In this episode of Unshielded: A Blockchain & Data Podcast by Midnight, host Jason Schober is joined by Alex McFarlane, Co-founder and CEO of Keyring Network, to reveal how establishing trust in blockchain tech addresses the real risks keeping institutions out of DeFi.

What You’ll Learn:

How to reframe privacy as selective disclosure rather than hiding behavior
Why smart contract and governance risk, not privacy alone, are the primary barriers
The difference between transparency and trust
How to build a killer UX that makes privacy adoption inevitable
Why the lottery paradox reveals crowdsourced wisdom in DeFi protocol design
How fixed-income primitives will dominate 2026

Alex McFarlane is the Co-founder and CEO of Keyring Network, a privacy-focused infrastructure company that bridges traditional finance and decentralized finance. With a quant background spanning risk, fixed income structuring and trading strategies at Nomura, Alex brings a unique perspective to blockchain adoption. At Keyring, he addresses the governance and smart contract risks that prevent traditional financial institutions from confidently participating in DeFi, leveraging zero-knowledge technology to enable selective disclosure and rational privacy.

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Episode Resources:

Alex McFarlane on LinkedIn
Keyring Network Website
Jason Schober on LinkedIn
Midnight Foundation Website