Stellar Foundation CEO: Blockchains allow money to circulate like email

Blockchain protocols should enable financial assets to move seamlessly through traditional and on-chain infrastructures. According to Denelle Dixon, the CEO of the Stellar Development Foundation, this is crucial for the mainstream adoption of the technology.

“From the beginning, we focused on making money move like email,” said Dixon.

Expect some real talk from me at #ParisBlockchainWeek on trust, innovation, and the impact on everyday financial services. We’ve got some work to do…let’s talk about it on 4/9, at 9:20 AM | Master stage. #PBW2024 https://t.co/Ea59ZhEU7G

— Denelle Dixon (@DenelleDixon) April 2, 2024

Making money move like email

By making money move like email, Dixon naturally means that capital or assets should be able to move from A to B as easily as information via email.

To achieve this, according to Dixon, it is important to create “entries and exits” and not just rely on transactions in volatile cryptocurrencies.

Dixon’s focus at Stellar is on creating decentralized protocols for the tokenization of “real” world assets. This includes art, real estate, shares, bonds and, for example, gold.

“My goal is to not only make this work for Stellar, but to create a web of blockchains that can all benefit from the work we do,” said Dixon.

We have to get away from tribal culture

According to Dixon, it is crucial that the industry leaves the tribal culture behind. What you often see now is that people become attached to a particular blockchain and wars take place between competitors, at least on social media.

If Solana’s blockchain crashes again, it will be a reason for Ethereum supporters to mock it. According to Dixon, that is not the right way.

“These kinds of challenges are actually bad for the blockchain ecosystem because it causes people to look at it and say, ‘Maybe we shouldn’t get into this after all.’” Dixon said.

According to Dixon, there is a lot less tribal culture at the top of the industry than many people think. “People always say that me and Brad Garlinghouse from Ripple probably don’t like each other, but the fact is that we like each other,” says Dixon.