How Vaults Become the Next Stablecoin Narrative | Sun Raghupathi
In this episode of Talking Tokens, Jacquelyn Melinek speaks with Sun Raghupathi, CEO of Veda, about how DeFi evolved from speculation to a robust financial backend for users, fintechs and asset managers. Sun explains why degens were essential beta testers for early DeFi systems, how vault infrastructure bridges the gap between onchain complexity and traditional finance, and why idle balances should automatically generate yield for users instead of enriching banks. He walks through Veda's growth from serving DeFi projects like Ether.fi to powering yield products for centralized exchanges like Kraken and Coinbase. He also explains why stablecoin yield is the killer use case driving fintech adoption, and how vault infrastructure works across multiple chains. The conversation covers the net interest margin disruption facing traditional banks, enterprise L2 announcements going quiet, and Sun's advice to DeFi founders on meeting reality where it's at during this critical window for execution.
TIMESTAMPS
(0:00) – Intro (1:06) – What most people misunderstand about DeFi today (1:22) – Getting into DeFi at the 2021 peak and the Wild West era (2:32) – Degens as beta testers for early DeFi systems (2:54) – DeFi transitioning from speculative to robust financial backend for the real world (3:49) – Two kinds of DeFi builders: changing the system vs getting rich (4:33) – Night and day difference between DeFi and traditional finance transparency (4:59) – Veda as a DeFi engine for asset managers, fintechs and financial apps (5:38) – Idle balances should generate yield automatically and vault infrastructure explained (6:59) – Starting Veda in mid-2024 with Ether.fi partnership (7:44) – Exchanges and fintechs entering DeFi unexpectedly (8:24) – Kraken DeFi Earn and Coinbase onchain yield vault products (11:35) – Stablecoin yield as the killer use case driving fintech adoption (14:00) – Veda's TVL growth, yield generation and operating across multiple chains (17:39) – Regulatory environment improving and asset manager interest in onchain products (20:30) – Vaults as the primitive for DeFi adoption at scale (22:03) – Technical architecture, security and risk management in vault design (25:10) – Smart contract audits and safety measures (26:49) – Vaults vs other DeFi yield products (28:43) – Recognizing legitimate vs sketchy vaults through track record and scale (29:44) – Groups Veda wants to tap into and traditional banks engaging with DeFi (30:46) – Hardest trade-offs for banks moving onchain and net interest margin disruption (31:45) – Will DeFi disrupt finance or will finance become DeFi? (32:34) – Watching enterprises building L2s and the quiet period on new chain announcements (33:19) – Advice to DeFi founders: small window to stay relevant and execute (34:00) – Meeting reality where it's at and ensuring the transition happens responsibly
ESSENTIALS
You can subscribe to the podcast on Spotify, Apple or YouTube. If you enjoy the show, please leave a review — it really helps. Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0LOgWxIQ0NnNUD5eXsSuoZ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/talking-tokens/id1743669141 Follow us on X Jacquelyn: https://twitter.com/jacqmelinek Talking Tokens: https://twitter.com/_TalkingTokens Follow us on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/_talkingtokens/ Note: This podcast is for informational purposes only. Views shared are opinions, not financial advice. The host or guests may have financial interests in discussed content.
How Vaults Become the Next Stablecoin Narrative | Sun Raghupathi
Subscribe & Listen
Why Onchain Vaults Are Following Stablecoins Everywhere | Hunter Horsley
Why Bitcoin’s Price Isn’t Affecting Institutional Interest in Tokenization | Thomas Cowan
More from Talking Tokens
How Sky Is Building the Future of Stablecoin Yield With USDS | Rune Christensen
In this episode of Talking Tokens, Jacquelyn Melinek speaks with Rune Christensen, founder of Sky (formerly MakerDAO), about how the protocol is connecting hundreds of billions in idle stablecoins to institutional-grade yield through its Sky Agent Network. Rune explains why Sky evolved from MakerDAO, how USDS offers a native 3.75% savings rate with no lock-ups or fees, and why the protocol generated $338 million in annualized revenue with $158 million in net profit during recent market volatility. He walks through the Sky Agent Network enabling decentralized capital allocation across players like Spark, BlackRock, and Janus Henderson, why Sky deployed $1 billion into the first tokenized CLO, and how the protocol's seven-year track record makes it the only project institutions trust at scale. The conversation covers Sky's 74% USDS supply growth, why DeFi and TradFi will merge into one system, and how AI agents will drive the next phase of financial automation through blockchain-native stablecoins. TIMESTAMPS 00:00 – Intro 02:08 – Why Sky evolved from MakerDAO: rethinking DeFi for real-world scale 04:00 – Sky as infrastructure for global capital markets and capital formation 05:34 – How Sky Savings Rate works with 3.75% yield 07:06 – Sky Agent Network: decentralized businesses competing for best risk-adjusted returns 08:16 – Why Sky is different from Ethena and other yield-bearing stablecoins 11:49 – Spark protocol reaching $3 billion TVL as it grows in the lending market 14:03 – How real cash-flowing assets are coming onchain for the first time 18:32 – Why institutions like BlackRock and Janus Henderson work with Sky 27:18 – Sky’s Grove deploying $1 billion into first tokenized CLO by Janus Henderson and Centrifuge 30:10 – When DeFi and TradFi merge: stablecoins can act as super capital 34:13 – AI agents driving blockchain-native financial automation 37:35 – Sky's revenue: $338M annualized with $158M net profit during market volatility 39:05 – Growing stablecoin supply as the main opportunity ahead 50:18 – Rune's endgame: fully automating Sky through AI to finally step away ESSENTIALS You can subscribe to the podcast on Spotify, Apple or YouTube. If you enjoy the show, please leave a review — it really helps. Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0LOgWxIQ0NnNUD5eXsSuoZ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/talking-tokens/id1743669141 Follow us on X Jacquelyn: https://twitter.com/jacqmelinek Talking Tokens: https://twitter.com/_TalkingTokens Follow us on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/_talkingtokens/ Note: This podcast is for informational purposes only. Views shared are opinions, not financial advice. The host or guests may have financial interests in discussed content.
Why AI Agents Will Manage Your DeFi Portfolio Before You Do | Vik Arun
In this episode of Talking Tokens, Jacquelyn Melinek speaks with Vik Arun, co-founder of Superform, about why DeFi was always heading toward automation and why AI agents not humans are the natural managers of onchain portfolios. Vik, who previously co-led a $100M DeFi and yield fund at BlockTower Capital before launching Superform in 2022, explains how the protocol evolved from a yield marketplace into a user-owned neobank, and why he believes the goal is to replace banks entirely rather than work alongside them. He walks through Superform's UP token launch, why 85% of airdrop recipients sold immediately, and what teams getting ready to TGE should learn from that experience. The conversation covers the two paths left for software companies in the age of AI, and why the only thing that can stop crypto's future is believers burning themselves out. TIMESTAMPS (00:00) Intro (01:15) How Vik is using AI across Superform and what it means for team structure (03:18) Two paths for software companies: fully embrace AI or settle for margins (07:45) Superform's evolution from yield marketplace to user-owned neobank (09:12) Why DeFi was always heading toward automation, not human management (10:51) How AI agents will manage vault strategies and what guardrails are needed (11:00) Where banks can't compete and what user-owned finance actually means (14:20) Self-custody: why some people genuinely don't want it and what that costs them (15:02) The Clarity Act and why banning stablecoin yields through banks could be great for DeFi (18:00) Will banks acquire DeFi protocols or will DeFi replace them? (19:08) Superform's end goal: replace the banks (23:27) Why Superform launched its UP token in a tough market (24:34) Core governance capabilities and the first three improvement proposals (26:09) Token launch lessons: after 85% of recipients sold immediately, distribution is everything (29:03) B2C vs B2B: mobile app for consumers, super vaults for institutions (30:52) Why this cycle may be the first where institutions lead retail into DeFi (31:38) 2026 roadmap: Android launch, credit card, and agentic vault managers (39:12) Final advice: the believers who stay will build what matters ESSENTIALS You can subscribe to the podcast on Spotify, Apple or YouTube. If you enjoy the show, please leave a review — it really helps. Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0LOgWxIQ0NnNUD5eXsSuoZ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/talking-tokens/id1743669141 Follow us on X Jacquelyn: https://twitter.com/jacqmelinek Talking Tokens: https://twitter.com/_TalkingTokens Follow us on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/_talkingtokens/ Note: This podcast is for informational purposes only. Views shared are opinions, not financial advice. The host or guests may have financial interests in discussed content.
How RockawayX Is Building the Actively Managed DeFi Vault | Samantha Bohbot
In this episode of Talking Tokens, Jacquelyn Melinek speaks with Samantha Bohbot, partner and chief growth officer at RockawayX, about why DeFi vaults have evolved from simple yield products into the foundation for actively managed, institutional-grade credit strategies. Samantha, who spent nearly four years as VP of growth at DCG before joining RockawayX, explains how the firm allocates over $2 billion across venture, liquid tokens, and onchain credit, and why it launched its own vaults on Morpho and Camino after spending years as one of the largest depositors into these products itself. She walks through what separates a serious vault from a commoditized one, why credit underwriting and risk infrastructure matter more than yield numbers, and how AI agents could reshape how capital flows into DeFi. The conversation also covers the Resolve exploit, why prediction markets are overhyped relative to actual usage, how to spot confirmation bias in crypto venture, and why building real financial infrastructure takes longer than a hackathon. TIMESTAMPS (00:00) Intro (01:14) Samantha's background at DCG and path to RockawayX (01:49) What RockawayX is: venture, liquid tokens, credit fund, and infrastructure (03:11) Why vaults are the next stage of the DeFi promise (05:24) How RockawayX differentiates its vault strategy from the crowd (07:22) Why credit underwriting and risk infrastructure are what separate real vaults (08:21) Why RockawayX decided to build vaults itself rather than wait (09:03) How the first RWA mixed pool works (13:37) Generative finance and how AI agents change vault UX and product fit (16:19) Embedding vaults into fintech products to reach non-crypto users (19:45) The Resolv exploit: how the attack worked and what curators got right (22:30) RockawayX's 2026 priorities and where to allocate time and resources (26:02) Why prediction markets are getting too much attention (27:14) Running a market-neutral strategy on Polymarket and its liquidity limits (33:16) Confirmation bias in crypto venture: pitching decks instead of businesses (40:09) OCC charters and the future of crypto banking regulation (42:37) Final advice: trust your gut on people and ideas You can subscribe to the podcast on Spotify, Apple or YouTube. If you enjoy the show, please leave a review — it really helps. Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0LOgWxIQ0NnNUD5eXsSuoZ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/talking-tokens/id1743669141 Follow us on X Jacquelyn: https://twitter.com/jacqmelinek Talking Tokens: https://twitter.com/_TalkingTokens Follow us on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/_talkingtokens/ Note: This podcast is for informational purposes only. Views shared are opinions, not financial advice. The host or guests may have financial interests in discussed content.