The Chopping Block: Ethereum's Inflection Point w/ Joe Lubin on DATs, CROPS, AI-Driven Exploits, Quantum Threats, and CFTC's Perps

Unchained

Laura Shin

Tech News, Business News, News

4.6 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 4 June 2026

⏱️ 62 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Joe Lubin makes the bull case for Ethereum amid a sea of bearishness. The panel dissects Saylor selling Bitcoin for the first time in four years, the meaning behind 9 senior EF departures, Justin Drake's Q-Day call (50% by 2032), Manuel Araoz declaring all of DeFi unsafe, the ThorChain hack fallout, the Zama/Overnight Finance USDC freeze saga, and the CFTC greenlighting the first US perpetual futures product. Welcome to The Chopping Block — where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, Tarun Chitra, and Robert Leshner chop it up about the latest in crypto. This week Joe Lubin is stepping in to make the bull case for ETH on what he admits is a tough day to be bullish. We open on Strategy's first Bitcoin sale in four years and whether the STRC preferred stock structure is "an algorithmic stablecoin with too many steps," as Tarun puts it. Joe pivots to pitching Ether DATs, then we get into the Ethereum Foundation's brain drain -- nine researchers gone, CROPS as the new mandate, and a mysterious new developer organization taking shape behind the scenes. The episode's meatiest block covers DeFi security: Justin Drake warns Q-Day is 50% likely by 2032, Manuel Araoz says all of DeFi is unsafe, ThorChain's been offline for two weeks post-hack, and the panel debates whether we're entering a rough 12-24 months where attackers outrun defenders. We close on Hyperliquid's all-time highs and the CFTC opening the door to US perps. Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pods, Fountain, Podcast Addict, Pocket Casts, Amazon Music, or on your favorite podcast platform. Show highlights 🔹 Strategy sold 32 BTC for the first time in four years as STRC falls below $100 par – Tarun calls it "an algorithmic stablecoin with too many steps" 🔹 Joe Lubin pitches Ether DATs as a safer model than Strategy – ~3% staking yield, no leverage, and "permanent capital" for the ecosystem 🔹 Nine senior Ethereum Foundation members departed in 2026 including Tim Beiko and Barnabe Monnot as Vitalik reframes EF around CROPS mandate 🔹 Joe reveals SharpLink, BitMine, and ConsenSys in talks to become Ethereum's "decentralized commercialization engines" – "there's only one foundation" but new nodes are forming 🔹 Justin Drake puts Q-Day at 50% by 2032 and calls NIST's 2035 timeline "a joke" after Google's quantum circuit breakthrough 🔹 Crowdsourced reverse engineering of Google's withheld quantum circuit improved results 12-13% using LLMs as a grinding tool 🔹 OpenZeppelin co-founder Manuel Araoz declares all of DeFi unsafe and advises friends and family to exit Aave, MakerDAO, and Compound 🔹 ThorChain remains offline two weeks after $10.8M hack – claims they disclosed the same vulnerability 17 days before the exploit 🔹 Zama's cUSDC contract frozen by Circle via court order in Overnight Finance dispute, highlighting privacy protocol limitations on freezable stablecoins 🔹 Hyperliquid hits $75 and flips Solana in FDV as CFTC approves Kalshi's BTCPERP – the first regulated US perpetual futures product Hosts ⭐️Haseeb Qureshi, Managing Partner at Dragonfly ⭐️Tarun Chitra, Managing Partner at Robot Ventures ⭐️Tom Schmidt, General Partner at Dragonfly Guest⭐️Joe Lubin, Co-Founder of Ethereum, Founder & CEO of ConsenSys Timestamps 00:00 Intro 01:06 Saylor Sells BTC & Market Panic 05:07 STRC Death Spiral & DAT Risks 07:07 Ethereum Foundation Exodus & CROPS 13:04 The "Not Second Foundation" Debate 17:58 Quantum Q-Day: 50% by 2032 23:47 Is All of DeFi Unsafe? 31:11 ZK Composability & Bridge-Free Architecture 34:19 Security Deployment Lag & AI Arms Race 40:18 Anti-Fragility & Formal Verification 47:36 Zama USDC Freeze & Privacy vs Courts 50:33 CFTC Perps Approval & Hyperliquid at $75 55:53 Hyperliquid's Distribution Flywheel 01:00:46 Joe Lubin's Ethereum Bull Case Disclosures Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	The formal verification is the strongest argument for like, okay, there's correct by construction. You know, we have the Swiss cheese and we've like put the holes in all the Swiss cheese, but it turns out it's multi-dimensional Swiss cheese because now it's in the third dimension. And then eventually, at post-mythos in the fourth dimension. See, who are you? Not a dividend. It's a tale of two quons. Now, your losses are on someone else's balance. Generally speaking, aircrafts are kind of pointless anyways.
0:24.1	I mean to trade. Not a dividend. It's a tale of two Kwan. Now, your losses are on someone else's balance. Generally speaking, air drops are kind of pointless anyways. Unnamed to trading firms who are very involved. D5.Eat is the ultimate. D5 protocols are the antidote to this problem. Hello, everybody. Welcome to shopping block. In a couple weeks, the four of us get together and give the industry inside perspective on the cut the topics of the day so quick control the source of
0:40.1	tom the defy maven and master of memes hello everyone next we've got to ruin the gigabrain
0:44.7	and grand pooh ba at gauntlet you joining us today we've got special guest joe lubin ethereum
0:50.2	evangelist and protocol patriarch wow good name thanks for having me thanks for thanks for being here. And I am a Steve that had hype man at Dragonfly for early-stage investors in crypto and onto caveat that nothing we say here is investment advice, legal advice, or even life advice. Lecy Chopin Block. That XYZ for more disclosures. So we had some Ethereum bearishness on the show last time, and we thought it might be good to counterpoint a little bit with some Ethereum bullishness.
1:14.4	Unfortunately, we brought you on on a day where it feels a little hard to be bullish.
1:18.1	Heath BTC is up.
1:19.6	If BTC is up.
1:20.8	As has been pointed out before the show.
1:22.7	Of the majors, ether is less.
1:24.9	Yes.
1:25.4	Of the majors, Ethereum is the least worst. Yes. Bullish, bullish for those of you who are doing the pair trade. For anyone else is just holding, it's a painful, painful day. So, okay, tell me, first of all, market seems to be very jittery right now. We've had just a bleed over the last week and a half, and today it leged down 6%.
1:45.3	And I think the news that catalyzed this was that Sailor had sold 25 BTC, which is not a lot
1:53.0	of Bitcoin, and he sold it months ago.
1:55.8	But this seems to have been enough to say, oh, my God, the up only, like the one buyer in the market
2:01.7	seems to be capitulating. It seems like that was maybe a shot across the bow, just a signal
2:05.7	with the market, hey, I might actually sell these, so please buy my derivatives and, you know,
2:10.4	please, you know, like, I will, I will pay my debts, but it seems to have backfired. I don't know,
2:16.4	maybe this was, this was understood to be the effect, but thoughts on the sailor effect.
2:21.4	And also, what does that maybe mean for the ETHDATs?
2:24.3	Well, he telegraphed it.
2:25.8	He said he was going to do this, and he did it.
	...

Transcript will be available on the free plan in 26 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Laura Shin, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Laura Shin and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.