found online by Raymond
From tengrain at Mock Paper Scissors:
I’m going to say it as clearly as I can: that tape is an insurance policy, and probably set up as a deadman’s switch. As an insurance policy, that tape would make its way to law enforcement if anything happened to him, and Cohen must have realized somewhere along the line that he needed an insurance policy so that he would not be getting any Russian Tea.
And pure speculation: there must be more than one tape. No one makes only one, so there will be more shoes to drop. Bank on it.