Zhixiong Pan
Zhixiong Pan|Sep 05, 2025 02:51
The Tempo topic went viral yesterday, not only maintaining its top position on Hacker News, but also receiving nearly 700 comments, with a lot of sarcasm and questioning. Supporters cite successful cases of actual cross-border payments and long tail markets, emphasizing the significant value of stablecoins in solving capital flow restrictions, reducing transaction costs, and simplifying cross-border settlement processes. However, a large number of criticisms revolve around regulatory arbitrage, centralized governance risks, reserve transparency, and the classic technical debate of 'which is more suitable between blockchain and databases'. In addition, Stripe's market position, coupled with new regulatory frameworks such as the GENIUS Act, has further escalated this discussion, sparking multidimensional discussions on engineering, compliance, and business models. Specifically, doubts and debates mainly focus on the following aspects: 1. The practical application value of stablecoins: Some comments acknowledge that the cross-border business cases provided by Stripe (such as the Latin American banking service platform DolarApp) are real and effective. Stablecoins help companies avoid the complexity of traditional cross-border settlements, reduce costs, and improve efficiency. But critics argue that these advantages have specific market limitations and are not applicable to all markets. 2. Regulatory arbitrage and legal risks: A large number of users have pointed out that Stripe's move is essentially a strategy of regulatory arbitrage, which involves entering a more relaxed or ambiguous regulatory field through stablecoins and blockchain. This raises deep concerns about compliance and legal risks: once the regulatory environment changes, such models may quickly be impacted. 3. The technological debate between blockchain and traditional databases: Critics argue that if the core trust mechanism still relies on centralized institutions or third parties, using traditional databases will be faster and more efficient; Supporters emphasize that blockchain has obvious advantages in data immutability, transparency, and multi-party trust and cooperation. The debate over this technology choice has also sparked intense discussions on security risks, performance costs, and ecological compatibility. 4. Doubts about the authenticity of decentralized governance: Comments generally doubt whether Tempo can truly achieve permissionless decentralization, and are concerned that initially operating nodes through designated partners may introduce centralized control, review risks, and conflicts of interest. Historical experience shows that there are few successful cases of the "centralization before decentralization" model, which exacerbates public skepticism. 5. Business motivation and profit model of Stripe: Many people believe that the real purpose of launching Tempo by Stripe is to control the flow of stablecoin funds, obtain spreads and floating income, and further expand its profit space in the payment ecosystem. Some comments even warn that this business model may transform Stripe into a new dominant 'middleman', strengthening its control over funds. 6. Regional differences in payment infrastructure and the application scenarios of stablecoins: Some have pointed out that different countries and regions already have mature and efficient payment systems (such as SEPA in Europe, instant transfer in Australia, etc.), and not all regions require stablecoin solutions. However, in long tail markets with unstable currencies or weak cross-border payment infrastructure (such as Latin America), stablecoins demonstrate significant advantages. 7. Deep concerns about security and credit risk: The comment mentioned the collapse of Terra stablecoin and the transparency issue of Tether, warning about the credit risk behind stablecoins. Especially when large-scale users rely on stablecoins based on US Treasury bonds, the risk of a run on the market may affect the bond market and financial stability. The public is calling for stricter audits and clearer risk protection mechanisms. 8. The controversy over the selection of EVM and the new L1 technology: Supporters acknowledge the strong developer foundation and existing toolchain of the EVM ecosystem, believing that it is conducive to rapid implementation. But opponents question why a lighter technology architecture (such as Ethereum L2) is not chosen, and point out that the new L1 chain may encounter more challenges in terms of liquidity, security, and ecological compatibility. The overall comment is quite sharp: while acknowledging the usefulness of stablecoins in specific scenarios such as cross-border payments, most people believe that Tempo is essentially Stripe's own money making tool, with many questions regarding regulation, governance, and security. Most discussions cannot avoid one question: "Do you really need blockchain Source: https://news. (ycombinator.com)/item? id=45129085
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