Mike Belshe: The 100 Bitcoin Hacking Bounty & How to Hold Bitcoin Where the ETFs Do

**Natalie Brunell** (0:00)
You basically allocated 100 Bitcoin to a wallet, and you said, go hack this. And clearly, it's still sitting there in that wallet, right?

**Mike Belshe** (0:06)
One thing that surprised me, how much people are afraid of quantum computers, I said, okay, fine. If you're so great, here's 100 Bitcoins, go get it.

**Natalie Brunell** (0:14)
You recently went to the White House.

**SPEAKER_3** (0:15)
BitGo, which is a big deal in the world of that thing, that little thing that's happening out there.

**Natalie Brunell** (0:20)
What caused President Trump to mention your company?

**Mike Belshe** (0:22)
Trump was discussing kind of all that we've done over the last 18 months in order to completely change the climate politically. We've been focused on institutions from the beginning. We strongly believe retail deserves what institutions demand. You get the same features that institutions get.

**Natalie Brunell** (0:36)
But if quantum became a reality today, wouldn't you be at risk of losing your coins?
Hey, everyone. Welcome back to the show. Joining me this week is Mike Belshe. He is the co-founder and CEO of BitGo. And BitGo has been in the news recently. I think I heard President Trump mention your company in the last two weeks. So, Mike, great to have you.

**Mike Belshe** (1:01)
Thank you, Natalie. Good to be here. It's been way too long because I think we met before you had this podcast. You were just getting started. How long have you been doing this now?

**Natalie Brunell** (1:09)
This is year five, I believe, which is so crazy.

**Mike Belshe** (1:12)
All right. So I think it's because you're in New York.

**Natalie Brunell** (1:16)
I record in New York a lot, but I'm based in the Midwest. I'm going to keep it private for OPSEC. We're going to talk about security here. We're going to talk about a lot. But no, I mean, what caused President Trump to mention your company? You recently went to the White House.

**Mike Belshe** (1:30)
I did. So look, it's been a big week for BitGo. Actually, pretty humbled and impressed. I've been working on a little thing. I'm impressed by the administration and teamwork, which is not something that you really think of with regulators. So we had the good fortune. I sat down with Commissioner Gold from the OCC. I sat down with the Secretary of Treasury Besant.
Of course, I met with Trump, also met with Chair of the CFTC, Mike Selig, and met with Chair of the SEC, Paul Atkins, all in the span of the last four days.
But the teamwork part, this administration is working together. When you think of regulators, there's been infighting and jockeying for positioning, and questions about like, this is the CFTC's turf, it's the SEC's turf. This administration is like, okay, let's chop up the work to be done. Let's figure out who should do which parts, and let's go figure out how to make sure we have a Bitcoin crypto agenda for America. And they're making it happen. So, you know, sometimes you hear, oh, thank you, President Trump, for your leadership. I almost feel like it's said too much. But on the other hand, he's assembled a team that's working together. I think it's an example for other administrations in the future. So I didn't mean to go so political.
I'm actually just genuinely impressed. They had, I was here for, there was this IAC meeting, which is an advisory committee at the CFTC. And then President Trump was discussing kind of all that we've done over the last 18 months in order to completely change the climate politically. And of course it's true. You know, 18 months ago, did you see, you know, DTCC? Did you see Morgan Stanley? Did you see Citibank saying that they're gonna touch Bitcoin? Well, now you do, right? And that's what happens once you shift from a regulator that wants to regulate by enforcement to a regulator that's like, wait a minute, let's understand this problem. We might have to change some things, but let's work on it. And that's what we have now. So anyway, they're working as a team, they're firing all cylinders.
Obviously there's been a lot of talk about the Clarity Act, which would help all of us, of course, regardless of which part of Bitcoin, crypto, tokenized equities you're on, but they are working well together and we're gonna get a good result whether Clarity passes or not.

**Natalie Brunell** (3:43)
Well, so you make it sound like there's been a lot of progress. I would say that a lot of my viewers feel the opposite, that they've kind of stalled on Bitcoin, we're not hearing about whether the United States is gonna buy or the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve. When are we gonna get an audit of how much the United States actually holds? So what do you say to the folks out there who feel like, no, this administration has largely forgotten the space?