Original text: The Rollup

Compiled & organized by: Yuliya, PANews

In the context of stablecoins gradually approaching a trillion-dollar scale, a new generation of infrastructure projects is actively laying out plans to compete for discourse power globally. Plasma is one of the most notable representatives, with a vision not only to build a stablecoin chain but also to create a truly scalable and community-driven financial network. This episode of The Rollup invites Plasma CEO Paul Faecks, who will share his thoughts and practices regarding Plasma's mainnet launch, community incentives, revenue design, competitive landscape, and future product planning. PANews has compiled and organized the text of this dialogue.

Mainnet Launch and Team Challenges

Host: Paul, it's great to have you here. The past few days must have been very tense for you and your team. Can you talk about that experience?

Paul Faecks: The entire week has been exceptionally tight, as launching a new chain involves many external factors, and many aspects are not entirely controllable. However, so far, everything has gone relatively smoothly. The team is very exhausted, but it’s gratifying to see the results materialize. Of course, the real challenges are still ahead. We have just released the Plasma One product, and the chain, DeFi ecosystem, and trading modules are just the basics; there is still a lot of work to be done in the coming years.

Host: You are only 26 years old and are already leading such a large project. That’s really impressive. Can you share your thoughts on your vision for the future?

Paul Faecks: Our direction is very clear: Plasma is not just about launching a chain; we aim to gradually build a complete stablecoin ecosystem. The past few weeks are just the starting point; the real construction has just begun.

Community Incentives and Token Distribution

Host: Before the chain went live, you designed a very unique incentive structure, such as "if you deposit $1 on the chain, you can receive $10,000 worth of XPL," which has a high level of dissemination. This model helped Plasma avoid many controversies. Why did you choose this approach?

Paul Faecks: Our principle has always been transparency and openness. Whether it’s public fundraising or token distribution, we want to give everyone the opportunity to participate. A stablecoin chain must rely on community enthusiasm and widespread grassroots participation; only when the community truly feels the value can the ecosystem be healthy. Nathan (Plasma's growth director) has played a key role in this regard with the stablecoin collective, ensuring that the distribution method is both fair and can stimulate user participation. This design is essentially aimed at allowing more people to feel the unique community atmosphere of Plasma.

Host: The market generally considers this to be one of the best launch cases of the year, or even this cycle. Many people felt that the team strategically considered how to balance large and small holders, allowing more people to feel a sense of belonging when receiving rewards.

Revenue Design and Sustainability

Host: Currently, Plasma has already seen considerable revenue, such as the high yield of Ethena USD, circular arbitrage, and XPL incentives. Many people are concerned about the sustainability of these revenues. How do you avoid falling into a "farming-selling" short-term model?

Paul Faecks: This is a key question. We are very clear that relying solely on liquidity mining is unsustainable; a stablecoin network must depend on widespread distribution and real demand. Our strategy is:

• Pursue real, organic user demand rather than purely incentive mining.

• Achieve large-scale distribution. This is our key focus. For example, before the launch, we expanded our cooperation with Binance Earn, which has 280 million users. This allows a massive number of users to directly access products on the Plasma chain within the exchange, which is a huge breakthrough.

In the long run, for Plasma to truly succeed, it must move towards large-scale application scenarios, breaking out of the niche crypto circle, and not just rely on "crypto-native speculative users." We have always emphasized avoiding a purely incentive cycle and instead promoting the generation of organic demand.

Host: Many projects launch first and then use token incentives for the ecosystem, while you successfully attracted a large amount of liquidity before the token launch. What is your core advantage?

Paul Faecks: I firmly believe that we have the most incredible team in the crypto world. Having a group of extremely sharp, long-term visionaries who genuinely want to create value is the strongest moat any company can have.

Competitive Landscape in the Stablecoin Field

Host: The CEO of Circle believes that the stablecoin market is about "growing the pie together." When you think about this "stablecoin chain war" with giants like Stripe and Circle, how do you view Plasma's positioning and advantages?

Paul Faecks: I believe stablecoins are at a huge turning point. The current market size is about $260 billion to $270 billion, but it will definitely reach a trillion-dollar level, and most of the growth has yet to happen. Therefore, our thinking about competition has also changed. When we first started, people questioned "why does a stablecoin need a chain"; now, our competitors have become giants like Stripe.

I think our goals differ from those of our competitors. The scale of this war will be enormous; I do not believe that Ethereum or Tron has won the scaling war yet, because what we refer to as "scale" today will mean completely different magnitudes in three to five years. We will see dedicated chains with hundreds of billions of stablecoins processing trillions of transactions daily. That is the future we are striving for.

We try not to get caught up in trivial questions like "What is Tempo doing? What is Codex doing?" I have deep respect for these teams; I think they are very sharp, and in some ways, they are pursuing different things.

The Impact of Stablecoins Reaching a Trillion Scale

Host: Another factor that has caused a leap in competitive forces is that people are beginning to accept the concept of "trillions." This is partly related to the U.S. government's need to finance its debt and use stablecoin companies as issuance channels. Now, it seems to be a consensus that stablecoins will reach a trillion in circulation. I want to ask more generally, what chain reactions will a trillion-dollar stablecoin ecosystem bring?

Paul Faecks: This is a rather complex question because it involves too many layers of change. I firmly believe that the world you describe will eventually become a reality, and we are focused on that. But the road to get there will be complicated.

Especially in the U.S., people have already realized the importance of stablecoins as a national strategy. Scott Besson has mentioned that stablecoins are a key strategic component of global dollar monetary policy because you need a price-insensitive buyer to purchase your government bonds. Stablecoins have indeed solved many problems in many places and released tremendous potential.

Host: As these things become more integrated, how will this affect the on-chain landscape?

Paul Faecks: I believe the boundary between on-chain and off-chain finance will become increasingly blurred, and we are witnessing this happen. There are two memes that have persisted for years and only recently became a reality: one is "institutions are coming," and the other is the hybrid of "CeFi at the front end, DeFi at the back end."

You will see more centralized financial products supported by on-chain processes in the back end, such as Coinbase and Binance have already launched similar products. This combination of pure on-chain and "traditional finance + on-chain" is where the real potential is released, and it is also a direction that Plasma is very focused on.

Plasma One Application and XPL Token Value

Host: You have launched the Plasma One application, a new type of bank (neobank that can provide financial services to global users, especially those in regions with inadequate banking services, through stablecoins and cross-border payments). What is its vision?

Paul Faecks: Stablecoins are the perfect technological foundation for building consumer-facing financial products. Plasma One has two goals:

• Provide an excellent user experience: Especially for users in countries with inadequate banking systems (such as Argentina, Turkey, etc.), providing a convenient channel to access dollars and enjoy modern financial tools. We can build a financial experience based on stablecoins that is far better than traditional banks.

• Act as a "distribution wedge": It is a concrete product that allows ordinary people to actually use the Plasma chain. Through it, we can gain a wide range of end users, thereby establishing a strong network effect, which is something Tron was once good at.

Host: So, how will the XPL token capture the value of the network?

Paul Faecks: We are very clear that XPL must play a core role in Plasma's economy. We want to avoid the confusion of value capture models like Uniswap, which is not suitable for long-term development. Although we cannot provide a completely clear answer at this moment, the system design will always be highly aligned with community interests, and we will explain the relevant details more openly in the future. Meanwhile, the XPL token will play an important role in this process, becoming a key driving force for the entire system.

Relationship with Tether and Ultimate Vision

Host: If 100 is the full score, Tether's co-founder believes their company has only developed to 0.25. How do you view Tether and its relationship with Plasma?

Paul Faecks: If Tether is at 0.25, then I think Plasma might only be at 0.00001; we have a lot of work ahead of us.

The Tether team has clearly built a truly generational company, and they have made many extremely long-term oriented decisions over the years, which we can only hope to emulate. I believe USDT has largely won the stablecoin game; it has a distribution network that is extremely difficult to replicate.

For us, it has always been very clear that Plasma is built around USDT. We have various stablecoins on our chain, but Tether is very dominant, with an extremely wide distribution moat that I think is hard to replicate. We greatly admire them and enjoy collaborating with them. I have the deepest respect for Paulo and the entire Tether team.

Host: Finally, for someone who is just getting to know Plasma, what is the one thing you most want them to know?

Paul Faecks: The one thing I want everyone to know is that we will win the stablecoin market. Stablecoins will become one of the largest markets globally, with a target market size equivalent to global GDP, and we hope to take a share of that. The future of global commerce will run on stablecoins, and Plasma will power it.

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