#322—The Hard Yaka newsletter is now USBC

Also, Greg Kidd shares his vision for USBC

Feb 24, 2025

Welcome to Yaka Stuff, our weekly newsletter that covers news, industry perspectives, and updates from the Hard Yaka ecosystem. Check out our last report here.

We are now USBC
Greg Kidd shares his vision for USBC
Quote of the week—Tokenization
This week in digital dollars
Sponsored athlete spotlight: Lila Lapanja competes at World Championship
Stuff happens

1. We are now USBC

First a little bit of housekeeping. A few years ago, we made the decision to shift investment away from new companies and into our ecosystem, one that could support our vision for an inclusive global economy powered by compliant digital dollars—USBC. This culminated in Hard Yaka co-founder and USBC CEO Greg Kidd’s majority investment in an Oklahoma-based bank this past summer.

Hard Yaka isn’t going anywhere and will continue to both support our portfolio of over 200 companies and make further strategic investments to bolster the ecosystem. But as part of this transition—from general investment activities to a focused operational mission—you’ll begin to see more and more of our marketing and communications move over to the USBC umbrella brand and North Star.

As a subscriber, your experience won’t change. You will continue to receive this newsletter in your inbox, but starting next week, it will be under the USBC banner.

2. Greg Kidd shares his vision for USBC

Greg had a wide-ranging chat with Thinking Crypto’s Tony Edward, covering everything from his acquisition of Vast Bank, the launch of USBC as a stablecoin on Uphold, and his long term vision for a tokenized deposit.

3. Quote of the week—Tokenization

Moving tokenized dollars on weekends might be a first step toward an “intermediate stage of tokenization,” as Blockworks’ Dan Shapiro describes it, “in which each bank creates their own permissioned chain or chains to tokenize their assets.”

Source:

DAS NYC Preview: Tokenization

4. This week in digital dollars

5. Sponsored athlete spotlight: Lila Lapanja competes at World Championship

2024 U.S. National Champion Lila Lapanja sporting ecosystem company GlobaliD on her helmet

2024 U.S. National Slalom Champion and USBC sponsored athlete Lila Lapanja competed at the World Championships in Saalbah, Austria last week, representing Slovenia, which, as Lila shared, was the culmination of a ten-year journey.

Here’s Lila:

We've hit the pinnacle of this race season as the World Championships 2025 in Saalbach, Austria begin!
I am thrilled to accept my nomination to the Championship Team and will be representing Slovenia in the Slalom race on February 15th!
Ten years ago, I was named to the Vail/Beaver Creek World Championship Team but had to forfeit my start due to an injury. And now, ten years later,
I have come full circle due to my passion, unfailing perseverance, courage and the faith that I am doing what I was born and blessed to do - ski race at the highest level with all my heart.

Next up, Lila plans to compete in the World Cup in Are, Sweden on March 9th. You can follow her journey here.

Also, stay tuned for an upcoming interview with USBC sponsored athlete Willy Mulonia, who is currently participating in his 8th Iditarod Trail Invitational.

USBC