The Blockspace Pod: What Epstein’s Bitcoin Investments Really Reveal w/ Kyle Torpey

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4.7 • 698 Ratings

🗓️ 10 February 2026

⏱️ 54 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Veteran bitcoin journalist Kyle Torpey joins the show to share his findings about Jeffrey Epstein’s involvement in bitcoin. Subscribe to the Blockspace newsletter! Welcome back to The Blockspace Podcast! Today, veteran Bitcoin journalist Kyle Torpey joins us to talk about the explosive revelations for Bitcoin in the latest Epstein files. We explore Epstein's $3M stake in Coinbase and his intriguing meetings with the architect of the Bitlicense, Ben Lawsky. Kyle debunks conspiracy theories about Epstein hijacking Bitcoin Core and explains the real influence Epstein had on early startups and protocol development. We also touch on the Blocksize Wars, SegWit2x, and other surprising Bitcoin connections hidden in DOJ documents. Subscribe to the newsletter! https://newsletter.blockspacemedia.com Notes: * Epstein invested $3 million in Coinbase in 2014. * Epstein sold 50% of his Coinbase stake for $15M. * 90% of hashrate signed the New York Agreement. * Brian Armstrong wrote to investors about Segwit2x * Epstein met with Gavin Andresen in 2011 Timestamps: 00:00 Start 02:41 Epstein & Bitcoin highlights 06:05 Hard fork proposals 13:17 Ben Lawsky 15:44 Winklevoss 27:10 Knots 29:53 MIT 30:50 Both side on Blocksize Wars 33:29 Was Gavin influenced? 38:13 Vinny Lingham 44:48 Mining centralization 👉CleanSpark, America's Bitcoin Miner! 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.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Blockchain Capital was basically a surrogate fund to funnel Epstein's investments into early-stage Bitcoin companies.
0:05.9	And Brock Pierce himself kind of seemed to serve this liaison role, matching Epstein with potential investments.
0:12.3	I don't think he was looking to influence Bitcoin Core development.
0:15.8	Because like I said, he's funding Gavin Andresen and the other guys at MIT.
0:20.1	And then he's also funding
0:21.4	Blockstream. And plus Bitcoin, the way it works inherently is meant to avoid that kind of
0:27.4	manipulation in the first place because it is this open source system where anyone can
0:31.2	contribute. Even if he tried to do that, I don't think it would work.
0:37.3	Welcome back to the Blockspace pod brought to you by CleanSpark.
0:40.1	Was Jeffrey Epstein trying to write Bitcoin regulations?
0:44.7	Did he co-opped core?
0:46.5	Or was he simply trying to steer Bitcoin early stage startups like Coinbase and Blockstream
0:52.8	or all of the above?
0:54.1	Or was he just trying to keep his
0:55.8	fingers on the pulse of things going on with Bitcoin? There's a lot to unpack in the most
1:00.6	recent Epstein files dump. So for today's show, we have veteran Bitcoin journal Kyle Torpion to do
1:06.3	just that. Kyle has had some fantastic original reporting on the Epstein files,
1:11.3	unearthing some things that no one else was able to find, like the fact that Epstein met with
1:16.0	Ben Lossky, the architect of the infamous bit license in 2014, and an interesting investor
1:22.0	letter from Coinbase's Brian Armstrong that relates to the block size wars.
1:25.9	You will not want to miss this episode if you were interested in Bitcoin history and lore and want to figure out what exactly was going on
1:32.2	with Bitcoin in the Epstein files. So give this one a listen. If you're interested in those,
	...

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