The Global Stablecoin Race Has Started

Everybody's talking about AI. Nobody can stop talking about Bitcoin. And somehow, stable coins have quietly become the hottest thing in global finance. Governments want them, banks want them, and fintech companies want them. So, what's going on?

I'm Lauren Wixon and you're watching the Boston Blockchain Beat. Japan's ruling party recently announced that it wants to promote yen back stable coins and explore crypto ETFs. Now, if you've been watching crypto long enough, you've probably noticed a pattern. Every country that used to say, "We're not sure about this crypto thing." eventually ends up saying, "Okay, but how do we make sure we're not left behind?"

And that's exactly what's happening here in Japan because stable coins aren't the crypto product anymore. They're starting to look a lot like financial infrastructure. And nobody wants to wake up 10 years from now and realize they miss the internet of money. Now, it's time for a few Boston Blockchain Week updates. And I have the one and only Ian Kane here with me.

Ian, what is up? How are you? How's it going? You know, it's What is up? I told you I spilled my my full Duncan coffee off my table on the floor this morning, but you know what?

That's okay. Somebody was trying to tell me something and I I filled it up with other coffee. But other than that, everything's great. We have a lot of good things going on. Um Boston Blockchain Week is is building momentum as we speak.

We're out and about uh you know pounding the pavement, getting more speakers, getting more sponsors, and drumming up interest for deal room as well.

All the fun stuff. Awesome. Well, I'm sorry about your coffee. That really sucks cuz nobody likes spilled coffee.

No, I was really looking forward to it, too. But what are you going to do?

Of course. But okay, so you mentioned speakers. So, we have some two really awesome speakers. Tell us. Yeah, I mean off the bat we've got two powerhouse uh women in in crypto and in blockchain.

One's representative from government side and other from the private sector. But um Hester Pur who's been a household name. She's a commissioner uh SEC commissioner uh who has been one of the most supportive uh representatives from the regulatory side of the United States government uh in this space. Very thoughtful, articulate, eloquent. uh looking forward to hearing uh what she has to say especially on I think her transition uh in her role as an SEC commissioner into whatever role she'll be taking next and then we have uh the chief security architect from Coinbase Yolanda who will be joining us and um Yolanda's planning to give a really interesting talk so you know maybe people are aware maybe people weren't aware that uh back in November of 2025 Coinbase had completed a single day onchain migration of about $70 billion in BTC and ETH from legacy internal wallets to a new internal wallet as part of a long-term uh security strategy.

And so Yolanda is going to give a talk on how that went down. You know, let's let's how did that migration go? How is it planned? How is it carried out from start to finished? I think it's going to be fascinating because um I I I certainly am looking forward to learning more about that.

Um

I'm looking forward to catching that one.

Yeah. No. So, I mean, two two powerhouse women in the space. Um, and we're still out there looking for more uh, you know, keynotes and speakers, but we've got a great bench of talent that's building. This is our fifth year doing this event, and you've been with us since the start, Lawrence.

So, you know, um, how much it's grown and the caliber of the people uh, that that come and participate. Uh, and they come from all over the world, which is pretty cool. So, you know, we've got folks um I mean, I could just I could go down the list, but I'd suggest you just go to the website and check out the current speakers page, which we've been updating on a weekly basis. I think at this point, we've got over uh 50 or so speakers that are booked, and we'll get that uh we'll double that by the time we get to September. We had just over a hundred last year.

So, I'm pretty confident we'll get to that number again. Um but we've got people from uh legal backgrounds. We've got people from the protocol world, Salana, we've got people from A16Z, the list goes on. Check out the website. Uh the program is building over the next month or so.

We'll work on um synthesizing the panels and so we'll start to get the agenda out probably July, mid July or so. And then um you know, we'll we'll look forward to the countdown to the show in September.

Yes. I'm loving the diversity. And then of course like the SEC and Coinbase, like that's a big deal.

Yeah. No, it's a huge deal. Yeah. We're pumped. And uh as everybody out there continues to watch our uh WTF marketing campaign and trying to get Palmer Lucky to come, we want Palmer Lucky to come to talk about Arabore Bank.

This isn't just a bit that we're doing. I mean, it is a bit now, but um you know, we've been

for now.

Yeah, it's a bit for now until he shows up

and you say, "Wow, those guys got Palmer Lucky." [laughter]

It's going to happen. We're manifesting.

Yeah, exactly. Has he called yet, Lauren?

No. [laughter]

So, as you heard, we have an awesome lineup of speakers coming from all diverse backgrounds. Let's move on to the deal room. So, I know in the last video, Ian, you announced the deal room. So, go ahead and give us a quick reminder on who is the deal room for, what's it all about, and then when are applications opening?

This is for investors looking for deals, and this is for startups looking for capital. And you know again this is another opportunity for us to build more around the Boston blockchain week platform. Uh we want to attract more investors. We want more startups to come into the ecosystem. And so it is a one-day uh presscheduled capital formation event where we're bringing together these two parties um ideally for startups to raise money and investors to find uh companies to invest in.

So um right now we are we're building the workflows actually to uh allow the applications to to come in but we'll be inviting venture investors venture and institutional investors to come and uh and join us and um July 27th we'll open applications for startups to apply to become a part of deal room and so we are looking for startups that are raising from seed to series B uh active rounds and um you know all the details will come out then but we'll have about 6 weeks to vet these companies and provide investors with um a list of potential opportunities that they'd want to meet with one-on-one all day Wednesday September 9th which will be right uh at Boston Blockchain Week in an adjacent uh you know location where we are downtown deal's going to be cool I'm excited about it too because it really just it focuses energy and it gets more of the people that we want to participate in this ecosystem involved and and that's not all for startups. So, I I didn't tell you yet. I we just um you know, last year we had a startup pitch competition that led off the program uh on the first day of Boston Blockchain Week with Gain Ventures. And we will we'll they're going to come back again. So, we're going to have um the kickoff of Boston Blockchain Week on that Tuesday, September 8th, I think probably around 10:00, we'll have uh the Gain Ventures pitch competition, which we're excited about.

That's awesome. All right. So, I'm finding this out all along with you guys, too. Gain Ventures.

That's great. And then where uh can the applications be filled out for that particular?

Um I think we'll doing it. We haven't put those out yet, but um you know, we'll we'll make we Yeah, we'll put them through our email distribution. We'll put them through our social channels as well.

Cool. All right. Well, y'all heard it here. So, just stay tuned for more BBW updates on when y'all can apply. Um I know that we are still looking for sponsors.

Is that correct, Ian?

Yeah, absolutely. We're we're still we're still talking to a number of groups about joining us. We have limited sponsor opportunities for deal room and I think that is a good get for people uh if they're interested in getting directly in front of um investors and startups in one room. Uh there's a a private pre-dinner uh for that event the night before on Tuesday evening. uh and if you are a sponsor of that particular component of deal room then that affords you the opportunity to be with all those people in an intimate uh space and environment I think that's a good get but um you know otherwise we are always grateful for our sponsorships uh that come through and at this point you know the city of Quinsey has been a great partner to us from the start we've got Bentley University joining us again goodwin joining us again Wolf & Company joining us again and Figment uh joining us again and so I've got my list of of people who I will be following up with you uh to make sure you're uh involved in the program.

Uh but yeah, if you're interested in sponsoring and making this event be the best that it possibly can be, then uh don't hesitate to reach out.

Awesome. All right. Well, y'all heard it here first. This is truly a one-of-a-kind event. So, be sure to grab your early bird tickets to Boston Blockchain Week before prices go up.

And yeah, this is going to be a fun event. Thank you, Ian, for coming.

Be there or be square.

Be there or be square. I love it.

Thanks, Lauren.

And perhaps the biggest signal that adoption is happening comes from traditional finance. SoFi recently began rolling out stable coin access to millions of users. Think about that for a second. A few years ago, stable coins were primarily used by crypto traders, and today they're showing up inside mainstream financial apps. That's a big deal because most people won't adopt blockchain technology because they just absolutely love blockchain.

They'll adopt it because it's faster, cheaper, and easier than what we're using before. So, why is everyone suddenly paying attention to stable coins? Because they're solving a real problem. Moving money globally is still slow. It's expensive.

And in many cases, it only works during banking hours. Stable coins offer a way to move value around the world almost instantly at any time of day. And that's why governments, banks, fintech companies, and startups are all racing to figure out their place in this new financial system. Thank you guys so much for watching today's episode of the Boston Blockchain Beat. If you are new here, be sure to like this video and subscribe to our channel.

And don't forget to grab your early bird tickets to Boston Blockchain Week before prices go up. And I will see you all in the next video.