Watch the full episode here: https://youtu.be/Cwjwf6UkNWU
This clip is part of a much deeper conversation. If you want the full context on where institutional crypto is actually headed, watch the entire episode and subscribe to the DCO Podcast for long-form discussions built for operators, founders, and decision makers.
Institutional crypto adoption is often described as inevitable, but rarely is it explained honestly. This clip captures one of the core reasons progress has been slower than expected: most blockchain systems were not designed for how institutions actually operate. Transparency, which is frequently celebrated as a defining feature of public blockchains, becomes a liability when applied to payroll, capital markets, treasury operations, and large-scale financial workflows.
In this conversation, Eric Saraniecki, Co-Founder and Head of Product at Digital Asset and a core builder behind Canton Network, explains why privacy is not a philosophical preference for institutions but a structural requirement. Banks, asset managers, and market operators cannot run critical systems on infrastructure that globally broadcasts sensitive activity. Imagine processing payroll, bonuses, or large capital movements on a fully public ledger. The operational and economic risks are obvious.
The clip also challenges a common misconception around stablecoins and institutional product market fit. While stablecoins have grown rapidly, their usage by large institutions remains limited. This is not due to lack of interest, but because public blockchains are deeply inappropriate for many institutional use cases. Institutions need the benefits of distributed systems without exposing every transaction to the world. They need deterministic workflows, controlled visibility, and compliance built into the infrastructure itself.
This is where Canton Network enters the discussion. Rather than forcing institutions to choose between decentralization and privacy, Canton is designed to support both. It allows independent applications to interoperate while preserving local privacy. Participants can share workflows and logic without relying on global broadcast or leaking sensitive information. This architecture is essential for real-world asset tokenization, digital asset treasury operations, stablecoin infrastructure, and capital markets coordination.
The broader theme of the episode, reflected in this clip, is that institutions do not operate on ideology. They operate on risk frameworks, capital efficiency, and reliability. Infrastructure must make workflows easier, not introduce new forms of exposure. Earlier enterprise blockchain efforts failed because they either tried to retrofit public-chain assumptions into institutional environments or built private systems without meaningful interoperability. The current wave of institutional interest is different because the problems are clearer and the constraints are better understood.
Throughout the full conversation, Eric outlines how Bitcoin, stablecoins, and tokenized financial instruments will not reach meaningful institutional scale until privacy, workflow integrity, and regulatory alignment are addressed at the infrastructure level. Transparency can be a feature for open ecosystems, but for banks and global markets, it must be selective and intentional.
This clip offers a focused window into those realities, but it is only a fragment of the larger discussion. Watch the full episode to understand how institutions think about validation, settlement, liquidity, and operational control, and why the next phase of crypto adoption will be shaped by infrastructure choices rather than narratives.
Subscribe to the DCO Podcast for more conversations that prioritize substance over hype and examine how capital markets, blockchain infrastructure, and institutional systems are actually evolving.