BitGo's Mike Belshe on What's Next for WBTC & Crypto Custodians
The Defiant15 Joulu 2022

BitGo's Mike Belshe on What's Next for WBTC & Crypto Custodians

This week on The Defiant Podcast, we speak with Mike Belshe, the CEO of BitGo, a digital asset custodian, wallet, and issuer of wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC).

We start our conversation with an overview of BitGo and Mike's crypto journey.

Wrapped Bitcoin is the most successful representation of Bitcoin on Ethereum. There’s about 200K Bitcoin in BitGo's custody, which is the equivalent of $3.4B. WBTC is an important piece of the ecosystem as it enables Bitcoin holders to interact with DeFi. We dive into the recent selloff that saw WBTC lose its peg to Bitcoin.

In the final part of our conversation, we discuss the role of custodians in the crypto space. Especially after what happened this year with FTX and various other centralized entities, crypto has been given a wake-up call to bring transparency and disclosures to CeFi. We explore the biggest lessons we can take away from this year.

Thanking our podcast sponsors:

  • Built by the team behind Avalanche, Core is an all-in-one command center for Web3 supporting Avalanche, Ethereum, and Bitcoin, a rich ecosystem of dApps, Bitcoin & Ethereum bridges, NFTs, Subnets, and more. Visit core.app to download now.
  • Minima is a new mobile-native layer 1 blockchain. Join over 400,000 node runners on Minima’s Incentive Program, to start earning $MINIMA every day until Mainnet launch. Get started at minima.global/get-involved
  • Railway is the first DeFi wallet to integrate the powerful RAILGUN privacy system built using zero-knowledge cryptography and available on Ethereum, BSC, and Polygon.


Jaksot(326)

Ethereum’s “HTTP Moment” with Marissa Posner & Yoav Weiss

Ethereum’s “HTTP Moment” with Marissa Posner & Yoav Weiss

In this episode of The Defiant podcast, Camila Russo sits down in Buenos Aires (Devconnect) with Marissa Foster (Product, Ethereum Foundation) and Yoav Weiss (security researcher, Ethereum Foundation)...

19 Joulu 202540min

Becoming the "Institutions Chain" With Avalanche’s Morgan Krupetsky

Becoming the "Institutions Chain" With Avalanche’s Morgan Krupetsky

In this episode of The Defiant podcast we speak with Morgan Krupetsky, VP of OnChain Finance at Ava Labs, to break down one of the most significant shifts happening in crypto today: the rapid institut...

5 Joulu 202540min

Tokenize Everything: Robert Leshner’s Vision for On-Chain Finance

Tokenize Everything: Robert Leshner’s Vision for On-Chain Finance

Robert Leshner — the mind behind Compound, and now the founder of Superstate — believes the next trillion-dollar shift will come from bringing the world’s assets on-chain.In this episode, Cami sits do...

18 Marras 202522min

​​Is DYOR Dead? Building a Safer Web3 with Alex Katz

​​Is DYOR Dead? Building a Safer Web3 with Alex Katz

In a world of fast-advancing technology, we are told to trust in our own research. But as the crypto space matures, scams and exploits remain a constant presence. When your assets are gone, they are g...

14 Marras 202537min

Avalanche DeFi: the Journey to Bring Institutions Onchain

Avalanche DeFi: the Journey to Bring Institutions Onchain

In the second episode of Ecosystems: Avalanche, we track the protocol’s trajectory, which included a peak valuation of $13 billion, followed by a period of consolidation and strategic redevelopment.Th...

12 Marras 202515min

Inside the PYUSD's takeover of PayPal with May Zabaneh, VP Crypto

Inside the PYUSD's takeover of PayPal with May Zabaneh, VP Crypto

In this conversation, May Zabaneh breaks down PayPal’s move into stablecoins with PYUSD and why it matters for financial inclusion. We explore how PYUSD could lower costs for cross-border payments, de...

7 Marras 202542min

Why Yat Siu Believes Altcoins Will Surpass Bitcoin

Why Yat Siu Believes Altcoins Will Surpass Bitcoin

In Web3, we find ourselves in an age of digital phantoms, a "click-farm" era where identity is flimsy and easily fabricated. But what if reputation could be real, portable, and valuable? Animoca Brand...

21 Loka 20251h 1min

The AI CEO Era: Breaking Build Bottlenecks with Vibe Coding | Ahmad Shadid

The AI CEO Era: Breaking Build Bottlenecks with Vibe Coding | Ahmad Shadid

In this episode of The Defiant Podcast, Vinny sits down with Ahmad Shadid—former quant trader turned founder—who redirected the 2022 GPU crunch into a decentralized GPU network and now leads a bold pu...

17 Loka 202547min