The RWA Roundup 2026 | CoinGecko Virtual Meetup #34

Added: 2026-06-04

[00:01:52]Heat. Heat.

[00:08:28]I'm power.

[00:10:57]Hey, hey, hey.

[00:16:36]Good morning, good morning, good afternoon, good evening everyone.

[00:16:40]Welcome to Coin Gekcko's 34th meetup. My name is Zong and I'm the head of research at Coin Gecko and I'll be the host for you today. Before we begin, I would like to thank Real Finance for sponsoring this meetup. Thank you Real Finance for allowing us to continue to host these events and very happy that Brandon from Real Finance is is joining us today. Um, also as the topic for this meetup is RWAS, I think I would first like to record our condolences to Ono team on the tragic passing of their founder and CEO Nathan Alman this week.

[00:17:13]May he rest in peace.

[00:17:17]So the title for today's meetup is the railroad assets R or RWA roundup for 2026. We're sort of midway through the year, so there's been plenty to discuss as RW has been one of the hottest sectors within the crypto industry recently. Trafy issuers have been looking to bring their assets on chain, right, in order to unlock efficiency gains. Well, actually I think crypto traders have also been very hungry for exposure to RWAS such as gold and AI equities and and whatnot. So I think lots for us to discuss, right? I think in in a recent report that we published on RWAS, total RWA market cap has actually grown to about 20 billion now from just 5.4 billion at the start of 2025. So that's almost like a four times increase in a span of about one and a half years. And um joining me to discuss the latest developments and the future of art. I think we have three very esteemed guests. Uh as I mentioned earlier, we have Branzen Kazakov. He's the vice president of growth for rail finance who's who's joining us today. We have Reed Simon, president of digital assets at Figure as well as Martin the Reich uh head of growth at Maple Finance. Welcome gentlemen. Thank you for joining us today.

[00:18:31]>> Yeah, thanks for having us.

[00:18:33]Right. So let's get into it. I think I I did a bit of introduction, you know, talking about how how much RWAs have have sort of grown uh in in this past sort of year and a half and really it has, you know, only continued to grow stronger. We see more and more headlines, you know, despite sort of the market downturn that that has hit us, you know, since October and and that sort of lasted for almost more than six months now. So perhaps you know to start off share with us what what what are some of the things that have surprised you about the RWA market and how it has sort of developed even during you know sort of what what people would say is is bare market right and and how it has continue to go from strength to strength. So maybe start with Brandon.

[00:19:16]Yeah.

[00:19:17]>> Yeah. Yeah. I think you kind of hit the nail on the head. Sort of what surprised me the most is not necessarily just the the growth but the the resilience of that growth. Um, you know, during this difficult market environment, the demand for tokenized assets kind of continues because the value proposition is is a little bit differentiated from what we've seen in the past, right? Um, the value prop is increasingly more practical rather than risky and speculative. Uh, that being said, you know, it's not as if there isn't risk in the more traditional sense, but again, it's it's more practical. So we've seen I think this progression from you know of tokenization go from you know just narrative theory and hypothesis stage more into functional financial uh infrastructure right now treasuries gold credit products they're attractive because they they introduce recogni recognizable sources of value onchain and yield and collateralization opportunities into an onchain environment. Um, so yeah, I think, you know, it's, yeah, just the resilience and and this this uh, you know, I guess mindset shift of people looking at onchain capital markets as as potentially a uh, a less risky place to be getting involved in.

[00:20:32]>> Thanks. Thanks for that. Brendan Reed, what about from your end because because you guys went through a listing and then sort of, you know, sort of saw this explode as well.

[00:20:42]Yeah, I mean I think it's been exciting to sort of see the the industry enter sort of like phase two of of tokenization where you know I think phase one was sort of like brand names that were sort of tradi purpose-built assets that were a great introduction for for institutional assets uh asset managers moving on chain uh but I think you know those assets sort of just sat there right they're permissioned and I think um you know one metric that um you know a competitor of yours uh has sort of highlighted is this concept of like active DeFi uh TVL and I think we're seeing a lot more assets um that are actually able to be used um on chain and availed of of kind of the benefits of composability um and I think that's a you know that's the the right trend and it's exciting to get to see other other assets get tokenized onchain um and really be deployed in in DeFi rather than just sort held in in a wallet.

[00:21:43]>> Thanks. Thanks for that. And Martin, you know, Maple's been around for for a while and gone through a few cycles. So So what's what's been surprising this this round?

[00:21:51]>> Yeah, OG RWA.

[00:21:54]Yeah, thanks. You know, great to be here first of all. Um and also condolences indeed to uh the Hondo team and Nathan's family. Um yeah, so Maple, you know, we've been around for a long time like we're, you know, sort of really early to RWA, right? um by you know essentially tokenizing uh institutional loans and you know putting them in into SER USDC ser USDT uh to reach point you know they have grown leverated throughout DeFi right they're multi-chain uh you know currently about four billion in TVL um I think you know the the bare market is a is a huge tailwind actually for uh RWS because you know if yields on chain are 30% and you know you can buy a memecoin and double in a week right then people aren't really looking at sort of traditional assets uh and these tokenized opportunities so I think um it's actually a big tailwind and it makes people onchain interested in these products uh and those will be the early adopters right of of rwas uh and then over time you know as sort of people start seeing the actual benefits of tokenization in these uh in these defi environments that we actually see you know traditional people come in, right? And I think at Maple, you know, our sort of thesis is that fintech will be the next big wave of uh of crypto adoption, right? And and sort of the fintexs are going to bring all these DeFi products, you know, all these RWAs to uh to their users. Um and you know, we're seeing a lot of of evidence of that. So where DeFi in the past was really this isolated sort of environment, it's now slowly starting to merge with uh you know, just traditional finance. Yeah, I think I think certainly we we're seeing more integration of RWAs into DeFi itself and more interesting sort of yield generating opportunities I guess come out from that. I think, you know, if if we put some of that aside and sort of I I guess we we'll definitely want to talk about credit in a bit, but I think, you know, in in in the more recent times, I think, you know, really the the some of the the biggest, you know, sort of growth for RAS have come in the commodity space, right? So, gold, um, silver, more recently, crude oil, you know, really, you know, come to the spotlight. uh you know and and this is this was not just in in RWA markets specifically but also in the traditional markets you know given all the macroeconomic and and political stuff that's been going on I guess you know while tokenized versions of these things have been around for a bit you know certainly like you know PEXG and XAT has been around for you know more than five six years now they launched back in 2019 2020 if I'm not mistaken so why do you think you know it has it has taken this long for them to be to be so popular as as as they are today. Do do you guys think it's just you know purely markets right and and you know the these things are now invoked or or there there's actually a greater shift towards these things maybe Martin go first yeah >> yeah yeah yeah so really good question and to your point like RW is something that's been spoken about for many many years um you know I think one of you know a few reasons one of them is of course that burps is just an incredible product right uh and it has so many advant advantages compared to traditional markets and it's really good for you know trading oil trading gold you know trading sort of like um private companies right and preipos and all these different things so I think that is a product of real product market fit and it's probably going to be one of the first crypto products that will be widely adopted uh then the other thing I would say is that stable coins is is the other leading indicator right like ultimately a stable coin you know is also an RWA in ence, right? Like it is just a tokenized dollar. Um, so you know, I think and you need stable coins for all the other use cases, right? Like without stable coins, you know, nobody can deposit into our products. Without stable coins, you know, you cannot use uh the prime asset on on Morpho or Camino, right? So you you need stable coins and we are just seeing a continuation of growth in in stable coins across the space. So I think that's just a leading indicator for everything that's to come. Uh and then the final thing I would say is like it is it's not easy to bring these assets on chain in a way that it actually adds real value uh to users. Um you know so you see a lot of projects trying different things but to actually get product market fit and you know real user adoption is uh is hard. Uh so you really need a a product that has some unique you know benefit on chain that you just don't have uh yet right. Um so and I think you know we're slowly starting to see all that developing uh and as more and more comes right it's kind of like a a wave of water like at some point you know it will just all start flooding in and uh you know the growth will will accelerate a lot and you know the example with hyperlquid is yeah it started with just crypton native traders right that just wanted to trade oil futures because there wasn't much volatility in crypto now it's like small hedge funds right are starting to use is as a source of alpha right uh then it will be big hedge funds then it will be you know the large uh investment banks uh and trading shops so I think you know it will just uh go through that evolution of of adoption >> yeah Reed what do you think >> yeah I I think it's probably uh two explanations one um I think is more market driven so just the reality of like volatility right and the assets that a lot of people like to trade um in crypto they have generally historically been volatile assets right um and I think the the script got flipped a little bit and so assets like gold and oil had that volatility and sort of like the unlock whether it's hyperlquid or or some other platforms like the technical unlock of being able to trade that in a way that it wasn't able to be traded in Tradfi was sort of like oh there's product market fit here um there's an unlock from the technology and there's volatility that makes it interesting for crypto people to trade.

[00:28:10]Um, and I think the second piece is like, you know, and it it it I think it comes back to the comment I made uh on the first question, which is there wasn't anything to do with them before, right? Um, they have great liquidity because they're commodities, right? Um, but I think the unlocks that we're seeing um for those assets being able to to play a role in DeFi um just didn't exist before, right? you could buy uh I think you know tether gold, you could buy it on Bitfinex, but there wasn't a lot that you could do with it sort of beyond that. Um and so I think it's a combination of sort of um you know macro trends for for volatility and the technology coming to kind of meet these assets um to unlock their their technical capabilities.

[00:28:53]>> No, thanks thanks for that. Brandon, how how how are you how how are you guys at at Rio looking at this because you know it sort of came out of nowhere and then sort of you know are you guys looking more on the tokenizing the >> Yeah or the >> you know I would I would agree with uh quite a few of the points that Reed and Martin already brought up. Um Reed, you you make a good point and you know a tokenized commodity only really becomes useful once there is actual use cases right just because you can tokenize something doesn't necessarily mean that it's a usable financial product on chain um so you know I think a lot of the surrounding infrastructure um you know regarding credibility took some time to mature you know investors need confidence in like custody redemption reserve verification the secondary liquidity the legal claim being represented by the token And I think a lot of that is what sort of took the time to mature sort of rounding back to your question of like why why have we seen this growth phase now and then I would agree with both of you know the um the product market fit and the macro environment also really helped like in an uncertain market investors are a little bit more receptive to assets you know with historical defensive characteristics while crypto users increasingly want uh productive or assetbacked exposures right so I think that's where a lot of that fit came in and you know it's nice to see just referring to gold there's so many other use cases when we when we talk about RWAS but gold's a really clear example of an asset that makes intuitive sense both to crypto users like you said re recent volatility and traditional investors right so it's familiar it's globally recognized naturally fits a 247 market structure and so I think there's it's kind of a multi-pronged approach as to why something like that is is picking up now and is is kind of a flagship use case for RW is >> nice. Let's let's switch switch gears a bit and talk about credit because you know two two of our panelists today you know uh products build products around credit right so figure and as well as maple I think you know with with with with this products you know you you really need um some maybe some some level of understanding of of of you know traditional credit risk assessment and and you know um and and sort of to to really sort of get a get a handle on the product. I'm just wondering, I guess from from from your perspective, I guess Reed and Martin, Reed can probably go first, like do do you think that's sort of like a learning curve for for for users who who are coming into contact with with you know, your products um you know and and do we need to I guess sort of introduce the concept of credit risk uh you know to to to to crypto deens now and see if they can they can they can sort of understand that that sort of riskreward sort of payoff.

[00:31:43]Yeah, I I'm kind of of of two minds. One being that, you know, historically we I think DeFi is an asset finance business, right? At the end of the day, DeFi has been conditioned to not care about who the borrower is. Um, look at the volatility, the liquidity, and sort of like technical liquidation thresholds.

[00:32:05]So, I think they've been conditioned for a certain sort of asset. And then I also think a lot of you know credit has not been credit. It's been you know perpetual motion points um and you know structures that that try to approximate an equity-like return but have an interest rate attached to it. So I I think um I think there definitely is a learning curve, but I also think a lot of the assets that have been tokenized as sort of you know private credit or or credit there isn't even enough information to understand what's inside it. So if you look at some of the the interval funds like you have no idea what loans are under it. So what credit analysis are you going to do? You could look at like the historical like price appreciation but again like the reratings or or kind of markdowns there they come in step-wise fashion and there's not a whole lot of diligence you you can do. So I think you know one of the the reasons that figure has been really successful with tokenizing helocks is fundamentally it's an asset finance business right um there isn't a credit intermediation everything is on chain you sort of you know similar to to what Brandon was talking about gold like a home equity loan is is pretty understandable right like you want to refinance um to or sorry you want to borrow to to renovate your property you want to pay off a you know college tuition like those are actual demonstrable use cases that people get in the real world and being able to lend against that as a credit asset rather than into a fund um or some kind of opaque structure. Um I think that's you know that that is the future and I think DeFi is conditioned um for that. Um, and I think it's, you know, what makes makes us really excited about the ability to to sort of bring those type of assets that real people, everyday users just didn't have access to in in the real world. Um, and bring those on chain in sort of a composable and easy to understand fashion.

[00:33:59]>> Yeah. Martin, what about on on you guys?

[00:34:02]And you guys have have also had quite a quite a bit of experience trying to bring credit onchain and and you know how how has that education process I guess been for for your users?

[00:34:13]>> Yes. Yeah, it did. So you know I think that uh ultimately the the only credit product you currently see DeFi users really be comfortable with is sort of like an asset backed or an overcolateralized uh product, right? So that's why we do over collateralized lending to institutional borrowers right now. I would expect that we will see more of these types of products coming on chain.

[00:34:53]>> I'm sorry.

[00:34:55]>> Sorry. I I I think you were you were lagging for a bit.

[00:34:59]>> Sorry. Okay.

[00:35:00]>> Yeah.

[00:35:00]>> So, you know, at Maple, we uh you know, we we do overcolateralized lending, right? So, we lend against, you know, Bitcoin, ETH, digital asset collateral uh to institutions. Um and you know, that's sort of the product we see users be comfortable with, right? Like it's very familiar to crypto users. You know, they understand that model. Uh you know, that that's sort of what they're used to. Um and we think that that is going to expand, right? And most of these credit products will be asset backed right for the foreseeable future. Um and over time you know we'll start introducing uh you know like other types of products on chain and and users will be uh will be comfortable with that. Um but right now you know we have seen that that is really sort of the area of traction where you know both allocators, partners, fintexs, exchanges, wallets you know and programs uh they're really you know comfortable underwriting them.

[00:35:52]>> Okay. I I think yeah definitely I guess those sort of overcolateralized models which are inherently I guess cryptonative probably you know is is easier for for for someone who's a DGEN to understand I guess I guess Brandon for for for real finance you guys are are building a sort of like a grading system I I would say right uh based on things like insurance coverage and probability default right um for for assets that that that your protocol tokenized I'm just wondering like you know could you talk a bit more about that who does the rating. How how how do you have a robust framework so that it doesn't get game or or get captured?

[00:36:30]>> Yeah, sounds good. I'll I guess I'll give a little bit of insight into how our consensus model works. It's it's rather robust. So, um you know, as with any other EVM compatible proofofstake chain, you've got your technical validators keeping the network secure and functioning. Um but for us, we also have business entity validators uh securing the network as well. And so I'm referring to effectively um traditional uh credit and risk scoring agencies that are taking a look at an asset, its probability of default, uh insurance companies um providing insurance quotes against said probability of default and then the tokenization companies that we're working with as well. So all of that information uh is basically embedded at the protocol level right into the token metadata. And rounding back to the point that I'm probably going to keep repeating like a broken record, we we feel that a lot of these components are important for things that are tokenized actually being usable financial products on chain. Um you know, as far as the way that the framework goes, it's intended to kind of separate the key functions in bringing an asset on chain. So the party tokenizing the asset, the party that are assessing the risk and then the party providing the insurance coverage are all um you know participating where uh applicable. Uh the critical I guess point I want to make is that real's not necessarily designed around the protocol simply declaring that an asset is safe or for you know it to have like a marketing badge stamp of approval. Um you know risk uh the risk scoring should really kind of reflect identifiable in inputs like asset structure um you know uh available financial information coverage terms default risk analysis and identify and uh you know the accountability of the the parties that are making these assessments. um the way that we kind of prevent gaming of it, there are economic incentives for these real world business entities to act as validators on the chain, but there are also penalties if they are negligent uh omitting information or they are um assessing something in incorrectly. So yeah, it's it's a big part of the sort of and I don't want to use the term standardized risk classification because there's no oneizefits-all solution. You know, there's different asset classes that are beholden to different jurisdictional frameworks coming from different organizations. But to figure out a way to embed risk classification in sort of a modular execution flow depending on those variables that I just mentioned to you is is how we kind of want to go about it.

[00:39:09]>> Okay. Very interesting. I think Martin like you know Brendan mentioned sort of you know uh offchain you know sort of people that have incentives uh you know to to do the credit assessment properly but also penalties if you know something goes wrong. I guess sort of is would you say that you know that's that's sort of similar to to to how Maple sort of runs your your sort of program right now you know that there are still delegates you know if if I understand correctly that that that sort of still gets involved in in how risk is being assessed even though there's a overolateralized element as well.

[00:39:48]>> Yeah. So at Maple, you know, we decided to to do everything inhouse. Uh so Maple is the asset manager, if you will. Uh you know, we provide the infrastructure, you know, we diligence all the borrowers, we underwrite the loans, we underwrite the collateral. Um so we we do it end to end.

[00:40:12]Um you know I do think we we do work of course with risk managers across the space you know curators on you know collateral underwriting and and and and things like that. Uh essentially to strike the LTVs right of the you know first of all like whether we accept it or not and then second of all how we strike the LTVs.

[00:40:30]Uh so I I do think all of that you know sort of open research is super valuable.

[00:40:34]Uh and the other thing we we work with is sort of firms that do prove our reserves, right? That verify that what we're doing is actually uh correct um and that you know we're overcolateralized at all times and you know that all the loan terms are implemented appropriately and and things like that. So of course everything is fully on chain already but we just have that extra layer on top. So I do think that is that is important. Um at the same time you know you sort of got to combine one party taking full responsibility right if you have like different parties doing different things there might be items that get lost right and because the overlap of responsibilities is not clearly defined uh so I think that's why we decided to do it all in house right and take the full responsibility at the same time it's really good to have sort of advisory firms firms you know checking doing checks and balances uh you know to make sure that um you know that everything is properly harder than than probably a run.

[00:41:33]>> All right. Nice. I think you know you read turning to you. I think you know figures you know so high loan pools receive ratings from from S&P and and Moody's right. Uh and and these are AAA ratings which is a first for for any sort of blockchain native asset pool. I just wanted to have maybe two questions and you know I think I think the first one is really you know how do you work with you know the rating agencies for for your heloc loans do they care at all that that these things are onchain or they really looking at just the underlying asset right but also I I I know you wanted to talk about hastra's prime token as well and and how does that quality that quality of collateral mean for what prime can be used for >> sure yeah so I mean look our view is we're probably the only vertically integrated um digital asset issuer. So from origination tokenization uh trading distribution into both securization markets for tradi and then distribution of yield through through defy um both on provenence and then also permissionlessly through through hasha.

[00:42:37]So for us we sort of look at like you know one of the the key features for um you know prime yield or or democratized prime is sort of this captive demand from tradfi to buy those credit assets.

[00:42:51]So it sort of solves the liquidity problem. Um but to do those securizations it generally does require ratings right so securizations are institutional basically uh structured purchasing of of those helocks and so you know over 9 years and and 23 billion of those helocks originated through a sort of a singular credit box the market is really sort of that validation element that the yield is sustainable and that the quality of of the the collateral is there um and I think that's a big unlock uh for hashra because it it you know we talked earlier about like what you know what credit underwriting qualifications do you know DeFi or sort of skill set does DeFi need to have um to be able to participate for some of these assets and our hope is essentially you don't need it right you can look at prime as a dollar denominated AAA rated yield source that then can get plugged into a whole host of of of protocols um and use cases um you know today it it can be used for for looping certainly because of interest rates on on chain. Um it's part of you know uh yield trading um platforms. It's part of um sort of risk trunching platforms. But if you even broaden out, you know, there's there's an opportunity for Bitcoin restaking, right? Where um that yield is is sustainable, uncorrelated with sort of onchain dynamics and can be transmorphed into, you know, Bitcoin as it's as it's earned um and really provide sort of, you know, a stable yield source. So for us it's it's you know we want to build boring highquality assets but that are base fundamental um and let crypto sort of build on top of it uh and really let composability and um and um you know composability really shine from from that.

[00:44:44]>> Okay. I I wanted to touch uh you know you know double down a bit on on what you mentioned earlier. So I think we we've talked you know quite a fair bit about you know a lot of reported interest about you know supply side of RAS right so you guys are bringing all this all these assets on chain there's a lot of people like fund managers brokers right there that they are looking to bring a lot of these RW assets on chain right but I'm also curious I think about the other side of the market right you talk about you know like the people who are chasing the yield like the demand side of the of the market who to your mind are sort of the main holders of RWA now. Um, you know, do do you you know, when when you guys build some of this products, do you all have sort of like intended holders in mind like like this product is really meant for maybe the the institutional crowd for example or this this this this products are really meant for for like a DA for example or or treasury or for example and and perhaps how do you think like the demand side is going to evolve? Um yeah, maybe we can start with Brandon then and we can move. Yeah.

[00:45:51]>> Yeah. Sure. Um, you know, I think for like treasury like products and some of the things that we spoke about like gold, there's already the natural audience among the crypto native folks.

[00:46:02]Um, you know, treasuries and users looking for lower volatility or yield bearing alternatives to just idle stable coins. um for private credit and like structured lending payments and institutionally originated assets, I think the initial audience is understandably going to be a little bit more professional and qualified because the assets are going to require stronger underwriting um you know stronger suitability um cases and risk management frameworks. Yeah, over time I think that effectively is going to broaden out but it it's not simply going to happen by just I think placing products on chain.

[00:46:38]I think demand grows when an asset has clear utility, right? So, you know, Reed, you you mentioned composability shining, right? Can you collateralize something? Is it able to be used as a settlement asset that isn't just sort of cash settlement with a faster messaging layer like we've seen a lot? Um, you know, is there yield bearing opportunities? All of these sorts of things. And, you know, at the end of the day, not every RWA needs to be distributed to everybody. A healthy market will include both the institutionally restricted products and then the more broadly accessible products that have some of that interoperability and and composability more on on the DeFi side of things um with probably rather transparent distinctions between the two.

[00:47:25]>> Thanks thanks for that Brendan. I guess I guess Reed, you know, turning to you like, you know, when when you guys, you know, decided to bring Helloc onto chain, was was there sort of like an intended audience for for all this?

[00:47:36]>> Yeah. Uh, look, I I think we would probably all agree and we certainly uh at Figure agree that not everything should should be tokenized. Um, you know, our our view is you should tokenize things that either couldn't function as collateral in Tradfi or that you meaning normal people didn't have access to um in Tradfi. And so, you know, our audience is is actually quite big. Um, if you think about, you know, what is competing against democratized prime, which is our sort of borrow lend market, um, is really a whole host of institutions. So if you think about the warehousing market in Tradfi, um it's money center banks that are essentially able to lend against helocks. Um and that isn't even available to smaller banks. So our you know the name democratized prime is kitschy in in the sense that the the ethos behind it is really to dem democratize access to prime services um specifically warehouse um finance. So for us it's everything from smaller community banks and tradi raas retail users um yield platforms on chain it it's a whole host um of users but our thesis has been let's take assets that have historically been locked behind some institutional moat whether it's a bank balance sheet so for home equity $500 billion of of home equity for American homeowners um and only a select few institutions are able to lend against these really high quality assets uh and let's break down that moat um and open up access um and and really let a whole host of institutions not even just crypto n crypton natives but also sort of a forcing function for maybe tradi native entities that don't have access to these type of highquality asset opportunities to actually come on chain and get access to them. Um and so I think you know um it's a it it runs the gamut and it's not just um sort of cryptonative or onchain entities only.

[00:49:39]>> Nice. So hopefully that will mean more more institutions coming coming on chain as well. I absolutely yeah I guess I guess Martin you know with with Maple um you know I'm curious to hear right right like who who are the main borrowers at at this point in time and you know you guys obviously launched you know syrup USDC as well so is is there sort of like a shift in terms of like who do you guys think you guys are are are building for and what products you guys put out in into the market.

[00:50:09]>> Yeah indeed. Yeah spot on. like we are essentially a marketplace you know we bring borrowers and lenders together you know if you make a list of like the top 100 crypto institutions um you know like we would be working with you know at least half of them right in in one way or another often also on the on the borrower side um so borrowers are really any entities that have large amounts of digital assets on the balance sheet uh that want to unlock liquidity against them right they're corporates exchanges you know trading firms hedge funds uh brokers, you know, players like that.

[00:50:46]Um then on the lending side, so I would say, you know, this is an evolution, right? Like the way I think about it in my growth role is uh yes, you have sort of an end state of like what you're focused on, but you always need to be focused on like the next 10x, right? Uh like where is your next next user base going to come from, right? And you want to make sure that user base is bigger than the one that you already have. So we really started in the high net worth individual segment, right? Just giving them access to to interesting high yielding products. Then it went to DeFi users um you know institutional DeFi users and now we are seeing the next big growth market as sort of like retail users that are on fintech applications. Uh and the reason we think that is that you know retail users of fintech applications are a bit more forward thinking than retail users in traditional banks right uh they are more open to innovation they're more open to trying out new products uh but they're still used to very low yields right if you go to your average fintech app I mean yields you know in Europe are like about 1% then in the US it's like maybe three you know three and a half% right and DeFi yields are really squarely above that so that is really the next big growth market we We ultimately think that is the lowest cost of capital, right? Uh is is really mass retail and the way to get there is by partnering with these applications that have millions tens of millions of users. Uh and you know those applications also are in hyper growth mode right like they they want to take market share from the traditional banks uh and grow their businesses. Uh so they're also very keen on these types of products. And what we have seen is that yield is a great customer acquisition tool, right, for these players. Like if they can advertise with yield that is one to three% higher than competitors, they're going to get a lot of the the users and they also have other products like trading and payments and cards and credit and things like that that they can then offer, right, to increase their revenue. So it's um that that is really the play that that we have seen work really well and that is that's now I think the area that defi or the the period of defi is that it's starting to merge with uh with that and I think over the next you know six to 12 months a lot of this is going to become clear a lot of these partnerships will be announced um and you know we'll see a lot of that come to life and I think that will be the next 10x for defi DVL right um because the time of you know this really innovative user users creating their own wallets and doing everything directly on chain. Um, you know, that is that pie is not growing as fast as it used to, right? Like, but I think the pie of of fintex and giving this super simple user experience like that's really where the the puck is going.

[00:53:34]>> So, you get to them through partnering with with sort of other people who who already sort of have the users and have the audience, I guess.

[00:53:41]>> Yeah. Yeah. Spot on. And then to Reed's point, the interesting thing for us in DeFi then to do is to actually tokenize these real world assets that they don't have access to right now, right? And Prime is a great example of that, right?

[00:53:54]Like as as a retail user, you can't really access that right now. Uh in a traditional system, but you know, you can through DeFi and ideally you would like to access that in your normal application, right? Your Robin Hood app, your Revolute app, your Square app, you know, Venmo, like whatever you you use for your finances.

[00:54:13]Nice. So, so I guess like you know another big part of of of RWA and and I'm sure all of you would have run into this as as as you guys build it out is regulations, right? And you know a big part of you know how RWA is going to be developed is going to be influenced or hindered by you know what what can you do in in I guess your jurisdiction or or you know or or some somewhere where you land in the world and you know we we've seen I think I think in increasingly a lot of this being being called out a bit more which is some projects have have sort of very creative structures to sort of get around like sort of you know where where where regulations s are um you know it's it's it's been a long time and and you know RB has been around for a while. Uh what would you guys say is is sort of the state of of regulations so far? Um you know and and sort of you know how has the conversations with with your respective regulators been more recently? you know, do you do you see them being more open and and and more receptive to to the things that you guys are doing and and you know, they can sort of, you know, keep up with the conversation and be be able to, I guess, sort of be more open to enable this sort of, you know, developments and and innovation in the market. Maybe you can start with Martin. Yeah.

[00:55:38]>> Yes. Yeah. So, first of all, you know, regulations are crucial for adoption, right? Mainstream adoption. uh and you know a lot of conversations that we're having are exactly about that topic uh with various players. I think there are certain really large markets where yeah the regulation isn't like super clear yet right it's not like super defined yet so I think that's really important is that we get full clarity on that uh yeah notice my my use a word there um I think that is extremely important right uh because you know everybody wants to play by the rules like we just need to know what the rules are so that's really sort of our perspective and I think it is going to open up a huge wave of growth uh from my perspective we haven't really seen crypto adoption yet at scale like we are really you know if you just think about the internet like we are pre-995 uh with crypto um and you know I think that um that in 1995 the reason that the internet really took off is that the US essentially uh put regulations in place for the internet right and it kind of open it allowed the open internet to flourish right within certain boundaries um and that then just caused a huge wave of innovation, right? A lot of new companies were founded, a lot of existing companies started shipping more products and that ultimately, you know, led to the internet boom, right, that we know today. So, I think that uh and the US is just a global leader, right? Like we just all need to acknowledge that like it has, I think, you know, probably about half of the global capital markets and maybe even more these days with that whole AI boom. So I think uh that's that's really where we're at right now in the industry and you know we're really excited to see all that come to life and yeah at we're very well positioned to uh capitalize on that.

[00:57:29]>> I guess speaking of the US market read you know you you probably you know that's that's where you operate that you know how how has things been going on on the regulation front in the US? Yeah.

[00:57:40]So, I mean it's interesting, right?

[00:57:42]Like, uh, Figure went public, uh, in September of this year. Um, and the prior administration, um, essentially made that very difficult. Uh, which is ultimately why we went public, uh, this this year. Um, so I think regulators are at large. They do understand these topics. Um, they are willing to engage.

[00:58:00]They are willing to have a dialogue.

[00:58:01]they are um you know willing to sort of think about innovation and how does that impact the way things are operating today. But I also think you know in crypto a lot of focus has been on this singular idea of what is a security and what is not a security and I think a product of that is the structures that resemble securities are really easy to replicate. So if you're a fund, right, like it's very easy because to put things in a box and sort of distribute um distribute exposure to it. Um and I think our industry has been like overly focused on all RWAs are securities, right? And that is not the the real case. Um, and I think it's one thing uh about asset finance uh where you're actually lending against a collateral asset that doesn't fit within that security framework. Um, and so I'm optimistic that both with regulators who are are sort of appreciate the value of innovation in in this space. Um, and structures that are not just well let's put a rapper on an interval fund or you know we're going to distribute you know a security in some creative way. Um I think there's you know a huge opportunity in front of us and I'm happy and excited that um those trends look to to persist.

[00:59:26]>> Nice. So good good to hear that that that there's there's a more administr a more um you know facilitative sort of sort of administration now now in in the US.

[00:59:37]>> What what about on on on your end I guess you know what what are you hearing and what you seeing on the ground in terms of regulation?

[00:59:44]Yeah, I mean I've I've been in the web 3 space for 10 years and it's been a constant moving target as far as us now like the conversation is definitely getting more constructive. Uh a few years ago when RWAS and tokenization were in kind of their early stages and we and we still are. The discussion kind of started more with whether regulated financial assets should even interact with the blockchain and now more I'm hearing you like the discussion is increasingly increasingly around how that interaction should be structured correctly. Right? So the important part is like Reed mentioned like tokenization doesn't remove the legal nature of the underlying asset. A security remains a security. Uh a regulated credit product remains subject to that type of assets relevant requirements. A tokenized asset needs to um you know it needs appropriate issuance, custody, distribution, disclosure and transfer uh controls depending on the asset type.

[01:00:44]Right? So our our approach over here, we're not ever really looking for clever ways to circumn those responsibilities.

[01:00:52]It's more so working to build infrastructure that can accommodate them, right? Um, you know, compliant aware assets, the validation trails, the risk information and regulated counterparties that we're working with because at the end of the day, we're we're the backend rails and or creating sort of full life cycle uh interoperable tokenization solutions. um it's various other counterparties that uh that we're working with that handle a lot of those aspects of things. But um yeah, I think I you know I think that the projects that are going to scale institutionally are are not the ones that treat regulation really as an obstacle to try and route around. It's the the people that are going to be operationally um uh aware of compliance and make it easier uh and more transparent and and more programmable depending on the particular situation.

[01:01:46]>> Yep. Yeah. Thanks for that. And and and you mentioned Rails, right? like you guys you guys are are sort of rails and I think that that that takes us nicely to to our next question which is you know you know we we see RWA projects you know obviously a lot of people are are building on public blockchains but there are also others who who who who are on private blockchains and then you know there's also you know you guys who who who have who are sort of building this this new rails and new new infrastructure specifically for RWEA I guess you know we we come back to the to the age old sort of question within the crypto industry because it's it's zero um quite quite quite easy in in certain cases to sort of just spin up new infrastructure. Do you think this will do you guys think this will sort of lead to sort of a fragmentation in terms of liquidity? Um you know should should should an institution come want to come in? Will they be, you know, sort of overwhelmed by the fact that, you know, there's just this many places that that they need to to maybe like integrate with or or or pay attention to because so much is happening on on so in so many different places >> or do you think like eventually it's it's going to is going to you know sort of concentrate just on a few networks?

[01:03:01]Yeah, I mean, you know, siloed environments and fragmentation is is one of the challenges with the traditional financial market that hopefully onchain finance works to kind of solve. Um, inevitably, I think there's going to be multiple networks involved. Uh, you know, just in terms of business relationships alone, um, different institutions and asset classes are going to have different requirements around privacy, compliance, settlement, distribution. But I don't believe that the end state of this is um hundreds of completely isolated pools of liquidity.

[01:03:36]You know, I think about um even in the last 5 years, things have changed a lot with different blockchain networks intention for inter interoperability and and collaboration with each other. So, you know, I think the market's going to increasingly reward that interoperability. Um you know, it's uh I think that's absolutely critical. Public networks, they've got a strong advantage in transparency, distribution, the composability side of things. Private or permissioned environments may retain or they might remain important for specific regulated workflows or um you know sensitive institutional activity. But the likely likely outcome I think is no one architecture is going to kind of defeat another. I think that infrastructure that allows controlled activity where it's needed and um preserving access to sort of broader interaction where um it's beneficial and collaborating with each other in an interoperable fashion is is ultimately how we're going to see the siloed and and fragmentation challenges kind of break down. So long-winded answer of basically stating, you know, I don't think it all needs to live in one centralized area.

[01:04:51]Yeah, Reed, what about you guys? You guys have your own chain obviously, but but I I think there are people building ways to to bridge out of that as well.

[01:05:00]>> Yeah, I mean, look, I if there's a typical crypto playbook for launching a chain, Figure has not followed any of sort of of that plan. So, you know, and and when Figure was founded, it wasn't really a crypto company at all, right?

[01:05:14]Like Providence is built as sort of our operating system. It's our, you know, tech stack for being able to deliver cheaper and higher quality originations in a very trady kind of context, right?

[01:05:26]Nothing um about that is is really crypto other than the operating rails.

[01:05:31]Um but I do think you know chains are generally becoming commoditized. Um I think a lot of the layer 2s have an identity crisis. Um so in some way I think you know the arbitrum um um you know seized uh whether you liked it or or you didn't like at least it it showed some differentiation. Um and maybe that's sort of a leading indicator for um you know chains having a a better sort of identity or reason for for building on them. Um but I think ultimately liquidity gets built around originators um and and the product rather than sort of the the rails. And I also think that you know so long as there is permissionless liquidity, permissioned liquidity is going to struggle. Um, so I I I think, you know, to to Brandon's point, like sure, there's going to be environments where certain actors are only going to want to live in a regulated or, you know, a permission pool, but I don't think that longer term that is is going to be a solution that that wins out. Um, so long as permissionless liquidity exists, I think permission liquidity will will struggle.

[01:06:41]>> Nice. and and Martin, I guess Maple is is on the on on at least two chains now, Ethereum and and Solana. I I guess how how do you guys think about this? And you know, do do you notice differences as as you as you guys move between different networks?

[01:06:56]>> Yeah.

[01:06:57]Yeah. Like I've always sort of been like a a single chain maxi, I would say, until like a few years ago and then I was like, oh, the future is multi-chain, maybe a few chains. Uh and now I would say it's it has evolved to thinking that um chains are just pure infrastructure right like it is just you know uh it's the way that all these players are going to run their companies right um it's just a much more efficient uh operating system if you will and then for us you know the reason to launch on chains is because you tap into distribution right uh so if you think about you know uh there's big fintex they have announced they're launching their chains, right? Yeah, we we want to be on those chains because we can tap into those user bases, right? I think that makes a lot of sense. Um, so yeah, I think the future is multi-chain. There will probably be, you know, 20, 30, 40, 50 chains. I mean, as a user, you won't even notice it, right? It'll just all be under the hood. I don't think we're need to be, you know, creating wallets. You need to be tracking your positions across all these different chains, right? I think that's a little bit something of the past. And as a chain, you need to have a real uh value proposition, right? you need to have a real differentiator and the biggest one I've seen so far is not really you know we can do double the transactions of the next best chain right like that is really something of the past uh chains you know that problem has been largely solved right um which means to at to point you know blockchain space is commoditized so it's not really the block itself that's valuable anymore it's really the ecosystem around it uh and that's where the uh that's where the opportunity is >> so so more more thinking about it as as sort of like a distrib distribution channel I guess rather than sort of so ress for for that that yeah >> definitely yeah it's more it's indeed it's more distribution channel it's um yeah you just tap into a certain ecosystem right of you tap essentially tap into an economy right like the best example I've heard is comparing chains to countries you know I think that is roughly the way to think about it and then you know uh certain companies are so big that they have the power to launch their own chain right? And build their own ecosystem around their sort of like centralized platform um and attract, you know, builders and innovators and stuff like that. And it's very similar to Shopify, right? If you think about it, you know, Shopify, yes, they have their own application and product, but then there's all all these other companies that are built on top of Shopify, right? Accounting software, marketing software, you know, and I don't know how many, but I think there's hundreds, maybe thousands of applications, right? And some have, you know, I believe I saw a stat a few years ago. it was like three applications have more than a billion in ARR right on top of Shopify probably in the meantime that's actually much higher um so I think that is a little bit the mental model to uh to uh to sort of like think through and then there will be some ecosystem that will be cross one dominant player right um and they will sort of be the you know the trading countries if you will right like the Netherlands you know like yeah we have a small local economy but there's a lot of trade between Germany the UK China the US that all flowing through our our little nation.

[01:10:08]>> Yeah. But the little nation can can also be, you know, center of of lots of flows as well. I I I think we're we're coming up to to the top of the hour and and you know, I just wanted to started to to sort of wrap up a bit. um you know I I wanted to to go across the around the table and sort of talk about you know your specific projects sort of could you give us an idea about I guess you know what's what's sort of coming next uh for for you guys and you know what what what our our users and and and our audience watching today can can sort of expect and and anticipate coming from you guys given that you know with with all the things happening in RWA is sort of hard to keep up as well. So, so you know, maybe I'll I'll start with Reed and you know, and you know, that that there there seems to be talk about going into auto loans as well and and and moving beyond home equity.

[01:11:02]>> Yeah. So, we think of, you know, expansion in kind of three three planes.

[01:11:06]Um so, one is sort of additional, you know, chains. Um where there is sort of like a different user base or growth path or access point to to different users um other asset classes. So um we've launched an auto pool um that's structured in the same way both for accessibility through democratized prime directly and through Hastra. We have um SMB loans, we have inventory trade finance um and we'll continue to kind of expand those asset classes um and and deliver yield um and and access to to assets that otherwise weren't accessible to everyday, you know, normal normal people. Um, and then there's also opportunity, I think, um, if you think about expanding for asset classes and different chains, um, for sort of a third vector of user experience, um, that probably looks more like, um, a vault experience that sort of is optimized across kind of those two axes.

[01:12:04]Um, and and making it easy to to get exposure um, in in that way versus, you know, if you think about like trying to loop on on Morpho. Um, are you, you know, manually clicking? are you needing to default to a curator? Um, uh, we think it's easier to sort of deliver that directly to the user and and let them decide for their own experience.

[01:12:26]>> Nice. Nice. Thanks so much. Martin, you you talked a bit about, you know, some some of the some some partnerships and and maybe some some big announcements down the road. Just wondering if there's, you know, anything else you would like to highlight. I think just just from a roadmap perspective and and where you where Maple is going.

[01:12:43]>> Yes. Yeah. So, it's really squarely to the the Finex and Neo Banks, you know, more having being able to accept more stable coins, have more integrations with Finex NeoS. Uh we want to continue improving the borrower product, right?

[01:12:57]The whole borrower experience. We just shipped a new update to that where borrowers can, you know, come to uh a full portal. They can put in the loan terms, get quotes, you know, um draw down the loan, provide c, you know, the collateral, right? It's really u you know the the ultimate end state to think about is you know if you're a borrower you know a few years from now we want to be able to come to Maple on a Sunday evening take down a billion dollar institutional loan you know supply the collateral the seamless experience um and uh you know with all the institutional guard rails legal documents governing it the custody infrastructure you know like everything that makes the the product special um so so we're sort of firing on all cylinder cylinders on that side and yeah, we have money 2020 next week. So, really excited about that. So, we'll be on the ground, you know, talking with uh with players, uh learning and um you know, just uh getting ready for um for a big few months ahead.

[01:13:57]>> Nice. Nice. Um and and last but not least, Brendan, I think we real you guys just TG not too long ago. You know what's what's on >> Yeah, we did indeed. uh you know with a blockchain ecosystem there's so many moving parts right um there's over 100 different projects protocols custodians regulated financial institutions you know alternative investment funds other wealth funds that we're speaking with um a lot of commitment on the institutional side that is already written in stone to be coming on our chain so the institutional adoption is is already there so we're materially derisk derisked compared to other early stage L1 once, you know, we're already a viable network. Um, the other components of that ecosystem, right, the back-end composability, the yield bearing protocols, um, the lending protocols, the secondary markets, the other trading venues, right? All of these are important to us and are going to be pieces of the puzzle that that are going to be put into place for this rather robust ecosystem for the individuals who are kind of participating in our ecosystem through the natives or the network's native token. um you know beyond you know the from here to to mainet um and when we're kicking off our pro proof ofstake mechanisms there's other utilities that are going to be opened up that allow for you know this end goal of democratized access to financial opportunities. So that's that's what we're working towards exposing uh the people that are are participating in our ecosystem with is is opportunity. But um yeah, a lot of lot of integrations, a lot of institutional adoption. Um and as they transition more towards uh you know, securing their position in um the asset token to run their validator nodes and all of these sorts of things. Um, you know, things are things are kind of just at the start for us, but really there's a lot going on behind the scenes that uh we're excited to share and excited to deploy. I wish I could spill the beans on all of it, but and lots of it isn't isn't public info yet, but uh pretty extensive pipeline for us for now.

[01:16:05]>> Yes, exciting times ahead. I think looking forward to to the launch of of of the mainet sometime this year. Um yeah and I I think you know pretty much that's that's all the time that we have for today. I think that was a very insightful discussion. We really definitely hit quite a few few few bits and and and and you know what what are the important points and you know hopefully everyone sort of got a good idea of of where the RWA sector you know has has evolved and and where we are going to go next right certainly a lot of exciting conversations in the last hour. So, um, before we go, I think, you know, thank you again to to Brandon, Reed, and Martin for for joining us today. Thank you so much for for your valuable contributions and and, you know, your your insights today. Um, thank you again to Real Finance for for sponsoring this this meetup and and for allowing us to continue to do this. And thank you all to the to the audience uh for for staying with us for for this hour. And hope you guys, you know, uh, you know, learn learn something new today. So, thank you so much. Take care everyone. Um, and have a good rest of the week.

[01:17:13]>> Thank you.

[01:17:13]>> Cheers to everybody.

[01:17:15]>> Cheers. show.