In this special UBRI Leadership Session, Ripple SVP Eric van Miltenburg sits down with Professor Darrell Duffie of Stanford's Graduate School of Business, U.S. Senate witness, and architect of the course The Future of Money and Payments for a conversation that moves from the theoretical to the genuinely urgent.

Duffie's "compliance by design" framework poses a radical question: what if privacy weren't a switch that governments could flip, but a cryptographic guarantee baked into the payment system itself? It's a question that cuts to the heart of every CBDC debate, every stablecoin regulation, and every fintech pitch deck claiming to serve the unbanked.

In this episode:

• Why the U.S. CBDC is dead and why that might be shortsighted
• How tokenized U.S. Treasuries went from zero to $10B and what clearing banks do next
• Why China's eCNY flopped even with government muscle behind it
• The surprising reason Europe may actually pull off a digital euro
• What Afghanistan's Hesab Pay reveals about stablecoins and financial inclusion
• Why agentic payments; AI making purchases on your behalf may be the real disruption no one's talking about
• And yes: why in 100 years, no one will carry "grubby bits of paper" in their pockets

Whether you're a regulator, a builder, a banker, or just someone who tapped your phone to buy coffee this morning this conversation will change how you think about who controls your money and why it matters.

So Donald stopped asking for permission.

In this episode, Lauren Weymouth sits down with filmmaker Donald Griswold to unpack how he's using Stuff.io, a blockchain platform backed by Mark Cuban and Snoop Dogg, to distribute Abundant directly to the kidney community, bypass the $50M Hollywood P&A machine, and prove that true digital ownership changes everything for independent artists. One in nine Americans is affected by kidney disease. This film could reach every one of them and no traditional streamer could make that happen. Because on a streaming platform, you have a license. On blockchain, you own it. And as Donald says "you can't give it, if you don't own it."

If you're a filmmaker, a creator, or a founder who's been told your project is too niche, this episode is your proof of concept. This isn't just a film launch. It's a manifesto.

• The Difficulty with Crypto Audits: Why $2.5 billion was lost in 2025 despite 92% of protocols being audited, and how "copy-paste" coding and human error contribute to massive losses.
• AI-Driven Risk Quantification: How Mintara Labs uses a proprietary AI pricing engine to translate on-chain data into real-world insurance premiums.
• The Future of Stablecoin Safety: Why new US and EU regulations are turning stablecoin reserves into a "built-in" insurance policy, allowing innovators to focus on pure crypto risks.
• Building on XRP Ledger: Discover why the XRPL EVM sidechain was the ideal testing ground for "tradable risk" and high-liquidity financial infrastructure.
• The "Hard Truth" of Startups: Sree shares the pivotal moment of shifting from a "passion project" to a revenue-generating business that serves real customer needs.

Video Recording Found on here

The NCA is on a mission to bridge the knowledge gap, focusing not on lobbying or existing industry players, but on helping everyday Americans understand and use digital assets with confidence.

In this conversation, you will learn:

• 🧠 The Truth About Crypto Users: Learn surprising stats that debunk the "crypto bro" myth, including why more holders are over 55 than under 25.
• 🛡️ Promoting Safe Adoption: Ali shares the NCA's advice on how to spot scams, the importance of "Do Your Own Research (DYOR)," and the role of strong consumer protections.
• 🏘️ Real-World Utility: Discover how crypto is being used today—from single mothers gaining financial independence to cattle ranchers tracking goods on the blockchain.
• ⚖️ The Role of Regulation: Understand how the NCA works to educate policymakers and why clear "rules of the road" are essential for innovators and consumers alike.

Tune in to hear how the NCA is spearheading a movement toward mainstream adoption by ensuring that when it comes to digital assets, even the "crypto-curious" and "crypto-clueless" have a resource they can trust.

In this episode, host Lauren Weymouth sits down with Mathew Le Merle, a titan of tech investment and the Co-Founder and CEO of Fifth Era and Blockchain Coinvestors. With a portfolio of over 1,500 startups, including more than 80 unicorns like Ripple, Kraken, and OpenSea, Mathew offers a masterclass on the past, present, and future of digital assets.

Drawing on 30 years of experience in Silicon Valley, Mathew explains why blockchain is not a separate phenomenon but the crucial next phase in the "digitalization of everything." He breaks down complex topics into clear, actionable insights, discussing:

• The Inevitable Shift: Why the digitalization of finance is the next logical step after the digitalization of communications and content.
• The Power of Tokenization: How creating a digital proof of ownership for real-world assets will unlock unprecedented liquidity and efficiency.
• The Future of VC: How venture capital models are evolving to adapt to a tokenized landscape.
• The Innovator's Dilemma: Why traditional financial institutions struggle to adapt and how they can strategically engage with disruptive technology.
• Navigating the Noise: Mathew’s advice for investors, entrepreneurs, and students on identifying long-term value and avoiding the pitfalls of hype and speculation.

Tune in for an essential conversation for anyone looking to understand the foundational economic and technological shifts being driven by blockchain and Web3.

Is this the first domino to fall in regulating the entire digital asset space, from DeFi to NFTs? 

Together, they dissect what this new law means for consumer trust, financial inclusion, and the future of crypto innovation. They explore how the U.S. now stacks up against international regulations and Professor Neitz shares inspiring stories of how blockchain is being used for social good and why educating our legal system on new technology is more crucial than ever. 

Tune in to understand the new rules of the road for stablecoins!

Listen in as Dr. Lui shares his journey from traditional cybersecurity to the cutting edge of "agentic AI," where intelligent agents can audit smart contracts, identify zero-day vulnerabilities, and even simulate the thinking of a hacker. They explore the critical difference between AI security and AI safety, sharing fascinating and slightly scary stories of AI agents that learn to "cheat" or act on their own accord. Discover how this new AI layer moves from a white paper to live middleware in under a year, what it means for the XRPL community, and what the future holds as we work to digitize human capabilities like memory, abstraction, and even creativity into the machines that will power the next generation of Web3.

Viewable conference session on YouTube

This conversation with Prof. Eduardo Castello covers how robotics combined with blockchain technology, creates new distributed robotic systems that help, support, and change the way humanity interacts with robots. 

Prof. Castello leads the Cyber-Physical (CyPhy) Life research group at the School of Science and Technology, IE University More info on projects can be found here.

We are joined by Finance expert, Raša Karapandža, Dean of EBS Business School  in Germany and Visiting Professor/Researcher at NYU Abu Dhabi. This professor is widely regarded as a thought leader in blockchain and crypto, having advised members of the US Congress on regulating Crypto and other blockchain related technologies and having served on Board of Director's for global payment processors like RS2.

By empowering farmers with blockchain based financial access, we can cultivate positive change.

A conversation with Riad Wahby the CEO of Cubist. Riad is a leading academic researcher and applied cryptographer responsible for the design and specification of several cryptographic protocols that form the basis for many Blockchains such as Ethereum and Avalanche. Additionally he is an electrical and computer engineering professor at Carnegie Mellon University. 

You can deepen your understanding with Saraji's latest book titled Blockchain Technology in Oil and Gas Industry.

*Shortly after we recorded this episode the first NFT home sale was announced!

Dr. Eric Falk, Co-Founder of Filedgr, talks all about this Digital Twin Datahub

This divide between those with digital skills and those with barriers to access and use continues to widen. Co-Pierre George, who holds the South African Reserve Bank Chair in Financial Stability Studies, and his talented team at University of Cape Town, see this as a call to action for innovative products and services that close this social and economic gap. In the last year, these XRPL Grant winners developed Nautilus Wallet  which provides universal access to digital rights assets without needing a smartphone. 

This episode leads us through a start-up experience of solving challenges of financial exclusion. 

This concludes our Season 4. We will resume with Season 5 in the fall. Special shout out to THE WEBBY AWARDS for honoring All About Blockchain as the best of the internet!

A discussion between Ripple software engineer Nathaniel Rose and Dr. Ali Emdad, Executive Director of The National FinTech Center, developing expertise in blockchain. You'll hear how committed both are to education equity and making a difference in the diverse workforce of the future.

A conversation with Dr. Thomas Puschmann, Director of Swiss FinTech Innovation Lab, University of Zurich. He has studied hundreds of global start-ups focused on  sustainability and financial technology,  providing solutions for environmental, social and governance topics. We  identify major trends in the financial sector future and discuss how the FinTech revolution plays a major factor in driving our sustainable development goals.  

Nikhil Vadgama, Deputy Director of UCL's Centre for Blockchain Technology, reviews ten sectors and hundreds of projects over the last decade that incorporate blockchain to provide better supply chain systems. 

Learn how challenges with traditional supply chains are solved using blockchain and what we can expect to see in the next ten years.

In a conversation with Leigh Jin, Professor of Information Systems and Director of Technology in Business Education Initiative at San Francisco State University, we discover their design thinking methodology that went into building these application prototypes.

Ishaan Hiranandani is a rising Junior at University of Michigan, leader in the Blockchain@Michigan (BAM) student club, entrepreneur and DeFi addict. He and his teammates dream of saving small businesses and won awards and support for their particular product MeldX which creates founder friendly method of raising capital. 

Listen to hear the roadblocks they encountered along the way and what the future holds.

Carnegie Mellon Professor Goldstein has been investigating the interaction of technology, work and money with his computer science students to overcome several long-standing problems of established lending markets.

By utilizing a public blockchain-style ledger they have created an equal access funding mechanism, BoLT: Building On Local Trust, that can reduce poverty and inequality.

Learn about the interesting deep technical problems they faced to bring solutions to people today.
 

Dr. Joanne Luciano, a distinguished Professor of Data Science, at the University of the Virgin Islands, is piloting a project called “The Emerald Archipelago Supply Chain Use Case”.  Her team seeks to significantly increase community access to locally farmed foods by implementing supply chain solutions built on blockchain.  
 
When actualized, this blockchain for good project can decrease dependency on food import while reducing cost and increasing value for residents and visitors. 

Tokenization of securities is still an area that is early in development and adoption but we can start to learn from enterprise solutions already on the market.

Computational finance expert, Simon Sive, identifies practical challenges and discusses the ecosystem players already solving them using the tools available with blockchain. 

Engineering Professor Marcos Antônio Simplício Júnior, from the Polytechnic School of University of São Paulo, talks us through the concepts with a high level technical perspective of the applied research architecture. At the heart of this project, listeners learn about our opportunity to develop a green economy; how using this modern, smart blockchain technology leads to sustainable economic and social developments.