Mai Santamaria

This one was special. Episode 300 of MoneyNeverSleeps was recorded live at the Podcast Studios at HeadStuff HQ in Dublin - the legendary former Westland Studios where artists like U2, Dropkick Murphys, and Hozier have recorded in the past - marking the end of an era for the show’s long-form interview format, and the beginning of a new chapter. Seven years. Three hundred episodes. Hundreds of conversations with founders, operators, investors, regulators, technologists, and dreamers building wh...

This week, we’re taking a look back at some of my favorite moments from the past year—the conversations that stuck with me long after we hit stop on the recording. If you missed them the first time around, now’s your chance to catch the highlights, chock full of startup smarts and web3 wisdom!

This week, I’m joined by the brilliant Mai Santamaria for a far-ranging discussion inspired by Ian Goldin’s concept of The Butterfly Defect — a thought-provoking take on the risks and interconnectedness of our global systems. We dive into how this idea resonates with the evolution of crypto, web3, and the financial markets, and explore how the convergence of traditional and decentralized systems could reshape the future. Mai, an award-winning fintech and financial policy expert, has been a tr...

This week, I’m joined by guest co-host Mai Santamaria, the head of the financial advisory unit for the Department of Finance in Ireland. We delve into the world of digital identity, discussing the projects of World ID and TON, iris and palm scanning, and how humans are incentivized to digitalize their identity. Mai and I explore the broader implications of digital identity on economic freedoms and the geopolitical landscape that influences the sovereignty of digital infrastructure.

Mai Santamaria joins me once again as guest co-host as we riff on the intersection of digital identity, digital wallets, blockchain, CBDCs, and how the political regime under which an individual lives influences your senses of trust and risk. We also blow to bits my expectation that the new EU digital identity wallet will have anything to do with blockchain, contrary to what we’re seeing with digital identity frameworks in Latin America.

This week I’m joined by guest co-host Mai Santamaria, the Head of the Financial Advisory Unit for the Department of Finance in Ireland. Mai and I riff on where crypto exchange Binance goes from here after being fined $4.3bn, with co-founder and CEO Changpeng Zao stepping down.  We also look at the new crypto-friendly Argentinian president, Javier Milei, and what he might do with dollarization and crypto adoption, and then finish up with a mind-opening counterpoint on Ethereum co-founder Vitalk Buterin’s new manifesto.

Mai Santamaria joins us this week to talk about how she fell into accounting and used it as a stepping stone to drive change across many organisations....as well as sharing an unfortunate translation mistake!