Most crypto exchanges are built like casinos: they chase the next hot token, prediction market, or trading product. Relai is building a different category—a savings brand for people who want to accumulate Bitcoin, hold it in self-custody, and build wealth over the long run. Julian Liniger explains why serving patient savers requires a different product, message, and business model.

The conversation also explores why rising living costs are pushing Europeans to rethink ordinary savings, and why the temptation to get rich quickly can drive people toward momentum trading and leverage. Julian makes the case for a longer time horizon: Bitcoin savings is less about chasing the next move and more about consistently building a position through changing market conditions.

Supporting context includes Relai's MiCA compliance journey, where regulatory overhead is costly but can also raise the bar for smaller competitors. Julian also discusses the company's self-custody model and reports more than 100,000 users holding over 20,000 BTC in their own wallets—not under Relai management. The episode covers how a Bitcoin-only company can earn revenue through services around long-term ownership while keeping the savings proposition at the center.

Timestamps:

00:01 — Europe's Cost of Living Squeeze

03:11 — Why Europeans Still Don't Get Bitcoin

07:37 — High Time Preference & Get-Rich-Quick

10:31 — Bitcoin Needs Patience Again

10:54 — AI Hype vs Bitcoin as Savings

14:58 — Bitcoin Is Where You Keep Your Winnings

21:42 — Leverage, Treasury Cos & Risk

23:46 — Relai Private Loans in Europe

29:03 — MiCA: Overhead and Moat

33:11 — Bitcoin Savings vs Casino Exchanges

35:26 — 100k Users, 20k+ BTC Self-Custody

37:49 — Retail App vs Relai Private

40:00 — Self-Custody Phone Wallet

42:58 — Seven-Figure Raise in a Bear Market

45:12 — AI for Building and Securing Relai

50:00 — Living Costs Drive Bitcoin Search

Links: 

• https://x.com/julian_liniger

• https://x.com/relai_app

Stephan Livera links:

• Follow me on X: @stephanlivera

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Bitcoin soft-fork debates around CTV, CSFS, OP_CAT, and OP_VAULT keep stalling — and Misha Komarov of Allocinit argues you can emulate much of that covenant behavior with cryptography instead of changing consensus.

Misha joins Stephan to unpack Bitcoin PIPEs v2: a Witness Encryption design that locks a signing key under an NP statement so a valid zero-knowledge proof decrypts the key and produces an ordinary Schnorr spend. Bitcoin L1 only checks a normal signature.

They compare PIPEs v1 (Functional Encryption / richer post-covenants) with v2 (Witness Encryption / binary pre-covenants), ciphertext sizes from ~300 TB toward single-digit terabytes, DKG and 1-of-n setup assumptions, non-custodial vault and shared-pool use cases, contrasts with cosigner models like Sigbash, and how Allocinit’s Shielded Bitcoin design differs from Shielded CSV’s client-side validation approach — plus open cryptanalysis challenges and a path toward implementable code.

Timestamps:

00:00 — Intro: Misha & Bitcoin PIPEs v2

00:27 — Background: BitMessage to =nil;

01:31 — Soft-Fork Fatigue & Nice-to-Haves

03:24 — Emulate Opcodes Without Soft Forks

04:54 — Witness Encryption Unlocks Keys

06:01 — Witness Encryption vs Bitcoin Witness

09:00 — PIPEs v1 vs v2: FE to WE

11:39 — Ciphertext Size & Cost Trade-offs

15:28 — Vaults as the Unhappy Path

16:23 — PIPEs vs Sigbash Cosigner

18:05 — DKG Setup & 1-of-n Trust

21:11 — Shared Vaults & Lending Use Cases

23:24 — Beyond Canonical OP_VAULT

26:35 — Shielded Bitcoin vs Shielded CSV

32:17 — Self-Custody Peg-In and Peg-Out

37:14 — On-Chain Footprint Walkthrough

39:42 — Security Challenges & Code Roadmap

Links: 

• https://x.com/nemothenoone

• https://x.com/allocinitxyz

Stephan Livera links:

• Follow me on X: @stephanlivera

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Almost every public Bitcoin node still runs Bitcoin Core. Brandon Black argues that client monoculture is a systemic risk — and that automation plus AI now make independent consensus implementations more realistic than skeptics assume.

Brandon (aka reardencode) returns to Stephan Livera Podcast for the first episode in a mini-series on non-Core Bitcoin implementations. He is shipping rbitcoin, a Rust full node aimed at server-side wallet and Lightning backends, with Electrum served in-process.

They dig into why rbitcoin has no UTXO set and no Core-style dbcache, how build-time differential testing differs from satd’s in-process libbitcoinconsensus dual-eval, BIP324 v2-only P2P, archival storage tradeoffs, LibreRelay-inspired policy, and what “production-ready™” means when every first-party line was written by AI under his prompting.

Brandon is blunt about maturity: the project is still early, contributors are welcome at rbitcoin.org, and listeners should treat alt clients as high-scrutiny infrastructure — not a drop-in replacement for Core tomorrow.

Timestamps:

00:00 — Intro: Brandon Black & rbitcoin

00:34 — Why Build rbitcoin

03:46 — Alt Clients Mini-Series

04:39 — Consensus Divergence Risk

05:53 — satd vs rbitcoin Paths

06:51 — Automation Makes Diversity Possible

08:29 — Build-Time Differential Testing

09:20 — Why Consensus Bugs Matter

10:55 — Lessons from btcd Divergences

13:35 — Target User: Wallet Backends

15:29 — Miners Leave the Non-Goal List

16:47 — Kill the dbcache Model

20:50 — Electrum In-Process

22:23 — Silent Payments & Tor

23:01 — BIP324 v2-Only P2P

23:46 — AI-Coded: Zero Human Lines

25:04 — Grok Plus Multi-Model Review

27:01 — DoS Rules & LibreRelay

28:34 — Upgrade Hooks

29:34 — Archive-Only, No 'UTXO Set'

31:50 — AI as the New Compiler

33:52 — Context Limits & Dependencies

38:06 — rust-bitcoin Relationship

39:08 — Wallet Infra Opportunity

40:00 — Still 10% a Joke

41:35 — Future of Client Diversity

44:50 — Outro: rbitcoin.org

Links: 

• https://x.com/reardencode

• https://rbitcoin.org/

Stephan Livera links:

• Follow me on X: @stephanlivera

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Most Asian markets still make buying and saving Bitcoin painfully hard. James of Ârc argues the fix is not another protocol breakthrough — it is local founders shipping simple DCA and savings products market by market.

James joins me from Mirissa Beach, Sri Lanka, where Arc is partnering with Fulgur Ventures on a continuous Bitcoin accelerator. He is a former EY advisor and Playfair Capital investor who previously built with Alexander Mann (now Fulgur GP) and later sold Consequence, an early LLM-on-databases company.

The conversation covers why the program is continuous rather than a six- or twelve-week cohort, how to apply at arc.lk/Fulgur, why Sri Lanka ranks among his top-three country bets, the South Coast talent melting pot, funding DCA apps across Asia even where operators already exist, AI agents as Bitcoin users, and why Strike expanding should not scare local founders.

Timestamps:

00:00 — Intro: James of Ârc

00:35 — From Accenture to Venture Capital

02:13 — Building With Alex Singh

03:21 — Fed Up With Monkey JPEGs

05:10 — Ârc Fulgur Bitcoin Accelerator

06:35 — Continuous Program at Mirissa

07:34 — Two Paths Into Ârc Fulgur

10:13 — Why Sri Lanka?

12:02 — Top-Three Country Bet

12:23 — Whales, Leopards, Beach Hub

15:00 — South Coast Talent Melting Pot

18:36 — 34 Local Founders Already In

21:39 — Fund DCA Apps Across Asia

25:23 — AI Agents Will Use Bitcoin

28:18 — Room for Many Asian Operators

32:23 — Just Focus on Your Customer

32:39 — Apply Now

Links: 

• https://x.com/James_of_Arc

• https://x.com/FulgurVentures

• https://arc.lk/

Stephan Livera links:

• Follow me on X: @stephanlivera

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Mike Belshe, co-founder and CEO of BitGo, walks through how institutional Bitcoin custody actually works in 2026: qualified custody, self-custody co-signing, and why BitGo still centers a 2-of-3 model after pioneering P2SH multisig in 2013.

BitGo now operates as a US-regulated qualified custodian and public company, while still offering the same wallet stack individuals can run in self-custody mode. The conversation covers what “institutional security” means in practice — HSM-backed co-signing, open-source recovery paths, multi-jurisdictional key storage (including how BitGo moved WBTC when US regulation looked hostile), and why on-chain multisig still beats vendor-locked MPC for cold ops.

They also dig into the political and operational risks around large Bitcoin holdings: KYC and PII as honeypots, France tying names to amounts, the war on cash reaching Bitcoin, and whether an EO 6102-style confiscation risk still belongs in the threat model. On the institutional side, Belshe pushes back on multi-custodian setups that add failure modes, explains insurance limits versus the size of the Bitcoin market, and why splitting wallets matters after events like Bybit.

Timestamps

00:00 — Intro: Mike Belshe of BitGo

00:59 — Don't Lose Self-Custody's Power

05:41 — Retail Deserves Institutional Security

07:16 — Humans Are Terrible at OpSec

09:56 — 2-of-3 Protects Theft and Loss

14:35 — Retail Pays 160 Basis Points

19:22 — Why People Drift Toward Banks

20:35 — Self-Custody Is Never Trustless

23:39 — Why BitGo Sticks to 2-of-3

30:31 — A Public CEO Holds Zero at Home

31:27 — KYC Leaks Are Government Honeypots

39:28 — France Doxed Bitcoin Holdings

41:30 — War on Cash Reaches Bitcoin

43:45 — Multi-Jurisdictional Key Storage

45:29 — Executive Order 6102 Could Return

47:43 — Quantum-Resistant Wallets Today

49:27 — Multisig Beats MPC

53:33 — Splitting Custodians Adds Failures

58:29 — 2-of-2 MPC Can't Recover Loss

01:00:57 — $5–7B Insurance vs $1.6T Bitcoin

01:03:35 — Bybit Lost 10x by Not Splitting

01:05:21 — Multi-Institution vs Qualified Custody

Links: 

• https://x.com/mikebelshe

• https://x.com/bitgo

Stephan Livera links:

• Follow me on X: @stephanlivera

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Walter Maffione, CEO and co-founder of KaleidoSwap, join me to explain how the project grew from an RGB Lightning DEX into a broader swap engine and LSP stack — Lightning as rails between Liquid, Arkade, Taproot Assets, Spark, and RGB — plus KaleidoSDK, desktop app, and browser Extension.

We dig into web app and SDK integrations for merchants and unified-balance wallets, how HTLC atomicity works across layers, BOLT 12 multi-asset offers and Nostr discovery for competing providers, Bitcoin-only scope with Flashnet and Utexo bridges for external stables, and a product lineup of desktop app, browser extension, and dual SDKs.

Walter also covers agentic payments via MCP plugins, self-sovereign local models with Tether’s QVAC, fee ranges around 0.5–1%, and a one-to-three-month mainnet launch path for the extension, swap provider, and web app.

Timestamp:

00:00 — Intro: Walter & KaleidoSwap

00:50 — From RGB to Multi-Layer Swaps

02:14 — LSP Plus Swap Provider Stack

03:42 — Merchants, Stables, Unified Balance

05:38 — Why Swap UX Took Over Wallets

06:42 — Liquidity Ops and Mainnet Path

07:58 — AI Attacks After Boltz Shutdown

10:23 — Defending Non-Custodial Swaps

12:18 — How Atomic Swaps Actually Work

13:36 — RGB, Liquid, Arkade, Spark 

14:36 — Open Spec, BOLT 12, Nostr Discovery

18:23 — Pay Anything via the SDK

19:34 — Bitcoin Layers Only + Bridges

22:05 — Desktop, Extension, Dual SDKs

25:05 — UX That Adapts to the User

26:32 — Agentic Payments and QVAC

33:22 — MCP Plugins, Keep Your Own AI

35:11 — Fees Around 0.5–1%

35:57 — Launch Timeline: Next 1–3 Months

37:05 — Find KaleidoSwap Online

Links: 

• https://x.com/bit_walt

• https://x.com/kaleidoswap

• https://docs.kaleidoswap.com/whats-kaleidoswap/introduction

Stephan Livera links:

• Follow me on X: @stephanlivera

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Recent attacks exposed how even large, educated Bitcoin holders remained exposed through single-vendor setups. The core lesson is that self-custody alone does not remove single points of failure; deliberate design is required.

Dhruv Bansal, co-founder and CISO of Unchained, joins to examine these incidents and the practical barriers that keep most hardware wallet users on single sig despite years of warnings.

The conversation covers the gap between theoretical multisig knowledge and actual adoption, the trade-offs between anonymity and regulated inheritance paths, why newer layers attract attacks first, and the need for human review of AI-generated code at Bitcoin firms.

Bansal argues that cryptographic hardware will become ordinary infrastructure for everyone in an AI-driven internet, not a niche Bitcoin tool, and that mature risk systems rely on fractal networks rather than centralized controls.

Timestamps:

01:42 — No Single Points of Failure Allowed

05:34 — Even Large Holders Skip Multisig?

09:14 — You Could Be Your Own Failure Point

13:35 — Anonymity vs KYC

16:27 — Don't Half-Ass Your Bitcoin Security

21:23 — One Wallet, True Multi-Vendor Security

24:24 — Single Sig Can Still Lose Everything

30:26 — Why Everyone Will Need Hardware Wallets

32:06 — Why Attackers Hit Bitcoin L2s First

36:32 — Bitcoin Firms Must Human-Review AI Code

40:05 — Bitcoin as Humanity's AI Defense System

42:59 — Remove Single Points of Failure Forever

45:25 — Hardware Wallets at Every Gas Station

47:34 — Bitcoiners and Key Entropy

Links: 

• https://x.com/dhruvbansal

• https://x.com/unchained

• https://www.unchained.com/

Stephan Livera links:

• Follow me on X: @stephanlivera

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00:00 - Interview with Gabriele Vernetti of Stratum V2 @gitgab19

15:38 - Interview with Jimmy Kostro @jimmykostro

29:30 - Interview with James Check of checkonchain

Links: https://x.com/gitgab19

https://x.com/jimmykostro

https://x.com/_checkonchain

https://x.com/_checkmatey_

https://x.com/stratumv2

Bitcoinchiangmai.org

Interviews at Bitcoin Asia 2026 Day 2

00:00 - Piriya Sambandaraksa

05:14 - Alexander Mann

11:04 - Shone Anstey of LQWD

17:03 -Liam Eagen from Ideal Group

Links: 

• https://x.com/piriya

• https://x.com/idealgroup

• https://x.com/liameagen

• https://x.com/LQWDTech

• https://x.com/shoneanstey

• https://x.com/alex_singh_mann

Stephan Livera links:

• Follow me on X: @stephanlivera

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In this episode, I interviewed several people at Bitcoin Asia 2026.

Timestamps:

00:00 - Interview with Adam Poulton

06:28 Interview with Giovanni Santostasi

15:18 Interview Jeff Walton of Strive

34:11 Interview with Alex B from ArkLabs

Links: 

• http://x.com/Giovann35084111

• http://x.com/adampoulton

• http://x.com/bergealex4

• http://x.com/arklabshq

• http://x.com/punterjeff

• http://x.com/strive

Stephan Livera links:

• Follow me on X: @stephanlivera

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In this episode, Piers Macrae demonstrates Wallet Playground and explains why hardware wallets are signing devices, not wallets.

Timestamps:

01:10 — Teach Me vs Do It For Me

03:23 — Test Any Wallet Free in Browser

09:09 — Coldcard Drama Forced Early Release

14:03 — Generate Seeds Using Your Webcam

17:52 — Hardware Wallets Aren't Real Wallets

21:52 — Only 1% Use Multisig for Life Savings

25:33 — Self-Custody Like Firearms Drilling?

27:30 — Only Tiny Percentage Will Self-Custody

Links: 

• X: @mineracks — https://x.com/mineracks

• Wallet Playground: https://walletplayground.com/

• mineracks: https://www.mineracks.com/

Stephan Livera links:

• Follow me on X: @stephanlivera

• Subscribe to the podcast

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