Bitcoin.com News Interviews

Latest Episodes:

Mercuryo's CBO on Why DeFi Will Live Inside Revolut, Not Replace It Apr 30, 2026

Show notes

Arthur Firstov, Chief Business Officer at Mercuryo, joined Alex Richardson at Paris Blockchain Week 2026 to challenge the dominant DeFi narrative.

The future isn't DeFi platforms beating banks — it's DeFi primitives living as backend infrastructure inside Revolut, neobanks, and traditional banks with polished UX and millions of users. Plus crypto cards as the consumer gateway, the 2026 fintech-pivot M&A wave, and Mercuryo's Mastercard crypto credentials product.

We cover:

- DeFi's actual adoption path: white-label inside banks

- Crypto cards as the mainstream stablecoin gateway

- The fintech-pivot driving crypto M&A in 2026

- Mercuryo + Mastercard's crypto credentials product

- What MiCA actually changed for an early-stage compliant firm👇

Chapters:

00:11 - Welcome and Introduction of Arthur Firstov

01:01 - Overview of Mercurio

01:29 - The Role of Stablecoins

03:06 - Stablecoin Payments in Consumer Platforms

05:12 - The Future of Crypto Cards

06:25 - Peer-to-Peer Payments and Agents

09:26 - Changes in DeFi and UX

11:41 - Impact of Micah Regulation

15:34 - Expansion to the US and Regulatory Challenges

18:05 - Trends in Payments and FinTech

23:21 - Future Trends in FinTech and AI

Drop your take in the comments — are banks winning, or just adapting?

📢 Follow for more crypto insights, interviews, and updates.

From 15 Banks to 250: Inside Paris Blockchain Week's Institutional Wave Apr 30, 2026

Show notes

Michael Amar founded Paris Blockchain Week in 2019 because U.S. and Asian investors told him Paris had no crypto ecosystem. This year, 250 banks showed up.

At PBW 2026, he sits with David Sencil to put real numbers behind the institutional adoption story, explain why MiCA enforcement is filtering who can attend European events, and predict where the next year's crypto M&A will land.

We cover:

- The 15-to-250 banks curve, year over year

- PBW's "Paris is good for food and vacation, but for crypto, no" origin

- MiCA enforcement filtering European events in real time

- Why next year is the crypto M&A year

- France's strengths and gaps for crypto founders

Chapters:

00:17 - Welcome to Bitcoin.com News Live Desk

00:36 - Michael Amar's Background

01:14 - Early Involvement in Digital Assets

02:23 - Launching Paris Blockchain Week

03:21 - Success and Challenges of the Conference

04:18 - Institutional Adoption and Growth

05:01 - Institutional Presence at the Conference

06:18 - European Regulations and Compliance

07:32 - Market Share and Competition

08:46 - Future of Crypto in Paris and Europe

09:33 - France's Role in Web3 and Crypto

10:34 - French Regulations and Innovations

11:11 - International Perspective on French Ecosystem

12:20 - Venue and Logistics of the Conference

13:34 - VIP Dinner at Versailles

14:48 - Planning and Execution of the Conference

15:42 - Importance of Quality and Logistics

16:57 - Support for French Entrepreneurs

19:38 - Safety and Perception Issues

21:43 - Key Elements for a Successful Conference

23:00 - Networking and Business Opportunities

24:11 - The Importance of Real-Life Engagements

📌 Follow Bitcoin.com for more Web3 insights, interviews, and breaking crypto news.

Animoca's Robby Yung on Why Crypto's Real Customer Was Always AI Apr 29, 2026

Show notes

Robby Yung runs Animoca Brands' investment business — 650 portfolio companies across Web3. At Paris Blockchain Week 2026, he sits with Alex Richardson to argue blockchain's real product-market fit was always agentic commerce, not human consumer apps. Plus the iTunes "false promise" of digital ownership, why 6 billion gamers are the natural mass-adoption vector, and how RWAs bridge the physical and AI-managed worlds.

We cover:

- Why crypto's real customer was always AI agents

- Digital property rights and the iTunes false promise

- Gaming as the mass-adoption vector

- What the metaverse actually is

- RWAs as the AI-physical bridge

Chapters:

00:16 - Welcome to Paris Blockchain Week

01:12 - Overview of Animoca Brands

02:13 - Agentic Commerce and Blockchain

03:41 - Consumer User Interface

04:27 - Digital Property Rights Explained

06:12 - Ownership in the Digital Age

07:40 - Gaming and Blockchain Adoption

09:28 - The Metaverse and AI

12:00 - Optimism and Concerns about AI

13:00 - NFTs and Their Future

15:05 - Tokenization and Digital Twins

16:05 - The French Web3 Ecosystem

17:54 - Europe's Role in Crypto

19:15 - Future Trends in AI and Blockchain

Follow Bitcoin.com for more crypto interviews, insights, and market updates.

Unregulated Crypto Loans in Europe? 😳 | Bybit EU CEO Apr 29, 2026

Show notes

Georg Harer was a financial lawyer for 10 years before joining Bybit. Now Co-CEO of Bybit EU, he sits with David Sencil at Paris Blockchain Week 2026 to walk through the post-MiCA European crypto landscape — including the regulatory gap MiCA hasn't closed (crypto loans), the three-license stack platforms need to operate, and his pitch to regulators for a consolidated license that would save firms millions.

We cover:

- Crypto loans regulatory blind spot

- The MiCA + e-money + MiFID three-license operator math

- Why Bybit EU started with retail before institutional

- Tokenized stocks at 2am at the club

- Euro stablecoin liquidity vs USDC dominance

Chapters:

00:42 - Bybit's Growth and History

01:11 - George's Background and Transition to Bybit

02:21 - Bitcoin Loans and Regulation in Europe

03:11 - Crypto Loan Regulation Discussion

04:03 - George's Introduction to Bitcoin

05:35 - Bybit's Focus on Europe

07:28 - Trust and Regulation in European Crypto Market

09:00 - Bybit's Customer Base and Licensing

10:30 - Institutional Focus at Paris Blockchain Week

11:15 - Average Bybit User in Europe

12:28 - Bybit's Licensing and Regulatory Challenges

14:11 - Future of European Financial Regulation

17:31 - Euro-Denominated Stablecoins

19:24 - Concerns About Dollar-Denominated Stablecoins

21:35 - Reporting Requirements for Stablecoins

22:22 - Excitement About Tokenized Stocks

23:47 - Bybit's Future Products and Success Metrics

Follow Bitcoin.com for more crypto interviews, insights, and market updates.

Satoshis as Gas: Cardano Foundation's Frederik Gregaard on Bitcoin + Cardano, Quantum, and On-Chain Audit Apr 26, 2026

Show notes

Frederik Gregaard, CEO of the Cardano Foundation, sits down with David Sencil at Paris Blockchain Week 2026 for a wide-ranging conversation that starts with one big idea: using Satoshis as a gas fee natively on Cardano — so Bitcoin holders get programmable DeFi without leaving BTC.

From there it goes deep — quantum resilience, AI agent identity at BMW and Lufthansa, the $400 trillion TradFi identity standard now anchored on chain, Grant Thornton auditing the Foundation's books on Cardano (Bitcoin holdings included), and why Abu Dhabi is the only regulator green-lighting cryptographic privacy.

We cover:

- Satoshis as gas: programmable DeFi on Bitcoin via Cardano

- Quantum, Q-day, and why UTXO-based chains score high

- AI agent identity at BMW, Lufthansa, and 400+ enterprise clients via SocoSumi

- Legal Entity Identifiers: the $400T TradFi standard now anchored on chain

- Hannover Re reinsurance — $100M minimum → $50K on the London Stock Exchange

- Grant Thornton's on-chain architecture audit of the Cardano Foundation's books

- Midnight, BLS signatures, GDPR-compliant on-chain finance, and the ADGM exception

Recorded at Paris Blockchain Week 2026.

Host: David Sencil

Stablecoin Payments in 12 Months: Myles Harrison on AMINA Bank's Build Apr 26, 2026

Show notes

"Absolutely not multi-decade."

That's AMINA Bank CPO Myles Harrison's window for stablecoin payments going mainstream — if the US and UK get their legislation over the line.

Myles joins Alex Richardson at Paris Blockchain Week 2026 to unpack what AMINA — the Swiss–Austrian–Hong Kong crypto bank behind the BIS's Project Agora — is actually building: corporate payroll in stablecoins, 24/7 settlement, and the regulatory groundwork that finally lets product teams ship.

We cover:

- Why Myles gives stablecoin payments 12 months, not 12 years

- How MiCA and the CASP license changed what product teams can actually build

- Gig-economy payroll, supplier payments, and the death of the $50 wire fee

- Running AMINA 24/7 through the tariff weekend — with no downtime

- Inside Project Agora: interop and legal finality as the two real walls- Why "bear market is for building" — and what TradFi is quietly shipping this cycle

Host: Alex Richardson Recorded at Paris Blockchain Week 2026.

1M Shares in 4 Days: Amy Oldenburg on Morgan Stanley's Bitcoin ETF Apr 24, 2026

Show notes

Morgan Stanley's spot Bitcoin ETF traded a million shares by day four — at 14 basis points. Not bad for a firm that spent years on the sidelines of the ETF race.

Amy Oldenburg, Head of Digital Asset Strategy at Morgan Stanley, joins David Sencil at Paris Blockchain Week 2026 to walk through how the bank is approaching digital assets — across product, infrastructure, and regulation — and why she says there's more coming behind this launch.

We cover:

Morgan Stanley's spot BTC ETF launch and the 14bp fee strategy
Why emerging-markets investors tend to navigate crypto better than most
The three-bucket framework: investments, infrastructure, new products
Where Amy lands on quantum and "Q-day" for Bitcoin
The GENIUS Act, OCC digital trust charter, and what's still missing from US clarity
Why cypherpunks and Wall Street aren't as far apart as they look

Host: David Sencil

Recorded at Paris Blockchain Week 2026.

Erald Ghoos, OKX Europe CEO — MiCA, Malta, and the 80% Exchange Reckoning Apr 24, 2026

Show notes

In 2017, a Bitcoin-maxi friend tried to convert Erald Ghoos. He didn't buy it — he'd spent his career building bank startups across Europe and was, in his own words, on "the dark side." Today he runs OKX Europe and says 80% of crypto exchanges on the continent won't survive what's coming.

David Sencil sits down with Erald at Paris Blockchain Week 2026 to dig into the regulatory pressure cooker reshaping European crypto — MiCA, PI, MiFID, GDPR, DORA — and why struggling rivals are already approaching OKX asking to be acquired. They cover OKX's decision to anchor three financial licenses in Malta, the new X-Perps product designed to bridge onshore compliance with offshore-level liquidity, and the unified spot-and-derivatives account that doesn't exist anywhere else in Europe.

We cover:

- The personal arc: from skeptical banker to OKX Europe CEO

- Why 80% of European crypto exchanges won't survive MiCA + PI + MiFID + GDPR + DORA

- Why rivals are openly asking OKX to acquire them

- The case for stacking three financial licenses in Malta

- X-Perps: bridging onshore compliance with offshore-level liquidity

- Europe's only unified spot-and-derivatives account

- Merz at Davos and the deregulation signal

- Tokenized stocks and 24/7 global market access

Filmed at Paris Blockchain Week 2026.

Host: David Sencil

Bitcoin.com News X: https://x.com/BitcoinNews

Banks Are Racing to Tokenize European Equity — WhiteBIT's Vlad Maltsev on the "Financial Supermarket" Era Apr 23, 2026

Show notes

Tokenized stocks trading 24/7 alongside crypto on one app. One European bank planning on-chain equity infrastructure by year-end. A "financial supermarket" where every asset class converges. This isn't a forecast from a think tank — it's what Vlad Maltsev, Deputy CCO at WhiteBIT, is hearing from the banks themselves.

Vlad Maltsev joins Alex Richardson at Paris Blockchain Week to unpack tokenization timelines, MiCA's real-world impact on European banks, WhiteBIT's upcoming US expansion, and why compliance is still the only door that matters for institutional adoption.

In this interview:

- Why compliance is the gateway for every institutional entrant

- How MiCA is pulling German and Dutch banks into crypto licensing

- The "financial supermarket" thesis — one app, every asset class

- Why tokenized equity could settle in seconds instead of days

- WhiteBIT's MiCA status and US expansion timeline

- What could dominate crypto narratives a year from now

Filmed at Paris Blockchain Week

Bitcoin.com News: https://x.com/BitcoinNews

WhiteBIT: https://whitebit.com

Host: Alex Richardson

Chapters:

00:19 - Welcome and Guest Introduction

00:35 - Conference Overview

01:04 - Institutional Adoption in Crypto

01:49 - WhiteBit's Ecosystem

02:30 - Sponsorships and Partnerships

03:53 - Institutional Adoption Insights

05:05 - WhiteBit's Market Focus

06:12 - Stablecoins and Tokenization

08:06 - Future of Financial Platforms

09:07 - Crypto Trading Cup

10:10 - Trading Strategies

10:59 - WhiteBit's Future Projects

12:17 - Future Use Cases in Crypto

KuCoin EU's Sabina Liu: A TradFi Veteran's Reality Check on Tokenization Apr 23, 2026

Show notes

Tokenizing an asset doesn't automatically make it liquid. After 14 years at the London Stock Exchange, KuCoin EU's Managing Director Sabina Liu has a reality check for crypto's RWA hype cycle.

Sabina joins Alexander Richardson at Paris Blockchain Week 2026 to talk through what she actually saw in digital assets that TradFi missed, where tokenization genuinely solves a problem (and where it doesn't), how MiCA has reshaped Europe's exchange landscape, and why KuCoin EU runs as a broker — not an order book — under the new regulation.

We cover:

- Why tokenization alone doesn't create liquidity or demand

- What TradFi still does really well — and why not everything needs to be on-chain

- How MiCA has reshaped the European exchange playbook

- Why KuCoin EU operates as a broker, not an exchange

- France's role in Europe's institutional crypto landscape

- Where the real bridge between TradFi and digital assets gets built

Filmed at Paris Blockchain Week 2026.

Host: Alexander Richardson