stablecoins
(109)
Tianwei Liu and the trouble with paying a friend
A favour involving Amazon Kindles sent Tianwei Liu into the plumbing of Southeast Asian payments. From Xfers to StraitsX, he has kept returning to one question: how much machinery can disappear behind an ordinary purchase?
Shehzan Maredia and the cost of keeping your bitcoin
He watched his parents work hard to earn money, then struggle with how to save it. At Lava, Shehzan Maredia is building a financial life around one conviction: people should be able to use their bitcoin without having to sell it.
Tope Alabi and the money in the wrong country
A string of startup experiments led Tope Alabi back to the same inconvenience: paying Nigerian expenses with American money. Afriex grew out of the interruption.
Devin McGranahan and the last mile of money
Western Union’s chief executive is betting that a cash network still has a place in a digital world. His test is whether faster money can become money people can actually use.
Nathan McCauley and the trouble with keeping the keys
Lost crypto keys gave Nathan McCauley a business idea. Turning it into Anchorage Digital meant learning that securing money and earning trust require more than good code.
Dimitri Dadiomov and the meeting that wouldn’t end
A weekly gathering with yellow-highlighted bank statements helped send Dimitri Dadiomov into business. The Modern Treasury co-founder has spent the years since trying to make money easier to follow - and recently changed his own job to keep building.
Rahul Shinghal and the price of being trusted
At PayPal and Stripe, Rahul Shinghal had a familiar name behind him. Building Tazapay meant earning trust from scratch - and changing his answer to what businesses needed.
Ryne Saxe and the long way to a simpler dollar
Before Eco, Ryne Saxe studied atoms and negotiated technology deals. His education in money began earlier, watching his father do business on the strength of his word.
Andy Bromberg and the trouble with a perfectly good calendar
After Sidewire, CoinList and Eco, Andy Bromberg is finding room for smaller inventions. His latest projects offer a close look at a founder who keeps asking why familiar tools have to work that way.
Raagulan Pathy and the price of crossing borders
A grandmother helped buy his first ticket into technology. After AWS, Facebook, Zoom and Circle, Raagulan Pathy is building KAST around a question he knows personally: why should money be less mobile than the people who earn it?
Ben Milne and the price of moving a dollar
A speaker business taught Ben Milne to count the cost of getting paid. Dwolla, a notebook of bad ideas, and a second act at Brale followed.
Bryce Ferguson and the art of getting out of the way
After helping build Coinbase Custody, Bryce Ferguson went to Berlin and saw crypto infrastructure from the customer’s side. Turnkey grew out of the friction he found there.
Flowdesk puts liquidity on the clock
A token can trade around the world and still be hard to buy. Flowdesk built a business around that gap, starting with a deceptively simple question: who controls the money?
Michael Shaulov and the problem with money that moves
A South Korean exchange-hack investigation sent Michael Shaulov down an unexpected path. The Fireblocks co-founder has spent the years since trying to make digital money safe enough to use, and ordinary enough to disappear into everyday business.
Mo Ali Yusuf and the work behind the money
From arguing against cash-on-delivery to building Fuze, Mo Ali Yusuf keeps returning to the same problem: the gap between a convenient financial experience and the machinery that makes it work.
Flex Yang and the price of trust
He helped turn Bitcoin lending into an institutional business. From Babel Finance to synthetic dollars, Flex Yang’s career keeps returning to a deceptively simple question: what makes a financial promise hold?
Piero Nunez del Risco and the account he couldn’t open
He helped build digital banking for millions of customers. Then a U.S. bank made him feel like a stranger. Pana grew from the distance between those two experiences.
Andrew Grech and the art of making money ordinary
Andrew Grech started CryptoSpend with a university friend to make digital assets usable at the checkout. Eight years and a new name later, the Wayex co-founder is taking that everyday idea across borders.
Eric Barbier and the long wait for instant money
A phone-credit exchange in the Philippines helped set Eric Barbier on a path from mobile messaging to global payments. At Triple-A, his latest wager is that money can travel faster if the institutions behind it take their time.
Raj Kamal and the last mile of money
From India’s civil service to fintech investing, Raj Kamal has spent his career inside institutions. At TransFi, he is working on the gap between money moving across a border and money arriving ready to use.
Fazz puts finance within reach
An Indonesian shop counter and a Singapore payment API seem an unlikely pair. Fazz built a financial services group by connecting them - and learning that access takes more than an app.
Bitso makes crypto disappear into payments
Bitso started with a place to buy bitcoin. Its more revealing business is helping money cross borders and land in a bank account, with the crypto machinery tucked between the two.
Hendra Kwik and the bank around the corner
Growing up in Jambi, Hendra Kwik saw how a small shop could work hard for years and barely grow. At Fazz, he has spent a decade trying to bring financial services closer to the people who need them - first through neighborhood stores, now through payment infrastructure that crosses borders.
Daniel Vogel and the last mile of money
A failed remittance startup taught Daniel Vogel where digital money gets stuck. At Bitso, the Mexican engineer has spent the years since building the connections that let it move.
ARQ got two million customers. Then it outgrew the dollar.
DolarApp won a following by making money travel more easily. Now, as ARQ, it wants the investments, the credit card, and the rest of the relationship.
Gauntlet and the trouble with too much money
A $775 million deposit sent yields tumbling. Gauntlet’s response reveals the work hiding behind DeFi’s deceptively simple “Earn” button.
Polymer Labs wants your money to arrive whole
Nearly $2 billion moved through its USDC bridge in nine months, the company says. Behind the tidy transfers is a more interesting idea: let applications prove what happened elsewhere, then get on with business.
Jeeves and the curious cost of crossing a border
A corporate card is a small piece of plastic. Jeeves has spent years turning it into a way around the expensive geography of business finance.
Phantom’s $3 Billion Bet on Fewer Instructions
Crypto asked people to become their own bank. Phantom bet they would prefer an app. A friendly ghost, a Solana beachhead and $268 million in funding have turned that wager into a much bigger ambition.
The Money You Send Home Has a Second Address
Kredete turns an immigrant’s regular transfer into a chance to build a U.S. credit record. Its first lending marketplace ran into a wall; the company found its way through by following the money people were already sending.