E13 - Sorel Carr on FinTech

Sorel Carr is the Head of FinTech Business at BNZ (Bank of New Zealand). Sorel comes from a decade in corporate banking and has been down the blockchain rabbit hole looking to inject new emerging tech such as defi into the more traditional banking world. 

In this conversation we discuss the centralised networks banks are part of such as SWIFT & CBDCs, and the decentralised competitors that can run stablecoins, and defi protocols like Uniswap.

Timestamps: 01:27 how do you define fintech? 06:09 is a bank a fintech? 09:22 future of money RBNZ & CBDCs 17:49 future of cash 21:58 SWIFT 28:24 stablecoins 33:11 defi 41:12 pancake swap & uniswap 48:05 UST & FTX 50:21 tokenisation 52:52 bcnz 54:29 rapidfire: chatGPT, future outlook 1:02:17 end

Some notes from the show:

• software is eating the world https://a16z.com/2011/08/20/why-software-is-eating-the-world/
• RBNZ future of money https://www.rbnz.govt.nz/money-and-cash/future-of-money 
• CBDC tracker https://cbdctracker.org/
• NZ helicopter money https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/114413517/give-kiwis-helicopter-money-cash-payouts-if-economy-crashes--treasury
• China CBDC status https://cbdctracker.org/currency/china-e-cny
• UK CBDC pilot https://www.reuters.com/markets/currencies/consumers-face-20000-pound-limit-digital-pound-bank-england-says-2023-02-07/
• Russian SWIFT sanctions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWIFT_ban_against_Russian_banks
• China/Saudi oil priced in Yuan https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Saudi-Arabia-Considers-Ditching-The-Dollar-For-Chinese-Oil-Sales.html
• alternatives to SWIFT https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWIFT#Competitors
• NAB to launch stablecoin https://www.coindesk.com/business/2023/01/19/national-australia-bank-becomes-second-australian-bank-to-build-stablecoin/ 
• NZ corruption index https://www.transparency.org/en/countries/new-zealand
• JPMorgan defi trade https://www.benzinga.com/markets/asia/22/11/29552324/jpmorgan-executes-first-defi-transaction-for-singapores-project-guardian 
• Aave https://aave.com/
• NZDs(table) https://www.techemynt.com/
• BSC validators https://bscscan.com/validators# 
• SushiSwap zombie attack https://www.gemini.com/cryptopedia/sushiswap-uniswap-vampire-attack
• pancake swap tokenomics https://docs.pancakeswap.finance/tokenomics/cake/cake-tokenomics
• Matt Damon https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEjjufPd3Is
• no crypto at the Superbowl https://cryptonews.com/news/there-will-no-crypto-advertisements-during-super-bowl-year-heres-why.htm
• Roofstock sells house as NFT https://www.forbes.com/sites/amydobson/2022/10/26/blockchain-makes-deeper-inroads-into-real-estate-as-roofstock-announces-its-first-nft-home-sale/
• chatGPT https://chat.openai.com/chat
• NFTs on Bitcoin https://decrypt.co/resources/what-are-ordinals-a-beginners-guide-to-bitcoin-nfts

Contact Sorel:

• LinkedIn https://nz.linkedin.com/in/sorel-car