Bridge's founders started the company and raised money in 2022 and launched its APIs in 2023, according to Zach Abrams.
“2023 is when we launched our APIs. 2022 is when we start, Sean and I started the company and raised money.”
Person
Zach Abrams
1 episodes · 14 quoted claims
Zach Abrams says Terra Luna's collapse hit crypto right after Bridge raised money, and the FTX collapse hit it again.
“And then immediately after we raised money, Terra Luna happened. and then the whole space was nuked and then FTX happened and it was nuked again.”
Bridge's first idea was letting people use a bank account to buy NFTs, before it moved to stablecoins.
“the first idea we had was using your bank account to acquire NFTs”
Bridge's first developer customer was Zulu, a Colombia-based company that converted Colombian pesos into stablecoins and then dollars.
“our first developer was this team called Zulu. And they were a company based in Colombia and they were taking Colombian pesos, converting them into stable coins”
SpaceX uses Bridge to move money collected in local currencies for Starlink back to the US via stablecoins.
“SpaceX came to us. They're selling Starlink all over the world.”
Zach Abrams says larger traders get better pricing in traditional currency markets but worse pricing in stablecoin markets, because spreads widen.
“in the fiat FX markets, as you get bigger, your pricing comes down. In the crypto markets, as you get bigger, your pricing goes up because the spreads widen.”
Zach Abrams says trading made up about 100% of stablecoin use two years earlier and about 80% at the time of recording.
“the trading use case was like 100 % of the market two years ago, was 80 % of the market today”
Zach Abrams says on some blockchains an address must be funded and prepared before it can receive USDC, which gets expensive when creating millions of wallets.
“in order to make the address, make it possible for that address to accept USDC, you have to fund it and prime it so that it is available to accept that USDC.”
Zach Abrams says Ethereum creates a great deal of value as a network but captures little of it for the token.
“And like Ethereum, wild value creation, like of all the blockchains, minimal value capture.”
Zach Abrams says before the GENIUS Act companies saw stablecoins as risky, and the law lowered that perceived risk.
“the perceived risk of engaging with stablecoins or issuing stablecoins was really high.”
Bridge issues stablecoins for Phantom, MetaMask and Hyperliquid through its open issuance platform.
“today we're issuing stablecoins with Phantom, we're issuing stablecoins with MetaMask, we're issuing stablecoin for Hyperliquid.”
Zach Abrams says some stablecoins, such as Tether, charge fees when users redeem out of them.
“a lot of stablecoins like Tether, for instance, charges burn fees when you move out of that stablecoin.”
Zach Abrams says DeepMind operated as a fully separate business inside Google for about ten years before being brought together with it.
“DeepMind was a totally separate business, separate everything for 10 years.”
Zach Abrams says Bridge started about three years before the recording and its APIs had been available for roughly two years.
“we started the company three years ago. Our APIs were available for like roughly two years.”