Bitcoin’s Power Shift: How Wall Street, Washington, and Trump Are Rewriting Crypto’s Future

When Capital and Power host Adam Shapiro sits down with Zack Guzman , founder of Trustless Media and host of Coinage, the result isn’t your typical crypto chat—it’s a reality check for anyone who thinks Bitcoin’s story is over. In this AINvest flagship episode, Guzman connects the dots between Wall Street, Washington, and the blockchain in a way only someone who’s lived the crypto rollercoaster can.

A Harvard-trained economist and former CNBC and Yahoo Finance reporter, Guzman has been on the frontlines of digital finance for nearly a decade. He covered Bitcoin before it was cool, called out leverage blowups before they happened, and now runs one of the first community-owned media companies using the same blockchain principles he reports on.

In the episode, Guzman tells Shapiro that Bitcoin has “graduated” from rebellion to respectability. Once a speculative token, it’s now an “interest-rate-sensitive asset,” moving with tech and AI stocks—but also starting to behave like gold as institutional ETFs pour in. Yet beneath the maturity lies a warning: Wall Street’s hunger for leverage could once again push crypto toward another crash. “They always find new ways to introduce leverage,” he says, citing the FTX and Terra meltdowns as proof.

The real bombshell, though, is Guzman’s take on stablecoins—digital dollars that have quietly become part of the global financial backbone. “Tether owns more U.S. debt than Germany,” he warns, calling stablecoins “the new money-market funds.” When USDC briefly lost its peg after the Silicon Valley Bank collapse, it revealed just how fragile that system is. “If banks are touching stablecoins,” he says, “the next bailout might come because of crypto.”

Then Guzman shifts gears to tokenization—the idea of turning audiences into co-owners. Through Trustless Media and Coinage, he’s building a model where fans buy NFTs that represent membership and ownership in the shows they support. “Trustless owns half, and the NFT holders own the other half,” he explains. “Anyone can mint and become a co-owner.” It’s the Web3 version of a co-op—one that could change how media survives in the AI era.

And yes, things get political. Guzman discusses his new Coinage documentary “USD1”, which exposes how Donald Trump’s family has entered the crypto arena with their own stablecoin venture, World Liberty Financial. He calls Trump’s coin launch a “power play,” designed to turn crypto into a political tool rather than a financial revolution. “It’s alarming,” he tells Shapiro, “to think this could be used to sell the office of the presidency.”

But Guzman isn’t cynical—he’s sober. “Maybe rethink crypto,” he says near the end. “We all thought it was a scam in 2022. Now we’re sitting near all-time highs. It’s much more than that—it’s a shift in how ownership and power are distributed.”

If you care about the future of money, media, or politics, this Capital and Power episode is essential listening. Guzman bridges the gap between insider knowledge and outsider candor, revealing a world where Bitcoin isn’t just digital gold—it’s the new battleground for trust, control, and transparency.

And after listening, don’t miss the documentary that started the conversation, "Coinage Media USD1" on YouTube. It’s the story of how crypto’s anti-establishment dream may be morphing into the ultimate power play.