Random

Crypto

·Oct. 12, 2020

The Harvard Endowment and alternative assets, Square buys $50MM of Bitcoin, Killer Mike launching a Bank and Akon building a $6B smart city

In this conversation, Will and I break down a few important pieces of recent news. MetaMask, the crypto wallet, hit 1 million month active users in yet another sign of the acceleration of retail adoption.

Square’s market cap is now equal to that of American Express, and the former also announced it has purchased $50 million of Bitcoin with its balance sheet. What do these pieces of news mean?

Greenwood Financial launched, a neobank led by Andrew J. Young, a civil rights legend, Killer Mike, a rapper and activist, and Ryan Glover, founder of Bounce TV network. How much scope is there for financial services for affinity groups instead of traditional geographical or product coverage areas?

Read Full Story

Fintech

·Nov. 9, 2022

Unqork and Securrency bring codeless architecture to private markets

The development could have a significant effect on traditional finance's adoption of DeFi and blockchain technology.

Read Full Story

Fintech

·Oct. 11, 2022

Chainlink and SWIFT partner at Smartcon 2022

International cross-border banking system SWIFT announced it was building integration with Chainlink.

Read Full Story

Fintech

·Aug. 11, 2022

Institutionalization of the DeFi ‘wild west’: why regulation is key

In the aftermath of stablecoin disaster, the institutionalization of crypto assets hangs in the balance, regulatory supervision is key.

Read Full Story

artificial intelligence asset management Crypto regulation & compliance things that are not true

·May. 27, 2019

How the SEC is wrong about the Internet and the Bitcoin ETF

The Securities and Exchange Comission punted again on allowing a passive Bitcoin ETF to enter the market. It failed to approve the VanEck SolidX Bitcoin Trust, instead opting to open a commentary period to address several questions around Bitcoin price formation and the health of the exchanges. A similar outcome faces the Bitwise Bitcoin ETF. You can tell I am not a fan of this waffling, and there are two core reasons: (1) the years-long delay and uncertainty is responsible for financial damage to both traditional and crypto investors, and (2) the premise of the objections misunderstand the environment of the Internet and the way our world is shaping up in the 21st century.

Read Full Story

Crypto eCommerce paytech

·Mar. 1, 2021

The Federal Reserve Payment Processor, its $100B of revenue, and whether blockchains and L2s can match the value it settles

Let’s do some math homework. It’s good for you:

The Federal Reserve money movement system broke for several hours. We look deeply into its volumes and transactions, and value it like a Fintech unicorn.
The Ethereum ecosystem is throwing around as much volume in settlement as the Fed check processing system. We explore scalability barriers and solutions.
Can eCommerce fit into our emerging infrastructure? We anchor to the market numbers in China and the United States.

Things break.

Sometimes the things that break are the US Federal Reserve ACH service, Check 21, FedCash, Fedwire, and the national settlement service. They were down for a few hours — discovered at 11AM on Feb 24th and still in trouble at 3PM that day. Everything is now up and running again.

Read Full Story

Fintech

·Aug. 29, 2023

Grayscale marks win in the case for Spot Bitcoin ETFs

Grayscale's appeal of the SEC's decision to deny their application for a Bitcoin ETF has been upheld. The industry is considering it a win.

Read Full Story

asset management Crypto digital securities / STO Investing

·Dec. 17, 2021

Pioneering Crypto ETPs to $3B in assets in 3 years, with 21Shares CEO Hany Rashwan

In this conversation, we chat with Hany Rashwan – the founder of Amun and 21Shares. Hany built the company that put out the first physically backed crypto Exchange Traded Product (ETP). In simpler terms, he created a vehicle for people to buy crypto assets, such as Bitcoin or Ethereum, on the stock market. Alongside Cathie Wood of ARK, 21Shares recently submitted a Bitcoin ETF to the SEC. While he waits for the US to get on board, Hany's products are already offered all over Europe, with more than $3 billion under management.

More specifically, we touch on his early entrepreneurial mindset which lead him to building successful businesses, how currency devaluation in Egypt pushed him to create 21Shares, what an Exchange Traded Product (ETP) is and how it related to Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs), the regulatory landscape for crypto-backed ETPs, and so so much more!

Read Full Story