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TODAY ON THE STARTING BLOCK: Bitget CEO @GracyBitget joins us to unpack details of last week's $388M hack. Then Jupiter founder/CEO @weremeow jumps in the Hot Seat! 8.30am ET | 2.30pm CET

Introducing The Latent, The Block's sister publication covering AI. Launching today: AI news, a data portal, The Latent Score, and a daily newsletter. We're bringing our reporting and data expertise to AI. See what we're building and subscribe below.

The Avalanche Summit is only 2 weeks out. We're happy to announce that we are the official media partners this year. September 16-17 in New York City!

NEW: Strategy $MSTR CEO Phong Le says selling about 7,000 BTC at $60,000-$65,000 was the "right trade" to fund preferred dividends. Strategy later bought 4,603 bitcoin:native for $369.7 million at an average price of $80,318.

THE BLOCK: Rain CEO Farooq Malik said more than 100,000 merchants are accepting stablecoin payments without knowing it. He said those transactions currently settle through Visa and outlined plans to let merchants opt for stablecoin settlement instead of waiting three days.

EXCLUSIVE: Inside Tether’s KPMG Audit: Gold Bars, Bitcoin, and $6B in Excess Equity Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino joins The Starting Block to unpack details of their KPMG US audit. Ardoino explains how Tether finally cleared the biggest hurdle in the room with a Big Four audit from KPMG US, why the timing mattered, and what the new yearly audit plus quarterly attestations mean for the company and the industry. Timestamps 00:00 - Paolo Ardoino joins to discuss Tether’s Big Four audit announcement 01:16 - Why the audit took years and what made it possible now 03:31 - Why Tether chose KPMG US after earlier controversy around attestations 04:58 - Yearly audits and quarterly attestations as a transparency standard 05:15 - Responding to critics who still question Tether’s transparency 06:36 - The 7 billion redemption stress test in 2022 07:57 - Why auditors counted gold bars in Tether’s reserves 08:40 - Tether’s gold and Bitcoin reserve holdings 09:23 - The private fundraising narrative and why Tether says it does not need capital 12:31 - Tether’s AI effort, Qvac, and the mission to serve the unbanked 14:59 - Supporting Bitcoin security work after the Coldcard exploit 16:52 - Confirming annual audits and quarterly attestations going forward

THE STARTING BLOCK EXCLUSIVE: "Being wise, wisdom, is achieved through proof of work. Through experience, through trial & error, through failure. If being wise was a simple as reading a few books, we'd all be wise." Catch @jackmallers LIVE | 31 July | 11AM ET/5PM CET

THE STARTING BLOCK EXCLUSIVE: Catch Charles Hoskinson live to wrap up the first month of the show! @gazza_jenks wants to know: 🚁 Did he sell the Black Hawk? 🐜 How bad were the bullet ants? ❌ The real reason he left @X ⌛️ The future of @Cardano 24 July - 11AM ET/5PM CET

Prediction markets are reshaping how we understand news, politics and finance in real time. But how do they work under the hood? We just launched a complete Prediction Markets Course to take you from beginner to expert! Don’t forget to leave your wallet address during sign up.

THE BLOCK: Benchmark reiterates Buy rating on Strategy with $570 price target, implying roughly 515% upside from the stock's Monday close of $92.68

[THE BLOCK EXCLUSIVE] We’re sitting down with CZ. Binance founder and former CEO Changpeng Zhao goes live and unfiltered on The Starting Block. June 29. 8AM ET / 2PM CET.