Adam Efrima is the SSV Core team Co-founder. He has been active in the crypto industry since 2013. Over eight years living in China working in the financial industry and fintech space, Adam has worked in CITIC Bank covering outbound investments for Chinese SOEs, he was also in charge of setting up the eToro Shanghai operation. Since then, Adam has been deeply involved in Ethereum staking, co-founding top performing staking project Bloxstaking as well as co-founding SSV Network, a decentralized validator infrastructure for ETH staking.

Adam Simmons is Chief Strategy Officer at RDX Works, a key contributor to the Radix public ledger. He has over 13 years of experience in building &amp; growing businesses in a range of industries including online video, blockchain &amp; digital marketing. With experience in both senior leadership &amp; hands-on roles, he has repeatedly recruited, managed, and trained highly successful teams within marketing, customer success and operations functions. Adam is also a previous member of the UK Paralympic Sprint Kayaking Team and has competed in multiple World and European Championships.


Adam Swick is the Chief Growth Officer at Marathon Digital Holdings. Prior to joining Marathon, he served as a principal at Refinery Ventures, where he was responsible for identifying and recommending business strategies to accelerate the growth of all companies in Refinery’s portfolio. Before Refinery, Swick was the director of strategic finance at Kraken Digital Asset Exchange, where he managed the company’s balance sheet, debt program, investor relations, and all forecasting activities. Prior to Kraken, he founded Swick Capital, a crypto-asset hedge fund, worked at Pritzker Group Venture Capital, and was a consultant at Boston Consulting Group. Swick holds an MBA from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University and a BS in finance from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania.

Adrian Brink is the co-founder of Namada and Anoma, where he focuses on building privacy-preserving systems that are resilient to global crises. Previously, he was a core developer at Tendermint (Cosmos) and worked at the Web3 Foundation. He also co-founded Cryptium Labs, which was later sold to Chorus One, and Metastate, where he contributed to major upgrades to the Tezos protocol​.

Adrien Stern is the founder &amp; CEO of Reveel, the omnichain payments infrastructure that enables one-click cross-chain payments to connect people across borders and networks. Before founding Reveel, Adrien led digital transformation efforts at BNP Paribas CIB. He was also previously a venture builder, and owns Bridge Music, a record label and recording studio. Adrien has a Bachelor’s degree in Sciences of Management from The University of Lausanne and a Master’s degree in Business Administration from Esade. 

Alex Hoffman is Head of Ecosystem at Superposition Finance. Superposition is revolutionizing DeFi by addressing its core challenges through robust risk management powered by Concordia’s best-in-class risk engine, omnichain functionality, and transparency.

Alexei Zamyatin is a co-founder of BOB, a first-of-its-kind hybrid Layer-2 powered by Bitcoin and Ethereum. He has been a Bitcoin and interoperability research contributor since 2015 and is most known for his work on trustless cross-chain bridges and L2s. Alexei holds a PhD in computer science from Imperial College London.


Alison Haire is the CEO and founder of Lilypad, a serverless, decentralized compute network that democratizes access to computational power by providing scalable infrastructure for AI, machine learning and other high-demand processes. Before founding Lilypad, she held roles at companies such as Filecoin, IBM and Accenture. Under her leadership, Lilypad leverages idle GPU capacity worldwide to fuel an open AI economy, providing cost-effective and scalable compute resources. Her work focuses on making high-performance computing accessible to more developers and researchers, while challenging the dominance of large centralized cloud providers​​.

With over 20 years of experience leading and designing games and tech companies, Alun is well-versed in creating innovative products that tackle experiential and developer challenges. In addition to his stewardship of LAOS Network, he is CEO and co-founder of the company building LAOS, Freeverse, which focuses on building scalable blockchain infrastructure. His history as the co-creator of ‘Barcelona World Race - THE GAME,’ a cutting-edge video game enabling virtual participation in real-world events, and his wider passion for gaming, have fed into his vision for LAOS Network as a solution for the intersection of Web3 tech with both gaming and real-world applications. Alun also led Shar3d.io, a pioneering company enabling collaborative 3D web applications, and served as CTO of Bodypal.com, a virtual garment services company. He holds a Ph.D. in Medical Physics from University College London.



Amanda Cassatt is the founder and CEO of Serotonin. Amanda previously served as Chief Marketing Officer of ConsenSys from 2016 through 2019. Joining one year after the launch of Ethereum, Amanda played a crucial role in defining, creating, and growing the narrative for ConsenSys, Ethereum, and blockchain overall.

Amanda stewarded the ConsenSys brand through its global expansion across enterprises, governments, developers, and consumers. She created and scaled the marketing team to over 50 people, serving both the ConsenSys brand and 50+ portfolio companies such as MetaMask, Infura, Truffle, and Gitcoin; managing teams in product marketing, growth, design, content, community, events, email, analytics and SEO. Amanda’s contributions to some of the most successful product launches, token sales and fundraises landed her on Forbes 30 Under 30 in 2016. Amanda is the author of the world's first web3 marketing book, Web3 Marketing: A Handbook for the Next Internet Revolution.

Amanda Keleher currently serves as Chief People Officer at Consensys, one of the largest and fastest-growing companies in the blockchain technology space. A well-rounded business leader with an over 25-year career in the technology space, Amanda is the driving force behind the human element of Consensys where she is responsible for overseeing all of the aspects of people, from building and maintaining the company culture to harnessing human capital as a key driver of business. 

Before joining ConsenSys, Amanda served as the Head of People at ThoughtWorks, a global technology consultancy company, for nearly ten years, where she led the global scale expansion by opening offices around the world and recruiting a diverse workforce at a time when the DevOps movement had just been born and a new skill set were yet to be developed. After her time at ThoughWorks, she served as the Executive Vice President, People &amp; Culture of Index Exchange, one of the world’s premier ad tech organizations; and as VP of People at Little Bits and Intent Media where she excelled in designing effective and creative strategies to attract and retain world-class talent in hyper competitive environments

Andrea Berry is a seasoned online video strategist with 15+ years of experience in transformative media partnerships. 

Her early successes include helping to launch Qello Concerts, the first direct-to-consumer live-music OTT service, later transforming it into Qello Media Services and Vimeo’s OTT channels offering across various industries as their first strategic sales director for their enterprise.

Currently, as the Head of Business Development at Theta Labs, Andrea leverages her expertise in online video and blockchain to drive strategic partnerships and growth opportunities for the company. She helps enterprises take advantage and lean into the opportunities Web3 presents. 

Andrew Redden is the CEO and CTO of Last Network, a blockchain platform focused on sustainable cash flow and reinvestment. Previously, he worked at Gitcoin and has contributed to numerous DeFi and Web3 projects. Redden's career reflects a commitment to developing technologies that prioritize long-term viability and community engagement​.

Andrew Thurman is a Data Editor based in Washington, DC. He previously wrote for CoinDesk and Cointelegraph, and worked in various roles for Chainlink and Nansen. His analysis has been quoted in The Financial Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, Forbes, Fortune, Reuters, The BBC, CNBC, and elsewhere. Contact Andrew at andrew@blockworks.co.

Andrey Sergeenkov writes educational articles as a freelancer. His works have been published in Coindesk, Cointelegraph, Entrepreneur and CoinMarketCap. He believes that transforming society towards lifelong learning, combined with decentralization in government and business, will lead to exponential social development.

Andy Bromberg is CEO of Beam and Contributor to the Eco Protocol. Eco has raised more than $90 million from an array of leading investors, including a16z Crypto, L Catterton, Activant Capital, Founders Fund, Pantera Capital, and others. Prior to Eco, Andy was Co-founder and President of CoinList. Andy is also a founding board member at FreeWorld, a non-profit seeking to end institutionalized poverty in the United States by providing access to living-wage jobs for people with criminal histories. He studied Mathematics and Computer Science at Stanford University and co-founded the Stanford Bitcoin Group.

An established and versatile Financial Executive with over two decades of experience running multiple trading businesses across top-level banks such as HSBC, Barclays, and UBS. After running the top Agency and SSA business for both UBS and Barclays, he took over Emerging Markets macro trading for Barclays. In 2018, wanting to go deeper into Emerging Markets he took a role as Head of Latam local markets trading where he was responsible for trading activities across Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, and Chile. In 2021 DeMartino moved into Crypto when he became CEO and founder of Coinbase Risk Strategies focused on DeFi and Derivatives trading. More recently he started Trident Digital Group, a crypto-native solutions firm that is focused on lending and safe yield generation and stablecoin adoption.


Anthony Scaramucci is the founder and managing partner of SkyBridge, a global alternative investment firm, and founder and chairman of SALT, a global thought leadership forum and venture studio.

Prior to founding SkyBridge in 2005, Scaramucci co-founded investment partnership Oscar Capital Management, which was sold to Neuberger Berman in 2001. Earlier, he worked in Private Wealth Management at Goldman Sachs &amp; Co.

In 2022, Scaramucci was ranked #47 in Cointelegraph’s Top 100 Influencers in Crypto and Blockchain. In 2016, he was ranked #85 in Worth Magazine’s Power 100: The 100 Most Powerful People in Global Finance. In 2011, he received Ernst &amp; Young’s New York Financial Services “Entrepreneur of the Year” Award.  Anthony is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) and a board member of the Federal Enforcement Homeland Security Foundation. He is the author of five books.

Scaramucci served on President Donald J. Trump’s 16-person Presidential Transition Team Executive Committee, and in 2017 briefly served as Chief Strategy Officer of the Export-Import (EXIM) Bank and White House Communications Director.

Scaramucci, a native of Long Island, New York, holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics from Tufts University and a Juris Doctor from Harvard Law School.

Antoni is a co-founder of Aleph Zero Foundation (Switzerland), an organization overseeing the development of the Aleph Zero blockchain, and a Managing Partner of Cardinal Cryptography (Poland), firm focused on core development of the Aleph Zero ecosystem.

Ari Juels is the Weill Family Foundation and Joan and Sanford I. Weill Professor in the Jacobs Technion-Cornell Institute at Cornell Tech and the Technion and a Computer Science faculty member at Cornell University. He is a Co-Director of the Initiative for CryptoCurrencies and Contracts (IC3). He is also Chief Scientist at Chainlink Labs. He is the author of crypto thriller novel The Oracle (Talos Press), which was released on 20 February 2024.

Austin Alexander is co-founder of LayerTwo Labs, a company focused on advancing the Bitcoin ecosystem through innovative solutions and specializing in the development of Drivechain, a specific type of blockchain sidechain designed to foster creativity and scalability within Bitcoin.

Austin Campbell is the founder and managing partner of Zero Knowledge Consulting and an adjunct professor at Columbia Business School. Previously, he has run portfolio management at Paxos for the stablecoins as well as being the chief risk officer of Paxos National Trust, has managed fixed income trading desks at JP Morgan and Citi, and has been a portfolio manager and structurer at Stone Ridge, the parent of NYDIG. He holds a BS in Mathematics from CSU Chico and a MBA from NYU Stern.

Ben Mills is the co-founder of Meso, a payments platform connecting banks and blockchains. Prior to Meso, Ben spent a decade building payments products as an early team member at Braintree (acquired by PayPal), as Head of Product at Venmo, and working on Solana Pay at Solana Labs.

Ben Rubin is the CEO and co-founder of Towns, a decentralized messaging platform dedicated to redefining online communication. Rubin has a rich background and a decade of experience in creating digital spaces that build trust and foster human connection. Prior to founding Here Not There Labs, the developer of Towns, Ben founded two venture-backed startups, Meerkat and Houseparty, both of which reimagined how people interact digitally. He scaled his communication products to hundreds of millions of users and raised over $70M in funding from Sequoia Capital and Greylock. After Houseparty was acquired by Epic Games in 2019, Ben went on to found Here Not There Labs, a venture-backed startup with over $30M in funding from a16z crypto and Benchmark Capital.

Ben Strack is a senior reporter covering macro and crypto-native funds, financial advisors, structured products, and the integration of digital assets and DeFi into traditional finance. Prior to joining Blockworks, he covered the asset management industry for Fund Intelligence and was a reporter and editor for various local newspapers on Long Island. He graduated from the University of Maryland with a degree in journalism.

Contact Ben via email at ben@blockworks.co

Bessie is a Brooklyn-based reporter covering DeFi and technology. Bessie worked as a tech journalist for The Org prior to joining Blockworks and was a management consultant for KPMG in another life. She is originally from Melbourne, Australia and holds an MA from New York University. She is also the mother of a bratty cat named Mochi. You can reach Bessie at bessie@blockworks.co

Bezalel Eithan Raviv, an ex-member of IDF Cyber Unit 8200, is a seasoned entrepreneur with deep expertise in technology and innovation. He now leads Lionsgate Network, a blockchain analysis firm specializing in professional money recovery services for digital asset investors in the +$2.5 trillion market. Prior to this role, Bezalel founded an investment banking firm supporting AI startups and developed Halleluiah, a pioneering web3 migration pattern for global music copyrights.

Billy Luedtke is the CEO and founder of Intuition, an information protocol powering a more trustful internet. Billy previously served as senior technology advisor at EY, a leading global professional services organization providing assurance, tax, audit, strategy and transactions. At EY, Billy created the company’s blockchain consulting practice, leading the technical development of blockchain-enabled distributed systems. Billy later became a senior token engineer at Consensys, a leading Ethereum developer (MetaMask, Infura, Linea). Billy continues to serve as an advisor at Consensys and MetaMask.

Billy Sebell is the Executive Director of the XDC Foundation and an early contributor to the XDC Network. Since early 2018, Billy has worked to develop the XDC community, focused on ecosystem and network growth and implementing use cases in trade finance. Billy previously spent more than 25 years in manufacturing and consumer products, dealing with the challenges businesses face in capital markets and international trade.

Bob Bodily is the Provo, Utah-based CEO and Co-Founder of Bioniq, a BTC Ordinals wallet and marketplace. He has a bachelor’s degree in neuroscience and a Ph.D. in educational/instructional technology from Brigham Young University, with 25 articles and 1K citations. He is a data engineer with 100K+ lines of production Python code, and he has two previous software startups, including an EdTech SaaS that sold in 2021.


Bogdan is the Co-Founder and CTO of Tenderly, the full-stack infrastructure solutions provider powering Web3 developer teams with the essential tools and services throughout their development journeys. 

Prior to co-founding Tenderly, Bogdan worked as a software engineer for major software platforms such as MVP Workshop and Go Daddy where he was responsible for constructing and managing the development of distributed cloud systems before realizing the lack of infrastructural support for Web3 developers. With his vast experience in constructing, expanding, and overseeing extensive distributed cloud systems, he is well-versed in the intricacies of blockchain technologies and their practical applications. 

Brandon Truong is lead product contributor for ZetaChain. He previously co-founded social platform Yada (which was acquired in 2020) and spent time building products for BuzzFeed and Udacity. 


 Brian Pak is CEO &amp; Co-Founder of ChainLight, an award-winning blockchain security firm that specializes in smart contract audits and on-chain monitoring. He is also a co-founder of Theori, an established US-based offensive cybersecurity company, since 2016, which he still leads today, having now amassed trusted partners including Microsoft, Google and Samsung. Brian’s early career started when he co-founded and developed Kaprica Security, inventing and patenting the Skorpion Charger, an Android mobile charger that can detect malicious software with no user action required. He has worked on research and development projects with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) of the US. Brian is also a founder of the team PPP (Plaid Parliament of Pwning) which won DEF CON CTF, one of the most prestigious hacker competitions held in Las Vegas, in 2013, 2014, 2016, 2017, 2019, 2022 and 2023. Brian graduated with a Masters Degree in Software Security Research from Carnegie Mellon University.

Three years ago, his act of burning a physical Banksy ignited global discourse on NFTs and Web3, exposing the industry's flaws. Now, through XION, founder Burnt Banksy leads a mission to democratize Web3 to the masses, making ownership accessible to all by removing unnecessary barriers and complications through chain abstraction. To date: XION has raised over $36M in funding with the goal of "making crypto disappear." Ultimately, Burnt Banksy wants to provide the benefits of crypto to people without requiring them to know anything about crypto.

Byron Donalds grew up in Brooklyn, New York, and he is also the proud son of a hardworking and loving single mother. His mother dedicated her time instilling in him that greatness requires sacrifice, which drives him as a devoted family man and United States Congressman.  

Byron is a graduate of Florida State University and received a Bachelor of Arts degree in finance and marketing. Byron's career led him to Southwest Florida, where he worked in the banking, finance, and insurance industries. Elected to the Florida House of Representatives in 2016, Byron represented Hendry County and east Collier County in the State Capitol. During his tenure in the Florida House, Byron served as the PreK-12 Quality Subcommittee Chair during the 2018-2019 Legislative Session and served as the Insurance &amp; Banking Subcommittee's Chairman 2019-2020 Legislative Session. While serving in the Florida House, primarily focused on elder affairs, criminal justice reform, and ensuring that each child has access to a world-class education. 

Byron is committed to serving and giving back to the community that gave him so much. He has served Southwest Florida in many ways, including previously serving on the Board of Trustees for Florida Southwestern State College after being appointed by then-Governor Rick Scott. Byron continues to volunteer in his church as a youth leader and a mentor. He also enjoys volunteering as a coach in youth football and basketball leagues.

Congressman Byron Donalds lives in Naples, Florida, with his wife, Erika, and their three sons: Damon, Darin, and Mason. Byron has spent his entire adult life serving others, whether it be through volunteering, business, or leadership. He is committed to representing Florida's 19th Congressional District's conservative values in Washington DC to ensure a stronger Florida and a stronger nation.

Byron Gilliam writes the Blockworks Daily newsletter, in which he tries to explain crypto markets to traditional investors and traditional markets to crypto investors (while trying to explain both to himself). Before joining Blockworks, Byron spent 25 years trading international equities for banks and brokers in Frankfurt, London, Paris and New York. He holds a bachelor's degree in History from Binghamton University. Contact Byron at byron@blockworks.co.

Cameron B. Pick is a partner and patent attorney at the Chicago-based intellectual property boutique law firm Marshall, Gerstein &amp; Borun. He prosecutes patents for emerging technologies, including blockchain and crypto, among other innovative areas. He may be reached at cpick@marshallip.com. 

Candace Kelly is the Chief Legal and Policy Officer for the Stellar Development Foundation (SDF), a non-profit organization that supports the development and growth of Stellar, an open-source network that connects the world's financial infrastructure. She leads the team responsible for SDF’s legal affairs and the policy team that is focused on bridging the gap between the public and private sectors. Previously, Candace worked for Uber Technologies, Inc., where she helped navigate the company’s response to regulatory investigations and advised on safety, security, privacy, consumer protection, and law enforcement response. Prior to that she served for 17 years at the United States Department of Justice.

Carlos Mercado is a data scientist at Flipside Crypto, specializing in the convergence of data science, cryptocurrency, economics, and open-source research. His expertise spans the Ethereum ecosystem and over 20 other blockchains, where he leverages SQL, R, Python, and Solidity to develop innovative data models and analytics tools. Carlos's notable contributions include the creation of the True Freeze DeFi primitive and leading the production of the 2023 Crypto Users Report, generating significant industry impact. Prior to Flipside, he applied his skills in AI strategy and product development at Guidehouse and offered data science consulting services.


​​Casey Wagner is a Senior Reporter based in New York. Casey covers crypto regulation, markets and central banks. Prior to joining Blockworks, she reported on macroeconomics at Bloomberg News. She graduated from the University of Virginia with a degree in Media Studies. Contact Casey via email at casey@blockworks.co

Charles Hoskinson is a Colorado-based technology entrepreneur and mathematician. He attended Metropolitan State University of Denver and University of Colorado Boulder to study analytic number theory before moving into cryptography through industry exposure.

His professional experience includes founding three cryptocurrency-related start-ups – Invictus Innovations, Ethereum and IOHK – and he has held a variety of posts in both the public and private sectors. He was the founding chairman of the Bitcoin Foundation’s education committee and established the Cryptocurrency Research Group in 2013.

His current projects focus on educating people about cryptocurrency, being an evangelist for decentralization and making cryptographic tools easier to use for the mainstream. This includes leading the research, design and development of Cardano, a third-generation cryptocurrency that launched in September 2017.

Chris Barrett serves as the Director of Communications at Chainlink Labs and has been involved with Chainlink since 2017. Chainlink is the only on-chain data and cross-chain platform that enables financial institutions to develop customized, flexible, compliant, and future-proof blockchain applications and tokenized assets. Before this role, he founded a leading PR agency for technology startups, where he worked with over 1,000 innovative companies. Chris is also an avid runner, having maintained a streak of running for over five consecutive years. 

Chris Brooks founded CryptoAssetRecovery.com in 2017 to help digital asset owners recover lost assets. Chris was a programmer at Fidelity Investments, VP of Technology at venture-backed Carescout (which sold to GenWorth, a spinoff of General Electric) and has founded and sold three bootstrapped internet companies. 

Chris Swenor is a seasoned entrepreneur and blockchain pioneer with a 20-year career that kicked off as a self-taught programmer at age 13. He swiftly moved from corporate roles into startups, leading several to successful acquisitions. Chris started venturing into blockchain and cryptocurrency in 2013, founding Reach in 2019, a platform that has since attracted over $13M in funding and onboarded more than 8,000 developers.

In recent years, Chris founded Humble, a decentralized exchange on Algorand, and Alloy, a blockchain gaming platform acquired in 2023. He is currently working on Voi Network, a layer 1 blockchain empowering its community with user-centric governance and economics. 

Christopher Perkins is President of CoinFund, a web3 focused Registered Investment Advisor.  He is also a member of the CFTC’s Global Markets Advisory Committee and its Digital Asset Markets Subcommittee.

Ciarán Murray is a seasoned veteran of the blockchain industry. Aside from advising on numerous blockchain projects over the years, and releasing a synthetics assets proof-of-concept last year, Ciarán previously worked in the media industry for British Sky Broadcasting. He is not only well placed to understand the issues facing the media industry but also how to apply blockchain and other distributed technologies to remedy them.

Da Hongfei is the founder of Neo, an open-source, community-driven blockchain platform designed to welcome developers into the Smart Economy. Hongfei operates as CEO of Neo Global Development (NGD), the executive arm of the Neo Foundation that is committed to developing the Neo protocol and its supporting ecosystem. He is seen as a luminary in the Web3 space and as a blockchain pioneer in Asia. Hongfei received his education at the South China University of Technology, receiving degrees in technology and English.

Damian Alvarez is a communications professional helping Web3 clients get their stories heard. He is currently the Head of Communications at Aori, an omni-chain logic layer that leverages off-chain data storage to enable high-frequency on-chain trading. He has worked at agencies such as Edelman and YAP Global to assist a variety of emerging and established clients to engage in industry-wide narratives surrounding technology. He may be contacted at damian@aori.io.

Dan Keeler is Editor-in-Chief at Blockworks. Prior to joining Blockworks, he was Frontier Markets Editor at the Wall Street Journal where he managed the Journal’s coverage of smaller emerging markets as well as created a number of high-profile events and a highly regarded newsletter. Before joining the WSJ, he was the Editor of Global Finance magazine. He is also the founder of New York’s FM Network, a group that hosts gatherings of finance professionals focused on smaller emerging markets.

Contact Dan via email at dan@blockworks.co

Dan Smith is a Senior Research Analyst based in the United States covering Curve, Convex, Aave, and Compound. Daniel previously worked in tax and valuation at EY and Bennett Thrasher. He is focused on using data visualization tools to better understand the health and profitability of various DeFi protocols. Contact Dan at daniel@blockworks.co

Daniel Batten is a ClimateTech investor, Bitcoin environmental impact analyst, CEO advisor and author. He is most widely known for his data-driven approach to Bitcoin mining research.


Daniel Cawrey has been involved full-time in the crypto space since 2013, including as an editor at CoinDesk. He is author of 2020’s “Mastering Blockchain” and 2023’s “Understanding Crypto” books, both available on Amazon.

Daranee Ganesh is a publishing and production manager based in Washington, DC. She holds an LLB with a focus on emerging technologies. Prior to Blockworks, Daranee worked on several legal and non-profit projects aimed at integrating decentralized solutions in the social justice framework, specifically within immigration and environmental law. Contact Daranee at daranee@blockworks.co.

Darren Kleine is an Alberta-based reporter covering podcast content at Blockworks. Previously reporting for Cointelegraph, he wrote feature content and a weekly series focused on the personal stories of influential figures in the Web3 space. He has been an active participant in the NFT art scene since 2020, creating works on curated platforms including SuperRare and KnownOrigin and hosting an NFT art-focused podcast called NFP with DKleine. Contact Darren Kleine at darren@blockworks.co.

David is an Editor based in the Netherlands focused on data-driven journalism. Previously, he wrote for TheNextWeb's crypto vertical before launching Protos in 2021. He's a reformed hardline Bitcoiner passionate about permissionless and decentralized networks. Contact David at david@blockworks.co

David Schwed serves as the Chief Operating Officer at Halborn, an elite blockchain security firm. Prior to Halborn, he was the Global Head of Digital Assets Technology at BNY Mellon, the world's biggest custodian bank, where he integrated the IT strategy for the company's digital asset services. David was also CISO for Galaxy Digital, where he led the development of information security and IT infrastructure, and served as a risk committee advisor, evaluating emerging threats in financial services. He also founded the Cybersecurity Master's Program at Yeshiva University’s Katz School of Science and Health, sharing his expertise as a practitioner-in-residence.


Delphine Forma is the policy lead for Europe &amp; UK at Solidus Labs, a leading market compliance and market integrity firm in digital assets. With a career spanning roles in major banks and blockchain ventures, she brings extensive experience in compliance and legal across sectors. She is the founder of the crypto compliance and legal TG group with 1,400 members. A Sciences Po Lyon alumna, Delphine also holds advanced degrees in European Criminal Business Law and anti-money laundering.

Denelle Dixon is the CEO and Executive Director of the Stellar Development Foundation (SDF), a non-profit organization focused on working with and supporting changemakers to create equitable access to the global financial system through blockchain technology. She leads the teams that help maintain Stellar's codebase, support the communities around Stellar, and advocate on behalf of the network with international stakeholders. Before joining Stellar, Dixon served as COO of Mozilla, one of the most successful mission-driven open-source organizations.. During her tenure at Mozilla, she led the organization’s business, revenue and policy teams including the ongoing fight for net neutrality and the global effort to ensure that people can control their personal data.

Dermot O’Riordan serves as a Director at the POKT Network Foundation where he helps steer product development and strategy. From Ireland to Silicon Valley, Dermot’s career ranged from advising tech companies and VC firms to leading marquee industry events. His interest in Web3 was sparked in 2016 with the rise of DAOs, leading him to dive deeper into the blockchain space, where he served as an advisor to projects like Radix and Dusk, and later, spearheading growth at Eden Block.

Donovan is a reporter based in Singapore. He previously worked in editorial at Bankless and is a huge fan of spaghetti Westerns and the Wu-Tang Clan. Contact Donovan at donovan@blockworks.co.

Elena leads product marketing at Hiro Systems, a developer tooling company bringing smart contracts to Bitcoin. She has spent the past six years working in blockchain and cryptocurrency startups. Elena co-founded Blockchain Latinx, an online community that explores what blockchain means for Latinos and for Latin America. She has an MBA from NYU Stern School of Business.

Eli Cohen is a corporate lawyer with 25+ years of experience in commercial transactions, financial services and regulatory matters and has worked in Asia, Europe and the United States. He is the General Counsel for Centrifuge, a real-world asset (RWA) tokenization and securitization platform and Chief Compliance Officer for Anemoy Capital SPC Limited a British Virgin Islands fund company issuer of the tokenized Anemoy Liquid Treasury Fund 1. He is a graduate of the Georgetown University Law Center, has a Masters in International Relations from the University of Pennsylvania and a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.

Eli Zeger writes about democracy and its relationship with technology. His work has been published in the Boston Review, Noema Magazine, Strange Matters, Zora Zine, among numerous other publications.

Elliot is the Head of Climate Strategy at Sustainable Bitcoin Protocol, where he is helping unlock Bitcoin's clean energy potential by bridging sustainable miners and climate-conscious investors. In his role at Sustainable Bitcoin Protocol, Elliot educates policymakers and NGOs on Bitcoin’s relationship with the energy system. He is a climatetech operator focused on alleviating energy poverty, bridging the digital divide, and promoting financial inclusion through technologies such as Bitcoin. Elliot was previously a Schwarzman Scholar and has served in the military, US Department of Energy, Clinton Foundation, and more. 

Evan Thomas is General Counsel for Alluvial, a software development company supporting the Liquid Collective liquid staking protocol. He was previously at Wealthsimple, Canada’s largest consumer fintech, where he was Head of Legal for Wealthsimple’s crypto trading platform. While at Wealthsimple, Evan helped launch Canada’s first regulated staking product. Before Wealthsimple, Evan was a litigator at Osler, Hoskin &amp; Harcourt LLP for nearly 15 years. Among other notable cases, Evan was hearing counsel to 3iQ Corp. in its appeal securing regulatory approval for Canada’s first publicly traded bitcoin fund in 2019.

Felix Jauvin is the host of the On the Margin podcast. Based in British Columbia, Canada, he lives and breathes where crypto and macroeconomics intersect.

Felix Xu, crypto geek, early adopter, and NFT collector. Felix graduated from NYU Stern and founded two crypto projects, ARPA and Bella Protocol, among the global top 500 by market cap. Felix previously worked at Fosun Investment, Sackler family office, and Vertical Research in New York and Beijing. Felix loves sailing, kitesurfing and was featured in the Wall Street Journal and The New York Times for his NFT collection.

Frank has a diverse career that spans creative writing, day trading, and a 12-year stint in financial planning. After experimenting with blockchain and being an early adapter to the Solana ecosystem, Mathis co-founded GenesysGo in 2021 to create a faster, more reliable and more secure decentralized data storage protocol. Their flagship product, shdwDrive is built on Solana and aims to bridge the gap between blockchain technology and traditional business infrastructure. GenesysGo is powered by a new type of decentralized data storage consensus mechanism, built from the ground up by the GenesysGo team.

Fraser is co-founder &amp; CTO of Cubist and an Assistant Professor at Carnegie Mellon University. She is an expert in software correctness: her research focuses on systems security, automated bug finding, and formal verification, from verifying (parts of) production systems like browser JITs, to finding exploitable bugs in real codebases. Her tools have found many zero-day bountied bugs and CVEs in the Chrome and Firefox browsers and multiple operating systems. Fraser received her BA in English and her MS and PhD in Computer Science from Stanford.


Garrett Harper is the producer for the Empire podcast. Garrett worked in private equity and product management before jumping into crypto full-time in 2021. His favorite thing about crypto? It conflates art, gaming, finance, software, and psychology into one hyper-growth industry.

Gijs op de Weegh is the CEO and Founder of StablR, where he leads the strategy, business operations, and investor relations. He founded StablR out of his passion for implementing blockchain technology in the financial industry and exploring its possibilities. Before founding StablR, Gijs co-founded Payvision, an e-commerce payment service provider, in 2002. Under his leadership, Payvision grew to over 300 employees and achieved a turnover exceeding €4 billion.

Gísli Kristjánsson is co-founder and CTO of Monerium, the first company to issue fiat onchain. He fell in love with programming at the age of 13. After working as a bonds broker, Gísli saw the inefficiencies of securities settlements firsthand and recognized the potential of Bitcoin. Prior to co-founding Monerium in 2015, Gísli founded and sold a platform to give users access to geo-blocked content. Fun fact: Gísli’s Ethereum address is among the 1% of the oldest addresses.

Haden Patrick is Director of Business Operations of Cordial Systems, a provider of institutional-grade self custody software using a Zero Trust security model.  Haden has executive experience in team leadership, engineering and education originating from his 24 year career as a Naval Officer. After co-founding SoloKeys, the first open-source security key company, he went on to manage projects connecting web3 to traditional finance at a cryptocurrency trading firm before joining Cordial Systems.

Hadley Stern, Advisor to MPCH, has extensive experience in leadership roles within TradFi and digital asset industries. As Global Head of Custody at the Bank of New York Mellon (BNYM) from 2021 to 2023, Hadley spearheaded the creation of the industry’s first bank-grade crypto-custody platform. Hadley also previously served as Chief Operating Officer at Bloq where he was responsible for the P&amp;L, product roadmap, and general operations. Hadley was Founding President of Fidelity Digital Asset Services where he led Fidelity's Blockchain Incubator and Digital Currency group and was pivotal in early product launches, including activating Bitcoin donations to Fidelity Charitable and building and running Fidelity first Bitcoin mining Operation.



Hannah Finnerty is Blockworks' editorial operations manager and is based in the US. Hannah previously worked in podcast production for The National in Abu Dhabi. She graduated from Bowling Green State University with a degree in multiplatform journalism and Middle Eastern politics. Contact Hannah at hannah@blockworks.co.

Hatu Sheikh is the co-founder and CMO of DAO Maker, the largest on-chain funding platform with 1.5M+ users. The platform's contracts have distributed over $600M, with a cumulative return of around 10x. Hatu has a strong background in marketing and strategy and has played a pivotal role in driving the success of various blockchain-based projects and tokens, crafting effective marketing strategies, and forging powerful synergies within the industry.

Harry Duckworth, a law graduate, embarked on a unique journey that led him to become the youngest trader at global commodities giant Trafigura. He then went on to set up desks for several hedge funds worldwide, accumulating over a decade of experience in trading, hedge funds, and emergent technologies. 

Through his work, he became fascinated by the revolutionary power of blockchain tech soon after the inception of Bitcoin. Years later he founded AgriDex International, to provide digital marketplaces and supply chain information for all participants in the global food chain. 

Hind Kurhan is a Co-Founder of Thesis Defense, a decentralized technology security auditing company whose mission is the facilitation of broad adoption of decentralized technology by improving security and audit consistency throughout the blockchain sphere.


Ian Rogers is the Chief Experience Officer at Ledger, leading the consumer-facing business delivering the world’s #1 way to buy and secure cryptocurrency.  Prior, Ian was the Chief Digital Officer at LVMH for five transformative years, working with a portfolio of nearly one hundred brands across luxury including Louis Vuitton, Dior, Sephora, and Hennessy.  Ian also sits on the boards of Dr Marten’s and Lyst.

Ian spent twenty years bringing digital music to the mainstream, first with Winamp then Yahoo!, Beats, and Apple.  Ian contributed to the 2015 launch of Apple Music including Beats 1, their digital streaming channel. Ian graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Computer Science (with honors, Phi Beta Kappa) from Indiana University in 1994.  Ian built some of the earliest music-related Web sites in the early 90s and has been working with Beastie Boys since 1993.

Igor Telyatnikov is the CEO and co-founder of the blockchain and financial services technology company AlphaPoint. Headquartered in New York, AlphaPoint supports over 10 million users, powering marketplaces and wallets in over 35 countries. With 15 years of experience in tech and innovation, Igor has empowered over 150 clients, including CME Group and Scotiabank. In 2022, he partnered with the Government of El Salvador to upgrade its Chivo Wallet into a national Bitcoin and dollar wallet, creating the first nationalized crypto ecosystem. Igor previously held roles at Cvetlo, LiftDNA, and Ingersoll Rand/Allegion, and has a Bachelor’s degree in Business Marketing from Penn State University. He is a frequent speaker at industry events.

Ishan is a University of Texas McCombs School of Business graduate with a BBA in Finance &amp; Marketing. He founded and managed a Private Equity Fund that reached an eight-figure Assets Under Management (AUM) and has also gained experience with many top 200 projects of crypto market cap. In 2022, he helped found SCRIB3, a Web3 Marketing and PR venture. He was notably among the first to raise an alert about potential deceptive and unethical business practices by FTX. Ishan contributes as a DeFi analyst, an active angel investor, and an advisor in projects like Polygon Technologies.

Jack Kubinec is a Solana ecosystem reporter based in Brooklyn, New York. Jack previously interned at Blockworks before joining full-time. He graduated summa cum laude from Cornell University with a degree in sociology. Contact Jack at jack.kubinec@blockworks.co.

Jag is the CEO and co-founder of re.al, an L2 build to facilitate deep onchain liquidity for tokenized RWAs. re.al seeks to redefine how RWAs are integrated into DeFi, using yield-generating real-world assets as novel building blocks in existing DeFi primitives.

James Cirrone is a breaking news reporter based in New York. Prior to joining Blockworks, James was a reporter and newsletter writer at Bloomberg News. He graduated from the University of Maryland with a degree in journalism. He also played trumpet in the university’s marching band. Contact James via email at james.cirrone@blockworks.co.

Jason Allegrante is the Chief Legal and Compliance Officer at Fireblocks. He is an experienced Counsel with a demonstrated history of working in the financial services industry with both large, traditional financial institutions as well as early stage fintech startups.



Jason Dehni is the co-founder and group CEO of Credbull, a leading DeFi platform offering structured high fixed yield solutions in SME private credit. Jason has over 25 years of senior management experience in asset management, private banking, SME lending, insurance, risk management, and crypto across North America, Latin America, Asia, and the Middle East. His background includes serving as group COO &amp; MENA CEO of a publicly traded crypto asset management company, co-founder &amp; CEO of an SME trade finance platform, and senior leadership roles in asset management, wealth management,  insurance, and management consulting. Jason holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and an Honours BA in Economics &amp; Political Science from the University of Toronto. 

Jean-Marie Mognetti is Chief Executive Officer of CoinShares, a publicly listed investment firm that manages over five billion in digital assets on behalf of a global investor base, and an experienced commodities trader with a background in quantitative strategies. A veteran of the Global Advisors group of companies since 2011, Jean-Marie has served in various leadership roles throughout his tenure, most recently as CEO of Global Advisors (Jersey) Limited and director of GABI, the world’s first regulated Bitcoin fund. In addition to his management responsibilities as CEO, Jean-Marie oversees the firm’s proprietary trading arm, capital markets portfolio, and risk management practices – areas in which he has developed unique expertise over his career. Prior to joining Global Advisors, Jean-Marie was a quantitative strategist with Hermes Commodities Fund Managers, and an Energy Trader Assistant at Lehman Brothers. He holds Master of Science degrees in Mathematical Trading and Finance from Sir John Cass Business School in London, and Bank-Finance-Insurance from Université Paris Dauphine in Paris, in addition to a Bachelor of Science degree in Economics and Finance from Université Paris Dauphine.

Jeff is an editor at Blockworks, based in the United States. He has been a part of the blockchain space for over a decade, most recently working as US news editor at Cointelegraph. His areas of focus include empowering artists and creators through technology, using proof-of-participation methods to reward self-improvement, reducing the effectiveness of Sybil attacks, seeking transparent equity for disadvantaged communities, and exploring fairer models of world governance. Contact Jeff at Jeffrey@blockworks.co.

Jesper Johansen is the founder and CEO of NORTHSTAKE, a regulated custodial staking company specialized in building regulatory compliant crypto staking products for institutional investors and financial institutions. The team holds backgrounds from financial institutions, pension funds, large investment companies to consulting, technology and audit firms, such as Accenture, Deloitte, PwC as well as blockchain and crypto projects e.g. DAI Foundation (MakerDao), Ethereum and L1/L2s. 

Prior to NORTHSTAKE, Jesper held leadership positions with Accenture Strategy and Deloitte Consulting advising clients in heavily regulated industries to implement new technologies and drive business transformation. He holds a MBA from Copenhagen Business School and a B.Sc. in International Business. 

Jess Sun is an independent writer and content strategist. She loves bringing good ideas to light, helping the people behind them shine, and bridging gaps in understanding. Follow her on Twitter or LinkedIn. Go to her website to learn about working with her.

Jesse Knutson is the head of operations at Bitfinex Securities, where he is responsible for expanding the platform’s issuance pipeline, overseeing distribution and building its user base while ensuring compliance with regulatory standards. Prior to this role, Knutson served as vice president of financial products at Blockstream, and held roles at prominent investment banks including Macquarie Group and Barclays.

Jim Myers is an engineer, early-stage investor, and the CTO &amp; Co-Founder of Flipside Crypto, a leading blockchain data analytics and business intelligence platform. Prior to co-founding Flipside, Jim developed the core technology that took products from 0 to 1 at companies such as Mylestone, Pluralsight, and Smarterer. Jim’s journey into the crypto industry began in 2015, eventually co-founding Flipside Crypto in 2017 to help empower crypto communities to create and share data-driven insights on the projects they care most about. Jim's passion for building extends to the broader startup community via his developer event series, Stack Dive, and as an angel investor to several local Boston-area startups, including AdHawk and LinkSquares. In a previous life, Jim developed advanced models to quantify risk and abnormal returns in the market for Financial Transmission Rights, a type of energy derivative.

JJ is an advisor, mentor and co-founder working across Bitcoin, mining and web3. He currently mentors for Outlier Ventures new Bitcoin Base Camp program and has co-founded a new protocol operating in stealth mode.

Joey is ranked by Chambers and Partners as one of the top 12 lawyers in the world, advising many of the largest platforms around the globe in the space. He co-chaired the Gibraltar Government’s working group on Blockchain for 3 years, which was established to develop the infrastructure to accommodate a DLT regulatory framework. Joey is also a specialist consultant to the United Nations and trains and assesses authorities primarily around South East Asia in virtual asset developments, DeFi and regulation. He is a member of several think tanks including the prestigious global ‘Wharton Reg@Tech’ initiative, the Blockchain Industry Parliamentary Roundtable on Blockchain Technologies at Parliament in the UK, and also contributed to the UK Law Society on the Blockchain Legal and Regulatory Guidance publication. He was the Xapo Representative on the Libra/Diem Association and has also contributed to various stablecoin and CBDC developments. 

Joeyz Yu is an entrepreneur with over 18 years of experience in product design and development. He co-founded Sending Labs to revolutionize communication protocols and social applications for Web3, leading the development of their flagship products SendingMe and SendingNetwork. Previously, Joeyz co-founded MoboTab, where he created the Dolphin Browser, used by over 200 million users and later acquired by ChangYou. Joeyz's passion for empowering users and building exceptional teams drives his mission to shape the future of the internet. 

John is the Editor of Evergreen Content at Blockworks. Before Blockworks, he was the producer and founder of an explainer studio called Best Explained. As Evergreen Editor, he manages the production of explainers, guides and all educational content for anything crypto related. He is passionate about making digital asset education more accessible for degens and fence-sitters alike. Contact John at john@blockworks.co

Byron Gilliam

This is a segment from the Blockworks Daily newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">subscribe</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-style-default is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">
“There are only two ways to make money in business: bundling and unbundling.”



— Jim Barksdale, former CEO of Netscape
</blockquote>



Stablecoins might unbundle banking (and then re-bundle it)



Bundling and unbundling aren’t the only ways to make money, of course — you can also invent something new or do an old thing more efficiently, for example.



But Jim Barksdale’s comment — made spontaneously to close a roadshow meeting for the Netscape IPO — became a dictum in tech circles because it explains a lot of things about the business of technology.



Much of the internet revolution, for example, can be framed as unbundling.&nbsp;



The internet caused newspapers to be unbundled into Craigslist, search engines and blog posts.



Fiber optics caused cable TV to be unbundled into streaming services.



Barksdale&#8217;s Netscape might be said to have unbundled the internet, letting users bypass bundled services like AOL and CompuServe, including email, news, chat and curated web access.



Sometimes, these unbundled services then get rebundled.



It used to be that to listen to a single song we liked, we had to buy 12 of them bundled into an album.



With the advent of the internet, we could buy each song individually as MP3 files (or download them illegally for free).



Now, we typically buy a bundle of millions of songs from Apple Music or Spotify.



Something similar may now be happening with crypto and banking.



Stablecoins are often described as tokenized dollars or money market funds issued by a crypto version of narrow banks.



But the best way to understand their potential significance might be as an attempt to unbundle banking.



Banks bundle all kinds of financial services: deposits, custody, payments, credit cards, lending, asset management, investment banking — most of which you are probably not interested in when you open a bank account.&nbsp;



Stablecoins, by contrast, offer the two services you are definitely interested in — the storage and transfer of money — and nothing else.



This might catch on because doing one thing well and leaving everything else out is often what disruptive technologies do best.



Stablecoins are a disruptive technology because they turn money into software — composable, portable and always on.



This is likely to cause problems for the legacy banks that are dependent on deposits as a cheap source of funding and whose offerings are encumbered by legacy systems and compliance regulations.



Stablecoins could take business from them by being a better kind of money offered in a better kind of checking account.



But that doesn’t mean that issuing them will be a better kind of business.&nbsp;



The risk disclosure section of Circle’s recent <a href="https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1876042/000119312525070481/d737521ds1.htm">S1 filing</a>, for example, is long and frightening: Competition, it warns, is “intense and increasing,” its profitability is dependent on interest rates (and therefore out of its control), CBDCs could “eliminate or reduce the need” for stablecoins, and regulation remains highly uncertain.



The S-1 also makes clear that it’s more expensive to issue stablecoins than Tether&#8217;s oft-cited results might have you think: Circle incurred $482 million of operating expenses in 2024 and just over $1 billion of “distribution, transaction and other costs.”



But you don’t have to read a 225-page S1 to be concerned — you only have to read this morning’s <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-04-23/paypal-aims-to-boost-stablecoin-use-by-offering-3-7-on-balances?utm_source=telegram&amp;utm_content=crypto&amp;utm_medium=social">Bloomberg headline</a> that “PayPal Aims To Boost Stablecoin Use By Offering 3.7% on Balances.”



That 3.7% is only about 60 bps below the fed funds rate, which isn’t much of a gross margin for issuers to work with.



If that becomes the norm, how will they make money from stablecoins?



Barksdale’s dictum suggests that stablecoins might have to become a loss leader for other, more profitable services.



As Circle’s S-1 implies, stablecoins seem likely to be issued by payments companies, banks and crypto exchanges as a way to attract or retain customers, irrespective of profitability.



To stay competitive, stablecoin issuers might need to offer the same core services — payments, banking and exchanges — as the companies they’re disrupting.



In other words: rebundle!&nbsp;



There is precedent for this.



As Barksdale’s Netscape colleague Marc Andreessen puts it, startups that disrupt incumbents by unbundling their services “often end up reforming themselves into a version of the company they took down.”



This has been a recurring pattern: As startups grow, the natural strategy is to “stay focused on your core and then add things to it,” Barksdale explains.&nbsp;



“And before long, you become a big bundle again.”



A current example is Robinhood, which will <a href="https://www.bankingdive.com/news/robinhood-to-launch-banking-product-deepak-rao/744277/">soon</a> offer checking and savings accounts, payments and cash withdrawals in addition to its core business of brokerage.



It feels like only a matter of time until it adds a stablecoin to that offering (as it has <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-09-26/robinhood-revolut-explore-entering-the-burgeoning-stablecoin-sector">reportedly</a> considered doing).



Robinhood would probably treat it as a loss leader, if so, and that could threaten stablecoin issuers’ already thin margins.&nbsp;



To stay profitable, stablecoin issuers might then have to rebundle some of the banking services they left behind.



They might even be required to rebundle.



The risk section of Circle’s S-1 filing includes a warning that “legislation requiring stablecoin issuers to be banks or to be affiliated with banks could materially affect our business.”



That may be why Circle and others are <a href="https://www.wsj.com/finance/currencies/crypto-knocks-on-the-door-of-a-banking-world-that-shut-it-out-082b3968?st=VkCCZA">reportedly</a> planning to apply for bank charters and licenses, despite the considerable cost that entails.



But could all this be an upside risk, too?



Bundling, after all, is one of only two ways to make money.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



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<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: Unpacking crypto and the markets.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Empire</a>: Crypto news and analysis to start your day.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: The intersection of crypto, macro and policy.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: All things Solana.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: Apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Bitcoin, bitcoin, bitcoin.</li>
</ul>

Banking

Stablecoins might unbundle banking (and then rebundle it)

Jeff Albus

This is a segment from the Lightspeed newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Solana is up. At $151.30, SOL is <a href="https://app.blockworksresearch.com/assets/sol?tags=sol&amp;interval=1m">back at monthly highs</a>, reversing an oh-so-steep early April dip. It&#8217;s pretty well outperforming broader crypto markets, which aren&#8217;t doing too badly themselves as they ride a wave of short squeezes, ETF inflows, and a sudden softening of trade war rhetoric.&nbsp;



Some ecosystem tokens caught the bullish wave, too, including Jupiter’s JUP, which is up 25% on the week.



Yesterday, <a href="https://app.blockworksresearch.com/research/jupiter-scale-synergies-and-scrutiny">a report from Blockworks Research</a> laid out all the ways in which Jupiter is becoming irreplaceable. Jupiter now commands 95% of DEX aggregator volume and 80% of perpetuals trading on Solana. It generates north of $280 million in annualized revenue and still trades at one of the lowest P/S ratios in DeFi.



Since launching in 2021 as a swap router, Jupiter has made no secret of its intent to become Solana&#8217;s super-app: home to perps, its own launchpad, a mobile wallet, a memecoin terminal, and more recently, NFT integrations via its DRiP Haus acquisition. Its liquidity index fund, JLP, is now the third-largest TVL pool on Solana — behind only Jito and Kamino. Its recent API upgrades (here&#8217;s looking at you, Ultra Mode) are quietly reshaping user behavior. I mean, come on. It&#8217;s pulling in $5–10 million in optional monthly fees.



Jupiter&#8217;s routing upgrades (Juno), cross-chain testnet (Jupnet) and rapid-fire acquisitions (SolanaFM, Coinhall, SonarWatch, Ultimate Wallet, Moonshot) signal a protocol building not just liquidity, but full-stack control. It&#8217;s a <a href="https://app.blockworksresearch.com/research/jupiter-scale-synergies-and-scrutiny">surgical level of vertical integration</a> rarely seen: data, analytics, interface and distribution, all consolidated under a single roof. Its treasury is buying back JUP at speed; so far, they&#8217;re over $20 million repurchased in under two months.



Risks worth watching mostly deal with looming token unlocks. The Jupiter team took heat recently-ish over its compensation and governance transparency. Plus, competition sharpens when winners emerge — Kamino, Titan and Drift aren&#8217;t going quietly. But Jupiter is digging a deep moat, and it&#8217;s doing this without relying on mercenary incentives. Ultra Mode usage is on the ascent. Aggregator dominance is stable. Perps volumes remain consistently above $25 billion per month.



While macro flows, ETF optimism, and geopolitical thawing may have sparked the week&#8217;s rally, Jupiter has helped things along by scaffolding Solana&#8217;s commercial core.



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<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: Unpacking crypto and the markets.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Empire</a>: Crypto news and analysis to start your day.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: The intersection of crypto, macro and policy.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: All things Solana.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: Apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Bitcoin, bitcoin, bitcoin.</li>
</ul>

Jupiter

Jupiter anchors growth as Solana surges to monthly highs

Ben Strack

This is a segment from the Forward Guidance newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Two weeks ago we wrote about <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/the-outlook-for-coin-as-macro-uncertainty-persists">the outlook for Coinbase</a> as macro uncertainty swirled. Cantor Fitzgerald analysts, at the time, initiated coverage of COIN — giving the crypto exchange’s shares a buy rating and a $245 price target.



Now, Benchmark analyst Mark Palmer has officially started examining Coinbase’s stock. He similarly gave it a buy rating, with a price target of $252.



When the Cantor pros wrote their COIN outlook on April 9, shares were trading for about $165 — less than half of what the stock was trading for in early December. At 1:30 pm ET today, the stock price hovered around $197.



Palmer notes that Coinbase’s partnership with Circle (allowing it to receive a portion of interest income generated from USDC reserves) means COIN will especially benefit from stablecoin legislation and increased adoption there.&nbsp;



Standard Chartered projects that the stablecoin market cap — currently about $230 billion — could hit $2 trillion by the end of 2028. As I mentioned in <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/yield-bearing-settlement-network-tokenization">yesterday’s newsletter</a>, Agora co-founder Nick van Eck cited that same number by 2030.&nbsp;



“As COIN continues to focus on the growth and expansion of its subscription and services offerings, the result should be a product mix with an increasing percentage of recurring revenue that should serve as a buffer against crypto market volatility,” Palmer wrote in a Wednesday note.&nbsp;



If you forgot, subscription and services revenue is a fancy name for Coinbase’s income streams not derived from transactions. In addition to stablecoin revenue, these include blockchain rewards and custodial fee revenue.



Subscription and services revenue <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/coinbase-q4-earnings">jumped to</a> $641 million in Q4 2024, a 15% increase from the prior quarter. That total represented 29% of Coinbase’s total revenue over that three-month period.&nbsp;



While Palmer pegs the compound annual growth rate of the company’s revenues at ~21% through 2026, he anticipates the CAGR for revenues from its non-trading offerings to be ~36% during that span.



Coinbase is set to report its Q1 results after the market closes on May 8. We’ll be tuning in.



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<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: The intersection of crypto, macro and policy.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">0xResearch</a>: Alpha directly in your inbox.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: All things Solana.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: Apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Bitcoin, bitcoin, bitcoin.</li>
</ul>

Coinbase

Revenue diversity fuels analyst’s latest COIN ‘buy’ rating

This is a segment from the Forward Guidance newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">subscribe</a>.



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Bitcoin’s rise to a level not seen in more than a month has many wondering when its price will get back to six digits — and what exactly it will take.&nbsp;



Maybe not as much as you’d think.&nbsp;



Bitcoin was trading around $93,700 at 1:30 pm ET — up 12% from a week ago.&nbsp;



The crypto market benefits from a foundation of “long-term structural growth drivers,” YouHodler markets chief Ruslan Lienkha reminded me — namely deeper integration with TradFi, improving regulatory clarity in the US, adoption via bitcoin ETFs, etc.&nbsp;



A quick note on the inflows into the US spot BTC funds yesterday:



<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="550" data-dnt="true">$913 million into US spot bitcoin ETFs yesterday, per <a href="https://twitter.com/FarsideUK?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@FarsideUK</a>. That&#39;s the 7th-highest single-day net flow total for those funds since launching 15 months ago. And a stark turnaround &#8230; <a href="https://t.co/LkE4cVGhs4">pic.twitter.com/LkE4cVGhs4</a>&mdash; Ben Strack 🟪 (@strack_ben) <a href="https://twitter.com/strack_ben/status/1915038239032815948?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 23, 2025</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
</div></figure>



Headwinds in recent months preventing a new all-time high above ~$109,000 include mixed expectations around US tariff policy, future Fed actions and the potential for a recession. That has, as you know, more broadly sent the stock market tumbling in recent weeks.



That said, Lienkha’s view is: “Bitcoin does not require a strong equity rally to move higher. Simply a stable and less volatile macro backdrop would likely be sufficient to support renewed upside momentum.”



While BTC crashed alongside equities earlier this month, it has more recently strayed from acting as a high-beta version of US tech stocks. BitMEX co-founder Arthur Hayes alludes to this in a Tuesday blog <a href="https://cryptohayes.medium.com/ski-cut-c24c971600c0">post</a> — and in his convo with Forward Guidance’s own Felix Jauvin.&nbsp;



<iframe loading="lazy" width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/bL8d97Wrt0E?si=pyRdsTflXMLRLUuF" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>







“Now that the global community believes Trump is a madman crudely and savagely wielding the tariff weapon, any investor with US stocks and bonds is looking for something whose value is anti-establishment,” Hayes wrote in the blog post. “Physically, that’s gold. Digitally, that’s bitcoin.”



Major economies printing money to cushion the effects of declining globalization would serve as a tailwind for BTC, he added to Jauvin.



We’ve written before about how various market participants perceive bitcoin <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/investors-bitcoin-narrative-confusion">as a risk-on asset</a>. That’s despite the asset sharing global, scarce properties similar to gold — a metal that has hit new price highs amid the latest market turbulence.



Hayes believes BTC bottomed at $74,500, adding optimistically: “Bitcoin will shed its association with said tech stocks and will rejoin gold in the ‘Up Only’ cuddle puddle.”&nbsp;



I’ll say it for him — that’s not investment advice.&nbsp;



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<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">Blockworks Daily</a>: Unpacking crypto and the markets.</li>



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<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">Forward Guidance</a>: The intersection of crypto, macro and policy.</li>



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<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">Lightspeed</a>: All things Solana.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">The Drop</a>: Apps, games, memes and more.</li>



<li><a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">Supply Shock</a>: Bitcoin, bitcoin, bitcoin.</li>
</ul>

Is BTC in ‘up only’ mode after rising above $94K?

Casey Wagner

It’s been weeks of mixed messages from the White House. Even as the administration flip-flops on tariff policies, one thing has remained consistent: Investors are acting on the slightest hint of good news.&nbsp;



Yesterday afternoon I wrote that markets were trading on a dream. I was talking about the rally we saw after US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent reportedly said in a private meeting that the trade war with China is “<a href="https://blockworks.co/news/global-trade-us-china-deal">unsustainable</a>.”



That was nothing compared to the after-hours surge we saw later on Tuesday.&nbsp;



The main catalyst was a comment from President Trump. He told reporters yesterday afternoon that he has “no intention” of firing Fed Chair Jerome Powell. Trump added that he “never” planned on removing Powell despite previously posting that the Chair’s “termination cannot come fast enough.”&nbsp;



Markets got a second boost when Elon Musk said on Tesla’s Q1 earnings call that he’d be stepping back from his DOGE duties next month. The comment was enough to distract investors from Tesla’s first quarter miss and 71% decline in net income. Shares were up almost 7% midday Wednesday.&nbsp;



Stocks and the dollar rose, while Treasury yields retreated. It’s further proof that the market doesn’t need to see any tangible policy changes to rally.&nbsp;



US indexes were still in the green Wednesday, but the rally was fading. The S&amp;P 500 was trading 2% higher at 2:15 pm ET, while the Nasdaq Composite had gained 3%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up around 600 points, although earlier in the session it had added as many as 1,100 points.&nbsp;



The intraday pullback followed more remarks from Bessent, this time in a public appearance. The Treasury Secretary spoke at an IIF event Wednesday morning, saying that China “is in need of rebalancing.” He did not, however, reassure investors that the White House will be walking back its levies on the country — a comment investors would have appreciated.&nbsp;



“China’s current economic model is built on exporting its way out of its economic troubles,” Bessent said. “It’s an unsustainable model that is not only harming China but the entire world.”&nbsp;&nbsp;



Trump yesterday told reporters that tariffs on Chinese imports will “come down,” but “won’t be zero.” As of Wednesday afternoon, the White House had not commented further on the situation or the status of any negotiations.&nbsp;



The Wall Street Journal, however, just <a href="https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/white-house-considers-slashing-china-tariffs-to-de-escalate-trade-war-6f875d69">reported</a> that China tariffs could land around 50% to 65%, citing unnamed senior officials. This would be less than half of the current level.&nbsp;



Confirmation on this would no doubt send stocks higher. In the meantime, at least Trump has taken firing Powell off the table.&nbsp;



We’ll share more updates tomorrow, when the tariff situation undoubtedly will be completely different.&nbsp;



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Donald Trump

US stocks retreat from session highs as China trade deal remains uncertain

Kate Irwin

This is a segment from The Drop newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">subscribe</a>.



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A day after I <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/immutable-teases-potential-ubisoft-collab">reported</a> that Immutable’s about to drop some news about its game with Ubisoft, a <a href="https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/ubisoft-and-immutable-unveil-new-chapter-of-multi-million-player-franchise-might--magic-fates-302435428.html">press release</a> has been published announcing the upcoming game. 



The game will be an installment in the fantasy Might and Magic franchise called Might &amp; Magic: Fates. It’ll be a trading card game (TCG), which also confirms what I reported yesterday.



Might and Magic is a series of retro roleplay games (RPGs) from New World Computing and 3DO that first released all the way back in 1986. Ubisoft <a href="https://www.gamesindustry.biz/namco-ubisoft-and-ms-carve-up-3do-assets">bought</a> the rights to Might and Magic for $1.3 million in 2003 when 3DO filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Over a dozen Might and Magic games have been released since the 80s, including official spinoff titles.



TCGs have been the most obvious genre for crypto game developers to build in because each card can be an NFT. Players can buy and collect digital cards as well as frames or special card backs for their decks.&nbsp;



Trading card games require fewer players to match up individuals in 1v1 matches (as opposed to massive battle royale games or team games, which can have much longer queue times). TCGs also don’t require players to be geographically close to each other for optimal gameplay, like fast-paced RPGs or shooters do.



TCGs can also make money — and can be made for less money than extensive 3D worlds like <a href="https://www.thegamer.com/difference-between-mmos-mmorpgs-online-multiplayer/">MMORPGs</a> or shooter games. Ad firm Udonis <a href="https://www.blog.udonis.co/mobile-marketing/mobile-games/hearthstone-player-count#h2-2">estimates</a> that Blizzard’s Hearthstone — arguably the most well-known TCG — has made over $900 million in total game revenue and makes millions of dollars per month (Key Banc Capital Markets <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-07-07/hasbro-s-free-magic-the-gathering-arena-official-launch-is-2019">said</a> that number was $600 million annually in 2019).&nbsp;



Immutable reportedly made <a href="https://crypto.news/blockchain-game-developer-immutable-says-2024-outlook-improved-after-reporting-50m-loss/#:~:text=Following%20a%20%2450%20million%20loss,with%20revenue%20exceeding%20%24110%20million.">$110 million</a> in 2024.



But the TCG market is also competitive, even in crypto, with Axie Infinity, Gods Unchained, Splinterlands, Parallel, and other titles already playable.



Immutable’s VP of Business Development Andrew Sorokovsky said in a <a href="https://x.com/soro/status/1915030852926583295">post</a> the Might and Magic TCG will use Immutable’s zkEVM chain, which also confirmed my reporting from Tuesday.&nbsp;



The press release states that there will be “hundreds” of cards featuring different creatures and characters.&nbsp;



Immutable cofounder Robbie Ferguson <a href="https://x.com/0xferg/status/1915030006889353415">posted</a> a minute-long teaser cinematic promoting the upcoming game, which features an armored skeleton brought to life with green magic.&nbsp;



More gameplay footage as well as preregistrations are expected “in the coming months.”  Ubisoft is also publishing a noncrypto prequel installment in the Might and Magic series, called Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era, that is <a href="https://store.steampowered.com/app/3105440/Heroes_of_Might_and_Magic_Olden_Era/#:~:text=Might%20&amp;%20Magic%C2%AE-,Release%20Date:%20Q2%202025,English%20and%2010%20more">expected</a> to launch sometime this year.



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Gaming

Might and Magic makes crypto comeback as TCG from Ubisoft, Immutable

Macauley Peterson

This is a segment from the 0xResearch newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/0xresearch">subscribe</a>.



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Restaking is evolving. What started as an Ethereum-native capital efficiency play is now transforming into a cross-chain economic coordination layer that spans protocols, assets and use cases.



<a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/symbiotic">Symbiotic</a> announced today a $29 million Series A, led by <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/Pantera">Pantera Capital</a>, to launch its Universal Staking Framework. The move goes toward supporting any asset securing any network — L1 or L2, modular or integrated. Symbiotic is active on <a href="https://www.binance.com/en-JP/square/post/2024-08-16-symbiotic-announces-integration-of-14-networks-into-shared-security-framework-12233736521281">14 networks</a>, a number expected to more than double in the coming months, providing programmable slashing, cross-chain collateral composition and new financial primitives like staking-backed insurance and “structured risk products.”



“This isn’t a pivot, it&#8217;s an expansion — a natural progression of the vision we started with,” Symbiotic co-founder Misha Putiatin told Blockworks. “From the outset, we focused on building a flexible coordination layer that supports a wide range of use cases.”



While <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/eigenlayer">EigenLayer</a> remains Ethereum-centric, with restaking built primarily via ETH-native validators and <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/liquid-staking">liquid staking</a> tokens (LSTs), Symbiotic expands the model across networks and collateral types — enabling non-EVM assets and modular AVSs to coordinate security under a unified staking framework.



Of course, EigenLayer isn’t standing still. Just last week, Eigen Labs <a href="https://x.com/eigenlayer/status/1912885738116620670">activated</a> slashing on mainnet — the final piece of its original roadmap. In terms of scale, it’s way out in front. It even <a href="https://x.com/molinaxis/status/1914740005978677677">launched</a> its own marketing agency. More than 190 AVSs (actively validated services) are now building on EigenLayer, including heavyweights like <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/LayerZero">LayerZero</a> and <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/infura">Infura</a>. With slashing now live, these services can enforce performance guarantees backed by economic penalties.



EigenLayer founder Sreeram Kannan called it “the next phase in our mission to transform Ethereum’s trust into a programmable primitive.”



As EigenLayer cements its role as Ethereum’s trust marketplace, other players are extending the restaking model in novel directions. Puffer Finance, for example, <a href="https://x.com/puffer_finance/status/1914405809188184399">came out</a> earlier this week with staking and restaking vaults for institutions. Designed for asset managers, DAOs and custodians, Puffer’s platform combines ETH staking with EigenLayer AVS restaking together within a compliance-ready framework. Features include validator permissioning, withdrawal policies and modular configuration of restaking exposure.



Meanwhile, <a href="https://x.com/moremarketsxyz/status/1899384972404023394">MoreMarkets</a> — formerly Nuffle Labs — is using restaking infrastructure to unlock utility for previously siloed assets like <a href="https://blockworks.co/price/xrp">XRP</a>, <a href="https://blockworks.co/price/ada">ADA</a> and <a href="https://blockworks.co/price/doge">DOGE</a>. By integrating with <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/wormhole">Wormhole</a> and AVS-layer attestations, MoreMarkets lets users stake or provide liquidity directly from their origin chain.



“Users shouldn’t be facing a bridging UI,” MoreMarkets CEO Altan Tutar told Blockworks. “They should just click once — from wherever they are — and start earning.”



Together, these developments mark a shift in how staking is conceived and deployed. It&#8217;s no longer just a consensus mechanism, but a programmable economic substrate. EigenLayer proved that trust could be abstracted. Symbiotic is showing that it can be recomposed. And protocols like Puffer and MoreMarkets are building the interfaces to bring it to institutions and long-tail assets.



Restaking isn’t just maturing, it’s mutating.



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0xResearch Newsletter

Restaking goes ‘universal’

David Canellis

Pete Rizzo

This is a segment from the Supply Shock newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/supplyshock">subscribe</a>. 



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The final known Satoshi email was sent to Mike Hearn, one of the earliest Bitcoin contributors and former Google engineer, in April 2011. 



By that point, Bitcoin had been running for 840 days, or less than two and a half years. Satoshi previously said they had been working on Bitcoin’s design since 2007 — so at most they were active in Bitcoin development for about four years.



Hearn, who has since stepped back from Bitcoin, had kept up <a href="https://plan99.net/~mike/satoshi-emails/thread5.html">emails</a> with Satoshi even after their <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/satoshi-nakamoto-last-online">final post</a> on BitcoinTalk in December 2010.



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" src="https://lh7-rt.googleusercontent.com/docsz/AD_4nXcZZVZwIwBSiK-A_RKyiyuhF1-ajEFlU7j9LEGzTBhYRwpb_jY63f8u3k1DCRz0g0yutHA4qo-fRdigBu4_4sFk-iYvJJONow9pgzgy6OeVg9rbPJvSFH4HEDpaL6fLi3RzxPZtgw?key=JL_yRvqxyiwt9MZUlz_5eEaa" alt=""/><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Hearn hosts a set of Satoshi emails on his personal <a href="https://plan99.net/~mike/">website</a></figcaption></figure>



“Satoshi did not leave the community because of Gavin&#8217;s CIA visit. He had already stopped posting publicly by the end of 2010 but was willing to continue emailing back and forth with me for months after,” Hearn <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/6t2ci2/never_before_seen_mike_hearn_satoshi_nakamoto/">wrote</a> on Reddit in 2017. “I realised this situation probably wouldn&#8217;t last which is why I kept peppering him with technical questions.”



Bitcoin’s creator had recently encouraged other community members to take over, a move that led to Gavin Andresen stepping up as lead maintainer. Alongside Hearn, Andresen would go on to <a href="https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Bitcoin_XT#:~:text=After%20Andresen's%20resignation%20from%20the,be%20implemented%20in%20Bitcoin%20Core.">organize</a> the forking of Bitcoin Core for BitcoinXT, which featured an increased block size limit that would also get larger every two years.&nbsp;



It was Bitcoin’s first great civil war, as <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/aug/17/bitcoin-xt-alternative-cryptocurrency-chief-scientist">portrayed</a> by mainstream media. Hearn had <a href="https://blog.plan99.net/the-resolution-of-the-bitcoin-experiment-dabb30201f7">sold</a> all his bitcoin by January 2016, when coins were worth under $500, and eventually moved on to build enterprise distributed ledger Corda as R3’s lead platform engineer, a position he <a href="https://www.ledgerinsights.com/lead-engineer-mike-hearn-departs-enterprise-blockchain-firm-r3/">left</a> in 2021.



“Can cryptocurrency work? Sure, I do believe that. It does need extensive competition between different coins, which we now have,” Hearn <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/kc2k3h/comment/gforyhb/">wrote</a> in late 2020. “Unfortunately when it comes to currencies, competition works against gaining critical mass and none of them have managed to get the same levels of awareness Bitcoin did.”



“I did stoically plug away at it for many years, but fundamentally my answers to how you can build a global consensus network in which people peacefully co-exist looks like the Bitcoin Foundation or the Corda Network, and that was far too suit-wearing to ever be accepted by the cryptocurrency community.”



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" src="https://lh7-rt.googleusercontent.com/docsz/AD_4nXckpVhTXFhCobS35P4eANlFbWMH06ySXCOOfH1aa9r-WqOmUfDqdND_Ue5oeVea98BAXm49sTvUZUpxie6mq7wQ02wRxeBKN-8oQnwAeO_iQk6sFjzxYl7Ni83FszzRSUzX-XGwNg?key=JL_yRvqxyiwt9MZUlz_5eEaa" alt=""/><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Satoshi had foreshadowed his leaving five months earlier on BitcoinTalk</figcaption></figure>



Certainly, we’ve all mused enough over the reasons for Satoshi’s departure. WikiLeaks “kicking the hornet’s nest” could be <a href="https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2216.msg29280#msg29280">one</a>. Andresen’s <a href="https://thenextweb.com/news/satoshi-nakamoto-left-bitcoin-because-of-the-cia-theory-cryptocurrency">visit to the CIA</a> could be too — Satoshi sent his last email to Hearn shortly after Andresen disclosed that he’d accepted the agency’s invite.&nbsp;



And perhaps, Satoshi really did have other balls in the air. He’d used similar language 11 months earlier, when he told Martti Malmi via <a href="https://mmalmi.github.io/satoshi/">email</a> that he’d “been busy with other things for the last month and a half” to explain his absence.&nbsp;



Maybe, Satoshi knew there was going to be tension between the cypherpunks, with their energetic anarchism, and the suits, with their rules and business hierarchies, and simply thought it easier to go return some video tapes instead. Who could blame them?



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Rizzo, The Bitcoin Historian&#8217;s view</h2>



There history goes again, always rhyming. As David notes, the tensions in the community that Satoshi left may be alive and well, but then again, so is the inherent demand for Bitcoin, with the “<a href="https://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/quotes/bitcoin-economics/">positive feedback loop</a>” he imagined working at a geo-political scale. Yesterday, shockwaves were sent across the industry when it was revealed SoftBank, Cantor Fitzgerald and Tether are <a href="https://bitcoinmagazine.com/bitcoin-for-corporations/softbank-tether-cantor-fitzgerald-prepare-3b-public-bitcoin-treasury-vehicle">reportedly</a> preparing to funnel bitcoin worth $3 billion into a new firm running the Strategy playbook, amassing capital to stockpile BTC.



The numbers alone are staggering. Could we have another Strategy? Another multi-billion company racing, alongside the ETFs, to capture 500,000 or more Bitcoin?  Certainly, the <a href="https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20250423962305/en/Tether-SoftBank-Group-and-Jack-Mallers-Launch-Twenty-One-a-Bitcoin-native-Company-Through-a-Business-Combination-With-Cantor-Equity-Partners">players</a> involved are enough to make the suggestion plausible. The only question that remains is how much bitcoin can they buy? Regardless, it’s another example of how Satoshi’s <a href="https://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/quotes/bitcoin-economics/">own stash</a> — and his foresight — only seem more impressive with time.



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Bitcoin

What Bitcoin’s Satoshi and Patrick Bateman have in common

Katherine Ross

This is a segment from the Empire newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">subscribe</a>.



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Since last week, Base’s Jesse Pollak has been very busy posting about content coins and prompting folks in his replies to coin everything, though that’s come with some mixed results.&nbsp;



<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="550" data-dnt="true">&gt; post pic of random girl from dating app &gt; someone launches a shitter &gt; get mad bc guy screenshotted first and is *checks notes* &quot;a creator&quot; and this is &quot;stealing&quot; &gt; guy tokenizes girl, but with picture &gt; directly links &gt; 5k mcap what in the fuck are we doing here man <a href="https://t.co/vwiXKGqUbm">pic.twitter.com/vwiXKGqUbm</a>&mdash; mert | helius.dev (@0xMert_) <a href="https://twitter.com/0xMert_/status/1914728220697493584?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 22, 2025</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
</div></figure>



Before we get into Pollak’s bullish thought process, I asked him about the now-deleted post promoting an image of a girl from Hinge being coined. The image was a screenshot taken from the dating site, and it’s unclear if the girl consented to the image being not only used on social media but also being put onchain. Even if consent was given, however, it’s against Hinge’s <a href="https://hinge.co/terms">terms of service.</a>&nbsp;



“I want to clearly apologize for this post. I shouldn’t have posted it or amplified it. I heard the feedback loud and clear, which is why I quickly apologized and deleted the post,” he explained.&nbsp;



For Pollak, this process has required a learning curve in real time. He told me the goal was to experiment in public and lead by example, hence Base’s launch of “<a href="https://zora.co/coin/base:0xd769d56f479e9e72a77bb1523e866a33098feec5">Base is for everyone</a>” last week. He added that he was prepared for some backlash, but he&#8217;s hyper-focused on bringing a billion folks onchain, which will require some trial and error.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;



“That said, in retrospect, one thing I would have done differently is added more context to the Base handle initial post. I had been talking about this for a few weeks on my personal handle, and we included a disclaimer on the Zora post itself, but it wasn’t enough. We could have done more here,” he said.



While oversaturation is a concern I’ve heard from folks around the industry, Pollak dismissed it.&nbsp;



“The truth is that you want basically infinite content, because that lets you sort and filter through to find the world-class stuff,” he said. “One of the reasons I am continually coining content is to lead by example here. If this is a normal, everyday thing, then the expectations around each individual piece of content are also normalized.”



As for the great debate of content coins vs. memecoins, Pollak says that the expectations for memecoins are centered around the overall value and curating a community. On the other hand, “people should have no expectations around the value or utility of any single content coin,” in Pollak’s opinion.&nbsp;



“A content coin is a singular piece of content, and the market is free to decide on the value of that content,” he added, citing a bowl of granola he <a href="https://zora.co/coin/base:0x395d485b80bc367830bf7458ee0bf12b23ec387b?referrer=0x849151d7d0bf1f34b70d5cad5149d28cc2308bf1">coined</a> that has a current value of $3,500.&nbsp;



“I’m not doing anything to create a community around this piece of content. I’m not promoting it over the long term, I’m not making a Telegram group, and I’m not turning my photo of granola into a project with ongoing support. I’m just coining a photo of my granola, and then moving on to something else.”



Pollak dismissed the criticism around Base leaning into Zora, noting that Base has been “continually posting on Zora for two years.”&nbsp; “No one from the Zora team knew about the ‘Base is for everyone’ post in advance, and this was not a coordinated marketing effort,” he explained.



There were some other tidbits from Pollak that I wanted to cover.



Specifically, I wanted to hone in on the potential for content coins to generate more value for Base, and the idea that maybe this is Base’s solution to pump.fun, the infamous Solana memecoin platform.&nbsp;



“I have a lot of respect for the Solana team – they’ve done a lot to onboard people into crypto, and I’m glad to see that. We’re looking to grow the pie, not just compete for the existing pie,” Pollak said. “You don’t need to understand anything about crypto or the underlying infrastructure to post on Zora. Creators can just post their content, start earning, and experience the benefits of onchain social firsthand.”



One thing that I’ve struggled with is the audience for content coins. Pollak, being as bullish as he is, thinks this is a broad way to onboard folks.&nbsp;



He breaks the consumers into two buckets: The first are collectors engaging with content coins for fun and looking to earn a participation trophy for being onchain. Then there are the traders who aim to utilize this newer segment to turn a profit. We’ve clearly seen the rise of the latter thanks to memecoins, but it feels as though the former has been adrift for a while, at least since the popularity of NFTs dropped off.&nbsp;



“We think content coins can help all three segments: creators, collectors, and traders by bringing more content and value onchain,” he explained.&nbsp;



As with all of crypto, the big test will be how long the hype lasts. Memecoins, despite their success, couldn’t even withstand the changing tides. While there’s a decent possibility of success, I’m always wary of the fickle approach crypto takes to narratives.



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Base

What Jesse Pollak would’ve done differently in launching ‘Base is for everyone’

Michael McSweeney

This is The Riff segment from a recent edition of the Empire newsletter, where newsletter writer Katherine Ross and other contributors opine on recent happenings in crypto. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">subscribe</a>.



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<h2 class="wp-block-heading">On our minds: Content coins</h2>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">Katherine Ross: </h3>



I’m of two minds here. 



First (and this was my gut reaction), I wonder if we really need another segment that lacks inherent utility. And, like I wrote above, is this something that lasts? You all know my background prior to crypto. So you know I’m a big fan of things like fundamentals that can help better gauge value.&nbsp;



But the other part of me says I’m holding content coins to an unfair expectation. There are real tokens and projects that are pushing crypto forward — content coins shouldn’t be mixed in with them.



Pollak’s comments made me wonder if content coins could act as crypto’s social media moment (at first I typed TikTok moment, but I don’t think we’re there yet). If we pull back the expectations and let the content speak for itself, I can see a scenario where content coins have a memecoin moment without the volatility. 



And, honestly, things like content coins do push crypto forward. Personally, I’ve found the discourse around the viability and usability to be really enlightening — not to mention, it feels like it’s been a while since I’ve seen such a variety of takes.&nbsp;



That’s not to say I support some of the controversial things that have happened, such as promoting or coining the aforementioned Hinge screenshot, but that’s a whole other discussion I’m happy to have at some point.&nbsp;



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">Michael McSweeney: </h3>



Like Katherine, I’m of two minds as well.



On the one hand, I’m all for carving out new, weird use cases for tokens. Whether “content coins” will prove to have lasting power or be another flash-in-the-pan CT topic remains to be seen. The folks over at Base obviously have an incentive to see the former outcome realized, so heavy tweeting to that effect (see Katherine’s piece above) is all but guaranteed.



That said, I’m a touch dubious about the notion that content coins will somehow avoid what I like to call speculative destruction, the sort of which tends to send most coins, tokens, etc. to the dustbin soon after they pop.&nbsp;



I think people will develop speculative expectations around a prospective successful content coin because that’s simply what happens in crypto. It’s inherently a speculative game. Always has been. I don’t think some kind of special immunity to those market forces will be conferred because someone came up with a new mode of thinking (though I’m happy to be wrong, as always).



I think if someone creates a content coin and people find a reason to speculate on it, the typical crypto market forces will almost certainly follow —&nbsp;especially if someone with some cash to burn sees a way to make money off whichever narrative surrounds that coin.



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Can content coins avoid ‘speculative destruction?’

This is a segment from the Blockworks Daily newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/daily">subscribe</a>.



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“I respect his independence,” former President Nixon reassured the White House crowd at the 1970 <a href="https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/remarks-the-swearing-dr-arthur-f-burns-chairman-the-board-governors-the-federal-reserve">swearing-in</a> of Fed Chair Arthur Burns.



“However, I hope that independently he will conclude that my views are the ones that should be followed.”



There’s no video of the event, so it’s hard to say for sure, but I’m guessing that was meant as a joke.



It’s also exactly how things worked out.



Burns famously allowed Fed policy to become subservient to Nixon’s political goals, fueling the 1970s epidemic of inflation.



The much-maligned Fed chair <a href="https://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/failed-fed">reportedly</a> acknowledged this as a tactical surrender: &#8220;We dare not exercise our independence for fear of losing it.&#8221;



Subsequent Fed chairs have fought their corner more resolutely, stressing that the Federal Reserve is an independent agency within government.



“Our independence is a matter of law,” Jerome Powell <a href="https://youtu.be/XUFVr430VLU?si=8g0IAiEL-1KBEuZn">said</a> just last week.



But that plain statement may mean less than it sounds.



Specifically, Powell meant that individual members of the FOMC are insulated from politics because they can’t be fired: “We’re not removable except for cause,” he noted. “We serve very long terms.”&nbsp;



(“Seemingly endless terms,” he added, drawing a laugh from the sympathetic crowd.)



This, he says, allows the FOMC to do its job “strictly without consideration of political or any other extraneous factors.”



“We’re never going to be influenced by any political pressure,” he promised.



If so, that would be a new development.



For the first two decades of its existence, political influence on the Fed was explicit: By law, the treasury secretary automatically served as the chair of the Federal Reserve as well.



That changed in 1935 as the Fed gained a measure of independence with the chair becoming a presidential appointee, no longer tied to the Treasury Department.



In 1951, the Fed won a further degree of independence when the Treasury Department formally agreed that the Fed could set interest rates without its input.



Still, this hard-won independence remained contingent on political approval.



The Fed was established by an Act of Congress and Congress retains the ability to revise the Act if it disapproves of how its creation is operating.



This is why, at his final press conference as Fed chair, Ben Bernanke offered a simple piece of <a href="https://www.richmondfed.org/publications/research/econ_focus/2016/q2/federal_reserve">advice</a> to his successor, Janet Yellen: “Congress is our boss.”



It’s been a reluctant boss, for the most part — after delegating its Constitutional power over money to the Fed, Congress has generally only held the Fed accountable after financial disasters.



Often, the Congressional response to those disasters is to grant the Fed more power, not less.



This is by design.



In <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Myth-Independence-Congress-Governs-Federal/dp/0691163197/ref=sr_1_1?crid=9YHOJHSKC7T0&amp;dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.bsZyT3haiztxYj-2kE6IVQ.JVQBzmH_0aksmHRtvUROqFvO2YSV6vL3czdA0R9vIZM&amp;dib_tag=se&amp;keywords=the+myth+of+independence+how+congress+governs+the+federal+reserve&amp;qid=1745285598&amp;sprefix=the+myth+of+independ%2Caps%2C160&amp;sr=8-1">The Myth of Independence</a>, Sarah Binder and Mark Spindel explain that, whatever Fed chairs like to say, the Federal Reserve is actually “interdependent” with Congress — and that Congress retains the ultimate authority through the Federal Reserve Act and its power to revise it.



The Fed, they explain, is dependent on Congress for its authority and Congress is dependent on the Fed for its stewardship of the economy.



This arrangement works for Congress largely because it gives them someone to blame when things go wrong — Binder and Spindel note that former Fed Chair William Martin once testified in Congress that “we’re here to be blamed.”



The result, they say, is that the Fed is &#8220;acutely sensitive to the need to secure political support for its policy choices.”



Similarly, the monetary economist James Dorn <a href="https://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/2019-09/cj-v39n3-5.pdf">found</a> that “the Fed is independent, but in practice that independence is continuously tested by political pressures for using accommodative monetary policy and credit allocation to win votes.”



It&#8217;s mostly been presidents who’ve exerted that political pressure.



Truman called William Martin a “traitor”; LBJ summoned the long-serving Martin to his Texas ranch to verbally assault him over interest rates; Burns was famously subservient to Nixon; Carter reassigned former Fed Chair William Miller to the Treasury Department because interest rates were too low; Paul Volcker was able to raise rates to 20% only because he had Reagan’s backing.



Dorn’s study found all this presidential pressure to be effective: “An examination of the evidence reveals that presidents tend to get the monetary policy they desire,” he concluded.



As a matter of principle, that may not be the worst thing — we wouldn’t let unelected bureaucrats set tax rates without political recourse, so why should we let Fed bureaucrats set interest rates?



As a matter of practice, however, it hasn’t worked out well.



In a <a href="https://econweb.umd.edu/~drechsel/papers/drechsel_political_pressure_shocks.pdf">study</a> of presidential influence on the Fed, the economist Thomas Drechsel unsurprisingly found that political pressure increases inflation “strongly and persistently.”



Specifically, he concluded that “increasing political pressure by half as much as Nixon, for six months, raises the price level more than 8% after a decade.”



Drechsel also found that presidential pressure to lower interest rates negatively affects GDP.



The effect is mild, but he cites it as evidence that “political pressure is not successful” for presidents hoping to win votes by raising economic activity.&nbsp;



That hasn’t stopped them from trying, of course, as we were reminded this week.



Does publicly calling Chair Powell a “major loser” amount to half as much political pressure as Nixon applied on former Chair Burns?&nbsp;



If so, history suggests we have an 8% increase to the price level to look forward to.



Or does President Trump’s schoolyard name calling amount to, say, twice as much pressure?&nbsp;



Drechsel doesn’t do the math on that because, before this week, who could have imagined a president exerting twice as much pressure on a Fed chair than Nixon did with Burns?



But investors appear to be doing the math for themselves: Bitcoin ETFs took in <a href="https://farside.co.uk/btc/">$381 million</a> yesterday — a notable reversal of the recent trend.



That’s helped push the price of bitcoin to near an <a href="https://x.com/MikeZaccardi/status/1914676954868973719">all-time high</a> relative to the S&amp;P 500 — a surprisingly sensible reaction to renewed presidential pressure on a Fed chair.



When former President Nixon swore in Chair Burns in 1970, gold traded at $35 an ounce.



When President Carter swore in Chair Volcker in 1979, it was about $300 and on its way to a high of $850 a year later.



Markets seem to sense the Fed has another tough decade ahead of it — one spent fighting for its independence.



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Fed independence may be the next major loser

Jack Kubinec

This is a segment from the Lightspeed newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/lightspeed">subscribe</a>.



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There’s a refrain in crypto these days that while many in the industry expected crypto to become more like traditional finance over time, TradFi has actually just become more like crypto.



Zeitgeisty stocks can trade more like memecoins than based on any sort of price-to-earnings ratio. Robinhood offers sports betting. The president of the United States cryptically encouraged investors to buy on social media before a tariff slowdown sent public markets rocketing.



And here’s a new piece of crypto culture to add to the traditional financial world: community takeovers. The CTO happens when a crypto project’s leadership steps away or is no longer cutting it, and its public backers step in to revive its fortunes. Sam Bankman-Fried was once <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/tatianakoffman/2020/09/06/exclusive-sbf-speaks-out-on-defis-sushi-saga/">granted</a> control of the SushiSwap multisig, for instance, and a more recent example came when the X profile “BuzzlamicJihad” added hundreds of millions to Aptos’ market cap by repeatedly posting: “Aptos looking good here.”



The TradFi version of a CTO comes from investors buying up niche publicly-listed stocks and announcing a crypto treasury strategy — leading the price to pump. Janover Inc. (now DeFi Development Corporation) <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/janover-to-receive-kraken-staked-sol">did so recently</a> after buying a real estate company and issuing convertible bonds to raise capital and buy Solana.



Yesterday, crypto-native market maker and investor GSR announced it had led a private placement into Nasdaq-listed Upexi alongside a group of other crypto investors. The funds were meant to back a Solana-based treasury strategy. Like DeFi Dev Corp, Upexi is relatively new to crypto. It went from <a href="https://ir.upexi.com/news-events/press-releases/detail/85/upexis-tytan-tile-kits-disney-frozen-and-new-disney-jr">selling</a> Disney-branded products at BJ’s Wholesale Club to strategically <a href="https://ir.upexi.com/news-events/press-releases/detail/97/upexi-shifts-focus-into-bitcoin-and-crypto-with-strategic">investing</a> in crypto via holding companies over the past year. Both stock prices surged by hundreds of percent following their crypto treasury and investment announcements.&nbsp;



In crypto, it’s easier to CTO a microcap memecoin than a blue-chip token, and the stock market CTO’ers seem to have learned this. Upexi had a market capitalization of $3.65 million at the end of last year, and Janover’s was $6.87 million. Both could likely have been flirting with forced delisting from the Nasdaq due to poor financial performance. Instead, the crypto saviors stepped in and offered US investors a regulated wrapper in which to gain Solana exposure.



Many have expressed doubts about the longevity of Michael Saylor’s bitcoin-buying spree at Strategy, but for the time being, the stock is a success story. And while SOL ETFs await approval, Solana folks want in on the action.



“Michael Saylor and his team pioneered some extremely capital efficient accrual mechanisms — I&#8217;m excited to see GSR through Upexi attempt to bring this mechanism to assets other than bitcoin,” DoubleZero co-founder Austin Federa, who participated in the Upexi placement alongside GSR, said in a direct message.



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Lightspeed Newsletter

Small-cap stocks are adding Solana exposure

This is a segment from the Forward Guidance newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">subscribe</a>.



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President Trump is still going after Fed Chair Powell. In a Monday Truth Social Post, Trump reiterated that he wants to see lower interest rates now, adding that Powell is “a major loser.”&nbsp;



Trump is hardly the first president to voice frustrations with the Fed and its leadership. But he is the only sitting president in modern history who has publicly threatened to fire the chair.&nbsp;



Both Joe Biden and Barack Obama — during their respective terms — said they were disheartened by slow progress on inflation, but each also stressed their respect for the central bank’s independence.&nbsp;



Of course, there’s the question of whether or not the president has the authority to remove a <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/jerome-powell-chair-stance-trump">sitting Fed chair</a>. Given what we’ve already seen from this administration (remember what happened at the FTC?), I’d argue fleshing out the legal argument is perhaps moot.&nbsp;



Trump has shown us that he’ll usually do what he wants. Should the courts uphold his decision to remove FTC commissioners, Powell’s job is even more at risk.&nbsp;



ECB President Christine Lagarde said during a Tuesday morning CNBC appearance that she hopes the Fed maintains its independence. Though she, too, has faced political pressures. When asked about what impact firing Powell could have, she declined to speculate.&nbsp;



&#8220;I&#8217;m not going to comment on market reaction to hypotheticals that I hope are just not on the table,” Lagarde said.&nbsp;



One <a href="https://www.theblock.co/post/351539/standard-chartered-bitcoin-rising-fed-independence-risks?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=social">argument</a> is that growing tensions between the Fed and executive branch could boost the price of bitcoin. I’d have to disagree, though. The Fed’s independence is a key stabilizing factor of the economy, and removing this would surely damage risk assets. For now at least, bitcoin still trades like a risk asset.&nbsp;



I’ll go ahead and apologize now to any bitcoin maximalists I may have offended.



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Trump continues criticizing Powell as global leaders stress importance of independence 

This is a segment from the Forward Guidance newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/forwardguidance">subscribe</a>.



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Because the industry’s been <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/stablecoins-tokenization-blackrock-galaxy-das">talking a lot</a> about the use cases for stablecoins and onchain RWAs, it’s worth highlighting a soon-to-launch settlement network for institutions.



Called Lynq, the network will be powered by the Arca Institutional US Treasury Fund (TFND). That has a portfolio of short-term, yield-bearing US Treasurys and issues its shares via the Avalanche Blockchain.&nbsp;



TFND requires AML/KYC on subscribers, and all client funds are held with US Bank.



Speaking of partners, Lynq is set to use tZERO’s special purpose broker-dealer <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/tzero-spbd-license-custody">license</a> and Tassat’s real-time blockchain infrastructure. (Since launching in 2017, Tassat has settled more than $2.5 trillion for institutions).&nbsp;



B2C2, Galaxy and Wintermute will “ensure critical mass by onboarding their top clients early, expanding adoption and establishing initial liquidity,” Arca Labs president Jerald David told me.



Arca Labs has been consulting with prime brokers, market makers, exchanges and stablecoin issuers for more than a year, David added. The goal is for funds to flow to and from exchanges to fund accounts and trades. And for stablecoin issuers to create and redeem for their users on Lynq.&nbsp;



In Wintermute managing director Katryna Hanush’s words: Lynq “streamlines onboarding, subscription and redemption, offering counterparties a safer and more efficient way to transact through settlement rails that integrate regulatory clarity, real-time operations and yield.”&nbsp;



That last word — yield — is important.



Taking a step back, stablecoins (aka tokenized cash) have grown to be a roughly $230 billion market. Agora co-founder Nick van Eck said at last week’s <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/tokenized-rwa-segments-will-boom-next">TokenizeThis conference</a> that he expects USD-denominated stablecoins to “nuke” most non-G20 country currencies over the next 20 years as more people adopt blockchain-based finance.&nbsp;



Van Eck projects that stablecoins could grow to a $2 trillion market cap in five years.&nbsp;



Meanwhile, tokenized money market funds are a smaller — but growing — segment, with BlackRock’s BUIDL fund recently passing $2 billion in AUM on its own.&nbsp;



Industry watchers expect this category to <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/tokenized-yield-funds-complement-stablecoins">grow in tandem</a> with stablecoins — with the former serving as a cash savings vehicle and the latter being an instrument for payments.



Stablecoin issuer Circle noted the demand to move <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/circle-hashnote-deal-tokenized-money">between cash and yield</a> when it acquired Hashnote in January.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;



Lynq uses Tassat’s “yield in transit” functionality, meaning institutions can receive interest based on intraday fund holdings, David explained. Fund interest is sent to Lynq users in five-second increments and distributed daily.&nbsp;



It remains to be seen whether Lynq can fulfill what it hopes to do. David labeled that goal, in 10 years, as aiming to “facilitate seamless interoperability between traditional and decentralized finance” via tokenized securities settlement, permissioned liquidity pools and who knows what else.



First it has to launch. Then we’ll see what sort of traction it gets and who else seeks to follow suit (and improve upon it).



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Arca

How a yield-bearing settlement network reflects a tokenization trend

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US equities are once again trading on a dream.&nbsp;



The Dow Jones Industrial Average and Nasdaq Composite indexes hit intraday highs Tuesday after Bloomberg — citing unnamed sources&nbsp;— <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-04-22/bessent-sees-de-escalation-with-china-situation-unsustainable">reported</a> that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the US/China trade war is unsustainable. While he expects de-escalation in the future, he said negotiations have not yet started.&nbsp;



Bessent apparently made the comment at an investor event in Washington closed to the public and media.&nbsp;



The Dow had gained more than 1,000 points midway through Tuesday’s session while the Nasdaq Composite rose as much as 3.3%.&nbsp;



The moves once again show just how desperate investors are for signs that the White House is inking deals with trade partners. As of 2 pm ET, the Trump administration had not commented on Bessent’s reported remarks.  In a report published Tuesday, the International Monetary Fund lowered its global growth forecast to 2.8% (from 3%) in 2025 and 2026. Analysts cited “epistemic uncertainty and policy unpredictability,” adding that the US effective tariff rate is now higher than it was during the Great Depression.



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China

US stocks erase Monday losses after Bessent calls China trade situation ‘unsustainable’

This is a segment from The Drop newsletter. To read full editions, <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/thedrop">subscribe</a>.



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Immutable co-founder Robbie Ferguson <a href="https://x.com/0xferg/status/1914650894840500628">wrote</a> on Tuesday morning: “Tomorrow we announce the outcome of a multibillion dollar partnership that&#8217;s been in the works for 2+ years.”&nbsp;



While we didn’t hear anything from Immutable by publication time, it could be about their game with Ubisoft.



Immutable’s partnership with Ubisoft’s Strategic Innovation Lab was first <a href="https://www.immutable.com/blog/immutable-and-ubisofts-strategic-innovation-lab-pioneering-a-frictionless-web3-gaming-experience">announced</a> in November 2023.



During an on-record interview at the Game Developers Conference in March, Immutable Chief Studio Officer Justin Hulog told Blockworks that he has been “working on co-developing a game with Ubisoft that we’re going to announce next month” for the past two and a half years. He added that “it’s one where we’ve really worked with their dev team to take the best of their learnings around TCGs.”



“Gods Unchained has been running for four years, so that’s been really helping to combine those two learnings together,” Hulog said.



While more specific details about the new game have not yet been made public, it’ll likely have blockchain elements and may use Immutable’s zkEVM, which Immutable is <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/crypto-gaming-walled-garden-ethos">leading game developers toward</a> these days over its Immutable X chain.



Ubisoft is the studio behind the Assassin’s Creed, Far Cry and Tom Clancy game franchises, to name a few. The studio previously launched Champions Tactics: Grimoria Chronicles using the Oasys blockchain back in October 2024.&nbsp;



“I believe, really, that we should stay chain-agnostic,” Ubisoft’s Innovation Lab VP Nicolas Pouard said during a panel moderated by Blockworks during the Game Developers Conference. Pouard did not immediately respond to Blockworks’ request for comment.



Before Champions Tactics, Ubisoft unveiled its Ubisoft Quartz NFT platform and <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/ubisoft-nft-efforts-are-off-to-a-rocky-start">released NFTs on Tezos</a> for its Tom Clancy game Ghost Recon: Breakpoint back in 2021.&nbsp;&nbsp;



The IMX token pumped after Ferguson’s tweet, spiking 28% from $0.46 right before the post to $0.59 within two hours, per CoinGecko data. IMX is up about 34% in the past week.



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