Jacob Franek

General Partner @alliance. Former Co-Founder @coinmetrics (acquired). Decentralizing finance.

[Aleks Larsen @alekslarsen]

https://t.co/1P7S8N13aH

[Jacob Franek @jacobfranek]

@BraytonKey Being solo is not just lonelier, it's harder... especially when fundraising

Having a co-founder allows one founder to focus on fundraising while the other(s) can focus on product/growth

Mad respect to anyone who can pull it off alone

[Jacob Franek @jacobfranek]

yes and no

the problem with using obvious AI writing is that you are immediately going to lose some percentage of your audience

why?

because when it's obviously AI -- the reader doesn't know how much of the underlying message is the author's vs. AI

did a lot of work go into it or was it a five second prompt?

we'll never know

the author may ultimately agree with what the AI wrote but that's intuitively a lot less interesting than writing it by hand because then I know it's 100% the author's thoughts

tl;dr when writing is obviously AI there is no proof of work

[Jacob Franek @jacobfranek]

finance (fintech + financial services) is a much bigger market than people realize

[Mario Gabriele @mariogabriele]

.@rooqster once asked a strange question: how much is the biggest bank in Jordan worth?

Billions, it turned out. For one small, growing country.

He wasn't building a bank in Jordan. He was sizing something bigger: a $100 billion market of companies running on stablecoins, with no way to actually move their money.

If a country like Jordan could support a multi-billion-dollar bank, a whole global economy running on stablecoins could support something far bigger.

That bet became @raincards, now valued at $1.95 billion.

[Kamino @kamino]

Introducing Kamino Fixed Rates

The definitive architecture for fixed-term, fixed-rate credit on-chain. Now live in private beta. Public launch in Q3 2026

Read the light paper: https://t.co/PqbShuLGS5

[Lorenzo Valente @LorenzoARK]

Jerry Murdock, co-founder of @insightpartners, one of the best VCs in the world, ~$90B AUM

@HarryStebbings "What seems crazy today that will be obvious in 5 years?"

"Blockchain is in the valley of disillusionment right now, it's really in a bad spot"

"Solana and Ethereum, they look like they have a long term potential"

[Jacob Franek @jacobfranek]

@GwartyGwart asseting the unasseted

as I always say

[Erik Voorhees @ErikVoorhees]

Just had my first organic agentic x402 magic experience

• Needed my agent to access a website for which I didn't have an account.

• It discovered (on its own) Apify, which accessed that service on its behalf. Apify accepts x402 payments, which is what my agent then suggested

• Agent set up its own wallet (it has never done a crypto tx before), gave me a deposit address on Base. I sent it some USDC (and no ETH)

• Agent then connected to Apify on its own, arranged payment via x402, and got the data it needed, reporting it back to me.

The whole sequence involved just 4-5 single sentence prompts from me. That was all pretty magic, but then I asked it this question.

Agentic commerce on crypto rails is the future.

agent was pi agent
model was kimi-k3-fast-api on https://t.co/HGUdedRs2j

[Jacob Franek @jacobfranek]

@HedgeFundClips This assumes private markets don't overvalue (or undervalue) companies

Boy do I have some news for you

[Zana Ventures @ZanaVentures]

https://t.co/esOff9bw0Y

[Jacob Franek @jacobfranek]

The intention behind immigration was always that it be highly selective, such that leading Western nations would attract the best and brightest from other nations.

The end result is therefore beneficial.

Selective immigration of highly skilled people raises the bar.

Mass, illegal immigration is the opposite. It is neither selective nor limited. It therefore doesn't bring the best and brightest. At its worst, it attracts another nations' rejects.

The end result is detrimental. It lowers the bar.

[Omid Malekan @malekanoms]

I have a new paper out, co-authored with @RebeccaRettig1 and @m_mosier_ , explaining how regulated financial institutions can use permissionless networks (like Bitcoin, Ethereum & Solana) without fear of the financial integrity laws.

Our paper first describes how credibly neutral infrastructure is beneficial for regulated entities and helps them reduce counterparty & settlement risk while embracing innovation. It then surveys the actual things regulators have said about engaging with these platforms, and wraps up with a simple framework for conducting compliance checks at the app layer.

TLDR: This is the paper you want to send to every TradFi compliance officer of any company that isn't issuing or building on public-permissionless blockchains due to BSA or sanctions fears.

https://t.co/y0xZprHPE0

[USDC @USDC]

USDC is expanding its role across tokenized capital markets.

Eligible investors can now use USDC to purchase dShares™ across 724 tokenized U.S. stocks and ETFs through @DinariGlobal via supported self-custody wallets, with the option to receive cash dividends in USDC.

https://t.co/m30YAP4M0U

[Jacob Franek @jacobfranek]

seriously wth

[Zack Voell @zackvoell]

Nikita Bier was like "crypto is the most muted topic on this app lol" then he quit and a new bull market started

[Jacob Franek @jacobfranek]

@JTLonsdale @InstituteCicero @8vc go joe!

[Imran @lmrankhan]

If creator revenue or callouts are done correctly in trading apps, they can become more than a source of perpetual revenue for signaling trades.

The best creators will eventually optimize for quality of their trades vs pump n dumps or -ev calls, because their reputation directly impacts their future distribution and earnings

Good calls -> better reputation -> more followers -> more volume -> more revenue -> greater incentive to protect reputation > better calls

It becomes a self reinforcing, positive reflexive loop where reputation becomes like an economic asset

[Nick Forster | Derive @nickforster]

Quietly compounding during the bear, Derive is ready for the bull

[U.S. Ambassador to Belgium Bill White @USAmbToBelgium]

The United States Mission to Belgium condemns, in the strongest terms, Ghent University’s retaliation against an American scholar following his accurate whistleblower reporting on academic fraud.

The United States government regularly funds and supports research, academic exchanges, and other engagements with overseas universities. Dishonest, corrupt institutions that engage in, or reward, scapegoating mob behavior are not desirable partners for us. This is particularly true where the purpose and effect of the scapegoating is to punish accurate journalism unearthing academic dishonesty. We are therefore reviewing any relationships we have with Ghent University.

Bad-faith idealogues will try to make this a referendum on the content of Cofnas’s scholarship – or polemical distortions of it. That’s wrong. Free speech means that controversial views are protected. And Cofnas’s views were known to Ghent University when he was hired.

The ultimate purpose of freedom of speech is to overturn lies, fraud, and false ideologies. This is precisely what Cofnas was doing, and precisely the reason his home institution wants to silence him.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.

[Erik Voorhees @ErikVoorhees]

Both parties in a desperate race to distance themselves from intelligence

[Steven Fulop @StevenFulop]

NYC will always have enormous advantages. But we shouldn’t confuse having advantages with being entitled to the jobs. Companies have choices now, and they’re clearly exercising them. Im quoted in this article because Morgan Stanley is now the fourth major company this year to make a similar announcement, and the pattern deserves a serious conversation.

Post-Covid, employers realized something fundamental: they can maintain a New York address without putting their next 1,000, 5,000 or 10,000 jobs here. They can grow elsewhere.

And every job that goes elsewhere means lost revenue that NYC needs to fund schools, public safety, housing and social services. That creates pressure for higher taxes and more anti-business policies, which only gives employers another reason to put their next jobs somewhere else. It’s a downward spiral unless elected leaders are willing to push back and find a better balance - even when politically difficult - that’s leadership.

What makes this more concerning is the contrast: other states are aggressively rolling out the welcome mat for jobs from NY and investment while NYC itself increasingly vilifies the very success we depend on to fund our priorities.