The Chopping Block: Is Canton a Real Blockchain? Ethereum’s Cypherpunk Dilemma, AI Security Chaos

Unchained

Laura Shin

Business News, News, Tech News

4.6 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 3 April 2026

⏱️ 57 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The Chopping Block crew and Wintermute’s Evgeny Gaevoy debate whether Canton is truly permissionless, if Ethereum Foundation should double down on cypherpunk ideals or embrace institutions, and how AI-driven attacks are forcing everyone in crypto and open source to rethink security models. 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 we’ve got Evgeny Gaevoy, Founder of Wintermute, known for sharp takes and sharper trades. First up, the group unpacks the Twitter war over enterprise chain Canton—does it deserve to be called “permissionless”, or is it just TradFi with extra steps? Cue the Solana–Ethereum truce, and a rare moment where every old-school degenerate finds a common enemy. Evgeny makes a strong case for why, despite years of jokes at the Ethereum Foundation’s expense, he thinks they’re finally ahead of the curve by doubling down on cypherpunk roots—even if it makes ETH a little more Linux and a little less Nasdaq. But does decentralization matter if stablecoins and institutions now control the fork-choice? Haseeb and Evgeny spar over whether Ethereum’s “world computer” vision means inviting in the corporate crowd or keeping the punk sanctuary alive. The mood shifts as the hosts dig into crypto’s unfolding security meltdown: AI-written hacks, NPM supply chain fiascos, and what that means for the future of open source in crypto. Plus, a fresh new hack (RIP Drift), and predictions on how defensive tech (or lack thereof) will shape the next cycle. Barstool banter, spicy takes, and zero investment advice as always—let’s get into it. Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pods, Fountain, Podcast Addict, Pocket Casts, Amazon Music, or on your favorite podcast platform. Show highlights 🔹 The Chopping Block crew and Evgeny Gaevoy debate whether Canton is a permissionless blockchain or just TradFi LARPing as crypto 🔹 Does Ethereum need to double down on cypherpunk “sanctuary” values—or let BlackRock and Circle join the party? 🔹 Haseeb dismantles the idea that all “tokenized RWAs” on “permissioned” blockchains are equivalent to Ethereum 🔹 Solana and Ethereum align—briefly!—with both camps skeptical of enterprise “default no” blockchains 🔹 Circle and Tether’s growing influence: can fork-choice governance still exist if stables dictate the canonical chain? 🔹 Linux, the open internet, and how crypto’s utopian dreams get co-opted by institutions 🔹 Drift’s $270M hack highlights the AI-enabled acceleration of exploits and the mounting risks for open-source software 🔹 AI in security: From North Korean supply chain attacks to open source’s existential crisis 🔹 Is the future of crypto code closed or open? Zero knowledge proofs vs. code visibility in the LLM era 🔹 Are we headed for a world where only org-backed, audit-heavy open source survives? Hosts ⭐️Haseeb Qureshi, Managing Partner at Dragonfly ⭐️Tarun Chitra, Managing Partner at Robot Ventures ⭐️Tom Schmidt, General Partner at Dragonfly Guest ⭐️ Evgeny Gaevoy, Founder and CEO at Wintermute Disclosures Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	I guess my most contrarian view on this is the Syrian Foundation for the first time in its life
0:05.3	is being ahead of the curve currently because it basically reads the room and it understands,
0:11.9	okay, all those people who weren't the cypherpunk values in the past, they have nowhere to turn
0:18.6	anymore.
0:19.4	Not a dividend.
0:20.5	It's a tale of two fun.
0:21.6	Now, your losses are on someone else's malagy.
0:24.4	Generally speaking, air drops are kind of pointless anyways.
0:26.9	I'm named trading firms who are very involved.
0:30.0	I like that ETH is the ultimate pump.
0:32.1	D5 protocols are the antidote to this problem.
0:36.0	Hello, everybody.
0:36.7	Welcome to the shopping block. Every couple weeks, the four of us get together
0:39.1	and give the industry insider's perspective on the crypto topics of the day. So quick intro, this is just you got Tom, the Defy Maven, and Master of Memes. Hello, everyone. Thanks, we've got Tarun, the Gigabrain, and Grand Puba at Gauntlet. Yeah. And joining us again, we've got if guinea high frequencyquency Hustler and Head Honcho at Wintermute. Hello. And I am a Cib, the Head Hibman at Dragonfly. We're at least invested in crypto, but I want to caveat that nothing we say here is investment advice, legal advice, or even life advice. Please see Chopin Block. At XYZ for more disclosures. So there's been an increasing debate that's continued on since we had our
1:12.2	previous show where we talked about the EF about this kind of core crypto cypherpunk values
1:18.8	versus the new normal of what is increasingly focused on adoption, enterprises, and the sort of
1:25.6	quote-to-quote grown-up version of crypto.
1:28.1	And a lot of this has really fixated on this debate waging between ZKSink and Canton.
1:34.7	So we're, first caveat that we're investors in ZKSink.
1:38.0	They wrote a long thread, basically targeting some of the claims that the Canton team has
1:43.2	been making.
1:44.1	Those of you don't know what Canton is, Canton is, they had another name before, I think,
	...

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