Effie Dimitropoulos joins Amy-Rose Goodey on The House is Digital for a conversation on stablecoins, digital payments and the infrastructure underpinning the future of finance.
As CEO of AUDD, Effie reflects on the journey of building one of Australia’s first Australian dollar-backed stablecoins, the challenges of operating without regulatory certainty, and the role stablecoins play in enabling programmable payments, tokenisation and cross-border commerce.
The discussion explores digital infrastructure, financial sovereignty, trade digitalisation, regulation and why Australian dollar stablecoins are becoming an increasingly important part of Australia’s digital economy.
A practical conversation on innovation, trust and the next generation of financial infrastructure.
speaker-0: Thanks, Amy Rose. How much time do we have exactly? Yeah. So the journey has ⁓ has been an interesting, ⁓ challenging, but also a rewarding one. ⁓ when we decided to do a stable coin and and looked at the Australian
speaker-1: We don’t know
speaker-0: environment in terms of its regulatory positioning, in terms of the opportunity, in terms of the existing policy and the frameworks that were around. We were in one sense a little bit disheartened that there it wasn’t further. And now we’re talking about 2017 and then moving into 2021. So that’s the inception period. And during that time ⁓ I was also involved in alternate payment rails not only in Australia but also in other jurisdictions across the world, ⁓ where policies and regulatory ⁓ environments were a little bit more mature and and in in many ways stricter. And so the genesis for AUDD stablecoin. was that we saw the opportunity as the crypto market was heating up and the digital asset space was getting ⁓ more attention, that as an operator of an alternative ⁓ product, well, that was exactly what we were already doing. We were doing cash vouchers, we were doing prepaid ⁓ card, we were doing digital money, ⁓ mobile money systems. And so as a consequence ⁓ of things moving onto the blockchain, we felt that that was a natural progression for us. And so when we considered ⁓ launching a stable coin in Australia as opposed to any other jurisdiction, we felt that we needed to apply the same rigour and the same frameworks of governance that we had applied to our existing financial products in the marketplace, not only existing in Australia, but the ones that are global and the ones that are meeting even higher regulatory standards than were in existence in Australia for the products that we were offering. So when you get to a position when you’re o offering a service and a product that is the same product, however in different markets, you adjust to saying, well, what do I have to meet in terms of standards for all of these jurisdictions? And to make it easy for yourself to operate something efficiently, you choose the highest one and you just say, it’s the easiest just to take a baseline as being the highest possible baseline and operate to that. And so When it came to ⁓ saying, okay, a stablecoin in Australia, no regulation. Okay, what does it look like now? Digital asset. Got it. And where do we go from here? Because digital assets are not all made the same and they’re not all equal. And certainly we looked at a stable coin as being very different to other crypto assets. ⁓ and in the sense that it’s a stable asset. It’s not a crypto asset. It’s not an investment volatile, fun and games hyped asset. It is a structural infrastructure ⁓ asset and so we wanted to ensure that when we looked at that, we looked at all of the existing regulations and policies in place to support that activity. And what we found was that it wasn’t there. And so ⁓ that that led us on a journey to say that’s all well and good. Australia may not have it today, but it’s going to catch up eventually. It’s going to come at some point in time. So how do we ensure that when launching such a product, that this product would feel safe, would engender trust, would have the right corporate frameworks ⁓ on governance, ⁓ establish the ⁓ perimeters for risk, and basically follow best principles ⁓ if you are operating anything of value in the market where a consumer or a business has their value at stake. And so we launched the business in 2021 ⁓ with all of that in mind. So at its core, structure was very important for us.
speaker-1: I remember. I remember those days. And actually you were a startup at that point. And as a startup, we know you have to answer a few questions. What value do you bring? What problem are you solving? And so for all our listeners who are wondering what does a s what does a stable coin do for our country? Obviously you’ve grown your you’re not a startup anymore. You’ve got your licensing. We can talk about that a bit later. But for Australia, for our country, what’s what are you bringing to the table?
speaker-0: I get asked this question often and I ⁓ am certainly very grounded in the fact that Australia’s financial system today is not very broken. I mean, you know, you or I could go down the street and pay for our croissant or our coffee in five different ways, seventeen different ways, it doesn’t matter from our ⁓ from our wallet, with our phone, ⁓ from our debit card, our credit card, ⁓ with cash, with all of those and we can do that fairly easily. And so when we’re talking about ⁓ what a stablecoin can bring, it’s not solving an Australian payments ⁓ issue. The new payments platform, you know, does a wonderful job of of ensuring that ⁓ things are a little bit more instantaneous. However, what’s broken or what is not as ⁓ robust or as ⁓ as efficient as it could be is the fact that those things are on traditional rails. And what does that mean? It means that traditional rails tend to operate nine to five, five days a week. They’re not always on. ⁓ and that that’s that’s an issue where you want to have settlements in payments that are instant or that are cross border or that are outside business hours. You can’t do that today easily within our existing infrastructure. And certainly even more importantly with the with the proliferation of tokenized assets and tokenized products ⁓ which are already inherently on the blockchain. How do you then have traditional money sort of plug into these ⁓ these new products? It new pro the old products are not programmable. The old products are not ⁓ not ⁓ interoperable. So a stable coin is a settlement layer and ⁓ it works within the financial system. It’s not replacing any financial system. ⁓ it’s not trying to do something that is done today because as we said, if something’s not broken, you don’t fix it. So we’re not going in there trying to say, payments at the ⁓ payments at the petrol pump are broken. Let’s fix it. No, they’re not. You know, that that’s all ⁓ that’s all well and good today. So it’s it’s about ⁓ the programmability and the efficiency ⁓ and ⁓ the ease and transparency of use.
speaker-1: And so bringing your product to market, we go from 2017 to 2021. We’re in 2020. Between 2021 and 2026 is a long time for a business to try to grow in an environment that is quite difficult. Can you I mean this this podcast is about policy. It’s about building Australian products ⁓ in an in an environment that allows them to thrive. Can you take us through the policy settings? ⁓ whether that allowed you to innovate or inhibited what were the good sides of things or the because you’re here now, so there must have been some progress, but can you take us through that journey?
speaker-0: Sure, sure. And I’m going to start with one word challenging. And I often ⁓ get asked, ⁓ but you make it look so easy, but you’re still here and you still have a smile on your face. And y you know, that analogy of the duck swimming underwater and paddling really fast, that’s what ⁓ we were constantly doing. ⁓ so twenty twenty one was when the business was ⁓ conceived and then we went to launch in twenty twenty two. and I might say we we launched ⁓ we had a DECA ⁓ function. So ⁓ that was all the way back then. twenty twenty two was an interesting and challenging year and it actually did make a difference to the policy and the regulatory environment and not a positive difference. What happened in twenty twenty two was the Terra Luna collapse, an algorithmic stable coin. ⁓ which then we spent the next six months educating the market about the differences between stable coins? well, you know, if anyone can tell me exactly what an algorithmic stablecoin is, that’s fantastic. We don’t. We very clearly and very ⁓ deliberately aligned ourselves to be a fiat back to stablecoin ⁓ with our sovereign currency of Australian dollars ⁓ and and and that’s You know, what we started with, what we’re here with today, and what we’ve been talking about ever since. ⁓ there are collateralized ⁓ stable coins as well, and those collateralized stable coins could be with ⁓ gold or oil or other commodities that that you put a par value onto that ⁓ token. So ours is very clearly a stablecoin that is backed fiat currency. The second event that happened during 2022 was the FTX collapse. ⁓ and Even though we had Mt. Gox years ago, the FTX collapse really brought ⁓ y really brought to the surface for ⁓ the industry sector and policy and regulators ⁓ a sense of trepidation. They sort of you know, they’re going, ⁓ two things, two major things happen in the one year, ⁓ a stable coin algorithmic stablecoin collapse and a current a cryptocurrency exchange collapse. And those two things combined. led to a lot of ⁓ negativity around the crypto and digital asset space. And that first year ⁓ was basically ⁓ very much ⁓ external damage control because it wasn’t anything to do with us it wasn’t anything to do with a fiat back stable coin it wasn’t anything to do with that it was basically managing ⁓ a little bit of education and a little bit of ⁓ clarity in understanding what this sector was about. But what it meant very interestingly for us was that it gave us the opportunity to start talking to the regulators. So up to this point, we had only needed to engage ⁓ a legal opinion. And so we had done that back in 2017, we revisited it in 2021, ⁓ and we basically always ⁓ kept abreast of what was happening or not happening within the space, certainly becoming a member of DECA ⁓ or blockchain Australia at the time, ⁓ to ensure that we were in those conversations early. The incubation of our business was in a a payments fintech ⁓ listed on the stock exchange, ⁓ who at the time were about to launch a ⁓ bank. And ⁓ and that meant that many people took interest in us in terms of the regulatory ⁓ s ⁓ regulatory ⁓ position. Not only was ASIC ⁓ asking the questions, and when I say asking, They were proactively coming to ask to ask the questions. What is this all about? What are you doing? But also Ostrak and APRA, because they wanted to understand the distinction of what a stablecoin business is doing in a payments fintech, which is also trying to launch a bank. Right. And so we had the opportunity to just start those conversations early. The benefit of that for us meant that we constantly kept abreast of what was going on in that regulatory and policy landscape. And ⁓ in that first period, ⁓ we didn’t feel it was much as much of a burden ⁓ because ⁓ there wasn’t as much focus ⁓ and emphasis on the businesses ⁓ that were operating stablecoins because there were few and far between. In fact, only one and one other ⁓ that was starting up at that point in time. So for us, twenty twenty-two was a very ⁓ interesting year to launch in. but twenty twenty three Where is where the conversations really started occurring. And that was on the back of the RBA’s DFCRC first pilot. And that first pilot was an opportunity for ⁓ for the Reserve Bank and Digital Finance Cooperative Research Center and all the other regulators to take a look in and to see what are these people talking about? You know, what are these CBDCs and stable coins and
speaker-1: Mm-mm.
speaker-0: And how could they possibly work within our economy, within our monetary infrastructure and ecosystem? And so it was a good opportunity to ⁓ to get to the table and start ⁓ educating. Because whilst ⁓ there may seem t from the outside looking in, a bit of frustration from our sector saying, ⁓ people don’t understand and the banking industry doesn’t understand and the regulators don’t understand, it’s like, yeah, they don’t, because it’s new. And so you have to educate, you have to include. ⁓ in the conversation. And so it was a fantastic opportunity to include the regulators in the conversations. And so we had that opportunity through a pilot and ⁓ and the pilot ⁓ came, went, we launched our business, we started ⁓ transactions in earnest later in 2023, ⁓ where some of the ⁓ some of the stars started aligning. and the biggest challenges of course remained With the fact that there was no regulatory clarity at that point in time. And I think I’ll step into that discussion when we when we talk a little bit more about ⁓ about the licensing. But I I suppose what what I want to say about those ⁓ first four years, or the years leading up to where we are today, is that at no point did we consider our business or our stablecoin as ⁓ as a hype product. As a marketing exercise. We very clearly from the outset saw that it was an infrastructure alternative rail that was moving into the new real world, the new real world that runs on digital rails, on blockchain rails, on other rails that are not necessarily bank rails. And so when you’re doing that, you make sure that you are protecting consumers. That you are following any governance and regulatory framework that is in existence. And where it isn’t in existence, and it wasn’t, as we mentioned, for the first instance, we actually sort of had a bit of a ⁓ a brainwave and said, Why don’t we engage ⁓ a university to look at this from a PhD perspective and say, what could a governance framework for such a business look like? And we did. We engaged ⁓ Victoria University and they ⁓ delivered us a a governance framework that was very much aligned to where we stand today still. And so our operation has been very clearly rooted in in those principles of reserve management, redemption rights, consumer protections, ⁓ operational robustness. So all all of the things that you come to expect from any financial product or service or value in market, ⁓ we applied that from day one. So we felt that, yep, regulation will come at someday. We’re not sure who’s going to regulate how it’s exactly going to be regulated. We think it’s going to look like this. So when licensing time comes, we will ⁓ be able to ⁓ meet those requirements and maybe have to tweak a little bit around the edges.
speaker-1: There’s a lot to be said for the groundwork that you laid. And I don’t know if you reflect on this much, but you were a first mover and you did a lot of legwork with the regulators. You you touched on it a little bit, but and and then it went to the DFCRC. If it and I know that you had a lot of conversations around your stablecoin and it was absolutely a hundred percent an educational pro and still is an educational process. So I just want to give you credit firstly for paving the way because now there are other stable coins in the market as well and their innovation continues to grow. But as we move through and and obviously it got to the stage where the government was well aware now that this technology was coming, it now we we speak to it as Australia’s next opportunity, the efficiencies, the impact on our economy ⁓ and and our GDP. We’re talking billion in excess of twenty billion a year. ⁓ inefficiencies if we leverage from the technologies like you’re building right now. But while this realization was happening in within our government and just even within Australian society, with look, crypto is is ⁓ the adoption rate is continuing to rise. The the awareness of the technology is is there. We accept the next evolution of the financial system. Or some people do, some people don’t. I might just say that there is an acceptance that it will evolve shortly. But even during that stage, where that acceptance was found, there were still frictions. And it isn’t until very recently that you have been able to thrive as a business. It really shouldn’t take 10 years or so. It should take ⁓ just, you know, maybe even maybe five years. I don’t know. But can you take me through the licensing and the frictions in the past few years, maybe.
speaker-0: find it fascinating and a bit ⁓ funny when I hear people talking about, ⁓ stable coins were all the conversation in twenty twenty five. I would argue that the stable coin conversation was twenty twenty-four. And in twenty twenty four, any event I attended, any discussion I had, anything that was ⁓ s you know, public webinars, any of those sorts of things, that’s when stable coins were being discussed. And I think People miss that fact ⁓ that it was all that discussion that led to the ending of 2024 event that sort of launched ⁓ the the movement ⁓ across the world with what stable coins meant. So, yes, there was a lot of stable coin discussion in 2025, ⁓ but that was as a result of okay, stable coins are now here, now they’re legitimate there, and that was all because of the Genius Act, right? But before that, Twenty twenty four was the year that everybody sort of clicked and went, ⁓ stablecoins are gonna make all of the other thing work. And why? Because it’s a settlement layer. ⁓ because it is the infrastructure. I almost got to the point where I found it amusing that I was talking about something so boring. It’s infrastructure, it’s rails, it’s not sexy, it’s not hype, but it is important. It is it is it has to work with our existing financial infrastructure. This idea that people have that, ⁓ stablecoins, you’re looking to replace banks. No, we’re not. It’s it’s i we’re working with the banks. We need the banks for ⁓ for the management of reserves, for compliance, ⁓ for the fiat on and off ramps or the cash on and off ramps that are required. So there are still ⁓ there are still those ⁓ those stories that you know that I I think are like urban legends almost that say, ⁓ you know, stablecoin operators looking to become banks. It’s not the case. It’s not not the case at all. So 2024 was for me that where I started feeling very confident that the hard work was going to pay off at some point because I heard the stablecoin conversation everywhere. And I almost felt a little bit of, ⁓ my God, really? You’ve finally come to the realization that stable coins are important. ⁓ and that was the 2024 conversation. Genius Act changed everything. So Genius Act changed everything, not because it was anything revolutionary, ⁓ not because it was amazing and fantastic. But because you know, Meker was around before that, the MAS had already established a framework, ⁓ Hong Kong was already starting to look at it, Japan. So everyone ⁓ in their own ⁓ jurisdictions or some of those jurisdictions were already ⁓ talking about it. For Australia, it was a little bit ⁓ lagging behind ⁓ in terms of whilst we were having conversations with the regulators, there was definitely the ⁓ the thinking process going into it. But nothing that was really translating into something that was looking meaningful and and sort of felt very far away ⁓ in the early stages of ⁓ late stages of twenty-four and early stages of twenty-five. ⁓ and so I I do credit the the ⁓ the launch of the Genius Act and ⁓ the passing of that to ⁓ to everybody’s ⁓ speeding up of ⁓ of regulatory activity. And I think when we got to mid last year and towards the end of twenty twenty five, where there was movement in from ASIC that basically said, ⁓ you know, stable coins ⁓ within our existing regulatory landscape, ⁓ we consider if they operate in this way to be non cash payment facilities and therefore it’s a licensed it’s a licensed operation and therefore ⁓ that that ⁓ stablecoin issuers should ⁓ apply for this for their product. And as a consequence, because ⁓ stablecoins require distribution, that crypto exchanges and facilitators of that stablecoin also need to ⁓ look at ⁓ licensing to be able to ⁓ support that ⁓ that product and facilitate that product. And so up to that point we had already ⁓ been operational for a few years. ⁓ operating within the frameworks that we talked about. 2025 presented us with challenges that were different. The different challenges were ⁓ the cost. We carried a balance sheet ⁓ cost ⁓ from day one saying regulation costs, regulation cost next year, regulation cost next year. When it came to last year, that sort of escalated. Why did that escalate? Because there were ⁓ whilst the clarity of the existing ⁓ pathway was being established, there were a lot of points in between. And at each point of ASIC issuing an update, ⁓ or you know, Treasury ⁓ providing a consultation paper or whatever it might be, we had to go to the cost and effort of stopping our operational business, looking at this, ⁓ fitting it in, making sure that we were still complying, ⁓ doing you know, you know, ensuring that ⁓ we understood what was happening. So that that became quite burdensome for for a period. However, the even that little level of clarity for us ⁓ made a big difference. ⁓ and the big difference that it made for us moving into twenty twenty six when we were granted ⁓ the license, we basically saw this instant weird shift. And for us, why we say it’s instant and weird is because Operationally nothing’s changed for us. our ⁓ operational management, our cybersecurity risk management, our redemption, our ⁓ reserve management, our liquidity management, none of that changes. ⁓ and so what changed? The perception and the acceptance and the opinions of the parties who wish to work with us. Or who are now opening their doors and asking to work with us, or are now ready to have those conversations and take it to the next level. Because whilst there has been a desire to incorporate the new technology and the new infrastructure within ⁓ existing corporate ⁓ treasuries and cross-border businesses, there’s always been this, but what’s your license? And it’s like, there is no license. so then how are you operating within ⁓ within you know constraints and barriers that need to be there. So it it has been challenging to convince ⁓ the traditional sector to understand, accept and trust that AUDD stablecoin is a an entity and a product and a service that they can comfortably deal with within their risk management. So that that I suppose has been the interesting part of the opportunities that have been opened up. I cannot tell you, Amy Rose, how busy we are It it almost ⁓ for for the thousands of conversations that we had up till last year, I reckon I’m having a thousand just in the last couple of months. It is ⁓ it is exciting. I I I’m I’m rapt that we’re here. It just did take a a fair bit of work to get here. And we’re not done.
speaker-1: No, well, and I’m pretty sure you turned grey ⁓ over that time completely. Yeah, same, same. Yep. Y we you talked about infrastructure. Now Australia is infrastructure. We love talking about infrastructure. We’ve got our physical int infrastructure, which we’ve heavily relied on, but now we’re moving to the digital infrastructure. I know that you have relationships and partnerships and you are building, I guess, the next evolution of
speaker-0: Thank God for hair dye.
speaker-1: the digital economy. And you you are, if we imagine it as a tech stack, you are a layer in the tech stack. Now I there’s a strong relationship with XDC network. I know you’ve done some work with them on the infrastructure, I guess to paint a picture for our listeners as to what products and services are you engaging with within the Australian or even global economy that is enabling that efficiency and that
speaker-0: It’s a it’s a great thing to try to give ⁓ to give a little bit of an example ⁓ in that space because you hit the nail on the head, we’re absolutely infrastructure, we are a layer, and ⁓ that layer is the settlement layer. The fact that a stable coin is programmable money and has ⁓ and has the ability to ⁓ have triggers associated with it, our partnership with XDC is a a really good example of where we see ⁓ stablecoins and and this settlement layer making a difference in trade payments ⁓ and cross border payments as the example. And what I mean w when you’re conducting a trade payment, there are a lot of steps that happen along the way. And the steps are everything from ⁓ they’re they’re triggered payments. So there’s money that goes in escrow. There is money that gets released on a particular trigger. There, you know, that trigger might be a bill of lading, it might be delivery at port, it might be ⁓ you know, on order. All of those all of those things are are potential triggers and they can be programmed ⁓ from a contract perspective, but then the value also has to bolt into that. And so hence why a stable coin being a settlement layer can also bolt into those contracts to say, okay, well when this trigger point happens, then that’s when you are able to release. You don’t have to rely on outdated or manual systems ⁓ to to enable those activities to occur. And so our work ⁓ with XDC and in the trade payment space has been trying to make ⁓ I I I dare make a mistake and say how many ⁓ actual steps there are ⁓ in a trade. ⁓ I I I do recall going to the conference ⁓ last year talking about trade digitalization. ⁓ we’re aiming to solve you know a piece of that where there are way too many steps. ⁓ you know maybe it’s something like you know twelve steps down to three ⁓ we we can make a difference in those kind of payments. So you ask about not only ⁓ trade payments, but the cross-border payments and exporter and importer type of payments where the transparency is also important. It’s not necessarily only about ⁓ the programmability, but it’s also about the transparency. We we like ⁓ in in our sector in stablecoin world ⁓ and ⁓ in in the digital asset space, we like to talk about ⁓ how if you do a cross border transaction today, you have to rely there’s a lot of trust that goes into the fact that Effie’s company has paid Amy Rose’s company ⁓ across the world ⁓ because she takes a screenshot of her receipt and then says, Yes, Amy Rose, I have paid you and ⁓ Amy Rose waits for you know, anything from three to seven to ten days to see that money in her bank account or not, because all she really saw was a receipt and ⁓ Effie’s company might have been a little bit ⁓ tricky and maybe p pulled that ri pulled that payment back anyway. And Amy Rose would be no none the wiser. When you include ⁓ blockchain technology ⁓ and ⁓ stablecoin layer you add that element of transparency it’s on the blockchain. I say to you, I’ve paid you, you look at ⁓ that transaction on the blockchain and it’s done. What I said is is reality. Immediately too. And immediately. And immediately. So there are there are those ⁓ friction points that we are solving with stable coins as opposed to, you know, the local ⁓ story of paying for your coffee at the at the coffee shop.
speaker-1: trade digitalization when you you talked about the steps but it’s we’re talking trillions of tons of paper involved in trade digitalizing globally so that trade needs to be digitalized even just just for our planet’s sake that that needs to happen it is a slow process but as you say you’re a layer in that process For Australia, and I’m I’m not quite sure ⁓ if you know ⁓ because I don’t, what what are the impacts of Australia rolling out a stable coin or leveraging from stable coins when it comes to those efficiencies? What will it do for our economy?
speaker-0: There are a number of things. ⁓ and and you did mention ⁓ you did mention some of those ⁓ pieces, but I’d I’d like to suggest that it might not be as tangible as ⁓ as as you know making a trade digitalization process more efficient. I’d like to suggest that if we don’t ⁓ roll out an Australian dollar sovereign ⁓ currency stablecoin, ⁓ We risk as an economy, as a country, as as a sovereign nation, the value of the money not sitting on our shores. What do I mean by that? ⁓ and you asked a little bit earlier about ⁓ the competition. the competition is not only in our backyard, the competition has been in our space from day one, from twenty fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, with the US dollar. stable coins already infiltrated and an important part of the digital asset space today. And what does that mean? On the one hand, I I I could use the terminology, well, people are using US dollars and the the money’s not ⁓ sitting on our our country. Well the argument would be the the money still wouldn’t be sitting on it because if it’s making a payment ⁓ in US dollars and it’s simply going in US dollar stable coins, then it wouldn’t be sitting on our shores. The counter argument to that would be for those US dollar stable coins that are currently sitting in Australian corporates, crypto businesses, digital asset businesses, money services businesses, Effie’s and Amy Rose’s wallets, at the moment, that is not money that’s backed in Australia or sitting in Australia or earning anything for Australia. It’s sitting in US Treasury bills and has nothing to do with our economy. I would say that there is a large portion that is not just ⁓ used to move, but it’s actually used as Treasury purposes in Australia. and if it’s being used for Treasury and it’s a US dollar stable coin being used for Treasury, that means that we are missing out on an opportunity on Australian dollars or an Australian dollar stablecoin being used for treasury operations and that in itself being and staying in the Australian. ⁓ monetary ⁓ system. And so that’s one of the potentials that I find that we do have with an Australian dollar stablecoin as opposed to ⁓ being overtaken by ⁓ other currency stable coins.
speaker-1: Look, it’s it’s common knowledge as well. The US stable coins are they’re dominant. They and and so they’ll they ⁓ and and I don’t disagree. There’s a sovereign risk there. With the US tariffs ⁓ and Trump’s, you know, he’s very focused on stable coins and obviously their first move is on on the regulations. Do you see an outcome or an intention that aligns with the tariffs and the stable coins and the US? treasuries and and I guess the impact on on the US to engaging with the rest of the world with stable coins and tariffs and and building up their reserves.
speaker-0: Exactly that. ⁓ I I I think that is exactly where we need to be focusing on as ⁓ as a country, as a nation. We need to be looking at that activity and saying, what does that mean for us? If the if that stable coin u utility is really ⁓ only active and there from a US dollar ⁓ US dollar basis, then all they’re doing is growing their economy. Where is that leaving us? Why aren’t we applying that same approach? Saying, let us grow our economy, let our local operators such as AEDD stablecoin, ⁓ thrive and and manage the reserves here and hopefully get to a point where we’re holding ⁓ you know, billions of dollars in ⁓ in treasury bills for Australia, not ⁓ not for another nation. And so w you know, if I’m a if I’m an Australian ⁓ company and I’m looking at my balance sheet, why am I holding risk with US dollar ⁓ instruments? Whether that is whether that is fiat or stable coin. In any case, if you’re holding it as a stable coin, you still have to report it as a US dollar balance sheet ⁓ piece. So one minute you’re making a gain, next minute you’re making a loss, why not hold it in Australian dollars ⁓ and ⁓ and ensure that you are are protecting both your own balance sheet as well as supporting the country.
speaker-1: And on on that sovereignty, if there was a necessity to engage with the US in US dollar backed stable coin, ⁓ and the requirement to engage would be to for Australia to use that US dollar stable coin. That would remove the opportunity for an Australian backed stable coin, ⁓ which would in turn our dependence on the US would would grow even Deep. So if you were to offer any recommendations or any advice to the Australian government, what would it be?
speaker-0: Look at our backyard. ⁓ I I strongly believe that they already are. I I think that is ⁓ certainly the conversations that I’ve had ⁓ do tend to lean towards. They need the the government and Reserve Bank of Australia and ⁓ Treasury, they’re all looking at that exact issue. How does this affect ⁓ monetary policy? How does this affect us as a nation? ⁓ it doesn’t It doesn’t necessarily mean that they are proactively helping or supporting a local stablecoin environment. ⁓ however, they are recognizing that ⁓ that that something needs to occur because we cannot have the a situation where we are no longer the masters of our own nation ⁓ and ⁓ and our own sovereignty needs to be protected. So I know those conversations are already have already commenced. ⁓ and certainly it’s the sort of questions that I do get asked ⁓ when I am speaking to ⁓ members of Treasury RBA APRA even and and and understanding that they’re having those conversations is encouraging for me. but what I’d like to see is a little bit more support ⁓ not only ⁓ that that they’re having the conversations and recognizing it. So I’m not sure what what it’ll take to get to the point of maybe volume, maybe it’s only really going to come down to volume, maybe at the point where ⁓ we are showing ⁓ reserve balances of a substantial amount that can’t be ignored, that then you know there’ll there’ll be this, okay, this is not going anywhere, this is not an experiment, this is not ⁓ this is not just a niche product or a niche service. There actually is value in ⁓ looking at this a lot more closely. So I I’m glad to be part of those conversations and I hope that ⁓ we can ⁓ contribute in a way that makes sense.
speaker-1: I’ve seen Australia ⁓ react in the past. And sometimes, you know, when we ask ourselves when will it be taken seriously? When when will those ⁓ conversations turn into support? And in in the past, I think during COVID it was a good example. We had technology in place that was overlooked for some time, the QR codes, right? And we and then as soon as a reaction was required and a technology was required in response. it was adopted. And that’s because people needed it. And that was the the the story of the QR codes. So I often think that it’s not until a moment of necessity that our government reacts. And ⁓ there there’s a lot of there there’s a ⁓ a very long process where quite and I mean globally regulation isn’t an easy thing. It’s definitely not easy at the moment and just takes a a lot of time. But I am mindful ⁓ of the fact that A we are not supporting s some of these technologies, including yours, immediately and right now because the risk is great. But secondly, we’re not actually ⁓ even as a country talking about it properly either. There’s a bit of a narrative that an undercurrent ⁓ because there’s not that awareness and there’s not that education around it. So I think there’s there’s a There’s a duty of care on the government side and a duty of care on ours, on our part, yours and mine and industry to educate. But if we look at the future, and I asked the question about what advice would you give the government? But in a perfect world, and you’ve launched, I know your relationships are growing now after the licensing, and there’s probably some really amazing things in the works. What do they you don’t have to give anything away, but what does that look like? What Now you’re able to launch. Finally. I mean, it’s a different world for you. What does it look like?
speaker-0: Wow, there was a lot in there, Amy Rose. ⁓ I want to start with ⁓ just a giggle about the QR codes because I I mentioned that my previous life I was ⁓ dealing with alternative payments ⁓ and alternative payment rails. ⁓ an alternative payment product of QR code was one that I pushed the barrow on and pushed and pushed and pushed the barrow on, even when even I thought it was outdated technology. You’re a fascinating. We we had ⁓ you so you know, QR codes came out and people were using them to look at brochures and you know, ⁓ you know, look at information on a product. And they’re sort of a little bit daggy, a little bit outdated. ⁓ and then they started getting used by ⁓ Asian payment companies, so China type of payment companies, Alipay, WeChat Pay, they were using QR code payments at register. And so I thought we should use QR code payments for us as well. And so we were pushing this barrow and you know, Australia was already past the QR code stage in a lot of ways for for the payment technologies because Apple Pay came around and you can pay with your phone and you can pay with your watch and you can do all those things. So why? Tap and pay was too easy to worry about a QR code. And then when QR codes ⁓ resurfaced ⁓ during COVID, we just sort of shook our heads and went, Yep, everybody was writing it off as old technology, but there you go, it’s right there. That’s different use cases. Yeah. So the future for us ⁓ is looking ⁓ bright. I mean, you know, you you talked about the fact that ⁓ we ⁓ are are really in a state of true launch now, even though we’ve done over a billion and a half of ⁓ payments volume transactions ⁓ with global partners, ⁓ because you know, a stable coin, whilst it’s an Australian dollar stablecoin, it’s not an Australian story. ⁓ it is a global story. It has to interoperate and interact just as value does today, where where my Australian dollar ⁓ is able to be used where my Australian dollar can already be used in 180 countries, in whatever country I go to, I should be able to use that dollar. Not like I use my fiat currency today, which is I have to convert it to that local currency. I want to see a future where my value I don’t have to actually make the exchange at all and I don’t have to think about it. ⁓ success with, you know, things like ⁓ payment products like WISE and Airwalllocks and ⁓ ⁓ those sorts things. you know, they they make it a little bit ⁓ e easier for you to do that. But a stable coin makes it that i extra step from an infrastructure settlement layer. So whilst it’s not an an an Effie and Amy Rose story, ⁓ whether my Australian dollars can be used in, you know, Japan, ⁓ it it then does become a who’s providing that technology to you or that wallet to you. And it’s easier for those guys to be able to launch in any country they want if they have stable coin rails everywhere. So the future is I you know, I I’d like to say if you’re asking for five years, I think ask me about five years because between now and then it’s going to be busy as ⁓ busy as. I can’t tell you just ⁓ just how busy. And it’s exciting. ⁓ I I think. I’m most excited that I feel that I am part of the digital future of finance and the digital ⁓ economy of the future and and and you know, part of the its architecture and engineering, ⁓ you know, what it’s going to look like for Australia, for stable coins and for good stable coins around the world. So ⁓ for our government I would say listen now. don’t only look at the bad examples of ⁓ of what’s occurred. Look at the current ⁓ operating good examples, ⁓ work with us to make it ⁓ a reality because if we don’t, builders and operators such as myself ⁓ or such as ⁓ you know people who are trying to innovate in this country will go elsewhere where the environment is friendlier and is more engaging and is ⁓ more open to acceptance of these technologies and these ⁓ and these new ⁓ innovative processes. So I would I would say to ⁓ our government is open ⁓ open the door, open your ears, ⁓ learn. If you don’t ask ⁓ so you know we are more than happy to ⁓ sit around any table and have these conversations ⁓ and work together to get a good outcome rather than ⁓ a theoretical one or one that’s not based in practical ⁓ real life ⁓ examples.
speaker-1: And I love to hear more about this actually. And we’re gonna have to have a number two episode. But congratulations. Can I just say that? Congratulations, because this has been a hustle. This has been grit. This has been stoic. So from me to you, congratulations. Thank you. And thank you for coming on the show. It’s always a pleasure to see you. Thank you.
speaker-0: Absolutely, would love to. Thank you so much. Thanks for having me, Amy Rose.
speaker-1: You’ve been listening to The Houses Digital, where policy meets innovation. Stay curious, stay inspired, and be part of the movement building Australia’s next economy. The future is happening now. See you in the next episode.