FINNOVATORS: Recent Episodes
Manuel Rensink
The FINNOVATORS podcast is brought to you from the future, the future of finance. Your host is Manuel Rensink, Director of Innovation Strategy at Securrency. Tune in for fascinating conversations with tech founders, finance wizzes, and legal experts from all around the world about decentralized finance, current events, and innovation opportunities. Get inspired by a future that is programmable, internet-native, sustainable, and accessible to all. The podcast series is presented by Securrency, a company at the intersection of institutional financial services and DeFi. Join us and subscribe to FINNOVATORS.
Bitcoin staking? On Proof of Stake chains?? Find out how Stanford professor David Tse and his team at Babylon Chain have found the way for PoW and PoS chains to coexist in a mutually beneficial way. We discuss this oxymoron, Mr Marconi, slashing, blockchain security, extractable one-time signatures, EigenLayer, and more. Make sure to tune in!
https://twitter.com/dntse
https://twitter.com/babylon_chain
https://www.babylonchain.io/
In an increasingly digital and AI-driven world, proof of authenticity and online privacy and safety are extremely important. Nick and his team at Dock.io are creating tools for organizations to issue digital credentials and certificates that are automatically and instantly verifiable, fraud-proof and auditable. We discuss the need for decentralization and web3, self sovereign identity, zero-knowledge proofs and the use cases in education, health, defi and traditional financial services. Make sure to tune in!
https://twitter.com/N1ckLambert
https://www.dock.io/
https://twitter.com/docknetwork
Interested in knowing more about some of the hottest long/short narratives in crypto? Huf (not his real name) talks about rage-quitting investment banking, porting his skills to defi, first as an actively managed yield platform and then pivoting to Pear, a composable pair-trading protocol. We discuss the importance of pseudonymity, the use cases for pair trading, trending long-short narratives, trading positions as NFTs, DAO economics, integrating off- and on-chain liquidity, double capital efficiency, building on Arbitrum, and Vitalik in the bedroom... Make sure to tune in!
https://twitter.com/hufhaus9
https://www.pear.garden/
The affable Harsh Rajat describes how being liquidated on a defi protocol inspired him to launch Push Protocol (previously EPNS), a cross-chain notification and messaging protocol for web3. We discuss the need for web3-native communication, some interesting use cases, the upcoming node decentralization, and his move to Dubai to take Push to the next level.
https://twitter.com/harshrajat
https://push.org/
What will drive the next million (billion?) users to web3? Convenient non-custodial ramps are crucial to bridge the gap with mainstream finance and web2. George and his team at Wert have developed a smart NFT & crypto checkout solution with industry-beating transaction success rates. We discuss how the devil is in the details, seamless UX, utility NFT's, Ebay, and future developments. Make sure to tune in!
Which Real World Assets will become big on-chain first? Piyush and his team at PolyTrade are betting on the multi-trillion market for Trade Finance. Having recently completed their funding round, they're ready to expand from their base in Dubai to the US and Asia. We talk about factoring, the UAE, India, Polygon and trade finance yield potential in DeFi. Give it a listen!
https://www.linkedin.com/in/piyush-polytrade/
https://twitter.com/Polytrade_fin
Privacy as a moral right, or a pragmatic need for institutions. Whatever the use case, Elena and her team at Iron Fish are bringing privacy-as-a-utility to the digital asset ecosystem. We discuss honest computation, zkp applications IRL, the Apple of blockchains, regulatory compliance, PoW, blake3, emission curves & inflation, stablecoins and private Bitcoin. Coming to mainnet on 4/20 (!) Don't miss out!
https://twitter.com/leanthebean
https://ironfish.network/
Trust in institutions and the current global financial system is at historically low levels. Philippe explains how Islamic Finance is based on society-oriented principles of fairness, transparency and risk sharing and argues that it is a truly capitalist alternative to an overleveraged, fractional banking, short-termist, boom and bust financial system. We talk about the role of blockchain, building a governance layer on top of Stellar, gold tokens and deflationary ecosystem tokenomics. Make sure to tune in!
Are you looking to pay your staff (partially) in crypto? Franklin offers a fully-compliant hybrid cash & crypto payroll service that enables streaming salary payments and automated tax services. Eric and I discuss market demand, stablecoins & CBDC, token table management, regulations and privacy. Make sure to tune in!
https://twitter.com/0xEricBrown
hellofranklin.co
https://twitter.com/franklinpayroll
Sam is the congenial brand-new CEO of Discreet Labs, the team behind programmable privacy solution Findora. From a chilly Eth Denver, he defines privacy as your ability to create relationships with anybody. We discuss his relationship with Satoshi, triple masking, DeFi, Weapons of Mass Surveillance, Kindereggs and Christian singles. Make sure to tune in to this fun episode!
https://twitter.com/samuelpharrison
https://findora.org/
https://twitter.com/findora
San Francisco-based Stronghold creates virtual networks that enable instant settlement and interoperability between legacy and new payment systems. With a focus on servicing businesses that have been "de-risked", Sean and his team combine defi and tradfi in innovative ways. We discuss merchant rewards, loyalty programs, impact investing, defi as a source of capital formation, and the future of stablecoins.
Who is ready to challenge the almighty Deribit in crypto options? Zug-based Phinom Digital is hungry for some market share. Ivan explains how a focus on compliance, risk management and institutions is the recipe for success. We discuss a fortuitous Bitcoin birthday gift, passport options, CeFi vs DeFi, and the current digital asset VC market. Make sure to tune in!
Telegram: https://t.me/+S-qLEq8dyjE5MTE0
Twitter: @PhinomDigital https://twitter.com/phinomdigital?s=11&t=TxqqV_J1y7O_ILRTvmRC5g
Facebook: Phinom Digital https://www.facebook.com/PhinomDigital/
Instagram:@phinom_digital https://www.instagram.com/phinom_digital/
Hifi is a borrowing & lending protocol with a difference! Fixed rates - long elusive in DeFi - and a focus on integrating real world assets and regulatory compliance. Doug and I discuss: increasing competition in the debt markets, the role of NFT's in DeFi, abstracting blockchain away from the end user, and barrel racing horses! Make sure to tune in!
https://hifi.finance/
https://twitter.com/HifiFinance
Michal's trajectory into digital assets spans banking, telecoms, Eth mining, a CEX, and an L1. Now a hands-on venture investor at Arca, he offers our audience unique insights into what's hot in the space. We discuss analytics, web2.5, security, blockchain gaming and of course defi. Make sure to tune in and find out about some of the "breakthrough" themes of 2023!
https://twitter.com/MichalBene
https://twitter.com/arca
https://www.ar.ca/
How many software firms are looking to address the multi-trillion dollar funding gap to achieve international sustainability goals? Adam and his team at Bitgreen are looking to both bridge this gap with innovative green capital formation, and provide a home to other moonshots on its L1 blockchain. We discuss green bonds, greenwashing, the path to liquidity, regulations, gamified token sales and chickenhood, Make sure to tune in!
https://twitter.com/adamcarv
https://bitgreen.org/
https://habbit.bitgreen.org/
As the public face of Tether, Bitfinex, and now also Holepunch, Paolo is arguably the most important man in crypto today. You can't tell though, as he remains a down-to-earth techie with a passion for Bitcoin, economic freedom and simply making global financial infrastructure more efficient and accessible. We discuss the importance of the wrath of god in the creative process, how cloud is a lie, Keet as both the Bittorrent and Bitcoin of communications, DeFi (mixed feelings), CBDC's, and a look into 2023.
Ran (Goldi) Goldshtein gives us a brilliant look into life as an entrepeneur in crypto, the Israeli ecosystem, and of course the impact of blockchain on the payments industry. We discuss how the banks are finally there, and are implementing blockchain faster than any technology since the mainframe. How the future belongs to stablecoins and the respective roles of #cbdc 's, banks, Swift, Visa, Mastercard and of course #bitcoin and decentralized #stablecoins. How Fireblocks acts as an enabler, and what we can look forward to in 2023. Make sure to tune in and be inspired by Goldi's passionate, yet levelheaded views on the industry.
We all have heard of DAO's, but what are Decentralized Autonomous Companies, and what are they solving for? Elena describes her journey from Crypto Chicks - a crypto advocacy organization aimed at women - to Metis: a web3 economy platform cum Ethereum Layer 2, that allows startups and existing web2 companies to pay employees, raise capital, store data, and target new markets. Tune in to learn all about it, and learn what Metis has in store for 2023!
https://cryptochicks.ca
https://metis.io
https://twitter.com/MetisDAO
James is a long time investor in the crypto and DeFi space and is no stranger to market cycles. He shares his thoughts on the current landscape and explains where he sees opportunities and how he plans to deploy his dry powder. We discuss both the importance of decentralization and the need for regulations in CeFi, LedgerX (earlier sold to FTX), Polkadot, the UAE as a crypto hub, sustainable yields in DeFi, and what will get us out of the current downmarket.
In this episode, Simon Schaber eloquently goes into some of the fundamentals of the current crypto crisis, the role of regulators, and of course the FTX shenanigans in particular.
In the short-term this impacts the whole industry. However, the present belongs to the builders, and the team at Spool is working on a DeFi protocol that promises risk-adjusted transparent yields for investors and valuable infrastructure for fund managers to build on-chain investment products. Tune in to learn about Freedom Dollars, DeFi SaaS, TVR, DAOs, tokenomics, and gasless self-balancing smart vaults on Ethereum L1!
"Every generation has the birthright to reinvent society as they deem fit". Norman is a crypto degen with strong defi values who set up Swiss-regulated Scrypt to be a trusted gateway into digital assets for institutions. Working at the intersection of defi and tradfi is a balancing act, a challenge that his team of tradfi'ers and crypto experts is well placed to manage. We discuss the future of defi, tokenization of everything and staking as a great form of fixed income. Not to be missed!
How can I calculate my current and historical P&L across DeFi protocols? What is my aggregate exposure to
https://valktech.io/
https://mymerlin.io/
https://twitter.com/valktech
https://discord.com/invite/nBZxnscu8r
What's the importance of having decentralized derivatives like futures, options and swaps, and what are some of the major use cases? Barney is a seasoned trading systems expert and explains how Vega's bespoke protocol and derivatives marketplace, can prevent MEV, have predictable trading fees in bps, margin credit, atomic closeouts, hybrid AMM / order book liquidity, and what's in the roadmap. We discuss the London blockchain ecosystem and how defi and tradfi are converging to benefit people IRL.
As a tokenizer and exchange of precious metals, VNX operates at the exciting intersection of Real World Assets (RWA) and blockchain. Alexander explains how his VC background helps him being an entrepreneur, why tokenized gold makes sense for both traditional investors and crypto investors, the safety measures that need to be in place, regulation, and the use of gold in defi. Make sure to tune in!
https://vnx.li/
Trusted stablecoins and lending platforms are among the most important building blocks of DeFi. San Francisco-based TrustToken is a pioneer in both: TrueUSD (TUSD) has global adoption, and TrueFi is a lending platform that requires little or no collateral and has successfully executed over $1.6bn in loans over the last 18 months. Rafael is a most engaging speaker and explains how a number of key innovations, DeFi on- and off-ramps, regulatory engagement and TradFi adoption, are playing an important role making DeFi safer and greater. Make sure to tune in!
Links mentioned:
https://www.trusttoken.com/
https://truefi.io/
https://real-time-attest.trustexplorer.io/truecurrencies
Inter-chain liquidity is existential for the future of DeFi, however it has remained largely elusive and honeypot "bridges" are slow and have been targets of billions worth of hacks. The team at Kima likes a challenge and addresses one of the hardest remaining problems in the DeFi space with a L1 settlement layer. Eitan talks about pivoting his company, his "safety first" mantra, the Israeli tech ecosystem and the upcoming Kima token.
US Air Force -> Goldman Sachs -> The Graph. Kyle explains his journey into web3, and his passion for creating an open source, serverless, incentivized hivemind. In his role at core dev team, Edge&Node, Kyle is at the center of The Graph ecosystem that is building the Google for Blockchain. We talk about grit, integrity, freedom, anti-fragility, interoperability, subgraphs and hardware stores. Subscribe and don't miss this fascinating episode!
How can NFT's be used to build a bridge between web2 and web3? Smart Token Labs make it easy for top brands in luxury, sports and esports to convert followers into users. Find out how one brand combines digital art, impact investing and brand activation using constantly-evolving NFT's. We also discuss Mark Cuban, the Australian crypto-scene and of course defi.
From the Securrency Liquidity Lounge in Davos, Yip & Michael lay out their vision for Unit Network and how this DAO of DAOs will lead to a more cooperative, equitable and sustainable token economy that eventually increases the pie for all: not only founders and investors but also customers and workers. A fascinating talk about puppies, cavemen, wormholes, parachains and interoperability.
From the Securrency Liquidity Lounge in Davos, we are joined by Heidi Pease: head of investment products at Wave Financial, a top 5 digital asset manager; and Tracy Trachsler: MD at CV Labs - a global crypto ecosystem business. We discuss Zug, Necker Island, Dubai, South Africa, Afghanistan, Davos and of course the Metaverse. Want to find out how to achieve Impact in the Metaverse? Make sure to tune in and listen to some amazing stories.
From the Securrency Liquidity Lounge in Davos, Jason talks about a global savings crisis and why each investment needs a protective halo. Having bootstrapped his firm to a top 10 global fintech, Jason has three golden tips for startups. With $7bn of structured products transacted by Halo over the last few years, he is only getting started though, and predicts that blockchain and smart contracts will further revolutionize financial markets.
Our first regulator on Finnovators, and well deserved too! Emmanuel shows how regulators can work hand in hand with fintechs and virtual asset firms to shape the future of finance. A sleeves up regulatory approach that is principles-based and gets deeply involved in tech governance and the creation of digital marketplaces. No surprise then, that Securrency Inc., Securrency Capital and many exchanges, brokers and custodians, have chosen ADGM as their home.
Why is a combat & investment banking veteran speaking to US Congress and at Davos on crypto? Chris lays bare some, perhaps surprising, opportunities for financial institutions and market infrastructure providers. Direct distribution, operational efficiencies and risk mitigation are great, but even greater are the fundamental values inherent in web3. Identity as private property, the creator economy and token governance present a unique opportunity for all of us to stop working the land as serfs in web2!
How does white-labeled liquid staking benefit DAOs, DeFi users, bridges and L1 protocols alike? Why are dynamic withdrawal pools the newest investment opportunity in Defi? Tune in and listen to our conversation with Simon to find out how Geode is aiming to set a trend of making liquid staking derivatives prominent in DeFi.
Why are NFT's the perfect solution for a multi-billion dollar collectibles market? We answer this and more, with Niko Hosn, CTO and cofounder of Raremint, and Carlos Betancourt, founding principal at BKCoin Capital. Niko explains how the NFT adds value layers to the physical asset, the challenge of bringing physical assets into the digital world, and why sports memorabilia are a great starting point. Carlos explains how asset-backed NFT's add value to an institutional portfolio, especially once integrated into DeFi and the Metaverse. Be ready to "collect to earn"!
True blockchain interoperability is of utmost importance for the future of web3, however it has remained largely elusive and "bridges" have been targets of some of the largest online thefts the world has ever seen. A novel approach by L1 Zetachain promises omnichain interoperability with cold wallet security and hot wallet convenience. Brandon explains how his team of engineers is approaching this hard problem and how it enables unified global liquidity, portable digital identity and various other use cases.
"Only innovation leads you to freedom!" DODO cofounder Diane Dai explains what freedom means to her, and how her decentralized exchange (DEX) is truly innovative in the crowded field of AMM DEX'es. On this episode, we talk about Effective Value Locked vs. Total Value Locked, the limitations of yield farming, DODO facilitating professional market makers entering DeFi, future roadmap, and how she deals with the crypto twitter drama show.
Trader-turned-builder 0xDorsal talks to us about the importance of pseudonymity, the challenges of placing large trades on DEX'es and the solutions put forward by Integral, the active risk of "passive" yield farming, effective liquidity, on-chain light pools and how every builder needs a tribe.
https://twitter.com/IntegralHQ
https://twitter.com/0xDorsal
As staking solutions explode in variety and complexity, there is an opportunity to help users and institutions identify the best staking opportunity that suits their needs and risk profiles. Smart-contract based, non-custodial platform, Stader, aspires to be aggregation layer across multiple blockchain networks. Amit Gajjala co-founded Stader in April 2021 and has already amassed nearly $1 billion in AUS and a $450m valuation. We talk about the different participants in the ecosystem, institutional solutions, and how to onboard the next billion users.
Alex explains how Nansen is the Harvard of "degens". A $750m blockchain analytics firm backed by the world's leading VC's that labels hundreds of millions of wallets on a variety of chains and provides valuable metrics and insights to crypto and NFT investors and traders. He takes us through the major analytics use cases, the use of machine learning in labeling wallets and pricing NFTs, the work he does with institutions and even Google, his expansion plans, and some of the major trends in crypto. Alex combines a data science background with deep blockchain expertise and most importantly: true passion. Don't miss this episode and make sure to subscribe!
Discover how money is being embedded in infrastructure and how the developer world and DeFi are coming together as two strings of DNA. Solving for the capital inefficiency of Proof-of-Stake protocols, enhancing the performance of blockchains, diversifying infrastructure away from the large Web2.0 cloud providers, it's all in a day's work at Ankr. Interoperability and Infrastructure as a Service will be big themes in 2022 and Josh is an engaging subject matter expert. Make sure to tune in !
Dave Nadig is Chief Investment Officer & Director of Research for @ETFTrends and @ETFdb and a well-known markets commentator. In this episode we discuss his recent article: "The MetaVerse: Brave New World or Capitalist Hellscape?" We discuss Axie Infinity and his skepticism of play-to-earn (p2e) games, the lack of interoperability and standards, Eth as the currency of the MetaVerse, tokenization being the future of investment management, Bitcoin ETFs and Canada... Dave's insights are not to be missed for anyone interested in the future of the internet!
F.A. Hayek: "The great trouble is that money wasn’t allowed to develop. After two or three hundred years of the use of coins, governments stopped any further developments. We were not allowed to experiment on it, so money hasn’t been improved, it has rather become worse in the course of time." Hard to disagree with the words of the famous late professor. Now, building on the Bitcoin and DeFi revolutions, several initiatives are under way challenging the way we think about money. Evan Kuo is a co-founder of Ampleforth, and explains the use cases of a decentralized synthetic commodity money with supply elasticity as a price stabilization mechanism. We discuss decentralization, various stablecoin concepts, regulation, oracle risk and more. Make sure to tune in and subscribe!
Ilya explains how VC firm Sanctor Capital sees common investment themes in a metaverse of interdependent worlds with their own economies, and with the need to connect to each other. DeFi, GameFi and NFTs all need more infrastructure and innovation in interoperability, decentralized identity, privacy and regulatory compliance. Furthermore, we discuss how blockchain is acting as a bridge for people with different backgrounds from all over the world to come together and contribute to the ecosystem.
Entrepreneur Bill Ottman shows how to create a social network that is open-source and transparent and connects into DeFi for rewarding creators and providing an alternative advertising model. Directly challenging Big Tech, with a clear alternative, rather than empty political grandstanding. The question is which of the the large platforms will follow first. The benefits are clear, as Bitcoin and Ethereum have shown: let others build on your platform, let users regain control of their identity and gain their trust, scale endlessly. Freedom of expression, freedom of managing your finances and privacy are big topics and Bill is rightly passionate about them, so make sure to tune in!
Public network infrastructure provisioning has been a core business model of telcos for decades. Andreas explains the logic behind moving from telephone masts, optic cables and data centers to operating Web3.0 nodes, validation and staking services. Tune in to hear us discuss how the future is decentralized, investing in Celo and DeFi use cases, Self-Sovereign Identity, Berlin as the blockchain capital of the world, and how blockchain helped federal agencies manage immigration of Syrian refugees.
Is Maximal (miner) Extractable Value - MEV - a threat or an opportunity? Caleb is co-founder of Eden Network, a transaction priority network of Ethereum block producers and DeFi participants. He discusses the dark forest, sandwich bots & time bandits, the many forms of MEV, how you can both protect yourself from frontrunning and slippage, and actually turn MEV into an opportunity as Trader Extractable Value. The topics discussed on this episode are a must-know for anyone transacting on DeFi in a significant way, especially if doing so with client funds.
Francisco Maroto set up and leads the Blockchain & Digital Assets division at BBVA, the global bank with Spanish headquarters that was an early adopter of blockchain technologies. He explains his 3E strategy: Execution, Expertise, Ecosystem. From payments to crypto trading & custody, securities tokenization & CBDC, stablecoins & DeFi, he elaborates on how a 160 year old bank can be innovative and a fierce competitor in the future of finance.
Mike Cagney founded Figure in 2018 and launched the Provenance blockchain to become the ubiquitous platform for real financial services, including lending and mortgage origination, payments, and the exchange of securities and non-securities. We discuss how Figure facilitates and de-risks the entry of financial institutions into the world of natively digital assets, how the merger with Homebridge and several recent partnership announcements fit its vision, digital identity, stablecoins, and how Provenance will become more valuable and bigger than Ethereum.
Dan Doney first discovered blockchain while working in the US intelligence community, where he became the first Chief Innovation Officer. He founded Securrency in 2015 and raised over $60m to date to transform global financial markets. In this episode, we discuss institutional defi, self-processing financial instruments, the ontology of finance, some of his favorite people and projects in the space and what winning looks like for Securrency.