Building a $1 Billion XRP Digital Asset Treasury! with Asheesh Birla

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
The idea behind ever North is like, really to make
it easier for folks to buy, hold and get exposure
to XRP. It's like, let's make it as easy as
buying Tesla stock in your brokerage account. I wanted to
see the XRP ecosystem grow, and so I started thinking
about what would make it easier for institutions to develop products,

(00:21):
for developers to build more products on the XRP ledger
and other blockchains as well.

Speaker 2 (00:27):
So, in regards to you everyone, how are you going
to be buying the XRP and how are you going
to be custoding it?

Speaker 1 (00:32):
Yeah, so we'll be using all mechanisms available to buy
XRP on the market.

Speaker 2 (00:42):
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(01:44):
more about Uphold and all the great services they offer,
visit the link in the description. Hey folks, welcome into
the Thinking Crypto podcast. I'm your host Tony Edward and
joining me today's Ashish Berla, who is the CEO of
ever North, which is an XRP focused digital APPA said
treasury company. She's great to have you.

Speaker 1 (02:02):
Tony, thank you again for having me on your pod,
And well, I want to thank you Tony. You've been
such a big supporter of the entire XRP ecosystem through
the thick through the thin. Thank you for all your support.
You're one of the good guys out there. I appreciate that.

Speaker 2 (02:19):
And the last time we saw each other or even
spoke to each other was last year Ripple Swell in Miami.
I think we were both a little drunk, but it
was good times.

Speaker 1 (02:27):
Yeah. I mean, it's always always a good time to
see you, Tony. You know, Miami's a is a great city.
You know. I'll be in New York for Ripples Swell conference.
I'm excited to m see that event, and then I'll
be speaking on a panel as well, moderated by Michael
Arrington about ever North.

Speaker 2 (02:47):
Yeah, it's exciting. She So, you know, after you left Ripple,
was this the project you were working on or were
you doing other things?

Speaker 1 (02:54):
Yeah? So I stayed connected to the crypto ecosystem, you know,
over the time on a personal behalf. I've made over
you know twenty digital asset and infrastructure as investments in
the crypto space, mainly because I believe in the space, uh,
you know, for the long term, and I wanted to

(03:18):
see the XRP ecosystem grow, but I think it needed
more infrastructure around it. It was still too hard to
build products in crypto in general, and so I started
thinking about, well, what would make it easier for institutions
to develop products, what would make it easier for developers

(03:40):
to build more products on the XRP ledger and other
blockchains as well.

Speaker 2 (03:47):
Absolutely, and actually, I mean we went through a very
hard time, you know, four years of Gary Genser, and
but it seems like that the tide has changed. The
industry is being embraced by the United States. And how
are you feeling about this new environment? And you know,
tradifying all these companies now coming in and building.

Speaker 1 (04:06):
You know, you're seeing stable coins. You know, just get
the Genius Act passed and within a few months it's
already up, you know, twenty percent in terms of market
cap post you know, Genius Act becoming you know law,
and you're going to see that same ecosystem development as

(04:26):
new laws are passed in government. But again, Tony, you
hit it on the head that the administration is behind
innovative technologies like blockchain. And by the way, this this
should sound familiar because in the nineties the government got
behind the Internet, and now you see post nineties the

(04:47):
growth in the Internet. But again, good regulation, good legislation
helps spur innovation and growth and going to see that
with with blockchain as well. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (04:58):
Absolutely, And many people are waiting for the Clarity Act
specifically to pass. You mentioned the Genius Act specifically for
stable coins, but the market structure has the meat and potatoes,
and I can't wait to see post Clarity Act passing
what innovators and entrepreneurs do. I'm excited to see the
innovation agreed.

Speaker 1 (05:17):
You know, I think there is there's a waiting demand
for folks to join, institutions to join. I think the
rest of the world also looks at the United States
and what they're doing on the regulatory and legislative front,
and and so, you know, while we think it's a
big deal in the United States, I'm also excited to
see how the other nations around the world, some that

(05:41):
have already been leaders in this space, you know, past
local legislation to support this industry. Because blockchain isn't a
domestic technology. The beauty of this technology and the XRP
ledger is that it's global in nature, and that's open
in nature, and that really enables the world's financial institutions

(06:02):
to build upon each other.

Speaker 2 (06:06):
Yeah, sheez, what do you think about this? Because this
is something I've been noodling on and talking a lot
about on the pod. You mentioned the openness and the
reach that this technology has, a blockchain technology, the xt
racy ledger and so forth.

Speaker 1 (06:17):
But it seems like for.

Speaker 2 (06:18):
The first time we will have truly global markets. You know,
there's some people who are going to say, well, what
about gold. A lot of people around the world, different
central banks hold gold, but you can't view it real time.
You can't verify this the amount in a storage or
in a bank, or if it's real. You can't have
instance settlement. It's not portable. But I feel like this
technology brings all those attributes that make it real time.

(06:40):
I can look at it on my phone.

Speaker 1 (06:42):
Yeah, that's the beauty of it. It's real time, it's
counterparty free, and you know, you can see a world
where you know, folks over time move from gold in
other assets into digital assets and other cryptocurrens these like
even uh, you know, for central banks, even for reserves,

(07:04):
uh and treasuries, and I know we're going to talk
about that today. Maybe that's the first step. So corporate
treasuries being the innovators, start holding digital assets through public equities. Uh,
Like what we're going to be building at ever North.
Uh and uh that is how things get started. But

(07:24):
maybe in the future you'll see central banks uh and
others also want to hold digital assets on in their reserves,
and I think that's going to be a very interesting
future that will onfold. But again you started the conversation
with the regulation. Regulations got to pass. Is got to
pass globally for sure.

Speaker 2 (07:46):
So let's talk ever North to give an overview of
this company. Uh, what's the mission and why XRP was
chosen as the digital asset.

Speaker 1 (07:56):
Yeah, so yeah, the mission is is really to make
it easier for folks uh to buy hold and get
exposure to XRP. Uh. It's it's for for us, Tony.
We've been in this space a long time. We know
how to manage wallets, we know how to you know,
manage cryptocurrencies. But for the large part of the world

(08:18):
that it's too difficult for big institutions that want exposure
to this asset class and XRP that's too complicated. So
the idea behind ever North is like, let's make it
as easy as buying Tesla stock in your brokerage account,
your e trade account, your fidelity account, your Robinhood account.

(08:39):
Just like you buy that stock, you can buy XRP
and the ticker for ever North and you get exposure
to XRP as an asset class. And we don't stop there.
You also get to participate in the strategies that will
develop at ever North, like yield strategies, and with those

(09:00):
yield strategies, the yield, a portion of that yield that
we generate will go back into the treasury. Let's we'll
use that yield to buy more XRP and add to
the treasury. And the goal here for ever North shareholders
is to maximize XRP per share. And why did I
choose XRP. I'll answer that question. Well, One, I really

(09:24):
believe in this future that the world is going to
be the financial world is going to be reformed, and
there's going to be a revolution, and that revolution is
going to start on a blockchain and it's spurred by
that innovation around the blockchain. And early on the XRP
and creators decided that they wanted to build a blockchain

(09:47):
that was optimized for financial use cases. This is back
in twenty twelve. Maybe that's mainstream now, but this is
back in twenty twelve to create an ecosystem, to create
a technology that's optimized for payments, as optimized for tokenized assets.
Today we call those real world assets or r w as.
But the ability to have these equities, real estate and

(10:10):
so forth, tokenized and available for the world on a blockchain, that's, uh,
that's what the XRP, leisure and supporting technologies are good for.
So you know, I I I, uh, you know, decided
XRP obviously, uh, you know, with my you know history,
that made a lot of sense. But I also noticed

(10:32):
Tony that there's no digital asset treasury of significance around
uh XRP and uh, and that made it a no brainer.
Let's go and let's go do it for sure.

Speaker 2 (10:45):
So would be safe to say you're looking to become
the micro strategy of XRP, you know, micro strategy specifically
focused on bitcoin, you know.

Speaker 1 (10:53):
Like I'm excited about building on the XRP ecosystem. I
think the world should know about what's going on in
terms of financialization on a blockchain, and I think the
world's going to look very different in ten years than
it is from now in the financial world because of
technologies like XCRP. But also all the accompanied technologies that

(11:18):
support the infrastructure around XRP, like the stable coin which
is growing rapidly that serves Tony as on and off raps.
That was a big piece that was missing. How do
you get onto a blockchain? Well, stable coins solves a
part of that, and ever North helps institutions and retail

(11:41):
investors get on and off and participate in the ecosystem,
the DeFi ecosystem around the XRP ledger as well.

Speaker 2 (11:51):
So with regards to you ever North, and this is
a rookie question because I'm still trying to grasp the
idea fully of digital aster treasure companies. Is that a
company that existed before with surch of services and products
or is it a brand new company specifically focused on
the x RP treasury or does it have, like I said,
other means of revenue and services and things like that.

Speaker 1 (12:10):
Now we are one hundred percent focused on XRP. We
are we're building, uh you know, a digital asset treasury,
but it's an active uh you know treasury, and that
we will be putting the XRP to use. Well, well,
we have a trade fies, a traditional strategy, and we

(12:31):
have a DeFi strategy, and we want to use the
XRP ecosystem to generate yield on the defile strategy side
of things. That'll help that ecosystem flourish. That will also
be good for the ever North Digital Asset treasury as well.

Speaker 2 (12:51):
Let's double click a bit on the DeFi component because
that's going to be something many people are interested in.
How you're generating the yield. Are you planning to use
like protocol like Flare or other protocols.

Speaker 1 (13:02):
So we're we're in discussions with a lot of the
protocols out there. You know, we we have to close
the transaction first before you know, participating in those yield
generation products. But you know, part of the reason that
every North exists is to you know, cultivate those yield strategies,

(13:24):
build those yield strategies directly on the XRP ledger, and
use XRP in the ecosystem to develop those yield strategies.
And so I'm excited about that. You know, I'm a
longtime product builder. Nothing gets me more excited than see
that ecosystem flourish. And again, I think one thing Tony
that was missing was like how do you get institutional

(13:47):
capital to participate in that ecosystem. I mean DeFi in
general has been you know, humming alan it has been
growing at an okay clip for the last four or
five years, has a lot of pumps and bruises. But
this might be the missing sort of adapter connection. Now
you have real capital coming in and this is just

(14:08):
the start to help you get those defive protocols to
mature and grow and really compete with the traditional finance world.
And again you saw that with stable coins. You saw
that with stable coins as well. Is that it was
humming and hawing along for almost a decade and then

(14:30):
things got real when that regulation passed, and now institutions
turning to stable coins for adoption for payments and other
use cases. But you're going to see that same thing
happen here in the decentralized finance world as well, with
lending protocols and everything else that we haven't even imagined yet.

Speaker 2 (14:50):
Absolutely something that came to mind, and I've seen other
dats do this, and it may be true early for
you to answer this question, But what the yield is
it going to be? Some of it paid out in
a dividend or reinvested into the respective treasury you.

Speaker 1 (15:05):
Know, our plans right now are to uh you know,
reinvest that into the treasury. Again, the the metric that
we are maximizing for uh is XRP per share and
uh you know that the plan is is to get
that yield uh and then go back into the treasury.

(15:26):
So if that yield is giving us US dollars, you know,
we'll use a portion of that to eventually go back
in and buy more XRP for the treasury. Got it?
That makes sense.

Speaker 2 (15:38):
A big question a lot of folks want to know
is how are you going to be buying the x
RP and how are you going to be custoding it?
Are you buying OTC on the open market? Things along
those lines.

Speaker 1 (15:48):
Yeah, so you know we'll we'll be using all mechanisms
available to uh, you know buy x RP on the market.
It's it's still growing tony the market. UH. So you know,
we want to make sure that we're balanced and measured
in how we uh you know buy XRP uh for
the treasury. So the good thing is we have a

(16:10):
lot of experience uh, you know managing treasuries. UH will
do the most efficient thing out there. But again, it's
getting easier and easier.

Speaker 2 (16:18):
Uh.

Speaker 1 (16:18):
You know, back in the early days, there were just
a couple of exchanges available. Now there's hundreds around the
world that trade cryptocurrencies, and now you you know, you're
seeing even you know, bigger players jump into the the
the ecosystem as well. So exciting to see this market develop, uh.
And it's also exciting to see XRP uh being the
third largest uh you know digital asset you know, volume

(16:42):
wise depending on the uh you know, the venue. But
that makes it also very interesting, uh in terms of uh,
you know, a digital asset treasury, and that also makes
it really interesting in the times of yield strategies that
we could potentially deploy, uh once this transaction closes.

Speaker 2 (17:01):
Yeah, for sure, you mentioned the demand for XRP. We've
seen a lot of ETF SPOTTYTF filings still on the
table waiting for the SEC to take action. In addition,
you had XRP futures go live on the CMEME and
so forth, and there's been a lot of institutional demand.
So I think it's like perfect timing that you guys
are launching this digital asset treasury company focus on XRP,
because how things have changed. She i mean, you know,

(17:24):
obviously the sec Ripple lawsuit has concluded after you know,
years of going back and forth. But you know, the
sun is shining down now on us and the dark
clouds have gone away, and there's a lot of demand
for this asset.

Speaker 1 (17:39):
Yeah, it definitely feels like a new day Tony Like,
it definitely feels like, you know, we started off as
infants in this industry and now we're you know, becoming adults.
And you know, I'm I'm happy to be part of
the adult movement in digital assets. And part of that

(18:00):
adult movement is getting institutions to adopt I don't think
this ecosystem. I don't think cryptocurrencies will flourish until there
is broad based adoption by institutions out there. And again,
ever north is one tool to help get institutional adoption,

(18:21):
making it easier to participate in in the crypto economy, uh,
making it easier to participate in this financial future that
will be built on blockchains. But there's going to be
other tools that we need. We talked about regulation and
the and the right kind of legislation, but we need more,

(18:41):
you know, tools around their ets being a great one,
see me futures trading. XRP another great tool. And again
this is all part of the adult growing up process
that the whole industry is h is now participation the end, thankfully, thankfully.

Speaker 2 (19:02):
Yeah, for sure. Now I read you guys are raising
one billion dollars to buy x RP. Of course, is
that a cap or in the future you may raise
additional capital? And who have who are the folks who
have participated so far in the capital?

Speaker 1 (19:17):
Yeah, that's a that's a good question. So you know,
we'll we'll stay active out there. Uh. You know, we
don't have any plans uh to stop uh, And so
we'll you know, you know, as soon as the transaction
is closed, we'll again look at additional opportunities. But the
idea is not to stop at a billion in uh,

(19:38):
you know, treachery uh And and I'm happy Tony to
be supported by world class investors. And one thing that
we do want to do is expand internationally. Uh. You
may know that XRP is as widely popular in Korea
and in Japan, and having s b I uh, you know,

(19:59):
participate in ever North's you know financing is going to
potentially help unlock those Asian markets for US as well.
So that post closed transaction, looking to those kinds of
expansion opportunities is going to be a high priority for
the North team. And again, we're lucky to have world

(20:20):
class investors from SBI, Ripple, Errington, XFP Capital, and several
others join us in this journey.

Speaker 2 (20:32):
Yeah, definitely. I remember SBI, and I forgot the CEO.

Speaker 1 (20:37):
Yoshitaka Katao Son. Yeah, excellent, excellent leader.

Speaker 2 (20:43):
Yeah, I remember following him over the years and the
different things he would say, and reading the SBI reports,
quarterly reports and things like that. So it's awesome to
see that they continue to participate in the ecosystem and
much more.

Speaker 1 (20:56):
Yeah, they have been excellent leaders and excellent partners over
the year, and I'm very very gracious that they are
part of this journey as well at ever North.

Speaker 2 (21:05):
So she's you got this trend right, Digital ACCID treasury
companies is growing. It's happening around the globe. Folks are
using different crypto assets. How are you guys preparing for,
let's say, a downturn in a bear market? Is one
of the things that things that concern me is potentially
some of these companies may not be managed well and
there could be some blow ups in the bear market,

(21:25):
or it might have to be some consolidation. But how
are you guys preparing for possible bear market and market downturns.

Speaker 1 (21:32):
That's a great question, Tony, and Hey, like I am
also concerned as I look at other treasuries in the
market that don't seem like they have formidable leadership teams
or even full time leadership teams. Well, what you get
at ever North is as a team that is purpose
built for you know, something like XRP Digital Asset Treasury

(21:56):
in Evernorth. You know, you get me that is the
weather as they come in crypto. You know, having been
been in the industry since twenty thirteen and seeing the winters,
the summers, the falls, all four seasons, Tony just doesn't
you know, a downturn doesn't phaze me. You know, there
are you know, some of the best opportunities are available

(22:19):
in downturns. What you have to do is plan for
the long term. And that's what this team is about.
We stick with things, we build for the long term.
We don't get too high in the highs, we don't
get too low in the lows. We sort of stay
even keeled and build it, build it out, so you know,

(22:39):
in the downturns, we'll be ready and here there are
opportunities for those that are patient. For sure.

Speaker 2 (22:48):
Now I saw and correct me if I'm wrong. A
listing on the NASTAC that that got approved this week.
What can you tell us there? And can both retail
and institutional investors access it?

Speaker 1 (22:59):
So what you say, saw I was? I was the
ticker symbol x RPN go live in That ticker symbol
is now tradable on the on the nasdack. We expect
that to happen sometime in quarter one of twenty twenty six.
Got I got it? Okay, So I was.

Speaker 2 (23:19):
My next question was going to be if the government
shut down is slowing things down for you guys as
it is with everything else.

Speaker 1 (23:25):
But hey, like listen, it might be slowing things down
for the government, but we're we're busy here at ever North.
We're busy thinking about how to leverage the XRP ecosystem.
We're thinking about, uh, you know, how to build the
right kind of risk tools out there so that we
can scale uh you know, in in the in the

(23:48):
right way. We're gonna you know, measure twice and cut once. Uh,
that's our plan. So that kind of tooling is really
important for these digital assets treasuries to scale, especially if
you want to participate in the decentralized finance ecosystem DeFi.

(24:10):
You need to have the right kind of risk tools,
You need to have the right kind of experience and
have that built ahead of time. So those are things
that we can, you know, continue to build and plan
for and the SEC and the government there's not much
I can do other than call a couple of folking,

(24:30):
you know, let's speed it up. But the rest of
the world is doing the same thing. So you know
we're back here busy building for sure.

Speaker 2 (24:36):
Yeah that you know, we can't control that, right the government.
It is what it is. We're all in the same
boat there. But we got a bunch of XRP ETFs,
I know, I mentioned it earlier, a lot of spotty
tfs that are seems to be they're going to be
approved by the SEC. I'm curious of what your take
is on the dynamic between a digital aster treasury company
versus an ETF and I know this the dats give

(24:59):
a new pathway for people to invest. What is your
take on the two products and they seemed to be
competing in a way, and how do you think that
all plays out?

Speaker 1 (25:09):
Well, hey, listen, like they're the one. The great thing
is we're even having this discussion around uh, you know
x r P e t fs and digital asset treasuries.
Like who would have thought a couple of years ago
that we would even have these discussions. So, hey, look,
the industry is maturing. If the industry continues to grow together,

(25:30):
you know, all these different players are going to do well. Uh.
And you know the the x RP ETFs and the
other ETFs out there. Hey, there's uh, there's there's potential
collaborations there as well. But I'd say one big difference
between an ETF Towny and a digital asset treasury like
ever North is that with ever North, it's an it's

(25:54):
an active treasury. We are going to be looking at
yield strategies, uh to maximize x RP per share. Uh.
And I think if you want that kind of exposure,
ever North is the right kind of product for you.
But ETF, uh it's a it's a very limited kind

(26:15):
of product, which is great for and you know, a
different kind of investor. But I almost see them as
you know, uh, you know, two different kinds of products
out there. You know, some people want the minivan, some
people want, you know, the the car. There's a market
for passenger car. There's markets for both, right, and like
this kind of specialization is good overall for the the

(26:39):
crypto economy and the ecosystem. It's great for x RP
as well.

Speaker 2 (26:44):
Yeah, well said, you know, we have the buffet of options,
right it, pick your pick, your your option that you
want and whatever you're comfortable with. You know, you mentioned
like you and I are kind of like o G.
So we're okay being uh you know, go buying on
the exchange, throwing in a hardware wallet. But not everybody
is going to be open to doing that or or
want to do that, so that's aren't a great option

(27:05):
the ETF. So it just depends on your preference.

Speaker 1 (27:07):
Yeah, that's absolutely right. It's like, you know, this is
something that I can just you know, you could go
tell your mom, Tony is like just go to you know,
Robinhood or each rade and and you can participate now
in the crypto uh, you know economy. Uh. And again
to your point five years ago, six years ago, imagine

(27:28):
telling someone that you've got to go get a wallet. Wait,
you got to be very secure about the wallet and
oh wait, if you want to earn yield on that uh,
now you've got to you know, move it to this chain.
And it's just too complicated. Let's think it easier for everyone, uh,
you know, around the world to participate, uh in this

(27:49):
new financial revolution. That's what you know, products like ever North.

Speaker 2 (27:55):
Yeah, great point. You know you mentioned everyone everyone around
the world. This is going to be a dumb question
on my part and it applies to dats. But I
know that only certain markets can access like the New
York Stock is Change or the NASDAK So would the
same rules apply here that whichever markets around the world
can access the NASDAQ will get access to this stock.

Speaker 1 (28:18):
Yeah, at launch, at close, once the transaction is approved,
then you'd be able to access ever North through FRP
and the ticker symbol on the Nasdaq available you know,
in your brokerage accounts. And then you know, the next
plan after that would be looking at how we tackle

(28:40):
international markets. And there are no more different strategies there.
But again, Japan and Korea are interesting markets for ever
North and we'll you know, start charting out plans to
attack those markets as well.

Speaker 2 (28:56):
This may be too early to answer this question, but
we see ashes these for tokenizing stocks happening right with
big institutions. So would that be an option that you're
going to explore. And again, maybe too early, but that
could be on the table.

Speaker 1 (29:09):
Yeah. Our goal here is to make this accessible and
in as stock. Buying XRPN as a stock is one
step towards making it more accessible. Uh, and we're not gonna,
you know, stop at exploring new opportunities. Uh, you know,
even outside of evern't know. I'm super excited about tokenized equities.

(29:32):
I think it's going to give you know, folks around
the world a chance to participate in the global financial
economy in ways that they couldn't do before, especially in
emerging markets. And just like folks can hold you as
dollars via stable coins around the world, folks are going
to be able to do that with all sorts of
other kinds of real world assets, equities, real estate, you know, debt.

(29:58):
They're going to be able to do that via this
tokenization frontier. And again I'm excited that that technology, uh,
tokenization and payments is what the XRP ledger has did
for and again that ecosystem can thrive on the XRP
ledger because of all the supporting technologies, like I mentioned

(30:21):
the stable coins as well, that are you know, growing rapidly,
that will help serve as a catalyst for that kind
of growth. In terms of this new world economy around tokenization.

Speaker 2 (30:34):
She I'm still like trying to grasp what the future
looks like with markets because you know, on the topic
of tokenization, where you have a lot of assets on
the blockchain, whether it be real estate, precious metal, stocks
of course, and different types of equities, and then you
have like twenty four to seven trading and like, are
we going to drive ourselves nuts or are we going

(30:56):
to have AI agents, you know, monitoring our portfolios and
maybe doing some trading while we're sleeping, right, And but
more liquidity, more options because you're dealing with people across
the globe who couldn't have participated with in the past
because you have to go through you know, those stakeholders,
the big bangs and so forth, and the big trading firms.

(31:16):
But now somebody in Hong Kong I can deal directly
with them via DeFi and we don't even need to
know each other.

Speaker 1 (31:22):
Yeah, so yeah, so listen that there's a lot that
needs to happen for twenty four by seven you know, trading,
and you hit on one big portion of it. It was liquidity.
You know, you need now you need liquidity support and monitoring,
you know, twenty four to seven. And hey, certainly AI

(31:42):
is an interesting technology that could potentially help there. But
remember you know when you first got access to the Internet.
I remember that first time of reading the newspaper, in
my case, the Detroit News sports section, and it was
only updated one time per day. And then eventually because

(32:05):
the Internet is real time, they had to compete and
they had to like update content all day long. And
the same thing is going to happen in my opinion,
with liquidity and trading online. Like you can buy bitcoin
and XRP twenty four by seven for sure, but again
that's not available to equities today in most markets. So

(32:29):
I have a feeling and it's my prediction, in my
belief that DeFi is going to push the rest of
these markets to twenty four by seven trading. You know,
there will be a scramble, but twenty four x seven
liquidity around all these different products that doesn't exist today
and it's going to need to be automated in some
you know fashion to scale. It's just can't survive doing

(32:54):
it the old way with you know, rigid market closes.
That's not the way crypto works. It's not the way
the world works, which is sort of like the beauty
of this whole you know technology.

Speaker 2 (33:07):
Yeah, for sure, it's a brave new world. And we
see now even the stock markets are trying to copy
the I wouldn't say necessarily copy, but they have to
keep up, and they're trying to expand their opening and
closing times to you know, be twenty four to seven
where possible. So it's just interesting how things are changing.

(33:27):
There's something I think you may have touched on, but
I want to make sure I confirm are you going
to be using our l U s D stable coin
in any way and the treasury you know maybe in
paying out certain things or running through the ecosystem and
things like that.

Speaker 1 (33:42):
Like we we definitely want to you know, partner with
you know, leading stable coins around the world. Just happens
that the r l U s D, the Ripple stable
coin is growing really quickly. Hey, every every blockchain, including
the x RP ledger needs on and off er ms,
and we're you know, we're excited about the growth there

(34:04):
because you know, you need to get onto the DeFi
ecosystem to get off the def ecosystem. But at the
same time, we're an XRP treasury, and so we want
to make sure that we are you optimizing for XRP,
but getting onto those decentralized protocols. I have a feeling
that Ripple r l U s D, the stable coin

(34:26):
is going to play a big part of that.

Speaker 2 (34:29):
That's awesome. She I think one thing I want to
get your thoughts on, because when you were working at Ripple,
of course you guys were speaking to a lot of institutions,
a lot of banks and so forth. And I mean,
just for example, this week it was announced at City
Bank is partnering with coinbase to offer crypto services JP
Morgan PNC Bank. What is it like seeing all of

(34:53):
these firms who at one point somewhere against crypto, but
now they're embracing it and everybody's coming into the same eCos.

Speaker 1 (35:01):
That's uh, you know, I love seeing it. I mean,
I know a lot of folks are you know, you
know anti bank, you know, from from very early on.
When I joined Crypto, I really did feel this was
about bringing the entire ecosystem and uh, listen to the
capital in the in the in the world is still
managed by large banks, and you need them to be

(35:25):
part of this ecosystem, just like the Internet. Like the
Internet to today is not just about individual bloggers. You
have big firms like Disney pushing content over the internet. Uh,
and so combined like, yes, you had a lot of
new players, but yes you have the traditional players as
well that really made the Internet what it is today.

(35:45):
Now you can get TV, sports, everything over the Internet
and that's why it scaled, and you need that same
thing to happen with crypto as well. Can just be
about speculators and and uh and and and and the
retail audience. You need the retail audience, and you need
institutions and again listen, like I think a big reason

(36:08):
why they didn't participate early on was because they had
a good They didn't have to innovate to be twenty
four by seven. Why nothing pushed them And what pushing
it was pushing them now is this technology. Certainly regulation
improving also was a catalyst, but again the consumer sort

(36:32):
of dictates a lot of these banking you know, industry
players and their behavior, and the consumer has spoken up
that they want this technology. They want faster payments enabled
by stable coins, and they will in a few years,
in my belief, want more access to the DeFi ecosystem

(36:54):
as well.

Speaker 2 (36:55):
Yeah, well said, it's amazing. The world of opportunities is
that this technology is opening up, and it's just so exciting.
And like I said earlier, I can't wait for the
Clarity Act to pass and to see the innovation boom
that follows. You know, you mentioned like the Internet and
the government got a right in the nineties and what
followed was amazing, Google, Amazon and much more in the world.

(37:17):
How we're communicating right now, right, it's incredible. She's great stuff.
Looking forward to the launch on the Nastaca as far
as publicly traded and so forth, and looking forward to
celebrating with you guys. But thank you so much for
joining me.

Speaker 1 (37:33):
Thank you, Tony, and again you're so wonderful to speak with,
and you know, I love everything that you're doing, but
I also just love all your support over the years.
You're definitely one of the good guys.

Speaker 2 (37:44):
Appreciate it, man.

Speaker 1 (37:45):
Thank you

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