A few welcoming words by the University of Zurich - Blockchain Center.

The global economy and geopolitical stability increasingly depend on computing. From a macroeconomic standpoint, the GDPs of entire nations are now heavily reliant on centralized cloud providers, underscoring the world’s growing dependence on computing resources.

This reliance introduces critical vulnerabilities, creating chokepoints in the global economy. Disruptions in supply chains or internet infrastructure can halt the operations of entire nations. Additionally, the loss of data ownership has become an accepted trade-off.

Acurast directly addresses these challenges by leveraging every chip’s potential while ensuring users maintain full confidentiality over their data—all at a significantly reduced cost.

Moreover, AI demands vast computing power, consuming so much energy that some cloud providers are now constructing dedicated nuclear power plants. This talk explores how Acurast is poised to revolutionize the confidential computing industry, particularly in AI model training and inference.

As blockchain and DeFi technologies evolve, mass adoption will extend far beyond cryptocurrencies. Traditional financial systems, including banks, credit cards, and payment networks, will continue to thrive, but the underlying infrastructure will transform. Blockchain will power settlements, FX conversion, and interbank transfers, while smart contracts will manage future financial transactions.

This talk explores the major pilots and initiatives led by banks and central banks in Switzerland and Europe that are already utilizing DeFi, Real World Assets (RWAs), and Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs):

▶ Tokenization of Illiquid Assets
Tokenizing assets such as SME bonds, real estate, and fine art brings them on-chain, making them tradeable on DEXs using Automated Market Makers (AMMs).

▶ FX Market
Project Mariana—leveraging DEXs to enhance foreign exchange markets using wholesale CBDCs.

▶ Repo Agreements
Project Guardian—utilizing RWAs as collateral in DeFi lending protocols for repurchase agreements.

As blockchain technology matures, the expansion from purely public state systems, pioneered by Ethereum, to privacy-centric platforms like Aztec and Aleo marks significant progress. However, the development of private shared state—where multiple parties can collaborate on data without revealing it to others—remains an unmet challenge. This talk outlines collaborative SNARKs, a cryptographic primitive that combines Zero-Knowledge (ZK) proofs with Multiparty Computation (MPC) to address this gap.
We will begin by exploring the motivations for private shared state, with applications in areas such as privacy-preserving machine learning, auctions, and gaming. The foundational research from Ozdemir and Boneh's 2022 paper on coSNARKs will be discussed, showcasing how these techniques enable secure, distributed proof generation among multiple participants.

Moving from theory to practice, we will look at the engineering challenges of implementing coSNARKs, such as optimizing the witness extension for practical use, and achieving real-world scalability. Benchmarks from recent alphanet deployments will highlight the performance and usability of coSNARKs in real-world environments.

We will mention the current limitations of this technology and the open problems in the field, inviting researchers and developers to explore its future possibilities. We will close by emphasizing how coSNARKs can broaden the Ethereum landscape by leveraging programmable cryptography to collaborate across private shared state.

After a short input from Zuitzerland and DAO Suisse, this fishbowl style workshop delves into Switzerland, its governance frameworks and how the concepts of residency and citizenship can be re-applied in the context of network states, societies and DAOs. It invites audience participation to discuss how these projects can build on what works in Switzerland in their governance design, development, and long-term participation.

Discover how to enhance your smart contracts’ security during the development process by leveraging static analysis tools to detect vulnerabilities directly within VS Code. Learn how to deploy and interact with your contracts using a familiar, Remix-like interface, and streamline your debugging workflow by interacting with on-chain contracts.

I will present results from my Master Thesis of the same name as well as some new insights. The session assumes some basic blockchain knowledge, but not cryptography although cryptographers will get the most out of it.

The European DORA regulation spans about 100 pages dedicated to operational resiliance in the financial sector. It serves as a comprehensive survival guide including for crypto asset service providers and their ICT providers. It mandates teams to thoroughly investigate their systems and integrations, encouraging self-awareness to minimize risks and mitigate the impact of technical failures. It also provides guidance on how to respond and who to notify when the impossible happens. Would DORA have prevented the Terra collapse? Probably not. But could DORA make life easier for those relying on experimental chains with downtime issues after code updates? Most likely, yes.

Protocol Guild is a collective funding mechanism supporting over 180 Ethereum mainnet contributors, including researchers and developers. By ensuring stable funding for these essential roles, Protocol Guild enables contributors to focus on core software maintenance, scalability, security, and network upgrades, ultimately benefiting the entire Ethereum ecosystem.

The Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) regulation introduces a unified legal framework for crypto-assets within the European Union, addressing gaps in consumer protection and market stability. It establishes specific compliance requirements for Asset-Referenced Tokens (ARTs) and E-Money Tokens (EMTs), as well as for utility token and other crypto-asset issuers.

ARTs, designed to maintain value stability by referencing multiple assets, must comply with stringent rules regarding collateralization, governance, and disclosure. Issuers are required to ensure proper reserves, risk management practices, and regular reporting to regulatory authorities. Similarly, EMTs, which are tied to a single fiat currency, must align with e-money regulations, emphasizing monetary stability and operational transparency.

For utility tokens and other crypto-assets, MiCA mandates the publication of a detailed white paper. This document must outline the token's functionality, associated risks, issuance details, and mechanisms for user protection. These disclosures aim to enhance transparency and bolster investor confidence.

MiCA’s requirements seek to harmonize regulations across EU member states, fostering innovation while addressing risks. The framework is pivotal for ensuring legal clarity and enabling sustainable growth in the crypto-asset ecosystem, balancing innovation with consumer and market safeguards.

Join this workshop to discover how to create an SGX application in Rust using Automata’s SGX SDK. We’ll walk you through the process step-by-step, providing a straightforward, fast, and easy way to leverage the power of trusted execution environments in developing blockchain applications.

To facilitate the adoption of blockchain based services globally there is a need for standardizing secure, privacy and regulatory-compliant on chain executions to scale. As we move towards a more decentralized future, ensuring cyber security, data minimization from origination to processing, and improving UX in executing on chain operations is crucial.

This work introduces a framework based on the ERC 7579 proposal, which integrates a module to lavage onchain verifiable credentials and zero-knowledge (zk) proofs in the context of modular smart accounts. This framework aims to standardize onchain executions by separating user authentication and transaction authorization while preserving privacy and regulatory requirements throughout the transaction lifecycle.

The growth of decentralized finance (DeFi) and real-world asset (RWA) tokenization presents unique regulatory challenges in Switzerland, Liechtenstein, and the EU. In DeFi, the absence of centralized intermediaries complicates compliance with traditional regulatory frameworks. Switzerland employs a principle-based approach, applying Anti-Money Laundering (AML) rules and investor protection standards to balance innovation with risk mitigation. In the EU, efforts to regulate DeFi are advancing under the Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) framework, though the status of fully decentralized platforms remains unclear, leaving a compliance gray area.

RWA tokenization is transforming the ownership and trading of real estate, precious stones, and both physical and digital art. Switzerland often treats tokenized assets under securities law, requiring issuers to ensure transparency, investor protection, and secure custody. Liechtenstein’s Blockchain Act offers flexible legal wrappers for tokenized assets, while the EU similarly emphasizes compliance with securities and transparency regulations. Use cases for tokenization range from fractional ownership of real estate to digitized rare art collections, enabling new opportunities for investors but demanding careful legal structuring.

Both DeFi and RWA tokenization highlight the need for tailored regulatory frameworks that foster innovation while ensuring market integrity, transparency, and consumer protection across jurisdictions.

This talk presents the recently launched Nym VPN, showcasing its in-depth functioning as a real-world application of blockchain technology in privacy-preserving solutions. This timely and relevant product launch aligns with D/ACC themes, given its scheduled release on January 28th.

In this talk, we explore several efficiency aspects at the interplay between the technical features of zero-knowledge cryptographic primitives and the architectural needs of building a layer 2. We tackle questions such as when to choose Plonk, Groth16 or FRI, and whether one can combine the advantages of these seemingly competing proof systems in order to efficiently support features such as proof aggregation. We also dive into several low-level aspects of the Linea L2, from the workings of the polynomial commitments to the design of efficient PIOPs.

Have you ever got liquidated?
If so, a significant portion of your position was wasted on paying MEV searchers. But it doesn’t have to look that way anymore. I will present the implementation of an Oracle Extractable Value (OEV) solution that has been live in production for months and liquidated hundreds and even thousands of positions. I will analyze the pros and cons of various designs and present the potential for mass-scale adoption of OEV in 2025 following our learning from implementing the solution to Venus, the top 5 biggest lending protocols on the market.

Ethereum began with an aspiration to create a public decentralized shared hard drive for the world computer.
Topology is introducing two key components to enhance the world computer: DRP, an Internet protocol that acts as the world computer’s RAM by enabling ephemeral real-time peer-to-peer computation, and Mandu, an orchestration blockchain that connects this RAM with decentralized hard drives. These protocols complement the current infrastructure, working in harmony with L1s and L2s alike. Their integration enables developers to build high-performance applications with real-time interaction, end-to-end encryption, and no single point of failure, leapfrogging the blockchain trilemma and advancing Ethereum's original cypherpunk vision. Through these innovations, Topology reimagines the architecture of the world computer.

Decentralized physical infrastructure networks (DePINs) are an emerging vertical within "Web3" replacing the traditional method that physical infrastructures are constructed. Yet, the boundaries between DePIN and traditional method of building crowd-sourced infrastructures such as citizen science initiatives or other Web3 verticals are not always so clear cut. In this work, we systematically analyze the differences between DePIN and other Web2 and Web3 verticals. For this, the study proposes a novel decision tree for classifying systems as DePIN. This tree is informed by prior studies and differentiates DePIN from related concepts using criteria such as the presence of a three-sided market, token-based incentives for supply, and the requirement for physical asset placement in those systems.

The paper demonstrates the application of the decision tree to various blockchain systems, including Helium and Bitcoin, showcasing its practical utility in differentiating DePIN systems.

This research offers significant contributions towards establishing a more objective and systematic approach to identifying and categorizing DePIN systems. It lays the groundwork for creating a comprehensive and unbiased database of DePIN systems, which will inform future research and development within this emerging sector.

Using nano-satellites with edge compute units, we will show how we intend to build an orbital compute layer with unique properties. We will propose a novel cryptographic applications layer built with a vision for space explorations.

The past few years have witnessed a surge in Ethereum-compatible networks, driven by the Ethereum community's roll-up-centric roadmap. These networks alleviate execution load from the expensive and slow Ethereum Layer-1 network, utilizing Ethereum as a data availability layer. While this transition benefits users by reducing fees and improving inclusion speed, it also fragments liquidity. This fragmentation poses a critical challenge for Decentralized Exchanges (DEXes) operating across these networks, which offer the same assets but suffer from price discrepancies due to a lack of synchronization. Currently, arbitraging between DEXes on different networks cannot be performed atomically. This study investigates the strategies employed by arbitrageurs to capitalize on price differences among DEXes across various chains. We identify two non-atomic arbitrage strategies: BRIDGE-ARB, which utilizes asset bridges between chains, and REBALANCE-ARB, which involves simultaneous, opposite-direction trades on the networks. We analyze the effectiveness of these strategies across seven different networks against Ethereum over a one-year period from September 2023 to August 2024.

Have you ever wanted to implement real-world applications such as private transfers, confidential voting systems, decentralized identity management, and private NFTs on Ethereum?

If yes, then this workshop is for you! In "How to Do Private/Confidential Transactions Directly on Ethereum," learn how to leverage Zama's Fully Homomorphic Ethereum Virtual Machine (fhEVM) to build confidential smart contracts. With the fhEVM, you can create privacy-preserving applications by performing computations on encrypted data, ensuring confidentiality without sacrificing the composability of smart contracts. By the end of this presentation, you'll have hands-on experience deploying private smart contracts using encrypted types and operations.

Quantum computers are on the verge of becoming a reality, posing significant risks to blockchain systems like Ethereum due to their ability to break classical cryptographic algorithms. In this talk, we’ll explore the challenges posed by quantum computing and dive into some potential strategies to make Ethereum resistant to these emerging threats.

In this talk, I will discuss the infrastructure and oracle requirements essential for realizing a fully decentralized Consumer Price Index (CPI) on Ethereum. A decentralized CPI could serve as a critical tool for transparency and accuracy in inflation tracking, yet it poses unique technical challenges. This session will explore the role of decentralized oracle networks in securing real-time off-chain data and ensuring tamper-resistant CPI reporting.
Key areas include the need for reliable decentralized storage, challenges in real-time data aggregation and the role of consensus mechanisms in maintaining data integrity. We’ll also examine the technical hurdles of decentralizing CPI data verification and storage, such as incentivizing data collectors and managing scalability across multiple sectors like DeFi and virtual economies.
Attendees will gain insights into the practical and technical requirements for building a decentralized CPI, understanding how it could drive financial transparency and further the adoption of Ethereum-based applications. This session is aimed at builders and technical users looking to address these complex requirements and implement robust infrastructure solutions within decentralized ecosystems.

This talk describes the differences between Process-based and VM-based Trusted Execution Environments (TEEs), assessing their impact on blockchain scalability. It will review the current state of TEE research, highlighting advancements and challenges. We also determine how other PETs (e.g., ZKPs or FHE) can complement TEEs. Additionally, the talk introduces a versatile framework designed for deploying and researching TEEs in both local and cloud settings.

Key trends and outlook for 2025

Zero Trust is a security framework that emerged in (Web2) network security, based on the basic principle of "trust nothing, verify everything".
In this talk we will present an architecture for Zero Trust Protocols in web3 and we show how to apply it for Bitcoin and Ethereum. Every request is authenticated, authorized, and secured before being granted. Verification is continuous, and access is limited to the minimum necessary.

In a world where everyone uses anonymous crypto-currencies for all payment needs and anonymous credentials and private smart contracts for all other digital interactions, it is impossible to trace wrongdoers, by design. This makes legitimate controls, such as tracing illicit trade and terror suspects, impossible to carry out. Here, we propose a privacy-preserving blueprint capability that allows an auditor to publish an encoding of the function f(x, - ) for a publicly known function f and a secret input x. For example, x may be a secret watchlist, and f(x, y) may return y if y in x. On input her data y and the auditor's pk_x, a user can compute an escrow Z such that anyone can verify that Z was computed correctly from the user's credential attributes, and moreover, the auditor can recover f(x,y) from Z.

I will present Vyper, a Pythonic smart contract language designed for the Ethereum ecosystem. Vyper prioritizes simplicity, security, and efficiency, making it an excellent starting point for new Web3 developers. The talk introduces the fundamentals of Vyper, explores its advantages over traditional Solidity programming, and emphasizes its user-friendly syntax and inherent safety features. Attendees will learn how Vyper’s minimalism supports optimal contract performance without requiring complex optimizations. By focusing on real-world examples and providing accessible resources, this presentation empowers developers to create secure, efficient smart contracts with confidence.

This talk is highly relevant with Vitalik’s recent discussion on “info finance”, the ECF Pensieve is a research fruit from work since 2018 by ECF as one of the first grant program in the blockchain space, on the mechanism of decentralized knowledge bases that is going to be a critical piece for info defense in the d/acc movement.

ECF.network is an instance based on the Pensieve mechanism that supports Ethereum alignment by fostering social consensus and boosting legitimacy for accountable projects. The session includes a speech and presentation, with potential for an interactive workshop.

Static code analysis is a cornerstone of blockchain security, helping developers identify vulnerabilities early in development. However, traditional tools often need help to catch subtle errors or adapt to evolving attack patterns. In this talk, I’ll introduce how we address these challenges with the Wake Framework—a modern approach to static analysis.

We’ll explore key concepts like the Data Dependency Graph (DDG) to showcase how Wake provides deeper insights into code structures. Additionally, we’ll explore the role of AI in static analysis, discussing where AI excels and where it falls short. I’ll provide a perspective on combining AI-driven insights with useful techniques by highlighting practical examples and lessons learned.

Whether you’re a developer, auditor, or security professional, this session will provide a fresh perspective on enhancing blockchain code security and give you an overview of tools to solve risks efficiently.

We present Mahi-Mahi, the first asynchronous BFT consensus protocol that achieves sub-second latency in the WAN while processing over 100,000 transactions per second. We accomplish this remarkable performance by building Mahi-Mahi on an uncertified structured Directed Acyclic Graph (DAG). By forgoing explicit certification, we significantly reduce the number of messages required to commit and minimize CPU overhead associated with certificate verification. Mahi-Mahi introduces a novel commit rule that allows committing multiple blocks in each DAG round, while ensuring liveness in the presence of an asynchronous adversary. Mahi-Mahi can be parametrized to either attempt to commit within 5 message delays, maximizing the probability of commitment under a continuously active asynchronous adversary, or within 4 message delays, which reduces latency under a more moderate and realistic asynchronous adversary. We demonstrate the safety and liveness of Mahi-Mahi in a Byzantine context. Subsequently, we evaluate Mahi-Mahi in a geo-replicated setting and compare its performance against state-of-the-art asynchronous consensus protocols, showcasing Mahi-Mahi's significantly lower latency.

This talk explores Switzerland's unique positioning with D/ACC cultural technology, rooted in a 700-year history of decentralization. It introduces the core thesis of Zuitzerland's vision to become a sandbox for future societal models. Una and Isla have presented this talk before, but not yet in Switzerland.

In this workshop, I will explore the reasons for autonomous media freed from corporate agendas, the decentralized stack needed to build one, the possible technical drawbacks and the extents to which such new generation of media could obtain political representation.

The complex dynamics and interactions within multi-layer blockchain architecture present unique challenges for decentralized finance (DeFi). To fully understand and address these challenges, it is essential to examine the interplay between various blockchain layers. One example of this interplay is maximal extractable value (MEV), which largely originates from DeFi applications. The value associated with MEV exerts centralizing forces and introduces security vulnerabilities at the consensus layer.

From Vitalik’s 2024 essay, a whole movement is forming around D/ACC.
Our speakers explore topics like zuzalu’s open-source tech movement, the path to defeating monolithic LLMs, and how individual freedoms like privacy, bio-defense and safety are critical components of this movement.

Based in Zurich, the Beastie Board is an ambitious project to create an entirely new kind of media and discovery experience to the blockchain. Come and learn about the system from a technical perspective, as well as it's goals regarding creating a resilient media infrastructure and what it could mean for the blockchain as well as the Web.

Decentralized Finance (DeFi) introduces a new financial landscape where user anonymity and diverse token interactions pose unique analytical challenges. In this talk, I explore the Ethereum token transfer network, which, unlike Bitcoin, hosts complex inter-token relations such as ERC-20 and NFT exchanges. By leveraging network science, I address gaps in existing transaction analysis methods that either depend on sparsely labeled data or overlook distinct DeFi user behaviors.

My approach employs graph motif-based fingerprints that can effectively infer transaction functions, enabling a clearer differentiation of user groups and token dynamics. I present a case study of Alameda Research’s activity leading up to the FTX collapse, where analysis of multi-token flows and node centralities uncovers shifts in token distributions and user centrality. These findings offer critical insights into the influence of high-profile accounts and evolving transaction dynamics within DeFi.

Beyond transaction networks, DeFi lending protocols like Compound and AAVE face risks analogous to traditional financial contagions. Collaborating with economists, I utilize blockchain’s transparency to model systemic risks, simulating price shocks and cascading liquidations within DeFi lending pools. Through these simulations, we identify risk-prone lending pools and behaviors that may destabilize protocols. My ongoing work integrates user-level data in a bipartite network to detect contagion-prone users and lending pools.

This talk will emphasize how network science and real-time data applications in blockchain offer a powerful lens for analyzing the dynamics and systemic risks inherent to DeFi ecosystems.

Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs) are revolutionizing governance by leveraging blockchain and Distributed Ledger Technologies (DLTs) to enable decentralized decision-making. Prominent in areas like decentralized finance (DeFi), venture capital, and digital art, DAOs offer transparent, democratic resource management. However, their diverse structures and associated challenges remain underexplored, necessitating a comprehensive taxonomy to systematically categorize and analyze their attributes.
This research aims to develop a DAO taxonomy that classifies DAOs based on their models, operational frameworks, and technological attributes. The taxonomy will capture key characteristics such as governance structures, community engagement, incentive mechanisms, and use cases providing a structured framework for evaluating DAOs' opportunities and limitations.

A lot of people are still "confused" and "scared" to jump into crypto and take part somehow in the communities. We can help by trying to create a better onboarding for our normies frens. This was our mission with SpaghettETH in Italy.

In this talk, we explore how Bermuda integrates with Safe to enable private transactions and self-custody of assets within a shielded pool. We will highlight the new capabilities this brings for the next wave of financial services and applications. Using self-custodial credit card - like Gnosis Pay - as an example, we illustrate how our protocol can preserve user privacy while maintaining full self-custody, paving the way for a new era of private and user-centric financial solutions.

This session explores the integration of decentralized oracle networks, cross-chain bridges, and core infrastructure that powers secure data feeds and asset transfers in the Ethereum ecosystem. Panelists will discuss smart contract wallets—their design patterns, security considerations, and best practices. The session will cover how to build secure wallets and robust blockchain applications while maintaining decentralization principles.

How can a strong Web3 community emerge in one of the least innovation-driven cities? This speech will share the journey of urbe.eth, a community that started with a group of friends hanging out to talk about Web3 and is now creating the first Web3 hub in Italy.

We present and evaluate the design of a system that allows users to combine private data into data pools using trusted execution environments and manage these pools by issuing digital rights tokens (DRTs) to third-party data analysts. Digital rights token represent specific rights to a pool of data and are issued on a distributed ledger.
Data analysts can purchase the right to execute open source code on the combined encrypted data and receive the result from this code execution, but not the underlying data. Different from other information infrastructures, the operators of the Nautilus platform cannot access the private data, which protects users' rights to their data. We discuss applications of the platform to financial and healthcare data analytics as well as implications for data governance more broadly.

Real-world assets (RWAs) represent a powerful opportunity to anchor decentralized systems in tangible value and stability. By leveraging the Swiss Franc (CHF)—a globally trusted and stable currency—RWAs can position CHF as a key asset in DeFi.
This presentation shows how far we've come with Frankencoin and examines the potential of tokenized Swiss assets, such as real estate and bonds, to enhance financial innovation and stability, offering a compelling use case for expanding CHF’s relevance in these systems.

This study examines the network of firms participating in the blockchain-based voluntary carbon market (VCM), focusing on the factors that shape partnership structures and the significance of chosen blockchain infrastructures within this context. Although blockchain technology was initially anticipated to consolidate market participants, our findings reveal a diverse and relatively fragmented ecosystem, featuring multiple infrastructure options. Distinct tokenization strategies also appear to influence collaboration patterns. Companies engaging primarily in tokenizing “legacy” credits tend to form more extensive partnerships, yet they may face increased competitive pressures. Conversely, those that tokenize credits through proprietary procedures often exhibit fewer connections, and shortening their supply chains. Overall, strategic considerations and market dynamics prevail over purely technical factors in shaping these interfirm relationships.

Despite the decentralized nature of Ethereum, wallets and dApps typically trust centralized providers for accessing account data such as balances and transaction histories. This talk discusses methods to extend the web3 API with correctness proofs so that users no longer have to rely on an individual provider's arbitrary data logging policies and access restrictions.

Blockchain scalability remains a central challenge in decentralized application ecosystems. Sharding has long been heralded as a promising approach for scalability, yet its implementation remains difficult due to asynchronous cross-shard interactions and execution bottlenecks. In Ethereum, these challenges are critical as it seeks to maintain decentralization, security, and composability while scaling to meet demand.
This talk introduces zkSharding, a sharded zkRollup design for Ethereum. zkSharding enables parallel transaction processing across independent shards while relying on Ethereum’s settlement layer for data availability and state validation. Its architecture ensures shard-level processing remains isolated yet interoperable, addressing cross-shard communication complexities.
zkSharding's architecture comprises:
Execution Shards: Independent shards process transactions in parallel, leveraging shared token standards for seamless cross-shard interactions.
Main Shard: Coordinates global state synchronization and validates cross-shard messaging.
Ethereum (L1): Provides settlement and data availability.

The design of zkSharding is based on several key innovations:
ShardDAG: A robust DAG enforces transaction ordering and data availability through rules ensuring state alignment and cross-shard consistency.
Async Calls: Non-blocking communication enables parallelism and avoids execution halts during cross-shard interactions.
Prover Network: Integrates a distributed proving system using novel design BOIL for efficient aggregation of zkProofs.
Fast Processing: Non-atomic transactions enable near-instantaneous execution while preserving security through ZKPs and Ethereum settlement layer.
Fee Optimization: A local fee model dynamically adjusts shard-specific base fees and incorporates mechanisms like message premiums and discounts to balance network load and incentivize efficient cross-shard transactions.

In this talk, we will explore zkSharding's detailed architecture and how it addresses fundamental scalability challenges. Additionally, we will highlight zkSharding’s most significant advantage: enabling applications, such as DEXs, to be natively composable across shards.

This talk explores the macroeconomic challenges facing Ethereum, with a focus on the dynamics of staking, inflation, and governance centralization. Leveraging a "stock and flow" macroeconomic model inspired by dynamical systems theory, we analyze the risk of excessive staking and its interaction with inflationary and deflationary forces. Our findings reveal that moderate inflation can serve as a mechanism to curb runaway staking, while overly aggressive deflationary strategies risk exacerbating governance centralization. This talk highlights the critical importance of balanced macroeconomic interventions, supported by quantitative modeling and simulations, to sustain Ethereum's decentralized architecture and ensure its long-term economic resilience.

This talk is based on research funded by the EF and available here: https://blog.20squares.xyz/issuance-dynamics/

As blockchain technology continues to evolve, it is reshaping the philanthropic landscape by enabling greater transparency, efficiency, and inclusivity. How can not-for-profits benefit from Web3?

Meet us at the Meet Space and share a drink with us!
Brought you by Duct Tape, ESP, PWN, World and Polkadot.

Liquity V2 allows borrowers to set their own interest rate in exchange for a certain risk level (loss of exposure upon stablecoin redemption). To facilitate the ongoing rate management for passive users, we built an automation system on the ICP that adjusts interest rates efficiently in a decentralized way.

The system makes use of the ICP's Ethereum integration and timers to continuously monitor the user's redemption risk, submitting interest rate update transactions as needed. By charging a small management fee, the system covers its own operational costs (ICP cycles and Ethereum gas costs) and is thus self-sustaining.

The transfer velocity of money is a macroeconomic quantity that measures the frequency of exchanges in an economy. For cryptoassets it can be exactly measured adopting a new approach, MicroVelocity. In this study we apply the framework to Ether, the native cryptocurrency of the Ethereum blockchain, to investigate velocity and its top contributors and how they can be characterised in the Ethereum ecosystem. While the inequalities and heterogeneity in wealth are well known, we here find that the same inequalities occur as well for MicroVelocity distribution and that this inequality is not explained just by wealth, but rather by the behaviour and economic activity of each individual agent.

Rollups have become a core part of the Ethereum ecosystem. They promise cheap and fast transactions with minimal trust. These revolutionary systems can do more than merely scale blockchains, they can add special features, target specific markets, and provide a cheap place to onboard the next billion users. After a brief recap of how rollups have come to be, we’ll take a look at modern research challenges and upcoming features of these systems. This will include interoperability concerns, security considerations, and more.

AI is reshaping industries, but its growing compute demands expose the limits of centralized data centers, which prioritize control and profit over user privacy and sustainability. Acurast offers a decentralized solution by harnessing the untapped power of billions of smartphones. These devices, equipped with advanced security features, form a scalable and confidential compute network that challenges Big Tech's dominance.

With 30,000 devices already connected, Acurast empowers users to take control, enabling hyper-personalized AI agents and fostering a fairer, more sustainable future for AI. As Acurast prepares for its 2025 token launch, it invites everyone to join the movement and redefine compute power for the AI era—decentralized, secure, and powered by the people.

Economic analysis of the use of stETH in the context of an ETF or exchange traded product

Explore the potential of stateless architecture in Layer 2 solutions. As Layer 2 technologies evolve, we will discuss the fundamental trade-offs and present how combining client-side Zero-Knowledge Proofs (ZKPs) with stateless architecture enhances efficiency. This session will highlight innovative possibilities not yet widely discussed in the Ethereum community, showing how this approach can revolutionize scalability, security, and privacy.

What is the impact of a reduction in staking yields on stakers, and how does it affect the market share of different groups? Could it lead to increased concentration? Using game theory, empirical research, and simulations, we analyze how changes in staking yields influence various staker types: Solo Stakers, Decentralized Staking Service Providers, and Centralized Staking Service Providers. We explore the conditions under which certain types gain market share and examine the potential implications for concentration.

What is Kademlia and why does it matter? this talk will examine the differences between the Kademlia routing systems and how they can be beneficial in the context of decentralized storage

There's a known dichotomy between Multisig and MPC solutions when it comes to custody solutions. Multisig solutions used to leak signer information on-chain. We demonstrate that one can use Multisig while retaining privacy of the signers.

The talk explores an intelligence-based transaction analysis model within the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM), providing insights into transaction behaviors and security threats. Designed to enhance transaction processing capabilities, the model leverages machine learning, a unique approach, and specialized data sets to fortify security intelligence.

By identifying and highlighting known malicious behaviors and exploit patterns, the approach aims to effectively mitigate security risks. Operating in two distinct modes, it offers real-time analysis for immediate threat detection and on-demand processing for in-depth investigation. The core strength lies in systematically storing generated intelligence in a dedicated database, enabling efficient retrieval and analysis.

We will present the applications of each mode, from historical data enrichment to smart simulations, and their implications for enhancing Ethereum's security ecosystem.

From the very inception of the Ethereum Proof of Stake, solo stakers were considered a backbone of Ethereum security. However, the share of solo stakers in Ethereum staking has been declining over time. Up until recently. With the launch of the Community Staking Module by Lido the situation started to change. Let's find out what are the reasons for that and why solo staking is still crucial for Ethereum.

The workshop explores the principles and practices of Swiss cooperative housing as a pathway to fostering sustainable communities. Participants will engage with innovative strategies for collaboration, resource sharing, and community building, highlighting how the Swiss model promotes social cohesion and environmental stewardship. Through interactive discussions and case studies, attendees will gain insights into transforming residential spaces into vibrant, resilient communities that prioritize sustainability and inclusivity.

Easy use of the Ledger new SDK with any Ledger hardware devices to ease your integration on top of Ledger Open Platform.

Web3 was a term coined by Gavin Wood, meaning “an internet based on blockchain” and “less trust, more truth.” However, with the rise of AI agents, what we really need is not an internet based on blockchain or less trust, but instead a complete end-to-end cryptographic internet where every interaction is trustless. ENS has been identified as a solution to address the tough problems of cross-chain addresses and universal cross-chain identity. The .eth TLD has the potential to serve as a foundational building block of the verified web, but the ENS protocol must undergo further development and gain broader adoption to fully realize this vision. This talk will cover where we are today and where we are going with universal ENS profiles and trustless resolution of user data.

BoLD is a new dispute resolution protocol that is designed to replace the originally deployed Arbitrum dispute resolution protocol. Unlike that protocol, BoLD is resistant to delay attacks. It achieves this resistance without a significant increase in onchain computation costs and with reduced staking costs.

World (world.org) is building the largest identity and financial network. In order to build privacy-preserving ZK identity systems, it is required for the proofs to be created on the users' devices so as to preserve user data privacy. However, mobile phones and other edge devices do not have the necessary computational capabilities to support the most important identity use cases at World scale. World has been building lots of innovative solutions in the client-side proving space and beyond in order to enable privacy-preserving ZK identity to its existing user base of over 20M humans.

During my presentation I will explore how AI-driven "convenience yield" concepts are transforming DeFi, with a focus on expanding access in emerging markets. Through real-world insights into AI-powered risk management and simplified DeFi tools, the talk will emphasize on the potential for broader financial inclusion and smarter, accessible investment solutions.

While elections are not the only factor, they are arguably one of the most important pillars for the functioning of liberal democracies. Recent evidence from around the globe demonstrates that conducting elections in a free and fair manner is not a straightforward process. One constant concern is the role of financial contributions for political campaigns. A discussion arose particularly in the USA, where economists and legal scholars suggested to have election campaigns financed by vouchers. Taking the concept of campaign vouchers a step further to the sphere of blockchain technology seems straightforward. As a general preliminary remark, we can state that vouchers are not alien to economies. There are, for example, education, health as well as food vouchers which were or are still being used for populations at large or for very specific groups. Once the coin is created it will be distributed to each citizen who can either donate it directly to one of the registered, legitimate beneficiaries which in most cases would be political parties or election candidates. Depending on the number of citizens, beneficiaries and economy the amount of altcoins would have to be defined, not too high, not too low, such as for example in Seattle (two vouchers for 50 USD). In order not to disclose their political affinity, as a function of vote secrecy so to speak, shielded addresses must be supported for the first transaction by a citizen. To support such a feature, anonymous zero-knowledge proof options such as zk-SNARK could be used (monitored by a state variable in the blockchain). Furthermore, it would be interesting to observe whether coins will be distributed among political parties to a degree proportional to voter share or whether we can see some more altruistic donor behaviour following principles of equality and fairness.

Our mission: Make crypto data accessible

The workshop will cover
- The aspects of security you need to know when auditing zero knowledge protocols and applications.
- Auditing fundamentals
- Common vulnerabilities in ZKP applications
- How to approach audit competitions
- Walkthroughs of Cairo, Mina and zkEVM Audits

This is a hands on workshop aimed at beginners, example code and resources will be provided

For the past decade, decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) have been explored and experimented with, risen and fallen many times. The term “DAO” itself remains subject to various interpretations, from on-chain governance to Discord-administrated organisations (“DAOs”) and DAOs-in-name-only (DINOs). The rich variety of DAOs across L2s, DeFi, NFTs, ReFi, DeSci and many other (sub-)ecosystems resulted in a vast natural experiment of people coordinating around these decentralised technologies, allowing us to observe the emergence of governance within a new system during a relatively short time frame. Based on about ten years of research on blockchain, we conduct a literature review on digital democracy in DAOs, shedding light on typical mechanisms and common challenges. In this talk, we will present our approach, preliminary findings and put them into perspective from insights we got along the way as well as observations from our daily work in the DAO space.

Anoma brings a universal intent machine to Ethereum, allowing developers to write applications in terms of intents, which can be ordered, solved, and settled anywhere in the Ethereum ecosystem.

Anoma is an interface, not an intermediary - it’s not another MEV redirection device. It provides a universal intent standard which does not constrain what kinds of intents can be expressed, but allows for built-in state, network, and application interoperability. Intents and applications written with Anoma can be ordered, solved, and settled anywhere - on the Ethereum main chain, on EVM and non-EVM rollups, on Eigenlayer AVSs, on Cosmos chains, Solana, or any sufficiently programmable state machine.

The main motivation behind Yolc is to strike a balance between these values for building Ethereum smart contracts:

• /Safe/ -Yolc is purely functional with linear type safety, made for the Ethereum virtual machine.
• /Expressive/ - YulDSL provides an EDSL called 'YulDSL' for transpiling Haskell code to Solidiy/Yul code.
• /Fun/ - Yolc allows you to write safe code in production, a joyful experience for super coders.

Web3 ecosystems aspire to redefine how technology is built and governed, yet they struggle to effectively engage and retain developers, creating thriving, engaged developer communities. What can Web3 learn from the open-source movements that revolutionised software development?

In this talk, we’ll draw parallels between these ecosystems, uncovering key lessons from open-source successes and failures that Web3 has yet to harness fully.

The Web3 community wants better decentralized infra alternatives to cloud providers (AWS, Vercel) in order to build better Web3 consumer apps. One shortcut to manifesting this tooling is adding cryptoeconomic security via Restaking from Ethereum to off the shelf P2P apps (BitTorrent, IPFS, etc).

Short inputs from our panelists on the meaning of the terms and movements followed by a fishbowl style exploration of the role of these movements in the next wave of AI and frontier tech development, and their role in humanity’s future success or failure.

Smart contracts on Ethereum power decentralized applications but operate in a trustless and immutable environment where even minor flaws can lead to catastrophic outcomes. Ensuring their correctness and security is paramount. Formal verification offers a rigorous approach to guarantee smart contracts meet their specifications, yet current methods face challenges such as complexity, scalability, and limited integration into developer workflows.

This talk introduces the Data-Aware Finite State Machine (DAFSM) model as a practical pathway toward the formal verification of Ethereum smart contracts. DAFSM models contracts as finite state machines with enriched capabilities for handling data, inter-contract communication, and modular transitions. This approach ensures safety properties, such as reentrancy prevention and role consistency, while supporting multi-contract verification for complex decentralized systems.

In addition to its existing capabilities, DAFSM serves as a foundation for a robust verification pipeline. Future developments include symbolic model checking for infinite data domains, plugins for integrated development environments (IDEs) like Remix and VS Code, and tools for analyzing and optimizing gas efficiency. The model also paves the way for privacy-preserving verification techniques, enabling contracts to leverage zero-knowledge proofs while maintaining formal guarantees.

Attendees will gain insights into the current state of formal verification, learn how DAFSM addresses critical challenges, and explore the potential of integrating verification seamlessly into smart contract development. This talk bridges the gap between theoretical rigor and practical application, offering a vision for building more secure and efficient Ethereum smart contracts.

Free personal names associated with various web3 communities in form of SoulBound tokens are the missing piece in the ecosystem, because they factually act as web3 usernames in various web3 communities and projects. Free personal names are essential for multiple use cases for web3 users as well as for web3 communities.

In this workshop, we’ll get acquainted with app.0xname.foo - a platform for web3 users that enables seamless creation of free personal names. I will demonstrate how to effortlessly create a community and then how to issue a free personal name in a digital form.

• app.0xname.foo is empowered by the PoM Protocol - an authentication system for web3 users and communities, available as a free public good.

Polkadot went through many changes in 2024, including the removal of parachain auctions, the adding of asynchronous backing to decrease block time and increase throughput, and improvements to on-chain governance.

In this talk, we will discuss the changes that are planning to be made to Polkadot in 2025. Some of these include: the addition of EVM compatibility - albeit with major improvements - to a system parachain, elastic scaling to allow parachains to use more throughput on a dynamic basis, and a unified address format useful across all parachains.

This talk explores the journey of transforming developer initiatives into thriving, sustainable movements within the Ethereum ecosystem. By leveraging nearly a decade of experience in Developer Relations, we’ll define the developer ecosystem and share lessons learned from building grassroots initiatives, including key frameworks like Francesco’s Developer Engagement Funnel and Hierarchy of Builder Needs.

The session will highlight strategies to localize community growth, foster accessibility, and enable cross-border collaborations that scale Ethereum globally. We’ll also delve into the power of permissionless innovation, using examples like MetaMask Snaps to demonstrate how empowering developers can create a ripple effect across the Web3 ecosystem.

This talk dives into the journey of transforming developer initiatives into thriving, sustainable movements within the Ethereum ecosystem. Drawing from nearly a decade of experience in Developer Relations, I will share insights into defining the developer ecosystem, building grassroots initiatives, and implementing frameworks like Francesco’s Developer Engagement Funnel and Hierarchy of Builder Needs.

We’ll explore strategies for localizing community growth, fostering accessibility, and enabling cross-border collaborations to scale Ethereum globally. The power of permissionless innovation will also be showcased, with examples like MetaMask Snaps demonstrating how empowering developers can create ripple effects throughout the Web3 space.

Attendees will leave with practical takeaways, including how to standardize developer onboarding, create safe and inclusive spaces for builders, and align community efforts for long-term impact. Whether you’re a developer, community builder, or advocate for decentralized innovation, this session will equip you with the tools to turn builders into movements that drive the future of Ethereum.

Quadratic Voting (QV) is celebrated for its ability to capture the intensity of voter preferences, transcending traditional binary choices. Yet, practical implementations often fall short of its theoretical promise. In this talk, we begin by exploring the fundamentals of QV as described in academic literature and evaluating its usefulness against conventional token-weighted voting practices. We then highlight how existing implementations diverge from these theoretical fundamentals.
Despite its promise, real-world deployments of QV face significant challenges, particularly in mitigating Sybil attacks, where adversaries manipulate identities to skew results. We propose integrating Proof of Personhood (PoP) protocols as a robust solution, ensuring Sybil resistance while maintaining accessibility and fairness. Additionally, we explore wealth redistribution within the QV framework, a critical feature that aligns economic incentives to boost voter participation and equity.
To bridge theory and practice, we present the architecture and a live demonstration of an on-chain QV implementation tailored for a token-based community. Deployed on the Ethereum testnet, our tool incorporates PoP protocols, token locking, and redistribution mechanisms, offering a comprehensive framework for decentralized and fair decision-making. The demo showcases how communities can create proposals, enable QV-based voting, and execute decisions transparently on-chain.
Our project invites collaboration from researchers, developers, and community managers to refine and scale this solution for DAO governance, public goods funding, and beyond. Join us as we explore how QV, combined with PoP and Ethereum’s decentralized infrastructure, can redefine democratic participation and drive the next generation of blockchain governance.

In this hands-on workshop, we'll demystify Zero Knowledge Proofs (ZKP) and their practical applications in machine learning by building a real-world application from scratch. Drawing from experience developing ZK applications at Nethermind and various blockchain projects, we'll demonstrate how to create privacy-preserving ML solutions that can be immediately implemented in production environments.
The workshop will guide participants through:

Building a simple ML model with privacy guarantees using ZK circuits
Implementing efficient proof generation for ML inference
Deploying and integrating with Ethereum smart contracts
Practical optimization techniques for production use

Using popular tools like Circom and Solidity, we'll create a working prototype that attendees can use as a foundation for their own projects. This session bridges the gap between theoretical ZK concepts and practical implementation, making it valuable for developers and technical decision-makers looking to integrate privacy-preserving ML solutions into their blockchain applications.

Current mechanisms for funding public goods in the Web3 ecosystem face a fundamental scaling challenge: as the number of projects grows, the cognitive overhead for funders becomes increasingly burdensome. This talk introduces Deep Funding (deepfunding.org), a mechanism recently invented by Vitalik Buterin that leverages AI, market dynamics, and expert human judgment to efficiently allocate resources across complex dependency networks.

This talk reveals how easily validators can be deanonymized in the Ethereum P2P network. We explore extracted data such as validator distribution and geolocation, discuss associated security risks, and discuss approaches to improve privacy.

Manually guided fuzzing on Ethereum smart contracts can uncover critical bugs, but debugging these issues is often challenging and time-consuming. This talk introduces Fuzz Shrink, a new feature in the Wake framework that automatically reduces complex failings within fuzz test cases into minimal, reproducible sequences, turning minutes of debugging into seconds.

Tokenized assets are expected to transform global finance, yet their legal treatment remains a source of uncertainty. This article presents an analytical framework for categorising legal structures of tokenized assets, addressing a gap in academic literature and regulatory approaches. We introduce a taxonomy based on the legal relationship between tokens and their underlying assets: Complete tokenization, where tokens embody legally enforceable rights, comprises direct tokenization, where tokens are the primary form of the asset, and indirect tokenization, where asset-backed tokens are created through intermediary structures. In contrast, incomplete tokenization results in tokens that function as "digital twins" with limited or no legal value.
Our analysis reveals that the effectiveness of tokenization depends on the robustness of this legal bond. We compare how these categories impact tokenization features, including asset transferability, legal certainty, and composability. Furthermore, we identify limiting factors in current regulatory frameworks, such as form requirements, ownership models, and identity mechanisms. Drawing examples from various legal systems and asset classes, including financial instruments, property rights, and digital assets, this work provides a foundation for evaluating tokenization strategies, with practical insights for regulators and market participants.

In this talk, we will take a look at Sei's groundbreaking implementation of parallelized virtual machine (VM) execution and optimistic block processing - the industry's first of its kind on mainnet.

At the core of Sei's performance is its proprietary Twin-Turbo Consensus mechanism, which combines intelligent block propagation with optimistic block processing. This dual approach significantly reduces block times, achieving single-slot finality in under 400 milliseconds.

Sei's architecture uniquely merges the scalability of Solana's monolithic infrastructure with the rich tooling and developer communities of both the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) and WebAssembly (WASM). This integration is done through pointer contracts and EVM precompiles, granting developers the flexibility to write decentralized applications (dApps) in either Solidity or Rust. Pointer contracts act as interpreters, enabling seamless interoperability between EVM and WASM environments. This ensures that tokens and contracts can operate across both VMs without the need for wrapping or duplication.

There has been a growing interest in shared sequencing solutions, in which transactions for multiple rollups are processed together. Their proponents argue that these solutions allow for better composability and can potentially increase sequencer revenue by enhancing MEV extraction. However, little research has been done on these claims, raising the question of understanding the actual impact of shared sequencing on arbitrage profits, the most common MEV strategy in rollups. To address this, we develop a model to assess arbitrage profits under atomic execution across two Constant Product Market Marker liquidity pools and demonstrate that switching to atomic execution does not always improve profits. We also discuss some scenarios where atomicity may lead to losses, offering insights into why atomic execution may not be enough to convince arbitrageurs and rollups to adopt shared sequencing.

US Treasuries are considered a "safe" investment offering a "risk free" rate of return. Is there an equivalent to Treasuries in DeFi? And if so, how does it differ in terms of risk?

The main topic of the panel is decentralization in defi, the Future of DeFi and “Why is self-custody & DeFi the future?

"Tokenization 2.0: Navigating Secondaries" highlights the evolution of equity tokenization and its transformative impact on finance. Hosted by Aktionariat, a leader in this field, the talk will explore the progression from Tokenization 1.0 - characterized by limited liquidity - to Tokenization 2.0, which introduces greater accessibility through secondary markets. It will also provide a forward-looking glimpse into Tokenization 3.0, envisioning a future of full interoperability and cross-chain compatibility. The session will delve into real-world applications of tokenized equity and its benefits, including transparency, 24/7 market access, and the implementation of Delivery versus Payment Smart Contracts.

Ethereum’s decentralized architecture relies on scalable and efficient block production, leading to the adoption of Proposer-Builder Separation (PBS). However, PBS-enabled environments that use standard Builder APIs expose validators to new privacy risks due to transport-layer metadata leakage, including IP addresses linked to public keys. This leakage allows adversaries to target block proposers and disrupt block production through network attacks, undermining decentralization and fairness.

Our experiment investigates how transport-level privacy leaks at validator-relay interfaces allow targeted disruption via metadata analysis and low-cost network-layer attacks. We implemented a transport metadata harvesting pipeline of the full currently most used PBS architecture - MEV-boost stack - to link validators’ public keys to the IP address of their consensus client as well as that of the mev-boost software and executed attacks in a lab setting to demonstrate the practical applications of this work.

Our analysis challenges the trust assumptions of relayers in the current PBS implementation and highlights how these vulnerabilities compromise proposer anonymity and incentivize adversarial actions, such as manipulating RANDAO values to interfere with block proposals. Beyond proposers, relays and builders are also at risk without sufficient transport privacy measures. To address this, we advocate for integrating metadata privacy protocols into PBS designs, particularly as the transition to enshrined PBS (ePBS) advances. Strengthening transport-layer privacy is essential to preserving Ethereum’s decentralization, security, and fairness in block production.

Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Networks (DePINs) integrate blockchain technology with real-world infrastructure, enabling decentralized systems for applications such as storage, computing, and IoT. By incentivizing resource contributions from users, DePINs create scalable networks that address practical needs while reducing costs at a significant level. With a market capitalization exceeding $29 billion and poised to reach $3.5 trillion by 2028, the sector is expanding through projects like Arweave for decentralized storage and peaq for IoT applications. As DePINs evolve, they hold potential to bridge Web3 technology with mainstream use by addressing everyday needs like energy grids and autonomous networks. In this talk, we will cover the essentials of DePIN - the idea of DePIN, examples of its real-world applications, key players in the space as well as future outlook.

I'll present how the industry is changing to sustainably improve incentive alignment and governance through deliberate design and how Aragon has modularised battle-tested governance primitives to empower this new renaissance.

Although rollups have attracted significant attention, there is limited empirical research on their performance under high load. To address this, we present a data-driven analysis of the transaction surge in late 2023 and early 2024, attributed to inscriptions—a method for recording data on the blockchain. Initially introduced on Bitcoin, inscriptions enable the representation of NFTs or ERC-20-like tokens without smart contracts, and have since expanded to other blockchains. This paper examines inscription-related transactions on Ethereum and major EVM-compatible rollups, assessing their impact on scalability during transaction surges. Our results show that, on certain days, inscriptions accounted nearly 90% of transactions on Arbitrum and ZKsync Era, while 53% on Ethereum, with 99% of these inscriptions involving meme coin minting. Furthermore, we show that ZKsync and Arbitrum saw lower median gas fees during these surges. ZKsync Era, a ZK-rollup, showed a greater fee reduction than the optimistic rollups studied—Arbitrum, Base, and Optimism.

Explanation about women in web3 association, what we do, who we are and why we build.

How can crypto communities transcend geographic boundaries to create a truly global ecosystem? CryptoMondays Zurich has successfully fostered international collaborations, leveraging partnerships to share knowledge and resources across borders. In this talk, I will share:

Tokenization of real-world assets (RWAs) represents a groundbreaking opportunity in the blockchain space, yet it faces significant challenges, particularly in navigating regulation and compliance. In this talk, we will explore how the integration of ERC-7726 and ERC-3643 provides a robust framework for addressing these challenges.

Achieving legal compliance is only the first step; maintaining a meaningful connection between your tokenized assets and the physical world is essential for long-term viability. We will discuss three critical components for successful tokenization: ensuring legal compliance, establishing seamless integration with real-world entities, and fostering interoperability with existing technologies.

Attendees will gain insights into a comprehensive strategy for tokenizing assets that not only meets regulatory requirements but also facilitates easy collaboration with legal entities and third parties. By leveraging standardized contracts, we will demonstrate how to create a tokenized product that is adaptable, compliant, and ready for the future of asset management. Join us to discover how to turn your vision of tokenization into a reality while staying firmly anchored in the real world.

The MEV (Maximal Extractable Value) landscape has evolved drastically from its early days when first described in the "Ethereum is a Dark Forest" blog post and depicted as convoluted and opportunistic bots lurking on the sideline, ready to exploit any minimal profitable opportunity at the expense of regular users. The original MEV ecosystem, which gave the term a somewhat negative connotation, represents today a far more sophisticated infrastructure and key component of the Ethereum network which is vital for its long-term sustainability, offering powerful tools for institutions useful for risk management, efficiency, and innovation. This talk traces MEV’s journey from its Wild West origins to its current role as an essential component of blockchain infrastructure.

The discussion begins with a brief history of MEV, highlighting the early challenges of the Ethereum design to ensure fairness and the pivotal role of initiatives like Flashbots and its architecture in reshaping the landscape. We then explore how the infrastructure is evolving into an institutional playground, focusing on underrated use cases beyond traditional arbitrage opportunities.

Key examples include the use of private transactions to safeguard sensitive trades, sponsored transactions to ensure seamless user experiences, and liquidation protection strategies to mitigate risks in volatile markets. These applications not only empower institutions to integrate MEV components into their core business but also contribute to a more equitable and distributed Ethereum ecosystem.

The talk emphasizes the dual value of MEV infrastructure as a business opportunity and a tool for functional improvements, urging institutions to onboard ethically and strategically. Leveraging MEV not only provides a competitive advantage to its users but also foster fairness and efficiency and promotes the development of the Ethereum ecosystem toward a more mature and institution-friendly landscape, while changing once for all the original negative connotation associated to MEV.

Ethereum events are a powerhouse of the ecosystem - where knowledge is shared, tools are created, and meaningful connections are made. Over the last 5 years, we've seen a boom of community-run events all over the world, underscoring their importance. However, it is crucial to make sure that the events remain independent, sustainable and focused on delivering real value.

As a serial event organizer, I've witnessed the darker side of this boom: the organizers are often left underfunded, undervalued and burnt out. In this talk I'll highlight the key issues faced by the organizers (along with the challenges that stop some communities from hosting a big event), and propose alternative approaches to funding and structuring events that will ensure their long term health and continued role in driving the ecosystem forward.

Alternative titles:
"Event Organizer's List of Complaints"
"The Trials and Tribulations of a Serial ETH Event Organizer"
"Bitching and Moaning from Someone Who's Been There"

Based on the latest advancements in Quantum Computing, this is a great time to re-asses the security of both Web 2.0 and Web3. At a high level we will cover the most common encryptions standards, basics of quantum physics and even dare an outlook until the end of the decade.

In this talk we explore how applications can recapture and redistribute the MEV they generate by imposing specific sequencing rules to their transactions. We provide several implementation mechanisms, including hooks in modular frameworks like Uniswap V4 and priority fees as MEV taxes in Layer 2s.

A few words of thanks from the University of Zurich - Blockchain Center

Meet us at the Meet Space!
Brought you by ESP, GSR, PWN, World and Polkadot.