News you can use: Hot topics, fact checks, trends, industry moves

a16z crypto editorial
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Editor’s note: In this regular news segment, we focus on the signal vs. the noise across various media sources — traditional media outlets, industry announcements, and debates online — to help you stay on top of what’s going on and why it matters. Be sure to also subscribe to our weekly newsletter if you haven’t already (or share it with others to subscribe!); and also check out the policy team’s regulatory updates as well.

Hot topics & fact checks

Are non-financial use cases for crypto dead?

“It’s fashionable right now to declare that ‘non-financial use cases of crypto are dead.’ Some people also claim that read write own has failed. These conclusions misunderstand both the thesis and the stage we’re in. We are clearly in the financial era of blockchains. But the core idea was never that every crypto application would emerge all at once, or that finance wouldn’t come first. The core idea was — and remains — that blockchains introduce a new primitive: the ability to coordinate people and capital at internet scale, with ownership embedded directly into the system. (And increasingly, to coordinate AI agents too.)” Chris Dixon’s article last week on the long game for crypto continues to garner discussion and debate.

When you’re building networks and not just traditional companies/ businesses…

Responding to a post on “why tokens can’t compound” — arguing crypto is about the power law of timing vs the power law of compounding — a16z crypto general partner Ali Yahya argues that the writer misses one of the most powerful drivers of exponential growth — network effects. He outlines what makes tokens valuable:

 

Another key difference that a16z crypto CTO Eddy Lazzarin adds is that protocols have more flexibility than corporations:

  • Corporations need to use fees or fundraises for growth
  • Protocols can issue tokens, and can even use these to pay for their operating costs

“The mint+burn dynamic decouples incoming fees from outgoing investment into the business investment (subject to inflation). Protocols can use fees to burn tokens (to limit inflation) and can separately mint new network tokens to reinvest in the business. These two functions can be completely decoupled.”

News & moves

TradFi continues to embrace and adopt crypto… plus, a new bank this way comes

BlackRock revealed this week that it was bringing its Treasury-backed digital token onto DeFi platform Uniswap, reflecting “a major vote of confidence in DeFi by one of the finance industry’s most influential firms” according to Fortune. This collaboration — which was in the works for over a year — between traditional finance and decentralized finance uses Uniswap’s market structure to power onchain trading for the BlackRock token, settled on Ethereum.

Erebor Bank, co-founded by Anduril co-founder and Oculus architect Palmer Luckey, received its national charter from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) last week, who shared that the approval reflects OCC’s “commitment to a dynamic and diverse financial system that remains innovative and relevant over time.” The bank plans to integrate blockchain technologies to settle transactions 24/7. It is also reported to be building products “designed for a clientele most banks don’t know how to serve” – including loans to finance AI/ GPU chips; underwriting for defense contractors, robotics firms, and other builders whose collateral “doesn’t fit neatly into traditional risk models”.

  • Luckey spoke to us about why this bank last year, here.

Earlier this year, the CFTC (Commodity Futures Trading Commission) had previously launched its Innovation Advisory Committee (renamed from the former Technology Advisory Committee) with the goal of gathering “expertise and recommendations on innovation in financial markets”. This week, the 35 committee members — including a16z crypto founding and managing partner Chris Dixon — were announced.

LayerZero, which last week announced its new chain Zero “designed to meet the needs of Wall Street” (as reported by Fortune), announced several new traditional finance partners including Citadel, Intercontinental Exchange (the parent company of the New York Stock Exchange), and Ark’s Cathie Wood. Founder Bryan Pellegrino shared that this scaling for the massive needs of traditional finance is partly due to zero-knowledge proofs, “which allows different parties to verify information in a privacy-preserving method”.

  • Read more on zero-knowledge VMs (and “Jolt Inside” Zero) here.

Crypto around the world…

The first-ever World Crypto Forum took place this past week in Seoul, South Korea. The event organizers observe that “KRW-denominated crypto market stands as the world’s second largest, following only the U.S. dollar.” And even though “institutional investment in digital assets remains strictly prohibited in Korea”, with participation limited to individual investors, the market has grown to become the second largest globally — showing “the immense potential and growth capacity” of Korea’s digital asset industry.

  • Anthony Albanese, COO at a16z crypto, and SungMo Park, Head of APAC go-to-market for a16zcrypto, closed out the event.

South Korea’s Financial Services Commission is looking to set a 5% cap on corporate investments in cryptocurrencies, according to Seoul Economic Daily, as reported by The Block — corporations and professional investors would be permitted to allocate up to 5% of their equity capital annually to the top 20 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization.

Stablecoins, stablecoins everywhere…

The Financial Times featured how the “The WhatsApp moment for money is here”, an article by a16z crypto’s Chris Dixon on how the internet made information global, and crypto is doing the same for money; you can also read a version on our website here.

Y Combinator announced last week that YC-funded startups can now choose to receive their funding in stablecoins, sharing that they believe stablecoins “are setting the stage for a new fintech renaissance and broader global access to financial services.” The further observed that “Sending money should be as easy as sending a text message. Stablecoins make that possible: cheap, fast, and global, using currencies people already trust.”

  • See also Chris Dixon on “The WhatsApp Moment for Money” (April 2025) and how “stablecoins are our first real shot at doing for money what email did for communication: make it open, instant, and borderless” here.

Crypto powering AI…

Coinbase announced agentic wallets this week, saying that it’s “the first wallet infrastructure built specifically for agents” — and built on the x402 protocol. Stripe also previewed how machine payments will work, allowing developers to directly charge agents. “The current financial system is tuned for humans,” observed Stripe product lead Jeff Weinstein, sharing that agents need: microtransactions, 24/7 global rails, controls (for human out of the loop), http native, low latency, and finality guarantees.

Bonus: Tools you can use

But what does the token actually do — does it control governance? have any claim on the treasury? receive protocol revenue via buybacks or dividends?

DefiLlam recently released Token Rights, which provides a “clear, standardized view of what a token entitles holders to” including revenue, treasury, governance — as well as historical governance discussions around token rights and whether teams raised equity separately from the token.

~a16z editorial 

 

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