Podcast

MoneyGram has been quietly building on blockchain for over five years. Now, with its own stablecoin (MGUSD), a Kraken partnership, a validator seat on the Tempo network, and $2B+ in stablecoin settlements already running — the pace is accelerating.

Bitcoin does not have native yield. But that has not stopped institutions, treasury companies, miners, whales, ETFs, and crypto-native desks from looking for ways to generate returns on top of BTC. In this episode of Converge by The Defiant, David Lawant, Head of Research at Anchorage Digital, joins the show to unpack the rise of Bitcoin options, synthetic yield, covered call strategies, and the growing intersection between TradFi and crypto-native market structure.

What if the blockchain token you hold doesn't actually give you ownership of the underlying asset? Dennis O'Connell of the ERC-3643 Association joins Converge to expose the hidden differences between tokenization standards — and why knowing which one you're buying matters more than most people realize.

Crypto is entering a new phase — and institutions, not retail, are driving it. As regulatory clarity arrives, the largest institutions in the world are moving from the sidelines into the market. The thesis from our guest: sentiment is poor, but fundamentals are improving; a coiled spring.

What happens when the institution at the center of U.S. market plumbing starts putting securities onchain? In this episode of The Defiant, Chris Storaker sits down with Tom Sullivan, Managing Director at DTCC Digital Assets, to discuss how DTCC is approaching tokenization, why regulatory clarity changed the game, and what it means for U.S. Treasuries, stocks, ETFs, collateral, and 24/7 markets.

Stablecoins have quietly become the most successful use case in crypto.

In this interview, Camila Russo sits down with Danny Ryan — former Ethereum Foundation researcher and a key leader behind Ethereum’s shift to proof of stake — now Co-Founder & President at Etherealize, to talk about the next big wave for crypto: institutional adoption of Ethereum. Recorded in Buenos Aires during Devconnect, Danny breaks down why the mood inside banks has flipped from “we can’t touch crypto” to “if we don’t adopt it, we’ll be left behind.” We dig into what institutions actually want beyond ETFs, why the biggest opportunity isn’t “tokenizing assets” but rewiring markets from first principles, and why privacy is table stakes for institutional-grade onchain finance.

In this episode of The Defiant Podcast, Chris Storaker sits down with Alex Garn, Chief Product Officer at Borderless, to unpack how stablecoins are quietly transforming cross-border payments — and what it actually takes to move money at scale across jurisdictions.

In this episode of The Defiant podcast we speak with Morgan Krupetsky, VP of OnChain Finance at Ava Labs, to break down one of the most significant shifts happening in crypto today: the rapid institutionalization of blockchain and Avalanche’s strategy to lead it. Morgan walks us through Avalanche’s “real-world adoption first” ethos, explaining how its unique architecture enables enterprises, fintechs, banks, governments, and consumer apps to build purpose-designed blockchains while tapping into a shared liquidity hub.