Solana Summer.
Well, Solana has been a hot crypto trade over the past 3 months, rising by around 60%, and more and more companies are embracing Solana as a Treasury reserve asset notables include Defi Devco, UPEy, Soul Strategies, Forward Industries, Helius, and Sharp's Technology, some names we've heard from right here on Market movers and elsewhere, regulatory catalysts continue for crypto.
Over the last week, the SEC approving generic listing standards for commodity-based trust. which makes it easier for crypto ETFs to gain approval.
Joining me this morning to weigh in is Kristen Smith, president of the Solano Policy Institute.
Kristen, good morning.
Thank you so much for joining me this morning.
Well, big institutions are starting to invest heavily in the Solana ecosystem, and with more innovative vehicles like DAs emerging and companies starting to adopt Solana as part of their strategy, how do you see this impacting capital deployment efficiency as well as the broader crypto market?
Uh, good morning, Remy.
It's great to be here.
Yeah, it's certainly been an exciting summer for Sellana, and what we saw over the summer, as you noted, was an explosion of digital asset treasury companies that are focused on Sellana as an asset.
Uh, and as you also mentioned, sometime in the next couple of weeks, we should be seeing, uh, ETPs come online for a pure play Solana.
As well, and so this is a huge contrast to what we saw in the last administration where the SEC was engaging in litigation with exchanges and others who were helping consumers get access to Salana.
As you know, self custody isn't for everyone.
Opening up a crypto account is not for everyone.
And so to have these alternative vehicles that allow individuals.
And institutions to get exposure to Seoul as an asset is hugely important because we do believe that the Salana network is going to be the infrastructure for all asset issuers and asset markets in the future.
So it's a really great opportunity for investors, and we're excited to see multiple products come online that give consumers more choice.
Yeah, and speaking of consumers and investors, the SEC approving generic listing standards that could make it easier for crypto ETFs to gain approval.
So what does this mean for retail investors who are watching?
Yeah, well, I think it's a really exciting opportunity for retail investors.
So previously, in order for a digital asset to get an ETF, and the only ones, by the way, to complete this process were essentially Bitcoin applicants and Ethereum applicants.
They had to go through this 19B4 process.
What the FCC has done is now they have created generic listing standards.
So if the token is a certain size or the forward market, Uh, futures markets have been established for a certain amount of time they can automatically go without having to get the government's approval.
And so with the passage of these ETF generic listing standards, Solana and a couple other assets like XRP, Doge and others will be uh immediately able to, to file these ETFs.
So we should see those products coming online in the next couple weeks which again.
And I think you know this is really important from like a policy perspective as well.
We, we want the regulators to do their job and ensure that you know we have well functioning trans transparent marketplaces, but what we don't want is for them to make a judgment call as to what investors should or should not be investing in.
That is the decision of the investor, and that's why it's really important that, you know, you do your own homework before making decisions about these types of investments.
Yeah, and speaking of which, Chrisin Defi Education Foundation debuting a national study that was conducted by IPSOS and that explored how Americans actually view US financial systems and also technology, and I found a startling stat.
So just under 5% of Americans believe that the current US financial system meets their financial needs.
So tell me what you thought of the research and how Americans actually want to be banking.
Yeah, well, I think this research is really important, and it just underscores that the system today, albeit one of the best, if not the best in the entire world here in the United States, still has shortcomings for many Americans.
I mean, I think that, you know, when you think of financial services, people want a place to safely store their funds.
They want to be able to borrow, potentially even lend, maybe trade.
The system doesn't work today.
It's very siloed and there are very expensive fees.
I think in the next few years as all of these services come on chain, we're going to see a lot more options for lower costs for individual consumers across the board.
So I think there's a real potential here, and I think it's one of the reasons, you know, why I personally am so excited to be working in the salon ecosystem because I think there's there's a lot of improvements to be made.
And finally, Kristen, we are heading into the final quarter of 2025, hard to believe, but tell us a little bit more about the Protect the Builders campaign, as well as some of the regulatory progress on market structure that you're anticipating.
Yeah, well, one of the things that we focus on at the Solana Policy Institute here in DC is ensuring that our public policies are a foundation for innovation that will lead to better services for all Americans, and I think the foundation of this are software developers.
Software developers are the ones that write the code that ultimately go into the, the, the blockchain-based systems that we're building this on.
And so we need to make sure that those software developers are protected and not held liable for actions that others may take using their software.
We want to encourage this.
We want to encourage building, and it's one of the reasons we launched our campaign here in Washington.
We had ad buys and events last week here in DC and we're doing a lot of direct lobbying on the hill just to educate about the role that software developers have in building our financial future.
OK, Kristen, thank you so much for joining us this morning and as always, thank you for sharing your insights and your perspective.
Thanks, Remy.
