The Next Era of Stablecoin Payments - TOKEN2049 Singapore 2026 — Transcript

Full transcript

1. 0:08Hello everyone.
2. 0:10It's going to be super exciting quick 15
3. 0:13minutes chat. We're going to talk about
4. 0:16the hottest topic on the planet after AI
5. 0:19which is stable coin payment.
6. 0:21And
7. 0:23I have
8. 0:24nobody than Zach and Zach from Liberty.
9. 0:28Thank you for joining me for this panel.
10. 0:30>> Thanks. Great to be here with you today
11. 0:31Ben.
12. 0:32>> Yeah.
13. 0:33So
14. 0:35we're going to talk like very quickly
15. 0:37about a stable coin payments but before
16. 0:40that we'll like to make a big
17. 0:42announcement. So I'm going to read from
18. 0:43the script but it's very exciting.
19. 0:45Everyone knows that a stable coin have
20. 0:48gotten really good at moving money.
21. 0:50But it's a state still painfully hard
22. 0:53for people to use them.
23. 0:54That's where
24. 0:56World Liberty
25. 0:58comes to the picture with USD one to
26. 1:00make it super simple.
27. 1:02And we are going we are super excited to
28. 1:04announce our partnership at Mash with
29. 1:07World Liberty to powering everyone who
30. 1:11has USD one to be able to spend their
31. 1:13money everywhere
32. 1:16like that Mash is accepted which is
33. 1:17hundreds of millions of merchants
34. 1:18globally. And we're super excited to
35. 1:21bring that to life this quarter. So
36. 1:25without a further ado we are going to
37. 1:27talk about the stable coin payment and
38. 1:30use case. But Zach we go over you first.
39. 1:34Tell us more about USD one and
40. 1:37why you guys are looking at the most
41. 1:40compliant way with the painful way to
42. 1:42apply for a charter bank. What's the
43. 1:45intersection of compliance and a stable
44. 1:47coin and how do you guys are solving it?
45. 1:50>> Yeah. Well first of all really really
46. 1:52excited for the partnership. Mash has
47. 1:55built some of the most unbelievable
48. 1:57infrastructure anywhere in payments and
49. 2:00you know, we're honored to be partnered
50. 2:02with with you guys.
51. 2:04Um, as for the trust charter, um, we
52. 2:07received our conditional charter uh
53. 2:10about a couple months ago. Actually the
54. 2:13the same day that I had my second baby
55. 2:16boy, we also received
56. 2:17>> Congrats.
57. 2:18>> [laughter]
58. 2:18>> conditional trust charter.
59. 2:20Um, but but what does that do for the
60. 2:22business? Um,
61. 2:24you know, a trust charter is is probably
62. 2:27the highest bar in American finance. Um,
63. 2:30obviously will increase trust in our
64. 2:32institution. It'll also increase
65. 2:34transparency.
66. 2:36Um, so we'll have certain requirements
67. 2:39that we'll have to meet, you know, per
68. 2:40OCC guidelines.
69. 2:43Um, hopefully we'll have that trust
70. 2:45charter operational soon.
71. 2:47Um, and it's something that um, you
72. 2:50know, we're really excited about. I want
73. 2:51I I want to be clear about this. It's
74. 2:54it's it's something that we've been able
75. 2:56to achieve
76. 2:58in spite of some of the attacks against
77. 3:00us, you know, whether it be the
78. 3:01mainstream media or you know, some of
79. 3:03these politicians that want to attack us
80. 3:05for for whatever, you know, nefarious
81. 3:08reasons they have. But um, yeah, it's
82. 3:11it's it's huge for the business. Um,
83. 3:14and we can't wait till USD 1 is is, you
84. 3:17know, accepted at the thousands of
85. 3:20merchants that you
86. 3:20>> Millions.
87. 3:21>> Millions. Millions millions of merchants
88. 3:23that you support worldwide.
89. 3:25>> [snorts]
90. 3:26>> Yeah, so
91. 3:27um, the reason you need the charter is
92. 3:30because you want to show that you're
93. 3:32like passing the highest bar of security
94. 3:35and compliance. So, it would be like a
95. 3:38trusted brand
96. 3:40uh for everyone who is using and holding
97. 3:41USD 1 or spending USD 1.
98. 3:44Um, why couldn't you do that without a
99. 3:46trust? What what like tell the audience
100. 3:49that why a trust is needed or you wanted
101. 3:51to kind of go extra mile to make sure
102. 3:53that you have the highest bar in
103. 3:55compliance and security.
104. 3:56>> Yeah, sure. I mean, ultimately, this is
105. 3:58people's money we're talking about.
106. 4:01Um so, you know, there's there's trust
107. 4:03me and then there's show me, right? Uh
108. 4:06what we're doing with this trust is
109. 4:07showing, you know, our holders, our
110. 4:10customers that they they really can
111. 4:12trust this product, right? The OCC has a
112. 4:15process in place. Um it includes some of
113. 4:18the things that I talked about before,
114. 4:20right? Things like AML, KYC, one-to-one
115. 4:24backing of reserves, things that are
116. 4:26already in place today.
117. 4:28Um but of course, today we're we're
118. 4:30issuing through Biko, right? And uh with
119. 4:33this trust charter, we'll be able to
120. 4:34take on that responsibility ourselves.
121. 4:37>> Yeah, the other Zach. So, I know like
122. 4:40trust is good as a foundation, but it
123. 4:42doesn't move the money itself, right?
124. 4:44So,
125. 4:45>> Sure.
126. 4:45>> and then one of your vision was like to
127. 4:48abstract all the complexity of the
128. 4:50crypto and the stable coin, so you can
129. 4:52bring it to the mainstream. What did you
130. 4:54guys do in that end?
131. 4:57>> Yeah, I mean, that's a great question. I
132. 4:59think for all stable coins, it always
133. 5:01starts with trading, right?
134. 5:04>> Right.
135. 5:04>> So, we focused, when we launched USD 1,
136. 5:07partnering with all the top exchanges in
137. 5:09the world,
138. 5:10um creating as many pairs for users,
139. 5:13being used as collateral for trading, um
140. 5:17and expanding the use within crypto. But
141. 5:19our vision has always been much bigger
142. 5:21than the crypto uh community. We really
143. 5:25believe that USD 1 is going to be
144. 5:27synonymous with the US dollar all around
145. 5:30the world.
146. 5:30>> Right.
147. 5:31>> So, if you look at the use cases for
148. 5:32crypto, it's like this. But if you look
149. 5:35at the use cases for the US dollar, I
150. 5:38mean, it's infinite. The whole world is
151. 5:40is operating on the dollar. And so, for
152. 5:43us, creating a digital dollar that moves
153. 5:46across borders in
154. 5:47fractions of a second, has less
155. 5:50friction, less cost to move funds, it's
156. 5:53good for everybody involved in the
157. 5:55global economy. And that's really what
158. 5:56we've been focusing on. First, building
159. 5:59out the distribution and the liquidity
160. 6:01inside the crypto community, and then
161. 6:03moving to the next bigger step, which is
162. 6:05global payments. And that's obviously
163. 6:07where Mesh and USD 1 and World Liberty
164. 6:10comes together.
165. 6:11>> Makes sense. And last year, you guys
166. 6:13announced the debit card. Um and uh
167. 6:18that's kind of where you kind of
168. 6:19abstract all the complexity. You can
169. 6:21receive USD 1 in your debit card, you
170. 6:22can spend it anywhere debit card is
171. 6:25accepted, which is huge. So, is it right
172. 6:28that like the way you distinguish
173. 6:30yourselves from USDT and USDC is like
174. 6:33you're building the whole ecosystem,
175. 6:34it's not just a stable coin, it has a
176. 6:36lot of other utilities like the debit?
177. 6:39Do you mind telling the audience more
178. 6:40about that?
179. 6:41>> Yeah, I think the biggest thing to
180. 6:43really focus on here is USDC or USDT,
181. 6:47rather, was the first mover. So, within
182. 6:50the crypto community, they had that
183. 6:52first mover advantage. But there's a lot
184. 6:55of reasons why institutions aren't
185. 6:57comfortable using USDT, and we see a
186. 6:59shift from USDT to regulated compliant
187. 7:03stable coins like USD 1.
188. 7:05Um Circle's done a great job around
189. 7:08being the leader in terms of
190. 7:12being a regulated stable coin. But I
191. 7:14think our competitive advantage, and
192. 7:16hopefully you can speak to this as well,
193. 7:19is our goal is to be a better partner to
194. 7:22the technology layers and to the
195. 7:24merchants and the distribution
196. 7:25platforms. So obviously, we have our own
197. 7:30goals and North Star at growing USD 1,
198. 7:33but part of that is working closely with
199. 7:35our partners like Mesh to really be able
200. 7:38to
201. 7:39bring value back to the platforms and
202. 7:41ultimately the end users making it
203. 7:43cheaper, faster, and easier to use.
204. 7:46>> Makes sense. Anything you want to add to
205. 7:47that?
206. 7:47>> Yeah, I mean, I would just add that I
207. 7:49think we're building some very
208. 7:51interesting layers on top of USD 1. Um,
209. 7:55you know, that includes things like WLD
210. 7:575 Markets. Um, Markets has grown to
211. 8:00become a top 10 lending market in the
212. 8:03industry. There's over a billion dollars
213. 8:05of TVL on Markets.
214. 8:08300 million of USD 1. There's over 500
215. 8:11million dollars of borrowers.
216. 8:13Um, and we're going to continue to
217. 8:15innovate and roll out products that our
218. 8:17customers ultimately want to see. And
219. 8:19that includes, you know, like like Zach
220. 8:22said, working with the best in the
221. 8:24industry, people like yourselves and
222. 8:25Mash and
223. 8:26>> And it's probably a good time to kind of
224. 8:29talk about this a little bit. You know,
225. 8:31we've talked about the World Liberty
226. 8:34app. And a lot of people have been
227. 8:36wondering when it's coming. Um, the
228. 8:39reality is is when we set out and first
229. 8:41had the idea about creating the World
230. 8:43Liberty app, the goal was to abstract
231. 8:46away all the difficulties to using
232. 8:49stable coins for payments. And
233. 8:51ultimately, that came down to finding
234. 8:54the right tech partner that could really
235. 8:56facilitate that, right? And deliver the
236. 8:58user experience that we wanted. Because
237. 9:01for us, to just roll out an app that
238. 9:03didn't really meet our standards for
239. 9:05what this product should be,
240. 9:07it didn't make sense. And so, now that
241. 9:10we've partnered with Mash, we've really
242. 9:12been able to create a product that we
243. 9:14truly believe not only crypto users, but
244. 9:16mainstream users as a whole are going to
245. 9:19be able to use, enjoy, to Zach's point,
246. 9:22integrate things like Markets directly
247. 9:25into the app in a very seamless,
248. 9:27user-friendly way.
249. 9:28>> Makes sense.
250. 9:29>> And, you know, you can you can sort of
251. 9:31be first and get it right, which is very
252. 9:35hard. Um,
253. 9:37or you can just get it right, right?
254. 9:39We're very focused
255. 9:41>> people's lesson and experience and then
256. 9:43get it right. Yeah.
257. 9:44>> Yeah, that's right. Like Bam, take take
258. 9:46Muse for example, right? Muse was not
259. 9:49the first AI product in the market, but
260. 9:52you know, Mark and the team and Alex,
261. 9:54you know, they got it right. Um and, you
262. 9:57know,
263. 9:59Meta's stock has uh been on a tear as a
264. 10:01result. Um
265. 10:03so, we're very focused on getting it
266. 10:05right. Um again, this is real people's
267. 10:08money on the line, right?
268. 10:10>> Right.
269. 10:10>> Um and so, we want to make sure that we
270. 10:12get this product right. We're We're very
271. 10:14confident that, you know, our customers
272. 10:17and community are are going to, you
273. 10:19know, really love this product.
274. 10:22And, you know, you you you you're
275. 10:24yourself and your company are are
276. 10:26helping us make this product much
277. 10:27better. So, again, we thank you for the
278. 10:29partnership.
279. 10:30>> Thank you. We appreciate
280. 10:30>> And beyond the use of the World Liberty
281. 10:32app itself, we are already in plans to
282. 10:36roll out this exact same technology to
283. 10:39some of the largest Web 2 businesses
284. 10:41that are in the marketplace. So, not
285. 10:44only will it be powering the World
286. 10:46Liberty consumer app, it's also going to
287. 10:48be powering companies
288. 10:51can't We're not going to announce it
289. 10:52today, but companies that have millions
290. 10:54of users are using it to facilitate
291. 10:56payments to
292. 10:58things like, you know, use your
293. 10:59imagination, drivers, uh
294. 11:02contractors, creators, et cetera. So,
295. 11:05>> to this ecosystem and use the USD one
296. 11:08the World Liberty app.
297. 11:08>> That's right. Anywhere a dollar is
298. 11:10accepted, really. I mean, the US dollar
299. 11:13is the greatest product America ever
300. 11:16created, right? Um and, you know, we
301. 11:19want to export that around the world.
302. 11:21>> Makes sense. And um so, like our core
303. 11:24mission at Mash has always like the joke
304. 11:26is like we want the product to pass the
305. 11:29grandma test, Yep, your grandma can use
306. 11:31it. So, it needs to be as simple as like
307. 11:33tap and pay or click and pay. But you
308. 11:36guys not only doing that, but um like
309. 11:38Mesh has a small role in that, but like
310. 11:40that was your core mission, too. But on
311. 11:42top of it, you want to kind of make it
312. 11:44simpler for businesses around the globe
313. 11:46to be able to tap into this technology.
314. 11:48That's That's huge.
315. 11:49>> Not only simpler, uh faster, and
316. 11:52programmable, right? This is just a
317. 11:54better form of money. Um
318. 11:56you people don't want to wait, you know,
319. 11:592 hours, 5 hours, 2 days to get their
320. 12:02money. They want it now.
321. 12:04Um you know, internet moves at the speed
322. 12:06of sound.
323. 12:08Uh stable coins are quickly becoming the
324. 12:10cash layer of the internet, and we think
325. 12:12that, you know, money should move at
326. 12:14that speed as well.
327. 12:16>> Makes sense. The last thing I would like
328. 12:18to ask is about agentic commerce and
329. 12:20agentic economy. So, we have like around
330. 12:235 billion people, more or less,
331. 12:25connected to internet. They're making
332. 12:27like two transactions
333. 12:29per day in average. We'll have hundreds
334. 12:32of billions of agents connected to
335. 12:33internet. They do thousands of
336. 12:35transactions per second, not even day.
337. 12:38And on top of it, they're doing
338. 12:40microtransactions. You cannot really pay
339. 12:43someone 0.00005
340. 12:45cents using Visa or Mastercard or wire.
341. 12:49So, that's going to where stablecoin
342. 12:50comes to the picture. Do you guys have
343. 12:51any plan to work on agentic economy,
344. 12:54too?
345. 12:55>> Well, we already have. I mean, I think
346. 12:58uh for anybody who watched my talk at
347. 13:01the World Liberty Forum, we announced
348. 13:04our agentic SDK. And so, essentially,
349. 13:07what that allows users and agents to do
350. 13:10is with one simple command, be able to
351. 13:13launch a USD 1 wallet, let their agent
352. 13:16transact anywhere agents are transacting
353. 13:20or will transact in the future, and
354. 13:22control the limits through a simple
355. 13:23dashboard. So, whitelisting wallets,
356. 13:27uh setting transaction limits, setting
357. 13:30transaction caps, etc. So, we've already
358. 13:32done that today and that can be
359. 13:34integrated with things like Zach was
360. 13:36saying like Muse, Chat GPT, Grok Bot,
361. 13:39you name it. So, we're already we have
362. 13:41been focusing on this for a while and we
363. 13:43think once the market really starts to
364. 13:47embrace this, USD 1 is already
365. 13:49positioned to be a leader in that space.
366. 13:52>> Makes sense. Any closing thoughts, Zach?
367. 13:55>> Yeah, I mean, um you know, like Zach
368. 13:58said, already building a bunch around
369. 14:00Agoric. Um to be frank with you, Bam, as
370. 14:02you know, the the volumes are quite
371. 14:04small in the Agoric space right now. We
372. 14:07believe that those will get much, much,
373. 14:09much bigger. Yeah, that's that's
374. 14:11definitely where the puck is going and
375. 14:13and we're always trying to sort of skate
376. 14:15where the puck is going, not not where
377. 14:17it is.
378. 14:18Um
379. 14:19you know, again, working with companies
380. 14:21like Mesh, I think we'll be able to
381. 14:24deliver um a user experience like no
382. 14:27other in the space and we're really
383. 14:29excited about it.
384. 14:30>> Super exciting. Uh with this, we're
385. 14:33going to wrap this session. Thanks,
386. 14:34everyone. Thank you, Zach and Zach.
387. 14:36Appreciate
388. 14:36>> having us.
389. 14:36>> Thanks for having you again soon.
390. 14:38>> Thank you, guys.