State of The Market, The Prediction Market Wars & Kraken Pursues Aave

**Jason Yanowitz** (0:00)
Nothing said on Empire is a recommendation to buy or sell any investments or products. This podcast is for informational purposes only, and the views expressed by anyone on the show are solely their opinions, not financial advice or necessarily the views of Blockworks. Our hosts, guests and the Blockworks team may hold positions in the company's funds or projects discussed.
All right, everyone, welcome back to Empire. Very excited about this one. Getting the show out a little late, but we're making it happen. Santi got a haircut. Santi looking sharp. Rob.

**Santiago Roel** (0:35)
You know, you know, it's bad when people know you got a haircut, right?

**Jason Yanowitz** (0:38)
Dude, you told me I got my what did you tell me? My eyebrows waxed or something.

**Rob** (0:43)
Rob was the one that did that. I think he was he literally was the first one. He's like, I got my eyebrows waxed. Like, how do they look? And then like we get on the pod and he's like, oh, my God, Santi.
And then we get on the pod and he's like, oh, what's going on?

**Santiago Roel** (0:55)
I don't think I've ever got my.

**Jason Yanowitz** (0:57)
Santi, take off the glasses. Let's see the eyebrows. And hence and hence waxed waxed for sure.

**Santiago Roel** (1:06)
Guys, there's plenty to talk about and other people to roast. It's not going to be me on this.

**Jason Yanowitz** (1:10)
All right, fine, fine, fine. Rob, how was the World Cup game? You flew to Seattle.

**Rob** (1:15)
It was amazing. So Seattle is a great soccer town, football town.
It's in the stadium. You can't undersell, and they have this in the UK and in Europe, but just how good it is when you can walk to the stadium, like from downtown, and you can hit up the bars, you can chant, you can cheer, like all the other fans are there. Because we have these games at MetLife or out at SoFi Stadium in LA in Inglewood, and you've got to drive there in the middle of nowhere, and yeah, they're big stadiums, but you just don't get the same kind of pre-game camaraderie. And so incredible time in Seattle. I hope they go, there is going to be another game there, I think in the quarterfinals, if the US makes the quarterfinals, which I am betting heavily on. So excited for that.

**Jason Yanowitz** (1:58)
Let's go, let's go.
And then they lost Turkey. What's going on? Odds, Santi's trade 2.4 last time. We're up to 3.1. Good trade, Santi, good trade.

**Santiago Roel** (2:08)
Outperforming the markets, guys, which is not saying much these days, but you know.

**Jason Yanowitz** (2:13)
I will say your micron trade is like good meal.

**Santiago Roel** (2:20)
My they delivered earnings yesterday.

**Jason Yanowitz** (2:22)
One of the craziest earnings I've like ever seen.

**Santiago Roel** (2:25)
Yeah, yeah, it's pretty wild. Markets down today though.
Are you saying broader sell off?

**Jason Yanowitz** (2:31)
So open AI pulled their SpaceX SpaceX went down, which then triggered, I feel like opening I to pull the IPO. Now broader sell off.
Thoughts on, maybe we can start with just general thoughts on markets.

**Santiago Roel** (2:44)
Well, wasn't it you that talked about like, if SpaceX IPO doesn't deliver as much, it likely delays some of the other IPOs and like that's...

**Jason Yanowitz** (2:55)
My call at the beginning of the year is that the market was going to, the equities market would top once the SpaceX IPO happened.

**Santiago Roel** (3:06)
All right. Well, it was nice knowing you guys this year. Should we just come back in September?

**Jason Yanowitz** (3:14)
I don't think crypto markets can come back, crypto equities and crypto tokens, without some sort of rolling over of the AI market. I think there is too much capital that going in... AI, I mean, not a unique take here, but AI has sucked up every bit of attention in capital and all of capital markets right now. And if you want money to flow back into crypto, you need some sort of rolling over. I'm not saying you need a huge bubble bursting, but it wouldn't be the worst thing for crypto if AI pulled back a little bit.

**Rob** (3:46)
I think the problem you have is that we're actually seeing, every quarter, you can tell the market is a little bit concerned about, okay, well, what's happening in earnings? Is this capex, are we going to get a good ROI out of it? Is there going to continue to be this upward acceleration that's happening to real GDP, to these businesses, and demand for compute and for AI every quarter? And yet, it keeps working.