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Exciting news! Knot has teamed up with Plaid, a Knot investor, as a preferred referral partner for card-on-file switching. With Knot's CardSwitcher™, users can set their credit or debit cards as the default payment across 100+ online merchants with just a few taps. Plaid customers can now import transaction history into Knot's SDK for even more seamless card switching ✨. This partnership aligns perfectly with our mission to create a user-centric financial ecosystem. Plaid's Transaction History, combined with Knot's CardSwitcher™, offers solutions for card issuers, merchants, and consumers. 🏦 Card Issuers: Achieve quick and efficient top-of-wallet placement 🏪 Merchants: Reduce transaction declines and improve customer retention by preventing involuntary churn 🏡 Consumers: Gain control over where cards are stored and how payment information is shared Thanks to Plaid for believing in our vision. Link in the comments for the full press release. If you want to utilize Plaid's Transaction Data with Knot, feel free to reach out!

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📖 Weekend Reading 📖 1️⃣ Nic Carter wrote the most important piece on stablecoins you can read right now, synthesizing the regulatory “conversation” on stablecoins through 5 distinct perspectives that span the spectrum of opinion. This is accessible for folks looking for a primer, but it also highlights some important nuances, such as stablecoins’ impact on the US dollar—both as a reserve currency and as a mechanism for enforcing the Washington Consensus. https://lnkd.in/dZnfmmBn Ayokunle Omojola also had a nice post on stablecoins this week, focusing primarily on extending the US dollar’s role as reserve currency. I’m not as worried about inflation-driven retail redemptions accelerating outside of market hours, as these dislocations tend to get arb’ed away quickly. However, I strongly believe that the US government needs to sensibly regulate stablecoins onshore to better control these risks and encourage more issuers, further derisking redemptions-based events. https://lnkd.in/dyqBP2qi 2️⃣ I really enjoyed this piece by Samir Desai dissecting Robinhood’s 3% cashback rewards scheme. More than the final result, it’s the exercise of understanding each component piece that really spoke to me. We should all be doing more of this. A few areas I might push back on: 1) I think there’s a bit of a leap from the average interchange rate to the eventual 2.60% — it’s unfortunately hard to get any hard numbers here. 2) I’d expect Robinhood has to share some percentage of the interchange with their bank (X1’s original bank, Coastal Community Bank). 3) The analysis doesn’t talk about chargeback-related costs. https://lnkd.in/diYkzidf 3️⃣ Activant Capital Research published a great overview of global real time payments—the high-level stats, the core networks, and the other relevant players. I do question the usefulness of some of these average transaction fee data points based on the conversations we have with partners (they seem too high for most practical use cases), but the broader message of decreasing costs and speed through linking real-time payments networks resonates deeply with what we’re building at Walapay. https://lnkd.in/dvriSWvu 4️⃣ Vitalik has a great write-up on multidimensional gas markets. Solana bros rejoice. This one’s a bit more technical, but the core idea is to continue segmenting block space for different types of computation, leading to different markets for distinct use cases. We saw the beginning of this with blobspace (EIP-4844), and Vitalik here has a new proposal in EIP-7623. https://lnkd.in/dXfnuV5y #stablecoins #usdc #crypto #bitcoin #btc #fintech #robinhood #creditcard #cashback #payments #rtp #ethereum

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The White House has signaled a significant shift in crypto policy. The "administration is eager to work with Congress to ensure a comprehensive and balanced regulatory framework for digital assets", while opposing the FIT21 bill in its current form. What's FIT21? This bill is set to redefine crypto regulations by: • Clarify Jurisdictions: Define roles for CFTC and SEC • Protect Consumers: Implement safeguards to prevent incidents like FTX • Encourage Innovation: Foster leadership in digital asset + blockchain tech This bipartisan bill is a huge step towards a consistent federal framework, and critical for the evolution of the digital asset industry.

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⚠️ Fintech giants are under fire. What’s happening? 🔍 Block and Robinhood scrutinies torched up brightly beside the Binance trials these days. If you are struggling to keep up with everything that’s going on, catch my investigations digest. 🕵️‍♂️ Federal Prosecutors Probe Block Federal prosecutors are scrutinizing financial transactions at Block, owner of Cash App and Square. Documents provided to prosecutors reveal alleged breaches involving sanctions violations and insufficient customer due diligence. So, who’s the source? A former employee disclosed to prosecutors that Square and Cash App processed transactions involving countries subject to U.S. sanctions without adequate reporting. Block denies some allegations, asserting a robust compliance program. Currently, the company faces scrutiny over alleged failures to address compliance issues promptly. 🕵️‍♂️  SEC vs. Robinhood The SEC is to issue a Wells Notice to Robinhood. That signals potential enforcement action over alleged violations related to its crypto activities. Robinhood contends that it has actively sought regulatory clarity from the SEC. And the company was not alone: other crypto exchanges made similar efforts to navigate complex regulatory landscapes. However, there are too many regulatory uncertainties surrounding the crypto landscape. Take the regulation reportedly violated: it’s the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (!). Yes, the state of regulation is that bad. 🕵️‍♂️  Binance's Legal Battle Unfolds: Founder Sentenced Binance, known for its extensive token listings and global reach, has faced mounting regulatory scrutiny in recent years. After pleading guilty, its founder, Changpeng Zhao, has received a four-month prison sentence for inadequate anti-money laundering measures. Prosecutors allege heavy violations, including sanctions breaches and insufficient anti-money laundering efforts. U.S. laws violated by Binance’s actions include the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA). Sanctions violations total over $898 million. So, the regulatory scrutiny facing Fintech and crypto firms intensified 😕 But when will the regulation and compliance guidance keep up? Share your forecasts and compliance pains in the comments. _________________ Note: This post is a summary of recent investigations and does not imply guilt or liability on the part of the companies mentioned.* #fintechgiants #investigations #fintechregulation #cryptoregulation #compliance #regulationviolations #block #robinhood #binance

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Robinhood acquiring Bitstamp for $200m is a steal. Few thoughts: - Bitstamp is oldest active exchange (founded 2011), surviving for 13 years is v impressive - always reputable but were were never able to break into tier one category (probably bc founders stepped down and bc based in europe) - 4m users seems small but most are in europe, that’s key - robinhood is primarily in US… competitors like kraken and etoro have bigger european biz than them, this is huge leap for robinhood euro expansion - $200m for 4m users. $50/user… any exchange takes that all day - $200m seems to be mostly/all cash, good win for bitstamp assuming they didn’t raise much money (which I don’t think they did) - robinhood also acquires bitstamp liability (idk details here but prob some nasty stuff comes with an exchange of 13 years) - if you like COIN, you should like HOOD… HOOD set up to have a big year And finally, zooming out from this deal… It’s great to see an exit by a non token company, we need M&A and IPOs for this industry to develop.

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Closing out on YC W24 batch with the ever-present question: Are YC Valuations Too High? 🔥The same burning question resurfaces whenever Y Combinator unveils its latest batch. At Acacia, we dive into this semi-annual debate with a nuanced perspective. 🎓Start with the fundamentals of SAFE agreements, which cap the price of equity in future priced rounds. Valuations are not being set, but expectations sure are. 👩‍🍼Next acknowledge that many YC companies are in their nascent stages, often pre-revenue and reliant on their first external capital, usually from YC itself. 🤝Not only are valuations not being set, but YC isn't setting them. Founders set caps and target raise amounts considering market trends, YC terms, feedback from angels and VCs, and more. With a low acceptance rate and strong historical track record, YC founders ask for more (right or wrong.) 👉The process is intricate and merits a careful approach from investors like Acacia, who invest in companies, not an entire batch. 🎰 Often, we encounter YC startups asking for valuations that seem to include every possible future success. Our Investment Committee carefully considers whether the price reflects real-world potential or an over-optimistic scenario. Companies that rank strongly on revenue but are fully priced at 40x or higher multiples risk being priced to perfection. The biggest risk here is being set up for down rounds, as companies can miss growth targets for many reasons (recently, macroeconomic factors like interest rate spikes.) 🎯As we navigate the complexities of startup valuations, particularly those emerging from YC, our goal at Acacia isn’t just to invest. It’s to partner with companies whose potential to grow and succeed aligns realistically with our assessment and market trends. 🎤What’s your take on YC valuations? Have you experienced similar questions or challenges in your investment decisions? Share your thoughts below.

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Starting a company requires all your life's energy. Make it big and worthwhile. There's an opportunity to do that in the stablecoin space right now. Founders, your work is vital for maintaining US financial hegemony and stability. My NFX partner Morgan Beller's case for why stablecoin founders are essential for US national security: https://lnkd.in/gpxiEdb8.

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Our mission at Cypherock has always been to solve the loss problem in Crypto Self Custody. Billions in Crypto have been lost due to lost seed phrase and owner death. This changes. Today. In this week of Bitcoin halving, we’re proud to introduce Cypherock Cover, a secure multi-chain, non-custodial & non-KYC inheritance-style recovery service for everyone. 🤯 No single point of failure Neither Cypherock can compromise your Crypto assets alone nor can the nominee. ⛓️ Multi-Chain The future is multi-chain. Cypherock Cover is designed in a way to securely transfer access to a nominee without compromising privacy and control of the assets. Hence every Crypto asset that is secured by the seed phrase will automatically be transferred. NFTs? Defi positions? Staked assets? Literally everything! 🌎 No KYC Required & Globally Available Neither you nor the nominee’s KYC is required to set up Cypherock Cover 🔒Seed phrase is never touched Unlike You-Know-Who, the seed phrase NEVER leaves Cypherock X1. 🔑 Non-custodial & Jurisdiction Agnostic Cypherock Cover acts as an infrastructure layer below the legal layer. Since Cypherock never custodies the Crypto assets, you are free to choose a nominee either from the legal system like a lawyer, or from your close acquaintance. 🫂 Complimentary to Existing Wallet Setup You are not required to transfer the assets from another wallet. Just import the wallet seed phrases and set them up right away. You can set up recovery of up to 4 different wallets through a single Cypherock X1. 📴 Offline & Non-Upgradable Hardware Enforced A critical component for Cypherock Cover to work is the X1 Card. X1 Cards are offline, non-upgradable, and have physical locations that only the users know about. Building something similar is that purely software is undesirable those will be cloud-based and upgradable adding counterparty risks. Cypherock Cover is going live in May ’24. For the 1st 1000 users, we are giving away 1 additional year of service free! Sounds interesting? Check out the link below to learn how it works.

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One of aspects of Carta's product development that excites me the most is not something we have an opportunity to talk about a lot. Its the infrastructure behind the product experiences we build that is so foundational to the ecosystem. Carta money movement infrastructure moves billions of dollars every year to facilitate crucial transactions. Now we are bringing automated money movement to fund admin and it is a game changer. This infrastructure will work to eliminate the manual, black box, and cumbersome ways that fund transactions are processed today. The future is transparent, seamless and predictable for Carta Fund Admin customers. I am pumped! https://lnkd.in/g3W_cRxn

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💰Robinhood is planning to buy Bitstamp for only $200 Million, in the first half of 2025, as a strategy to expand outside of the USA and have an increased global presence.🌍 By being one of Europe's largest crypto exchanges, offering over 85 cryptocurrencies and holding more than 50 global licenses you’d think Bitstamp would be worth a lot more.🤔 Do you use Bitstamp? #crypto #cryptocurrency #currency #blockchain

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We've released the latest edition of our EQ/IQ Crypto Newsletter, and it's chock-full of critical industry developments! Here are my top three takeaways: 1️⃣ Robinhood has entered an agreement to acquire Bitstamp for an estimated $200 million and plans to expand its lineup of crypto-native products and services. 2️⃣ Coinbase's new Smart Wallet aims to bring millions of new users on-chain with improved usability and security relative to traditional wallets. 3️⃣ Kraken Digital Asset Exchange is seeking at least $100 million in pre-IPO funding. Which key industry developments are you following closely this week? 💡

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Institutional investment and enterprise adoption are the key themes driving growth in 2024. Once the necessary regulatory changes catch up, the full potential of the tech as well as new value creation models can be realized. Exciting times ahead.

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Three key principles that uphold crypto: 1. Anonymity (just nod through verification while holding up your passport) 2. Decentralization (sorry, we're not servicing folks from your country anymore) 3. Security (your money account? Locked down.) 🙄

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There's a lot of buzz about stablecoins in the fintech community right now. But we're just scratching the surface of what fintechs will achieve. If the opinions of this cohort of leaders are anything to go by, stablecoins are back on the agenda. In this report, we spoke to leaders at different points in the payments value chain: stablecoin issuers like Paxos, embedded banking providers like ClearBank, B2B payments fintechs like Freemarket and VCs like General Catalyst. We asked: how are you thinking about stablecoins and what progress will be made this year? Here are a few things they told us: - Market timing is a challenge we need regulators, banks and governments to come on board. But with stablecoins we’ll find the next category-defining business. - Traditional financial institutions (FIs) are experimenting. When they see clear ROI, they’ll start rolling out stablecoin rails to other countries – this will be a pivotal moment for market readiness. - Stablecoins will reach a market cap of $250bn by the end of 2024, growing 2-3x the pace of the crypto market overall. - Providers with the right licences will be in a stronger position to launch stablecoin products and offer those to other FIs. - By the end of 2024 we’ll see some marquee partnerships where traditional fintechs are launching a full stablecoin solution, wallets pay-ins and payouts. For those thinking about adding stablecoins to their tech stack, I hope this collection of views, along with summaries of use cases, can provide some useful perspectives. https://lnkd.in/dh7ZAfg2

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PSA: If you send a founder product nits + feedback with concomitant screenshots/mocks you instantly vault into being an S-tier user. (Friction logs are even better, of course.)

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VERY excited to share our latest token launch case study with the team @ Ethena Labs 🚀 Ethena provides derivative infra to transform ETH into the 1st crypto-native, yield-bearing synthetic dollar, not reliant on the banking system: USDe. And they're backed by a fantastic roster of investors, with their latest round led by Dragonfly. As Ethena's Shard program concluded, Guy Young and the rest of the Ethena leadership team needed a token launch partner who could offer holistic support throughout their token launch while also handling custom requests in a specific turnaround time. Here's what happened: Challenge(s) Ethena faced 2 specific challenges during their airdrop. 1. Deploying the actual airdrop campaign 2. Distributing tokens with variable unlock schedules across 3 stakeholder groups Per Challenge #1 ➡️ Ethena’s Points program determined stakeholder airdrop allocations and vesting schedules. Ethena stakeholders would accrue Points for staking the $ENA token. Those Points would directly translate into the # of tokens each would receive upon airdrop. Thus: Ethena needed a token launch partner who could set up the right workflows, security + compliance checks to ensure $ENA would be correctly distributed according to these Points allocations. Per Challenge #2 ➡️ Simultaneously, Ethena needed a partner capable of distributing the right amount of tokens across 3 distinct stakeholder groups: 1. One-time airdrop claimants 2. Ethena’s top 4k points holders, who would receive their tokens over a 6-month period 3. Investors, team members, and other internal stakeholders Specifically, they needed help handling variable unlock schedules for Group (B): If any Group B members exited the ecosystem before the end of those six months, they'd forfeit the unvested portion of their tokens. These forfeited tokens would need to be redistributed equally to the remaining claimants in Group B. Solution Liquifi's platform ensured all Ethena stakeholders received the right token amount while accounting for multiple eligibility parameters. This meant we executed the following: ✔️ Set up processes to recalculate, re-upload, and reissue token grants ✔️ Provided Ethena with a custom API to track token amounts ✔️ Built a custom UI claim portal for Ethena stakeholders to claim tokens without confusion In Guy's words: "The custom API provided by Liquifi, along with the Claim Page it enabled, helped ensure a smooth UX for users accustomed to the Ethena UI." Results + 37,000 txns + 51,000 unique wallets + $400M+ transaction volume + <1% support ticket ratio from users In Guy's words: "Liquifi helped us release one of the largest airdrops ever. In addition to the technical support, the human element they provided communicating with our users and getting them their tokens was first-class." Link to the full case study below 👇

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Bootstrapping is better for founders and employees 🤝 Aligned Incentives: Founders and employees share a common goal for sustainable growth and success 🏆 Long-Term Focus: No pressure for rapid exits and hiring for the sake of a large head count 📈 Ownership: Fewer dilution rounds = larger share of the company’s equity What do you think?

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