Debunking Operation Choke Point 2.0: Crypto’s Convenient Scapegoat

35 min readApr 16, 2025

Introduction

A paranoid narrative has taken root in some crypto circles: “Operation Choke Point 2.0.” This theory claims U.S. regulators conspired to systematically de-bank crypto firms — a covert crackdown supposedly behind the 2023 collapse of crypto-friendly banks like Silvergate, Signature, and SVB. Prominent Bitcoin-adjacent influencers — Nic Carter, Caitlin Long, Balaji Srinivasan, among others — have amplified this story at every turn, framing crypto’s recent banking woes as the result of an illicit government campaign. In their telling, Washington is the villain pulling secret strings, and “Choke Point 2.0” is to blame for business failures that would otherwise be someone else’s fault.

This article offers a sharp, Bitcoin-native rebuttal of that narrative. We’ll show, with hard evidence and public data, that “Operation Choke Point 2.0” is an invented scapegoat — a myth peddled to avoid accountability for reckless banking, bad bets, and fragile business models. The demise of Silvergate Bank, Signature Bank, and Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) was driven not by a shadowy anti-crypto plot, but by poor governance, concentration risk, and mismanagement at those institutions. We’ll dismantle the misleading claims (from alleged 15% crypto deposit limits to wild “Pelosi bailout” conspiracies and supposed FDIC skullduggery), exposing how these arguments rely on speculative framing, anonymous sources, and narrative manipulation rather than facts. Along the way, we’ll directly confront the rhetoric of Carter, Long, and Srinivasan — using their own words and “receipts” to lay bare the exaggerations and contradictions in the Choke Point 2.0 mythology.

In short, this is a definitive takedown of the Choke Point 2.0 meme — a caustic reality check to counter the ideological campaign that has tried to rewrite history. No, the U.S. government didn’t secretly murder crypto banks. The evidence shows a more mundane truth: these banks blew themselves up, and crypto influencers invoked a phantom conspiracy to redirect blame, pump their personal brands, and court partisan sympathies. It’s time to set the record straight.

A Recycled Political Boogeyman

The very label “Operation Choke Point 2.0” is a recycled panic phrase lifted from partisan politics. It harkens back to the original Operation Choke Point under the Obama DOJ, a controversial 2013–2017 initiative that pressured banks to drop certain “high-risk” industries (like payday lenders and gun sellers) from the financial system. Right-wing commentators vilified that program as government overreach, and President Trump loudly terminated it in 2017. Fast forward to 2023: crypto advocates like Nic Carter resurrected the “Choke Point” imagery to paint the Biden administration as orchestrating a similar secret campaign — this time targeting the digital asset industry. Carter explicitly drew the parallel, saying the alleged crypto crackdown “echoes the DOJ’s Operation Choke Point from last decade” (Operation Choke Point 2.0: Is the US Coming for Crypto? — Blockworks). The term caught on quickly. What began as Carter’s personal thesis soon became red meat for partisan discourse: Republican lawmakers held hearings on “Operation Chokepoint 2.0” (Meuser: The Biden Administration’s Operation Choke Point 2.0 Was …), and even Donald Trump vowed to “end the alleged Operation Choke Point 2.0” if re-elected (What is Operation Choke Point 2.0? Trump vows to end it) — pledging at a 2024 Bitcoin conference, “They want to choke you out of business; we’re not going to let that happen,” and promising to fire regulators like SEC Chair Gary Gensler on day one (What is Operation Choke Point 2.0? Trump vows to end it).

In reality, what critics dub “Operation Choke Point 2.0” is not an official program at all — it’s a conspiracy theory branding applied to a loose set of regulatory actions and bank failures. Carter and company took a series of unrelated events (warnings from banking agencies, the denial of Caitlin Long’s bank application, and the failures of three banks) and wove them into a grand persecution narrative. They presented routine supervisory guidance and the fallout from crypto’s own implosions as evidence of a coordinated plot. As we’ll see, this narrative was heavily driven by ideology and opportunism: The “Choke Point 2.0” label allowed these influencers to piggyback on partisan anger (casting crypto as the latest victim of big-government scheming) and to galvanize support from the Bitcoin community by portraying themselves as freedom-fighting truth tellers. It’s a classic play: wrap yourself in a political cause to deflect blame from your own role in a debacle. But shouting “conspiracy!” doesn’t make it real. And indeed, financial regulators themselves (including some quite sympathetic to crypto) remain unconvinced anything like “Choke Point 2.0” ever existed. For example, the new Acting FDIC Chairman, Travis Hill — no enemy of crypto — said he hasn’t seen “concrete evidence [that] a conspiracy against crypto actually existed,” cautioning that his agency would never condone de-banking lawful customers without cause (Why the new FDIC Leadership Isn’t Convinced Operation Chokepoint 2.0 Exists — Unchained) (Why the new FDIC Leadership Isn’t Convinced Operation Chokepoint 2.0 Exists — Unchained). In other words, even the people with inside access find the theory dubious.

So where did the theory come from? Largely from a small group of Bitcoin-adjacent voices who have relentlessly pushed it. Let’s briefly identify the main proponents and their motives:

Nic Carter — a venture capitalist and crypto writer — arguably spearheaded the Operation Choke Point 2.0 narrative. In January 2023, Carter published an influential article titled “Operation Choke Point 2.0 Is Underway, and Crypto Is in Its Crosshairs.” He claimed to notice “the origins of a coordinated crackdown on crypto banking” unfolding in plain sight (Nic Carter). Over the next year, Carter doubled down with a multi-part series accusing regulators of executing a “Biden administration plot to destroy crypto”. His Part II piece literally asked: “Did the government start a global financial crisis in an attempt to destroy crypto?” (Nic Carter) — a question that presumes a rather spectacular conspiracy (as if regulators wanted to spark bank runs and contagion just to take down crypto). By Part III, Carter flatly wrote of the “Biden Admin’s Plot to Destroy Silvergate” (Nic Carter). In sum, he cast the U.S. government as deliberately engineering or exploiting a banking crisis to choke off crypto’s fiat access. We’ll examine his “evidence” later, but suffice to say Carter’s framing is steeped in speculation and incendiary rhetoric — and it caught on.
Caitlin Long — CEO of Custodia Bank — has been another prominent voice crying Choke Point 2.0, and her involvement is deeply personal. Long’s Wyoming-based startup bank (focused on digital assets) was denied Federal Reserve membership and access to Fed payments in early 2023. Feeling spurned by regulators, Long published a fiery blog titled “Shame On Washington, DC For Shooting a Messenger Who Warned of Crypto Debacle” in February 2023. In it, she blasted “Washington’s misguided crackdown” on crypto and argued “most of today’s policymakers seem intent on killing the high-integrity innovators.” (Shame On Washington, DC For Shooting A Messenger Who Warned of Crypto Debacle — Caitlin Long) Long revealed she had privately warned federal regulators of looming crypto risks (and even handed evidence of fraud to law enforcement) but instead of heeding her, “policymakers” attacked her compliant bank — proof, to Long, that the crackdown was ideological. She decried that “Custodia Bank found itself in the crosshairs of Beltway politics at their worst,” attacked by the White House, the Fed, and even a Senator who absurdly conflated her solvent bank with FTX’s fraud (Shame On Washington, DC For Shooting A Messenger Who Warned of Crypto Debacle — Caitlin Long). Long’s takeaway: regulators were so embarrassed by their failure to catch bad actors that “D.C. is demanding scalps” and “throwing the baby out with the bathwater” by scapegoating the entire crypto industry (Shame On Washington, DC For Shooting A Messenger Who Warned of Crypto Debacle — Caitlin Long). She warned that “Washington’s crackdown will only push risks into the shadows” (Shame On Washington, DC For Shooting A Messenger Who Warned of Crypto Debacle — Caitlin Long) — exactly the argument that an Operation Choke Point 2.0 is both unjust and counterproductive. Long has continued to invoke this narrative in interviews, essentially positioning herself as a martyr of a political crusade. Her motive is clear: to cast the Fed’s rejection of Custodia not as a judgment on her bank’s merits, but as part of a broader anti-crypto agenda. (Never mind that the Fed explicitly cited Custodia’s “novel and untested crypto activities” and inadequate risk management as serious safety and soundness risks in its denial (Federal Reserve Board — Federal Reserve Board announces denial of application by Custodia Bank, Inc. to become a member of the Federal Reserve System) (Federal Reserve Board — Federal Reserve Board announces denial of application by Custodia Bank, Inc. to become a member of the Federal Reserve System) — suggesting the decision was based on prudence, not politics.)
Balaji Srinivasan — former Coinbase CTO and well-known tech futurist — brought his own dramatic flair to the Choke Point 2.0 discourse. Balaji is known for bold predictions, and in March 2023 he made his most outrageous: he publicly bet $1 million that Bitcoin would reach $1M per coin within 90 days, anticipating a rapid hyperinflation of the U.S. dollar (Then They Fight You | Stormrake). Why such doom? Balaji argued that a banking crisis was imminent and that authorities would respond with capital controls and currency debasement — effectively trapping people’s money in failing banks while crypto was “choked” off. He urged people to “get to the Bitcoin lifeboat” before the government closed the exits. This extreme thesis overlapped with the Choke Point 2.0 narrative: Balaji believed regulators would ring-fence crypto (e.g. cut off USD-to-crypto ramps) to prevent an exodus from the banking system. In his view, recent government actions were “deliberately restricting the crypto markets in an attempt to cut off people from exiting the fiat system” (Then They Fight You | Stormrake). Balaji cheered Nic Carter’s early warnings about Choke Point 2.0, framing it as the harbinger of the “Now they fight you” stage for Bitcoin. In essence, he wove the alleged anti-crypto crackdown into a larger apocalyptic narrative of state control versus financial freedom. Of course, Balaji’s $1M Bitcoin bet infamously expired worthless — the U.S. banking system did not implode by mid-2023, and the dollar did not die in 90 days. But the stunt succeeded in going viral, reinforcing Balaji’s image as the prophet of an imminent showdown between crypto and the establishment (even if reality disagreed).

Together, Carter, Long, and Srinivasan (along with a chorus of crypto pundits and politicians they influenced) turned “Operation Choke Point 2.0” into a pervasive meme. To the unwary, it sounds plausible: multiple crypto banks failed and crypto companies struggled to get banking — surely that can’t be coincidence? And indeed, none of us in the Bitcoin community are naïve about regulators’ skepticism toward crypto. It’s true that U.S. agencies have ramped up enforcement and issued stern warnings about digital asset risks, especially after major frauds like FTX. But to leap from a generally tougher regulatory climate to a secret “concerted federal effort to de-bank crypto” is a bridge too far — one built on cherry-picked incidents and feverish inference. The reality, as we will detail, is far less conspiratorial: Crypto’s banking trouble in 2023 was largely self-inflicted, a consequence of crypto firms’ own risky behavior bleeding into their banks, and of banks’ mismanagement of basic banking risks. What “Choke Point 2.0” proponents frame as a malicious campaign was, under the microscope, a series of reactive measures by regulators scrambling to contain damage in real time (and arguably not acting decisively enough, rather than overreaching!). As the Government Accountability Office (GAO) concluded in its review of the 2023 bank failures, “risky business strategies along with weak liquidity and risk management” were the proximate causes of the collapses — with crypto exposure being just one of many factors, and regulators largely failing to rein in these banks until it was too late (Bank Regulation: Preliminary Review of Agency Actions Related to March 2023 Bank Failures | U.S. GAO) (Bank Regulation: Preliminary Review of Agency Actions Related to March 2023 Bank Failures | U.S. GAO). In other words, far from coordinating an attack, regulators missed the warning signs of trouble. This is the polar opposite of the Carter narrative that regulators actively caused the crisis.

Now, let’s dig into the meat of the issue: what really happened to Silvergate, Signature, and SVB, and how we know “Choke Point 2.0” is a myth.

Why Silvergate, Signature, and SVB Really Failed

The collapse of three banks in March 2023 — Silvergate Bank, Signature Bank, and Silicon Valley Bank — set off alarms in both the crypto industry and the broader financial world. Conspiracy theorists rushed to fit these events into the Choke Point 2.0 narrative, insinuating that crypto-friendly institutions were deliberately taken down by authorities. But an examination of each bank’s financials, public reports, and post-mortem analyses by regulators tells a clear story: these banks failed due to their own mismanagement and exposure to volatile deposits, not because of any secret order from Washington to “de-bank” them. Let’s review each case with facts:

Silvergate: Self-Inflicted Wounds from Crypto Concentration

Silvergate Capital was a California-based bank that had bet its entire franchise on serving the crypto industry. For a while, that made Silvergate a star — it attracted dozens of major crypto exchanges and companies as clients, rapidly growing its deposit base. But this success came with extreme concentration risk: by 2022, virtually all of Silvergate’s deposits were from crypto businesses, meaning the bank’s fate was tied to the boom-and-bust cycles of crypto markets. When the crypto market crashed in 2022 (think Terra/Luna collapse, hedge funds blowing up, and finally the FTX scandal), Silvergate’s fortunes turned overnight. The bank faced a classic run — not due to government meddling, but due to its customers fleeing en masse. After FTX imploded in November 2022, other Silvergate clients got spooked about the safety of their funds. In the fourth quarter of 2022 alone, Silvergate lost a staggering 68% of its deposits as customers withdrew billions (Silvergate: Another fall from the CeFi house of cards | Fintech Nexus). This kind of outflow would be fatal to almost any bank. Silvergate scrambled to meet withdrawals by selling assets at a loss — dumping $5.2 billion in bonds for fire-sale prices, which crystallized a $718 million loss on its books (Silvergate: Another fall from the CeFi house of cards | Fintech Nexus). By January 2023, Silvergate reported a net loss of $1 billion for Q4 2022 and its deposit base had plunged from about $12 billion to just $3.8 billion (Silvergate reports $1B net loss in the fourth quarter of 2022) (Top crypto bank collapses as Silvergate announces plans to wind …). In short, the bank was hemorrhaging liquidity because its undiversified depositor base (crypto firms) was in crisis.

Silvergate’s downfall was entirely of its own making. It chose to court volatile, largely uninsured deposits without proper contingency planning. Its risk management failed to account for the scenario of simultaneous industry-wide withdrawals — a glaring oversight for a bank whose CEO boasted in mid-2022, “We’ve got all of them… anybody serious about regulation” as clients (Silvergate: Another fall from the CeFi house of cards | Fintech Nexus). When “all of them” decided to pull funds, Silvergate had no lifeline. Notably, regulators did not force Silvergate to close. The bank voluntarily decided to liquidate in March 2023 when it became clear it could not continue operating safely (Silvergate: Another fall from the CeFi house of cards | Fintech Nexus). This was announced in a press release citing “recent industry and regulatory developments,” which conspiracy folks love to quote out of context. But no secret order was needed to kill Silvergate — the bank committed suicide by over-concentration. Even some of Silvergate’s top insiders acknowledge this. The former Silvergate Chief Risk Officer, in a personal account, blamed poor management decisions and overreliance on a few large crypto clients, not the government, for the bank’s failure (nic carter on X: “good thread and piece on OCP2.0 (linked in next …). And the GAO’s analysis found Silvergate’s collapse was precipitated by the crypto market’s “contagion” and Silvergate’s own inability to manage liquidity under stress (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory) (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory). In fact, by the time regulators issued stern warnings to banks about crypto in early 2023, Silvergate was already mortally wounded by the FTX aftershocks. There was no need for a conspiracy to bring it down — it was a casualty of crypto’s implosion.

Signature Bank: Mismanagement, Unrestrained Growth, and a Classic Bank Run

Signature Bank’s failure on March 12, 2023 has been the biggest lightning rod for Choke Point 2.0 claims. Why? Because Signature was one of the most crypto-friendly banks in the U.S. (though far from only a crypto bank), and its abrupt closure by the New York Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) came just two days after Silvergate’s liquidation and one day after SVB’s collapse. To the paranoid, it looked like a coordinated strike. In reality, Signature failed for mundane, well-documented reasons: atrocious risk management and a complete loss of depositor confidence. An internal review by the FDIC (Signature’s federal regulator) concluded unambiguously that “the root cause of [Signature Bank’s] failure was poor management.” In an April 2023 report, the FDIC blasted Signature’s executives and board for pursuing “rapid, unrestrained growth” without adequate controls or regard for the mounting risks (Signature Bank failure due to ‘poor management,’ US FDIC report says | Reuters) (Signature Bank failure due to ‘poor management,’ US FDIC report says | Reuters). From 2019 to 2021, Signature’s assets more than doubled (134% growth, far above peer banks) — much of it fueled by uninsured deposits from crypto companies, large real estate clients, and other corporations (Bank Regulation: Preliminary Review of Agency Actions Related to March 2023 Bank Failures | U.S. GAO) (Bank Regulation: Preliminary Review of Agency Actions Related to March 2023 Bank Failures | U.S. GAO). By late 2022, nearly 90% of Signature’s deposits were uninsured (above the FDIC’s $250K guarantee) (Signature Bank closed by NY regulator | Banking Dive). That made the bank extraordinarily vulnerable to a run, since large uninsured depositors tend to flee at the first hint of trouble. Regulators had repeatedly warned Signature about its heavy reliance on such hot money and other “weak corporate governance practices,” but the bank failed to correct course (Signature Bank failure due to ‘poor management,’ US FDIC report says | Reuters) (Signature Bank failure due to ‘poor management,’ US FDIC report says | Reuters). In fact, according to the FDIC report, Signature’s leaders dismissed examiner concerns about uninsured deposit stability right up until the eve of its failure (Signature Bank failure due to ‘poor management,’ US FDIC report says | Reuters).

When Silicon Valley Bank suddenly imploded on March 10, panic spread to other banks, and depositors looked for any bank that might be risky. Signature was an obvious target given its deposit profile. That Friday (Mar 10), Signature faced a run of its own — about $10 billion in deposits evaporated in a matter of hours (Signature Bank Shutdown Caused by ‘Crisis of Confidence’ in Leadership, NYDFS Says) (Signature Bank Shutdown Caused by ‘Crisis of Confidence’ in Leadership, NYDFS Says). The bank’s team struggled to provide real-time data to regulators about its liquidity position, which further eroded trust. By the end of the weekend, NYDFS had seen enough: fearing that Signature couldn’t open on Monday safely, the state seized the bank and handed it to the FDIC. This was not a pre-planned attack but a reactive move amid a fast-moving crisis. NYDFS Superintendent Adrienne Harris emphatically denied that the closure had anything to do with Signature’s crypto business. “The decisions made over that weekend were not crypto-related,” a NYDFS spokesperson stated, adding that Signature was a “traditional commercial bank” with a wide range of clients (from food vendors to real estate) and that NYDFS had been a “national model” in supervising crypto activities responsibly (Signature Bank Shutdown Caused by ‘Crisis of Confidence’ in Leadership, NYDFS Says). Harris later testified that crypto deposit outflows were not the primary driver of Signature’s run — many other large clients withdrew funds in fear (Fleeing Crypto Depositors Didn’t Bring Down Signature, NY …). The key issue, she explained, was a “crisis of confidence in the bank’s leadership” after it failed to provide reliable data during the run (Signature Bank Shutdown Caused by ‘Crisis of Confidence’ in Leadership, NYDFS Says). In other words, Signature’s management lost credibility when it mattered most. This aligns perfectly with the FDIC’s autopsy: Signature’s collapse was a textbook case of bank mismanagement and panic, not a regulator conspiracy.

Yet the conspiracy theorists latched onto one person’s speculative comment: Barney Frank — the former congressman who sat on Signature’s board — told media he “suspected” regulators shut Signature to send an anti-crypto message since, in his view, the bank was still solvent (Signature Bank Shutdown Caused by ‘Crisis of Confidence’ in Leadership, NYDFS Says). Frank admitted $10B had fled but mused there was no fundamental insolvency, implying ulterior motives. Let’s be clear: Barney Frank had every incentive to deflect blame (he was on the board of a failed bank, after all). And his claim is directly refuted by the regulators on scene. NYDFS called Frank’s theory “ludicrous,” reiterating that Signature was on the brink and unable to open safely due to management failures (Signature Bank Shutdown Caused by ‘Crisis of Confidence’ in Leadership, NYDFS Says). The FDIC also said no, Signature was deeply troubled. Even Congress’s GAO report noted that Signature had been trying to reduce its crypto deposit exposure in the year prior to collapse (from ~30% of deposits in 2021 down to ~20% by early 2023) (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory) (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory) — evidence that the bank itself recognized the crypto-related risk and was voluntarily scaling back, not being forced unwillingly. In fact, Signature’s CEO publicly announced in December 2022 — after Silvergate’s FTX-fueled woes — that Signature would cap crypto deposits at around 15% of total deposits (down from ~23% then) to reassure investors who were nervous about its crypto reliance (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory). This is critical: the much-buzzed “15% crypto deposit cap” originated from Signature’s own management, as a risk mitigation target to calm the market, not from some secret FDIC rule. Conspiracy peddlers later twisted this into “regulators imposed a 15% cap” without evidence. But as Signature’s CEO Joe DePaolo made clear, he set that goal to appease investors, not regulators (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory). The context demolishes the claim that a shadow directive was in play — it was a voluntary business decision amid sector turmoil.

Bottom line: Signature Bank failed because it was grossly mismanaged and could not survive a crisis of confidence. Federal and state overseers certainly had crypto-related concerns (they’d have been negligent not to, given volatility in that sector), but the decision to close Signature was driven by the bank’s actual inability to operate safely after a massive run. The postmortem evidence — from FDIC’s own words (“poor management” (Signature Bank failure due to ‘poor management,’ US FDIC report says | Reuters)) to NYDFS’s blow-by-blow of the bank’s dysfunction — obliterates the idea that Signature was arbitrarily executed to make a point. If anything, regulators are guilty of reacting too late (downgrading Signature only the day before it failed, despite long-running issues) (Bank Regulation: Preliminary Review of Agency Actions Related to March 2023 Bank Failures | U.S. GAO) (Bank Regulation: Preliminary Review of Agency Actions Related to March 2023 Bank Failures | U.S. GAO), not of masterminding its demise.

Silicon Valley Bank (SVB): A Red Herring in the “Crypto Crackdown” Story

SVB’s spectacular failure on March 10, 2023 — the largest U.S. bank collapse since 2008 — had essentially nothing to do with crypto, yet it often gets lumped into the Choke Point 2.0 narrative for context. Carter and others suggested that regulators’ focus on crypto may have distracted them from shoring up SVB, or even posited that allowing SVB to fail was convenient cover to take out Signature. Such conjecture doesn’t hold up. SVB failed because of a plain old interest-rate risk management fiasco. The bank had loaded up on long-term bonds during the low-rate era and didn’t hedge that exposure; when the Fed hiked rates rapidly in 2022, SVB’s bond portfolio market value plunged. At the same time, SVB’s depositor base — largely tech startups and VCs — began burning cash and withdrawing funds. In early March 2023, SVB disclosed huge losses on asset sales and failed a capital raise, sparking panic among its depositors. In one day, $42 billion was withdrawn from SVB, and it was insolvent by the next morning (Signature Bank failure due to ‘poor management,’ US FDIC report says | Reuters). The idea that this was part of an anti-crypto scheme is absurd — SVB’s downfall was so fast and so clearly tied to mismanagement (as the Federal Reserve’s own postmortem detailed) that it caught regulators flat-footed (Bank Regulation: Preliminary Review of Agency Actions Related to March 2023 Bank Failures | U.S. GAO) (Bank Regulation: Preliminary Review of Agency Actions Related to March 2023 Bank Failures | U.S. GAO). If anything, regulators were too lax on SVB (the Fed kept rating it satisfactory until 2022, despite clear warning signs (Bank Regulation: Preliminary Review of Agency Actions Related to March 2023 Bank Failures | U.S. GAO)). There was no element of “de-banking crypto” here: SVB was not a crypto bank (it had a few crypto industry clients, but not a focus). Its failure did, however, contribute to contagion fear that helped run Signature two days later. But that’s a far cry from claiming someone pulled SVB’s plug on purpose. In truth, SVB’s collapse was a classic bank run born of economic forces and poor oversight.

We mention SVB mainly to underscore a pattern: the banking crisis of spring 2023 was driven by systemic issues (interest rate whiplash, uninsured deposits) that had nothing to do with a targeted crypto purge. Numerous banks came under stress — including First Republic, a bank with zero crypto exposure, which failed in May 2023. If “Operation Choke Point 2.0” was the orchestrator, it apparently didn’t mind taking out a bunch of non-crypto banks too, which makes no sense. The far simpler explanation is the true one: bad risk management made these banks vulnerable, and when panic hit, they fell like dominoes. Regulators were scrambling to contain the fallout, not selectively picking winners and losers based on crypto ideology. In fact, the FDIC and Federal Reserve rushed to backstop all deposits (even uninsured) at SVB and Signature to prevent broader collapse — a move hardly consistent with an intent to strangle the crypto sector. Signature’s crypto clients were made whole just like every other depositor, courtesy of those “anti-crypto” regulators. So much for the secret choke job.

Debunking the Choke Point 2.0 Claims and Tactics

Having established the real causes behind the bank failures, let’s address the specific claims and tactics used by Choke Point 2.0 proponents. The narrative has relied on a mix of anecdotes, mischaracterizations, and politically charged innuendo. Below, we tackle some of the most commonly cited “evidence” for the conspiracy — and show why each falls flat under scrutiny.

Claim: Regulators imposed a 15% cap on crypto deposits (or otherwise forced banks to cut off crypto clients).

Reality: No formal rule or public directive to this effect has ever been produced, and available evidence suggests this “15% cap” was a misunderstanding of banks’ own risk decisions. As noted earlier, the 15% figure came from Signature Bank’s CEO stating in December 2022 that he would voluntarily limit crypto-related deposits to 15% of Signature’s total — a move to reassure investors uneasy with the bank’s exposure (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory) (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory). This was months before Signature’s failure. There was no leaked memo or regulation capping crypto deposits at that level — only later rumors. In 2023, some crypto executives began whispering that unnamed regulators had informally told banks not to exceed ~15% of deposits from crypto firms. But these remained unverified claims. Coinbase’s chief legal officer, for example, filed FOIA requests trying to uncover any “informal cap” communications, acknowledging they were based on mere “allegations” of such a cap (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory) (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory). So far, those FOIAs have not yielded a smoking gun. On the contrary, a satirical summary of the situation noted that to date there is “no concrete evidence to support this theory” — joking that conspiracy theorists must imagine “Masonic sasquatches…rummaging through Area 51’s file cabinets in search of incriminating documents” (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory) (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory). In short, the 15% cap story appears to be crypto folk legend. Regulators did issue guidance warning banks to be cautious with crypto deposit volatility (which is prudent given what happened to Silvergate/Signature), but there’s no indication of a hard threshold. Even Acting FDIC Chair Hill, when asked in 2025, didn’t cite any rule — he only acknowledged hearing “anecdotes” and seeing some “pause letters” (more on those next) and said if any examiner explicitly pushed a numerical cap out of bias, that’d be unacceptable (Why the new FDIC Leadership Isn’t Convinced Operation Chokepoint 2.0 Exists — Unchained) (Why the new FDIC Leadership Isn’t Convinced Operation Chokepoint 2.0 Exists — Unchained).

In fact, one piece of real evidence shows the opposite of a coordinated cap: by early 2023, banks themselves were shying away from taking on more crypto deposits because they saw the risks. Signature was reducing crypto deposits. Metropolitan Commercial Bank exited crypto clients in January 2023 of its own accord (Operation Choke Point 2.0: Is the US Coming for Crypto? — Blockworks). After Silvergate and Signature fell, remaining banks like Customers Bank and Cross River quietly pulled back on crypto exposure to protect themselves. The lack of willing banking partners for crypto in mid-2023 wasn’t because the government forbade it; it was because the business looked dangerous after two banks got burned. If anything, the official stance from regulators was: you can bank crypto customers, but manage the risks or face supervisory action. That is a far cry from an extra-legal “choke off crypto or else” edict that Choke Point 2.0 believers imagine.

Claim: The feds deliberately seized Signature Bank to send an anti-crypto message (as Barney Frank alleged), and even refused to let it be acquired with its crypto business intact.

Reality: We’ve already addressed Frank’s claim — the regulators and the evidence contradict him. Signature was seized due to a real failure, not as a sacrificial lamb. As for the acquisition rumor: there was a Reuters report, citing anonymous sources, that when the FDIC was marketing Signature for sale, it told bidders they must agree to drop Signature’s crypto business. This one report on March 17, 2023 caused a flurry of outrage in the crypto community (“See! They’re openly forcing an end to crypto dealings!”). However, the FDIC formally denied that report almost immediately. An FDIC spokesperson stated that the agency imposed no such condition, and that any bank (crypto-friendly or not) was welcome to bid on Signature (FDIC Denies Report Signature Bank Purchaser Must Divest Crypto) (Signature Bank in money laundering probe, auction buyer must …). In the end, Signature’s remnants were bought by Flagstar Bank, which chose not to take on the crypto depositors — but that appears to have been Flagstar’s business decision, since by then most crypto deposits had already fled Signature anyway. There is zero proof that the FDIC blocked any bidder over crypto. It’s telling that only anonymous “people familiar” initially fueled this narrative, and the official record refutes it. Even New York’s NYDFS superintendent Harris went on to say that such theories of a secret anti-crypto agenda in Signature’s resolution were “ridiculous,” emphasizing again that the bank’s failure was about managerial incompetence and a broad loss of confidence (Signature Bank closure was not about crypto, NYDFS reaffirms).

This pattern repeats: Choke Point 2.0 arguments lean heavily on speculative sourcing — anonymous quotes, conjectural memos, “people are saying” — while dismissing the on-the-record facts. Carter’s writings are full of phrasing like “sources say” and “it appears that…”, stringing together circumstantial clues into a grand narrative. But time and again, when independent investigations publish their findings, they don’t corroborate a conspiracy. The New York DFS conducted an internal review of Signature’s supervision and closure (releasing a detailed report), and nowhere does it reveal any political plot — it documents a cascade of missteps by the bank and a race by regulators to keep up (Signature Bank Shutdown Caused by ‘Crisis of Confidence’ in Leadership, NYDFS Says) (Signature Bank Shutdown Caused by ‘Crisis of Confidence’ in Leadership, NYDFS Says). The Federal Reserve and FDIC’s inspectors general likewise reviewed their agencies’ handling of SVB and Signature; the criticisms they levied were about sluggish supervisory responses and resource gaps, not about secret orders to kill crypto banks (Signature Bank failure due to ‘poor management,’ US FDIC report says | Reuters) (Bank Regulation: Preliminary Review of Agency Actions Related to March 2023 Bank Failures | U.S. GAO). These are hardly the findings one would expect if, behind the scenes, top officials were executing a coordinated choke plan.

Claim: Regulators targeted certain crypto companies (like stablecoin issuers) and coordinated across agencies to make crypto business untenable — essentially a stealth version of Choke Point.

Reality: Regulators definitely increased their scrutiny of crypto in late 2022 and 2023 — that much is true. We saw the SEC sue various actors, the NYDFS clamp down on some stablecoins, and banking regulators issue policy statements about crypto risks. But that is called enforcing existing law and prudential standards, not a sinister extracurricular conspiracy. A key piece of “evidence” that Choke Point 2.0 fans cite is a series of “pause letters” the FDIC sent to a handful of banks in 2022, allegedly ordering them to pause expanding crypto activities. These letters came to light in a court case (Coinbase obtained them via discovery). At first blush, that sounds bad — an FDIC directive to stop crypto dealings! However, context matters. The FDIC’s Office of Inspector General investigated those letters and found they were sent in spring 2022 as an ad-hoc response to banks that had notified the FDIC of planned crypto-related ventures. The FDIC basically said “hold up until we assess the risks.” In October 2023, the FDIC OIG critiqued the agency for sending such letters without timely follow-up — essentially faulting them for potentially chilling activities without clear process (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory) (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory). But notably, this happened before the big crypto collapses (Terra, Celsius, FTX) and arguably prevented some banks from diving headlong into partnerships that could have sunk them. Once the crypto market chaos unfolded by end of 2022, those cautionary letters look prescient. And crucially, they weren’t permanent bans — they said “pause and engage with us.” The affected banks weren’t ordered to dump existing crypto clients or shut accounts en masse. It’s a stretch to equate these behind-the-scenes supervisory letters with an “Operation Choke Point.” The original Choke Point was a DOJ-driven program with explicit lists of prohibited customers. Here we have regulators pumping the brakes amid an onslaught of crypto risk (and in hindsight, can you blame them? The “crypto lenders” Caitlin Long herself warned about did implode and cause bank runs!). In any case, by mid-2023, even the FDIC’s leadership under a new administration is saying if there was over-zealous de-banking, it wasn’t sanctioned from the top. FDIC Chair Hill indicated any instances of examiners unfairly pressuring banks are being corrected, if they occurred (Why the new FDIC Leadership Isn’t Convinced Operation Chokepoint 2.0 Exists — Unchained) (Why the new FDIC Leadership Isn’t Convinced Operation Chokepoint 2.0 Exists — Unchained). That’s the opposite scenario of a monolithic scheme — it suggests maybe a few over-cautious bureaucrats, not an orchestrated campaign.

To the extent multiple agencies acted against crypto around the same time (Fed denying Custodia, SEC enforcing on crypto firms, banking regulators issuing joint statements), the simplest explanation is convergent concern: all saw the same string of industry blow-ups and reacted according to their mandates. It doesn’t require a secret inter-agency cabal; it’s more a case of regulators finally waking up to risks they had underestimated. Even Nic Carter’s own timeline of “Choke Point 2.0” events is basically a list of public actions: a warning here, a policy statement there, an enforcement action there (Operation Choke Point 2.0: Is the US Coming for Crypto? — Blockworks) (Operation Choke Point 2.0: Is the US Coming for Crypto? — Blockworks). There’s nothing particularly shadowy about it — unless one takes the view that any regulatory action against crypto must be in bad faith. That seems to be the core ethos of the conspiracy believers: they cannot accept that crypto ventures might genuinely pose safety, soundness, or legal risks warranting regulatory response; instead, any pushback must be part of a nefarious scheme. This is convenient, because it means crypto industry players never have to concede faults — they can blame the big bad government for any setbacks.

Claim: “Operation Choke Point 2.0” is proven by the language officials use — calling crypto activities high-risk, discouraging banks from touching crypto clients, etc. It’s the same playbook as the original Choke Point.

Reality: Yes, regulators have labeled certain crypto activities “high risk.” Guess what — they are high risk! Calling a spade a spade isn’t a conspiracy; it’s basic risk management. The original Operation Choke Point infamously painted entire industries as reputation risks to scare banks away. In the crypto context, regulators are warning that crypto firms carry unique liquidity and compliance risks (which is demonstrably true, given crypto’s volatility and the fraud/exchange collapses we’ve seen). For example, in early 2023 the Fed, FDIC, and OCC issued a joint statement cautioning that business models concentrated in crypto could be unstable and that banks should exercise caution and robust due diligence (Operation Choke Point 2.0: Is the US Coming for Crypto? — Blockworks). Far from being covert, this was an open policy stance. Banks were not prohibited from serving crypto clients; they were told to do so responsibly and be prepared for the risks. Those who cry “Choke Point!” interpret any caution as de facto prohibition. But numerous banks (even today) still bank crypto firms — they just do so under heightened scrutiny. And yes, some banks pulled back from crypto voluntarily — that’s the market at work, not jackboots at the door.

Proponents also point to what they deem a coordinated media narrative in early 2023 highlighting crypto’s role in the bank failures — as if that media coverage itself was part of the scheme to justify Choke Point 2.0. This is tinfoil-hat thinking. Crypto did play a role (especially at Silvergate and Signature) so of course it was reported on. Interestingly, the GAO’s official review in April 2023 noted that Signature had actually reduced its crypto-related deposits in the year before failure and that SVB had no significant crypto exposure (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory) (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory). In other words, the government’s own analysis did not scapegoat crypto as the cause; it cited it as one factor for Signature, but emphasized broad mismanagement and rapid growth as more fundamental causes. This nuance is lost on the Choke Point 2.0 crowd, who insist that regulators blamed crypto to cover their own failings. The truth is regulators blamed Signature’s management above all (Signature Bank failure due to ‘poor management,’ US FDIC report says | Reuters). It was actually crypto lobbyists who wouldn’t stop blaming regulators.

Claim: Crypto personalities like Carter, Long, and Balaji are whistleblowers speaking truth to power, exposing an ugly campaign that others were too afraid to talk about.

Reality: It takes some audacity to cast oneself as a whistleblower while trafficking in rumors and politically convenient half-truths. In fact, what these influencers have done is closer to whipping up a moral panic to serve their interests. By creating an “Operation Choke Point 2.0” enemy, they rallied the crypto community’s base instincts (distrust of government, desire for victimhood status) and also reached sympathetic ears in partisan media. This boosted their profiles significantly. Nic Carter went from just a venture guy to the go-to commentator on alleged crypto debanking, scoring op-eds in mainstream outlets like Fortune (Nic Carter) (Nic Carter) and being cited in Congressional hearings. Caitlin Long leveraged the narrative to spotlight her crusade against “captured regulators,” aligning herself with pro-crypto politicians and painting Custodia as a martyr of Fed overreach (Caitlin Long on Why Operation Choke Point 2.0 Has Bankers Nervous) (Custodia Bank CEO Caitlin Long Calls for Broader Crypto Policy …). Balaji rode the wave to reinforce his doomsday brand, attracting hundreds of thousands of followers to his pronouncements on the coming “fiat crisis” and government clampdown. In other words, Choke Point 2.0 has been great for the personal brands of its evangelists. It’s a textbook example of how a conspiracy theory can be “opportunistically used…to elevate personal brands and court partisan audiences,” as the prompt of this article noted. These folks courted Republican lawmakers and media — finding a particularly receptive audience among those predisposed to believe the Biden administration is unlawfully persecuting a new technology. It’s no coincidence that right-leaning outlets and committees picked up the term.

Meanwhile, by blaming an external enemy, crypto influencers conveniently dodge accountability for the industry’s failings. It wasn’t their poor risk management or bad actors like SBF that caused the mess — no, it was the government! This rewrite of history attempts to launder the reputations of those in the crypto ecosystem who made grave mistakes. It also obscures the lessons that should be learned from the bank failures. If one truly believes Choke Point 2.0 took down Signature, then you might ignore the real lesson about concentration risk and liquidity management that every banker (and crypto firm) should heed. Thus, the Choke Point 2.0 myth isn’t just wrong — it’s dangerous in that it encourages complacency and a persecution complex.

To be clear, none of this is to absolve regulators entirely. The postmortems show regulators did screw up — but largely by not acting sooner on obvious risks, not by executing a secret plan. There’s a bitter irony here: Carter and Long lambaste regulators for being too harsh in early 2023, when arguably the evidence shows they were too lenient in prior years (letting banks pile up uninsured deposits and risky exposures with minimal intervention). The conspiracy narrative has to perform mental gymnastics to maintain both “regulators failed to prevent these collapses” and “regulators caused these collapses” simultaneously. It tries to have it both ways, depending on the audience. This incoherence is glossed over by focusing the anger on a villain (Operation Choke Point) instead of the messy reality.

Finally, let’s address the Twitter theatrics and exaggerations that have been part of this saga. Nic Carter at times acknowledged the thin evidence, couching that Choke Point 2.0 was “happening in plain sight” but without a paper trail (Operation Choke Point 2.0: Is the US Coming for Crypto? — Blockworks) (Operation Choke Point 2.0: Is the US Coming for Crypto? — Blockworks) — a clever way to claim both that it’s obviously true and unfalsifiable. He took victory laps whenever a new tidbit (like the pause letters or a politician’s comment) seemed to validate the narrative, yet downplayed refutations. Caitlin Long’s tone oscillated between statesmanlike (“I’m offering to work with policymakers of all stripes” (Shame On Washington, DC For Shooting A Messenger Who Warned of Crypto Debacle — Caitlin Long)) and incendiary (accusing senators and Fed officials of blatant bad faith (Shame On Washington, DC For Shooting A Messenger Who Warned of Crypto Debacle — Caitlin Long)), depending on the platform. Balaji, of course, went full “end is nigh,” effectively telling people a banking collapse was orchestrated and only Bitcoin could save them — a claim which, three months later, looked rather foolish as banks stabilized and Bitcoin remained under $30k. The hype-to-reality ratio in all these communications was high. Direct quotations illustrate this starkly. Carter’s Part II headline asking if the government started a global financial crisis to kill crypto (Nic Carter) is one example of hyperbole that doesn’t age well. Balaji’s infamous bet tweet, “I will take that bet…90 days…digital dollar devaluation” (Then They Fight You | Stormrake), is another — it screams of conviction, but ended as empty theater. Caitlin Long declaring that policymakers are intentionally trying to destroy honest innovators (Shame On Washington, DC For Shooting A Messenger Who Warned of Crypto Debacle — Caitlin Long) might resonate with the frustrated, but it impugns without proof the motives of an entire cohort of public servants (many of whom genuinely were trying to prevent harm that some crypto products could cause to the financial system). In sum, the rhetorical technique across the board was: assume malice, speak in grand conspiratorial terms, and dismiss any counter-evidence as naive or propaganda. That’s not healthy skepticism — that’s propaganda in its own right.

Conclusion: Crypto’s Crisis Was No Conspiracy

The narrative of “Operation Choke Point 2.0” has now had over a year to percolate, and yet it remains a theory in search of proof. All available hard evidence — financial statements, failure reports, public testimony — undermines the notion of a covert campaign to de-bank crypto. The simplest timeline is the accurate one: Crypto companies took extreme risks in 2020–2022, those risks blew up in 2022 (with multiple high-profile collapses), and in 2023 the aftershocks rocked the banks that had catered most heavily to the sector. Regulators responded imperfectly, sometimes clumsily, but their actions were largely reactions to events, not the cause of them. Silvergate wasn’t pushed off a cliff by regulators — it jumped off by being overleveraged to a collapsing industry. Signature wasn’t assassinated for being pro-crypto — it imploded from a bank run and years of managerial hubris. SVB wasn’t a pawn in an anti-crypto scheme — it was a casualty of interest rate whiplash and bad asset-liability management. These truths are inconvenient for those who built careers or followings on the Choke Point 2.0 myth, but they are supported by the “receipts” we’ve cited throughout.

It’s also telling that by late 2024, as the banking system calmed down, some crypto leaders quietly began moving off the Choke Point narrative. When Coinbase’s legal officer presented the FDIC “pause letters” to Congress, he framed it as vindication that something happened (Coinbase’s top lawyer says Operation Chokepoint 2.0 is ‘no …) (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory), but others noted that an abundance of caution in supervision does not equal a grand conspiracy. Acting FDIC Chair Hill’s comments in 2025 (citing lack of concrete evidence of a bias-fueled debanking plot (Why the new FDIC Leadership Isn’t Convinced Operation Chokepoint 2.0 Exists — Unchained)) suggest that if Choke Point 2.0 ever existed, the new regime can’t even find it — likely because it was never an official program to begin with. Meanwhile, crypto firms did manage to find banking partners (albeit fewer and more cautious ones), and no law or regulation specifically prohibiting crypto banking was enacted. The U.S. government, for all its warranted skepticism about crypto, did not ban crypto or crypto banking in 2023. In fact, by 2024–2025, regulators were publishing guidance on how banks can handle crypto-related activities within the rules, and Congress was debating stablecoin frameworks. Those aren’t the actions of a government that secretly decided to “strangle crypto in its crib.” Reality is more nuanced — and frankly, more boring — than the conspiracy theory.

From a Bitcoin perspective, it’s important to call out the Choke Point 2.0 narrative for what it is: an ideological coping mechanism deployed by certain influencers to avoid hard truths about bad business practices. Bitcoiners are known for our skepticism, but that skepticism should cut both ways — not just toward the government but also toward sensationalist claims made by our own community thought leaders. We shouldn’t accept a convenient scapegoat without evidence. The saga of 2023’s bank failures holds many lessons: about not keeping all your eggs in one basket (be it one bank or one sector), about the dangers of leverage and duration risk, about the value of decentralization and the stability of sound banking practices. To reduce it all to “the government did it because they hate crypto” is an intellectually lazy reduction that helps no one (except those selling books, newsletters, or political campaigns on that theme).

As Bitcoiners, we pride ourselves on understanding first principles and not trusting verify. So let’s verify: The idea of Operation Choke Point 2.0 fails the test. Its key claims crumble under verification, its promoters’ agendas are transparent, and its effect if unchallenged would be to let the real culprits of 2022–2023 off the hook. We shouldn’t let that happen. Reckless bankers and crypto grifters would love nothing more than for us to blame imaginary federal goon squads instead of holding them accountable.

In the end, the demise of Silvergate, Signature, and SVB was a product of the hubris and errors of those institutions’ leaders (and in some cases, the excesses of certain crypto firms they banked). It was not a heroic last stand against a tyrannical government plot. It’s time for the crypto community — and especially we Bitcoiners who value clear-eyed truth — to retire the Choke Point 2.0 mythology. By all means, remain vigilant about regulatory overreach; engage in the political process to ensure fair treatment of crypto technologies. But let’s do so grounded in reality, not by chasing phantoms. The next time someone tries to peddle a grand conspiracy for why a crypto business failed, demand evidence. Don’t accept narrative in place of data.

“Operation Choke Point 2.0” belongs in the bucket of debunked crypto urban legends. The sooner we acknowledge that, the sooner we can focus on what really matters: building robust, anti-fragile Bitcoin infrastructure that can thrive without needing special favors — and without needing excuses when things go wrong. In the long run, truth and accountability are more bullish for Bitcoin than any comforting conspiracy theory. And that’s the hard truth that the sharpest Bitcoiners must insist on, if we want our community to remain intellectually honest and resilient.

Sources:

FDIC report on Signature Bank’s failure (cause: “poor management” and pursuit of growth without risk controls) (Signature Bank failure due to ‘poor management,’ US FDIC report says | Reuters) (Signature Bank failure due to ‘poor management,’ US FDIC report says | Reuters)
GAO Preliminary Review of 2023 Bank Failures (Signature and SVB’s rapid growth, reliance on uninsured deposits, and mismanaged risks) (Bank Regulation: Preliminary Review of Agency Actions Related to March 2023 Bank Failures | U.S. GAO) (Bank Regulation: Preliminary Review of Agency Actions Related to March 2023 Bank Failures | U.S. GAO)
Coindesk — NYDFS Superintendent denies Signature closure was crypto-related (it was due to a “crisis of confidence” in management during a run) (Signature Bank Shutdown Caused by ‘Crisis of Confidence’ in Leadership, NYDFS Says) (Signature Bank Shutdown Caused by ‘Crisis of Confidence’ in Leadership, NYDFS Says)
Nic Carter’s writings in Pirate Wires (e.g. claiming a coordinated crackdown and asking if govt caused a financial crisis to destroy crypto) (Nic Carter) (Nic Carter)
Caitlin Long’s “Shame on Washington” blog post (criticizing a “misguided crackdown” and claiming policymakers want to “kill” honest innovators) (Shame On Washington, DC For Shooting A Messenger Who Warned of Crypto Debacle — Caitlin Long) (Shame On Washington, DC For Shooting A Messenger Who Warned of Crypto Debacle — Caitlin Long)
Balaji Srinivasan’s public Bitcoin bet tweet (predicting imminent banking collapse and hyperinflation within 90 days — which did not occur) (Then They Fight You | Stormrake)
Coinbase FOIA request summary (allegations of a 15% deposit cap; acknowledges no proof yet and notes Signature’s CEO had pledged to cut crypto deposits to 15% himself) (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory) (Coinbase demands records on ‘Choke Point’ conspiracy theory)
Reuters coverage of Signature and SVB failures (timeline of runs, context of closures) (Signature Bank failure due to ‘poor management,’ US FDIC report says | Reuters) (Signature Bank failure due to ‘poor management,’ US FDIC report says | Reuters)
Unchained interview with FDIC Chair Travis Hill (no concrete evidence of a crypto debanking conspiracy, and any de-banking was argued as safety/soundness driven) (Why the new FDIC Leadership Isn’t Convinced Operation Chokepoint 2.0 Exists — Unchained) (Why the new FDIC Leadership Isn’t Convinced Operation Chokepoint 2.0 Exists — Unchained)
Fintech Nexus on Silvergate’s Q4 2022 implosion (68% deposit outflow after FTX, massive losses from asset sales) (Silvergate: Another fall from the CeFi house of cards | Fintech Nexus)
Cryptobriefing — Trump vows to end “Operation Choke Point 2.0” (politicization of the term in partisan rhetoric) (What is Operation Choke Point 2.0? Trump vows to end it) (What is Operation Choke Point 2.0? Trump vows to end it)
FDIC denial of Reuters report about Signature buyer condition (no requirement to divest crypto) (FDIC Denies Report Signature Bank Purchaser Must Divest Crypto)

This article was generated using OpenAI, guided by John Carvalho.