ABOUT THIS EPISODE
Spark avoided the DeFi hack that hit almost everyone else in April. Cofounder Sam MacPherson lays out why, and where he thinks AI fits into DeFi security.
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In April, a hacker widely assumed to be tied to North Korea drained tens of millions from KelpDAO's rsETH market, and most of DeFi took the hit. Spark did not, because it had quietly exited rsETH months earlier.
Sam MacPherson, cofounder and CEO of Spark, joins Laura Shin to unpack the conservative playbook, rate limits, a triple redundant oracle, and a governance process built to move slowly on purpose, that turned a near miss into a footnote while rivals absorbed the damage.
They cover why Spark's TVL climbed more than 50% after the hack, how emergency multisigs and time locks work when Sky's month-long governance process is too slow, and why MacPherson thinks AI will make smart contract audits more reliable, not less.
MacPherson also maps Spark's growing footprint, from Anchorage-backed institutional lending to a new Uniswap stablecoin FX layer, and why he isn't worried about SPK near its all-time low even as the business keeps compounding.
Host:
Guests:
Sam MacPherson - Cofounder and CEO of Spark
Timestamps
📣 00:26 Visit 1inch.com to swap tokenized securities, crypto and more. Simple. Secure. Self-custodial. Whatever asset you’re buying - swap it at 1inch.com
🏦 01:08 What Spark does and how it plugs into the Sky protocol's balance sheet
🛡️ 05:07 Why Sam says Spark's conservative design let it dodge the KelpDAO hack
⚖️ 11:24 How the rsETH exit exposed the tradeoffs in Sky's onchain governance
🎙️ 13:52 Visit 1inch.com to swap tokenized securities, crypto and more. Simple. Secure. Self-custodial. Whatever asset you’re buying - swap it at 1inch.com
💰 17:41 Why Sam thinks DeFi yields are converging toward SOFR, not higher
🤖 20:47 Why Sam says AI cuts both ways for DeFi security after the hack wave
🏛️ 23:26 Why Sky built the subDAO model, and whether it can survive politics
💵 26:58 The stablecoin land grab: Robinhood, Coinbase, and Spark's role in it
📊 30:50 Why Sam isn't worried about SPK trading near its all time low
🚀 32:39 Spark's next chapter: institutional lending and Spark Savings USDT growth
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