#58 - Can financial speculation create useful Web3 ecosystems?

In the ninth episode of our new season of Web3 Innovators, our host Conor Svensson is joined by Lex Sokolin, Chief Cryptoeconomics Officer at ConsenSys where he has built and now leads the Cryptoeconomics team. Lex is a New York and London entrepreneur who previously held the role of CMO & Global Fintech Co-Head at ConsenSys. He also writes a Fintech newsletter, Fintech Blueprint. Episode highlights:How being at a Conference and seeing how many other people owned Bitcoin, inspired Lex to startThe challenges surrounding Blockchain adoptionLex’s view on the current capital market situation and how this impacts people’s view on cryptoHow speculation surrounding regulation can generate economic use casesHow Lex believes computational infrastructure will develop as we want to create digital third spaces for ourselves, away from the home and officeThe pain points that people experience in cryptoLex’s opinion on where companies should and shouldn’t be using BlockchainHow he believes Web3 technology will impact the financial landscape over the next 10 years Key Takeaways:It’s figuring out and taking action on how to help crypto businesses operate and how to remove barriers that prevent those businesses from having functional operations. So, it’s more about having these seamless rails in place, so that people can engage with the technology. - Lex I think that you can draw a line and you can say, is blockchain a cost saver for your company or is it a revenue generator? - Lex You can look at Apollo or KKR, the large private equity firms or some of the large hedge funds that are essentially price insensitive and are willing to continue investing into an ecosystem that they own because they own the underlying capital for the whole ecosystem. - Lex I think there"s some cases where they just put all of their own float on top of their own system or a system that essentially holds through equity ownership. But I think for most midsize to small, to even medium or large banks, the cost savings story is tough. - Lex What"s going to feel very natural in 10 or 15 years is that you"ll have digital ownership over all your stuff. And if it"s not on chain, and you don"t have it in your wallet, then you will feel like it"s not real. Like in the same way that I wouldn"t want that paper document today, because it does me no good. - Lex Connect with Lex on Twitter Resources:ConsenSys Connect with Us Join the Web3 Innovators community and engage with like-minded individuals passionate about the potential of blockchain technology. Contact Chainlens: Twitter | Discord | Telegram Explore Chainlens Email Chainlens Contact Web3 Labs: Twitter | LinkedIn | Instagram | Facebook | Discord | Tiktok Explore Web3 Labs Email Web3 Labs