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This week Simon Taylor is joined by:
Stephen Richardson, Chief Strategy Officer & Head of Banking, Fireblocks
Ido Ben-Natan, CEO & Co-Founder, Blockaid
We cover:
Why a list of 140 logos doesn't guarantee Open USD distribution, and what Stephen Richardson says is the overlooked challenge
The economic model flip - zero mint/burn fees and reserve revenue shared with distributors
Stephen's thesis on tokenized treasuries becoming the neutral bridging asset between stablecoins
Why onchain visibility may be discouraging banks from issuing stablecoins
BIS concerns about credit supply, and the DeFi counter-argument
Robinhood's product blitz - estimated 7% APY via Morpho, stock tokens in 120 countries, and Lloyd's-backed DeFi insurance
Distribution Is the Hard Part
Open USD launched with Visa, Mastercard, Stripe, BlackRock, and 140 other companies. The consortium shares reserve revenue with distributors by default, charges zero mint and burn fees, and promises neutral governance with no single chain or company advantaged.
The question is whether any of that translates to actual volume.
"A list of logos is not necessarily distribution," Simon noted, citing Rob Hadick. Stephen Richardson pressed the same point from the operational side - global liquidity is "one of the biggest challenges that's overlooked." Tether and Circle spent years building OTC desks, exchange relationships, and on/off-ramps across emerging markets. "They've managed to build those distribution and liquidity networks very strongly," he said. Whether Open USD approaches this through crypto-native venues or through institutional banking channels "will be a very interesting dynamic to watch."
Ido Ben-Natan framed the opportunity differently. The economic model (revenue distributed "from a few to many") may matter more than the launch roster. Ramp's Alex made a similar point in a public thread - negotiating revenue share with existing top-10 stablecoins proved "long and uncertain." Open USD's default structure removes that friction.
Simon's read is that Open USD is targeting the payments that don't use stablecoins today, not the crypto flows that already do. Stablecoin payments volume sits around $400 billion. SWIFT clears $5-6 trillion per day. The addressable market is fiat, not crypto.
Tokenized Treasuries Could Bridge the Stablecoin Fragmentation
Stephen offered a forward-looking idea that stood out - tokenized treasuries could become the interoperable layer between different stablecoins.
"I think tokenized treasuries are going to be that," he said. The logic - as treasuries move onchain (through Canton, Stellar, and other networks), they become a neutral settlement asset. Swap a stablecoin into a tokenized treasury, move it, swap back out into a different stablecoin on the other side. Government liabilities as the bridging mechanism.
"That's what happens in LCH today," Simon added. "Off hours, cash is money market funds." The same structure could apply to stablecoin interoperability. Tokenized treasuries could fill the role that money market funds play in derivatives clearing when banks are closed.
Ido added that if every stablecoin is ultimately backed by the same underlying treasuries onchain, "the view of some of these different banks on the risk of some of those different assets goes away really meaningfully."
The Visibility Problem Banks Won't Say Out Loud
The BIS annual report flagged stablecoins as falling short on singleness, elasticity, interoperability, and integrity. It also warned about illicit activity on permissionless chains.
Stephen pushed back on the framing. The visibility that makes onchain activity trackable may be exactly what's discouraging banks from issuing stablecoins.
"If I take $200 cash out of my bank and do something illicit with it, no one can really see it," he said. "But if I issue a stablecoin and it touches an Iranian wallet, Artemis and all these folks can see that." Banks aren't comfortable with risk profiles that are visible in ways cash historically wasn't.
On credit supply, Stephen challenged the BIS assumption that deposits leaving banks means less lending. "There's this underlying view that you push things into stablecoins, those funds move outside of banks, and banks can't lend," he said. "I think there's not a progressive view that as you aggregate liquidity, lending starts to sit on top." DeFi creates new credit ecosystems - wallets holding stablecoins, tokenized stocks, and money market funds, with protocols offering borrowing against them.
Robinhood Ships at a Velocity TradFi Can't Match
Robinhood announced its own L2 chain on mainnet, an estimated 7% APY product via Morpho with Lloyd's of London insurance, stock tokens in 120 countries usable as DeFi collateral, and perpetual futures with 10x leverage in Europe, all in a single day during the "The World is Flat" event in Greenwich, London.
The Earn product goes to all 27 million users via Privy embedded wallets. Under the hood, it's Steakhouse Financial curating USDE and USDG via Maple's Syrup protocol. "Proper DeFi lending," Simon noted. "You are buying almost a form of private credit." The Lloyd's insurance addresses the "is it safe?" question that keeps mainstream users on the sidelines.
Ido, who attended the Greenwich event, pointed to the stock token demo - sending a tokenized stock to someone in Africa. "That primitive tied to a public chain unlocks a ton of really interesting things," he said. For users with large portfolios who want liquidity without triggering tax events, stock tokens as DeFi collateral could be the entry point.
"Could you imagine Fidelity or Schwab launching that many products in a single day?" Simon asked. Robinhood sits just under $100 billion in market cap. If they execute globally at this velocity, the gap with legacy players continues to widen.
The Contest Shifts from Issuance to Economics
Three stories, one pattern - the infrastructure layer is fragmenting, and the contest is shifting from who issues money to who captures economics at each step. Open USD bets that sharing reserve revenue unlocks distribution. Robinhood bets that shipping faster than regulators and competitors can respond builds a durable lead. And the BIS report, read in context, may reveal more about what central banks fear than what stablecoins lack.
Stephen summed up the bank positioning - they may interact with stablecoins but swap them into tokenized deposits internally "to generate yield on them, lend them, and do the things that they need to do." The coexistence thesis (stablecoins, tokenized deposits, and tokenized treasuries each serving different purposes) looks increasingly like the operational reality.
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