On January 17th of 2013, Lance Armstrong admitted to blood-doping for the Tour De France.

To honor the anniversary of Lance’s devastating honesty, we’re prepared to make our own confession.

We’ve been doping for the newsletter. That’s right. We’ve been consuming eye-bulging, hand-shaking amounts of caffeine to bring you your fix every morning.

Instead of judging us, join in by indulging in this newsletter and the latest episode of the Coffee & Crypto podcast! 

On this week’s episode we do a deep dive into Dungeons and Dragons, SBF’s newest and whiniest critic, NPCs, and the delusions that talk to us when we try to sleep.

Espresso Shots

☕️ SHIB Releases Shibarium 🐕 🪙

SHIB, the team behind the Shiba Inu currency, are “putting the finishing touches” on their layer 2 network, Shibarium, built on Ethereum.

Shibarium will offer faster transaction speeds while also attempting to minimize cost.

BONE and TREAT tokens will be available on Shibarium, but ShibaSwap, Shiba’s decentralized exchange, will not be added at launch.

ShibaSwap will be included later, after the launch of the mainnet (full operational blockchain).

It’s an exciting development for SHIB, and there’s an equally exciting lawsuit coming from Shibarium, a Japanese dog café with the same name as their new network.

☕️ Hackers on the Move 🏃‍♂️ 🕵️

The North Korean Hacker group, Lazarus, who famously nabbed 41,000 ETH in the harmony bridge hack, have deposited some of that $63.4 billion on to Binance, Huobi, and OKX.

These funds, those ostensibly public, were deposited using the anonymity system, Railgun.

In addition to hiding their identities with Railgun, the deposits apparently came from 350,000 separate wallet addresses.

Admittedly, it’s very cool and bold for internationally infamous hackers to leave such public evidence, we were expecting a trail of black, fingerless gloves leading down a hallway.

☕️ Logan Paul Wants to Burn CryptoZoo Down 🐯 🔥

Logan Paul has created an exit strategy for his failing NFT project, CryptoZOO.

Logan Paul and the other cofounders are going to burn their tokens, so that they have no financial upside to the project. Disappointed investors can also burn their tokens and will be refunded the initial .1 ETH ($150) minting price.

Many have praised Paul for focusing less on lawsuits and instead prioritizing fixing the project and reimbursing investors, but not everyone was so easily swayed.

 “But let’s be honest. You didn’t care until it started to impact your reputation,” said crypto_bitlord7.

Jokes on you, crypto_bitlord7, if Logan Paul cared about his reputation he probably wouldn’t have vlogged in Japan’s Suicide Forest.

Spilling the Beans

Sam Bankman-Fried VS Bernie Madoff 🤨 💰

Sam Bankman-Fried, he’s the worst fraudster since Bernie Madoff.

You’re going to be hearing that a lot in the coming year(s). 

Probably because most Americans can’t bring to mind the names of any other white collar criminals.

While Charles Ponzi, of course, invented the Ponzi scheme, Bernie Madoff is the undisputed king of fraud.

Yeah, maybe there wasn’t a Martin Scorcese movie about Madoff’s exploits. But that’s directly due to the fact that Madoff, unlike Jordan Belfort, didn’t keep a Carrie-Bradshaw-like diary of all his naughtiest exploits.

When it comes to crime, just be it, don’t say it.

But contemporaries aside, who’s really worse? SBF or Madoff?

Let’s throw up those numbers.

Sam’s embroiled in an estimated $8 billion in fraud.

Madoff's Ponzi scheme landed him an estimated $64.8 billion.

So that’s one point in Madoff’s column. 

But aside from the total gross, the intent may be the deciding factor.

Sam still hasn’t gone to trial and the point that his defense team want to emphasize is:

This wasn’t malicious criminal fraud. This was incompetence, or at best, negligence.

And the outcome of that trial still remains to be decided.

Now, Madoff, on the other hand, at one point told his sons that his entire life was a lie and his investment firm was just one big Ponzi scheme.

That’s pretty explicit.

Like we said, details will still be forthcoming about Sam’s involvement, but for now, having only embezzled about 12% of the numbers that Madoff put up, it’s clear that Bernie Madoff is in a different league.

Bernie Madoff is at the top of the food chain. He’s a Great White-Collar Crime Shark. 

Madoff is an apex predator and Sam just plays Apex Legends.

But don’t feel so bad, Sam, you’re still going to get demonized in the media. And your hair is way bigger than Madoff’s.

Meme of the Day

Who is that fraud I see, staring straight back at me... 🎵

The Last Sip

We’re back with another session of historical figures’ thoughts on crypto.

King Leonidas of Sparta: “Hold, HOLD, HODL!” (In response to the Persian bear market)

Thomas Jefferson: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are imbued with certain unalienable rights, the rights to liberty, self-custody, and the pursuit of the bag.

The Bhagavad-Gita: Now, I am become Contagion, the destroyer of markets.

Stay Caffeinated,

Coffee & Crypto Team

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DISCLAIMER: None of this is financial advice. This newsletter is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. Please be careful and do your own research.