Circle Launches Native Version of USDC Stablecoin on Polkadot

Circle has launched the native version of us DC stable coin on polka dot with projects like centrifuge and Moonbeam integrating the stable coin. Joining us now is Parity Technologies, Chief Financial Officer Fami Sayed Parity Technologies is the firm that builds the polka dot ecosystem. Welcome to the show, Fami, good morning. Thank you for having me. Thanks for being here. All right, let's start off with what kind of demand you were seeing. This is a product that allows developers to implement US CC and to the salon. I mean, sorry, the Polka dot ecosystem. Uh What kind of demand was there from developers and users for this? We're seeing we're seeing strong demand across all of our power chains uh within the popular ecosystem. Um We've approached this in a unique way. Um Circle is minting US CC onto the ass hub which is a system power chain uh which says essentially as a gateway into our entire ecosystem. And then through that integration, every power chain uh within the popular ecosystem can access native US DC on on Polka dot Can you tell us a little bit about real world use cases here? Like what's actually happening in the polka dot ecosystem now who's using it? Um You know, just, just give us a broad picture for our audience. Sure. So we have a number of sort of D I protocols, smart construct protocols, um gaming protocols. So just to take one example uh amongst many in um so centrifuge is a polka dot power chain uh fully operational. Um It brings institutional uh unchain credit into the ecosystem and centrifuge is making us DC the NATO currency for its liquidity pools. So users can they be able to finance assets with us DC within that sort of credit pools that centrifuge are bringing into the ecosystem. And there are many other examples within that uh Moonbeam Hydro DX, other sort of protocols who will use us DC uh uh to uh sort of help demo uh increase demand from institutional sort of uh investors and other sort of developers and application users. Uh looking at developer activity though on, on Polka dot It seems to have fallen off tremendously. I mean, I, you know, just looking at it uh for monthly commits and, and, and uh developer activity, you know, we're seeing commitments on, on github fall uh very much uh you know, from like 60 to about a month ago to, you know, it's about a dozen now. Uh and then active developers uh were like three dozen a month ago and it's, it's also down uh significantly. Why? Why is that? Why is it, why has developer activity on polka dot gone down? So we still see continue to see high demand and develop activity within the pocket ecosystem. Um So, I mean, there are many metrics to use beyond just github. But in terms of activity from the power chains activity from new developers coming in building on within those power chains applications and also uh prospective power chains, we're seeing a lot of sort of focus on the space. Uh and uh we'll continue to do so, where is most of polka dots activity? I mean, do you have any sense geographically of like where kind of the hottest uh the most interest is in polka dot Sure. So, I mean, we're seeing activity across the globe. Um I was just last week at Singapore for Token 2049 and there's a lot of interest at the Poop Booth um that came so a lot of uh activity within Asia uh which was again, very positive to see uh when we can continue to see strong demand within uh the western world in terms of Europe and us, in terms of people building uh within the ecosystem. I guess the other question that some people have is sort of what's, what's what's happening with Gavin Wood, right? Like, I mean, he was, he was very much the face of polka dot This was kind of like his project. Um He's definitely seems to be receding from the spotlight a little bit, you know, we don't see him as much as before, you know, kind of representing polka dot and in interviews and so on. And so what exactly is, is his role, is he still involved in the project or not so much? So Gavin remains actively involved. He is chief architect in terms of the polka dots within pa and he's very much focused on sort of the next steps in evolution within polka dot So he's very, very involved, heavily involved with not only the core developers within parity, but also interacting with uh sort of power chains and sort of advancing uh how we think about polka dot and its use of uh block space in terms of utility access to uh the core purchasing power and utility power within um Polka dot You mentioned uh institutional adoption, institutional interest when we were talking about us DC. Just a few minutes ago, I know parity technologies recently announced a partnership with a crypto storage provider, Zodiac custody, which is also a subsidiary of Standard Charter also that is a very large bank. Tell us about institutional interest in the Polka dot ecosystem. We haven't heard a lot about it. We're hearing a large amount of institutional interest in Bitcoin, of course, on the back of this ETF news uh are what are institutions um say, what are they wanting to know about the polka dot ecosystem and how are they interacting with it? Sure. So again, Polka dot is an interoperable uh ecosystem. I think the opportunities within that is exciting for a number of counter parties there in the opportunity with ZOD is to help support and educate uh uh institutional uh uh adoption within the ecosystem as well as building on the existing developer ecosystem that we have. We believe that that will bring strong synergies uh within within polka dot uh What, what exactly I I in terms of uh the stable coins, are there any other stable coins that uh you see going on? Uh polka dot Any time soon? Uh any any thoughts given perhaps uh that you know that? Well, I'll let you, I'll let you fill in the plane again. We, we are, we are open to um other opportunities with other stable coins. I think the opportunity with us DC in terms of how it has gained institute institution adoption and, and the use cases within uh our ecosystem was a strong case to bring that into our ecosystem as a native US DC. We are, again, we'd be open to engagements with other stable coins where we see opportunities and we see demand from our ecosystem. What kind of institutions are working in the uh polka dot ecosystem? You know, I mentioned Standard Chartered, but are there any other um institutional folks that you can tell us about uh at this moment? I I cannot, there are some conversations happening with not only uh ZOD and sort of counterparts through, through that partnership, but also with other custodians that we hope to be able to announce in the coming months. Um But there are some discussions in the background that we again, as I say, we hope to be able to announce uh within uh within the coming months and coming quarters. All right, Fay, we are going to leave the conversation there. Thanks so much for joining the show this morning. Thanks for having me. Thanks very much. That was Parity. Technology's Chief Financial Officer Fami Sayed.