Why the room needs them.
Rob Hadick is a general partner at Dragonfly, the crypto investment firm that led the seed round for the AUSD issuer Agora and co-led Velocity's $38m Series A. He argues that stablecoins collapse the four-party card model rather than plug into it, a case he set out at length in a June 2025 essay. At Proof of Talk Paris 2026 he joined the Hecto Main Stage fireside on investment opportunities in the rise of stablecoins, and sat on the Proof of Pitch General Track jury.
The full account.
Rob Hadick is a general partner at Dragonfly, the crypto investment firm he joined in 2022 from the hedge fund GoldenTree Asset Management. Fortune reported in February 2026 that he signed in April 2022, sat out a six-month non-compete and started that November, as FTX collapsed. At Dragonfly he covers market structure, stablecoins, payments and tokenised assets. He holds an MBA from Columbia Business School and a degree in economics and political science from Washington University in St. Louis, and sits on the digital asset markets subcommittee of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission's Global Markets Advisory Committee.
Payments is his subject. In June 2025 he published a 12-minute essay, "Stablecoins and the Collapse of the Legacy Payment Model", which traces the card business from Diners Club in 1950 through Bank of America's mass-market card programme to the cooperatives that became Visa and Mastercard, then argues that stablecoins collapse that four-party model rather than connect it. Dragonfly also co-published "Stablecoin Payments From the Ground Up" with Artemis and Castle Island Ventures; Blockworks reported on 30 May 2025 that the study put business-to-business stablecoin payments at an annualised $36bn against $18bn person-to-person.
In April 2024 Dragonfly led the $12m seed round for Agora, issuer of the AUSD digital dollar. The firm announced a $650m fourth fund in February 2026. That July it joined FirstMark to lead a $38m Series A for the London stablecoin payments company Velocity, alongside Coinbase Ventures, Capital One Ventures, QED Investors, Activant Capital, Ripple and Wintermute Ventures. Since 11 June 2026 he has been a director of Avalanche Treasury Corporation, the Nasdaq-listed digital asset treasury company, where he chairs the compensation committee and the nominating and governance committee.
He appeared twice at Proof of Talk Paris 2026, the invitation-only summit held 2–3 June at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in the Louvre Palace, both times on the opening day. At 16:45 he joined the Hecto Main Stage fireside "Investment Opportunities in the Rise of Stablecoins" with Diogo Mónica of Haun Ventures and Anchorage Digital, moderated by Amanda Cassatt of Serotonin. Earlier, from 14:00 on the Taostats Stage, he sat on the General Track jury for Proof of Pitch, judging the pitches rather than making one.
What Rob believes about the next ten years.
Years of shipping.
Lines that keep proving correct.
“Stablecoins aren't just an improvement on or connective tissue for existing payment rails, they allow companies to bypass those legacy rails entirely and collapse the current payments value chain in on itself. Because if you're stablecoin native, everything is just a book transfer.”
“We will not be in a duopoly years from now.”
“Consortiums are hard and they break easily.”
What they have built, written, and backed.
Built
- AgoraIssuer of the AUSD digital dollar, whose co-founder and chief executive is Nick van Eck. Dragonfly led its $12m seed round, announced 2 April 2024, with General Catalyst, Hack VC and Kraken Ventures among those taking part. Hadick was the Dragonfly partner quoted on the deal.
- VelocityLondon stablecoin treasury and settlement platform, founded in 2025. Dragonfly and FirstMark led its $38m Series A in July 2026, joined by Activant Capital, Capital One Ventures, QED Investors, Coinbase Ventures, Wintermute Ventures and Ripple. Velocity says the round took its total raised to nearly $50m since May 2025.
- Stablecoins and the Collapse of the Legacy Payment ModelHis own 12-minute essay, published on Medium on 16 June 2025 under the line "Why Stablecoins will Unlock the First Trillion Dollar Fintech". It runs from Diners Club in 1950 to the cooperatives that became Visa and Mastercard, and argues that a stablecoin-native issuer needs neither an issuing and merchant bank pair nor a card network.
Rob at Proof of Talk
The next Proof of Talk is in Abu Dhabi.
Louvre Abu Dhabi, 3–4 December 2026. Admission is by application, and the room is capped at 2,000.
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