The Archive: Crypto, Startups, and Stories

Reverie

Ever wonder how the leading crypto businesses and protocols were built? In this show, we have conversations with the founders, operators, and investors behind the most interesting businesses in crypto.

Hosted by Reverie

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9 episodes
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Avg 1 hr 28 min
English

Episodes 9

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#8
August 11 · 1 hr 55 min
Evgeny Gaevoy, CEO & co-founder, Wintermute
In this episode, we sit down with Evgeny Gaevoy, Founder and CEO of Wintermute, one of the largest crypto-native trading firms in the world. We cover Evgeny’s childhood growing up in post-Soviet Russia, how the chaos and opportunity of the 90s shaped his view of markets, his decade at Optiver, and why he eventually left traditional finance to build Wintermute. Evgeny walks through the early days of the company, from struggling to raise money from VCs to eventually scaling through DeFi Summer.We also go deep on the evolution of crypto market structure and how Wintermute sees itself. Finally, we talk about Evgeny’s “Golden Path” thesis: why crypto may be losing its original purpose, why institutional adoption is not necessarily the end goal,and why he thinks crypto needs to rediscover meaning beyond speculation. ----- Altitude – the global business account with stablecoin and fiat bank transfers, free on-and off-ramps, 5% APY, corporate cards, bill pay, and more. ------ Questions or feedback? Email us at ⁠archivepodcasthost@gmail.com⁠ Website: ⁠https://thearchivepod.com⁠ Twitter: ⁠https://x.com/Archive_Pod⁠ ------ Timestamps (0:00) Intro (1:07) What is Wintermute (4:14) Evgeny's upbringing (15:59) Joining Optiver and learning market making (26:28) Leaving Optiver, moving to London, and discovering crypto (36:00) Starting Wintermute and raising from VCs (41:17) Getting into DeFi before it was obvious (53:53) How Wintermute avoids bureaucracy and operated like a tech company (1:03:33) The Golden Path for crypto (1:23:01) What bad market making behaviour actually looks like (1:35:33) Evgeny's thoughts on Hyperliquid (1:39:09) Wintermute's next chapters, and building beyond market making (1:51:57) DND, Warhammer, and grand strategy games
July 10 · 1 hr
Ivo Crnkovic-Rubsamen, founder, Pascal
In this episode, we sat down with Ivo, the co-founder of Pascal, a new prediction markets venue. We started off by discussing the state of prediction markets today and why existing venues are still far from the reliability, performance, and capital efficiency of mature exchanges. We also cover how prediction markets could evolve from gambling-adjacent products into tools for real risk transfer and how Pascal’s OTC desk will play a role in this. Lastly, we dig into Ivo’s time at dYdX, the role of small specialist trading firms in new markets, and how Pascal is building toward becoming a major venue for price discovery. ----- Altitude – the global business account with stablecoin and fiat bank transfers, free on-and off-ramps, 5% APY, corporate cards, bill pay, and more. ------ Questions or feedback? Email us at ⁠archivepodcasthost@gmail.com⁠ Website: ⁠https://thearchivepod.com⁠ Twitter: ⁠https://x.com/Archive_Pod⁠ ------ Timestamps (0:00) Intro (1:10) Intro and the state of prediction markets today (4:44) Prediction markets for real risk transfer (15:07) Event contracts are capital inefficient (18:46) The story behind Pascal (21:58) The different players trading on prediction markets (32:16) The life cycle of new markets (38:23) Pascal's OTC desk (44:25) Meeting Matt at dYdX and learnings from working there (51:24) the dYdX mafia (54:16) Pascal's roadmap
S1 · E7
June 8 · 2 hr 22 min
Dan Guido, Trail of Bits
Dan Guido is the co-founder and CEO of Trail of Bits, one of the most respected security research firms in crypto, government, and software infrastructure. In this episode, we trace Dan’s path from hacking his high school’s computer systems to working at the NSA, the Federal Reserve incident response team and eventually building Trail of Bits. We dive into how North Korean hackers became some of the most sophisticated attackers in the world, what DARPA is, and how trail of bits works with government contracts. Finally, Dan shares his views on AI and cybersecurity, why defense may benefit more than offense, and what happens when agents dramatically increase the attack surface of the internet. ----- Altitude – the global business account with stablecoin and fiat bank transfers, free on-and off-ramps, 5% APY, corporate cards, bill pay, and more. ------ Questions or feedback? Email us at ⁠archivepodcasthost@gmail.com⁠ Website: ⁠https://thearchivepod.com⁠ Twitter: ⁠https://x.com/Archive_Pod⁠ ------ Timestamps ((0:00) Intro (0:23) Altitude (1:14) What is Trail of Bits and how did it get started (6:49) Dan's upbringing and developing a passion for computer science and hacking (16:25) Working at the NSA (22:51) North Korean hacks on crypto (28:22) The incident response team at the Fed (33:05) The motivation behind Trail of Bits, and DARPA's role (47:23) Starting Trail of Bits (58:22) Government shutdown, losing all revenue, and surviving with 1 paycheck (1:04:36) Hiring people for mastery and building a high agency team (1:15:34) Bitcoin post-quantum cryptography (1:20:12) The culture and expectation at Trail of Bits (1:38:42) Mythos and AI's role in cybersecurity (2:05:48) San Bernardino iPhone incident, and Dan's proudest moments (2:12:12) Learning to become a CEO (2:19:59) Peiter "Mudge" Zatko
S1 · E6
May 15 · 1 hr 20 min
Lucas Bruder, co-founder, Jito | Ep. 6
Lucas is the co-founder of Jito, the leading infrastructure provider and LST provider on Solana. In this episode, we dive into how Lucas went from running MEV bots on Ethereum to betting early on Solana. We explore what drew Lucas to Solana, how Jito scaled from ~3% to ~90% validator adoption, and the hard decisions that Jito had to make around MEV on Solana. Finally, Lucas shares his perspective on where crypto is headed, why trading is the killer use case for blockchains, and what Solana needs to win long term. ----- Altitude – the global business account with stablecoin and fiat bank transfers, free on-and off-ramps, 5% APY, corporate cards, bill pay, and more. ------ Questions or feedback? Email us at ⁠archivepodcasthost@gmail.com⁠ Website: ⁠https://thearchivepod.com⁠ Twitter: ⁠https://x.com/Archive_Pod⁠ ------ Timestamps (0:00) Altitude(1:23) What is Jito(10:18) Why Solana stood out early (16:06) Starting Jito (22:58) FTX fallout and doubling down on Solana (30:54) MEV politics and shutting down the mempool (36:20) Memecoins (38:59) Finding PMF and scaling to >90% of validators (41:27) Jito airdrop and token launch strategy (51:40) Expanding beyond infra to user facing apps (59:12) The Solana ecosystem and what it needs (1:16:00) Jito’s presence in DC and crypto policy
S1 · E5
April 24 · 1 hr 20 min
Michael Shaulov, co-founder, Fireblocks
Michael Shaulov is the co-founder and CEO of Fireblocks, the leading infrastructure platform powering digital asset operations for institutions. In this episode, we trace Michael’s journey from growing up in Israel and serving in Unit 8200 to building and selling his first company, and ultimately founding Fireblocks after uncovering critical security flaws in early crypto markets. We also dive into how Fireblocks found product-market fit by obsessing over a narrow set of customers, and how the company scaled through DeFi, market crashes, and hypergrowth. ----- Altitude – the global business account with stablecoin and fiat bank transfers, free on-and off-ramps, 5% APY, corporate cards, bill pay, and more. ------ Questions or feedback? Email us at ⁠archivepodcasthost@gmail.com⁠ Website: ⁠https://thearchivepod.com⁠ Twitter: ⁠https://x.com/Archive_Pod⁠ ------ Timestamps (0:00) Intro (0:34) Altitude (1:31) Growing up in Israel, learning programming, and starting internet businesses (7:49) Unit 8200 and the mindset it teaches (16:05) First startup, mentorship, and early lessons (20:20) Discovering crypto through exchange hacks (28:18) Finding product-market fit with Fireblocks (37:11) Enterprise-first vs bottom-up GTM strategy (42:53) DeFi moment and catching the Compound wave (51:24) Surviving Terra, 3AC, FTX (1:08:44) What is fireblocks doing today “At the end of the day as a small startup your goal is not to actually boil the ocean, your goal is not to promise everything to everyone, your goal is find the narrowest MVP that will appeal for a systematically well defined category of customers”
S1 · E4
April 1 · 1 hr 43 min
fomo’s Se Yong Park: Building a user-friendly trading app
Se is the co-founder of fomo, a social trading platform. In this episode, we discuss Se’s journey from Yale to dYdX, how he built product intuition, and the early insights that led to him starting fomo. We also dive into the product philosophy, why crypto UX has historically failed mainstream users, and what fomo is doing to fix this. Finally, we explore the long-term vision around the “speculation graph” and how speculation might become the next form of social identity. ----- Altitude – the global business account with stablecoin and fiat bank transfers, free on-and off-ramps, 5% APY, corporate cards, bill pay, and more. ------ Questions or feedback? Email us at ⁠archivepodcasthost@gmail.com⁠ Website: ⁠https://thearchivepod.com⁠ Twitter: ⁠https://x.com/Archive_Pod⁠ ------ Timestamps (0:00) Intro (0:22) Altitude (1:13) Early life. Jersey and Yale (7:03) Working on product at dYdX and meeting Paul (14:06) The genesis of fomo, early team formation (33:42) Product-first philosophy and obsession with UX (46:24) User-led growth and getting to know your customers (59:48) Raising Series A from Benchmark (1:06:22) Where fomo is heading; the speculation graph era (1:21:49) Building a social product to match its growth (1:28:58) Memecoins as a category (1:40:35) Which teams does Se look up to?
S1 · E3
March 9 · 50 min
John Morrow, Co-Founder, Gauntlet
John is the founder of Gauntlet, which operates institutional vaults and manages risk for major DeFi protocols. In this episode we talk about Gauntlet's evolution from risk modeling to automated on-chain vaults and why vaults are the future of on-chain finance. We also discussed the evolution of DeFi from the perspective of innovation and UX. We also spent some time discussing Gauntlet’s beef with Aave, regulation under the Gensler era, and John’s truck. ----- Altitude – the global business account with stablecoin and fiat bank transfers, free on-and off-ramps, 5% APY, corporate cards, bill pay, and more. ------ Questions or feedback? Email us at ⁠archivepodcasthost@gmail.com⁠ Website: ⁠https://thearchivepod.com⁠ Twitter: ⁠https://x.com/Archive_Pod⁠ ------ Timestamps (0:00) Intro (0:11) Altitude (1:16) What Gauntlet does (5:28) Risk management vs asset management (11:09) What’s missing in vaults today? (16:52) Innovation and investing in DeFi (19:32) Can the blue chips get disrupted? (Morpho vs Aave) (22:07) The Aave DAO politics (30:18) Regulatory environment then vs now (41:01) Exploits and hacks in DeFi (46:39) Gauntlet’s culture (48:44) John’s truck and his love for chocolate milk
S1 · E2
February 12 · 1 hr 20 min
Building the System of Record for Crypto, with Ethan Chan, CEO of Allium | Ep. 2
Ethan is the co-founder and CEO of Allium, a crypto data infrastructure company. In this episode, we talked about Ethan’s upbringing in Singapore and how his military experience shaped his leadership style. We also cover his transition from AI to crypto, the early days of building Allium, and what raising capital after the Terra/Luna collapse was like. Lastly, we spent some time digging into why data quality matters for institutions and how Allium is preparing for the future of AI agents and on-chain finance. ----- Altitude – the global business account with stablecoin and fiat bank transfers, free on-and off-ramps, 5% APY, corporate cards, bill pay, and more. ------ Questions or feedback? Email us at ⁠archivepodcasthost@gmail.com⁠ Website: ⁠https://thearchivepod.com⁠ Twitter: ⁠https://x.com/Archive_Pod⁠ ------ Timestamps: (0:00) Intro (0:25) Altitude (1:15) Getting engaged in Argentina (4:43) What Allium is (9:44) Upbringing in Singapore (19:08) Working in AI before crypto (30:05) What starting Allium was like (39:53) Building through the bear market (43:05) Managing Allium’s internal infra (48:04) Scaling Allium, mistakes, and customer acquisition (52:28) Allium’s customer centric culture (55:31) AI strategy at Allium (1:09:31) Future of crypto distribution
#1
January 28 · 1 hr 26 min
Keone Hon, Co-Founder, Monad
Keone Hon is the founder of Monad, a high performance blockchain aiming to scale the EVM. In this episode, we dive into Keone’s upbringing and how that’s influenced him over the years. We also discuss the early days of Monad, his experience raising the seed round, and how Keone's recruiting philosophy. Plus, we get an inside look at Keone’s day-to-day and his vision for Monad’s future. ----- Altitude – the global business account with stablecoin and fiat bank transfers, free on-and off-ramps, 5% APY, corporate cards, bill pay, and more. ----- Questions or feedback? Email us at archivepodcasthost@gmail.com Website: thearchivepod.com Twitter: https://x.com/Archive_Pod ----- Timestamps: (0:00) - Intro (0:42) - Altitude (1:32) - Monad Launch (4:25) - Keone’s early life and interests (16:52) - Where Keone's work ethic came from (19:52) - Working at Jump and how the culture passed on to Monad (24:26) - Starting Monad (30:05) - Raising the seed round for Monad (32:29) - Growing the Monad community and open-sourcing code (36:35) - How Keone hired for the early team (44:07) - The future of Category Labs (51:26) - Which metrics is Monad focusing on (1:00:24) - Building a base of loyal and passionate users (1:07:45) - The personality of an L1 founder (1:13:46) - Founders that Keone looks up to (1:18:34) - Day in the life of Keone (1:23:57) - The endgame vision for Monad

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