At WEF23 in Davos, BlackRock* COO Rob Goldstein joined Circle CEO and Co-Founder Jeremy Allaire for a wide-ranging discussion on our companies’ evolving partnership, along with ways to use digital cash to eliminate inefficiencies from institutional flows.
Goldstein joined BlackRock 29 years ago and has played an instrumental role in helping to grow the firm into one of the world’s leading providers of investment, advisory and risk management solutions, with more than $8.5 trillion AUM today. Allaire co-founded Circle 10 years ago, and over the past 5 years has led the growth of the company and its dollar digital currency USD Coin (USDC) to more than $40 billion in circulation as of Feb. 10, 2023.
Last year, BlackRock began implementing a carefully planned digital asset strategy that included an equity investment in Circle and the launch of the Circle Reserve Fund to manage a portion of the USDC reserve.
Here are some highlights of the conversation.
The catalyst for Blackrock's digital asset strategy
Goldstein discusses how last year’s sanctions against Russia brought a renewed focus on global payment systems. Instead of shutting down digital assets, regulators and governments began to get smarter about potential frameworks to oversee the industry.
Fixing the inefficiencies of institutional flows
Goldstein and Allaire talk about how using digital cash – like USDC – can help eliminate inefficiencies in the institutional world, including through tokenization of securities.
The launch of the Circle Reserve Fund
Goldstein explains the benefits of creating a 2a-7 government money market fund to manage the majority of the USDC cash reserve.
View the full conversation here.
*Rob Goldstein is COO and Head of BlackRock Solutions at BlackRock, which manages the Circle Reserve Fund, a registered Rule 2a-7 government money market fund.
