Menu #18: Bitcoin Mortgages to FX Plumbing

Chainlink
Radical Business
Web3 Dinner Club: 16th July
Bitcoin Mortgage is here
Brand Spice
Chef’s Note

This is The Menu: the UK Web3 operator’s weekly briefing.

What founders, investors, and builders are actually discussing behind closed doors.

The industry is starting to look less like a series of disconnected experiments and more like a system finding its shape.

In this issue:

Signal, served weekly.

The dinner club is proudly sponsored by Novel Labs.

A multi-award-winning London storytelling studio building the brands of the future in AI, blockchain, and emerging technologies.

Best known for the $100m expansion to the Bored Ape Yacht Club, The Mutant Cartel World.

If you’re a startup or scale-up building a brand and looking for real go-to-market impact from those who have repeatedly built unicorns and category kings as VCs and founders... ask for an intro at the table.

Blockchains are very good at knowing what happens on-chain but not naturally good at knowing what happens in the real world, and smart contracts can execute rules automatically, but they still need reliable information to act on.

That is where Chainlink comes in.

Chainlink is a decentralised oracle network that helps blockchains securely access real-world data and external systems.

Without oracles, smart contracts are trapped inside their own networks.

A DeFi lending platform, for example, needs trusted price data before it can decide whether collateral is safe.

An insurance contract might need weather data.

A tokenised asset platform may need payment, identity or settlement information from outside the blockchain.

Chainlink provides that bridge.

Instead of relying on one single data provider, Chainlink uses a network of independent nodes to collect, check and deliver information to smart contracts.

That reduces the risk of one bad source, one broken feed or one dishonest actor controlling the outcome.

Its native token, LINK, is used to pay node operators and support the economics of the network.

Project Pangea was announced by Chainlink, FairSquareLab, UniKA and Qivalis, with UniKA representing a Korean coalition and Qivalis described as a euro stablecoin consortium powered by 37 European banks.

Chainlink has launched Project Pangea with banking consortia from Europe and South Korea.

The aim is to move international FX settlement from T+2 towards T+0.

Basically they are reducing the time between a currency trade being agreed and the money actually settling.

Today, cross-border FX can still involve delays, intermediaries and capital being tied up while both sides complete.

Project Pangea wants a different model:

Direct atomic settlement between regulated euro and Korean won stablecoins.

Atomic settlement means both sides of the transaction happen together, or neither happens at all, thus reducing settlement risk.

The project brings together UniKA, a Korean banking coalition, and Qivalis, a euro stablecoin consortium backed by European banks, who are reported to represent more than $10 trillion in AUM.

The structure that this happens within is key, as banks will not need to abandon existing systems.

Project Pangea is designed to use Swift infrastructure and ISO 20022 messaging, with Chainlink acting as the connective layer between traditional banking systems and blockchain settlement.

Chainlink’s CCIP provides cross-chain connectivity, with their Data Streams providing FX market data.

FairSquareLab provides the on-chain FX settlement technology and the Pangea L1 network where settlement contracts operate.

This is not crypto trying to sit outside the banking system.

It is blockchain infrastructure being connected to banking through the standards banks already use.

For tokenisation and on-chain finance, this is important.

Real-world finance does not move on-chain simply because the technology exists.

It moves when institutions can connect new rails to old systems without breaking legal, compliance and operational workflows.

If Project Pangea works, the implications are significant.

Faster settlement.
Lower counterparty risk.
Less trapped capital.
More efficient cross-border liquidity.
A clearer role for regulated stablecoins in institutional markets.

There are still questions around regulation, liquidity, legal finality, stablecoin oversight and whether the model can scale beyond one corridor.

But the signal is the next phase of on-chain finance may not look like a revolution.

It may look like banks using familiar messages, through familiar infrastructure, to trigger settlement on new rails.

W3DC:

Project Pangea is offering institutional blockchain adoption a different path than that of replacing existing banking infrastructure.

Connecting Swift, ISO 20022, stablecoins and on-chain settlement.

Less hype, more real-world use cases!

A founder’s reminder: culture compounds too!

Radical Business is a useful reminder that building a company is not only about growth.

It is also about what kind of business you are actually building.

David Gaines makes the case for a more practical, human version of business. One that does not treat profit, people, supply chains, customers, competitors, community and the environment as separate issues.

He is essentially saying to founders, The early decisions usually become the culture.

Who you hire, how you sell, how you treat suppliers, how you speak to customers, how you show up in your community, and how you handle pressure.

And one that's often overlooked:
How you look after yourself!

These things can feel secondary when you are trying to survive, raise money, ship product and find customers.

But they are rarely secondary for long.

The book’s “Seven Seeds Framework” is useful because it gives founders a broader lens. It asks them to think about supply chain, employees, customers, community, competitors, environment and self as connected parts of the same business.

That may sound idealistic.

But it is also practical.

Businesses with unhappy employees eventually pay for it, with poor suppliers eventually inheriting the risk; marketing unethically eventually damages trust, and that which ignores its community eventually loses relevance.

A founder who burns out eventually becomes the bottleneck.

The strongest idea in the book is that a radical business is not one trying to look radical.

It is one that returns to the root purpose of business:

Meeting a real need.
Solving a real problem.
Providing real value.

For Web3 founders, that feels especially relevant, as this industry talks a lot about community, ownership, alignment and decentralisation.

But those words only mean something if they show up in how the business is actually run.

Radical Business is not a playbook for growth hacks or fundraising tactics.

It is a useful prompt to ask better questions about the company you are building.

Who benefits from this?
Who carries the cost?
Are we creating value, or just extracting attention?
Are we building trust, or just chasing conversion?
Can this business survive its own success?

W3DC:

Founders are often pushed to move faster, scale sooner and optimise harder. Radical Business is a reminder that the deeper work is designing a company people can trust. Not just a product people can buy.

A curated, seated dinner for a small group of builders working in crypto, AI, and frontier tech.

One table. No pitches. No panels. No ego contests.

Just the kind of conversation that doesn't show up in your LinkedIn feed. The relationships that move capital, talent, and ideas in Web3 don't start at conferences.

They start at a handful of dinners with the same people, repeated over time.
Seats are limited by design.

Proudly sponsored by Novel Labs.

One of the more practical crypto stories this week came from Coinbase and Better.

A Michigan couple has reportedly closed what the companies describe as the first Fannie Mae-backed home loan using Bitcoin as collateral.

Not another crypto trading product!, we hear you cry.

No, It is Bitcoin being used inside one of the biggest real-world credit markets: housing.

And for once the structure is fairly simple.

The borrower does not sell their Bitcoin to fund the down payment.

Instead, they pledge Bitcoin as collateral alongside a standard Fannie Mae-backed mortgage. Better originates and services the mortgage, while Coinbase provides the crypto-account infrastructure.

In the example given, a buyer could support a $100,000 down payment by pledging $250,000 in Bitcoin, with a separate crypto-backed loan layered alongside the traditional mortgage.

Bitcoin is not replacing the mortgage; it is supporting the down payment.

A key distinction is this is not “buying a house with Bitcoin” in the pure crypto sense.

It is closer to using digital-asset wealth as collateral within the existing financial system.

For crypto holders, the appeal is obvious.

They may be able to access homeownership without selling Bitcoin, preserving exposure and potentially avoiding an immediate taxable sale.

For lenders, the attraction is also clear.

There is now a growing group of borrowers whose wealth does not sit neatly in cash savings, salary history or traditional brokerage accounts.

Some of it sits in Bitcoin, USDC or other digital assets.

The question is whether that wealth can be recognised safely inside mainstream credit products.

This is where the policy shift matters.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency has directed Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to account for certain crypto holdings held on centralised exchanges. Self-custodied assets are not included under that approach.

That tells us that crypto may be entering the mortgage system, but only through controlled, visible and institutionally managed channels.

So a broader story is being written here.

The next phase of digital assets may not be about replacing the financial system.

It may be about being around long enough that you are accepted by it.

Bitcoin becomes collateral.
Stablecoins become settlement tools.
Tokenised funds become distribution rails.
Public blockchains become infrastructure with compliance wrappers.

The purist version of crypto imagined people stepping outside the old system.

The institutional version will look different.

It brings crypto assets into familiar legal, credit and custody frameworks, then asks whether they can make existing products work better for a new type of customer.

There are still obvious questions.

How volatile is the collateral?
Who controls liquidation?
What happens in a severe market drawdown?
How are borrowers protected?
How far will regulators go?
And will self-custody ever be treated in the same way as exchange-held assets?

But the direction is clear: digital assets are becoming more than things to trade.

They are becoming balance-sheet assets, collateral assets and access points into mainstream finance.

W3DC:

The Bitcoin-backed mortgage is not really about buying a house with crypto.
It is about whether digital-asset wealth can be recognised by traditional finance without forcing holders to sell.
This first transaction is paving an interesting path!

This report looks at Strategy, formerly MicroStrategy, and the risk it may now represent to Bitcoin itself.

The key point is not that Strategy is about to become insolvent.

It is that its model depends on liquidity, funding and market confidence.

Strategy has built one of the largest identifiable Bitcoin positions in the world. The report says it holds around 846,800 BTC, roughly 4% of all Bitcoin.

The model has been simple.

Raise capital. Buy Bitcoin. Do not sell.

That works while the market rewards Strategy with a premium to the value of its Bitcoin holdings.

The report calls that premium the engine.

When Strategy trades above the value of its Bitcoin, it can issue new equity or credit, buy more Bitcoin, and keep the machine running.

But if that premium disappears, the machine changes.

Issuing new paper becomes harder.
The cost of capital rises.
Buying weakens.
And confidence starts to matter more than asset coverage.

That is where the preferred shares come in.

Strategy has created income-style instruments that sit above common equity. The report estimates the annual dividend bill at around $1.71bn.

The issue is that this bill is not really covered by operating cash flow.

It depends on Strategy continuing to raise new money.

So the risk is not simply

“Does Strategy own enough Bitcoin?”

It is:

“Can Strategy keep funding the structure without being forced to sell Bitcoin?”

The report argues that liquidity bites before solvency.

Strategy may have plenty of asset backing, but if the funding channel jams, pressure can appear much earlier.

The effect on Bitcoin: “Strategy has been a major source of demand."

But demand funded by market confidence can, under stress, become supply.

If Strategy cannot issue on attractive terms and cash runs down, the report argues that it may eventually need to sell Bitcoin to meet obligations.

That is the reflexive risk.

Selling Bitcoin into a weak market could push the price lower.
A lower Bitcoin price could weaken Strategy’s premium.
A weaker premium could reduce issuance capacity.
Reduced issuance capacity could force more selling.

This is not a prediction. It is a structure to watch.

W3DC:

Strategy has been one of Bitcoin’s strongest demand stories.

But the same structure that helped turn capital into Bitcoin demand could, under stress, become a source of Bitcoin supply.

So it's not just how much Bitcoin Strategy owns.

It is how dependent the model has become on the market continuing to fund it.

UBS and Nethermind: Ethereum with guardrails

UBS and Nethermind have completed proofs of concept showing how compliance controls can be embedded into Ethereum infrastructure. The work applied risk rules at node level and used relay services to manage how approved transactions are broadcast and included on-chain.

The signal is clear: institutions may not need to abandon public blockchains, but they will need more control around how they use them.

For tokenisation, this is important. Real-world assets need more than open rails. They need compliance, monitoring, operational certainty and trust.

Ethereum may be public infrastructure.

Institutional Ethereum may need guardrails.

Until next time