Around the Coin

On the Around The Coin podcast, host Stephen Sargeant interviews fintech leader Michelle Beyo, CEO and Founder of Finavator, about why open banking, open finance, and open data have advanced globally while North America, particularly Canada, continues to lag behind due to a lack of consumer data rights, clear timelines, and mandated implementation. Beyo explains how consent-driven data sharing could increase competition, lower costs, improve lending and mortgage processes, and potentially drive GDP growth, citing McKinsey's estimate of a 1–5% GDP impact from open data and Brazil's reduced interest rates for small and medium-sized businesses. They also discuss digital identity, Denmark's efforts to protect consumers' rights over their voices and likenesses against AI deepfakes, stablecoin innovation shifting toward the U.S., Canada's productivity and funding challenges, and the importance of retaining intellectual property and entrepreneurial talent. Beyo also shares insights into Finavator's work, its new Venture Studios initiative, and practical advice on building partnerships, preventing burnout, and standing out through thought leadership.

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Host Stephen Sargeant introduces an in-person September 2025 Around The Coin podcast episode with Emma Todd, CEO/co-founder of MMH Technology and CEO of MMH Data Systems, an early Toronto crypto organizer who moved from traditional banking into crypto full time in 2016. Todd recounts her start at a Bitcoin conference, building events, learning pricing without mentors, and why early companies folded when they couldn’t explain what problem they solved. She explains Canada’s innovation challenges and talent flight, contrasts faster, more supportive jurisdictions, and highlights Alberta’s pro-business approach. Todd details how she entered Bitcoin mining via launching the first mining conference in 2018, built a business in equipment and site selection, and began transitioning into AI data centers in 2022 with global clients. She shares leadership and hiring principles, due diligence practices, and entrepreneurship advice on research, mentorship, pivoting, multiple income streams, and loving the grind.

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In this episode of Around The Coin, host Stephen Sargeant sits down with Amanda Wick, author of The Catalyst and Founder & CEO of the Association for Women in Cryptocurrency, for a wide-ranging conversation about the forces reshaping institutions, technology, and society.

Amanda shares insights from her experience in financial crime, crypto, and public service, including her work on the January 6th Committee. She and Stephen discuss misinformation and social engineering, declining trust in institutions, political polarization, the relationship between crypto and regulation, AML and financial crime, and the growing tension between technological progress and democratic institutions.

They also explore the state of the crypto industry, the consequences of regulatory and political decisions, FATF and the global financial system, gender inclusion in crypto, and why Amanda believes meaningful change ultimately depends on people rather than institutions alone.

This is a conversation about more than crypto. It’s about who shapes the systems we live under, how those systems change, and what happens when trust begins to disappear.

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Host Stephen Sargeant welcomes Wei Zhou, CEO at Coins.ph, to discuss grassroots crypto and stablecoin adoption in the Philippines, why the country consistently ranks in Chainalysis’ global top 10, and how regulation since 2016–2017 enabled licensed exchanges and bank connectivity. Zhou explains Coins.ph’s dual licensing (VASP and EMI), its focus on remittances and payments, and how stablecoins can cut remittance costs from 5–10% to 10–20 bps when used properly, emphasizing the importance of deep USDT/USDC-to-peso liquidity and 24/7 rails. He recounts his entry into crypto via ICO-era token distributions, his “Google moment” using Binance, and his time as Binance CFO. The conversation also covers Coins’ PHPC peso-backed stablecoin sandbox, multi-chain stablecoin support, AI-driven productivity inside the company, post-FTX trust, and transparency initiatives like putting government budgets on-chain.

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In this episode of Around The Coin, Stephen Sargeant speaks with Bart Smith, CEO of Avalanche Treasury Co., to discuss building a regulated digital asset treasury focused on the Avalanche ecosystem. Bart explains why a public treasury vehicle can give investors brokerage-account access to AVAX exposure, staking (over 90% staked), and potential upside from investing in Avalanche-native businesses. They cover U.S. regulatory developments including the CLARITY and GENIUS Acts, shifting SEC/CFTC attitudes, and why institutional adoption may accelerate despite lagging prices. Bart shares his background in quant trading and early Bitcoin involvement, why he chose Avalanche for privacy, permissioning, customization, and EVM-compatible high throughput, and highlights use cases like FIFA ticketing and Wyoming’s stablecoin. They also discuss payments, tokenization of real-world assets, DeFi growth, buybacks, and long-term infrastructure for 24/7 markets.

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Host Stephen Sargeant welcomes George Christopher, Principal Investor at CoinFund (founded 2015), discussing how CoinFund invests from pre-seed through Series C+ across seed and venture funds in blockchain-focused companies. George shares his background in SaaS growth investing, argues the “SaaSpocalypse” mainly threatens horizontal workflow tools, and outlines defensible moats like proprietary data, security, licenses, and liquidity. He explains early-stage investing centers on founder/team vision and market size, while later-stage focuses on product-market fit and scaling. They cover crypto VC dynamics, stablecoins as long-term infrastructure, regulation as both risk and moat (including stablecoins and prediction markets), AI’s impact on venture workflows, compute and specialized data as AI “picks and shovels,” and why agentic payments will take longer due to trust and guardrails. George also details CoinFund’s LatAm stablecoin payments bet on Trace Finance in Brazil, and shares where to find him and CoinFund for pitches. 

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Live from Futurist, host Stephen Sargeant interviews Charlene Cieslik, an independent financial crime compliance consultant with 26 years in compliance (including early FINTRAC) and 10 years in crypto, about Canada’s crypto compliance landscape. Cieslik argues repeated misconduct by industry players has driven regulatory stagnation and poor laws, and says stablecoins should be treated as payments, not securities, while warning Canada is lagging in innovation. She highlights data sovereignty and national security risks from foreign-controlled payments infrastructure, calls for stronger public-private collaboration, and is skeptical FINTRAC’s enforcement push will deliver. Discussing Bitcoin ATMs, she supports data-driven decisions over bans, and stresses many firms mistake AML for KYC, neglecting risk assessments. She also covers “three MSBs in a trench coat” risks, the importance of human communication amid AI governance, and challenges women face in crypto, emphasizing visibility and speaking openly as her legacy.

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Live from Futurist, host Stephen Sargeant interviews Andrei Poliakov, founder and CEO of APX Lending. Poliakov explains why he built a highly regulated, compliant crypto-backed lending business after failures like Celsius, BlockFi, Voyager and FTX, offering loans in Canada and the US against Bitcoin and Ethereum up to 60% LTV with no rehypothecation, segregated insured cold-storage custody and on-chain collateral visibility. He details APX’s second vertical—lending-as-a-service—providing a plug-and-play stack for exchanges, banks, credit unions and fintechs to launch crypto lending in under 60 days while APX handles credit, compliance, underwriting and servicing. They discuss Canadian regulatory realities, adoption, banking interest, borrower use cases, entrepreneurship, and how APX uses AI behind the scenes while keeping human support.

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Live from Futurist, host Stephen Sargeant interviews Nikita Sachdev, owner of Luna PR, about how AI is reshaping public relations in crypto, Web3, and AI. Nikita explains that while AI makes content creation easy, distribution and winning attention are harder, making PR and credible placements more valuable, especially as search shifts from SEO to “GEO” (generative engine optimization) driven by AI recommendations. They discuss balancing digital PR with in-real-life relationship building through conferences, private dinners, and Luna PR events like Crypto Polo Cup and DAT Summit. Nikita shares takeaways from interviewing CZ, outlines common client pitfalls like weak product-market fit and unrealistic fundraising expectations, notes the industry’s institutional shift, and describes staff reductions and efficiency gains from AI. She also previews an AI media-intelligence tool to improve pitch relevance and journalist matching.

We are also available via:

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Host Stephen Sargeant welcomes Patrick O’Kain, partner at Borderless Capital, to discuss cybersecurity, crypto investigations, blockchain analytics, and how AI-driven agentic commerce and stablecoins will reshape payments and finance. O’Kane explains Borderless Capital’s infrastructure-focused investing, his background in counter-terrorism finance and DOJ crypto investigations, and why blockchain security is increasingly treated as a national security priority as institutions move markets onto blockchain rails. They cover dual-use investing and navigating government procurement, the shift from retail “mass adoption” to institutional and autonomous transaction flows, and why trust, data, and real operational maturity create moats as AI lowers barriers to building products. O’Kane highlights Cloudburst Technologies’ threat intelligence approach combining off-chain and on-chain data, discusses stablecoin growth and tokenization composability, and flags post-quantum security and “harvest now, decrypt later” risks.

We are also available via:

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