Latest / The Paul Barron Crypto Show / Canada Politely Moves To Solana🍁$CADD Stablecoin CEO INTERVIEW❄️

Transcript

Canada Politely Moves To Solana🍁$CADD Stablecoin CEO INTERVIEW❄️ · The Paul Barron Crypto Show

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Canada has entered the stablecoin market, and it is going
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: to be a hot one today. We're going to break
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  Speaker 1: This is the self-custody to use. So make sure and
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  Speaker 1: check it out. Tell them we sent you. Joining us
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: is going to be Didier Lavallee, who is the founder
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: and CEO of Tetra Digital, the founder and owner, I guess,
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: or launcher of CADD. So great to have you on
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: the show. How are you? I'm great.
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: Thanks for having me.
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: All right. So we did a Canadian digital dollar video
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: the other day. It absolutely went nuts. So the audience
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: clearly wanted to learn more about this. So we said,
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: let's get them on the show. And you, of course,
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: was kind enough to say, yes, let's just go into it.
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: I want to talk about the first thing, and that
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: is the demand that is setting up for CADD. If
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: you look at the ecosystem map right here, As I
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: show this for some of you guys, you might be
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: able to see this right here, access wallets, some of
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: which you'll recognize, BASE is on there, Uniswap, MetaMask, Coinbase, Phantom,
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: the big ones, conversion and payments, liquidity and trading, networks,
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: on-chain metrics. You've got Aerodrome in there, BASE, Ethereum, Curve. These,
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: of course, are staple names in the crypto industry. Moving forward,
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: what has been the demand so far?
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's great. It's growing, I would say, very steadily
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: and well for us. We launched in May. We got
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: regulatory approval in April of this year, launched in May.
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: And as you can demonstrate, we've been really focused on
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: setting up the right partnerships with the right infrastructure providers.
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: September was a good or great month for us. We
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: did about just over a million dollars worth of liquidity
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: on chain and organic liquidity. So we're not subsidizing anything
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: in terms of liquidity. This is all users coming to
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: the various pools and transacting our token. So it's growing
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: really well. And unfortunately, I apologize, but Orca was not
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: on the list. We launched on Orca last week and
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: that pool has just been blowing up. I mean, it's
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: doing about half our volume every week, every day.
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: We can show it. Yeah, we can show it right here.
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: It's leading the CAD digital markets right there to back
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: up your statement on Solana. which the demand is now
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: outperforming Ethereum. Why do you think that is?
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: I think Solana has an amazing community of users. They
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: really are passionate about the protocol. And we saw at
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: the summit last week in Toronto, lots of enthusiasm around
• 3:07
  Speaker 2: what we're doing. The foundation works well as well with
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: the ecosystem. So we're very excited about some of the
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: things we're doing with the foundation. And it's just an
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: overall amazing community and they're showing up.
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: Well, I think the innovation side of Solana looks to
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: new projects and it always attaches to them. And if
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: it's a quality project, I think people understand it, especially
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: the Solana community. They can sniff out anything that's not
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: right quickly. So the fact that you've got validation there
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: is huge. I'm looking at a story here by the Walrus.
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: This is in reference to Visa and MasterCard and the
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: growth it has in Canada. I was surprised at this
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: number right here, DDA. And that is Visa and MasterCard
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: controls 96% of Canada's credit card market. So pretty significant overall.
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: When you look at that and how this impacts the
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: use of stablecoins, because I think we've seen Visa and
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: MasterCard make huge inroads on stablecoin credit card bases here
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: in the United States and abroad. How does this affect
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: your play into the market with the Canadian digital dollar?
• 4:16
  Speaker 2: I think it's important for us to consider MasterCard and
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: Visa as partners. And actually, we view both of them
• 4:21
  Speaker 2: as partners. We're part of the MasterCard crypto program and
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: we also work very closely with Visa on a variety
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: of opportunities and projects. You know, Canada is a very
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: traditional but also conservative market when it comes to financial
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: services and institutions. And as such, you have many incumbents,
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: big six consortiums of banks. They're really tied together. So
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: we work with the infrastructure as opposed to trying to
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: work against it. And I think it's an important part
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: of our strategy. And it's showing up on how fastly
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: there's an option.
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: All right. So here is the point I want to
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: get at. I'm looking at further in this article. I
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: thought this was an interesting spin. And this was in 2022.
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: Rogers had an outage which affected 12 million subscribers. It
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: was estimated that this basically cost Canada... around 142 million.
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: Pretty big impact. The point I'm getting at is that
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: Canada continues to lean on American infrastructure. This has been
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: one of the things that Carney has stepped out and said,
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: wait a minute, we're not going to go that direction.
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: And digital assets may be one of the drawing lines
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: now where Canada and the U.S. start to go head
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: to head for some of that market. When you look
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: at Carney and what his broader strategy is overall, How
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: does that play into how you guys are going to
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: market with CADD?
• 5:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah, we're very excited about the strategy that Carney has
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: put in place in terms of financial innovation and competition.
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: We have very strong top of the house signals that
• 6:00
  Speaker 2: our government wants more projects like CADD to come to
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: market and more disruption and innovation when it comes to
• 6:07
  Speaker 2: financial services. I am a believer that Canada wins when
• 6:13
  Speaker 2: we are strong partners to the U.S. Our economies are tied.
• 6:18
  Speaker 2: But sovereignty is incredibly important. And you need sovereignty over
• 6:22
  Speaker 2: your dollar, right? And the Canadian dollar and having a
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: stable coin that's essentially native to Canada, sovereign, and controlled
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: by a Canadian organization is important and fits right into
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: what Carney is trying to do.
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: How closely are you guys working with the Canadian government
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: in terms of this? You've got Circle and even Tether
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: to a certain extent working very closely with the White
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: House and the administration here in the US. What about
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: with what you guys are doing at Tetra to work
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: directly with Canada in some of their strategies? I mean,
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: you've got the EU and Canada announcement here, which is
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: a partnership packed with the EU. So where can you
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: guys participate in some of this expansion, especially around digital assets?
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: I would say we participate both in, I would say,
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: public forums and private forums. So what do I mean
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: by that? The government has been really good in engaging
• 7:22
  Speaker 2: with the industry. As such, we're an active participant. We
• 7:26
  Speaker 2: have made some submissions that are public, that are available
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: for people to go look, in terms of what we're saying,
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: and specifically as it relates to the Canadian stablecoin strategy.
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: And then I would say also actively in rooms with
• 7:41
  Speaker 2: government talking about how they're thinking about legislation, building the
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: Stablecoin Act, you know, what it is, what is necessary
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: for Canada to be competitive at global scale in terms
• 7:53
  Speaker 2: of the product and the way the laws are shaped.
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: So like anything, I would say lobbying and advising the
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: government and, you know, the various regulators includes some certain
• 8:06
  Speaker 2: amount of polish and also being able to have active dialogue,
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: both private and public. And we're very active in both fronts.
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: I do believe Canada really understand what's at stake. They've
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: moved incredibly fast in terms of the stable coin act.
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: We expect the drafts legislation out pretty much any week
• 8:23
  Speaker 2: now with an implementation early in 2027. And by government standard,
• 8:29
  Speaker 2: that's pretty fast.
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah. So that's an act similar to the Genius Act
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: here in the U.S., which kind of set the groundwork
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: for digital assets and mostly stablecoins. All right, so let
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: me ask you this question, because I know this is
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: an issue that we have even here within our own
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: news coverage, and it's always the issue of regulators not
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: understanding the crypto market at broad. Is that a problem
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: that you have in Canada, trying to get regulators to
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: truly understand what is at stake here right now?
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I would say Canada is an interesting place because,
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: for example, on the security side, we have 13 different regulators, right?
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: I think for financial institutions overall, if you play across
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: the entire landscape, there's about 21 regulators or self-regulating entities
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: that you have to deal with. So it's fragmented and
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: it's a complex environment. I would say some of them
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: understand incredibly well the potential of this technology, their center
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: of expertise and innovation within those regulators and they're at
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: the forefront of what's going on. I'll probably give the
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: example of Commissioner Pierce as an example, right? Very public,
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: talks a lot about what's going on. I also saw
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: she resigned. So that's unfortunate for the SEC. So we
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: do have these thought leaders that are present within the
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: regulatory bodies, but it also comes down to what the
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: country wants to be, what's the overall direction. And on that,
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: there's still a lot of education that needs to happen. Canada,
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: was very early in digital asset. Yes, Ethereum came out
• 10:03
  Speaker 2: of Canada. We also had the first ETFs come out
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: of Canada. We had the first regulatory framework for crypto
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: trading platforms. And then I would say post FTX, things
• 10:13
  Speaker 2: really slowed down. Risk went way off. And now we're
• 10:17
  Speaker 2: bringing that back and there's constructive dialogue. So It's a challenge,
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: I think, like anywhere else, but we are seeing things
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: change and there's pockets of enthusiasm that are spreading and
• 10:30
  Speaker 2: we're leaning hard into it.
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: You know, Canada retail is still very active and surprisingly so.
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: I know when we look at our own metrics on
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: our audience, Canada usually is in the top 10. You
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: have obviously the UK, the US, some of the other
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: markets out there in Asia and the Middle East that go,
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: but Canada hangs right there in the top 10 in
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: terms of interest in our content, which is mostly technology
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: around what we're seeing in crypto and digital assets. So
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: do you think that the consumer market is prepared for
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: this evolution that's happening right now worldwide?
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: I think it is. I mean, some of the stats
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: is about one in three Canadians holds digital assets and
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: And as it relates to stable coins specifically, I mean,
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: one of the stats we like to point out is
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: one in five Canadians sends money back home. The way
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: our construct works, you know, I think it's 70 to
• 11:23
  Speaker 2: 80% of Canadians are first or second generation immigrants in
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: our country currently, which means that a lot of them
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: are sending money back home to India, Pakistan, the Philippines,
• 11:35
  Speaker 2: et cetera. So they understand the value of digital assets.
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: And even when we recruit, We get a lot of
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: people that come to work at Tetra that basically say,
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: I send money back home every week or every month.
• 11:49
  Speaker 2: And I do it on stable coins because it's better technology.
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: And I want to help build a Canadian stable coin.
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: So certainly believe that the population will adopt. The other
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: piece that I believe is incredibly important is the safety
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: and soundness of whatever you provide to the Canadian population.
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: We are a fairly conservative country when it comes to
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: financial services. And as such, anything that individuals will trust
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: need to be incredibly secure and well-regulated and governed. So
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: we take that responsibility very seriously.
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: I have a couple of questions for you around the
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: largest Canadian companies. I'm looking at the list right here.
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: This is 450 companies or so, total market cap around
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: four trill. You got the Royal Bank of Canada in there.
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: Number two, Shopify. And then it is, you know, TD Bank, Scotiabank,
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: Bank of Montreal, Enbridge. A lot of finance, okay? You know,
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: kind of hovering around the top there in terms of
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: market cap. Two things here. One, Shopify could be a
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: secret weapon. This is a major retail function. It has
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: the possibility of going absolutely huge in terms of digital
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: asset payments. You look at that market and then you
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: look at the banking side of this. How do you
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: guys fit in those two major sectors? Because here in
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: the US, it's almost like the banks are against the
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: crypto companies. How does that play out in Canada?
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, no, great question. I think to no surprise, the
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: technology components and partners that we have are always the
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: fastest movers, right? They're excited about the technology. And if
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: you look at the Shopify partnership, I mean, that came
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: directly from the top of the house. They see what's
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: going on globally. They see flow of funds and think
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: about the capacity from a Shopify to program your treasury function.
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: So be able to move capital pretty much programmatically all
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: over the world. That's happening on stable rails. It's not
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: happening on any traditional construct. So that adoption is very quick.
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: The banks in Canada have been relatively slow in adoption
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: of digital assets. but they realize they can read what's
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: going on in the US like everybody else, the largest
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: financial market in the world. And they're now playing catch
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: up very aggressively. There are certainly a lot of optimism
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: as to what the banks will be able to do.
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: And then the market, I strongly believe the market will
• 14:19
  Speaker 2: dictate what the best solutions are, right? You saw a
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: headline recently around tokenized deposits for financial institutions in Canada.
• 14:28
  Speaker 2: And at the end of the day, if you're creating
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: a walled garden, well, the walled garden will only allow
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: the people within the garden to transact, right? Stablecoins are
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: also around fungibility and interoperability globally and at scale. So
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: I do believe that over time, financial institutions will become
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: increasingly important partners of Tetra. And we have some great
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: ones today. We have National Bank. We have ATB Financial
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: as well. They've been supporters of CADD since day one.
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: Let me ask you this, because obviously your success with
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: Orca within Solana, you look at Shopify and Solana Pay,
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: even though this is news, it was back in 2023.
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: You guys remember this. We've covered this pretty heavily. Then
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: you look at the Fiserv platform, the digital asset platform
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: on Solana, all launching. What kind of message do you
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: think this sends to Canadian banks? I know what it
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: sends to American banks here in North America around Solana
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: being a potential for rails when it comes to maybe
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: some of these biggest financial institutions out there, including you guys?
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: I think there's a healthy debate within Canadian financial institutions
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: around permissioned and permissionless blockchains and which are going to win.
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: And then you obviously have protocols like Canton that have
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: been approaching financial institutions really heavily. Ultimately, the banks will
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: have to be able to, again, connect into the environment
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: that's used by organizations like Shopify, Fiserv and where retail
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: users are using.
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: So I envision a view where you have fungibility around
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: those environments. I think Solana is incredibly well positioned. I
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: would also point out that some of our other partners
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: that are up and coming change, you know, we have
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: a partnership with Temple, with ARK, that are purposely built
• 16:20
  Speaker 2: for payments as well. And some of these things are
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: really interesting to pay attention to because they offer features
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: that from a payments perspective might become really interesting.
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: I noticed you guys put this out. This was in
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: reference to your partnership with Circle to bring CADD, the
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: first stable coin there regulated into ARK, which you just mentioned.
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: Are you at all concerned that Circle would launch a
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: Canadian dollar, you know, like a USDCC, you know, in
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: terms of being able to compete?
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah, great question. Would they do it? I'm sure they're
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: thinking about it, right? And, you know, I think the
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: reality or what I would share with the audience is,
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: you know, you see them everywhere in Canada and I'm
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: sure in other jurisdictions as well. Now, what would be
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: and is really important is that they are going to
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: launch a, let's say, a Canadian token, that that Canadian
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: token is actually backed by Canadian securities. And it's under
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: Canadian jurisdictional review, both from a regulatory perspective and from
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: a governance perspective. I think the last thing Canadians would
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: want to see is essentially a U.S. company playing within
• 17:36
  Speaker 2: the Canadian dollar space, right? but doing it from the
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: other side of the border. So I think there's probably
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: a way for them to come into market, but the
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: Canadian sovereignty and nativeness of what Tetra is doing plays
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: a huge part in your adoption curve. And I don't
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: think that's necessarily going to change.
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: All right. So that kind of brings up the question
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: of the competition. Globally, Tether has kind of been one
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: of those companies that has been very neutral, which is
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: why it's been picked up by almost every region of
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: the world when it comes to digital assets. Now, USDC
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: Circle making its way into distribution, BNB partnership with Binance,
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: obviously getting distribution with Coinbase. What about the competition of
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: Canadians actually preferring to use a USDC or a USDT
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: versus something like what you guys are building? How do
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: you approach that?
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: It's actually a huge reason as to why we launched.
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: We saw a lot of Canadian companies building on U.S.
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: Rails.
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: So they were using USDC specifically and primarily in Canada
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: to build infrastructure around their company. And we would go
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: and we would speak to them and they would tell us, well,
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: it's imperfect because I'm wearing FX risk. I would really
• 18:59
  Speaker 2: like to be able to do this with a Canadian token.
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: And that gave us a lot of, I think, information,
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: but also capacity to focus and think about product market
• 19:12
  Speaker 2: fit because we had such strong signals as Canadian businesses
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: wanting and were demanding a Canadian stable coin that could
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: be used. I think globally, listen, at the end of
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: the day, US dollar is still a global reserve currency.
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: I don't think that's necessarily going to change. But if
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: you're in Canada and you're sharing money abroad and you
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: can do it out of a Canadian token, so you're
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: not wearing any FX risk, As long as I can
• 19:37
  Speaker 2: off ramp that token in whichever jurisdiction that they want
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: to send it to, then Canada and a Canadian token
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: can become a preferred way of moving assets. So for
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: us to compete, I would say for all non-USD token
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: to compete really well globally, we need to be able
• 19:56
  Speaker 2: to have scale, reach, and then the right partners and
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: the right jurisdictions to be able to off-ramp our token
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: into whatever local currency is needed.
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: I'm looking here at the stablecoin market cap. This is
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: a reference to the CADC dominance right there. You've got
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: it going on. When you look at that and the
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: comparison to CADD versus other Canadian dollar coins, how does
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: this play out? Do you feel like you guys are
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: the circle of Canada and that you're going to control
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: the market and take share?
• 20:31
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's really interesting you see that. I think that
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: chart gives you two things. One, still incredibly early in Canada, right?
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: Still a lot to be done for us as a market.
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: And secondly, what's important for the audience to understand is
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: both the CADC and QCAD are securities. They're prospectus-led stablecoins,
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: which means that they cannot be used by payments. They
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: cannot be used by retail users. Their entire utility is
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: essentially to be on a crypto trading platform as a
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: trading pair vehicle. So the utility is incredibly different between
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: what we've put out and what they have. And I
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: think over time, the market will continue to be attracted
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: to our token.
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: Didier, how do you guys handle paying yields? Because here
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: it's a very dicey topic. You've got the Bank of
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: Canada now planning to bring stablecoin rules in 2027. We
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: just talked about that. This is an issue today. Most
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: of the exchanges out there are still paying yields. A
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: lot of private wallets and self-custody wallets still paying yields.
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: What about you guys? Will you pay yields on CADD?
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the yield conversation goes back to what I was
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: mentioning earlier around competitiveness of the Canadian token and the framework.
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: So we have actively discussed with government the need of
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: a yield or rewards. Cause I know we yields the
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: bad word. Now let's call it rewards as a necessary
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: step for Canada to be competitive at, at scale and globally. Ultimately,
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: nobody wants to hold a balance on something that's not
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: generating a return, right? Because if you're doing so, then
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: you're just going to swap into something else where you
• 22:18
  Speaker 2: can get a return either overnight or on a weekly
• 22:20
  Speaker 2: monthly basis. So I think it's an important part of
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: the dialogue. I would represent that right now things in
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: Canada are still in flux. And why do I say that?
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: You haven't seen the legislation yet. So the initial draft
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: talked about no yield. The conversation seemed to have moved.
• 22:38
  Speaker 2: Clarity was killed. Genius is in place, which actually allows
• 22:41
  Speaker 2: more yield than Clarity would have. And I'm sure our
• 22:45
  Speaker 2: regulators are paying attention to that. But our thesis continues
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: to be for Canada to have a competitive offering. It
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: needs to be able to pay something out.
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: Are you having the kind of pushback from the banking
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: industry in Canada against banning these rewards?
• 23:05
  Speaker 2: Absolutely. But I would say it's done in a very
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: Canadian polite way.
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: Not in the, well, we won't say names, but not
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: in the way that some of the U.S. banks are
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: doing it to the crypto industry.
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: That's right.
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: All right. So I want to get into more of
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: a sticky subject. This is one that's close to my heart.
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: And that is freedom of speech and the idea. I
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: was very upset when I saw these things happen in
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: Canada where we saw banks began freezing the accounts to
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: these truckers. And this was in reference to these protests.
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: It went pretty bad. It went viral around the world.
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: And these truckers, I felt like, were in the right.
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: There was no reason for them to get banned accounts,
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: especially your bank accounts. They even got into the point
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: where it was trying to control activity on the digital
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: asset side of things. Are you going to be in
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: that same framework? Because even today inside Genius, these stablecoin
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: companies can go in and claw back inside of accounts.
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: So how does that work for you guys, especially with
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: this very touchy subject that has already happened in Canada once?
• 24:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's a great question. And I would
• 24:14
  Speaker 2: also say it's probably, Paul, a complicated question. And what
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: do I mean by that? We are a regulated institution
• 24:23
  Speaker 2: and as such, we answer to our regulators, you know,
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: first and foremost, but we also, you know, need to
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: have the balance as to what's right and what's wrong
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: within the institution. As things progress, Canada will need similar
• 24:42
  Speaker 2: mechanisms for regulated players that are offering digital money like
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: Tetra to be able to, you know, do certain actions.
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: The question we still have at Tetra very transparently is
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: whose authority will we act under, right? Because again, we're
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: a regulated business and as such, we need to conduct
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: ourselves a certain way. But for me to go, let's say,
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: freeze somebody's assets, which authority do I actually have to
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: do so? So I do believe it's a complex question.
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: And ultimately, For this project to work, we need to
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: be able to work in partnership with regulators and government,
• 25:25
  Speaker 2: but we also don't want to overreach in terms of power.
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: How much infrastructure do you think is being put in
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: place to track the activity of these wallets? Because this
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: is another thing that we're dealing with, I think, globally.
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: When you deposit stablecoins in your wallet, and you want
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: to swap out because of, let's say you're a trucker
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: in Canada, and you're going to go out and do
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: a protest, and you're going to say, I'm going to
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: flip into Bitcoin or into something else, and I'm going
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: to do it quickly here. How is that being tracked
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: from a forensic side? Are those kind of discussions coming
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: up in Canada? Because I know they're coming up here
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: in the US.
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: There's certainly conversations, and we do have a role and
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: responsibility in terms of, I would say, wallet monitoring. but
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: it's mostly blacklisted addresses and jurisdictions you don't want to
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: be interacting with, right?
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: So list and whatnot. There's no surveillance program as to
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: who owns what. Um, and actually, you know, I'm a pretty,
• 26:27
  Speaker 2: pretty aggressive nonbeliever of, of, of certain tools that are
• 26:31
  Speaker 2: allow you to pinpoint who owns what wallet. Uh, But
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: being able to monitor where the token is going on
• 26:38
  Speaker 2: chain and what it's doing, I think, is a healthy practice,
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: specifically as a regulated entity. And that certainly will be
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: part of our construct. And I think the Staplecoin Act
• 26:49
  Speaker 2: construct to be able to demonstrate that, for example, their
• 26:52
  Speaker 2: token's not in Iran, you know, very drastic example. But
• 26:57
  Speaker 2: those would be one of the things that we would
• 26:58
  Speaker 2: be monitoring for. All right.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: This is an angle that I think we should address,
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: and that is in reference. If you think about growth,
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: one of the things that has been absolute paramount in
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: terms of growth has been meme coins. Hear me out.
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: The U.S. is the king of meme coins. But right
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: behind that, you've got India, United Kingdom, Philippines, Nigeria. And
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: there it is, right there, the Great White North is
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: number eight. So there's interest here on meme coins. You
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: guys potentially could be the perfect meme. I mean, we've
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: had memes of Carney. Carney himself could be memes that
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: could benefit Canada in terms of the way of just
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: trades and things of that nature. Plus, you just have
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: so many different opportunities here around Trump and his meme
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: coins and the fact that we've seen this already with
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: heated rivalry. And then you have all the perfect products.
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: You've got the maple syrup. You've got Dan Aykroyd trying
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: to do some stuff. I mean, you guys got a
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: lot of famous Canadians. So why not create an infrastructure
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: for meme coins? Because pairing with these meme coins is huge.
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's a great question. The way I
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: would answer it is ultimately what Tetra is trying to
• 28:19
  Speaker 2: do is have a real impact in terms of the
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: financial construct and infrastructure of this country. And while meme
• 28:26
  Speaker 2: coins certainly have a place in the ecosystem and a
• 28:29
  Speaker 2: healthy place for sure, we have much, I would say,
• 28:32
  Speaker 2: broader ambition in terms of changing the infrastructure and the
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: foundation layer of how assets move in the country. So
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: I just probably don't want to have my picture online
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: in a variety of ways, you know, maybe probably me
• 28:47
  Speaker 2: even being from Quebec next to poutine or something like that.
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: when you're trying to be taken seriously with the big
• 28:54
  Speaker 2: banks and government in terms of shaping the future of finance.
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: So that's my answer. There's a time and place for that.
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: There are great people in Canada that are really good
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: at this stuff, but it's not Tetra's bread and butter.
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: I understand that. I get it. Here's my position. I'll
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: just say it in the sense that there is a
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: next generation that is coming, and they are the king
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: of memes and the queen of memes. They're coming fast
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: and they're going to get a lot of this wealth
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: handed down to them. And they are going to go
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: with the players that are playing in the game. So
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: I'm just going to leave it there. Hopefully we'll see
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: you there in that game in the arena with the
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: rest of that. So it's going to happen. So anyway. Didier,
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: it's been good talking to you. We've learned a lot
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: about what you guys are doing. We'll keep a very
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: close eye on what Tetra is up to with CADD.
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: So thanks for coming in today. We appreciate it.
• 29:49
  Speaker 2: Thanks so much for having me. It was a great pleasure.
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: If you like this video, hit like and subscribe, drop
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: a comment down below, and also join our free private
• 30:05
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