Agorism, Privacy Wars and Why THORChain Won't Flinch

Ray

2026-04-21 — 8 min read

@THORChain Community Space ft. @SallyMayweather, @KentonC137 & @patriotsounds | April 18, 2026

By @Raynalytics

TL;DR

THORChain's Vegas meetup is locked in: April 27th, 7:00 PM at the F1 Arcade in Forum Shops at Caesars. Food served 7-9 PM, capacity for 50-100 people. F1 racing simulators all night.
ADR 25 (dev fund treasury transfer) needs node votes urgently. Nine Realms is shutting down and still controls the wallet receiving 5% of protocol revenue.
Scam site alert: swap.throchain.org is a phishing site mimicking the official swap interface. Kenton has reported it to registrars, Cloudflare, and Google.
Sal the Agorist joined to discuss agorism, revisionist history, and crypto as the weapon against central banking. He sees THORChain as essential infrastructure for financial freedom.
$XMR on THORChain continues to excite the privacy community. Sal confirmed Firo and Zano are also building toward cross-chain privacy tooling.

Introduction

A crypto cop who tracks stolen funds for a living is thinking about buying $RUNE. That was the story @KentonC137 dropped during Saturday's Podcast #191, just before the featured guest arrived. The officer, a Bitcoin maximalist by conviction, told Kenton that $XMR on THORChain would make his job "so much harder, maybe even impossible," but that he thinks it's necessary.

That set the tone for the entire episode. Sal the Agorist, the 276K-follower libertarian firebrand behind three books and "The Subversive Spectrum" podcast, joined Kenton and @patriotsounds for a wide-ranging conversation about agorism, privacy, revisionist history, and why THORChain is positioned at the center of the fight for financial sovereignty. Before Sal arrived, Kenton and Denny covered protocol updates, a phishing site takedown, and Circle's controversial response to the Drift hack.

1. Vegas Meetup: F1 Arcade, April 27th

Kenton confirmed the venue for THORChain's meetup during the Bitcoin Conference in Las Vegas. The event will be held at the F1 Arcade in the Forum Shops at Caesars, about a 10-minute walk from the Venetian.

Details: Monday, April 27th at 7:00 PM. Ten F1 racing simulators booked for the night. Food served buffet-style from 7:00 to 9:00 PM (included in the venue minimum spend, so don't eat beforehand). The space is booked for 50 but can expand to 75-100 without committing to a larger minimum. The RSVP link has been updated with the address.

Sal confirmed he'll be flying in the day before and plans to attend.

2. ADR 25: Dev Fund Treasury Transfer

Nine Realms is shutting down as a company, and they currently control the wallet where 5% of THORChain's protocol revenue is directed for the dev fund. While Kenton noted they're "friendly" and won't steal the funds, they also have no obligation to return them.

"5% of the revenue and deciding where it goes isn't a small decision."

The proposal (ADR 25) would transfer control to Chad and his team, who are the only group putting their hat in the ring. Kenton said he actually thinks they're "too shrewd" with spending, joking that he has to tell them to spend more. The alternative options are simple: vote for the treasury transfer, propose a different team, or vote to set the dev fund to 0%.

Kenton urged nodes not to wait for v3.18 to just include the address change automatically. He wants proper on-chain governance with a vote and a paper trail.

3. Scam Site Alert

A phishing site at swap.throchain.org (the R and O are swapped from the real swap.thorchain.org) was discovered mimicking THORChain's official swap interface. Kenton spent his Friday night reporting it: contacting the registrar, filing with Cloudflare, and submitting Google's phishing form. He even set up a fresh wallet with $10 to intentionally get drained for proof.

The site appears to be pointing to Nine Realms' endpoints and may not be fully functional, but the warning stands: always double-check URLs before connecting your wallet.

4. Circle, Censorship, and the Drift Hack

The recent $285M Drift Protocol hack became a jumping-off point for one of the episode's core themes: censorship vs. security. ZachXBT has been publicly criticizing Circle for not freezing the ~$232M in USDC that moved through Circle's own cross-chain transfer protocol (CCTP) during the exploit.

Kenton gave Circle credit for their stance. Circle has said it only freezes assets when directed by law enforcement or courts, not in real time during hacks. Kenton compared this to the U.S. freezing Russian dollar-denominated assets during the Ukraine conflict, which triggered the rise of BRICS alternatives and undermined confidence in dollar neutrality.

"We're just taking a position of neutrality. What is THORChain? THORChain is just decentralized neutral infrastructure. That's all it is."

Kenton turned the criticism back on ZachXBT, arguing that by publicly documenting exactly how funds move through THORChain, he's essentially providing a playbook for future attackers. Citing Robert Cialdini's "Psychology of Persuasion" and the copycat effect, Kenton suggested ZachXBT's motivations are more about engagement than protection.

5. Meet Sal the Agorist

@SallyMayweather is a 276K-follower libertarian content creator, author, and host of "The Subversive Spectrum" podcast (Wednesdays, 7:30 PM ET). He describes himself as a "libertarian turned anarchist" who found $BTC in 2013 and never looked back.

Sal's three books cover agorist philosophy and revisionist American history:

Anti-Politics is a collection of agorist essays from various anarchist thinkers and authors. The American Experiment is a cover-to-cover revisionist history from the Greeks through modern presidencies. Three Books That Changed the World is a deep dive into the Progressive Era (roughly 1898 to WWI), examining how three influential books shaped the expansion of state power.

His website saltheagorist.com just launched, and he also runs agorathreads.com for libertarian merchandise and apparel.

6. Agorism and THORChain

The conversation zeroed in on why agorism and THORChain are natural allies. Agorism, founded by Samuel Konkin III, is a philosophy centered on building parallel economic systems through entrepreneurship in black and gray markets, bypassing the state rather than engaging with it politically.

"We can't comply our way out of tyranny."

Sal called cryptocurrency "by far the most powerful tool in the agorist toolbox" because the state's power fundamentally rests on its ability to print money. Without that, the entire apparatus collapses. Gold and silver have the right properties but are confiscable. $BTC and crypto are non-confiscable.

Kenton framed the problem as one of demand, not supply: society is addicted to government, and changing politicians is like attacking drug supply instead of addressing the demand. $BTC, he argued, is a "Trojan horse" that draws people in through greed and gradually opens their eyes to what financial sovereignty means.

THORChain's role in this framework is clear: it's the neutral, permissionless exchange layer that lets anyone move between any crypto without intermediaries. As Sal put it, there are "a lot of swaps you can't make on centralized exchanges just because the government doesn't like those coins."

7. Privacy, $XMR, and the Eye of Sauron

The longest discussion thread concerned THORChain's upcoming $XMR integration and what it means for the protocol's relationship with regulators.

Kenton laid out the bull case bluntly: THORChain is not a mixer. It's a conduit. You can already swap any token to $BTC and use CoinJoin, or swap to $ETH and use Tornado Cash. $XMR is no different. The mixing occurs on Monero's chain, not on THORChain. Everything on THORChain is public and trackable.

"It's not a real cryptocurrency if it hasn't been accused of money laundering."

Kenton compared potential regulatory pushback to NWA's "Parental Advisory" labels in the early '90s: intended to suppress sales, they became a badge of credibility that every artist wanted. He predicted that if privacy coins face censorship, it would function like capital controls on a collapsing currency: a fire alarm, not a deterrent.

Sal, wearing his @monero Rujo hat, agreed. He views @firoorg as one of the most underrated privacy coins, particularly popular in Asia, and recommended the hosts bring on Reuben Yap (Firo's project steward) for a future episode. He also highlighted @ConfidentialLyr's product @Bridgeless_com and Rosen Bridge's work with Firo for cross-chain private trading.

Kenton added that @zano_project is working on gateway addresses expected in May, which would make it easier to integrate Zano into DEXs like THORChain.

8. The Bybit Stress Test

The conversation briefly touched on last February's Bybit hack, where stolen funds flowed through THORChain. Kenton framed it as a valuable stress test: the protocol survived, and the community flushed out developers and node operators who wanted to censor transactions.

"Anyone who's left over now, I think we're aligned. We're all on the same page."

The result is a more ideologically cohesive community. Nodes that remained are committed to neutrality and permissionlessness. Kenton said this actually gives him confidence to be publicly doxed, knowing the network can survive without any individual.

What to Watch

ADR 25 vote: Nodes need to vote on the dev fund treasury transfer before Nine Realms fully winds down. Don't wait for v3.18.
Vegas meetup: April 27th, 7:00 PM, F1 Arcade at Forum Shops, Caesars. RSVP link updated.
$XMR integration: Code is progressing. Production-ready timeline estimated at 3-4 months after going live on testnet.
Zano gateway addresses: Expected in May, potentially opening the door for a THORChain integration.
Firo and Rosen Bridge: Cross-chain privacy tooling being developed. Reuben Yap flagged as a potential future guest.
Next week: Unstoppable Wallet and IBEC on the show.