The Crypto Hiring Boom Key for Mass Adoption

Crypto offers a “level of excitement that the banks can’t,” BlockTower Capital’s Michael Bucella says

article-image

Blockworks exclusive art by axel rangel

share

A recent trend in crypto hiring has confirmed an exodus of top talent from TradFi into the digital assets space that will surely spur mass adoption.

Meltem Demirors, chief strategy officer at digital asset investment firm Coinshares, spoke early last year of the likelihood of talent leaving TradFi: “Crypto is going to drain banks of their top talent.”

Demirors appears to have been correct. A survey carried out by executive search firm Heidrick & Struggles found that almost half of respondents had entered the crypto sector from investment banking.

Crypto companies have more money to spend with venture capital funding pouring into the sector. The digital assets arena is also expanding and has much greater depth when it comes to opportunities than heretofore through the development of Web3, decentralized finance, non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and blockchain-based gaming. Meanwhile, compensation at TradFi institutions is up considerably as they are now scrambling to compete for talent.

Coinbase alone plans on hiring 2,000 people in 2022. Data from LinkedIn demonstrated a 615% increase in job postings containing terms such as ‘blockchain’ or ‘crypto’ last August compared to the previous year.

Amid the backdrop of the great resignation, people have changed how they think about life and work, making competition between the TradFi (traditional finance) and digital asset sectors even more acute. It also means that compensation is not the sole factor.

According to David Duong — who recently left HSBC to head up institutional research at Coinbase — “It’s actually a career risk if I don’t move into this space.” He discounts compensation as the primary motivation and cites an emphasis on the relevance of what he actually works on as the most important factor.

As money and financial systems continue to evolve, we are witnessing a shift from TradFi to the digital assets space. Talented professionals in financial services want to work on relevant and cutting edge projects. As Michael Bucella of crypto investment firm BlockTower Capital put it recently, crypto “offers [a] level of excitement that the banks can’t.” Bucella exited Goldman Sachs for BlockTower in 2017.

Crypto market maker GSR is a good example of the Cambrian explosion that’s happening in crypto and manifesting itself in the wealth of opportunities that the company is now offering. GSR is hiring for 100 open roles in London, New York, Singapore and Zug. Earlier this year John MacDonald, former managing director and chief technology officer at Citadel Securities in Europe, joined GSR as its CTO to drive the firm’s technology strategy. 

The talent drain is not exclusive to banking. These roles span a myriad of functions including compliance, finance, legal, risk management, sales, software engineering, DevOps and enterprise technology and security.

GSR’s Michael Bressler late last year gave insight into even greater ambitions for the company, saying, “Our plan is to add 100 hires every six months for the next few years.”

The company’s intentions were certainly borne by its progress in 2021. While GSR started the year with a headcount of 60, the current team is now over 250.

Just like so many others that have made the transition, Bressler is a veteran of traditional finance, having worked for JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs previously. GSR’s global head of sales revealed what the company values most in new crypto hires: “A passion for crypto.”

Hiring is not confined to pure crypto startups either. Many of the companies in TradFi and fintech are also adding staff for newly created crypto units and projects. Having opened a crypto and blockchain business unit in 2021, PayPal has followed up by hiring 100 crypto experts. Payments company Stripe is diving back into crypto following a previous foray into the sector between 2014 and 2018.

Amid what can only be described as a crypto recruiting frenzy, and with crypto and traditional industry leaders announcing blockchain-based products, it’s only a matter of time before the adoption of cryptocurrency becomes a global standard across industries.


This content is sponsored by GSR.

Tags

Upcoming Events

Old Billingsgate

Mon - Wed, October 13 - 15, 2025

Blockworks’ Digital Asset Summit (DAS) will feature conversations between the builders, allocators, and legislators who will shape the trajectory of the digital asset ecosystem in the US and abroad.

Industry City | Brooklyn, NY

TUES - THURS, JUNE 24 - 26, 2025

Permissionless IV serves as the definitive gathering for crypto’s technical founders, developers, and builders to come together and create the future.If you’re ready to shape the future of crypto, Permissionless IV is where it happens.

Brooklyn, NY

SUN - MON, JUN. 22 - 23, 2025

Blockworks and Cracked Labs are teaming up for the third installment of the Permissionless Hackathon, happening June 22–23, 2025 in Brooklyn, NY. This is a 36-hour IRL builder sprint where developers, designers, and creatives ship real projects solving real problems across […]

recent research

Research Report Templates.png

Research

The convergence of DePIN and energy generation aims to address modern grid challenges by incentivizing distributed generation.

article-image

An improving outlook on tariffs is positive for cryptocurrencies, but a sustained rally is going to take movement on the regulatory front

article-image

Apollo’s Christine Moy explained how the “velocity” of innovation in crypto has led to the evolution of RWAs

article-image

Warren Buffett attributes his astounding investment returns to only about a dozen “truly good decisions” he’s made

article-image

This report has been corrected.

article-image

Stablecoin revenue a bright spot for the crypto exchange in Q1, as trading revenue dropped 19% quarter over quarter

article-image

Creators are being told to “shill” their tokens and cash in on their “cults”