The era of the ‘crypto casino’ is officially over. In its place, the blueprints for a robust, institutional-grade ‘Internet Financial System’ have been unveiled. This was the definitive message emerging from the third day of Abu Dhabi Finance Week (ADFW), where the conversation shifted decisively from speculative price action to structural financial engineering.
Under the banner of ‘Engineering the Capital of Capital’, the Abu Dhabi Global Market (ADGM) hosted a rare convergence of the industry’s most influential figures. The leaders of Strategy, Circle, Binance, and Coinbase—Michael Saylor, Jeremy Allaire, Richard Teng, and Brian Armstrong, took to the stage not to hype the next bull run, but to articulate how digital assets are becoming the granite foundation of the global economy.
The Granite and the Building: Redefining Capital
The day’s most profound theoretical restructuring came from Michael Saylor, Founder and Executive Chairman of MicroStrategy. In a sector often drowning in technical complexity, Saylor offered a stark return to first principles, drawing a sharp line between ‘capital’ and ‘credit’.
“The world is built on Capital. It runs on credit,” Saylor told the packed auditorium. He deployed a striking analogy to illustrate the distinction: “Capital is all that granite underlying New York City. Credit is the buildings that generate the rents over the granite.”
For Saylor, Bitcoin is the granite—immutable digital capital. Traditional fiat instruments, bonds, and real estate are credit—dependent on cash flows and counterparty solvency. He argued that the global financial system is currently “running on credit” disguised as capital, a fragility that digital assets solve.
Saylor detailed how MicroStrategy has operationalised this thesis, acting effectively as a “central bank of Bitcoin” by holding over 3 per cent of the total supply. By engineering yield-bearing instruments backed by this “digital granite,” he is bridging the gap for institutions that demand the stability of credit with the performance of digital capital. “Most people don’t want a roller coaster of volatility on the way to getting rich,” he noted. “Most of them want a bank account that pays them 10 per cent forever.”
The Economic Operating System
While Saylor focused on the asset, Jeremy Allaire, Co-founder and CEO of Circle, focused on the rails. Allaire declared the arrival of the “Internet Financial System,” an “Economic Operating System” where the global economy migrates on-chain.
“We’re now moving into actually bringing the entirety of what we think of as the economic and financial system on-chain,” Allaire stated. This goes beyond simple payments; it encompasses the entire lifecycle of economic value, from treasury management to commercial contracts.
Allaire highlighted the explosive growth of stablecoins as the fuel for this new OS, noting that USDC transactions had reached nearly $10 trillion in volume. Crucially, he predicted the rise of an “agentic economy,” where AI agents—unable to open traditional bank accounts—will rely entirely on digital wallets and smart contracts to transact. In this near future, the financial system must operate at the speed of code, not the speed of banking hours.
From Casino to Utility: The Institutional Pivot
The maturation of the sector was further evidenced by the strategic pivots of the world’s largest exchanges. Both Richard Teng of Binance and Brian Armstrong of Coinbase articulated visions that moved well beyond retail trading.
Teng, a former regulator himself, argued that the entry of institutions brings “different investment patterns, different duration,” creating a “healthier market future” with greater depth. He revealed Binance’s focus on building a hybrid “C5 platform,” combining the user experience of centralized finance with the innovation of Web3.
Armstrong echoed this sentiment, outlining Coinbase’s ambition to become the “everything exchange” and the primary financial account for the digital age. He praised the efficiency of crypto rails, noting that cross-border payments can now be settled “in less than one second for less than one cent,” a stark contrast to the friction of the legacy SWIFT network.
The Abu Dhabi Advantage
Throughout the day, Abu Dhabi was repeatedly cited as the critical enabler of this transformation. Armstrong explicitly labelled the UAE as “the other crypto capital of the world” alongside the US, crediting the region’s regulatory clarity for allowing businesses to build “bridges into traditional finance”.
The ADGM’s strategy of “innovation with guardrails” was praised for striking the elusive balance between risk and progress. As Teng noted, Abu Dhabi’s “pro-innovation approach” and early adoption of comprehensive crypto frameworks have allowed it to develop deep institutional trust.
Engineering a New Era
The third day of ADFW offered more than just speeches; it provided a glimpse into the plumbing of the future economy. The distinction between “traditional finance” and “crypto” is rapidly evaporating. As Saylor demonstrated, Bitcoin is becoming a standard treasury asset. As Allaire showed, stablecoins are becoming the standard payment rail.
By providing the regulatory certainty and institutional infrastructure required to support this shift, Abu Dhabi is doing exactly what its theme suggests: engineering the capital of capital. The foundations have been poured, and the vertical construction of the Internet Financial System is now underway.