On today's Talking Tokens, Jacquelyn sits down with Jillian Friedman, Chief Operating Officer at Symbiotic, to talk about what it actually takes to make tokenization work at scale, ranging from why 94% of tokenized real-world assets are still bought directly from the issuer, to how Symbiotic's LiquidLane gives investors an instant exit from illiquid RWAs, to why she doesn't see CeFi and DeFi as opposing camps.

Jillian Friedman breaks down why she thinks institutions are tokenizing the easiest assets first instead of the most useful ones, what actually makes an asset "digitally native," and her honest answer for what it really takes to get a risk committee to say yes.

Timestamps: 

00:00 Introduction to Jill Friedman and her background

02:50 Why Jill transitioned from law to crypto and her early interest in Bitcoin

03:32 The appeal of DeFi and Symbiotic's focus on both C-Fi and DeFi

05:30 The future integration of centralized and decentralized finance

06:56 How digital native assets differ from off-chain assets

08:35 The spectrum of digital nativeness and tokenization challenges

11:25 Market readiness and infrastructure needs for tokenized assets

14:33 Long-term outlook: the inflection point for tokenization and DeFi

17:42 Regulatory and risk considerations for institutional adoption

21:24 LiquidLane: solving liquidity and exit challenges for RWAs

27:34 Future of tokenized assets and market evolution

28:40 Jill's advice for navigating the crypto space

Today’s episode is sponsored by Anchorage Digital, America's first federally chartered digital asset bank and provider of regulated stablecoin issuance. To find out more, visit anchorage.com. You can subscribe to the podcast on Spotify, Apple or YouTube. If you enjoy the show, please leave a review — it really helps. Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0LOgWxIQ0NnNUD5eXsSuoZ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/talking-tokens/id1743669141YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TalkingTokens Follow us on X Jacquelyn: / jacqmelinek Talking Tokens: / _talkingtokens Follow us on Instagram / _talkingtokens Note: This podcast is for informational purposes only. Views shared are opinions, not financial advice. The host or guests may have financial interests in discussed content.

On today's Talking Tokens, Jacquelyn sits down with Thomas Gregory, VP of Payments at Binance, to talk about what it actually looks like to build a global payment infrastructure from the inside, ranging from QR code rollouts in Argentina to the Binance Card hitting the market across 20 countries and B-Stocks hitting $2 billion in trading volume in a single weekend. 

Thomas breaks down why he sees domestic payments in Latin America and Africa as the real unlock for the next wave of adoption, why crypto and fiat are becoming indistinguishable in Binance's super app vision, and why his ultimate benchmark for success is the day isn’t what you’d think it is.

TIMESTAMPS: 

00:00 Introduction to Binance's Payments Vision

03:46 Lessons from Fintech Disruptors 

06:52 Consumer Acceptance of Crypto Payments

10:26 Hyper-Localization in Payment Solutions

12:19 Metrics for Binance’s Payment Success and Regional Focus

13:35 Binance Card: Flexibility and Usage

17:00 The Future of Crypto as a Payment Medium

26:57 Industry Milestones and Investor Demand

36:55 Addressing Local Currency Preferences and Education

39:10 The Road Ahead for Payments and User Adoption

42:14 Parting Advice

Today’s episode is sponsored by Anchorage Digital, America's first federally chartered digital asset bank and provider of regulated stablecoin issuance. To find out more, visit anchorage.com. 

You can subscribe to the podcast on Spotify, Apple or YouTube. If you enjoy the show, please leave a review — it really helps. 

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0LOgWxIQ0NnNUD5eXsSuoZ 

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/talking-tokens/id1743669141

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TalkingTokens 

Follow us on X Jacquelyn:   / jacqmelinek   

Talking Tokens:   / _talkingtokens   

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Note: This podcast is for informational purposes only. Views shared are opinions, not financial advice. The host or guests may have financial interests in discussed content. 

On this edition of Strata Research's Analyst Insights, Jacquelyn sits down with Institutional Research Analyst Alex Beaudry to break down the results of Strata's first industry survey where they asked five leaders across the agentic payments space, including the CEOs of Alchemy and Anchorage and Circle's Chief Product and Technology Officer, who all weighed in on where it actually stands today. The consensus is pretty clear: institutions are adopting this first, not consumers, and the reason has less to do with the technology and more to do with the fact that most people still don't want an AI agent touching their money, which Alex points out is basically the perfect combination of the two things the general public fears most.

TIMESTAMPS:

0:01 Introduction to Strata Surveys

1:22 Why Revisit Agentic Payments Now

3:42 Institutional vs. Consumer Adoption

7:22 What the Survey Responses Agreed vs Disagreed On

9:59 Trust, Risk, and the Path to Adoption

Research Link: https://www.token-relations.com/p/stratamedia-survey-agentic-payments

You can subscribe to the podcast on Spotify, Apple or YouTube. If you enjoy the show, please leave a review — it really helps. 

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0LOgWxIQ0NnNUD5eXsSuoZ 

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/talking-tokens/id1743669141

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TalkingTokens 

Follow us on X Jacquelyn:   / jacqmelinek   

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Note: This podcast is for informational purposes only. Views shared are opinions, not financial advice. The host or guests may have financial interests in discussed content. 

On today's Talking Tokens, Jacquelyn sits down with Dom & Phil Kwok, co-founders of EasyA, a platform that teaches developers and consumers how to actually build and use blockchain technology. 

The brothers also run some of the biggest hackathons in the space at events like Consensus Miami and Consensus Hong Kong. 

Dom & Phil explain why so much of crypto's top talent drifted to AI over the past few years, why they think the sentiment around crypto is starting to shift, and how their new Kickstart product is trying to do for funding what AI did for building. 

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 Sibling Entrepreneurs: The Journey Begins

02:31 Identifying Market Gaps in Blockchain Education

05:22 Trends in Consumer and Developer Interest

09:24 The Shift from AI to Crypto: A New Era

12:40 AI's Impact on the Workforce and Startups

15:50 Long-Term Vision: Balancing Roadmaps and Market Cycles

18:09 The Importance of Founder-Led Marketing

23:25 Getting Started on Social Media

24:38 Overcoming Fear of Posting

26:47 The Impact of AI on Content Creation

28:07 The Evolution of Startup Development

31:55 The Role of AI in Lowering Barriers to Entry

33:09 Bridging the Gap Between Wall Street and Crypto

35:45 The Growing Interest in Crypto on Wall Street

39:08 The Future of Tokenization and On-Chain Finance

43:11 Advice for Navigating the Crypto Landscape

Today’s episode is sponsored by Anchorage Digital, America's first federally chartered digital asset bank and provider of regulated stablecoin issuance. To find out more, visit anchorage.com. 

You can subscribe to the podcast on Spotify, Apple or YouTube. If you enjoy the show, please leave a review — it really helps. 

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0LOgWxIQ0NnNUD5eXsSuoZ 

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/talking-tokens/id1743669141

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TalkingTokens 

Follow us on X Jacquelyn:   / jacqmelinek   

Talking Tokens:   / _talkingtokens   

Follow us on Instagram   / _talkingtokens  

Note: This podcast is for informational purposes only. Views shared are opinions, not financial advice. The host or guests may have financial interests in discussed content.

On today's Talking Tokenization, Jacquelyn sits down with Suzy Singh, Deputy Chief Operating Officer at Securitize, to pull back the curtain on what institutional tokenization interest looks like day to day.

Suzy outlines why everything you're seeing announced publicly has been in the works for six to twenty-four months behind the scenes, then breaks down why Securitize tokenized its own equity on day one of going public. 

Then Suzy gets into what its recent Cantor Fitzgerald partnership is really trying to unlock for blockchain-based IPOs, and why she thinks the next major wave of adoption in this space isn't going to come from institutions. 

TIMESTAMPS:

0:01 What tokenization means and why it matters

01:03 Why more institutions are talking about tokenization

03:25 Where demand is coming from across financial firms

05:28 The long timeline from first conversation to launch

09:11 How going public changed Securitize’s credibility

14:20 Why issuer-sponsored tokenized equities matter

19:56 IPOs, retail adoption, and the future of onchain markets

You can subscribe to the podcast on Spotify, Apple or YouTube. If you enjoy the show, please leave a review — it really helps. 

This episode is sponsored by Securitize, the proven leader in tokenized funds, equities, and private markets. Discover more at securitize.io. 

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0LOgWxIQ0NnNUD5eXsSuoZ 

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/talking-tokens/id1743669141

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TalkingTokens 

Follow us on X Jacquelyn:   / jacqmelinek   

Talking Tokens:   / _talkingtokens   

Follow us on Instagram   / _talkingtokens  

Note: This podcast is for informational purposes only. Views shared are opinions, not financial advice. The host or guests may have financial interests in discussed content. 

On today's Talking Tokens, Jacquelyn sits down with Anchorage Digital’s CEO and Co-founder Nathan McCauley and Head of Policy Kevin Wysocki to talk about what the post-GENIUS Act world of stablecoins looks like from the inside.

They think most of the market isn't paying enough attention to the banks racing to tokenize their deposits and explain why all 5,000+ US banks are eventually going to need stablecoin rails, how DC has done a near complete 180 on crypto, and why agentic banking is tracking almost exactly like the early crypto industry did in 2017.

TIMESTAMPS:

02:00 The Current State of Institutional Adoption

03:55 Understanding Stablecoins and Digital Dollars

06:04 Global Perspective on Dollar Dominance

10:04 Future of Cross-Border Commerce and Global Payments

12:07 Building Infrastructure for Stablecoins

13:59 The Role of Policy in Stablecoin Adoption

20:50 Conversations Behind Closed Doors

23:01 Fed Master Accounts and Regulatory Clarity

27:23 The Rise of Tokenized Deposits

39:10 Building Trust in the Crypto Industry

41:49 The Future of Agentic Banking

49:34 Advice for the Future

Today’s episode is sponsored by Anchorage Digital, America's first federally chartered digital asset bank and provider of regulated stablecoin issuance. To find out more, visit anchorage.com. 

You can subscribe to the podcast on Spotify, Apple or YouTube. If you enjoy the show, please leave a review — it really helps. 

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0LOgWxIQ0NnNUD5eXsSuoZ 

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/talking-tokens/id1743669141

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TalkingTokens 

Follow us on X Jacquelyn:   / jacqmelinek   

Talking Tokens:   / _talkingtokens   

Follow us on Instagram   / _talkingtokens  

Note: This podcast is for informational purposes only. Views shared are opinions, not financial advice. The host or guests may have financial interests in discussed content. 

On today's Talking Tokens, Jacquelyn sits down with Joseph Chalom, CEO of Sharplink to talk about why he and a group of Ethereum stewards including Joe Lubin and Tom Lee decided now was the moment to go back on offense for the Ethereum ecosystem.

Joseph breaks down why he thinks the Ethereum institutional supercycle is already here, how Ethereum will win even amid bad price action and why the long term holders are the ones who will win this decade.

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 The Evolution of Ethereum's Narrative

03:38 Ethereum’s Institutional Supercycle

05:23 Why Ethereum’s Narrative Is Changing

07:48 Building Ethereum for Institutional Adoption

09:56 The Trillion-Dollar Tokenization Opportunity

16:46 Why the Institutional Supercycle Is Already Here

23:17 From Experimentation to On-Chain Finance

30:33 Investing in Ethereum’s Long-Term Future

You can subscribe to the podcast on Spotify, Apple or YouTube. If you enjoy the show, please leave a review — it really helps. 

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0LOgWxIQ0NnNUD5eXsSuoZ 

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/talking-tokens/id1743669141

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TalkingTokens 

Follow us on X Jacquelyn:   / jacqmelinek   

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Note: This podcast is for informational purposes only. Views shared are opinions, not financial advice. The host or guests may have financial interests in discussed content. 

On this edition of Strata Research, Jacquelyn sits down with our Institutional Research Analyst Alex Beaudry to dig into the OUSD announcement that resulted in Circle's stock dropping and had the crypto world convinced a new stablecoin competitor had arrived.

After looking into the details, Alex argues this is just Stripe's stablecoin wrapped in a consortium for competitive cover, then he walks through why the 140 company list is largely a marketing move before getting into which of the two paths to success for OUSD he actually thinks will play out. 

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 Introduction to OUSD and Its Impact

02:46 The Role of Stripe in OUSD

05:33 The Consortium of 140 Companies

08:00 Market Dynamics and Competition

10:15 Investor Reactions and Market Implications

13:20 Paths to Success for OUSD

Check out the associated Strata Research report for more details: https://www.token-relations.com/p/who-really-owns-ousd

You can subscribe to the podcast on Spotify, Apple or YouTube. If you enjoy the show, please leave a review — it really helps. 

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0LOgWxIQ0NnNUD5eXsSuoZ 

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/talking-tokens/id1743669141

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TalkingTokens 

Follow us on X Jacquelyn:   / jacqmelinek   

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Note: This podcast is for informational purposes only. Views shared are opinions, not financial advice. The host or guests may have financial interests in discussed content. 

On today's Talking Tokens, Jacquelyn sits down with CZ, founder and former CEO of Binance, on the exchange's ninth anniversary to talk about what he got right, what he missed, and why he thinks AI handling payments in crypto is coming within months, not years. 

CZ breaks down why he once thought stablecoins were a temporary patch job, how he sees blockchain technology as one of three foundational technologies alongside the internet and AI, and why crypto wealth penetration is still well under 1%. 

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 AI, Crypto, and the Future of Payments

00:33 Building Binance in 2017 and Moving Faster

03:44 How Binance Reached the Top

05:48 Building a Community-Driven Platform

08:27 Creating Products People Return To

10:31 Crypto as Foundational Technology

11:33 Where AI and Crypto Intersect

14:26 Using AI as a Productivity Tool

18:37 The Next Opportunities in Crypto

21:21 Building at the Intersection of Skills and Value

21:53 The Future of Traditional and On-Chain Finance

You can subscribe to the podcast on Spotify, Apple or YouTube. If you enjoy the show, please leave a review — it really helps. 

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0LOgWxIQ0NnNUD5eXsSuoZ 

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/talking-tokens/id1743669141

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TalkingTokens 

Follow us on X Jacquelyn:   / jacqmelinek   

Talking Tokens:   / _talkingtokens   

Follow us on Instagram   / _talkingtokens  

Note: This podcast is for informational purposes only. Views shared are opinions, not financial advice. The host or guests may have financial interests in discussed content. 

On today's Talking Tokens, Jacquelyn sits down with Roger Bayston, Head of Digital Assets at Franklin Templeton, to discuss his 35-year journey at the firm and how tokenization became the focal point to his career there today.

Roger breaks down how he sees blockchain less as a new financial system and more as a long overdue infrastructure replacement, why BENJI’s ability to transfer and accrue interest in real time is a bigger deal than it sounds, and why investors should stop sleeping on a specific asset class with $25 to $30 trillion in activity. 

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 Introduction to Tokenization and Franklin Templeton

03:02 Roger Bayston's Journey in Finance

05:45 The Vision for Tokenization in Asset Management

09:11 State of Tokenization Today

11:46 The Evolution of BENJI and Its Impact

15:01 Future Outlook for Tokenization

17:57 The Integration of Traditional Finance and Blockchain

21:05 The Future of Investment Products

21:59 Resurrecting SPVs and Trust in Finance

25:07 Building Trust in Digital Assets

28:21 Institutional Interest in Blockchain

30:46 Investing in Networks and Blockchain Opportunities

33:45 Tokenization and New Asset Classes

39:31 The Future of Banking and Tokenization

You can subscribe to the podcast on Spotify, Apple or YouTube. If you enjoy the show, please leave a review — it really helps. 

This episode is sponsored by Securitize, the proven leader in tokenized funds, equities, and private markets. Discover more at securitize.io.

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0LOgWxIQ0NnNUD5eXsSuoZ 

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/talking-tokens/id1743669141

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TalkingTokens 

Follow us on X Jacquelyn:   / jacqmelinek   

Talking Tokens:   / _talkingtokens   

Follow us on Instagram   / _talkingtokens  

Note: This podcast is for informational purposes only. Views shared are opinions, not financial advice. The host or guests may have financial interests in discussed content.