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Real Conversations about Real-World PayFi

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• 8 min read
Real Conversations about Real-World PayFi

From Schnitzels to Stablecoins: Real Talk with Triple B

In the latest episode of Real Conversations about Real-World PayFi, Concordium’s CEO Boris Bohrer-Bilowitzki (aka “Triple B”) serves up unfiltered insights, from almost opening a Viennese restaurant to architecting blockchain infrastructure for the next financial era. This is different from your average crypto chatter. It’s a no-buzzword, no-BS journey through identity, programmable money, and why Concordium might be the rails for real-world adoption. Pull up a seat. The proof is in the pudding.

1 Boris Bohrer-Bilowitzki Origins: From Liechtenstein to Concordium

  • Boris Bohrer-Bilowitzki (“Triple B”) traces his roots to Liechtenstein—a regulatory-forward crypto hub.
  • Background in private banking and trusts, followed by a stint in brokerage in Vienna, then London.
  • Nearly opened a high-end Austrian restaurant, but crypto came calling.
  • Co-founded Copper in 2018—an institutional-grade crypto custodian that played a key role in scaling Web3 infrastructure.
  • Eventually exited as Copper “outgrew him” and regulatory layers multiplied.
  • Joined Concordium mid-2024, seeking a fresh challenge in a space that still has something real to build.
  • And yes, he still has a soft spot for boiled, baked, and braised Bavarian cuisine—food podcast pending.
  • Comments 

2 WEB3 DISILLUSIONMENT

  • Not a Liechtenstein story: Background shaped perspective, but entry into crypto was pragmatic, not national
  • Buzzwords rejected : “Web3,” “TradFi,” and similar terms dismissed as hollow
  • Post-2017 space not a success: Boris sees little real progress, labels much of it “bullshit”
  • Focus on substance: Frustrated by meme coins and performative DeFi; calls for real utility
  • 20 years in finance: brings clarity on where to apply pressure and how to filter noise
  • Copper’s role acknowledged: Anthony notes its importance; Boris now focused on protocol-level execution
  • Comments 

3 WHY CONCORDIUM

  • Copper connection: First encountered Concordium when it became a Copper client
  • Core appeal: identity at base layer: Only chain he saw solving the KYC/AML problem structurally, not at the edge
  • Regulatory realism: Real-world finance doesn’t work without identity - banks won’t onboard “nobody”
  • Dismisses utopian DeFi: Talks of drawing mortgages in your underwear on a Sunday via DeFi were unrealistic years ago. 
  • Core USP: Centered around identity  
  • ZK + ID = unlock: Claims Concordium uniquely combines identity and zero-knowledge proofs to enable compliance and privacy
  • Vision: smart payments at all levels: Sees blockchain’s real use case in payments—from coffee to complex finance
  • Bigger pie untouched: $3.4T crypto market is still a sideshow—real value sits in untapped identity-anchored utility
  • Comments

4 PLT VS SMART CONTRACTS

  • Privacy as final frontier 
    • Anthony Day frames programmable privacy as essential for Web3 to scale
    • Identity, decentralization, and infra are understood, but lack of selective disclosure blocks enterprise
  • Concordium’s correction 
    • Boris agrees on privacy but disagrees on smart contracts
    • Calls them great for conditionality, not for custody
  • Base-layer execution 
    • Relying on contracts for holding funds is flawed and causes hacks 
    • True programmable money must live at protocol level, 
  • PLT model 
    • Protocol Level Tokens issued natively alongside CCD 
    • Allow logic and enforcement without smart contract custody risk
  • Identity + ZK stack
    • Adding built-in identity and zero-knowledge proofs enables smart money:
      • age gates 
      • geofencing 
      • selective disclosure
  • Positioning 
    • Smart money must be native, private, and programmable
    • Concordium built for this, even if still under the radar
  • Comments

5 STABLECOINS AS ENTRY POINT

  • Mass adoption vector
    • Stablecoins seen as the natural next step toward adoption
    • Current use cases limited to crypto-native activity (collateral, DeFi, trading)
  • Not targeting crypto-native
    • Concordium avoids competing with Tether/Circle on exchange collateral use
    • Focus is on unlocking real-world utility — not on-chain leverage
  • Value of identity
    • Identity is key for real use cases and regulatory alignment (e.g. Travel Rule)
    • Concordium is being pulled into compliance-heavy territory for this reason
  • Chain repositioning
    • Concordium is now “a chain for stablecoins” 
    • Strategic shift made early 2024
    • Focused on use-case-driven adoption, not speculative volume
  • Protocol-level support
    • PLTs launching end of June or early July
    • 7 to 8 issuers already actively building stablecoin solutions on Concordium
  • Regulatory tailwind
    • U.S. Genius Act and global pressure indicate stablecoin compliance will unlock broader innovation
    • Stablecoins serve as on-ramp for real-world programmable assets
  • Positioning
    • Stablecoins are the Trojan horse 
    • Concordium is structured to ride on that bringing regulation into relevance
  • Comments

6 FROM FIAT ANCHORS TO TOKENIZED UTILITY

  • Fiat and regulatory reality
    • Starting with fiat currencies makes sense in current geopolitical context (BRICS, Middle East, dollar pressure)
    • Regulation like MiCA is critical, even if some ignore it
    • Compliance must be built in at the base layer
    • Identity becomes central to solving compliance-related problems
  • Stablecoins as stepping stones
    • Stablecoins misunderstood as just “digital euros” or “digital dollars” (Anthony Day)
    • True potential lies in programmable value-bearing instruments
    • Tokenizing yield-generating funds makes sense if they can also be used for payment
    • Stablecoins are a necessary first step before broader financial innovation
  • Adoption requires abstraction 
    • UX must move beyond keys and mnemonics: seamless design
    • Users shouldn’t need to understand blockchain to benefit from it
    • The backend complexity of existing financial systems is already opaque—blockchain should aim for same user simplicity
  • Meme coins and capital attraction
    • Meme coins prove that ideas can attract liquidity
    • Not inherently valuable but show “network value” and “community value”
    • They may be the V1 of something better (Anthony Day commenting)
    • Community actions (e.g. X-to-earn) can be rewarded through tokens
    • Applications can abstract staking, voting, and distribution into user-friendly formats
  • Comments

7 IDENTITY, AND USE-CASE-DRIVEN PRIVACY

  • ZK tied to real-world needs
    • Concordium’s privacy model is strictly tied to use cases, not abstract ideology
    • Users shouldn’t need to show ID constantly just to access services
    • “It comes down to what you’re trying to access”
  • How Concordium handles identity
    • Users identify once via the wallet (passport/driver’s license photo)
    • ID is verified off-chain by third-party identity providers (IDPs)
    • A cryptographic hash (not the ID) is issued and stored in the wallet
    • This becomes a reusable identity object, example: birthdate becomes a hash, not shared data
  • ZK use cases
    • Age verification: the chain confirms if user is over 18, without revealing date of birth
    • Geofencing: verifies jurisdiction for regulated assets without disclosing nationality
    • Compliance-driven sectors (gaming, gambling, adult content, stablecoin issuance) are key targets
  • Analogy to legacy systems
    • Similar to needing a bank card to buy cigarettes—banks did KYC, age is inferred
    • Same logic now applied with ZK: prove conditions without disclosing identity
  • Clarification on data
    • “Your passport is never on-chain”—a recurring concern Concordium addresses
    • Concordium replicates the exchange/bank model: proof is stored, not data
    • The identity object is wallet-bound and only releases yes/no proof when needed
  • Comments

8 PROOF WITHOUT EXPOSURE: ZK, SIMPLICITY, AND SMARTER MONEY

  • Use case examples (Anthony Day)
    • Data purchase: buyer can prove jurisdiction or rights without revealing identity (e.g. CIA buying sensitive data)
    • Highly relevant in regulated sectors and privacy-sensitive industries
    • Data not made available etc. etc. 
    • Generally basic explanation of ZKP
  • Protocol-level design (Boris)
    • ZK tied into Concordium at the protocol level, not in smart contracts
    • Enables native enforcement of constraints like geofencing, age, jurisdiction
  • No smart money (yet)
    • “Smart programmable money” is mostly a myth today, true programmability is rare
    • Most current implementations require extra infrastructure to work
    • Concordium claims to offer the foundational design to support it natively
  • ZK complexity and adoption
    • Only a handful of experts truly understand ZK cryptography
    • Enterprise adoption depends on usability and trust, not technical mastery
    • Existing financial systems are also opaque; blockchain must offer similar abstraction (archaically complex with 1970s technology)
  • Strategic direction
    • Space needs simplicity, not more complexity
    • Boris argues the market is dominated by a few giants (BTC, EHT, SOL) and “a kilometer of shit”
    • Instead of fighting over crumbs, the goal should be to “bake a new cake” for real-world value
  • Comments

9 BUILDING THE FUTURE: USE CASES AND RAILS

  • Emerging ecosystem
    • Provenance Tags highlighted as part of an "old" ecosystem
    • 7+ projects currently building on Concordium, with more announcements expected 
    • Focus areas include MiCA-compliant euro and dollar stablecoins, local-yield initiatives, and identity-driven applications
    • Several more will be announced over the coming weeks
  • PLTs unlock real-world logic
    • Protocol Level Tokens (PLTs) to launch end of June/July
    • Enable non-custodial smart contracts which just enforces conditionallity
    • Use cases range from programmable yield distribution to rental deposits with profit-sharing logic
  • Key verticals
    • Trade finance: Adds transparency and yield to high-value flows; smart contracts enforce delivery/payment terms
    • Escrow/rental: Yield-generating locked deposits with programmable condition enforcement
    • Regulated grey zones: Gaming, gambling, and adult industries benefit from built-in age verification and compliance
  • Strategic shift
    • Identity stack makes Concordium attractive for serious builders, despite its low hype and “non-Solana” history
    • Builders choose Concordium not for attention, but for infrastructure that actually solves compliance and privacy
  • Regulatory outlook
    • Success tied to solving for MiCA, the Genius Act, and upcoming stablecoin regulation
    • Concordium positioning itself as the rails—not the apps—for compliant financial innovation at scale
  • Comments

10 ADOPTION BARRIERS & INSTITUTIONAL INTEGRATION

  • Joke about Pudding and audience comment
    • The core issue is not what blockchain solves, but how to scale it to national/institutional levels
    • Stablecoins and blockchain have massive potential, but replacing existing systems with proper governance is the real challenge
    • Cybersecurity, regulatory compliance, and legacy integration are all friction points
  • Enterprise adoption faces cultural and technical inertia
    • Example: ASX’s failed blockchain upgrade shows how hard DLT integration can be
    • Traditional finance teams (e.g. treasury or accounting) are not equipped for wallets, keys, or custodial risks
    • Complexity of token management is a blocker—“Glenda in Finance” shouldn’t need to understand mnemonic phrases
  • Web3 UX is still too difficult
    • Irreversible loss from lost private keys is a non-starter for most users
    • Better UX and abstraction layers are essential—Concordium works on this via identity mint/burn mechanisms
    • Industry leaders still use overly complex language, limiting accessibility and understanding
  • Lessons from the internet
    • Adoption curve mirrors the internet: early confusion, slow uptake, eventual critical mass
    • People don’t need to understand how the internet works to use it—the same must happen for blockchain
  • Path forward: simplicity + resilience
    • Systems must be simple, familiar, and come with safety nets
    • Blockchain has the potential to be cheaper, faster, and more robust—but only if it becomes invisible to the end user
  • Comments

11 PARALLEL SYSTEMS, MARKET READINESS & NEXT CYCLE

  • Transformation takes time—even with strong business cases
    • Even simple tech replacements take 1–2 years in traditional enterprises
    • Core banking upgrades are notoriously slow—legacy infrastructure (often from the 1970s) cannot just be “switched off”
    • Systems are wrapped in layers just to prevent collapse; this adds complexity and fragility
  • Institutions are aware—and cautiously experimenting
    • Large players are not complacent; they are testing incremental improvements
    • Adoption will run in parallel to legacy systems until confidence is high enough to scale
  • Real value: system replacement, not just token value
    • Bitcoin’s role is secure as a store of value; now attention shifts to replacing infrastructure
    • Broader utility requires trust, resilience, and a familiar user experience
  • Momentum is building in the right places
    • Stripe, MasterCard, and others are piloting stablecoin-based payment infrastructure
    • PayFi aligns perfectly with these trends, and Concordium’s privacy+compliance design is attracting serious issuer interest
  • Comments

12 FINAL THOUGHTS: SIMPLICITY, STABLECOINS & WHAT COMES NEXT

  • Simplicity is key
    • Adoption hinges on abstracting complexity away from both retail and institutional users
    • From MetaMask to Copper, projects must prioritize usability across the stack
    • Retail users shouldn’t worry about private keys; concepts like sponsored transactions will help
  • Payment is the wedge
    • Stablecoins as a means of payment is not a big leap given existing merchant networks (e.g. PayPal, Stripe, MasterCard)
    • Concordium’s infrastructure aligns well with this shift—privacy, compliance, and stablecoin readiness
  • Regulation is the tailwind
    • Current momentum in global regulation is pushing the ecosystem forward
    • Real-world use cases and regulatory clarity will drive faster mainstream adoption
  • Closing note
    • Boris emphasizes leaving the crypto bubble behind to focus on tangible, real-world integrations
    • Episode closes on a light tone with a “proof pudding” reference—Concordium encouraged to keep building and stay visible
  • Comments
    • (153 words)

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