The Crypto Conversation

• Kaia - Stablecoins for mini-Dapps on Superapps

  John Cho is Vice President of Partnerships at Kaia DLT Foundation, a non-profit organization established to accelerate the Kaia blockchain’s global adoption and ecosystem maturity.  Why you should listen Kaia is a mobile-first superapp that’s rapidly becoming one of the most intriguing Web3 platforms to watch. Originally known as Klaytn, Kaia rebranded and repositioned itself in 2024 with a bold vision: make crypto invisible. By integrating blockchain seamlessly into daily mobile life, Kaia’s goal is to onboard the next billion users without them even realizing they’ve crossed into Web3. And it seems to be working—Kaia has seen a staggering rise in on-chain activity, ranking second globally in daily active users. This momentum is largely fueled by its unique strategy: hosting Mini Dapps inside the app itself—think of them like mobile games or utilities that live inside a crypto-native superapp. But what makes Kaia different is it is open to third-party developers and fully committed to open-source gaming. That’s a huge shift. Instead of locking users into a walled garden, Kaia is betting on community-driven innovation through Mini Dapps—lightweight, mobile-friendly, and composable little apps that make up the building blocks of the platform. These Mini Dapps allow users to explore DeFi, NFTs, and gaming with just a few taps, no wallet stress or MetaMask hurdles.  On the financial infrastructure side, Kaia is moving quickly. It recently partnered with Tether to integrate USDT, and it's also driving the development of stablecoins pegged to the Korean won (KRW) and Japanese yen (JYP). This isn’t just about payments—it’s about enabling a stable, familiar financial layer inside a blockchain ecosystem. For users in Asia especially, being able to transact with stable, fiat-pegged assets makes the jump into Web3 feel a lot less risky and a lot more practical. Kaia isn’t just building an app—it’s building an economy, one mobile tap at a time. Supporting links Stabull Finance Kaia Andy on Twitter  Brave New Coin on Twitter Brave New Coin If you enjoyed the show please subscribe to the Crypto Conversation and give us a 5-star rating and a positive review in whatever podcast app you are using.

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• tBTC - The Bitcoin Standard for DeFi

  Callan, also known as “Sap” is the Co-Founder of Threshold Labs, the managing team behind Threshold Network’s tBTC, a trust-minimized bridge enabling native Bitcoin in DeFi. Why you should listen Threshold Network is a decentralized infrastructure protocol that leverages threshold cryptography to provide privacy and access control services on public blockchains. It was formed through the merger of two projects, Keep and NuCypher, with the aim of enabling secure and decentralized custody and data privacy. One of its core offerings is tBTC, a decentralized bridge that allows users to bring their Bitcoin onto Ethereum and other EVM-compatible networks in the form of an ERC-20 token that is fully backed 1:1 by BTC. tBTC is designed to address the limitations of custodial wrapped Bitcoin products, such as WBTC, which rely on centralized entities to hold users' BTC. Instead, tBTC uses a network of randomly selected node operators that collectively manage custody through threshold signature schemes. This structure ensures that no single party can access or move the underlying BTC, enhancing security and decentralization. The latest version, tBTC v2, introduces a scalable and permissionless model, progressively shifting control from human intermediaries to protocol-based guarantees. Bitcoin DeFi—or BTCFi—is an emerging segment of decentralized finance that aims to bring Bitcoin’s liquidity into smart contract ecosystems. Historically, Bitcoin has been underutilized in DeFi due to its limited scripting capabilities and incompatibility with platforms like Ethereum. Bridges like tBTC are key to unlocking Bitcoin’s potential in DeFi, enabling BTC holders to participate in lending, yield farming, liquidity provision, and collateralized borrowing—all while retaining exposure to Bitcoin. By offering a decentralized, trust-minimized bridge, Threshold Network positions itself as a foundational layer in this growing ecosystem. Supporting links Stabull Finance Threshold Network Andy on Twitter  Brave New Coin on Twitter Brave New Coin If you enjoyed the show please subscribe to the Crypto Conversation and give us a 5-star rating and a positive review in whatever podcast app you are using.  

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• Algorand Foundation - Why TVL is a Poor Metric For Investment Decisions

  Staci Warden is the Algorand Foundation CEO, and Dr. Matthew Brigida is Chief Economist at Algorand Foundation. In June, the Algorand Foundation’s tokenomics team released a new study questioning the assumption that TVL is a meaningful investment signal. Despite being widely cited as a proxy for legitimacy, the research found that TVL doesn’t correlate with token performance, even when adjusted for known distortions like double-counting. Why you should listen The team analyzed 300+ cryptocurrencies from 2023–2024, simulating weekly long/short strategies based on TVL rankings. The result? No outperformance, no alpha. And no meaningful insight once broader market movements are accounted for. As Pew reported last year, most Americans still don’t trust crypto. If TVL continues to be used as a shorthand for credibility, that only adds noise. This paper adds to the growing push for better metrics in DeFi. Algorand’s mission is to power a world where information has integrity and innovative ideas can scale. The Algorand Foundation supports Algorand’s rapidly growing ecosystem by providing a best-in-class developer environment, supporting key infrastructure and setting technical standards, offering comprehensive support to builders and entrepreneurs, and providing the framework for decentralized governance.  Supporting links Stabull Finance The TVL Study White Paper The TVL Study Blog Post Algorand Andy on Twitter  Brave New Coin on Twitter Brave New Coin   If you enjoyed the show please subscribe to the Crypto Conversation and give us a 5-star rating and a positive review in whatever podcast app you are using.  

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• Coinpass - The UK Crypto Platform for Businesses

  Jeff Hancock is the CEO of Coinpass, a UK-based crypto exchange acquired by OANDA in 2023. He’s bringing crypto and traditional finance closer together in a secure, regulated way. Why you should listen ​​Born in London in 2018, Coinpass climbed the regulatory mountain early, securing an FCA crypto-asset registration and then catching the eye of multi-asset heavyweight OANDA, which snapped up a majority stake in August 2023. Now the exchange enjoys the deep pockets and risk-management chops of a global FX giant while keeping its Union-Jack credentials intact.  Coinpass is unapologetically business-first: corporate and SSAS pension accounts, OTC desks, Faster Payments for GBP, SEPA Instant for EUR, and a Fireblocks-secured custody stack. The offering tops out at roughly 18 coins across 50 pairs, with auto-trade DCA tools and a staking “Earn” programme. As the FCA’s May 2025 paper ushers in a tougher regulatory era, Coinpass is already playing the game two moves ahead—fully registered, audit-ready, and backed by OANDA’s deep balance sheet. Its curated asset list and institutional-grade spreads may forego meme-coin noise, but they deliver what CFOs and treasurers actually need: transparent pricing, instant GBP rails, and a compliance posture built to glide through tomorrow’s rulebook. While other exchanges scramble to retrofit governance, Coinpass stands out as the gold-standard gateway for UK digital-asset professionals—future-proof, rock-solid, and ready to scale. Supporting links Stabull Finance Coinpass Andy on Twitter  Brave New Coin on Twitter Brave New Coin If you enjoyed the show please subscribe to the Crypto Conversation and give us a 5-star rating and a positive review in whatever podcast app you are using.

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• Pi Squared - The Verifiable Settlement Layer for AI and Crypto

  Grigore Roșu is a professor of computer science at the University of Illinois and a former NASA engineer, where he developed the K Framework - an open-source “Rosetta Stone” for programming language semantics. A day-one contributor to the Ethereum Foundation, he later founded Runtime Verification, now the leading formal verification company in Web3. In 2023, he founded Pi Squared with the vision of bringing the next million developers to Web3 by utilizing his revolutionary K Framework. Why you should listen Pi Squared solves the fragmentation and trust limitations of today’s blockchain infrastructure by enabling verifiable, cross-chain computation and settlement, so apps, agents, and protocols can interact across ecosystems without relying on bridges, centralized parties, or unprovable logic. It’s the missing trust layer for a modular, interoperable, and enterprise-ready Web3. Pi Squared’s core offering is its Verifiable Settlement Layer (VSL)—essentially a decentralized, programmable foundation that wraps any action (data storage, transactions, computation) into a cryptographically sealed “claim.” These claims are verified by a global network of validators, settled via their high-performance FastSet consensus protocol, and become instantly accessible across chains and environments—all without intermediaries or trust assumptions. VSL enables fast, provable, cross-ecosystem settlements—serving AI, blockchains, or any off-chain systems. Already live on devnet, Pi Squared showcases powerful use cases like cross-chain asset bridging (e.g., via Wormhole NTT), blockchain state mirroring, and auditable AI pipelines via Trusted Execution Environments. Their system dramatically reduces redundant computation in blockchains—one node computes and proves, and everyone else verifies in milliseconds—boosting throughput, slashing energy use, and minimizing vulnerabilities. Think verifiability everywhere—from remote compute and DeFi to AI inference—supercharged by formal-language-backed proofs. Pi² is stitching formal verification, zero-knowledge proofs, and cross-chain interoperability into one fast, composable layer. No fluff, no trust—just proof. Supporting links Stabull Finance Pi Network Andy on Twitter  Brave New Coin on Twitter Brave New Coin If you enjoyed the show please subscribe to the Crypto Conversation and give us a 5-star rating and a positive review in whatever podcast app you are using.

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