:45.9	that sounds right.
0:47.3	Yeah, that might be by 2030.
0:48.8	Anyway, we'll talk about that.
0:49.9	And also, this energy from precious metals, is that going to rotate back into crypto? What else we got? Right? Right? It totally will, right, guys? Fidelity is launching a Fidelity dollar, a new stable coin on Ethereum. We're going to talk about why this one is a little bit more significant than all the other stable coins that have launched in recent months. And speaking of Ethereum, nice, big, chunky Ethereum section, we're going to make a pretty good macro-Eth bowl case. Ryan and I both saw on Twitter, we're both like, this is the best thing that we've seen around ETH in a while. We're going to talk about it. Quantum resistance efforts, macro conditions. This is really good setup for Ethereum. And also, Ryan's got this story. Maybe you guys have heard about this. Oh, you want me to tell
1:27.9	this story. I don't know this story. Ryan put it in the agenda. Son of a government contractor who may
1:32.8	have stolen $40 million from the U.S. so that they could brag about it and flexed in telegram,
1:40.0	which is how they got ousted for doing it in the first place. Yeah, it's kind of funny, actually, dude. I can't wait to tell you the story. But first, before you get in, we've got some news from our friends over at Cracken. They're launching a pretty juicy DFI product, aren't they? What is this? They have launched DeFi Airn. They launched it this Monday, made a pretty big splash across the Cryptosphere. Ryan, have you heard of this thing called the Defy Mollet?
2:01.0	Yeah. earned. They launched it this Monday, made a pretty big splash across the Cryptosphere. Ryan, have you heard of this thing called the Defi Mollet?
2:05.0	Have I? Have I ever?
2:07.4	You might have been the guy who coined it.
2:09.4	I do recall, yes.
2:10.7	Yeah. So this is that.
	...

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