CoinDesk
Andrew Forson, president of DeFi Technologies, pushed back hard on the narrative that decentralized finance is in structural decline, arguing that a $20 billion drop in total value locked and roughly $1.1 billion lost to exploits — including the $292 million Kelp DAO bridge hack — obscure a stablecoin base layer that is growing at a pace no TradFi rail matches.
"DeFi is way more than those protocols that have been hacked. Those who don't know that are suffering from deep ignorance," Forson said in an interview with CoinDesk, contrasting localized code exploits with the broader health of the ecosystem.
Why it matters
Forson anchored his argument in the Treasury market footprint of dollar stablecoins. Stablecoins held more than $150 billion in U.S. T-bills at the end of 2025 — a figure confirmed by the Bank for International Settlements at $153 billion — which he framed as exceeding the central-bank reserves of Saudi Arabia and Germany. Stablecoin transaction volumes are expanding 20% to 30% month-over-month, and Chainalysis estimates stablecoins moved more than $35 trillion last year, with projections of $730 trillion to over a quadrillion dollars by 2035.
He also reframed security risk. Critics such as former OpenZeppelin CTO Manuel Aráoz have warned that AI is becoming "superhuman" at exploiting open-source code, but Forson noted that no core hack has hit the Bitcoin or Ethereum networks, nor the issuers behind USDC or USDT. The transparency of onchain code, he argued, is DeFi's defense mechanism: exploits surface publicly, get debated openly, and get patched in days, while errors in legacy banking can sit in "private buckets" for years.
Market impact
Forson drew a direct line from DeFi's continuous, 24/7 operation to the speed at which the sector stress-tests itself — "toddlers learn to walk by falling" — and warned that Wall Street firms that do not engage with tokenization and crypto services now will lose market share to those that do. BlackRock, JPMorgan, Morgan Stanley, and Charles Schwab have already rolled out crypto and tokenization offerings, suggesting the institutionalization Forson describes is no longer hypothetical.
Frequently asked questions
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Why is DeFi Technologies' president pushing back on the 'DeFi is dead' narrative?
Andrew Forson argues that headline exploits — including the $292M Kelp DAO bridge hack and roughly $1.1B in cumulative losses — obscure a stablecoin base layer that he says is structurally sound, with $150B+ in T-bill backing and 20–30% monthly volume growth.
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How much in U.S. Treasuries do stablecoins currently hold?
According to Forson and the Bank for International Settlements, stablecoins held more than $150B in U.S. T-bills at the end of 2025 — a figure Forson compared to the central-bank reserves of Saudi Arabia and Germany.
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How fast are stablecoin transaction volumes growing?
Forson said stablecoin transaction volumes are expanding 20% to 30% month-over-month. Chainalysis estimated stablecoins moved more than $35T last year, with projections ranging from $730T to over a quadrillion dollars by 2035.
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Has AI actually hacked core DeFi infrastructure like Bitcoin or Ethereum?
Forson noted that no core hack has hit the Bitcoin or Ethereum networks, nor the issuers behind USDC and USDT — pushing back on warnings from former OpenZeppelin CTO Manuel Aráoz that AI is becoming 'superhuman' at exploiting open-source code.
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Which Wall Street firms have moved into crypto and tokenization?
Forson cited BlackRock, JPMorgan, Morgan Stanley, and Charles Schwab as institutions that have rolled out crypto and tokenization offerings, and warned that TradFi firms that don't engage now risk losing market share.
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