Forkast.News

Crypto and blockchain has seen everything this year. From the start with it's all time highs and it's role in the Ukraine War, to the year ending with the debacles of Terra Luna and the mess left by FTX and much more. These instances have left industry edging more towards the importance of security and regulations in the space. We spoke with the Independent Community Bankers of America's Brian Laverdure to learn more about developments in crypto asset regulation and how they might help the industry rebound.

Macros and microeconomics have taken a hit on the industry, leading venture capitalists and investors to take a more cautious path when investing. But some believe the opposite, now is the time to seize the opportunity. Why should we be investing during the crypto winter? What value can you get out of this? And what should we be investing in? Get the answer to all these questions & more in the latest episode of Word on the Block

As China's dominance in the world of blockchain grows, the question that everybody is asking is - can one be tracked by this technology? Watch what Yifan He, who is building Chinese Blockchain Based Service Network or BSN & taking it to the world, has to say in this conversation with Forkast's Angie Lau. Find out why he doesn't believe in cryptocurrencies & why non-crypto blockchains are going to be what traditional industry & systems back on. And what are the synergies and links there are, if any, between the Digital Yuan & BSN.

China now has an over 80% share in blockchain patent applications worldwide. This shift in China's strategy comes even though crypto currencies are frowned upon in the country. Even though crypto currencies are one of the most popular applications of blockchain technology globally, China has taken a different route as it develops Blockchain Base Service Network or BSN. How exactly does BSN work? Is it linked to existing public chains? Or is it developing in isolation? Is BSN China's connection to global blockchains? And how does it operate without crypto currencies? What is NTT & how does one use it?

Blockchain and cryptocurrencies have been around for a little bit more than a decade, but compared to the insituationals companies they are still in their infancy. But as blockchain and crypto grows, more and more institutional players are joining the fields. You know things are getting serious when one of the oldest ventures joins the game supporting ventures that disrupt the way we invest and work in. When did they realise that they would no longer turn a blind eye to these disruption? What made them join forces and build infrastructure on it? Will this pave the way for more institution to join in? Get all these answers and much more on the latest episode of Word on the Block where we are join by Alex Mansion of Standard Charted Ventures.

The right policy structure is critical for success. As the blockchain & cryptocurrency sectors grow & break through barriers set by traditional industry, having the right guardrails in place will be essential to help it get to the next level. So which agency or agencies need to develop policies for the crypto industry? What are the rules that need to be written? How do we ensure the policy architecture does not stifle innovation? Are cryptocurrencies securities or commodities? And does any one country in the world have the lead in formulating crypto policy? Get the answers to these questions and a whole lot more in this conversation between Tomicah Tillemann and Forkast's Angie Lau.

Hong Kong based crypto unicorn Animoca Brands has invested in over 340 web3 projects and companies so far, and more are coming. We find out how they find the right ventures to back and what challenges and opportunities they are spotting in this age of the crypto chill. And why are they participating in the Open Metaverse Alliance, what exactly is it and why do we need it.

NFTs have become ubiquitous, but they are a lot more than just a picture. They are a way to prove provenance, secure authenticity and a whole lot more. And Artifact Labs, which originated within the realms of one of Hong Kong's oldest newspapers SCMP, is using NFTs to preserve Asia's historic moments. Find out the challenges they've faced along the way as well as their thoughts on the Chinese NFT landscape. And what are the missing pieces in the crypto regulatory puzzle and what can be done better.

The world of finance is male dominated and this is true of the web3 world as well. Per a McKinsey report, all male teams snagged 85% of venture funding in the US in 2018, compared to a measly 2% by all female founding teams. How can this equation be made more equal? How can women get access to a more inclusive financial system and what needs to change? Forkast's editor in chief Angie Lau speaks to Wendy Diamond who leads the Women's Entrepreneurship Day Organization or WEDO, that is trying to solve these exact problems that women across the world face when it comes to accessing, participating and using the existing financial ecosystem.

While there are thousands of blockchains around, most of them work in their own galaxy and interoperability is still a challenge. However, Cosmos is trying to change that by creating an internet of blockchains. How exactly are they creating that internet & what challenges are they facing as they try to create a system that could operate over the next few decades? And why is uplifting grassroot communities and creating systems that support local economies top of Cosmos agenda? Find out the answer to all these questions and more in the latest episode of Word on the Block.

We are just about beginning to scratch the surface of what a metaverse could be & the opportunities it presents. A world where our digital avatar is our identity & we can do things without being restricted by location or access. Forkast's Editor in Chief Angie Lau chats with Sandra Helou, the cofounder of Metapolis to understand not just the opportunities but the challenges & difficulties a metaverse could present & how to navigate through this new landscape. She believes decentralization can exist with accountability.

The Metaverse is coming but are we prepared? What are the opportunities and challenges this new alternate reality presents? And what role will demographic gravity play in easing us into the Metaverse? Will rules of the real world apply in the virtual one and what will it take to be a responsible corporate leader in it? And what could be the social and societal ramifications of living a digitally immersive life? Forkast chats with one of South East Asia's largest banks to find out how it is getting ready to engage in this new world.

There are thousands of blockchains in the crypto universe, but Tezos has emerged as the chain of choice for artists & creators across the globe. What's driving artists to TZ and how is that changing the world of NFTs & art? Tezos is also among a select few private blockchains that have made their way into China, what's been their experience so far & where do they go from here? You'd find the answers to these questions & a whole lot more in this exclusive chat between Forkast's editor-in-chief Angie Lau & TZ APAC's Katherine Ng.

The crypto markets maybe in the throes of the bear market, but those building foundational level technology are still hard at work. We discuss how blockchain technology has evolved over the years & how it's changing the way industries operate. How open source projects enable diversity & the need for permissionless & hybrid blockchains. And the role of the Linux Foundation in nurturing the blockchain technology of tomorrow.

An old boy's club - that's how the world of finance & investing is often seen. And unfortunately the crypto ecosystem is looking no different. What will it take to make the world of Crypto more inclusive? Is there a need for gender focussed policy action? And who are the female changemakers in Web3 who are shattering the glass ceiling? Get the answer to all these questions as NEAR Foundation & Forkast launch the Women in Web3 Changemakers 2022.

Name, Image & Likeness, or NIL law has given many student-athletes a chance to monetize their talent. How has it changed the lives of these high school & college sportsmen & women? And is it making fans invest in their future? How is the recent chill in crypto air impacting platforms that are helping build a business based on NIL? And what's the future of digital currencies? Get the answer to all these questions in this conversation between Forkast Editor in Chief Angie Lau, Ben Armstrong & Aaron Murray

Chaos, doubt & FUD has taken hold of crypto investors as we deal with the contagion from collapsing crypto hedge funds & exchanges. And the ripples from Terra's de-peg have shaken the world of stablecoins with allegations & rumors now at Circle's doorstep. How is the issuer of the world's second-largest stablecoin, USDC fairing? Are its assets safe? Are USDC holders safe in case of bankruptcy? How has USDC managed to increase its market capitalization in these chilly times? And what are the company's plans for the crypto winter? Get all the inside details on this exclusive one-on-one conversation between Jeremy Fox-Geen, Chief Financial Officer of Circle, and Forkast's Editor-in-Chief, Angie Lau.

Vignesh Sundaresan, more popularly known as “Metakovan” changed the face of NFTs with his $69 million purchase of Beeple's “Everydays: The First 5000 Days”. Why did he pay $69 million for the NFT? What drives his investment thesis? And what value do NFTs hold? Find out in this exclusive conversation with Forkast's Editor-in-chief Angie Lau, as he talks about the people who have inspired him and his crypto journey.

Japan was among the first the world to introduce crypto-linked regulations in 2017. The country has now passed a law that clarifies the legal status of stablecoins, but what exactly does it mean? And what needs to be done to hasten institutional adoption of digital currencies? And what can other countries learn from Japan's experience of regulating digital assets? Forkast's editor-in-chief Angie Lau talks to Phillip Gillespie, CEO of B2C2 that is looking to bridge the gap between cryptocurrencies and traditional finance by providing crypto liquidity to institutions.

One in three people in the world are gamers but only a fraction of them are in Web 3.0 gaming. What will it take to bring them into blockchain gaming? And what's missing from the current spectrum of blockchain games? Singapore-based gaming startup Ethla's CEO Wui Ngiap Foo talks about the gaps & opportunities they are spotting in gaming. And how they are looking to onboard the next billion users into crypto.

Singapore's Temasek, one of the world's largest sovereign wealth funds, has been looking at blockchain technology since the crypto winter of 2018. How much of its US$270 million portfolio is geared towards crypto & blockchain projects? Have they invested in Bitcoin? And how do they pick & choose businesses they'd like to be a part of? Get the answers to all these questions and more as Forkast's Editor-in-Chief Angie Lau meets Pradyumna Agrawal of Temasek in Singapore.

Singapore headquartered Crypto.com, is dreaming big and hopes to have 100 million users on its platform by the end of 2022. Brand recall & trust are going to play a big part in acquiring new customers for the crypto exchange. So what are the challenges ahead of them and how are they dealing with cross jurisdiction regulatory differences? Find out in this conversation between Forkast's Editor-0in-Chief Angie Lau & Crypto.com's Eric Anziani.

DBS Group is one of the oldest and biggest financial groups in South East Asia, and they now have their eyes focussed on the digital economy. Forkast's Angie Lau talks to the group's CEO about how they are transforming not just themselves but architecture of the existing financial systems. And what's the role for regulators in shaping this new economy.

What exactly is the Metaverse and how will it transform our lives? Will legacy financial institutions continue to remain relevant in the new virtual reality? And what is attracting Web 3 and crypto firms to Dubai? Forkast's Editor in Chief Angie Lau speaks to Citi's Ronit Ghose to answer these questions & more.

The recent events in crypto markets have reiterated the need for a crypto regulator & greater oversight over digital assets. Will this be a key factor in bringing traditional finance firms to the world of DeFi? What is the knowledge gap that exists in the crypto industry? And where and how is FTX looking to deploy its US$2 billion dollar crypto venture fund? FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried and Amy Wu, head of FTX's Ventures join in on this exclusive conversation to answer these questions & more.

Anthony Scaramucci, Founder & Managing Partner of alternative investments firm Skybridge says he's looking to create the bridge between traditional finance and Defi, the future of finance. He says it is odd that legacy financial firms are investing in companies that buy crypto tokens but won't invest in underlying tokens directly. He also believes crypto is about individualism and empowerment and governments cannot ignore it anymore. Listen in to the entire conversation between Anthony Scaramucci and Forkast's Editor in Chief Angie Lau straight from the Bahamas.

From the rustle of the paper to the news at your fingertips on your smart device. Technology has changed not just how we consume news, but how the people who bring you the news work. Will blockchain technology be the next leap for journalism? How could NFTs help journalists benefit from their work? Could crypto tech raise the trust between news providers and their audiences? Find out in this exclusive one-on-one chat between Dwayne Desaulniers, Director for Blockchain and Data at the Associated Press, and Forkast's Editor in Chief Angie Lau.

Will China beat the US to the first Central Bank Digital Currency? How soon might we see the first digital dollar? And what's the role played by dollar backed stablecoins playing in the current financial system? How are policy makers and regulators in the US shaping the crypto story? Kristin Smith, Executive Director at the Blockchain Association answers all these questions & more in conversation with Forkast's Angie Lau.

From Gucci to Louis Vuitton, Spider-Man to Batman, there's no escaping the craze for NFTs. The market for NFTs or non-fungible tokens catapulted to US$18.5 billion in 2021, a rise of over 500 times compared to the previous year. So what are the opportunities for this segment? Would GameFi continue to drive the rise or will we see new use cases take the lead? Forkast's Angie Lau is in conversation with Duc Luu of Spores Network to answer these questions and more.

From the recent launch of Bitcoin-based exchange-traded funds in the U.S. to El Salvador's plan to raise US$1 billion through BTC bonds to fund its “Bitcoin City” property development, growing mainstream adoption of the world's original cryptocurrency is demanding increased scalability. Adam Back, a Bitcoin development veteran and CEO of blockchain technology company Blockstream, which is working in partnership with El Salvador's government on its Bitcoin-backed bond plan. says the solution lies in layer-2 networks. Layer-2 is a secondary protocol built on top of a blockchain such as the Bitcoin network or Ethereum. Mirroring the protocol evolution of the internet, layer-2 technology such as Bitcoin's Lightning and Liquid networks tackle scalability issues by moving processes off the main chain.“While it's difficult for (all) potential users of Bitcoin to directly hold it on-chain, there are different use cases that can use it in different ways,” Back told Forkast.News in a video interview. “[Layer-2] provides a different kind of section of transactional capacity-optimized for use cases.”“You can onboard more users and there's less data hitting the main chain ... it has some trade-offs, but it provides similar kinds of assurances to the main Bitcoin chain.” Back said, “It's difficult to have a single protocol that's optimal for everything.”Taproot — the last major upgrade of the Bitcoin network, which went live last November —  came four years after the SegWit soft fork, the only other big change to the network, implemented in 2017. Given the slow and irregular pace of upgrades, most Bitcoin network innovations take place on layer-2.“If you look at the internet and the base layer of the internet being TCP/IP … the TCP/IP protocol essentially hasn't changed in decades, yet there's an enormous amount of innovation on the internet. But it's happening in the layer above, or in the application layer,” Back said. “And that's considered, in engineering terms, a good way to do it, because you want the best technology to be robust.”Watch Back's full interview with Forkast.News Editor-in-Chief Angie Lau to learn more about layer-2 solutions, the “block war” between layer-2 providers, the Bitcoin Taproot upgrade and BTC's mainstream adoption.

The price of Bitcoin has dropped by more than 22% in the past 30 days. Predictions that the world's original crypto would top US$100,000 by the end of the year are beginning to look overly optimistic, to put it diplomatically. Yet Mark Yusko, chief executive and investment officer at Morgan Creek Capital, is holding firm in his belief that Bitcoin will be worth US$250,000 within the next five years. He thinks Bitcoin's current low price, as denominated in U.S. dollars, is bunk.“It's interesting that in the short run, when prices fall, as they have in the last few weeks, people start to get a little antsy and start to question these long-term trends and fundamentals,” Yusko told Forkast.News in a video interview. “Price is a liar.”In terms of Bitcoin's actual value, the truth lies in gold, Yusko said, asserting that fiat currencies can conceal changes in real value. “If you look at U.S. stocks, we're having new all-time highs,” he said. “That's because we denominate in a depreciating asset — the dollar.”The S&P 500 has soared more than 98% over the past five years. However, last month, it took just 2.57 ounces of gold to buy the index, the same as it did more than 16 years earlier, in October 2005. That price was unchanged from June 1997, 24 years ago. In contrast, Bitcoin, currently trading at a value worth around 26.97 ounces of gold, has skyrocketed more than 60-fold in the five years to date. By the end of November, U.S. Consumer Price Index inflation was running at  6.8%, the highest level since 1982. The inflation rate across the 19-member eurozone had reached 4.9%. Bitcoin — often touted as a safe-haven asset and a hedge against inflationary pressures — had slumped to below US$50,000 for the first time since early October. Yusko attributes Bitcoin's slide to the launch of a series of U.S. exchange-traded funds (ETFs) based on Bitcoin futures. “[What a Bitcoin futures ETF] does is allow me to create a paper version of Bitcoin, which is completely independent of the 21 million supply … And that contract then allows someone to go short on the other side,” Yusko said. “This time, within days of (Bitcoin's) peak at US$68,000 …  (came) the issuance of (ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETF) BITO. And I believe a bunch of banks and others have gotten short on the other side, and they're pushing the price down a little bit.”Watch Yusko's full interview with Forkast.News Editor-in-Chief Angie Lau to learn more about the secular and cyclical dynamics of Bitcoin, the impact of Bitcoin futures ETFs on the market, how investors should distribute wealth in the crypto space, and upcoming opportunities in 2022.

A recent US$40 million-plus bid for a rare copy of the U.S. Constitution by 17,437 virtual strangers may have failed to win the prized historical document, but it thrust the decentralized autonomous organization that united them into the spotlight. ConstitutionDAO's audacious campaign, which raised the money for its auction bid within a week, catapulted not only itself but also the entire DAO phenomenon into the public consciousness. A DAO is like a virtual flash mob — a leaderless group of like-minded people working together toward a common interest. Governance is achieved through the use of smart contracts and votes among members who use tokens instead of ballot papers. If this novel fusion of a leaderless organizational structure with decentralized technology can work to get auction bids up and running, who's to say it can't be applied in the finance arena? Not Marcello Mari, the CEO of SingularityDAO — which is using SingularityNET's artificial intelligence technology to handle the complex tasks of data processing and crypto asset management in decentralized finance. “Imagine an AI that can do price prediction for you, analyze the different market trends, and make suggestions for you on your crypto investments,” Mari told Forkast.News in a video interview. “People can just invest in this basket of tokens in these portfolios, and then the AI will do everything else for them.Yet even in an organizational structure that appears as democratized as a DAOs, the issue of power concentration persists: the democratic principle of “one person, one vote” is critically compromised by the fact that those who hold large proportions of issued tokens command a commensurately large share of votes. “My vision is to have DAOs that are actually managed by artificial intelligence delegates,” Mari said. “What we want to see in the future is AIs that are able to make decisions based on the community vote.”Despite this decentralized ideal, Mari's position as a DAO chief remains a contradiction in terms. So SingularityDAO has its sights set on complete decentralization over the next five years to phase the leadership role out as its users become accustomed to its artificial design. “If this happens in five years' time, I'm done. I'm out. I don't need to be the CEO of the DAO anymore,” Mari said. Watch Mari's full interview with Forkast.News Editor-in-Chief Angie Lau to learn more about how DAOs work, how AI will shape DAOs and DeFi and where ConstitutionDAO went wrong.

Shipping times from China, the world's biggest exporter, are set to grow longer amid a new set of Covid quarantine mandates for vessel crews. The new rules mean that seafarers may have to spend as much as seven weeks in isolation for each return trip. That latest blow to the logistics industry comes as the Covid pandemic appears to have gained renewed momentum, propelling a surge in demand for products as consumers around the world stay at home.Adding to the bottleneck is an increase in U.S. manufacturing output to levels not seen since March 2019, which will likely be augmented by the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill that President Joe Biden recently signed into law.“There's a lot happening in terms of supply, as we know — unprecedented volumes going on with demand currently,” Dennis Delgado, the co-founder and chief product officer of supply chain-focused blockchain firm SyncFab, told Forkast.News. “There's a huge backlog in the industry.”The use of blockchain to facilitate logistics processes is one of the technology's less-talked-about success stories, in which it incorporates layers of trust through which enterprises in the supply chain network can share data and digitize paper-shuffling manual operations.Yet the logistics business has proved somewhat resistant to the allure of blockchain technology, a reluctance attributable largely to regulatory concerns and a lack of knowledge. “You'd be surprised at the number of companies and vendors we work with that are still hesitant to adopt new technologies,” Delgado said. “When you get into some of the larger organizations that have been around for decades, they have entrenched systems in place that can vary from department to department.”A talent crunch in the logistics sector has deepened supply chain problems across a range of industries. Consulting firm Deloitte argues that the evolving complexity of supply chain management requires not only a larger workforce but also new skills. According to Delgado, SyncFab and partner firm Smart MFG can make manufacturing “cool again” by adding incentive layers in which MFG tokens are used to reward supply chain processes that may otherwise go unnoticed, such as quoting for work. “Areas like that, where we normally don't think would necessarily be paid or rewarded, we disagree,” Delgado said. “We think there are a lot of opportunities there that these blockchain tokenomics can bring, and with the added layer of getting a newer generation interested in manufacturing again.”Watch Delgado's full interview with Forkast.News Editor-in-Chief Angie Lau to learn more about the current supply chain crisis, how NFTs can be used in manufacturing, and how blockchain can help digitize legacy industries. 

The decentralized finance sector has undergone phenomenal growth this year, with its value soaring more than tenfold to US$250 billion. But as it becomes too big to fail, its lack of regulatory access points is raising concerns among finance industry observers and finance industry oversight bodies. “[DeFi] will be difficult to tackle because our current frameworks for financial services are built in the construct of having a financial intermediary in every single financial service provision, and that's been the access point for the regulators and supervisors,” said Iota Nassr, an economist and policy analyst at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development's Directorate for Financial and Enterprise Affairs, in a video interview with Forkast.News. “In DeFi, of course, this is non-existent, and this is becoming a big puzzle for us.”The new paradigm is perplexing not only for policymakers and regulators, but also for many investors, despite its much-lauded attributes of transparency, pseudonymity, and claims to represent a democratization of finance. Nassr points out that the very complexity of DeFi protocols requires esoteric knowledge that remains out of reach for ordinary investors, and which puts better resourced — and, by implication, larger — market participants at a strategic advantage when it comes to benefiting from all that this new industry has to offer.“We have this paradox where we have absolute transparency, but at the same time, we have the need for some technical, engineering, software development or coding skills which the average user does not have,” Nassr said. She added that this produced a level of opacity that — when coupled with the lack of the customary investor protections found in traditional, regulated financial products — could expose many investors to miscalculations of risk and financial losses.DeFi's ability to foster financial democratization — with its inherent promise of inclusion in a finance sector long dominated by Wall Street and institutional players — was not a given, she said, amid the preponderance of those same institutions, alongside family offices and professional investors, in the space. “We need to be really cautious when arguing for DeFi for financial inclusion, at least at this stage of development,” Nassr said. “For the moment, DeFi activity is concentrated on institutions, and we see a lot of family offices participating in this market to enjoy the leverage opportunities that are available there.”In Q2 this year, transactions worth US$10 million or more accounted for 60% of all DeFi deals, and Nassr said that if smaller institutional and professional investors were included in that calculus, it would show that almost 95% of total transaction volume in the sector involved non-retail investors.“Retail users who wish to execute very small-value transactions may be faced with disproportionately high fees, and this is effectively pricing them out,” she said. “This is not to say that there is no potential, but we don't see this practically happening today.”A new OECD report entitled “DeFi: Activities, Risks and Why it Matters” is due out in January. Watch Nassr's full interview with Forkast.News for a sneak preview of its contents.

It may have taken a global pandemic to do it, but millions of unbanked people in Latin America have been propelled into the financial system since the beginning of the Covid-19 crisis. Some 17% of the region's unbanked population had gained access to the system by autumn last year as, within a matter of months, pandemic-related subsidies made financial inclusion a necessity. Nevertheless, in Brazil, 34 million adults — almost one in six Brazilians — remain unbanked, according to São Paulo-based research firm Instituto Locomotiva. Those without access to basic financial services like savings accounts, credit and loans are disproportionately women. “Many of the wallets and the banking records are in the name of the husband,” Taynaah Reis, chief executive of blockchain-powered neobank Moeda Seeds, told Forkast.News in a video interview. “This becomes a problem when [women] look for credit.”Fortunately for Reis — who says that even she had limited access to information and credit, despite the benefits of privilege and a private school education — she was able to raise capital for Moeda Seeds through a US$20 million initial coin offering.Being in blockchain has given Reis the opportunity to see the technology's promise to democratize access to capital. But the sector has attracted its fair share of criticism, from worries over the speculation rife in crypto to concerns about the carbon footprint of such an energy-intensive industry. Yet Reis says there are also ways for the industry to promote and foster environmental and social sustainability.“Now, we have the COP26 (United Nations Climate Change Conference), and many discussions on climate change to hold every country accountable and every individual accountable, as well,” she said. “We see opportunities to create different economic models and assets that are sustainable over time.”Moeda Seeds has itself created one such model, entering into a partnership with Brazilian forestry manager 3Agro on a non-fungible token project. The scheme allows buyers of the tokens not only to support the planting of açaí trees in the Amazon region through their investment, but also to gain exposure to revenue generated by the sale of the berries from the trees that are grown as a result.With this kind of creative thinking, Reis says, blockchain-based finance can unleash forces for increased prosperity, social inclusion, environmental responsibility and the greater good.

The first Bitcoin futures exchange-traded fund made its debut on Wall Street just a little over a fortnight ago. Six days later, Mastercard partnered with digital asset management company Bakkt to bring cryptocurrencies into its network. As increasing numbers of mainstream finance sector businesses enter the crypto space, digital assets are reaching a level of maturity that's defying the predictions of their critics.“Blockchain, Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies are no longer some young, innovative technology,” Blockdata co-founder and managing director Jonathon Knegtel said in a video interview with Forkast.News. “It's almost a teenager.” Moves by traditional finance sector players such as banks to integrate crypto with their existing products and services are giving the digital asset industry the momentum it needs to achieve critical mass in the mainstream, Knegtel explained.“[Mastercard and Bakkt's partnership is] making it a lot easier for people to actually enter the ecosystem and partake,” he said. “Because more users are coming in, the value goes up, and then the value gets circulated inside, and people start funding each other. And that's the stage we're at now.” Amid all this, crypto banks are emerging to further disrupt the banking system. These crypto banks — and digital asset businesses — resemble “challenger” banks such as PayPal and Revolut, providing crypto-focused financial services such as borrowing, lending and saving. If the previous wave of finance industry disruption was brought on by challenger banks, crypto banks appear to represent the next one. “Challenger banks definitely introduced the concept, but that means it's a lower jump for them to then jump to the next point and be exposed to crypto,” Knegtel said.The crypto space has seen major growth in 2021. In the third quarter, blockchain companies raised US$6.5 billion, a 30% increase from the previous quarter, according to Blockdata. Half of the 20 biggest venture capital firms now have exposure to crypto exchanges, and institutional decentralized finance is expected to become a US$1 trillion industry.The growth in the capital involved comes as blockchain companies reach critical mass and require larger fundraising rounds, which Knegtel believes is a sign that the crypto space is reaching maturity, although he also points out that the growth of the DeFi space remains minuscule compared to traditional finance.“US$1 trillion is just 1% of the assets under management of the top 100 banks in the world,” he said. “One percent as a part of an asset diversification strategy in 2021 is not that much. And that alone would bring another US$1 trillion.”Watch Knegtel's full interview with Forkast.News Editor-in-Chief Angie Lau to learn more about crypto banks' disruptive effects on the banking system, how regulation can propel the crypto space into maturity, how DeFi may challenge centralized crypto banks, and the risks behind the burgeoning market for non-fungible tokens.

Bitcoin may have taken a back seat in the collective consciousness of the crypto community this year as the non-fungible token scene took off and decentralized finance enjoyed an Indian summer, but the coin that started it all has been back in the headlines lately. Bitcoin has returned to valuations last seen during the heady peaks of spring, a BTC futures fund began trading on Wall Street earlier this month, and a Central American nation has adopted it as a parallel currency. The world's original cryptocurrency remains the subject of debate, concern and criticism, but for a number of crypto watchers, 2021 marked the beginning of the end of traditional finance, with Bitcoin poised finally to transform the space. “A few hundred years ago, we were still in a world that was ruled by emperors — shahs, sultans, kings, czars... Within a span of 80 years that all disappeared,” Ben Caselin, the head of research at crypto exchange AAX, told Forkast.News in a video interview. “Things change.”As things have changed, Bitcoin has also changed. The peer-to-peer payment network described in mysterious Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakomoto's original white paper has evolved into an asset class held by a wide range of investors — from retail traders to traditional finance sector businesses to governments. Caselin insists that in order to navigate a crypto space that has grown well beyond Bitcoin, it is critical to recognize Bitcoin's core principles, which extend beyond its technology.“Bitcoin is not just a technology. It's not just an asset,” Caselin said. “It's also a set of principles, and it is also a very unique entity now in this world, just like the internet … Bitcoin is the awakening of humanity to its own sovereign capacities.”Amid the rise of new blockchains with more powerful functions and faster transactions, concerns have grown that Bitcoin is being outmoded. With thousands of cryptocurrencies and blockchain applications appearing, many investors have diversified their crypto portfolios. “There's a lot of experimentation going on,” Caselin said. “If you really want to stick to the Bitcoin network, you could almost say that things that really succeed in the altcoin space perhaps will eventually graduate to Bitcoin.”Bitcoin broke its own price record this month to trade at US$66,930, and Caselin believes that institutional adoption will be the deciding factor in whether it rises further. “For Bitcoin to keep rising, more capital needs to come in, and that cannot just be small money,” Caselin said. “It makes sense in the bigger scheme of things that now it's the time for institutions. But they also have to kind of go through … cultural transformations.”Watch Caselin's full interview with Forkast.News Editor-in-Chief Angie Lau to learn more about why Bitcoin is still the next big thing.

Blockchain is becoming increasingly integrated into the corporate world, and luxury brands are particularly well-positioned to reap the rewards of digital innovation, which is set to play a part in an industry that's constantly seeking to reinvent itself. The Covid-19 pandemic has taken a significant toll on the luxury sector, which shrunk by as much as 22% in 2020, setting its growth back five years. The Big Four fashion weeks, for instance, saw Paris, Milan, London and New York welcome only a handful of their usual stylista guests or put their shows online as much of the runway set stayed away. Out of the crisis, however, other opportunities are rising as blockchain beguiles brands in the luxury business that were wondering how to navigate the new landscape.“The big brands are beginning to see that there are new channels, new markets that they can be marketing and selling into,” Zilliqa co-founder Max Kantelia told Forkast.News in a video interview. Zilliqa is a layer-1 blockchain with smart-contract capability.A collector himself, Kantelia says blockchain will bring two major changes to the luxury industry: proof of provenance and the tokenization of physical collectibles.As the NFT sector has gained momentum this year, major luxury brands have begun to embrace it. Such storied fashion houses as Louis Vuitton and Burberry have been exploring NFTs in gaming, and Gucci released a four-minute NFT film created for its 100th birthday that was snapped up at a Christie's auction. Yet the virtual-world fashion experience remains difficult and somewhat inelegant for an industry that prides itself on its sleek appeal. The process of setting up Ethereum wallets and the like can be a turnoff for even the most ardent luxury lover.Kantelia says luxury brands need appropriate venues, and suggests the next step is to create digital assets that complement, not replace, real-world ones, bridging the gap between the physical and digital universes. Listen to Kantelia's full interview with Forkast.News Editor-in-Chief Angie Lau to learn more about what he sees as the digital future for luxury goods, arts and gaming, the regulatory environment in which it will operate, and why blockchain interoperability will underpin the development of the emerging ecosystem. 

As the adoption of blockchain technology grows around the world, so have the barriers between blockchains in different countries and regions. Much like the internet, which started out as small sets of nodes in universities before expanding globally to form an interconnected and far more useful World Wide Web, blockchain nodes — now distributed across the globe — are in need of greater interoperability. “At the end of the day, the primary catalyst for blockchain is really its connectivity [and] it's about decentralization,'' said John DeVadoss, the co-founder of InterWork Alliance (IWA), in a video interview with Forkast.News. The IWA, a non-profit organization working on the adoption of tokens for day-to-day operations, recently announced its merger with the Global Blockchain Business Council. One of the IWA's major projects to connect the blockchain space is building a Token Taxonomy Framework (TTF), which defines a common language, behaviors and properties for tokens. The TTF allows its users to choose what and how much they would use the framework.Blockchain standards and national, unified infrastructure such as China's Blockchain Services Network enhance the connections across global blockchain ecosystems. But mainstream adoption of the technology is still slowed down by other factors. DeVadoss believes that one of the main factors that is stagnating a global blockchain explosion is the misconception of the distributed ledger. “Much of the mainstream enterprise IT world still thinks of blockchain as database because they are unable to see beyond the technology,” DeVadoss said. “There has never been a stack like a blockchain stack because none of them had economic protocols baked inside intrinsically.”Despite what DeVadoss characterizes as a popular misconception of blockchain as a “trust machine,” he still sees the technology as beneficial, with adoption likely to continue exploding in the coming years. “I have seen tremendous amount of uptake through the InterWork Alliance and — of course — now with the GBBC,” DeVadoss said. “There's tremendous amount of latent interest and I think it's going to explode over the next 18 months.”Watch DeVadoss' full interview with Forkast.News Editor-in-Chief Angie Lau to learn more about the IWA's efforts to connect the blockchain space, how the blockchain is changing the business logic, and why data stored on the blockchain can't necessarily be trusted.

Bitcoin took another major leap recently toward becoming mainstream after its adoption by El Salvador as legal tender. Meanwhile, central bank digital currencies (CBDC) are gaining momentum in economies around the globe. Michael B. Greenwald, the first US Treasury attaché to Qatar and Kuwait, and now the director of Tiedemann Advisors, sees El Salvador's venture as Bitcoin's great inflection point as the world keeps a close eye on Bitcoin's first national testbed. “Countries like El Salvador, they're not going to have huge impacts on what the U.S. does or others do, but it definitely does bring the issue to the table and it raises alarm bells,” Greenwald told Forkast.News in a video interview. “Ultimately, it's going to be the large central banks and what it means for them as they create a new digital asset framework.”In Asia, China's e-CNY experiments are expanding to more cities and sectors. The digital yuan may be China's effort to counteract what Greenwald calls the “weaponization of the dollar”. “But let's remember there's a divide of the Fed right now,” Greenwald said. “You've got Randy Quarles and Lael Brainard, where one is pushing a stablecoin approach and one is pushing a central bank digital currency.” Such divisions will likely spur debates for years to come and may ultimately lead to U.S. policy paralysis, Greenwald predicts, “without any real action.” In the meantime, the digital yuan is already being used widely in what is already essentially a soft rollout across China, from public transport to the country's futures market, which Greenwald sees as an alarming challenge to the dollar's future international dominance.Could there also be a scenario where these rival currencies will one day coexist in the same digital wallet? According to Greenwald, a future digital dollar and the digital yuan will unlikely cozy up to each other, especially not in the near future. “But I do see a digital dollar in the same wallet as a digital yen or a digital euro or a digital pound,” Greenwald said. “The cross-border issue in a future digital wallet, that's definitely one of the issues the Fed is looking to tackle in the coming months to years.”Watch Michael Greenwald's full interview with Forkast.News Editor-in-Chief Angie Lau to learn more about the internal divisions within the U.S. over a CBDC, the future of Bitcoin as a currency outside El Salvador, how the central banks of the art world are leading the NFT revolution and more. 

Cardano's much-anticipated Alonzo hard fork finally kicked off a new era of smart contracts on the blockchain. Because of that new capability, the proof-of-stake platform can now host decentralized applications (dApps) in the highly competitive decentralized finance (DeFi) space. But the unregulated Wild West of DeFi recently received some significant noise complaints from the Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Gary Gensler, who told the Wall Street Journal that DeFi projects are not exempt from regulations. “We will see over the next few months to years, some form of a crackdown,” said Charles Hoskinson, the CEO of Cardano developer Input Output Hong Kong, in a video interview with Forkast.News. “[That] means that the next generation of DeFi is up for grabs.”Hoskinson compares what might be an upcoming surge in DeFi regulations to the initial coin offering (ICO) upheavals of 2017, in which global crackdowns on questionable crypto projects and outright scams shut down waves of companies but also led to the creation of new financing models that gave birth to a new generation of projects like  ICP and Solana. “The winners of the future in the DeFi space are going to have liquidity and interoperability, the ability to move multi-chain,” Hoskinson said. “And finally, cost predictability is such an important thing… It's so bizarre how we just tolerate massive swings in the price of doing business.”Cardano did not make it to the first wave of DeFi, which generated superstars such as Uniswap, MakerDAO and many more. Even so, despite calling DeFi's current state a “bubble,” Hoskinson remains bullish on DeFi in the longer term. Cardano, its founder says, has had its eyes on the so-called “second wave of DeFi” all along. “We need governance, we need certification, we need insurance, we need regulation on these things, metadata identity… at the same time, you need to decentralize,” Hoskinson said. “The next wave of [DeFi] will do that with a straight face and will be significantly harder to regulate in a traditional sense. The way we constructed Cardano was for that second wave.”Watch Hoskinson's full interview with Forkast.News Editor-in-Chief Angie Lau to learn more about Cardano's plans for its new smart contracts ecosystem, how a regulatory compliant DeFi community might take shape, the promises and pitfalls of non-fungible tokens (NFT), what he sees as the top five uses for smart contracts, and more. 

Why is Axie Infinity so popular, and what is the potential of play-to-earn gaming? Two venture capitalists share insights on Asia's special place as GameFi's hub.

HighlightsBinance's user agreement: “So in their user agreement, when you sign up, you are not permitted to sue them in any jurisdiction around the world. The only place that you are allowed to sue Binance when you sign up to that agreement is the Hong Kong International Arbitration Center… The other interesting thing is, Binance obviously doesn't want to be subject to local jurisdictions because they don't want to be regulated, which is a very smart thing to do if you're in their shoes.”The “ski lift ticket” rule: “In every jurisdiction in the world, there is some iteration of what I call the ski lift ticket rule, which is that when you go skiing and you buy a lift ticket, you sign the lift ticket. And when you sign the lift ticket, you say that even if somebody that works for the mountain pushes you off the chairlift and you fall and get hurt, that you cannot sue the mountain. The reality is, even if you just fall off the chairlift and get hurt, you can sue the mountain. Why? Because in click through, one way, non-negotiated contracts, especially with large financial players, there are certain rights that you simply cannot give up.”The international rule of law: “Generally, because these companies are regulated, consumer fights happen locally. They happen in your country pursuant to jurisdiction. They do not happen under international law. Because when you're regulated as a company, you are required to show up in that country's court system to have the fight. So this is very unique. For a lot of reasons, but most interestingly to me is because consumer arbitration as a world, as a group, as a community, this is really one of the first times that the question has not been consumers of this jurisdiction or consumers of that jurisdiction, but the consumers of the world and a community.”Demarcation of corporate assets: “Bitcoin, Ethereum, those are community assets. I think those should be minimally regulated. The corporations that utilize community assets to make profit from consumers, those are corporations trying to make a profit. And right now, they're doing a good job of wrapping themselves in the cloak of community assets, but they are not community assets. The internet is a community asset. Amazon is not. The blockchain is a community asset. Binance is not. And so I think that that is the line of demarcation that we need to have.”

HighlightsSCMP's foray into NFTs: “ARTIFACT is our attempt to create a new standard for historical NFTs. For us, anything that is as an account of a historical moment, so new stories, or potentially a historic artifact itself, recreated or sometimes created for the very first time as a digital asset. So we do actually think that this is a very different world to the NFT world that has exploded over the course of really the last six months.”Preserving history on the blockchain: “One of the areas where we believe NFT can truly benefit an entire industry, actually, not even industry should across industries, is in recording history, recording historical accounts and historical assets, which together we are referring to as ARTIFACT. So our project is to set a standard, and by standard, I mean a specific smart contract with a specific metadata structure that will allow anyone eventually to be able to mint NFTs that are historical and be able to sell and trade them on a very specific market, that we are going to be building a marketplace platform that serves both the issuer world and the collectors world.”Blockchain brings context to history: “Any single story never lives by itself. It lives within a timeline of events. It lives within a historical context of the moment. It lives within contemporaneous analysis and insight. And it's really, really hard to be able to showcase all of that complexity through a single news story, even in a newspaper, not to mention a single article digitally. But blockchain allows us to create that context and have that context be fully transparent, the process of how a story came to be fully transparent.”Time travel through a metaverse: “Sandboxes are really, really exciting new canvas. So much of understanding Hong Kong, understanding greater China requires experience. Like the scale of the Forbidden City. You can describe it in words. But until you walk into the Forbidden City for the very first time, it's really hard for any human being to truly understand how incredibly, not only massive, but like what that moment in time would have been like when the court was filled. And Hong Kong is the same way for people who have not experienced Hong Kong…. Our hope is that The Sandbox will allow us to actually be able to tell that story properly for the first time.”

HighlightsFacebook's foray into the metaverse: “Facebook is now saying they are transitioning into becoming a metaverse company, away from being a social media company. But this isn't anything new. They've been undergoing this transition for a long time, of course, with their acquisitions in VR and Oculus. But of course, they're also trying to launch [Diem], which is their own cryptocurrency. That's no coincidence. They understand that there will be this economic system that is woven throughout the metaverse.”Fortnite's venture to the open metaverse: “Tim Sweeney, CEO of Epic Games — who also has a duopoly on gaming engines with the Unreal Gaming Engine — he himself has stated that he believes the metaverse needs to be open for all the reasons he's a sci-fi nerd, as you would expect as well, that we saw with Ready Player One. He fears that when he's gone, Epic Games could be an evil corporation and it could have power beyond the wildest imagination. And it will try to seize control of the metaverse. So he's already talking about the open metaverse. He's just raised over US$1 billion to make Unreal and Epic Games more open.”Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are now the economic layer of the metaverse: “But if we kind of focus on NFTs, because I think that's more generally how people will invest in the metaverse, these effectively are collectibles in different media types and different forms. But ultimately what they do is they restore the idea that you can have something that is digital and scarce, which is ultimately the web broke collecting. It made anything that was digital close to free, or at least people expected it to be free.”Why metaverses need interoperability: “Let's say they get bored with the game and people always eventually get bored with the game. You can't perpetually keep people locked in and entertained by a game. That could last for a decade. It could last for a year. It could last for a month. But ultimately they'll get bored. And when they get bored, then what? Ultimately, in this case, all the value and time that they put into it is lost. They can't transfer that out of that system.”

HighlightsSeparating money from the government: “A good way to frame this is like, as most people understand, that back in the 1500s, 1600s, this concept of separating church and state. It was a struggle — a fight. Ultimately, I think people realized that it was important that something as crucial and personal to people's lives as religion is not controlled by the government. Money is even more personal and important to people's lives. In that regard, trying to separate money and state is really the entire ethos of what cryptocurrency is.”Is Voorhees putting himself out of a job? “I want to be clear that I won't be out of a job. I won't have a W-2 paycheck anymore, but my job, my passion, the project I work on when I wake up remains — and will remain — ShapeShift. But there's just no pay stub from an employer. It's just a different model. The vision here really is to build a multi-chain, self-custody crypto platform that the whole world can use. There's not really any of that today. It's kind of a niche that doesn't exist. It's hard engineering because we're working with multiple blockchains, whereas most DeFi projects exist only on one, primarily Ethereum.”How decentralized decisions get made: “There are forums and ideas get discussed, and so in that situation, there's lots of noise. If there's an idea that people start taking seriously in which there seems to be support for it, and there's a formal governance process in which a proposal is ultimately made, which details what's going to be done, what money is going where and those kind of things. Ultimately, a vote happens. The vote is a smart contract that looks at the FOX balance of each person voting at a certain block height in Ethereum and you can vote yay or nay on a proposal. And ultimately, based on the rules that we've set up, a simple majority will win that. And then if that occurs, funds will actually move on chains from the DAO to the address specified in the proposal.”Who gets the last laugh: “When we were at that conference, Money 20/20 in Vegas in 2012, yeah, we were right next to this huge PayPal booth. I remember the sneers and snickers of the people manning that booth. A couple of them had maybe heard of Bitcoin and they thought it was a joke. We're just sitting in there. No one was coming up to talk to us. There was no one at that conference interested in Bitcoin or in BitInstant. We just stood there looking silly while all the professional money people of the world gathered and made their deals. And it's just amazing to see that none of those companies are relevant in the future of decentralized finance. All of them will have to adapt to crypto or they will go the way of Polaroid. And I think a lot of the banks are going to get really caught off guard by this. The fintech companies move a little faster and I think a lot of them will adapt. PayPal accepts Bitcoin now and cryptocurrency, but the banks are too entrenched.”

HighlightsPolygon's early struggles: “We all know that Ethereum is very decentralized, secure but has scalability issues. So what Polygon started to do is that we wanted to provide this entire Ethereum development capability on this layer-2, basically. So that's where we started. And we also were very much focused on building something that gets used and all that. There were a lot of nuances in between. Like it took us a lot of time. We were not from Silicon Valley. We did not have fancy big [venture capitalists] supporting us.”High gas fees directed users to Polygon: “Ethereum was seeing the second or third wave of these high gas prices. The first time it happened and then it dipped, people were like, “Okay, it was a one-time phenomenon.” But then it happened the second time, the third time, and people realized something needs to be done. By that time, because of this bottom-up approach, we were fully production-ready. And if you ask me what is the reason for Polygon's success, because we are production-ready.”The case for zero-knowledge technology: “As an enterprise, you really need to derive some value out of these blockchain solutions. It has to be on a public blockchain. Now, you need privacy. You need scalability. Yes, we all are building on it. So I feel in 18 to 24 months, there will be fewer enterprises which will have actual value generating use cases on these blockchains. And most of them then would probably be funded by or kind of being run on some sort of zero-knowledge technology. That's why we at Polygon also, we have invested so much of our time, energy and resources in the last six months in the zero-knowledge space, and then now we are in a stage where in two to three months you will see Polygon will emerge as the powerhouse of zero-knowledge in the whole industry.”India's crypto brain drain: “Soon, the Indian government has to realize that the brain drain in the blockchain space is so big because you are not building for your local users … I would never want to live out of India. I want to go back to India, work from there to the ecosystem there. But then due to this uncertainty, and I'm not saying there's anything positive or negative, this uncertainty, nobody knows.”India's crypto ban rumors: “I think most of that is media sensationalism, actually. I'm from India and generally, I would say 95% of any team that is building out of India either know me or I know them and I know what they are doing to reach out to me for the investments and all that. And I've not found even a single team which is trying to build some technology-related solution being haggled by the government. Nobody has been touched upon by the government. The government is only trying to curb or kind of trying to figure out how to stop this, speculation or kind of gambling, which nobody can deny that a lot of retail loses their money in this.”

One of Wall Street's least risky businesses, securities lending, is now also being used by crypto lending companies to provide high yields for hodlers — or long-term crypto holders. But what are the risks to crypto holders? “If you ask any Wall Street veteran: ‘What is the safest business on Wall Street?' They're not going to tell you banking, they're not going to tell you trading, they're going to tell you sec lending,” Celsius Network CEO Alex Mashinsky told Forkast.News in a video interview. “That is also the safest business in crypto.” Securities lending is the loaning of assets such as shares to firms and institutions. Experts agree that the practice is less risky than before, but it's not entirely risk-free in the traditional finance world. For crypto finance companies like Celsius Network, a crypto lending platform, the loaned assets are cryptocurrencies. Celsius Network's securities lending strategy has allowed the platform to provide high-yielding interest rates for investors that choose to deposit their assets into Celsius. It currently offers 6.2% for Bitcoin and 8.88% for stablecoins, at press time. “When an institutional exchange borrows Bitcoin from us, instead of sec lending, they do digital asset lending and they pay us interest,” Mashinsky said. “No one on Wall Street has ever paid this money, the sec lending income, to their customers — that's the best-kept secret.” With Bitcoin's boom, more services have popped up around the globe to present investors with a variety of options for their chosen interest-bearing crypto accounts. But like many other aspects of the crypto industry, the new kinds of services have drawn the attention of regulators. Recently, crypto lending platform BlockFi which also operates trading services and interest-bearing accounts, has the New Jersey Bureau of Securities breathing down its neck, with local authorities claiming BlockFi's Interest Accounts offers unregistered securities to its users. Texas and Alabama have made similar moves against BlockFi. According to Mashinsky, the sales aspect could be a sensitive zone for regulators. Celsius users must purchase cryptocurrencies outside of the network, putting Celsius out of regulatory cross hairs — at least for now. “Even though some may look at Celsius and BlockFi as competitors, they're really not competing with us on yield,” Mashinski said. “Our job is just to earn that yield for you.” But with the growth of the company, which Mashinsky says added US$300 million net assets in the same week Bitcoin recently dipped below the key US$30,000 mark, the company has opted to move its headquarters and main operations out of the United Kingdom to the United States, citing increasing regulatory uncertainty in the U.K. and the better business environment across the Atlantic. “For some of the things we do, we may benefit from being based in the United States,” Mashinsky said. “If we choose to go public or if we choose to do some other financial activities, there's a big disconnect in valuation.” Watch Mashinksy's interview with Forkast.News Editor-in-Chief Angie Lau to find out the safety and risks of crypto securities lending, Celsius' plans for public listing, why he believes Bitcoin will reach US$160,000 this year, and more.

Valkyrie's application to open a Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) has been delayed by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). But Valkyrie's chief executive is not surprised. She says a cautious approach is par for the course when it comes to approving any innovative financial product. “Actually, when we first applied for a Bitcoin ETF back in January, right after VanEck, we had a timeline of about two to three years that we thought the application would be,” Valkyrie CEO Leah Wald told Forkast.News in a video interview. “We moved our timeline up when it seemed as if there was a lot more interest.”A Bitcoin ETF is a financial instrument that reflects Bitcoin's price and is traded on traditional exchanges, giving investors with minimal crypto knowledge exposure to the asset without purchasing it directly. As Bitcoin ETF applications pile up for the SEC's review — with Cathie Wood's ARK Invest also recently adding to their number — some say the products should have been approved long ago. One of those voices is that of SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce, who said that if the SEC's standards for other products had been applied equally to Bitcoin ETFs, “one or more of them” would already have been approved. Wald, however, recalled precedents that certain products take longer to obtain SEC approval. “Even gold took a while,” she said. “Especially esoteric securities that are still being figured out from the rest of the agencies.” Wald said excessive market volatility could be a concern for the SEC. Not the direct volatility relating to the prices and public sentiment trailing the crypto industry, but the ability of the industry's infrastructure to handle that volatility. “I think that the SEC has been pretty clear from the onset of all the Bitcoin ETF applications, even back in 2017, about concerns around custody,” Wald said. “Now, we finally do have true institutional-grade custodians, but there are still stress tests happening in the market.”Watch Wald's interview with Forkast.News Editor-in-Chief Angie Lau to learn more about the benefits of a Bitcoin ETF compared to over-the-counter trusts and mutual funds, the increasingly crowded field of Bitcoin ETF applicants, Wald's positive outlook on Bitcoin and its technology, and more. 

As Huobi winds down in China, Binance gets put in the regulatory doghouse in the U.K., and Bybit is slapped with enforcement action by, Canadian authorities — cryptocurrency exchanges around the world are feeling the heat of intensifying government scrutiny and crackdowns.  Alexander Höptner, who became CEO of 100x Group — the holding group for crypto derivatives exchange BitMEX's owner HDR Global Trading Limited — after BitMEX co-founders Arthur Hayes, Benjamin Delo and Samuel Reed were charged with violating the U.S. Bank Secrecy Act, says that the reason behind the regulatory action is because crypto derivatives are “the next big thing.”“Most of the regulators are currently working on regulatory regimes on spot trading, brokerage and custody,” Höptner told Forkast.News in a video interview. “The next thing that's coming now is defining and designing a regulatory regime for derivatives.”Höptner hails from a traditional finance (TradFi) background, having led Germany's second largest stock exchange Börse Stuttgart to launch one of the European Union's first regulated digital assets exchange. He also held executive committee roles with the operator of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, Deutsche Börse AG.  Unlike Höptner, who has embraced the increasingly digitizing finance industry, other prominent players in the traditional finance space are more skeptical of crypto. “Big Short” investor Michael Burry recently raised hackles by calling the crypto market an overleveraged “bubble.”  But to Höptner, such concerns are overblown.“When you look at [our] leveraged products, yes, we have 100x, but the majority of the leverage clients are using single-digit,” Höptner said. “When you look at the classical financial markets, yes, the leverage is lower, but the usage of that one is much higher.”In a recent JPMorgan survey, 49% of investors from across 1,500 institutions shared legendary investor Warren Buffet's sentiment on Bitcoin, calling it “rat poison” or a temporary fad. The other 51%? They believe that Bitcoin will “become an important asset” and is “here to stay.”For Bitcoin and crypto to reach new heights and continue to achieve further institutional and professional adoption, some exchanges such as FTX have adopted licensing strategies. But according to Höptner, exchanges will need to pick and choose primary locations to comply with local regulations before global expansion.“You cannot be in every country in the world, fully regulated. It's impossible,” Höptner said. “First thing's first — start with the first fully licensed jurisdictions and then we tackle the next one, and probably the first one is not the U.S.”Watch Höptner's full interview with  Forkast.News Editor-in-Chief Angie Lau to learn more about which countries are wooing derivatives exchanges, why crypto is not so different from the traditional finance world, and how to assess the current digital assets market from a long-term perspective.

When El Salvador's president, Nayib Bukele, shared with the world that his “Bitcoin Law” had been approved by the nation's Congress in a supermajority vote, it was a watershed moment for the original cryptocurrency, and for cryptos generally. The adoption of a crypto coin as a parallel currency was billed as a means of mitigating the Central American nation's economic exposure to monetary policy made by another country's central bank — the U.S. Federal Reserve — and of giving Salvadorans more direct control over their own financial affairs. Now, not quite a month later, issues of financial self-determination remain in the spotlight for Samson Mow, chief strategy officer of Bitcoin technology company Blockstream. “The key here is to bring sound money to the people,” Mow told Forkast.News in a video interview. “Now, when they're earning a dollar in Bitcoin, they're getting the same hard currency and finite amount of currency that Michael Saylor would get when he invests billions into Bitcoin”. But in order for Bitcoin to succeed as a superior currency to existing fiat money, the network must be able to support micro-transactions. That's been a challenge, particularly in recent months — at their peak in April, average Bitcoin transaction fees topped US$60. “When you're spending, you don't want to pay a dollar for buying your groceries and then pay another dollar to pay for your [transaction fee],” Mow said. Layer 2 projects such as the Lightning Network and the Liquid Network are one means by which transaction fees can be lowered, as they decongest Bitcoin's main chain by moving transitions off it. “The Lightning Network is kind of like a network of bar tabs,” Mow said. “When you go to a bar and you want to order a drink, you're not going to pay for every single drink. You'll give them your card and then they'll charge you at the end of the day.” Although authorities in most countries are still grappling with the regulation of cryptocurrencies, Mow suggests that the increased adoption of Bitcoin will lead to what he calls “hyperbitcoinization” — a situation in which Bitcoin evolves is a ubiquitous currency. “At some point, you'll reach a tipping point, or inflection point, where you just cannot convert dollars into Bitcoin,” Mow said. “And at that point, your choice is to either mine Bitcoin or earn Bitcoin.” Watch Mow's full interview with Forkast.News Editor-in-Chief Angie Lau to learn more about Bitcoin's road to ubiquity, the lingering questions about the environmental impact of mining it, and how Layer 2 projects are paving the way for a Bitcoin-centric economy.