Kevin de Patoul, CEO & Co-Founder of Keyrock | From Market Making to Global Scale: The Digital Asset Revolution

Thanks, Kevin.

Well, firstly, congratulations.

That's no mean feat to...

I mean, as you say, many people can have an idea and start something, particularly when barriers are created that are lower and allow for innovation.

But to have started this organisation in 2017 And we're in 2025 recording here, and you're going from what sounds like strength to strength, puts you in a very small percentage of there will still be a lot to do and challenges to come, as you know, but really having built something meaningful.

So truly remarkable.

Congratulations.

And many things to dig into there.

first question is you know the original thesis um i mean how long are we seven or eight years on um does it remain exactly uh as you assumed it to be is it remarkably different or is it somewhere in the middle that thesis being uh you know at the highest level that all assets will become digital

yeah i think that that remains uh entirely the case in if anything i'm more and more convinced of it because what is nice is that you know kirok we've been saying this for seven years but now you're blackrock saying it as well right so it does help to cement your convictions but i think there's also i mean to be very honest i think there's also a bit of to some extent retrofitting right it's not like we had we had a plan seven years ago and everything went exactly according to plan it didn't but that you know things change and where we went as a company changed and you adapt, you kind of pivot, you adapt to the market, build new things.

But everything that we did was what was there from the beginning is that really conviction that all assets will eventually be digital.

And that, if anything, is just getting stronger.

I think the reason for it is that from like it's not a philosophical belief, right? When you look at the genesis of digital asset, there was like this whole movement of cypherpunks and a lot of it is to some extent I mean, there is some philosophy into it of decentralization is good in and out of itself and so on and so forth.

But for us, even though we do see the merit of decentralization in a new system, the reason why we're so convinced is that when you look at the numbers, it just makes economic sense to exchange value digitally versus doing it in a traditional centralized system.

And we see that we had kind of the A parallel that I think is useful is with information.

We saw what happened when you start digitizing information and how much information starts to flow much more freely and everything becomes basically an order of magnitude bigger.

And we just thought eventually, no matter where your philosophical beliefs are, and even if you are a bank, you will eventually see that transferring value through a blockchain It's just a faster, easier way, cheaper, more secure way to do it.

I don't think that if the sentence

is know financial assets will digitalize there's many people who would put a strong case for that not um being the conclusion that we get to just with an asterisk to time frame which is a significant asterisk if you then take it to the the nuance of with the blockchain is how that will happen, then there would be some people who would argue against that.

I mean, now less, but certainly seven years ago.

But all of that is to say, just because, you know, that makes sense.

You know, a few guys coming together and saying that lofty thing isn't going to create any success.

So I'd love to know, you know, and there'll be many things.

And as you humbly said, like, you know, have to refine your course many times when you're starting but what's really the moment that from that coming together founders like you know you're anybody looks at backgrounds you know relatively well-placed bright individuals from good organizations to come together and do this but like it doesn't doesn't necessarily mean it's going to happen what's that moment where it's like not the aha but the product market fit where you're like oh we've we're going to be successful at this as well like how long did that take and what do you attribute it to and the categories might be did you get luck is a terrible word but it will take some of it and hard work the absolute right investors who guided you like how did they believe in a bunch of guys who had this huge vision was it just as founders you you had some magic was it um you know the timing of the market um just allowed you to take the opportunity when no one else there's many categories there love to hear you play around with some of that please

i think it's a bit uh all of the above right but The thing that I don't think there is one product market fit like this, especially if you look at where we are today, right? We have many different things on the market and many different revenue lines, type of clients, product.