The Real Maxime Podcast

In this episode, we are joined by Morgan McKenney, CEO of the Provenance Foundation, a public proof-of-stake blockchain designed specifically to enable regulated financial services firms to deploy digital assets. Morgan joined Provenance in 2022 to lead its ecosystem expansion. She is passionate about enabling the digital economy, harnessing emerging technology for business value and democratizing access to financial services to support economic growth. Tune in to hear more about Morgan's journey as a global Fintech and digital transformation leader.

In this episode, we are joined by Robert Alcorn, Co-Founder and CEO of Clearpool, a highly innovative and composable protocol that enables borrowers to raise unsecured liquidity directly from DeFi markets. Clearpool's founding goal was to solve the problem of over-collateralization, one of the most significant problems facing DeFi borrowers. Rob is an experienced founder with a 25-year career including operating a family business and building large fixed income sales and trading businesses. Tune in to hear more about Rob's journey as a DeFi entrepreneur.

In this episode, we are joined by Paul Saint Donat, Partner of dlab, a first check discovery venture capital firm providing capital and resources to web3 and crypto projects. Paul and his team are committed to helping founders at the time where they need it the most: the beginning. They share a core belief that web3 will usher in a more open, transparent and participatory world creating an Internet-sized impact. In our conversation, Paul opens up about his upbringing in New York City, finding purpose as an AmeriCorps volunteer before joining the buy-side. Tune in to hear more about Paul's journey as a digital fund entrepreneur.

In this episode, we are joined by Kyle Downey, CEO and co-founder of Cloudwall, a provider of state-of-the-art risk management infrastructure to a growing base of institutional traders and investors in digital assets. Kyle launched his venture after calling time on his leadership career at Morgan Stanley, where he was a Managing Director in the bank’s automated risk trading department. In our conversation, Kyle discusses his unconventional path to Wall Street, Cloudwall’s founding story and the challenges its platform is striving to solve. Tune in to hear more about Kyle's journey as a Fintech entrepreneur.

In this episode, we are joined by Marcus Leanos, founder and Chief Investment Officer of MJL Capital, a fundamentally-driven, research-focused crypto-native hedge fund. Marcus started his career investing in banks and emerging Fintech. He explains to us that what the Internet did for information-transfer, blockchain will do for value-transfer by making all units of value interoperable, programmable and composable. Tune in to hear more about Marcus' journey as an institutional investor and digital fund entrepreneur.

In this episode, we are joined by Aryan Sheikhalian, Head of Research and Investor at CMT Digital to discuss the main web3 infrastructure development threads going on at the moment and understand the path towards better scalability, abstraction and interoperability. A blockchain expert, Aryan is uniquely qualified to make sense of recent technology trends and philosophies in the space.

In this episode, we are joined by Sidney Powell, Co-Founder & CEO of Maple Finance who shares his journey from debt capital markets & institutional banking, to taking on the world of private credit by building a leading capital markets platform on the blockchain. He is one of the most impressive DeFi entrepreneurs we have met, with a keen sense for capital formation, organizational development & go-to market strategy.

In this episode, we sit down with Ash Ashmawy, CEO & Founder of Kemet Trading, who is leading the effort to provide institutional-grade infrastructure for digital asset derivative trading. Ash is a formidable entrepreneur and trading technologist who knows how to execute when he identifies a problem to solve. Tune in to hear his personal journey, and how he was able to secure funding from an impressive list of institutional investors in a challenging year for crypto markets.

In this episode we welcome Benoit Bosc, Managing Director and Global Head of Product at GSR, who is amongst a pioneering group of accomplished institutional traders and risk managers having made the move into crypto and web3. At GSR Benoit works daily to expand the crypto derivative market and provide innovative solutions to a growing franchise of token-issuing ventures. He brings a unique insight into the events of 2022 and the current state of the market.

In this episode we dive into Karl Cole-Fireman’s unconventional journey as both a lawyer and as an entrepreneur, and learn about the various facets of his cutting-edge fund practice. As the founder and Managing Partner of Cole-Frieman & Mallon LLP, Karl is well-known in the crypto industry for his subject matter expertise and his innovative work with managers who invest in non-traditional asset classes.