Brick by Brick
This month, dear reader, we’re going to take a look at some bricks. And, since the NBA playoffs are here let me clarify that I don’t mean a missed shot. I’m talking about the small but quite important building bricks that, when put together, create something exciting. Something grand. Something where the whole far exceeds the sum of its parts. To set the stage properly let’s start with some context. There’s a story about England’s most celebrated architect, Christopher Wren, visiting the construction site of St. Paul's Cathedral after it was destroyed in the great fire of 1666. As the story goes Wren was touring the construction and he came across three bricklayers on a scaffold; one crouched, one half-standing, and one standing tall. He asked the crouched man what he was doing to which the man replied, “I’m laying bricks”. He continued to the second bricklayer who was half-standing and asked the same question, to which this worker replied, “I’m building a wall”. Wren continued his inquiry with the third bricklayer, who was proudly placing his bricks. This time the man, posed with the same question, replied enthusiastically “I’m building a cathedral.” Three men. Same job. Different outcomes (for both the men and the project!)
Context Is Everything. Bricks build buildings. And this month boy oh boy, did a whole bunch of bricks get put into our building. I’m going to explore these below and remind everyone that looking at price is the booby prize; looking at what is being built is the real prize. This is why I remain so excited about what is happening in this space and the opportunity for all of us over the coming years. So grab your mortar, dear reader, we’re going to get to work…
The Regulatory Brick: Clarity Clears Committee
As you may recall last time around we were talking about the never ending Netflix series called "Will the Clarity Bill ever pass?” Well, it looks like our Netflix series just got its best episode to date, with the Senate Banking Committee, in a historic 15-9 vote1, moving to send the bill to congress. Importantly, this was also bipartisan, including democrats Gallego (AZ) and Alsobrooks (MD)1, who helped negotiate key compromises regarding stablecoin rewards. The key logjam was around yield, with banks concerned that if stablecoins could produce interest that people would… leave banks. Ultimately, the compromise created concedes this and passive stablecoins held in an account will not be able to produce yield (think interest) if they are just sitting there. Rewards, however, may be provided as incentives for use, trading or network security. So if the asset is doing something, it can earn.
I have a couple of thoughts here. Last I checked we live in a capitalist society. Banks unhappy that deposits may leave if they can get better yield elsewhere seems to be a bit whiny in my opinion. If you want to keep customers… provide better product! No matter, the crypto constituents gave that point up. However, in return, they realized the ability to provide rewards for staking. I see these as almost the same thing. Yes, there is one more step in pressing the “stake my coins” button, and yes there may be a short term lock up (think of it kind of like a very small CD, but instead of a six month lockup its generally hours, days or weeks), but at the end of the day the tokens can be rewarded. Voila!
The White House has targeted a July 4th signing2 which means there is still some road to go, however, the bill needs to pass both the Senate and then the House3 as well given it’s revisions. Will it make it? My opinion is yes. This is critical for the next steps of the industry which has been begging for some kind of regulatory clarity for years. And both Democrats and Republicans know this. This is the key that should unlock 401K funds, institutional allocations, advisor recommendations and more. There’s still work to do in some parts of the bill, notably an ethics provision that would limit or prevent participation (ahem, “grifting”) by government officials, which I believe is probably a good idea for everyone. I personally don’t think we need any more Trump meme coins, which were a credibility nightmare for our industry on all fronts. I do want clear rules of engagement, and it looks like we could be there. With some final, thoughtful, work we may finally get this done and put our Regulatory Brick in place.
The Sovereign Brick: Uncle Sam Stacking
Now let’s turn to our Government here in the US, which is currently sitting on 328,372 bitcoin worth roughly $25 billion4, making the US the largest sovereign holder in the world! And how was this $25 billion being stored? Well, white house advisor Patrick Witt himself noted “We’ve heard stories and confirmed some of them of cold wallets that were being stored in drawers of desks in various agencies.”5 Let that sink in for a moment…. some part of twenty five billion. In a desk drawer. In a government agency desk drawer. Not. Good. There are reasons that institutions use, well, institutional grade cold storage via custodians like Anchorage Digital. Isn’t it time our Government did as well? And according to online investigator ZachXBT, some of the Governments stack has allegedly been stolen by insiders!6 This is one of the key points of a proper Strategic Bitcoin Reserve, which will include proper guidelines for storage. Trump signed an EO to get this moving in 2025. It looks like the short strokes are now being put in place to actually manifest this in reality7.
More than storage, the SBR will allow the US government to purchase BTC. The $25 billion in Bitcoin already owned by Uncle Sam was acquired via seizures. Call it… a series of happy accidents. Normally seized assets are sold on the open market, however one of the provisions of the 2025 order was to prevent this7, thereby allowing the government to enjoy any appreciation of the seized assets. Now, however, Congress is debating whether to make that a deliberate strategy and actually go shopping. Two competing bills would authorize buying 200,000 BTC per year for five years8… That’s one MILLION Bitcoin my friends. I’m not going to go into these bills as I want to stay higher level here, but suffice it to say that if either one passes the US Treasury could be in the market buying Bitcoin7 as soon as Q4 2026, becoming the first sovereign nation to do so. Importantly, I think this creates an asset arms race, and impels every other major country to buy Bitcoin, which of course feeds directly into our Demand Wave thesis. This is our Sovereign Brick.
The Distribution Brick: Schwab Supports Stacking
I’ll start this section by noting that, up until a few years ago just about every one of the major banks and asset mangers treated crypto as if it was toxic waste, including Schwab. That’s now changed. As of May 13 Schwab Crypto9 began rolling out to retail customers. Now to be clear, it’s in a gentle launch so not all of their roughly 35 million brokerage accounts will have immediate access. But, in case you missed that let me repeat: “35 million brokerage accounts”. All soon with instant access to crypto. These accounts comprise something over $12 Trillion in assets 10. Can it be long before the other big guys make crypto available as well? This may be the single biggest distribution channel in the world! For some, the barrier to crypto was credibility. For others, access. Schwab just removed both of those barriers for tens of millions of Americans who already trust them with their retirement savings. Now I want to issue one caution, same as last month. This is going to be managed by advisors who for nearly a decade have been told that this asset is toxic waste. Now it seems they are being told to pile it on. So we need to note that access doesn’t mean understanding. I say again that major education is critical here as participating in these markets is still not for the faint of heart, and I don’t think this can be treated like any other asset particularly due to its volatility. However, wisely applied with a risk-managed overlay to mitigate downside is something I absolutely advocate for to limit downside pain. Having said that we still have to acknowledge that Schwab is now setting the table, and the takeaway here is we now have a Distribution Brick.
The Financial Brick: Tokenize Everything
Larry Fink, CEO of BlackRock has been saying it for years. Notably, in his 2025 annual Chairman’s letter to investors, he said “…every stock, every bond, every fund, every asset can be tokenized”11. Well, we’re on our way as in May Tokenized US Treasuries crossed $15.35 billion12. This is a huge jump from the $3.9 billion in early 202512, and a scant two years ago this sector was not more than an experiment. But now $15+ billion? Well, that’s a real number, (and that doesn’t even include the broader tokenized real-world assets sector which neared the $31 billion threshold, a 44% jump year to date!12) But, staying focused on treasuries, the market is growing. BlackRock offers BUIDL13, Circle/Hashnote USYC,14 and WisdomTree WTGXX15 All tokenized. All the beginning of a new way for investors to, well, invest. And they’re not doing this because anyone told them to. They’re doing it because tokenized assets are a better product. Each offers 24/7 trading and instant (or near instant settlement). And WTGXX is notable because in February 2026, the SEC granted WisdomTree the first-ever exemptive order specifically authorizing a 24/7 tokenized fund trading with instant settlement16, a mutual fund that anyone can invest in and gain the benefits of tokenization, and it’s a retail product blessed by the SEC. That’s important because BUIDL is institutional only, while USYC is for non-us persons. It also demonstrates that now, regulators in the US are literally getting on the bus. Given Fink’s proclamation, it certainly can’t be long before we see more of these. This is our Financial Brick.
blockchAIn: The AI Brick
In this final section, which has become a staple, I generally pontificate on how AI and blockchain are the proverbial peas and carrots (Thank you Forrest!). Well, last year we previewed how Bosch was pioneering electric cars and chargers that could negotiate transactions directly with no human intervention. Back in March of this year I highlighted the Alchemy agent wallet, which is designed to empower Machine to Machine (M2M) transactions. Well, as of May, the M2M world is expanding. On May 11th Circle launched Circle Agent Stack17, a complete infrastructure suite for Agents including wallets and a marketplace, while also facilitating nano-payments. This ecosystem is specifically designed to allow AI Agents to custody assets, discover services and complete transactions independently and programmatically. A few days earlier on May 7th Amazon entered the fray, with Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Payments18 created in collaboration with Stripe and Coinbase. Of course, and not to be outdone, Google was actually first to market on May 5th, launching pay.sh19, a Solana based platform which works inside all major common AI interfaces to facilitate payments. Circle. Amazon. Google. This is foundational folks, and it’s from the big guys. Up until now it’s been a tiny market, with only $73 million transacted agent to agent over the past year.20 But with these players joining, and machines being able to get business done at a fraction of the cost of a credit card transaction, I see the growth of these markets as absolutely… inevitable. I argue this will be the biggest brick of all. The AI Brick.
In Closing
A Regulatory Brick. A Sovereign Brick. A Distribution Brick. A Financial Brick. An AI Brick. This industry is being built. Brick by brick by brick. You know I’ve been pointing toward the Demand Wave for a while. This is the next foundational layer of said wave. It doesn’t happen all at once, it takes time. But taking a step back, can there be any question of where we’re going? So, while everyone is losing their mind over these markets, the smart money is simply looking out to the horizon. I encourage you to look as well and not get caught up in the short-term price chaos. Price up today? Down today? I say it’s irrelevant. The foundation is being laid in front of our eyes, all we have to do is look. Before you know it on that distant horizon instead of bricks, I argue we’re going see a cathedral. And that, my friends, is very exciting.
That’s all for now! Until next time be well, stay safe, and I’ll keep Decrypting Crypto for you!