Crypto Becomes Infrastructure — A Conversation with Arthur Firstov, CBO of Mercuryo

Arthur Firstov is the Chief Business Officer at Mercuryo, a world chief in crypto funds infrastructure. With over seven years of expertise in fintech, B2B partnerships, and digital property, Arthur has helped Mercuryo scale previous $50 million in annual income and safe partnerships with greater than 300 firms — together with Circle, Coinbase, Mastercard, Revolut, and Polymarket.

He has grow to be a acknowledged voice and knowledgeable on stablecoins, digital banking, and the convergence of Web3 and conventional finance.

Q1: You’ve been in crypto funds since 2017 — earlier than it was modern, and lengthy earlier than ‘tokenized Treasuries’ had been a headline. Looking again at 2025 to date — how would you describe the business’s trajectory?

Arthur Firstov: The market’s matured. The noise is gone, and what’s left are actual rails — stablecoin settlement, tokenized property, on-chain treasury methods, regulated custody. We’ve moved from narrative to utility. Crypto isn’t making an attempt to interchange conventional finance anymore; it’s quietly wiring itself *into* it. At Mercuryo, that’s been our thesis from the beginning — connecting the crypto financial system to the monetary infrastructure the world already runs on.

Q2: Many consultants name tokenization ‘crypto’s killer app.’ What’s completely different this time?

Arthur Firstov: Regulation and yield. In 2023, tokenization was a demo — now it’s a product. Regions just like the EU and Singapore have clear guidelines, and high yields make tokenized Treasuries enticing. Beyond that, we’re seeing wallet-native issuance. Look at what MetaMask did with M0 — launching its personal stablecoin infrastructure. Wallets aren’t simply gateways anymore; they’re turning into issuers of monetary merchandise.

Q3: Let’s speak about funds. Stablecoins processed round $46 trillion this yr. What does ‘mainstream’ really appear like?

Arthur Firstov: It appears to be like invisible. Stablecoins will cease being the story — they’ll simply be the plumbing. We’re seeing this with Revolut — integrating rails that permit customers transfer cash straight from financial institution accounts into self-custodial wallets. Mercuryo plugs into that circulate, turning multi-day processes into immediate transactions.

This fall: 2025 is being known as ‘the yr establishments arrived.’ What modified?

Arthur Firstov: Infrastructure and mindset. Custody is regulated, liquidity deep, and compliance automated. When you’ll be able to tokenize a Treasury and settle it globally in minutes, it’s not an experiment. We work carefully with MasterCard, which now points crypto playing cards letting customers spend stablecoins from wallets straight at retailers. That’s real-world adoption — not hypothesis.

Q5: Multicoin says crypto now competes for consideration, not simply capital. Do you agree?

Arthur Firstov: Absolutely. Attention drives liquidity. Memecoins onboard customers, however stablecoins and RWAs maintain them. It’s the identical funnel social media adopted — consideration first, utility subsequent.

Q6: What’s subsequent? What will show that crypto has grow to be infrastructure by 2026?

Arthur Firstov: 1. Tokenized Treasuries cross $500B. 2. Stablecoin settlement quantity surpasses Visa. 3. A neobank runs stablecoin rails by default — and doesn’t even promote it as ‘crypto.’

Q7: And for the typical particular person?

Arthur Firstov: Money strikes like information — borderless, immediate, programmable. You’ll ship worth as simply as sending a message. That’s when crypto actually disappears — and that’s what we’re constructing towards at Mercuryo.

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