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Ethereum’s Next Act: From Asset to Economy - TOKEN2049 Singapore 2026 — Transcript

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0:08So, we got a little bit of time to talk
0:11about basically what the economic
0:14activity on Ethereum looks like. It's
0:15been uh a pretty eventful decade. We've
0:18seen a crazy idea come to life and uh
0:21now even more. And if you haven't
0:23noticed, the theme this week and the
0:26last 6 months has been institutions are
0:28finally here coming going full steam
0:30ahead. And uh one of the things I want
0:32to start off with is trying to sort of
0:35just level set a bit. Um there's been so
0:38many things that we've talked about
0:39Ethereum can do and uh and we wanted
0:41people to do on Ethereum and I'd love to
0:44kind of hear maybe starting with Joe on
0:46just what do you feel like is now
0:47finally possible
0:49on Ethereum that wasn't possible a year
0:51or two ago.
0:52>> Uh so much is possible on on Ethereum.
0:55Uh but I I'll focus on uh two things
0:58because they're uh closely related to
1:00what we're doing at at MetaMask and
1:03Consensus. Um so one thing that is
1:06possible on the wallet side um is that
1:10everybody can now have uh real personal
1:15financial agency. You can have your
1:18entire financial life fully under your
1:21control permissionless. You don't have
1:23to ask your bank manager if you can take
1:25uh out a little bit more money than than
1:27they're comfortable with. Um, and uh,
1:31you can uh, via the MetaMask money
1:34account. Um, put all of your assets into
1:38uh, a single personal money operating
1:40system. When you put your money into
1:42that money operating system, it comes
1:44alive in the sense that it's suddenly
1:46earning quite a lot of yield, 6% or
1:48higher. It remains fully liquid. Um and
1:53uh you can make use of it uh in trading
1:55and perks and prediction markets,
1:57tokenized equities, etc. Um you can
2:01invest it in different other ways and
2:03you can um pay for things uh either with
2:06tokens from the account or or via the uh
2:09the debit card which is a pure
2:11blockchain debit card but it runs on on
2:13the master card rails. On the Ethereum
2:16side, um we are on the verge of unifying
2:21the entire Ethereum ecosystem. Uh so uh
2:25we've been doing some proofs of concept
2:27at at Consensus. Um I was speaking with
2:31uh Jordie Balina of EEZ um uh and and
2:36one of his colleagues also named Jordy
2:38last night. um and they've been doing uh
2:40some really great proofs of concept and
2:42and the idea there is that uh we had to
2:45in order to achieve scalability at layer
2:471 of Ethereum and that is moving really
2:50well. We're uh we're doubling
2:52scalability, we're tripling scalability,
2:55and we'll see scalability grow at layer
2:571 by orders of magnitude over the next
2:59few years, mostly through zero knowledge
3:01approved technology, but also the the
3:03modular architecture, the roll-up
3:06roadmap and actually private per
3:08permissioned blockchains using Ethereum
3:10technology, using the Basu execution
3:13technology um can now be all brought
3:16into a unified Ethereum ecosystem where
3:20uh using zero knowledge proofs on the
3:22different networks uh you can compose a
3:25bunch of activity. You can take
3:27fragmented liquidity and bring it into
3:30uh unified liquidity pool uh in an
3:33atomic execution context and you can run
3:35a whole bunch of transactions across a
3:37bunch of different networks um in real
3:40time um without the use of dangerous
3:43bridges. And so, uh, we're about to see
3:45lots of corporate chains, uh, lots of
3:48layer twos, uh, and, uh, Ethereum, uh,
3:51will be the credibly neutral, reliable,
3:55um, digital asset settlement platform.
3:58>> I feel like you're just going to set the
4:00whole agenda. Let's just call it early.
4:01We got
4:03>> done. It's all,
4:05>> but I'll let Paul and Seb answer too.
4:07Like, from kind of your perspectives, I
4:09feel like a lot of the ideas are now
4:11finally coming to life. What do you feel
4:12like is super obvious that wasn't
4:14possible a year or two ago?
4:15>> Yeah, I I guess for me taking the DeFi
4:18and financial products angle, uh the
4:21very historic difference compared to two
4:22years ago is that we have reached
4:25feature par with web two. What do I mean
4:27by this is that now that we have full
4:30account of traction and we have lower
4:33gas fees, what that means is that you
4:35can build financial products for large
4:37scale consumer distribution that you
4:40have no idea is powered by Ethereum
4:42behind the scenes, right? Like you could
4:44not tell. The only, you know, difference
4:46is that the financial product that
4:48you're going to use is actually of a
4:51better pricing, has deeper liquidity
4:52because the underlying infrastructure is
4:54open and is able to aggregate more
4:56liquidity, more competition, etc., etc.
4:59And I think the the the first example of
5:01that that we uh at at Moro built was
5:04like integrating into the Coinbases of
5:06the world or the Robin Hoods of the
5:08world where the end users have literally
5:10no idea that the chain is behind the
5:12scenes, right? And this is only possible
5:14uh when you have mature DeFi ecosystem,
5:16cheap uh gas fees uh as well as like a
5:20full account abstraction stack and you
5:21combine everything together uh and
5:24compose the action such that from the
5:25user perspective is just one click that
5:28is like no additional cost nothing. Um
5:31and I think to me this is like the real
5:33like zero to one. So that's one. The
5:36second is purely just trust from like
5:39all those large like distribution
5:41platforms and Wall Street in general
5:43where they now recognize blockchains and
5:45Ethereum in particular as like a
5:47reliable settlement platform where they
5:49can have all their user balances like on
5:52on a DeFi protocol on Ethereum, right?
5:54Like um if you take like a Coinbase for
5:57example, there is like probably like $3
5:58billion of of customers assets that are
6:01on Morpho, right? Robin Hood has like a
6:03billion dollars of assets that are in
6:04the Morphos smart contract, right? So,
6:06we're reaching this level of trust with
6:09the EVM and and the code that has been
6:11built in the EVM uh that was definitely
6:14not there uh um two years ago. And the
6:17good news is that this trust is
6:19compounding, right? Like people see the
6:21good lo big logos like Robin Hood,
6:23Coinbase doing stuff and they're like,
6:24"Oh, wow." Like as a TratFi institution,
6:27all this distribution is coming on
6:29chain. It means that my ETF that I was
6:31distributing on stratfire rails is not
6:34going to be you know getting that much
6:35volume because volume is coming on
6:37chain. So if you're like a Fidelity, if
6:39you're a Blackpark, if you're an Apollo,
6:41you're thinking about how how do I move
6:43on chain and I start to like operate
6:45those rails in order to myself, you
6:47know, curate operate the financial
6:49services to offer to large distribution
6:51and that's a complete zero to one that a
6:54year ago was not like a reality.
6:56>> It's like suddenly and then instantly
6:57it's just everybody on it and Sam, I'll
6:59let you uh comment as well.
7:01>> So the question is uh what can you
7:03repeat the question? just what was not
7:05possible a year or two ago on Ethereum
7:07that now you're seeing everybody sort of
7:08do things and it's sort of really kind
7:10of coming to life from the early vision
7:13of
7:13>> Yeah, I would I would never have
7:14imagined I mean we've come a long way in
7:16just one year. So I guess three things
7:18have occurred over the past year that I
7:20would not have imagined would have
7:21happened anytime in the near future at
7:23the time which is um well first of all
7:26with respect to the financial
7:27institutions we've seen JP Morgan and
7:30Black Rockck tokenize their money market
7:32funds you know that would that would
7:34have been a mind-blowing statement to
7:36say just a number of years ago that
7:38happened over the past year. Uh I mean
7:42secondly you know we we we see now the
7:44rise of uh agent the agentic economy and
7:48I have a lot to say about that today. Uh
7:51but I think that there is a huge
7:53convergence and an intersection with uh
7:56with agents agents needs they need
7:58compute to think and they need money and
8:01that is basically stable coins and we'll
8:04talk more about how that intersection
8:06will play out for for Ethereum and ETH.
8:09And lastly, you know, businesses are now
8:12using crypto to borrow against and build
8:16massive data centers. Bit Digital is the
8:18first company in history to use its
8:21crypto to borrow against it and and
8:23build out a 1 million square foot data
8:26center in North Carolina to service a1
8:30billion dollar contract uh with Enskill
8:33that's I think IPOing soon. No company
8:36has ever done that. And so I think these
8:38are, you know, these are major moves uh
8:41happening uh that have a connection to
8:44Ethereum and uh these are statements
8:45that would have been pretty uh
8:47impossible to say just a couple of years
8:49ago.
8:50>> That's awesome. Um I want to get back to
8:52Paul here. So you're building Morpho
8:54into open credit network and there's a
8:56pretty big vision behind this thing. I'd
8:58love to kind of have the audience
8:59understand how you think about the
9:00future of Morpho and what does that
9:02unlock? Yeah, I guess like first we so
9:06we think of Morpho as like you know what
9:07we call the open and credit network for
9:09the world. Like concretely what does
9:10that mean is like you have people that
9:11have an excess of capital. They want to
9:13generate interest. You have people that
9:14have a need for financing. You know they
9:16have ambitions. They want to realize for
9:18the world and and our goal is to match
9:20the two, right? Like people that are
9:22willing to trust the ambition of someone
9:24else with capital and fund them. And and
9:27the goal of Morpho is to establish the
9:29most efficient matching between the two
9:30parties, right? And then you you you you
9:33so the the reason why you want to do
9:35this is basically you want to reduce the
9:36the cost that people have to trust each
9:39other, right? And and in order to do
9:42that, you're thinking, hey, we need like
9:44a shared like settlement layer where
9:46this is going to be able to happen to
9:47aggregate all the lenders and all the
9:50bars in one place in order to make
9:52things happen, right? and and and so
9:55blockchains are obviously a very natural
9:57environment for that where by definition
9:59the infrastructure is open and so as a
10:01result you have much more competition
10:03right I really think like you know I I
10:05like to think of the killer case of
10:07blockchain being openness and openness
10:09fosters two interesting thing for
10:11financial infrastructure uh competition
10:14on pricing and accessibility right so
10:17very concrete example and and coming
10:18back to like you know how Coinbase built
10:20loans on on Morpho they used to have a
10:22centralized as a service for loans,
10:24right? That was not built on
10:24blockchains, etc. In order to issue the
10:27loans, they had like a intermediaries
10:28and the rate was very high. What happens
10:30now is that they settle directly uh on
10:33on on blockchain. And so when this
10:35happens, you have tens of thousands of
10:38lenders that are going to come on the
10:40other side and that are going to compete
10:41to give Coinbase like the best interest
10:44rate possible. So what effectively we're
10:46doing as Morpho is we're collapsing the
10:49spread between the lending rate and the
10:51borrowing rate. And that spread today in
10:54the economy is very high. Like that's
10:55the net interest margin that you have,
10:57you know, of banks. That's approximately
10:593% on the global economy, right? And so
11:01we think of our mission at collapsing
11:03that cost of trust, right? Collapsing
11:05the the the spread between the lending
11:07rate and the borrowing to to have cheap
11:08funding. And obviously the only way to
11:10do this is through like up an
11:12infrastructure and and like this core
11:14protocol morpho that is like built on
11:16top that can aggregate intents of of
11:18both parties.
11:19>> Yeah. Can I just follow on on uh on what
11:22Paul said? Um what's really going on
11:25here is that we are um at the point
11:29where we're scalable and usable and
11:32reliable enough so that we can transform
11:34how business works on this planet. Um
11:37essentially the way the the way the way
11:40trust has worked uh is top-down command
11:43and control systems. You got
11:44authorities, you got trusted third
11:46parties. Um and we are replacing that
11:49kind of trust which uh is somewhat
11:52abused at times, somewhat capricious at
11:54times um and generally rewards the
11:58centralized controlling parties more
12:00than uh all the rest of us. Uh and so
12:04we're replacing that with a new form of
12:05trust. Satoshi invented the most
12:08powerful form of trust, decentralized
12:09trust. And what now we're able to um now
12:12we've attracted the attention of
12:13governments and financial institutions
12:16and they recognize that hey this is good
12:19this is really powerful. uh we can
12:22instead of being your trusted
12:24counterparty with all sorts of
12:25regulations to make sure that we don't
12:28steal your money um we can imbue um the
12:32trust of a decentralized protocol in
12:34market-based systems like Morpho uh
12:37where uh you're interacting with your
12:40peer counterparties rather than the
12:42house. Uh as we all know the house
12:44always wins. Um and uh essentially we're
12:47moving into a much more decentralized
12:50economy.
12:51>> No, I absolutely agree. And it's also
12:53just creating these systems that are not
12:56um sort of giving the power to the other
12:58side and the fact they now have the
13:00infrastructure to do so is I'm pretty
13:02big on lock. I do have a question for
13:03Sam before we kind of get to uh some of
13:05the other stuff around the economic
13:06activity on Ethereum. But uh Bit Digital
13:08to me is a very interesting sort of
13:10approach um to to the space. Could you
13:12tell us more about how you're set up?
13:13How does it work with white fiber and
13:15and why is it different than just a
13:16traditional e treasury company that
13:18others may have heard of?
13:20>> Yes. So, Bit Digital is a public listed
13:22company on NASDAQ and it's a very simple
13:25company. It's just two line items on its
13:27balance sheet. It's a bunch of Ethereum.
13:30That's the first line item. The second
13:31line item is a 60% controlling stake of
13:35a company called White Fiber that IPOed
13:37last year also on NASDAQ. And White
13:39Fiber is a pure play AI uh
13:42infrastructure company. Uh it has a
13:44cloud business, a very successful one.
13:46It has a very successful uh collocation
13:48business on the data center side
13:50servicing
13:51more than a billion dollars worth of
13:53contracts over the next few years. So
13:56the reason why we positioned ourselves
13:58this way is because we we're not we're
14:00not in the business of just accumulating
14:03ETH and putting it on our balance sheet.
14:05We think that that is not an alpha
14:08producing
14:09posture. Um, and we don't think that's
14:12actually a full-time job as well. So, we
14:18so we felt that it's important to have
14:21an operating business as well and we
14:23have an incredibly successful one
14:24through White Fiber. Um, and it is
14:27servicing the AI economy. And that's
14:30really important because there's
14:32absolutely no company, no public company
14:34in the world that I know of that
14:35represents economically
14:38the convergence of artificial
14:40intelligence and Ethereum, which will
14:43eventually intersect in a in a huge way.
14:46Now, hope hopefully there'll be a moment
14:48to get into that later. So, that that's
14:50how we've set ourselves up. Um, I think
14:52we're pretty unique in that manner. Um,
14:55we do we do have our our our criticism
14:58of pure play dats. That's why we've sort
15:01of moved away from that category. I I
15:04wish that category never was in
15:06invented. I think that's a a terrible
15:09category and a bad way to measure
15:11yourself, but uh here we are.
15:14>> Sorry, I have to jump in. [laughter]
15:16>> There's going to be some tension. So
15:18while while you're
15:20>> no no tension I I I [laughter] have a
15:22huge amount of respect for for SAM and
15:24their business model. I I think the
15:26marriage of AI uh and ether um and
15:30decentralized protocols is a very
15:32powerful direction. So um I fully
15:34understand uh what he's saying. Um but
15:37uh I do believe that uh um pure play uh
15:42DATs that choose the right token are
15:45incredibly valuable for their
15:47shareholders uh and for the ecosystem
15:49that they operate in. Uh is is it with
15:52the assumption that you have to actively
15:53deploy capital to increase the asset
15:55value or just the fact that you need an
15:58institutional buyer for this and this is
15:59the easiest way to get that demand
16:01because because it's the productivity of
16:03those assets that gets you that yield or
16:05alpha or just the the ecosystem to grow.
16:07>> But Joe Joe I would I would challenge
16:09that a little bit. So if if you believe
16:11>> let me say something first before you
16:14challenge it. So, so um for Sharlink and
16:19uh for our friends at BMR, um we are
16:22focused on um uh
16:27uh track or collecting yield uh from uh
16:31staking into the protocol. So, there's a
16:33a risk-free yield uh that that we can
16:35capture uh relatively easily. There are
16:38things that we can do over and above
16:40that risk-free yield uh that uh uh are
16:43very low risk. um sitting in qualified
16:46custodians. Um and there are other
16:48things that we can do in terms of
16:50investing in companies that are aligned
16:53with the Ethereum mission that are um
16:56designed to grow the value of the Ether
16:58token, grow the uh size of the Ethereum
17:02community. Uh and so um that all of that
17:05is just really active activity and we
17:08have 10 people with full-time jobs. uh
17:11really really the best and the brightest
17:13people uh who who do a great job on
17:16that. Um and the idea is that uh if you
17:20can grow the amount of ether uh that you
17:23are exposed to um in a sort of passive
17:26way from the shareholders perspective
17:28because we are working for the
17:29shareholder to grow how much ETH uh
17:32you're effectively in control of. Um
17:34this is really the start of the next
17:36generation economy which is going to
17:38last decades or centuries who knows. Uh
17:41and so um having a uh having a giant
17:46pile of the highest powered money um
17:49collateral money ether um what will we
17:52be able to do in terms of giant
17:54businesses in the future? Um and um from
17:57a personal perspective uh being exposed
18:00to the next generation of highest
18:03powered money um is going to be very
18:05good for the shareholders.
18:08>> I mean I I I don't uh
18:11>> I don't think you're on different sides
18:12at all.
18:12>> Yeah. I don't argue against the I mean
18:14Ethereum is an incredible technology.
18:16Thank you for bringing it to life, Joe.
18:18Uh I think I think um the issue is that
18:25these DATs are trading at a discount to
18:27NAV and so the markets are making their
18:31decision on on the value
18:33>> correlated with the Ether token.
18:35>> Fair. But just to be clear, I don't
18:38argue against the value of ETH. It's it
18:40Ethereum solves for escrow through
18:42atomic swap technology. That is very
18:44powerful. That takes away the middleman.
18:46I used to be a banker and a lawyer. So I
18:49was the ultimate middleman and I'm very
18:52aware of how useless my value was in
18:54those in what I was doing for like a
18:56decade. Uh being involved in those
18:59professions and when when uh when
19:02Ethereum came out, I realized that my
19:04professions in banking and as a lawyer
19:06was redundant. Uh and that's why I
19:09joined your movement. But my my argu my
19:12argument about the pure play dats
19:16have made up their mind that we're
19:17trading at a discount. Bit digital
19:20trades at a premium if you remove the
19:22white fiber aspect but it's just a
19:25difficult yard stick I think to be to be
19:29uh measured and that front because
19:31>> that's the view in a current in a slice
19:33of time. So so it it's likely to cycle.
19:36>> Yeah. I guess maybe to add my
19:38perspective on that because why not?
19:40[laughter]
19:41I think the way I like to think about
19:43that even the pure player DATs is the
19:45jewel of tokenization like purely from
19:47an investor distribution perspective. Uh
19:50we have all those crypto assets that you
19:51know could be distributed to broader
19:53audiences on TRFI marketplaces, right?
19:55And so just purely the most simple like
19:58you know stupid that that does not do
20:00anything. Just the fact that it's
20:01available to a broader set of investors
20:03to allow for broader investor
20:04distribution in my sense is is is is
20:07valuable right from a purely like
20:09expansion of the investor set. So just
20:11like you know TRFI brings their assets
20:14on chain through tokenization we can
20:15bring our assets to their markets
20:17through through that uh and I think this
20:20uh in itself is is valuable but I don't
20:22think the panel is about that. Yeah.
20:23Yeah. Okay. But but but what you said is
20:25actually very interesting because that
20:26was sort of my next question which is
20:28you are now in the perfect sort of
20:29center of institutions coming to you
20:31wanting to figure out what they can do
20:33on chain and I'd love to kind of
20:34understand what is something common in
20:37terms of the conversations you're
20:38having. Are they just excited about more
20:40yield and that's kind of the only that
20:41matters? Are they excited about just
20:42finally having some obvious thing that
20:44they can do on chain and that's why
20:46they're interested or or is it just that
20:48there's a bigger market now? Like what
20:50stands out and why is it exciting to
20:51them? Yeah, a lot of things not much I
20:55can talk about but what I can share
20:57institutions in general now trust
21:00blockchains as a settlement layer they
21:02all believe uh in the promise of the
21:05open I mean the promise of the open
21:07financial system settling on blockchain
21:08is too big to fail like it is going to
21:10happen it's just a matter of time so
21:12what they see their role in this is the
21:14following and how they approach D5
21:16specifically is the following they want
21:18to use blockchain and defy as a
21:21technology
21:22Right? Those guys are asset managers.
21:24They've been doing this for decades and
21:26decades. They know this thing much
21:28better than most crypto people. Right?
21:30However, they want to use the chain for
21:32two things. Control and network, right?
21:35control for them is the ability to
21:37upgrade their backend, upgrade their
21:39software in order to offer financial
21:41products that are, you know, 247 where
21:44they can control the risk, they can
21:45control the rate, they can control the
21:46compliance and they, you know, are
21:49capable of uh having like uh interest
21:52rate that are paid every second and that
21:54are um uh on on which they they don't
21:57like have to rely on cryptonative people
21:59to manage their assets for them. They're
22:01not interested into investing in D5
22:03protocols that are are managed by like
22:06DeFi natives. They're interested in
22:08taking control of the D5 protocol. Uh
22:12and so so that's uh the the first thing.
22:14And so that's basically you could argue
22:16you could do outside of the chain,
22:18right? Like in a you know a modern
22:20backend like Rust whatever uh the
22:23business value for them is the network
22:25effect like it's the distribution. uh
22:28you have more and more assets on chain
22:30right they see all the distributors that
22:32I've been referring to they're all like
22:34every single fintech has a road map in
22:36the next three years to move entirely on
22:38chain like every single one of them
22:39right they're all moving to
22:40self-custodial wallets they're all
22:42moving to their settlement on chain and
22:44so the distribution is coming onchain
22:46and so as a NASA manager as a financial
22:48institution you don't have the choice
22:50this is where the the money is going to
22:52be this is where the business is going
22:53to be and so their approach is hey we're
22:57gonna common chain. We're going to take
22:58control of those financial primitives
23:00and we are going to um try to collect
23:04the distribution and where it lands
23:06right so what does that mean concretely
23:07because that's a bit abstract right
23:09first it starts with tokenization I
23:11bring my products on chain and try to
23:12make sure I'm distributed where the
23:14distributors are coming on chain but
23:16tokenization it to me it's a bit like a
23:18Frankenstein right like
23:20>> this is a means to an end not not the
23:22actual
23:22>> Yeah yeah yeah exactly is is just like
23:25you you have this very modern technology
23:26technology that basically you just like
23:28tokenize the share of a fund, but the
23:30fund itself still runs on on on
23:32infrastructure that was built before
23:34Vitalik was born, right? And and and so
23:37and and so you basically send the money
23:38on chain and then it goes into this like
23:40very old infrastructure. And so we think
23:43you have to rebuild the entirety of the
23:45phone structure, the entirety of the
23:46origination on chain directly, right?
23:49And that's what we call vault, right?
23:51Basically, it's like the next step is
23:52like you you're going to run your fund
23:53entirely on chain in non-custodial way
23:56or in a regulated way and and you're
23:58going to bring bars and origination on
24:00chain etc. And they realize this as
24:02well. So this is the next step for them
24:04is like hey how can you start leveraging
24:05the onchain economy not just as
24:07distribution but the computer to start
24:10managing funds on chain to start using
24:12your tokenized assets as collateral to
24:14borrow money etc etc.
24:16>> Awesome. Right. We have five minutes and
24:18I have three really important questions.
24:20So, we're going to try to be concise
24:21with our answers. And I'm going to start
24:23with Sam because I want all three of
24:24your opinions on a bunch of these
24:25things. So, the question I have for Sam
24:27is well, especially with the Wiber um
24:29integration to uh kind of the strategy
24:31of Bit Digital. I'm kind of curious to
24:33see how you think about the overlap of
24:36AI with crypto in terms of just kind of
24:39what does it mean for stable coin,
24:40agentic payments, and what excites you
24:41about that future. We're going to start
24:42with that.
24:44>> Well, so that that that is a huge topic.
24:47I I'll I'll be concise, however. So, you
24:49know, agents need compute to think and
24:51agents also need something to pay with.
24:53And I think that's obviously uh where
24:56Ethereum could play a huge role. I think
24:57there would be there's going to be a
24:59supernova in the in the Ethereum and ETH
25:03uh world. Uh because the agentic economy
25:06is a real thing and um I hope I hope
25:10everybody here listens to this because
25:11in the next few years that's basically
25:13what our lives will be mostly dealing
25:16with agents. And so if you think about
25:20it,
25:21uh artificial intelligence is basically
25:24machine native intelligence and Ethereum
25:26is machine native money. And these are
25:29very similar languages and and and banks
25:32and credit card companies that they
25:34those things were built for humans uh
25:37and uh they weren't really built for
25:39agents. And so there is an incredible
25:42opportunity uh for ETH to to position
25:46position itself to be the the the native
25:50and organic and natural go-to for agents
25:53to make to be making payments. And so if
25:55you see all these machines coming
25:57online, you know, in the past last year
25:59and every single conference, it was
26:01about getting humans involved in
26:03Ethereum. I actually don't care about
26:05that anymore. I want machines to get
26:06involved in Ethereum. That's a that's a
26:10100
26:10>> much bigger number.
26:11>> That's a millionx opportunity. So
26:13machine to machines, they need humans
26:16out of the way and you have that with
26:18Ethereum because Ethereum solves for
26:20escrow, takes out the middleman, takes
26:22out what I used to be and it just speaks
26:25to each other. [clears throat] And I
26:26think that's really an incredible
26:27opportunity. So that's that's where I'm
26:29excited about and I know I'm right. Uh
26:32it it's going to be it's going to be
26:34really obvious in the future. Uh but um
26:36but it's not so obvious now.
26:38>> No, I absolutely agree. Um kind of a
26:40question for for Joe and uh
26:42>> can I jump in on that one?
26:43>> I'll ask the question, but I think you
26:44can choose to blend in because it it
26:46adds on to it. Like one of the things
26:47I'm curious about is as we kind of hear
26:49institutions coming in, one of the
26:51common themes that I feel like becomes a
26:53given is that they know how to make
26:54money already. They're just doing it in
26:55new rail because they're they're
26:56thinking of it as infrastructure. So,
26:58how do you kind of think about the next
26:59few years of what does it mean for ETH
27:01the token and the value approval to to
27:03ETH and u would love to kind of get your
27:06and Paul's uh view on this too.
27:07>> Okay. Can I talk a little AI first
27:10>> please?
27:11>> So, um so first um despite the fact that
27:14I just said AI, I I don't really like
27:16the term artificial intelligence. Um I
27:18don't call search artificial search. Um
27:21uh essentially machine intelligence uh
27:24enables us all to uh access the the sum
27:28total wisdom of humanity best practices
27:31mentoring tutoring etc. And so I really
27:34think that humanity will be in the
27:36center of the evolution of a human
27:38machine intelligence economy. Uh and so
27:41uh where this uh ramifies for us is um
27:45in our MetaMask financial services
27:48system, we need to get it right and very
27:51delightful for the user. But then we
27:53build machine intelligence into the
27:56system so that everybody can understand
27:59uh what's going on in this pretty
28:02complicated technology. Uh and so uh
28:04machine intelligence is a user manual
28:08for life on planet Earth. And I think uh
28:10I think that it's going to um
28:13supercharge uh the economy with us at
28:16the center of it. Just I I think it's
28:17important to uh uh to be positive about
28:20machine intelligence. Um and
28:24where do I think um the system of the
28:27world is going? I I think we're moving
28:29into a uh a much more decentralized
28:32global economy because uh we're scalable
28:35enough to do that. I think layer one is
28:37going to be a credibly neutral
28:39censorship resistant high throughput
28:42very high throughput uh a national uh
28:45digital asset settlement layer and
28:47coordination layer uh for major entities
28:50and valuable assets and valuable
28:52protocols. I think layer twos and
28:54private permission networks are are all
28:56going to start to reflect what the
28:59economies look like and what the nation
29:01states look like. Uh these modules are
29:04very useful for um for corporations to
29:08put their stuff on it to put their
29:10assets on it to uh bring their partners
29:12and and their users onto it. Uh layer
29:14twos and other systems are good for
29:16consortia or gaming ecosystems etc. So
29:19so that I think is going to be the
29:21architecture for the world. Um all the
29:23blockchain systems flow to and through
29:26Ethereum. So, it's all going to be we're
29:28not going to be talking Ethereum and
29:30Salana and and other protocols that much
29:33the same way we don't talk uh TCP IP and
29:36um and other protocols uh uh on the web.
29:39We're just going to be using
29:40applications and and so where does the
29:42value flow to? Uh two answers. One uh
29:46the one that you were looking for is
29:48that there's going to be a huge amount
29:50of contention at layer 1. there's going
29:52to be a lot of usage, staking, burning
29:55of ether at layer twos and in even uh
29:58private permission chains. Uh so when
30:00things get really going, when we start
30:02burning lots of ether, um uh ether is
30:05going to have an enormous monetary
30:06premium and uh there will be much more
30:09demand um for ether than supply. Um but
30:14the real
30:16uh the sort of longitudinal way to think
30:19of where the value flows to um we're
30:22moving from an economy uh that and a
30:26society that is scarcity based to one
30:29that is abundance-based. And so we're
30:31with the use of machine intelligence,
30:32with the use of decentralized trust, uh
30:35we're going to all be able to do
30:38anything we want. we're going to be able
30:40to create projects that grow as big as
30:43we can put attention uh into them. Uh
30:45and so the value is going to be
30:47everywhere. It's going to be a fractally
30:49expanding global economy. Uh so um yes,
30:53layer one ether will will will get a
30:55bid. Uh but uh everybody will be able to
30:57make their own magic internet money and
30:59and create their own value.
31:01>> Amazing. Well, my final question to all
31:02of you, maybe we can get a quick uh line
31:04on that one, is just Ethereum's been
31:06around for over a decade and we kind of
31:08all knew it from the world computer, but
31:09people kind of come in different years
31:11of different version of it. So, what
31:12widely held belief about Ethereum do you
31:14feel like is something should people
31:17should reconsider now that we've kind of
31:19seen a whole incredible decade of
31:21accumulation around the progress on the
31:23project and uh what do you think people
31:24should uh unlearn about Ethereum? We'll
31:26start with Paul. Yeah, I I think again
31:29to me blockchain is all about having an
31:32open infrastructure and for me
31:36finance is all about connecting people
31:38like finance is about like connecting
31:40intents between people and the more the
31:43most open infrastructure will foster the
31:46most amount of connectivity, right? And
31:49in order to be the most open to
31:51everybody, you have to be neutral. In
31:53order to be neutral, you have to be the
31:55most decentralized layer. So this is
31:57really what it boils down to. The best
31:59financial primitives, the best
32:01settlement layers, the most competitive
32:03pricing, the deepest liquidity comes
32:05down to openness. Openness comes down to
32:07neutrality. Neutrality comes down to
32:09decentralization. And I think people
32:11don't realize how important that is for
32:13like you know Ethereum like positioning
32:15in in in general.
32:17>> Sam,
32:18>> the question is
32:19>> what do you think people should
32:20reconsider about Ethereum now?
32:23Um well I think I think uh I think
32:27Ethereum and crypto in general
32:28unfortunately has a bit of a a stain and
32:31I think it's really from the past few
32:33years of like price chasing and and I
32:36think there's been a lot of resistance
32:39particularly by boomers that are in
32:41certain positions at financial
32:44institutions
32:45u they they just have a dark view of as
32:47soon as you say the word crypto you
32:49could you could tell something shuts
32:51down. I use the word digital assets and
32:54same thing, right? But they they're
32:55they're fine. So I think gen
32:57generationally uh you know we everybody
33:00here has normal have normalized crypto
33:03in in their portfolios and and I think
33:07once gen Gen Z gen X even and
33:10millennials they're in their positions
33:11of power and that's that's happening now
33:13they'll normalize digital assets or
33:15crypto and and then you're going to see
33:17massive a massive movement uh towards
33:21the normalization and institutization of
33:24Ethereum and I think that's that's
33:25something that will happen in in I think
33:27over the next 10 years when when when
33:29you know these boomers die.
33:32So [laughter] I think
33:35don't worry I I think there's a widely
33:38held misunderstanding that that's
33:40promulgated by different protocols VCs
33:43journalists um that um there are lots of
33:48competing systems uh that are gaining
33:51tremendous traction um and that's
33:54because these people are spending uh
33:56much of their effort on marketing um uh
33:59they're building you know memecoin
34:02casinos and things like that. So,
34:03they're they're actually creating a lot
34:05of entertainment. Uh I I I appreciate
34:08what they're doing. Uh but the the real
34:11core ethos of our ecosystem is about
34:15decentralization. It's about lots of
34:17independent entities uh coming together
34:20to build a public good shared protocol,
34:23a credibly neutral infrastructure for
34:26the planet. And so when people uh
34:28complain that the Ethereum Foundation
34:30isn't doing well or the Ethereum
34:32technology isn't doing well, it's simply
34:34wrong. Uh people point to the public
34:38>> conflict. Where's the CEO of Ethereum?
34:40Why is he not moving the picker up?
34:43Right.
34:43>> Sorry.
34:44>> The CEO of Ethereum, where is he?
34:46>> Where's the C? Yeah, exactly. Uh so, uh
34:49Ethereum is being built um by a lot of
34:53uh independent aligned entities. um
34:56there's a a very well understood
34:58process. Uh and it's great to have uh
35:01vigorous discussion and conflict etc.
35:04rather than having u your protocol which
35:07looks a little more like a company than
35:09a rigorously decentralized protocol.
35:11>> Well, decentralization is why we're here
35:12and why this industry got started. So
35:14Joe, Paul, Sam, thank you for an amazing
35:16conversation. Please give a big round of
35:17applause.

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