CTRL/SHIFT - 14 06 2026 CHAPEL STAGE - INSTITUTIONAL PANEL

uh how actually institutions are entering this world because you have to think that uh one of the main initiative from BGA was actually a UN accelerator program right we were in Copenagen last uh last months and that's actually a sign on our institutions are are entering in this field so I would like to welcome in the stage uh Glenn please come come to the to the coach uh Franchesco Lmona from Joan present minist and Alexandra Malvventano from European Decentralization Institute. Thank you. One second for the slide. It's pretty warm in this chart, right? Okay.

So, uh I will be the moderator. So just to give you uh in a nutshell what is happening on the side of BJ for for the people that actually don't know this this association like you know BJ from four years and it's part actually three four years is is kind of like you know trying to understand if there is like a purpose that's that's my view Glenn maybe correct me if I'm wrong I think that BJ is trying to understand if there is like a purpose uh a part of the profit organization like there is there is a real purpose for nonprofit. There is a real purpose for impact in this industry because like you know this industry started from Bitcoin right from blockchain. So we're really connected with the financial institutions with with the financial world like blockchain is becoming a backbone of financial infrastructure. But in my opinion like one of the main takes of uh BGA is like is there like any other use case that are not really related to financial u financial purpose is there like the can be this technology used for uh for profit for good purposes so that's why I invited Francisco Amona that is actually like really helping to innovate Italy in my opinion with his is a community controversial government and also invited Alexandro that is really working with closely with the European Commission with the European Foundation through his institute European decentralized institute.

So the main goal of this panel is like how institutions are entering in this world and actually is like how we can be little bit different from the main purpose that we always see hear about this industry. Is there any insightful use case that is not just related to finance? Okay. So thank you everyone to be here and um mainly like I would like to start with you Glenn of course. Um so like you know BJI tagline is a purpose over profit and yeah I mean like it was founded by by a bit we know it well right and now you reached the level of partnering with the UN and you made such a good projects in the cohort like we saw uh so many impactful projects and good startups.

So um what do you think I mean like uh how you can surf this uh this narrative? How you can actually sell this narrative of like you know being impactful for good? What what are the main metrics that you actually care as a association about um about these impactful actions like what actually means for good? What actually means for impact for for BJ?

Okay so that's a very interesting question right Juluka. It's actually something that we have received a lot uh of you know questions by the industry because it's very interesting when you think about it. The blockchain for good alliance is founded by Bybit and globally Bybit is the world's number two crypto exchange. So sometimes people put two and two together and they're like what the heck that doesn't math out. It doesn't make sense.

The world's number two crypto exchange creating a nonprofit that it wants to back you know blockchain for impact projects doesn't make sense. And it's a it's a very it's a it's not hidden that of course BJ is part of by bit's overall ecosystem. So sometimes people think that you know there's a level of impact washing or greenwashing for these projects like oh what's in it for by bit when they created BGA. So there's a little bit of sensitivity over there for sure but of course I won't tell you that blockchain for good is automatically genuine. What I will tell you is actually whether you can check how real it is in any different situations.

Three things that we can talk about. The first one, does anybody actually benefit who isn't already in crypto? If the only beneficiaries are actually just token holders, then it's not impact. It's just purely marketing. The second thing, would a project survive?

You know, if let's say you remove the token, if the answer is no, the project will not survive. Then that's why you realize that the impact was never really the point. And the last thing is is is anybody outside this blockchain industry willing to put their name on it? Whether it's a parliament member, whether it's your UN agencies, whether it's other governments or other NGOs, are they willing to put their name onto something like that? If they don't, then they definitely have done some diligence that the industry doesn't even do itself.

So when you talk about what we are doing, what is really impact to us, it's about changing lives for the better. It's not so much about commercial profit when we talk about what BGA does. Of course, yes, BBIT is a major backer of PGA and that's a very interesting concept that we like to deal with as well. But one thing that we always say is that a lot of projects that we decide to back that we decide to support are not even you know directly contributing to the bottom line of BBIT itself. It's about really the impact that they have on the world to the people to the communities that they serve and that is the true evidence that when we talk about blockchain for good and what blockchain for good alliance is doing it is all about the heart and the soul of the project that utilizes blockchain for good.

Okay. Thank you Glenn. Actually I think that gives a clear explanation of actually what is doing BGA for the people that don't know. I think that was quite helpful. Thank you so much.

But like let's go more in a tangible way. Let's try to understand what are one of the main pillars. What are one of the main actions that you have done this year and last year for example like maybe the uh the crowd is quite interested to understand more like what you have done with the UN with the United Nations. We were together in in Copenagen. We are going in New York in September.

So I'm interested to understand like what what is your role? What is the partnership with the United Nations? What you have done with them?

Okay. So nice question for marketing what BJ is really doing right. So the BGA is actually number one we are a member on the UNDP's blockchain advisory board. So we actually regularly convene to advise you know different programs and initiatives that the UN and the UNP and other UN agencies can actually do to adopt blockchain properly across countries. And of course UNDP has a massive distribution channel right the development program we are actually the founding members of what is the SDG blockchain accelerator with the UNDP.

So together with multiple other partners including those like Kadano, those like Stellar and a lot of other partners across blockchain and AI we actually run a global accelerator. So this accelerator is entering into its third cohort really soon. But in the first two cohorts what we've seen is projects that solve problems for different UNDP country offices. So when we piloted it last year, we had 76 different UN country officers come on board to say that hey this is a problem how many 76

okay six countries okay

76 different countries that actually say that hey this is a problem that I have how can I use blockchain to solve them we match the different blockchain projects within the entire ecosystem to pair it together to solve these problems and pilot these solutions for the different countries and the pro and the projects that actually manage to reach a certain level of skill in its pilot they actually get to be deployed through UN's procurement process to actually match on site. So we have European projects that actually piloted BGA projects basically European projects that were based in Netherlands that are actually piloting in Africa. So we actually bridge countries together like that through the alliance.

That's amazing. That's a real impact though. uh and like you know I won't I won't try to follow this this uh this answer on on the next one like in all these projects we know now now it's been a while right that you are in BJ's like almost three years and um like even with this partnership with UNDP and actually what is the main usea use use case that you see like which use case has more traction in the blockchain field because we saw that blockchain started for as a financial backbone right and you are mentioning that over 76 76 countries is all over the world actually try to use blockchain for for a good impact. Maybe might be for charity, might be for uh uh you know might be for actually trace water supply chain might be for digital identity. So in all these years what is the one of what is one of the main use cases that that you think has actually more impact?

My friend I actually have no real answer for that because the real answer is it really depends. We at the BGA and my colleagues that are here can verify this with me as well. And you yourself also, we have seen a lot of different projects utilizing blockchain for all sorts of purposes. Of course, we talk about some crazy projects that literally like to come up to us and say that, hey, we have a crypto token and you know, crypto can make people rich and therefore that's blockchain for good, but that's completely nonsense, right? That's that's nonsense.

But that aside, we've seen projects that utilize blockchain for cyber security. We've seen them use it for supply chain transparency. We've seen them use it for philanthropic causes. Recently we even have a project that actually is using you know NFTTS to save cats on chain. So literally they tokenize stray cats on chain and you can actually support them by utilizing this NFTs in the game kind of like reviving the whole NFT and metaverse era again but really you but really to push the concept that blockchain and decentralized technologies can even support stray animals.

At the same time we also one of our most major most majorly backed projects that actually got a further investment by bid itself is a Spanish project called ethic hub. They were in they are coffee they're backing coffee farmers so micro financing to coffee farmers on chain so the real answer to your question Januka is there is no real answer to that we see amazing use cases that perhaps people never really thought of before

let's say I know there's 76 count for example on topics of UN let's say the the main three topic the main three use cases maybe trustability digital

traceability we talk about clean energy and we talk about sustainability

clean energy and sustainability

absolutely for across the UN

okay thank you so this this was quite helpful to actually have a glance of what BJ is doing and I think that we all lighted different use cases that are not just finance related so that that's actually amazing and you know because there is all these bias that blockchain is just like related to finance but here is the proof that is not

that's the fun thing right I never talked about finance

yeah that that's a good point thank you so much of course

so that was like the more impact view I won't pass to Franchesco Lammona and I'm more interested like on the public sector view, right? So, of course, you are non-technical like you know you you come from a low background and like you know you're focused on also on economic backgrounds but like from a public sector view how do you see blockchain like do you see it as more a treat? Do you see as an opportunity? What is your general opinion on this technology? And do you think that government understand and actually try to implement this technology?

Yes. Um good afternoon to everyone. Uh thanks Jaluka. This is a important uh question because in my opinion the all the reason that now are moving the institutional is the the fear the fear to losing an opportunity and the fear to uh improve some differences between countries especially in the in Europe and the most fear of Europe is a social dumping uh and other kind of dumping uh busted on a different way of see these opportunities and also other fears that all the government inside Europe view the the position of every national country is that is the fear of a disunion a different normative uh between country that lives in in Europe. This is one of the most critical point that Europe for most politics don't have an doesn't have a unique idea but all country are moving alone in especially in the new technologies also we are looking for the bellic uh problems and all all the new technology like yeah and also blockchain uh has an important impact on the geopolitical geopolitical problems.

Yes. Uh we are looking that in this period there is no more the the past stabilities and a differences view point of view about the new technology can improve this differences between internal country. Also um a few years ago we can look at the establishment inside the position of uh politics in the world. We have two blockies uh the America, China and Europe is neutral was natural

the middle. Yeah.

Yes. in the middle. Today is a little bit different is because um the the support of America is not power like in the past

and China is a a new and important competitor on the all market especially new technologies blockchain. Yes.

And we have to make some policy some shows about who we are Europe. What is Europe? We are a federation what we want to want to be

and the new technology and the blockchains will be the sector where will be a economic war who now keeps the structure and the studies and they improve their systems will be advantage for the next year. Yeah, I really like your take because basically like we can say that you know now new technologies like as a kind of like power tools you know we had for example uh cold war and you know there was the nuclear power that you know the countries destroy it was based on how many nuclear weapons you had right now I think that you know the main power tools that actually is carrying separating and differentiating countries is actually how much innovative you are as a country as a region. So we can say that for example now the re the real war is kind of like in the AI field right now who which country has the best YI model is quite like you know winning on the race and actually also on the side of blockchain. uh the country that has more in innovative implementation of of of this technology is way more advanced against the others and as Europe I completely agree with you that we are still in the middle and is completely actually to center us. Uh also in terms of legislation I think that we can say that maybe there we are like kind of kind of like positioned better if you compared to US or to China.

Uh but of course like it's still like seen as a as a treat. agree with you like there are a lot of talks there are a lot of implementations uh but I think that after this um you know all these maker implementation this this year that we had a lot of gray areas we will see next year more adoption scale in my opinion and maybe we can try to actually try to be competitive uh against other countries at least in the blockchain field in the EI field I don't I don't think so it's quite I also mentioned Arnold another panel actually said that that you know in the eye field it's quite hard to be competitive but I think that in the blockchain field in Europe we still have something because in my opinion ma and micro in general is like a real complete uh low systems that can have a template to scale for startups of course it's hard to implement because you know all the countries all the all the companies that came in Europe they were not prepared to this legislation centralized exchanges the centralized protocols they are not prepared. So I can see from like you know public view point of view that is kind of like complex and is seen as a as a fear as a treat as you as you were saying.

Yes. Also another another focus on iso important is the the normative system of the most part of most European countries. Uh we come from a civil system of law and we have a power bureaucracy. Uh bureaucracy come from two word. Bureau that is the table.

Yeah.

And Katos is a ancient Greek word is a power and now we we live we live uh in this system and uh for the external country this system is too much long too complex rich of differences procedurous but um we are we have a traditional of this system and for us this is a sort of guarances. Um for example we we for for make law we make a lot passages between parliament uh senato and other institution

it's fragmented like the bureaucracy is fragmented

but this is a a form of guarances of democracy other country have a a more a faster system of making law. Uh in the other country the drafting is more more fast but um when we work when we draw the law uh we have we do a important uh important work of balance because we believe that the the imposed law isn't the best show. uh we prefer like uh our tradition a balance between all the interests in the in the play and uh this is important for our tradition and for a guarantee for democracy tradition the other country has an other differences way to make law and they don't understand why we are too much slow

uh but indefinitely I I I'm agree with our system only because I work in this and uh for me is really a a guarantee of transparencies and um and other civil rights also. I think with um the implementation of digitalization also with the system of blockchain will be more guaranteed other right like uh transparencies uh security privacy uh also we we are leaving a important discussion between uh who support more transparencies in the procedure and who support more privacy of person uh In in

like there is a debate between more innovation like more caring about the citizen

and we have to make a balance between who prefer the transparent transparency

and the others that prefer privacy of person a blockchain is a good solution and we are working uh of a normative in this way. I hope that the the the work will will good and can we we are arriving in definitely normative that today is still still complete

still it's still a great area yeah I hope that actually m also after this first July will a bit clarify the the current situation that is actually great for for for players for builders for startups like it's actually you know affecting all all the business scale you can be a startup you can build be a small medium enterprise you can be a large corp but it's quite difficult to understand how to respect the law because the law is is quite complex and we definitely need like a way to actually uh achieve with that but um uh you know like I'm curious to understand your point of view and then we will pass to Alexandra but like um it's funny because you know blockchain is a technology that is out there from a lot you know blockchain is not a new technology right now it's bit trendy now we saw that institutions are following it But I think that EI was way more disruptive. Uh not for you like I mean I mean like you know EI is way literally more disruptive as technology. Like if you have to compare EI and blockchain EI is more disruptive because you know I try to I try to you know I try to explain blockchain so many times to people around me but blockchain is something hard to understand if you're not in the field. while EI you know with JGBT was way easier to understand it because even if you're nontechnical person you use chibbt daily basis and is way easier to understand so based on this concept of like from a public sector view do you think that you know like the government now is like has the same balance awaits between EI new laws and blockchain new laws or like do you think that the focus is more like on EI what is your take

yes yes we have a lot programs bus and especially on EI and uh in blockchain we are in the p we are in the past there is a a new technology that um we don't have studies in in profoundity we have just some ideas but uh in my opinion uh there will be a lot study that have to study the sector and improvement then a normative about it and uh this is Because um we want before to make a law we want know the sector. This is important

still a bit unknown sector. If the I sector is way easier to analyze and also to you know understand how can actually be can be legimated. It can be actually legal you know on specific point of view from both like the business side the consumer trend sides blockchain is quite hard to define and to work on laws on that. That's why like Michael know it's already hold you know as as a legislation Michael that went out doesn't cover so many topics that are related to web3 world that's just because I think that bureaucracy is so slow and innovation is so fast right it's just like a a complex different game

I think that another problem in the Italian public sector is that old politicsmen speak every every time a new changing the young in the in the office but we still leave a problem that is the age of the public officer.

Exactly. there is not a generational change like the the general age of a member of the parliament is still over 60 I think or 50 right

and that's why I like what you're doing with Italian government and uh with your role because you run like with the cons like you you represent the the people of under 35 in Italian cabinet you you work closely with with Melon you work closely with all the people of the parliament also with controversy initiative as yours and that's why I invited you in this in this panel. Thank you Franchesco for your take.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Uh so um let's start um let's start also now you know we touched with with Glenn like more on the impact view uh with with Franchesco more on the public sector view. So we kind of like have a state of art of what actually is happening uh related to those topics right. Um now for you Allesandro like you are more like on the decentralization challenge I guess right. So like you run you are part of this decentralization institute. So to follow like the flow of this conversation, what do you think is the main blocker of institutions to embrace decentralization?

Because of course like we have institutions that are embracing AI, we have institutions that are embracing blockchain, but the centralization is something different, right? So do you see that institutions are going to embrace decentralization or just maybe blockchain on a DT scheme, right? on a permission scheme. What are maybe can you make an example of one of the best project you see in around the institute or with your relation with the tum foundation with European Commission? What is your take like the blockchain technologies implemented in institutional side more as a decentralized structure or more permission and structure with the LT scheme?

Well, thank you for the question and by the way great uh insights before guys. Thank you for for sharing that with all of us. Uh I think that's it's really political choice because even AI and even blockchain and any kind of technology can be more or less decentralized depending how you design it. Right? So it's very a political choice and institutions there they need to have a political will or political push to go toward the centralized solutions.

That's it. And they need to see the value. So forget about the technology. Let's think about the real Yeah, technology is there and there are so many great solutions. We say that a lot of things happen at bottom up and and so on.

But when we talk about decentralization right, it's really a more political uh let's say aspect. So what's the value of decentralization

and what is your opinion around like you know that you work closely with European Commission like what is your opinion uh how they see them this decentralization value they see the value I mean they see the value there is the mika right but they made the mikar more to stop and to avoid fraud or whatever or they made mikar to help the regulator like what is the the actual

all institutions all governments all enterprises are hierarchical centralized organiz organizations since thousands of years of our human civilization history. It's been always like this. So bringing the centralized solutions, it's not easy. It's hard and it goes against the real nature of these organizations many times honestly. But if they see the value for example right now you you mentioned the geopolitical landscape.

I mean we are quite clearly in a multip from an international relations point of view in a multipolar world where you have different uh center of powers. So resiliency it's a key point and decentraliz decentralized solutions avoid unique point of failure right you see Ethereum as the world computer but even internet and the worldwide web it's actually decentralized solutions well the governance of it is very American le but anyway it's

Etheum it is kind of decentralized

or AWS you know like so like from a technical point of view like I love the central decentralization narrative Yeah,

but also we have to say that like there are kind of limit limits in technology because as you say like web worldwide is decentralized

but then you see the servers are like on you know on a few

ends the infrastructure let's say the worldwide web was developed was developed in Europe in in Switzerland and this was not commercial then it was commercially captured by big by US big tech but it was not a commercial solution it was

yeah yes right distribution of knowledge information that is that's internet blockchain brings in the trust on the digital uh world. So that's is this distribution of value because when you have trust that's why Bitcoin right and everything else when you have trust oh yeah that's that's has some value

and so this is a real use case this is a real value for blockchain and other decentralized solutions but again very important the political design and political will because even blockchain solutions or other kind of decentralized solutions can led toward centralized outcomes or dystopic dystopic outcomes or so on. So going back sorry a bit

that's amazing that's been all

I like to brainstorm panels otherwise are boring

but going back to your point uh if there is any blogger for institutions I don't think there is any specific blogger I think that actually even if it's not that known underneath for example the guys were talking about UNP and United Nations but even OECD many international organizations have been piloting and and working on this since 10 years or Oh 2016 17 I would say so I mean it's not new this thing we are 2026 now right we are actually last week I was in this event I mean I think you guys you were too there at a science po uh with UNDP so there were many blockchain foundations and other players from also tradition like the po from France they were saying okay yeah we are in this blockchain phase now where we are transitioning from pilots through production

it's not anymore than a research it's transition I like this is becoming it should become the backbone of our digital public infrastructure and that's very hard that's very longterm let's say process but is happening

actually

I would like to end to to you and then also we'll come back to to Glenn for this question like

um I I like your your touch points and in your opinion what what are the main use cases that institutions will embrace with blockchain technology like maybe transparency for for supply chains, sustainability like you know what are the main use cases that you think that are actually are being embraced from institutions maybe digital identity for example like I love the concept of like you know from in Switzerland from the first January 2027 we will have the first digital passport all in ZK actually the project was already out a few months ago but they had a big issue with privacy uh so they stopped it but from 1st January 2027 old all new passports for new citizens will be issued in blockchain. All digital passport using ZK. So I'm really a believer of of ZK technology as you know it already we touched in other panels but apart maybe of digital identity do you see other main use cases on how actually the centralized technology are being embraced from institutions or just digital identity? Oh,

let's not touch financial, right?

Other other.

Okay. So, going behind the financial applications of course, but also the identity you just mentioned it as I said is being I mean blockchain is a sort well that's my view but maybe wrong it's a sort internet 2.0 internet of value rather than internet a network of value rather than network of information. So it's really becoming it could be and my opinion will beam in some point really the base the foundation of digital public infrastructure DBI when you talk about digital public infrastructure of course you will you're going to talk about healthcare you want to talk about transportation you're going to talk about logistics you're going to talk about well these are three right you mentioned three you ask three but many more I mean almost everything

almost in this case

so we are talking about digital economy and digital society as overall moving uh yeah real economy actually in real society moving in the digital world and blockchain is one of the technology in a decentralized manner that can make this possible at scale another very important point because coordination at scale is one of the main value also of of these uh technologies so

thank you Al really nice insight thank you so much so uh yeah as you can see we made like a deep dive overview on actually how institutions are entering this world and I was really really quite interested about the use cases because then like we say okay we talk about adoption we we talk about transition but in my opinion was really important to all the main pillar the main use cases that are actually institutions are embracing. So for sure financial we saw real world assets we saw uh you know tokenizations of bonds treasury bonds but also as we discover today digital identity trustability supply chain sustability are main topics that actually are being embraced from institutions. So Gran, do you would like to end with uh your opinion about this topic? Something to say maybe to our crowd or Oh, okay. For me, I'm not European, right?

Obviously, so I decided I'm going to get like whacked on my way out here or maybe I get praised. I don't know. But anyway, so honestly to the rest of the world, Europe has always struck as somewhere that's very like sustainability is very close to it. A lot of the a lot of the culture that's really well preserved always goes onto sustainability of the world, the environment and I believe that you know in that aspect we see a lot of projects that that come from Europe that are actually embracing this how to save the world. One of our major projects right now is a project called plastics that comes from Europe.

Yeah, you know the guys as well. They are amazing people, right? They are essentially piloting different types of projects with different UN agencies around the world to properly trace you know and turn plastic waste into usable credits that people can buy things with. So turning plastic into

they partnered also with the buyer level ken right like football teams. Yeah. They basically like plastics is an amazing project that I saw as an advisor and basically what they do they they take all the plastic bags from you know the actual

plastic all plastic um tools that actually are coming from you know football matches in a stadium you know imagine like you go to a stadium and you drink Coca-Cola people in Europe how they are like you know throwing away all these blasting bottles everywhere and they created a nice nice system flow they they flow the plastics uh they they they take all plastic and they actually recycle the plastic and creates a creative systems that more you recycle more you earn and then you can spend these these credits again maybe to maybe win a ticket a free ticket to your team and so on and that was done with Bay Leen that is like a famous football club in Germany and that's based on blockchain but people don't know that's why what we should do that's why we do this panels try to make you know awareness about this topic because also as Sandra said now it's 2026 like research were done like 10 years ago. Now the technology is here and like actually is in being implemented. So thank you everyone for the for this panel. Uh I'm really happy of of the topics that we touch. If you have any questions of course you can come to us.

Uh it was the last technical panel of the day. Now we will have visions and some artistic related stuff. Thank you everybody. Thank you.