Author: Wu Says Blockchain

This interview revolves around the origins of World Liberty, the growth and application of the stablecoin USD1, the planning for RWA tokenization, team and capital layout, as well as discussions on regulation and regional market construction with WLFI CEO and co-founder Zach Witkoff and COO and co-founder Zak Folkman. Zak stated that their goal is to serve user groups that are not fully covered by traditional finance, with an integrated application (transfer/consumption/crypto trading/card payment) centered around the USD1 stablecoin.

Reasons for Entry and Zach's Personal Background

Colin Wu: Zach, first, could you briefly introduce your upbringing or family background?

Zach Witkoff: I was born in New York City and raised by my parents, Steve and Lauren, who are both very hardworking. I grew up in a family real estate business environment, spending almost all my time at various construction sites. It was during this process that I witnessed many inefficiencies in the traditional financial system. At that time, the concept of cryptocurrency did not exist, but it began to spark my interest in "how to improve this system."

Editor's Note: Steve Witkoff is an American billionaire, real estate investor, and long-time ally of Trump, born in 1957 in New York, with a law degree. He founded Witkoff Group, amassing a fortune in real estate, and was appointed as a special envoy for Middle Eastern issues after Trump was elected president in 2024, despite having no prior diplomatic experience. As an envoy, he participated in international affairs such as mediating the Russia-Ukraine conflict and humanitarian aid in Gaza.

Colin Wu: How did you initially enter the crypto industry? Was there a key moment or person that led you to shift from the family business to blockchain?

Zach Witkoff: For me, I started investing in the crypto space around 2016 or 2017. World Liberty is my first real involvement in operating a crypto-related business. A significant reason for entering this field was that I witnessed some friends having their bank accounts terminated and being banned from platforms, and I experienced similar situations myself. This reality became the true opportunity for me to enter the crypto industry.

The Origin and Early Development of the World Liberty Project

Zach Witkoff: About two years ago, I was sitting with Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, and they were feeling down. I asked what was wrong, and they told me they had their accounts "terminated" by the two largest banks in the U.S. and were also "banned" from platforms. We began discussing solutions, and the conclusion was that a more democratized system was needed, centered around stablecoins. With stablecoins, essentially no one can tell you "your account is closed" (unless you are on the OFAC sanctions list). No one can dictate who you can send money to, why, or how. The starting point of World Liberty is to truly return financial control to the users.

Note: Zach Witkoff, Donald Trump Jr., and Eric Trump previously appeared together on Fox News, stating that their family and team had encountered large banks terminating accounts and being "de-serviced" about two years ago, leading them to decide to reconstruct cross-border settlement and retail payment paths centered around stablecoins. In a live interview at TOKEN2049 in Dubai, WLFI co-founder Zach Witkoff also mentioned that the birth of World Liberty Financial stemmed from observations of pain points in traditional finance: first, a lack of transparency, with large banks operating too opaquely; second, insufficient accessibility, with about 1.4 billion people globally still without bank accounts; third, low cross-border efficiency, with some economies facing comprehensive costs of up to 9% to access dollars. Eric Trump also stated that traditional lending processes still rely on paper and lengthy approvals, with common lending cycles taking 90–120 days; whereas on-chain transfers can be completed in seconds, with lower costs and higher transparency. He mentioned that the family had previously had their accounts canceled by banks for political reasons, which is why he firmly believes that cryptocurrency and their efforts at World Liberty Financial will make those banks regret it, aiming to leave banks behind and fundamentally change the financial system, ending the banks' hegemony.

Colin Wu: I heard that in 2024, before the election, you first raised funds in Asia, but it wasn't easy to start. Then we also saw Justin Sun make a significant investment?

Zach Witkoff: We have a lot of respect for Justin. We are friends with him. He has built a remarkable business based on Tron; as far as I last understood, the stablecoin supply on Tron is about $82 billion. We think he has done a great job, and we have a friendly relationship. That's pretty much the nature of our relationship.

Zak Folkman: Hello everyone, I am the COO and co-founder of World Liberty Financial. When I was in law school, I learned a lot about contracts and transactions. When I read the Ethereum white paper, I realized that Ethereum and smart contracts would fundamentally change everything from finance to technology to global legal transactions, allowing two parties to transact without meeting or even trusting each other. Once I understood this, I immediately immersed myself in it. My co-founder Chase Hero and I have been long-term business partners, and we initially made significant investments in Ethereum, followed by Bitcoin. In the early stages, we provided consulting for many successful startup projects and invested through our family office, participating in many projects' investments and consulting to this day.

How World Liberty Helps Users Without Bank Accounts

Colin Wu: So, the next question is, can you introduce the current products of World Liberty? Especially how they help users, particularly those without bank accounts.

Zak Folkman: I believe the goal of World Liberty Financial is to provide people with financial transaction tools to prevent them from having their bank accounts terminated. But more importantly, it is to provide financial tools to those who are underserved by banks or completely unbanked, while also hoping that these individuals can derive more value from the services than traditional financial institutions offer. I think viewers of your channel might believe that cryptocurrency provides a faster, more transparent, safer, and cheaper way to transact.

This is also why we all love cryptocurrency so much. Combine this with the concept of asset self-sovereignty or self-custody, and you get something that has never existed before. When you think of cryptocurrency, it is always seen as a separate existence from the traditional financial system. Historically, if you wanted to use cryptocurrency in stores, gas stations, to buy groceries, or to get coffee, it was often very difficult. Although some exchanges have launched debit cards, their effectiveness has not been ideal.

Our goal is to provide a simple application, similar to Cash App, WeChat, or any kind of Venmo, allowing users to easily store and send funds, and combine cryptocurrency trading, such as swapping, staking, yield farming, etc., providing users with a simple card that they can use to spend cryptocurrency at points of sale anytime, anywhere, making traditional bank accounts completely unnecessary. Therefore, we realized that if people are going to transact in cryptocurrency daily, they need to have a stablecoin that can be used globally and is always pegged 1:1 to the dollar. To this end, we launched USD1, which has become the fastest-growing stablecoin in history.

Zach Witkoff: As Zak mentioned, our USD1 is the fastest-growing stablecoin, and we have now surpassed $2.4 billion. The last time I checked, our trading volume in 24 hours exceeded $500 million, and USD1 was only born 90 days ago. Besides the stablecoin, as Zak mentioned, we are actively building a very robust asset tokenization platform focused on RWA (Real World Asset tokenization). Members of the Trump family and I come from the traditional real estate industry, and we all have quite substantial real estate investment portfolios, which are very suitable for tokenization. I think this is a very interesting field worth exploring. But we won't stop there. We are also looking into the oil and gas industry and the overall commodities sector. Our belief is that World Liberty hopes for every asset globally to be tokenized. This is a better technology and a better system.

Misunderstandings About USD1 Stablecoin and Binance Cooperation

Colin Wu: You mentioned the USD1 stablecoin. The community says that USD1 has a significant partnership with Binance and BNB Chain; is this true? When did Binance join, and how do they support USD1? We also know that Binance has invested in USD1, so why did they choose USD1?

Zak Witkoff: Actually, this is a common misunderstanding. We are not saying that Binance owns shares in World Liberty, nor are we partners. In fact, the partnership mainly arises from the high demand for USD1 on Binance. If you go to PancakeSwap or on the BNB Chain, you will see a very strong demand for USD1. People naturally pair USD1 with meme coins over there and use USD1 specifically through Binance Launchpad. So Binance is mainly providing services based on user demand. As for that $2 billion transaction, Binance merely accepted the money and was not a participant. We persuaded MGX to use USD1 for settlement because it is safer, faster, and more transparent.

They completed a $2 billion transaction using USD1, with no transaction fees, and it was done in less than two seconds. Clearly, this is a better way to transfer funds, especially for large international payments. Therefore, what Binance did was simply accept the funds. If there was no demand on Binance, they might have destroyed the funds or converted them to cash. But due to the huge market demand, the funds continued to stay on Binance.

Zak Folkman: In addition, we actually have some fantastic partnerships throughout the BSC ecosystem. Projects like ListaDAO, PancakeSwap, and almost all protocols on Binance Smart Chain are very willing to collaborate with us. I believe USD1 is not only the fastest-growing stablecoin but also the only stablecoin with a large number of enthusiastic followers.

For example, projects like Sahara AI have adopted USD1 as part of their crowdfunding, which shows that our community is very active, very engaged, and enjoys trading. Zach just mentioned our daily trading volume; the reason it is so high is that people are not just holding this token long-term; they are actively using it, and the circulation speed of USD1 is very fast. Therefore, many projects on the Binance Smart Chain want to collaborate with us, mainly because they know our project has extremely high user loyalty and followers similar to meme coins. Moreover, we are a stablecoin. This brings a very unique characteristic to the stablecoin market that may never have existed before.

How the World Liberty Team Advances Work

Colin Wu: My next question is, how many people are currently working in the World Liberty team, and how do you accelerate the team's work?

Zak Folkman: We have been hiring. However, we are not hiring just to hire. We only recruit top talent, absolute star employees. So, every employee we hire is a leader in their field, from our analysts and developers to our Chief Compliance Officer and General Counsel. Every position we hire for seeks individuals who are not just "filling a vacancy" but can bring unique perspectives. This is why we have been able to achieve such great success with a very lean team. We have about 30 full-time team members, maybe a little more now, but roughly 30 people. From our ecosystem managers and business development personnel to our senior management team, everyone is top talent, which is what allows us to be so successful, grow quickly, and still maintain a small team.

Zach Witkoff: Each of us wears multiple hats. No job in the company is too big or too small. I am the CEO, Zak is the COO, and we both get involved in the minutiae of the company while also overseeing the largest projects. I think this is very critical. We believe that the most successful companies in the future will need to have streamlined teams, especially as technologies like AI become more widely applied. Personally, I think that five years from now, companies with over a thousand employees will find it extremely difficult to operate efficiently. I believe the trend is towards a more efficient workforce.

How ALT5 Sigma Helps the World Liberty Ecosystem

Colin Wu: The next question is about ALT5 Sigma. Can you explain this company in detail and how ALT5 helps the World Liberty ecosystem?

Zach Witkoff: Regarding ALT, we announced a deal where they will acquire $1.5 billion worth of World Liberty tokens. This deal will help our ecosystem in multiple ways. First, this company has some very powerful technology, especially around stablecoin technology, which will help amplify the flywheel effect of USD1.

Secondly, this company's current financial strategy is primarily long-term holding, and they actively support this token. We are bringing it to Nasdaq and allowing it to trade freely. In the future, this company plans to continue acquiring more tokens. Therefore, clearly having a large buyer in the market that continuously purchases tokens and supports them is very beneficial for the ecosystem. So we are really excited. I will join the board as chairman, and we will roll up our sleeves and work hard together.

What Impact Will Trump's Policies Have on the Entire Crypto Industry?

Colin Wu: My next question is, what do you think of Trump's crypto policies? What positive impact do you think Trump's policies will have on the entire crypto industry and the future?

Zach Witkoff: First, I want to say that we separate business from politics. We are a business and completely do not get involved in political matters. However, it is clear that President Trump is one of the greatest presidents in history. He has proposed clear regulatory policies and established clear rules. Therefore, these policies are very beneficial for the industry.

Throughout the development of cryptocurrency, especially during the Biden administration, we were essentially operating blindly. People were moving their businesses overseas because it made no sense to conduct crypto business in the U.S.; it was simply not worth the risk, which is utterly ridiculous. So, President Trump signed the Genius Act. I believe that the market structure will become clearer in the future. Moreover, I have great respect and admiration for the entire government team; I think they have done an excellent job.

Zak Folkman: To add, I think the crypto industry we saw before, at least in the U.S., was divided between the two parties. And to let everyone feel the remarkable work that President Trump has done, he completely eliminated the divisions between the two parties in the entire industry. He brought everyone to consensus, completely setting aside their political beliefs.

So, if you look at how he has pushed the industry forward, especially outside the U.S., he has encouraged governments around the world to start adopting and reflecting the policies implemented by his administration. I believe that all practitioners in the global crypto industry, or those who will benefit from crypto but have not yet realized it, should express their heartfelt gratitude to him.

Will World Liberty Engage in More Activities or Community Building in Asia?

Colin Wu: I have one last question. Will World Liberty engage in more activities or community building in Asia, especially in the Chinese community?

Zak Folkman: Yes, we actually are traveling. Next week, I and some members of our team will go to Hong Kong to visit many different participants in the crypto industry, investors, and potential partners. Then, I, Zach, and the rest of our team will head to Korea for Korea Blockchain Week. I believe we will announce something very significant during Korea Blockchain Week.

Zach Witkoff: Next, we will also make a larger announcement at Token 2049 in Singapore, where we will appear on the main stage. So we have a lot of significant news and initiatives to release, and I think the world will be very excited about these announcements.

Colin Wu: Yes, there will be many conferences in Asia over the next two months; the schedule is packed.

Zak Folkman: We are obviously an American company, and all members are U.S. citizens. However, we also recognize that the major markets for the global crypto industry are in Asia. We have many friends and partners in Asia. There are a large number of World Liberty Financial token holders in various regions of Asia. Therefore, we have spent a lot of time there, and as World Liberty continues to grow, we will spend even more time there in the future.

So, thank you to all our Asian friends who support us. We are very grateful for all your support, and we will try to visit Asia as much as possible, looking forward to seeing more of you in Hong Kong, Korea, Singapore, or anywhere else.

Zach Witkoff: I think this is also one of the greatest joys of founding World Liberty. Sometimes, Zak, Chase, and I walk down the street and meet members of our community who say, "Oh my gosh, thank you so much; this is the best community." It really makes our every day special. In fact, this is the meaning of what we do—providing people with tools to help them live better and happier lives. As Zak said, dear community, we really love you. If you see us in Asia, please come over and say hello; we are very approachable. We might fly five to six hundred hours a year, and we believe it is very important to go to places around the world to do business, truly understand the issues locally, and develop appropriate solutions. So yes, we will continue to work hard for the community, for the project, and for World Liberty. I believe the community will be very satisfied with our results.

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