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Why do intelligent, successful people make terrible decisions with money? And if wealth is supposed to make us happier, why does having more often leave us wanting even more?Dr. Robert J. van Eyden has spent more than three decades navigating financial markets, leading major financial businesses, and studying the psychology behind wealth creation and financial decision-making.In this episode of the Stonks Go Moon Podcast, Robert joins Rocco Strydom to explore the uncomfortable truths about money, financial literacy, artificial intelligence, and the human behaviour that shapes our financial futures.Drawing on lessons from his latest book, Jack of All Trades: How to Become the Complete Trader, published by Penguin Random House, Robert makes the case that understanding financial markets is only half the battle. Understanding ourselves might be considerably more important.Why does professional success not necessarily translate into financial intelligence? Is artificial intelligence creating a dangerous illusion of expertise? Have financial markets become another form of entertainment? And where exactly is the line between investing and gambling?The conversation also explores a question that rarely receives enough attention in discussions about wealth: What is money actually for?From protecting what we've earned to resisting the temptation of endless accumulation, Robert challenges the conventional definition of financial success and argues that real wealth should create opportunity, purpose, and positive change.Because becoming financially literate isn't simply about knowing how to make money. It's about understanding what to do with it, how to protect it, and when enough is enough.In this episode:Why intelligent people make irrational financial decisionsThe relationship between financial literacy and personal disciplineHow AI is changing our understanding of financial marketsThe dangers of confusing information with genuine expertiseWhere investing ends and gambling beginsWhy protecting wealth matters as much as creating itHow psychology influences our financial behaviourWhy having more money doesn't necessarily mean greater happinessThe responsibility of wealth and the importance of giving back

In this episode of the Stonks Go Moon Podcast, we sit down with Konstantins Vasilenko, Co-Founder of Paybis, to explore how cryptocurrency is evolving from a speculative frontier into a regulated global financial industry. Having navigated more than a decade of crypto market cycles, Paybis has grown to over 7 million users, with a focus on accessibility, compliance, and bridging traditional finance with digital assets. We discuss the impact of Europe's MiCA regulations, the rise of stablecoins as a payment solution, the future of cryptocurrency exchanges, and why the next major opportunity could lie in helping banks and financial institutions enter crypto without building their own regulatory infrastructure. In this episode: Why crypto regulation is both necessary and challenging. How Paybis survived multiple crypto booms and crashes. The importance of MiCA and PSD2 licensing. Why stablecoins are transforming business payments. Whether traditional crypto exchanges will remain relevant. The rise of decentralized prediction markets. How crypto and traditional banking could converge over the next decade.

Joseph Buttram, CEO of Field Digital, joins the Stonks Go Moon Podcast to discuss the infrastructure powering the next generation of digital finance.From stablecoins and institutional adoption to AI agents, regulation and the “picks and shovels” behind crypto, Joseph explains where digital finance is heading and how Field Digital is positioning itself for that future.

Zach Ipour, co-founder of MegPrime and Megatel Homes, joins the Stonks Go Moon Podcast to discuss rising mortgage costs, housing affordability, crypto payments, XRP, and MegPrime’s blockchain-based approach to rent and mortgage payments.We also discuss the MegPrime Z5 Protocol, rent and mortgage rewards, and MegPrime’s January 2026 SEC no-action letter.

South Africa’s electricity system is caught between rising tariffs, municipal debt, ageing prepaid infrastructure and a massive shift toward rooftop solar.In this episode of the Stonks Go Moon Podcast, Rocco Strydom speaks with Andrew Reeve of Mezura about building the technology that could connect these pieces.From secure prepaid metering and automated municipal revenue collection to prepaid residential solar and technology that could help turn homes into mini power stations, Mezura is rethinking how electricity is bought, sold and managed.Could smarter infrastructure help fix one of South Africa’s biggest problems?We unpack the technology, the business model and what the future of South Africa’s electricity system could look like.

In this episode of the Stonks Go Moon Podcast, Rocco Strydom sits down with Danilo Curillo, founder of The Miracle, to discuss why Web3 marketing has been broken for years—and how MetaMask's latest partnership could completely change the game.Instead of spam, banner ads, and token incentives, The Miracle is bringing personalized, on-chain rewards directly into crypto wallets, helping users discover products they're actually interested in while rewarding them for real activity, not empty clicks.They discuss:Why traditional crypto marketing failedHow MetaMask is changing user acquisitionWhy wallets could become the next operating system for the internetOn-chain data vs. traditional advertisingWhy rewards beat banner adsThe future of Web2 and Web3 marketing convergenceIf wallets become the primary interface for payments, identity, AI, and digital experiences, the advertising model of the internet may never look the same again.

Banks are finally taking stablecoins seriously.In this episode of the Stonks Go Moon Podcast, Rocco Strydom sits down with Ran Grushkowsky, CEO of MassPay, to discuss why the future of payments isn't about crypto speculation, it's about faster, cheaper, and fairer global money movement.They explore why cross-border payments remain slow by design, how stablecoins are disrupting decades-old financial infrastructure, why regulation is no longer the biggest hurdle, and why merchant adoption, not Bitcoin's price, will determine the next phase of growth.Topics include:Why stablecoins are becoming a payment infrastructureThe hidden incentives behind slow banking systemsVisa, Mastercard, and banks are embracing blockchainWhy merchants, not consumers, will drive adoptionThe future of cross-border paymentsWhy stablecoins are a fintech story, not a crypto story

Stablecoins are no longer about speculation; they're becoming real payment infrastructure.In this episode of the Stonks Go Moon Podcast, Rocco Strydom sits down with Wesley Rios from Morph to discuss why stablecoins could transform global payments, cross-border transactions, and financial infrastructure. From instant settlement and 24/7 availability to reducing banking friction, Wesley explains why the next phase of crypto adoption may happen quietly in the background while businesses simply enjoy faster, cheaper, and more reliable payments.Topics include:What stablecoins actually areWhy cross-border payments remain brokenStablecoins vs traditional banking railsThe rise of payment-focused blockchain infrastructureWhy "boring" payment technology often winsThe future of global money movement

Is AI actually in a bubble… or are we looking in the wrong place?In this episode of the Stonks Go Moon Podcast, Rocco Strydom sits down with Itamar Novick, Founder and General Partner at Recursive Ventures, operator, investor, and one of the early minds behind scaling companies from startup to IPO. The discussion dives deep into the current AI landscape, separating hype from reality and asking where the real opportunities are emerging.While everyone is slapping “AI-powered” onto products, Itamar argues the real bubble isn't AI applications — it's AI infrastructure. Data centers, energy, large language models, and the underlying stack are attracting enormous attention, while the real application layer may still be early.⚡ Topics covered:Are we in an AI bubble or an infrastructure bubble?Why vibe coding may be one of AI's first real winnersWill white-collar jobs disappear?AI and the future of reskilling the workforceWhy governments, VCs, and big AI companies all share responsibilityAI in sales, content creation, and autonomous agentsAdvice for founders raising capital in the AI eraWhy VCs no longer fund ideas — they fund tractionThe rules for startups are changing. The barrier to building has dropped dramatically, but standing out may be harder than ever.

What if Bitcoin wasn’t just something you hold… but something you actually use every day?In this episode of the Stonks Go Moon Podcast, Rocco Strydom sits down with Ben Blaine from MoneyBadger to unpack a quiet shift happening in South Africa right now:You can walk into a store, scan a QR code, and pay with Bitcoin - instantly.No banks. No selling. No friction.We break down:How Bitcoin payments actually work in real-world retailThe role of Lightning wallets and QR paymentsWhy major retailers like Pick'n Pay are already liveThe surprising adoption is happening across thousands of storesWhy this could completely change how people think about moneyFrom surf towns using Bitcoin to pay kids...to grocery stores accepting crypto at checkout.

Quantum computing just went from “sci-fi” to “this might break things sooner than we thought.” In this episode of the Stonks Go Moon Podcast, Rocco Strydom sits down with Ian Smith (Quantum EVM) to unpack Google’s latest research and why it’s not just a crypto problem, but a global systems problem. Google’s findings suggest modern encryption could be broken within the next decade, potentially as early as 2029. That impacts far more than Bitcoin. We’re talking about: Financial systems Military infrastructure AI acceleration Global data security Crypto just happens to be the canary in the coal mine. In this episode: What Google actually revealed about quantum computing Why current encryption across industries is vulnerable The real timeline to “Q-Day” US vs China in the quantum race Why crypto communities are underestimating the risk What needs to happen before impact

Cars sit parked about 95% of the time, while people struggle with rising mobility costs. EV prices are volatile, and cities are trying to reduce emissions without building more infrastructure. So a new question is emerging: What if mobility isn't about owning bigger fleets, but unlocking the ones that already exist?In this episode, Rei Vardi, founder of Eon, shares how he built a national virtual fleet of premium electric vehicles without raising venture capital. Eon is like Airbnb for EVs, a peer-to-peer platform combined with advanced tech that makes renting shockingly easy and fully contactless.Book exactly the car you want, verify via facial scan and ID in the app, and use your phone as a Bluetooth key. No counters, no paperwork, no talking to the owner - just walk up, unlock, and drive.Rei dives deep into:• His origin story: Taking over his dad's 2015 Tesla Model S in college, trying to rent it out manually, and facing disasters (scratches, smoking, dents, late returns, and even one renter using the car in a bank robbery).• Why raw peer-to-peer car sharing is risky (like "handing someone a gun") and how Eon automates handoffs, insurance, education, and support to make it safe and passive for owners.• Why Eon focuses exclusively on EVs: to accelerate adoption, increase utilization for greater carbon impact, and leverage the most advanced in-car tech.• Bootstrapping through near-shutdowns, VC pitching struggles (wrong timing in mobility, burned investors, profitability vs. hypergrowth), living in a van in San Francisco, and why going solo allowed sustainable building.• Real impact: Thousands of cars in the network, major customers like Netflix and Four Seasons, owners earning passive income from idle cars, and renters converting to EV buyers.

DeFi was supposed to make capital more efficient. Instead, it created a new kind of fragmentation.In this episode of the Stonks Go Moon Podcast, Rocco Strydom sits down with MacBrennan Peet, founder of Project 0, to talk about why DeFi users still get stuck with scattered collateral, disconnected venues, poor capital efficiency, and unnecessary liquidation risk. Project 0 is building a prime brokerage layer on Solana designed to unify portfolio management across venues like Kamino, Drift, and Jupiter Lend.MacBrennan’s background is unusually deep for someone still so young. He started trading biotech and pharma names as a teenager, later worked on projects with Morgan Stanley and in private equity, helped build marginfi, and has spent years inside Solana DeFi infrastructure. That background shows up in this conversation because this is not a hype-driven crypto interview. It is a practical discussion about market structure, fragmented liquidity, basis trades, unified margin, and what DeFi still gets wrong.We get into:why DeFi became more fragmented even though blockchains were supposed to unify everythinghow users lose yield and capital efficiency when assets sit across multiple venueswhy “unified margin” matters more than most retail users realizehow Project 0 is approaching Kamino, Drift, and Jupiter integrationsthe difference between DeFi-native opportunities and simply rebuilding TradFi onchainwhy Solana is becoming a serious environment for more advanced trading infrastructurewhat comes next once lending and perps are tied together more efficientlyOne of the most interesting ideas in this episode is that DeFi may not win by copying traditional finance feature for feature. It may win by leaning harder into what only onchain systems can do well: composability, speed, transparency, and new forms of capital efficiency. That is where Project 0 is aiming.

Stablecoins aren't just surviving crypto winters; they're exploding into the backbone of global finance. In this episode of Stonks Go Moon Podcast, Rocco Strydom talks with Chunda McCain, Co-Founder of Paxos Labs, about how regulated stablecoins are quietly becoming the most-used digital dollars on EarthFrom powering PayPal's PYUSD (now billions in circulation) to cross-chain compliance, trust, and enterprise adoption, Chunda explains why stablecoins won over memecoins, NFTs, and much of DeFi (for now). He shares war stories from building in tough regulatory times, how Paxos navigated uncharted territory to issue branded assets, and why more branded stablecoins are coming.Key highlights:Why stablecoins are the foundational layer for all finance (faster, cheaper, better margins)Enterprise crypto is thriving while grassroots is in chaosPaxos Labs helps companies issue branded stablecoins, generate yield, borrow against assets, and go full crypto without breaking rulesChunda's journey: Bitcoin whitepaper at ~12 → DeFi epiphany inspired by his grandfather's restaurantFuture: Once companies integrate stablecoins, DeFi yields are next

While U.S. headlines obsess over ETFs and enforcement, Asia is quietly building.In this episode, Rocco Strydom sits down with Marc Liew, Head of APAC at Jito, to unpack how stablecoins, staking, and Solana infrastructure are reshaping institutional crypto adoption across Asia.Marc’s background spans R3, Ripple, PayPal, and years inside cross-border payments. He has been in the room with regulators, central banks, and financial institutions as they experimented with CBDCs, stablecoins, and blockchain settlement rails.Now at Jito, he’s focused on institutional-grade staking infrastructure on Solana.What We Cover:Why stablecoins found product-market fit in Asia before the U.S.How remittances are accelerating real crypto adoptionWhy institutions are entering crypto through ETFs instead of direct on-chain tokenizationThe difference between traditional staking and Jito’s liquid staking modelMEV rewards and how they change staking economicsSolana’s infrastructure upgrades and block assembly marketplaceWhy decentralization matters for regulatorsThe growing convergence between AI agents and crypto paymentsWhy Asia leads in retail adoption, but the U.S. still leads institutionallyFrom Payments to Web3Marc shares his early “aha” moment when blockchain settlement clicked for him:If we can send a text in milliseconds, why can’t we move money the same way?That question led him from traditional payments into Web3 in 2016, deep into CBDCs, stablecoins, and now into building yield-generating infrastructure on Solana.The Big ThemeCrypto is maturing.Stablecoins are no longer theoretical. Institutions are no longer experimenting quietly. Liquid staking is evolving into a capital efficiency tool rather than just passive yield.And Asia isn’t debating whether crypto works. They’re deciding how to deploy it.