Nicholas Gregory, CEO of CommerceBlock, joins the show to talk about their new statechain implementation, Mercury. In this episode:

Origins of CommerceBlock
Nicholas' prior career in martial arts
Nicholas' underground MMA club in NY
Did Roger Ver take the most expensive BJJ lesson ever?
The purpose of CommerceBlock's Mainstay system
The difference between OpenTimestamps and Mainstay
How sidechains evolved from the original vision and where they are today
What can Bitcoin learn from Ethereum?
Nic's rundown of privacy-enhancing technologies
Centralized mixers versus coinjoin versus statechains for privacy
How statechains allows you to send a UTXO without an on-chain transaction
Trust drawbacks and caveats in using statechains
CommerceBlock's Mercury statechain implementation
Statechains as virtual opendimes
Synergies between statechains and Lightning
Nicholas' thoughts on Bitcoin scalability
Statechain timelines

Sponsor notes:

Copper is transforming how institutional investors engage with digital assets by developing award-winning custody and next-gen trading infrastructure. Headquartered in London, the firm is scaling rapidly across Asia and North America to bring its suite of products to a wider pool of institutional investors. To learn more visit copper.co or reach out on Twitter, @CopperHQ

Aave is a decentralized, open source, and non-custodial protocol where users can deposits and borrow digital assets, and earn interest on those assets. Head over to aave.com to experience and learn more about DeFi.

Nicholas Gregory (CommerceBlock) on statechains for scalability and privacy (EP.211)