theCUBE + NYSE Wired: Crypto Trailblazers | Nick Ducoff, Solana & Manish Dutta, Alphaledger

Nick Ducoff, Solana & Manish Dutta, Alphaledger

In this insightful episode of the Crypto Trailblazers series hosted by theCUBE, Mike Cagney of Figure Markets sits down with analysts from theCUBE Research to discuss groundbreaking advancements in blockchain technology and their implications for the finance sector. This video is part of the NYSE Wired digital event, aimed at bridging the gap between Silicon Valley and Wall Street by integrating technology and finance. Cagney, an eminent figure in fintech, shares expertise on the transformative role of blockchain in financial markets during this interview. Conducted by seasoned analysts at theCUBE, the discussion delves into Figure’s innovative contributions, including their blockchain-native loan origination and securitization process. He outlines how Figure leverages blockchain to achieve cost reductions, enhanced security and improved liquidity in financial transactions. Key takeaways from the interview highlight insights on the evolution of the Web3 ecosystem, such as the emergence of stablecoins as pivotal to transaction processes and the rise of decentralized finance (DeFi). Oltsik states these developments signify a shift towards democratizing finance, wherein truth and transparency are foundational. The conversation concludes with a look at Figure’s pioneering efforts in creating a new financial marketplace utilizing blockchain technology. #CryptoTrailblazers #FigureMarkets #BlockchainInnovation #Web3 #NYEWired #BlockchainFinance #DecentralizedFinance #Fintech #Stablecoins Find more SiliconANGLE news and analysis https://siliconangle.com/. Follow theCUBE's wall-to-wall event coverage https://siliconangle.com/events/ Learn about the latest theCUBE events https://www.thecube.net/ 00:00 - Intro 00:05 - Emerging Innovations in Financial Technology and Market Dynamics 02:45 - Key Elements in Financial Ecosystem Dynamics 06:20 - Blockchain: Truth and Transformation 09:39 - Shaping the Future: Innovations in Financial Markets and Stablecoin Integration 13:15 - Enabling the Future: Navigating Disruptions in Banking and Lending 16:51 - Exploring Opportunities and Building Confidence in the Blockchain Ecosystem

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More from theCUBE + NYSE Wired: Crypto Trailblazers

Manish Dutta

Founder & CEO

Alphaledger

Nick Ducoff

Head of Institutional Growth

Solana

play_circle_outline John Furrier hosts a discussion with Nick and Manish at the NYSE studio.

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play_circle_outline Transforming Securities: Alphaledger's On-Chain Innovations and Solana's Fastest Blockchain Partnership with Simplify Asset Management

play_circle_outline Modernizing KYC and AML: Ensuring Regulatory Frameworks Foster Innovation in Blockchain Integration for Finance's Future

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Nick Ducoff, Solana & Manish Dutta, Alphaledger

Manish Dutta

Founder & CEO Alphaledger

Nick Ducoff

Head of Institutional Growth Solana

search

John Furrier

>> I'm John Furrier with theCUBE. We are here at theCUBE's East Coast new studio at the New York Stock Exchange. Of course, we've got our Palo Alto Studios. Of course, we cover all the tech events all over the world. I'm John Furrier, your host. We've got two great guests here, Nick and Manish. Nick's the head of instrumental growth at Solana. We just had a great breakfast. Manish is an entrepreneur, CEO of Alphaledger. Gentlemen, thank you for coming on as part of the Crypto Trailblazer series, the NYC Wired programming community. You're both blazing the trail. Nick, we go back, we're just riffing off camera, early days of big data. Now, we're in big crypto. Manish, good to see you. Nick, we'll start with you. You hosted a breakfast, the NYSE president was on, with me and Brian Baumann. Curated a list of players at the Solana office. Talk about the organization that you're heading up and the community and the role and the relationship.

Nick Ducoff

>> Yeah, so Solana Foundation was formed to support the Solana blockchain, support with growth, support with development, support with the ecosystem, and really help ensure that Solana continues to exist and grow forever. I think it's still very early, but incredible exciting growth at Solana season. This year alone, Solana's the most used blockchain in the world with over 120 million daily transactions, $2.5 trillion has been transacted on the network year to date.

John Furrier

>> We had the NYSE president on and the US presence now, cute, notable, huge international success. Smart contracts. It's the fastest, most preferred chain by many, if you look at the uptake. Just talk about that dynamic real quickly. I think it's notable.

Nick Ducoff

>> Yeah, it's pretty incredible. But there's actually more transactions on Solana than all other public blockchains combined. The reason for that is it's the fastest, it's the cheapest, and it has unified liquidity. I think one of the things that the founders got really, really right was they said, "Hey, you don't have to make the trade-off between scalability and liquidity." Solana's vision is to bring all people around the world together in a single liquidity venue to trade any asset against any other asset 24/7. With 80 million monthly users of the platform, we now have about 1% of the world's population, 99% to go.

John Furrier

>> Manish, you're an entrepreneur, you're building on this new infrastructure, not new, but maturing fast. Talk about what you guys are doing at Alphaledger and then you've seen these ways before. What's notable right now?

Manish Dutta

>> Yeah, look, I think crypto's here to stay. It's becoming mainstream. When I started Alphaledger in 2019, our focus was very simple, which is to bring securities on chain. The question really we had to answer was when and how do we do it? It wasn't the question of if. That allowed us to become the first player in the industry to record municipal debt on blockchain, first ones in the country to do both loans and securities on blockchain as it relates to municipal debt. Recently, we partnered with Simplify Asset Management to launch a T-12 target distribution of 12% private fund that's on Solana. We love Solana for a couple of reasons. One, it is the fastest blockchain that's out there. It is purpose built for speed, settlement, execution. Importantly, there is a human element to it that I really personally need, especially building a securities business on blockchain.

John Furrier

>> Yeah, that came up in today's breakfast. I want to know, it wasn't filmed, so I want to do a real quick recap and then I want to come back to it. This is an exclusive event. Nick, you hosted the Solana office with the NYCQ and NYC Wired. State of Crypto Policy, the View from Washington. Obviously, you kicked it off and you hosted and curated the group, the head of technology at Capital Markets Brian Baumann and the ICE Futures President Trabue was there. He had some commentary. Guys, explain what the breakfast is about. What is the point of view from Washington? What is the state of crypto policy? Because this is going to happen. Securities will be on chain, it's just a matter of time, everyone knows it. This is a force that cannot be reckoned with, but the political blockers and all the jockeying going on in D.C. certainly will impact timing. Thoughts on State of Crypto Policy, the View from Washington, even though we're in New York.

Nick Ducoff

>> A few really promising things have happened this year. One, President Trump ended Operation Choke Point 2.0, so that allows banks to bank crypto companies. I think that was a really big deal. Second really big deal was the GENIUS Act was passed. This made stable coins approved by legislation and here to stay. Now, it's no longer a four-letter word to use the blockchain for these financial institutions. Then, the third thing is just I think the success of the public markets for crypto companies. You've seen Circle, Figure, Galaxy, Gemini, many of those are actually also trading on the Solana blockchain, SuperState tokenized Galaxy stock, which is trading on the Solana blockchain. I think the success of those IPOs has been a very clear marker that the window is open right now for more and more blockchain activity.

John Furrier

>> Manish, you've seen the tech projects from IT transformation. We're in a revolution here and evolution with crypto. What's your view of what needs to happen in Washington in the state of crypto?

Manish Dutta

>> Yeah, look, I think to Nick's point, President Trump and his administration, so David Sacks and team right below him, they've done a fantastic job. For the last four or five years that we were talking to the regulators, you couldn't really do much. With the new administration now in place, the rules are working towards a tokenization ecosystem. I think this is the future, where the future is now. As the regulators engage more of the regulated firms like us, I think the reality is that securities' coming onto public blockchain and we are focused very much on Solana. That's going to happen in near real time and it's going to happen faster than we think it's going to take, and it's already here.

John Furrier

>> I enjoyed the dialogue from the crowd. It was a very short presentation from the president of ICE. Nick, the commentary is interesting. There was a lot of commentary, and Trabue said something really interesting, builders and processors, the build side and the process side, we're in build-out mode.

Nick Ducoff

>> Absolutely.

John Furrier

>> But process, you can need it just enough to keep it going, but you don't want too much. This is a huge issue for Solana because it's very active on the build-out side still. Then, he's got a venture he's got going on, and this dependencies hat, shoes need to drop.

Nick Ducoff

>> A hundred percent. Solana is for builders. One of the reasons I wanted us to do this segment today with Manish and I together is because it's never about us at the Solana Foundation. It's always about people like Manish who are building on the Solana blockchain. As you mentioned, and John, we're so grateful that you joined us today at our offices downtown, we had 30 plus builders in the room, builders from Franklin Templeton, builders from Citi, builders from tokenization protocols like Alphaledger, all together figuring out how can we make the Solana blockchain ecosystem better. I think that's one of the really truly great things about the Solana ecosystem.

John Furrier

>> Manish, talk about from the builder side, obviously, you're not doing a nonprofit, it's for profit. Although, there's certainly a societal benefit that has impact, maybe sidecar or something along the lines, but you're building out. What are some of the things you need to see? What do you really firm on? What's your point of view on this? This is a huge dynamic.

Manish Dutta

>> Yeah, look, I think process is important, but process cannot be an impediment to innovation. As we think of securities coming on chain, one of the fundamental things that have to change is how we really do the KYC AML. I think the government is working towards that. The policy makers are thinking about that, but I think that really has to be looked at very closely in order for real products and real innovation to come on a public blockchain. Because I think the old rules, while they served as well, they continue to serve us okay, they're not meant for a fast engine like Solana, so that has to change. As we think of bringing real products, like we recently announced a billion dollar housing infrastructure, and that's going to come on Solana. I think these homes are being built for the middle mile, the policemen, the firemen, the teachers that support our country and our children, that infrastructure has to be built. For that to get built on a structure like Solana, we need better rules, better roadmap, better regulatory infrastructure.

John Furrier

>> I want to get your thoughts, Manish, on this because there's something that I was talking to Nick about and Brian off camera. Successful open source or open communities thrive when there's participation. There's clear examples on the software side, Linux Foundation, Apache Software Foundation. To Nick's point, they didn't want to get in the way, but they want to facilitate and create less friction for builders. What's your view on the Solana ecosystem? Could you share, for the folks that may not know some of the working mechanics, why do you like it? What's going on? What are the key things they're optimizing for? Why should I do that? What's in it for me?

Manish Dutta

>> Yeah. Look, we started in a permissioned environment. When we decided to move to Solana, it was a purposeful decision. It was baked on two fundamental facts. One, when we started, Solana did not exist. It has existed, it's gone through ups and downs, but it's now fortified. It's the fastest chain out there. As the team is focused on engineering, it'll allow us to transact in 130 milliseconds. Today, it's 400 milliseconds. Tomorrow, it's going to 130 milliseconds. That is fast. That means the speed of light. The next step really for us was the human element. That is the most important component when you're building technology and when you're building a financial technology on a public blockchain. I don't think there is a chance-

John Furrier

>> Give me an example of what that means.

Manish Dutta

>> It means being able to call an engineer when you want to design a token where you want to ensure there is confidentiality. Nobody wants to see balance sheets out there. I think working with the engineers at Solana is paramount for the success of financial innovation.

John Furrier

>> Nick, you had a great line on the Uber coming from the breakfast that your organization is viewed as a human API to Solana. I like that. I want to ask you explain what that means.

Nick Ducoff

>> Yeah, so the Solana technology is open source, available to anyone on GitHub. The Solana Foundation's purpose, there are not that many of us. There's only 60 or 70 of us that work at the Solana Foundation, but it's really our job to facilitate the builders and cultivate an ecosystem of folks, because there's never going to be enough of us at the foundation. In fact, we want to remain small and get even smaller to help support all of the 80 million monthly users of the Solana network. Helping support builders like Manish and they become evangelists. We also have a program called Super Team where we have groups of individuals all over the world who help us be local as well as global. Here on Wall Street, I think we're increasingly seeing the DATs and ETF issuers. At the breakfast today, we had Bitwise, Franklin Templeton, many other issuers. Those folks now all help support spreading that message of the many virtues of the Solana network as well.

John Furrier

>> Manish and Nick, I want to get your thoughts on an observation that I have and I want you to get a reaction or agree, disagree, or add commentary to it. The old model of innovation was the young guard displace the old guard, the new guard kills the old guard. SaaS, and then we've seen... but cloud computing now, we're in 2.0 cloud, you got blockchain infrastructure. It looks a lot like infrastructure on the cloud, IaaS, PaaS, SaaS, but a little bit different. But here in New York, the old guard is coming together with the new guard. It's a blending because it's so powerful. You have old guard, new guard interacting. Stable coins, because of the GENIUS and CLARITY Act, puts really good frameworks in place that lets regulatory catch up, and then ultimately accounting and finance, that's a system design. What's you guys view of this cultural ship? Because it's not the bomb-thrower Gen Z, "Yeah, take over the new territory." It's a cohesiveness. What's your reaction? Do you agree and would you add comments or anything? Because I think it's something I've never seen before where they're old and new. Not old aged, but you have some old like me, but it's a interaction.

Manish Dutta

>> Look, I'll call myself old, okay? I was at a firm called PIMCO for 20 years, and I think in finance you have to collaborate. There is just no getting around that, right? When you're talking about moving capital, when you're talking about somebody's investments, when you're talking about trading, it's a contact sport, but it does require collaboration at the end of the day. Just seeing that and seeing that in New York is quite amazing because it is allowing us to build innovative products. It is forcing the regulators to look at things differently. That's how you move the economy. That's how you move the industry forward, is by collaboration, so I agree. I think that's the only way to move forward and not just have it be a young versus old person game.

John Furrier

>> It's not a missionaries and mercenary binary thing.

Manish Dutta

>> No.

John Furrier

>> A little bit of both?

Manish Dutta

>> It's a body contact sport, but you need teams.

John Furrier

>> Nick, you got to be in the arena. What's your take on this? Because, again, this is community 101, right?

Nick Ducoff

>> Yeah, listen, I think the two biggest things happening right now in technology are AI and blockchain. If you're in finance, blockchain is absolutely as important as AI. You're seeing everyone make investments in the blockchain space. It's only until recently when the new administration came in and really set the frameworks and are making regulatory permissiveness such that financial institutions can engage around this. They don't see a clear path forever. They see a clear path into the midterms, which we don't know what's going to happen then, but everyone's moving as fast as they possibly can to lay as much track in the next 18 months so that this is hardened. They can run finance on blockchain rails, which is the vision that totally the founder of Solana had from the very beginning, which is all assets, single liquidity venue, global participation. That's what we're fighting for at the Solana Foundation.

John Furrier

>> Yeah, and the good news in D.C. is unlike a decade ago, the lawmakers are more tech savvy, less lawyers, more tech leaning. They still got lawyers down there, but you're starting to see that. The Gen Zs are recognizing that they don't know what they don't know. They're smarter now. They're online. They're all learning, either self-learning, dropping out of school. We had Steve Wang in here yesterday from Dub, dropped out of school at 18 from Harvard. He's got this amazing platform, and he was on camera and he said, "Yeah, I didn't know anything about compliance, so I hired an old guy. He was 35." All right, good, but this is the self-awareness.

Manish Dutta

>> Sure.

John Furrier

>> This is where there's some old stuff, like you've said, it is team sport, you got to know this.

Manish Dutta

>> Yeah. Yep. I think compliance, as it relates to securities, it's an important component. That's the process part, right? The building part is the fun part, and that's what we are building on Solana.

John Furrier

>> Guys, thanks so much for coming in. Nick, thank you so much for organizing that breakfast. I was super honored to be there. Solana's got great performance, great ecosystem, and outside of the speeds and feeds on the chain, it really is fostering a huge entrepreneurial culture, kind of a new generation. It's the same movie we've seen many, many times in tech, but it's coming into all verticals and all industries, and it's just phenomenal. Manish, congratulations.

Manish Dutta

>> Thank you.

Nick Ducoff

>> Thank you.

John Furrier

>> All right, I'm John Furrier. This is a Crypto Trailblazer series, our ongoing series. We feature the leaders in crypto and blockchain infrastructure. Again, the movie is the same, infrastructure, software, applications all coming in on a decentralized basis. We're doing our part to share that data with you. Thanks for watching.

Nick Ducoff, Solana & Manish Dutta, Alphaledger

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John Furrier

>> I'm John Furrier with theCUBE. We are here at theCUBE's East Coast new studio at the New York Stock Exchange. Of course, we've got our Palo Alto Studios. Of course, we cover all the tech events all over the world. I'm John Furrier, your host. We've got two great guests here, Nick and Manish. Nick's the head of instrumental growth at Solana. We just had a great breakfast. Manish is an entrepreneur, CEO of Alphaledger. Gentlemen, thank you for coming on as part of the Crypto Trailblazer series, the NYC Wired programming community. You're both blazing the trail. Nick, we go back, we're just riffing off camera, early days of big data. Now, we're in big crypto. Manish, good to see you. Nick, we'll start with you. You hosted a breakfast, the NYSE president was on, with me and Brian Baumann. Curated a list of players at the Solana office. Talk about the organization that you're heading up and the community and the role and the relationship.

Nick Ducoff

>> Yeah, so Solana Foundation was formed to support the Solana blockchain, support with growth, support with development, support with the ecosystem, and really help ensure that Solana continues to exist and grow forever. I think it's still very early, but incredible exciting growth at Solana season. This year alone, Solana's the most used blockchain in the world with over 120 million daily transactions, $2.5 trillion has been transacted on the network year to date.

John Furrier

>> We had the NYSE president on and the US presence now, cute, notable, huge international success. Smart contracts. It's the fastest, most preferred chain by many, if you look at the uptake. Just talk about that dynamic real quickly. I think it's notable.

Nick Ducoff

>> Yeah, it's pretty incredible. But there's actually more transactions on Solana than all other public blockchains combined. The reason for that is it's the fastest, it's the cheapest, and it has unified liquidity. I think one of the things that the founders got really, really right was they said, "Hey, you don't have to make the trade-off between scalability and liquidity." Solana's vision is to bring all people around the world together in a single liquidity venue to trade any asset against any other asset 24/7. With 80 million monthly users of the platform, we now have about 1% of the world's population, 99% to go.

John Furrier

>> Manish, you're an entrepreneur, you're building on this new infrastructure, not new, but maturing fast. Talk about what you guys are doing at Alphaledger and then you've seen these ways before. What's notable right now?

Manish Dutta

>> Yeah, look, I think crypto's here to stay. It's becoming mainstream. When I started Alphaledger in 2019, our focus was very simple, which is to bring securities on chain. The question really we had to answer was when and how do we do it? It wasn't the question of if. That allowed us to become the first player in the industry to record municipal debt on blockchain, first ones in the country to do both loans and securities on blockchain as it relates to municipal debt. Recently, we partnered with Simplify Asset Management to launch a T-12 target distribution of 12% private fund that's on Solana. We love Solana for a couple of reasons. One, it is the fastest blockchain that's out there. It is purpose built for speed, settlement, execution. Importantly, there is a human element to it that I really personally need, especially building a securities business on blockchain.

John Furrier

>> Yeah, that came up in today's breakfast. I want to know, it wasn't filmed, so I want to do a real quick recap and then I want to come back to it. This is an exclusive event. Nick, you hosted the Solana office with the NYCQ and NYC Wired. State of Crypto Policy, the View from Washington. Obviously, you kicked it off and you hosted and curated the group, the head of technology at Capital Markets Brian Baumann and the ICE Futures President Trabue was there. He had some commentary. Guys, explain what the breakfast is about. What is the point of view from Washington? What is the state of crypto policy? Because this is going to happen. Securities will be on chain, it's just a matter of time, everyone knows it. This is a force that cannot be reckoned with, but the political blockers and all the jockeying going on in D.C. certainly will impact timing. Thoughts on State of Crypto Policy, the View from Washington, even though we're in New York.

Nick Ducoff

>> A few really promising things have happened this year. One, President Trump ended Operation Choke Point 2.0, so that allows banks to bank crypto companies. I think that was a really big deal. Second really big deal was the GENIUS Act was passed. This made stable coins approved by legislation and here to stay. Now, it's no longer a four-letter word to use the blockchain for these financial institutions. Then, the third thing is just I think the success of the public markets for crypto companies. You've seen Circle, Figure, Galaxy, Gemini, many of those are actually also trading on the Solana blockchain, SuperState tokenized Galaxy stock, which is trading on the Solana blockchain. I think the success of those IPOs has been a very clear marker that the window is open right now for more and more blockchain activity.

John Furrier

>> Manish, you've seen the tech projects from IT transformation. We're in a revolution here and evolution with crypto. What's your view of what needs to happen in Washington in the state of crypto?

Manish Dutta

>> Yeah, look, I think to Nick's point, President Trump and his administration, so David Sacks and team right below him, they've done a fantastic job. For the last four or five years that we were talking to the regulators, you couldn't really do much. With the new administration now in place, the rules are working towards a tokenization ecosystem. I think this is the future, where the future is now. As the regulators engage more of the regulated firms like us, I think the reality is that securities' coming onto public blockchain and we are focused very much on Solana. That's going to happen in near real time and it's going to happen faster than we think it's going to take, and it's already here.

John Furrier

>> I enjoyed the dialogue from the crowd. It was a very short presentation from the president of ICE. Nick, the commentary is interesting. There was a lot of commentary, and Trabue said something really interesting, builders and processors, the build side and the process side, we're in build-out mode.

Nick Ducoff

>> Absolutely.

John Furrier

>> But process, you can need it just enough to keep it going, but you don't want too much. This is a huge issue for Solana because it's very active on the build-out side still. Then, he's got a venture he's got going on, and this dependencies hat, shoes need to drop.

Nick Ducoff

>> A hundred percent. Solana is for builders. One of the reasons I wanted us to do this segment today with Manish and I together is because it's never about us at the Solana Foundation. It's always about people like Manish who are building on the Solana blockchain. As you mentioned, and John, we're so grateful that you joined us today at our offices downtown, we had 30 plus builders in the room, builders from Franklin Templeton, builders from Citi, builders from tokenization protocols like Alphaledger, all together figuring out how can we make the Solana blockchain ecosystem better. I think that's one of the really truly great things about the Solana ecosystem.

John Furrier

>> Manish, talk about from the builder side, obviously, you're not doing a nonprofit, it's for profit. Although, there's certainly a societal benefit that has impact, maybe sidecar or something along the lines, but you're building out. What are some of the things you need to see? What do you really firm on? What's your point of view on this? This is a huge dynamic.

Manish Dutta

>> Yeah, look, I think process is important, but process cannot be an impediment to innovation. As we think of securities coming on chain, one of the fundamental things that have to change is how we really do the KYC AML. I think the government is working towards that. The policy makers are thinking about that, but I think that really has to be looked at very closely in order for real products and real innovation to come on a public blockchain. Because I think the old rules, while they served as well, they continue to serve us okay, they're not meant for a fast engine like Solana, so that has to change. As we think of bringing real products, like we recently announced a billion dollar housing infrastructure, and that's going to come on Solana. I think these homes are being built for the middle mile, the policemen, the firemen, the teachers that support our country and our children, that infrastructure has to be built. For that to get built on a structure like Solana, we need better rules, better roadmap, better regulatory infrastructure.

John Furrier

>> I want to get your thoughts, Manish, on this because there's something that I was talking to Nick about and Brian off camera. Successful open source or open communities thrive when there's participation. There's clear examples on the software side, Linux Foundation, Apache Software Foundation. To Nick's point, they didn't want to get in the way, but they want to facilitate and create less friction for builders. What's your view on the Solana ecosystem? Could you share, for the folks that may not know some of the working mechanics, why do you like it? What's going on? What are the key things they're optimizing for? Why should I do that? What's in it for me?

Manish Dutta

>> Yeah. Look, we started in a permissioned environment. When we decided to move to Solana, it was a purposeful decision. It was baked on two fundamental facts. One, when we started, Solana did not exist. It has existed, it's gone through ups and downs, but it's now fortified. It's the fastest chain out there. As the team is focused on engineering, it'll allow us to transact in 130 milliseconds. Today, it's 400 milliseconds. Tomorrow, it's going to 130 milliseconds. That is fast. That means the speed of light. The next step really for us was the human element. That is the most important component when you're building technology and when you're building a financial technology on a public blockchain. I don't think there is a chance-

John Furrier

>> Give me an example of what that means.

Manish Dutta

>> It means being able to call an engineer when you want to design a token where you want to ensure there is confidentiality. Nobody wants to see balance sheets out there. I think working with the engineers at Solana is paramount for the success of financial innovation.

John Furrier

>> Nick, you had a great line on the Uber coming from the breakfast that your organization is viewed as a human API to Solana. I like that. I want to ask you explain what that means.

Nick Ducoff

>> Yeah, so the Solana technology is open source, available to anyone on GitHub. The Solana Foundation's purpose, there are not that many of us. There's only 60 or 70 of us that work at the Solana Foundation, but it's really our job to facilitate the builders and cultivate an ecosystem of folks, because there's never going to be enough of us at the foundation. In fact, we want to remain small and get even smaller to help support all of the 80 million monthly users of the Solana network. Helping support builders like Manish and they become evangelists. We also have a program called Super Team where we have groups of individuals all over the world who help us be local as well as global. Here on Wall Street, I think we're increasingly seeing the DATs and ETF issuers. At the breakfast today, we had Bitwise, Franklin Templeton, many other issuers. Those folks now all help support spreading that message of the many virtues of the Solana network as well.

John Furrier

>> Manish and Nick, I want to get your thoughts on an observation that I have and I want you to get a reaction or agree, disagree, or add commentary to it. The old model of innovation was the young guard displace the old guard, the new guard kills the old guard. SaaS, and then we've seen... but cloud computing now, we're in 2.0 cloud, you got blockchain infrastructure. It looks a lot like infrastructure on the cloud, IaaS, PaaS, SaaS, but a little bit different. But here in New York, the old guard is coming together with the new guard. It's a blending because it's so powerful. You have old guard, new guard interacting. Stable coins, because of the GENIUS and CLARITY Act, puts really good frameworks in place that lets regulatory catch up, and then ultimately accounting and finance, that's a system design. What's you guys view of this cultural ship? Because it's not the bomb-thrower Gen Z, "Yeah, take over the new territory." It's a cohesiveness. What's your reaction? Do you agree and would you add comments or anything? Because I think it's something I've never seen before where they're old and new. Not old aged, but you have some old like me, but it's a interaction.

Manish Dutta

>> Look, I'll call myself old, okay? I was at a firm called PIMCO for 20 years, and I think in finance you have to collaborate. There is just no getting around that, right? When you're talking about moving capital, when you're talking about somebody's investments, when you're talking about trading, it's a contact sport, but it does require collaboration at the end of the day. Just seeing that and seeing that in New York is quite amazing because it is allowing us to build innovative products. It is forcing the regulators to look at things differently. That's how you move the economy. That's how you move the industry forward, is by collaboration, so I agree. I think that's the only way to move forward and not just have it be a young versus old person game.

John Furrier

>> It's not a missionaries and mercenary binary thing.

Manish Dutta

>> No.

John Furrier

>> A little bit of both?

Manish Dutta

>> It's a body contact sport, but you need teams.

John Furrier

>> Nick, you got to be in the arena. What's your take on this? Because, again, this is community 101, right?

Nick Ducoff

>> Yeah, listen, I think the two biggest things happening right now in technology are AI and blockchain. If you're in finance, blockchain is absolutely as important as AI. You're seeing everyone make investments in the blockchain space. It's only until recently when the new administration came in and really set the frameworks and are making regulatory permissiveness such that financial institutions can engage around this. They don't see a clear path forever. They see a clear path into the midterms, which we don't know what's going to happen then, but everyone's moving as fast as they possibly can to lay as much track in the next 18 months so that this is hardened. They can run finance on blockchain rails, which is the vision that totally the founder of Solana had from the very beginning, which is all assets, single liquidity venue, global participation. That's what we're fighting for at the Solana Foundation.

John Furrier

>> Yeah, and the good news in D.C. is unlike a decade ago, the lawmakers are more tech savvy, less lawyers, more tech leaning. They still got lawyers down there, but you're starting to see that. The Gen Zs are recognizing that they don't know what they don't know. They're smarter now. They're online. They're all learning, either self-learning, dropping out of school. We had Steve Wang in here yesterday from Dub, dropped out of school at 18 from Harvard. He's got this amazing platform, and he was on camera and he said, "Yeah, I didn't know anything about compliance, so I hired an old guy. He was 35." All right, good, but this is the self-awareness.

Manish Dutta

>> Sure.

John Furrier

>> This is where there's some old stuff, like you've said, it is team sport, you got to know this.

Manish Dutta

>> Yeah. Yep. I think compliance, as it relates to securities, it's an important component. That's the process part, right? The building part is the fun part, and that's what we are building on Solana.

John Furrier

>> Guys, thanks so much for coming in. Nick, thank you so much for organizing that breakfast. I was super honored to be there. Solana's got great performance, great ecosystem, and outside of the speeds and feeds on the chain, it really is fostering a huge entrepreneurial culture, kind of a new generation. It's the same movie we've seen many, many times in tech, but it's coming into all verticals and all industries, and it's just phenomenal. Manish, congratulations.

Manish Dutta

>> Thank you.

Nick Ducoff

>> Thank you.

John Furrier

>> All right, I'm John Furrier. This is a Crypto Trailblazer series, our ongoing series. We feature the leaders in crypto and blockchain infrastructure. Again, the movie is the same, infrastructure, software, applications all coming in on a decentralized basis. We're doing our part to share that data with you. Thanks for watching.