Ivan on Tech covers privacy coin pumps, Bitcoin's weak trend, and upcoming tech IPOs
Ivan on Tech's crypto market update, recorded while on vacation.
Summary
Recorded while on vacation, this market update focused on the outperformance of select privacy-related coins — Near, Zcash, Hype, and Venice — while the broader altcoin market remains largely in bear trends, with many coins down 80–94%. He argues that Hyperliquid qualifies as a "privacy coin" in a functional sense because it provides both 24/7 trading on news events when traditional markets are closed and genuine trading privacy for those acting on time-sensitive or sensitive information. He discusses the upcoming IPOs of SpaceX, OpenAI, and Anthropic, noting they will collectively require approximately $200 billion in fresh capital from the market. He briefly notes that Kevin Warsh has been named the new Fed chair. He closes with a clip of Christine Lagarde, heading into an informal Ecofin meeting (which begins with a Eurogroup session), appearing to cast doubt on the value of stablecoins.
Key Takeaways
FULL TRANSCRIPT
Welcome and Market Overview
Ivan on Tech: Yes, yes, yes. Welcome to another episode. As you can see, I'm on vacation — we're on vacation — but the market is moving. Coins are hitting all-time highs. Privacy is popping off. Really, really crazy how privacy is popping off. We'll be speaking about that. Of course, I'll be providing an update on Bitcoin. I can tell you already now that Bitcoin currently has a lower high, and sadly this thing is putting in another lower high.
But just like in life, you have some positivity and some negativity, and you have to focus on the positivity. So if we are to focus on the positivity, what do you see? You see Near, for example, in a new bull trend, especially on the daily. To see positivity, you have to go to the daily. You have to look at the strong altcoins on the daily.
Privacy Coins Leading the Rally
Ivan on Tech: Near is up 70% since the bull flip. And of course they have their confidential payments now live, and they are playing into the privacy narrative. This is the importance of tracking what flips bullish in real time — because once something flips bullish, boop, big Valhalla. Very, very interesting. A 70% pump. But it's not the biggest pump when it comes to privacy.
Another privacy coin, as you know, is Zcash. Zcash is up 77% since the bull flip — fantastic returns. As you can see, the money line works very well. The money line did not get shaken out by the dump right here. It remained bullish and we continued to the upside. Fantastic 77% return.
Also look at Hype. Hype is up 92%. Now, the reason why Hype is significant — listen, in reality it's also a bit of a privacy coin. Hear me out here. If you want to trade the US stock market and you are a bit of an insider, how do you trade the US stock market? You go to Hype. You go to Hyperliquid. I'm not putting any moral weight into the actions that people take, but it is a privacy coin in the sense that there is no other way to trade the US stock market — or other markets, whatever market you want, equities markets — with privacy. Hype is that. While it's not a privacy chain in the traditional sense, for stock traders, for people who are in the know, it's a bit of a privacy chain. So you can say this is also privacy.
Also, big news happen over the weekend — some world awareness event, some business event, some new announcement. There is no way to trade on the stock market, but you can trade on Hyperliquid. You can trade stocks and everything on Hyperliquid. So the use case is there. It is the privacy narrative. Boop. Fantastic bull trend.
As you know, we care about use case only in the case that it is confirmed by the price trend. You can have the best use case, the best narrative — no one cares. We don't care either. Why? Because we need to make money in this industry. We're here to profit. We're a profit-seeking community. And that's why we're probably the most profitable — because we went risk-off in October. We said it's time to get out of alts. Bitcoin and alts went down 80–90%. Most of them are still down. Bitcoin went down 50-plus percent, still in a bear trend. And now you see some altcoins taking the step to bullishness. We track it very, very closely, and we are excited when you have the narrative and the price both confirming the bullish signal.
Why Zcash Spent a Decade Going Nowhere
Ivan on Tech: You can see Zcash itself — you had over a decade when no one cared about it. Being in Zcash during all of that time is more or less capital destruction, because during that time you had all kinds of stuff happening. And if you zoom out even more, it's like a decade of dead. You want to be in things that are not dead, because it's a big opportunity cost to not be in bullish assets.
But anyway — Zcash, good. Privacy, good. Hyperliquid, also privacy, believe it or not. Near, also privacy.
Near's Cross-Chain Privacy Technology
Ivan on Tech: Near is fascinating technology — fascinating tech — because it is cross-chain privacy. I'm telling you that as a developer, because not only am I all about the financial markets, I actually started as a developer. All of you OGs know that I'm a developer at heart. But I also discovered that if you just have fundamentals and no pumpamentals, it's not good. So you need to have the price pump.
But from a tech perspective, they've done something remarkable here. Basically, you send assets privately across different chains. The blockchain does not know what you do. The recipient just gets the money — that's it. And the whole process is super smooth and compliant. Very important — compliance. You know, the older I get, the more I understand that you need compliance. Because if you send big amounts, at the end of the day, if you need to explain it to someone with authority, you want to be able to do that.
If a chain is fully private and there's no way to do an audit, maybe you're a company, maybe you're a corporate user doing transactions, or as an individual you could get audited for whatever reason. Maybe even if you live in a zero-tax jurisdiction, you may still get audited for other reasons, including money laundering concerns. It can be many different reasons. So the most important thing with all of this privacy is that if you actually want and need to prove what happened, it's possible. And with Near, it is that way. You have a viewing key. If you are audited, you can show: hey, I'm a good guy. I'm a white fluffy rabbit.
So Near — fantastic. I love Near. Very, very nice. Now that the price is up and we're in a bull trend, we've been in love with Near since the 18th of April. Fantastic bull pump. Let's see what happens.
Venice: Privacy AI Up 335%
Ivan on Tech: The fourth one is Venice. Venice is the privacy AI, and it's been bullish since February 18th — up 335%. Now the important point here is of course to be selective and to use good tools. I use the money line, the money scanner, to see in real time when things go bull or bear.
Here you can see why it's important to be selective, because most coins are struggling a lot. Look at Mocka Network — this is Animoca, should be a blue-chip gaming coin — down 94% since the bear flip. Space and Time down 91%. Zach, 90%. But even the big names — let's not just focus on the small ones. Look at Filecoin. Wrecked. Super, super wrecked. Even Coti — wrecked, 90% down. If it's a bear trend, you've got to stay out. There is no recovering sign. Uma — blue-chip oracle — down 82%. Ronin, 78%. Zora, 78%. Everything is down.
Basically, you have only a few select assets doing well. Only a few select assets. That's why it's about the tools. It's not about the narrative. There are many other privacy coins that are not doing well. There are many other privacy solutions that are not doing well. So just because Near and Zcash and Hype and Venice are doing well, that's not a guarantee that your privacy coin is going to do well. And then people complain — "my privacy coin, it's unfair, it's manipulated, our privacy coin is also good." They tell me, "Ivan, if you love privacy, why don't you cover my coin?" Because your coin does not pump. Simple, simple, simple.
We are very selective. We have an amount of capital we need to put into the market. It has to give us a return. To miss out on bull trends because you're holding some bear thing is very, very bad.
Hyperliquid and the 24/7 Trading Thesis
Ivan on Tech: All in all, you have a few select coins pumping. The overall market is still quite dead, and it's all about being in bull trends. Someone in the comments is saying: every time Trump announces material information while the traditional brokerages are closed and the only place you can trade assets is Hyperliquid, the bullish thesis gets stronger. Yes — not only does Hyperliquid allow you 24/7 trading based on news, it also gives you privacy. If you are close to Trump, you can put in some trades.
Another thing people tell me sometimes is that trend following is a lagging indicator. I hear it sometimes. But you see the results yourself. It's all about having a repeatable system where you know that you will be part of the upside and not part of the downside. Very important. You can repeat it over and over again across different assets.
Someone in the comments is saying we're in a Bitcoin bear market because it's a bear trend. It's a fact. It's fully factual. It's a fully fair way of saying that we're in a Bitcoin bear trend. People don't like when I say that, but it's true.
Another angle: everything connected to AI is pumping. Venice is private AI. Zcash is privacy in the age of AI. I mean, I would say it's more of a privacy narrative than AI. Can you say that Zcash is AI? Maybe. Near is fully focused on hosting AI. But it doesn't really matter — is it AI or privacy? It's both. It's all about getting people excited about it. If you can say it's privacy to the privacy people, if you can say it's AI to the AI people, they both love it, price goes up, fantastic. We need good narratives in this industry, not just VC crap. We need good narrative. This is good narrative. You love privacy? Good, we're privacy. You love AI? We're AI also. We're both. You want quantum resistance? Zcash is quantum resistant. Fantastic. You need all of this.
Near's Incognito Mode in Detail
Ivan on Tech: Speaking about Near — if we dig deeper — your crypto wallet just got incognito mode. Confidential payments across 35-plus chains are live on Near. Toggle one switch in your wallet, your transactions become invisible on-chain. Toggle off — public again. And look at what it looks like on the explorer: the sender shows as anonymous. "0.1 ETH transfer — chain has no record of who sent it." There you go. But if you want, you can prove it.
Look here — compliance built in. To prove a transaction to a regulator, auditor, or accountant, hand them the viewing key. This is important. I know that many people in this space want to be like Jason Bourne — hiding from the state, cyberpunk, this and that, with your $100. But if you actually have money, you know that life is actually better if you honestly go to a place with low tax so you're not bothered by it. And then if you need to show something, you can show it. It's important to not be constantly on the run, because the stress you get — I see them in the comments, I can feel their stress. Just relax. Take a coffee. Don't do anything shady. You don't have to hide. Just go to a place where it's low tax, where you love it. It's fully legal. And if you do some big transfer and need to show something, you can show it. It's private, but you decide if you want to show. Simple, simple, simple.
And by the way, sorry for not being fully cypherpunk. I was more that way when I was younger. But you know, all of the illusions kind of fade. Maybe you guys are older — most of you watching this are probably around 50 years old, so you probably understand. When you're young, you think everything is romantic. You have a romantic brain. But as you grow, you understand things differently.
Branding Matters: Why "Secret" Is the Wrong Name
Ivan on Tech: Another thing I love with Near is that it's not this geeky branding. I hate when a privacy coin does the whole "hidden, private, secret" thing. Speaking of which — Secret Network. I don't like that it's called Secret. It sounds shady. And this is an example where privacy currently does not pump all privacy coins, because Secret Network is not pumping. Maybe it will pump. Maybe it will catch up. But I don't like that they're called Secret, because if you get audited and they say, "Wait, why did you send Secret? What are you hiding? You have a secret — which secret?" I want to be able to say, "It's Near. It's a super big chain. Everyone is using it." Very good branding. Not this geeky Jason Bourne stuff.
Near has $3 billion-plus in monthly volume in this new system, 35 chains supported, and it's not a beta. This is why crypto. I love privacy. This is great. You've got to do it like this. Big shout out to the Near team — they've done it very, very nicely. And it's not only privacy on one chain. It's across chains. You can send ETH privately. You can send 35 different chains privately, with Near infrastructure.
IPO Mania: SpaceX, OpenAI, Anthropic
Ivan on Tech: Moving on and switching gears a bit. FTX bankruptcy is now the same amount as Tom Lee's losses on ETH. Crazy.
Looking at the stock market — you're going to have SpaceX, OpenAI, and Anthropic all IPOing within the coming months. Why are they IPOing within the coming months? Because it's kind of a race now — who's going to get all of the money? These are some of the biggest IPOs in history. SpaceX is going to be the biggest. Let's see how big OpenAI or Anthropic will be. They're going to be drawing so much money from the market that there's a bit of competition between them. If you're too late, there's no money left for you, because such big races basically require the market to come up with $200 billion in fresh capital.
How this is going to go — it can go two ways, as always: bullish and bearish. There's no way to know. No one can tell you. But we have a system that will tell us. It could be that this crazy run we've had since March of this year comes to an end because you have this crescendo — the apex, all of these big IPOs, they are so big and people are so excited. The average person is now a stock investor and a SpaceX investor. Or maybe it's a perpetual rally, kind of like the dot-com era — maybe another year. It took quite some time to really go bad in the dot-com. And who was it — was it Druckenmiller? I think it was Druckenmiller who was actually bearish on the dot-com, then he flipped bullish, and then it collapsed. He was correct in the end. That's why you don't want to predict.
We never predict. We just follow the channel. It's impossible. Even if you're correct about the what but not the when, you're incorrect. If you just get one right, you lose money. You need both. And they're very hard to predict. So if you ask me, will this rally continue? I don't know. But if it goes bear, we're out. That's it. Simple, simple, simple.
You see the system in action here — it turned bear here, we became risk-off on stocks, then we became risk-on. What that basically means is that we have all of the upside — basically all of the upside. You become risk-off here, you enter potentially a bit higher here. But the thing is, you need to wait. The benefit is that should this thing have gone down 70%, we're not part of it.
Is AI a Bubble?
Ivan on Tech: I don't care whether it's a bubble or not. People are worried — is it a bubble or not? Is AI a bubble? Guys, I don't know. Maybe it's a bubble. All good tech actually does a bubble. Look at the railroad mania in the US — there were like a thousand railroad companies when rail was new tech. It created a bubble. It was great tech. AI is likely going to do a bubble. But when? This year? In five years? How big? I don't know. And the best thing is — I don't care. We have a system with mechanical rules, with the money line. It is such a nice system. I literally don't care. We ride the bull trend. We don't overthink it. Should it go bear, we're out.
Bitcoin Still Weak, Conclusion
Ivan on Tech: So what is the conclusion here? Bitcoin is still bearish on the big picture. On the daily, by the way, it's still bullish, so potentially a bit of pump left — but it's looking weak. Overall, Bitcoin is looking weak. We need to look at what's happening with the altcoins. Altcoins are now in the privacy era, but not all privacy coins pump. Only select ones that are bullish, bullish, bullish, bullish. So follow the trend. Let's see what's going to happen.
Oh — Kevin Warsh is now the Fed chair. We will be keeping you updated with what's going to happen there with the rates.
Christine Lagarde on Stablecoins
Ivan on Tech: Oh guys, sorry — I almost forgot. Let me see if you can hear this. I'm recording. Christine Lagarde. I love Christine Lagarde. Look at how she discusses stablecoins. Listen to this.
Christine Lagarde: "Well, hello everybody. I'm, as you see, prepared to go to the informal Ecofin meeting, which starts with a Eurogroup meeting, and will be particularly relevant today and tomorrow — discussions about the digital euro, discussion about stablecoins and how valuable they are — or not — and of course…"
Ivan on Tech: Did you hear that? "How valuable they are — or not." Discussion about stablecoins and how valuable they are — or not. Yeah, exactly. Big shout out to Christine Lagarde. No comment. No comment. But you see — maybe not valuable. Let's see.