Yat Siu claims that rethinking how we finance education could be the breakthrough that popularizes blockchain, starting with DeFi student loan funding.
Ripple's $25 million donation to a crypto education fund has reignited conversations about how blockchain projects are building influence through academia, but in the latest episode of Byte-Sized Insight, Animoca Brands co-founder Yat Siu says that money alone is not enough.
Instead, real-world use cases, such as DeFi-backed student loans, may be the most compelling value proposition for cryptocurrencies to date.
DeFi student loans
On April 30, Pencil Finance, a project backed by Animoca Brands and its educational division Open Campus, announced a $10 million student loan funding initiative aimed at providing cheaper blockchain-backed loans. Siu believes that this type of investment in infrastructure goes beyond symbolic funding.
"What our industry needs much more is this kind of positive-sum use case that everyone else understands," Siu said in the interview. "If students can receive better, cheaper, and more effective opportunities and interest rates through cryptocurrency student loans, what happens? They are going to be more pro-crypto."
Unlike a one-time donation, the Pencil Finance model integrates cryptocurrencies directly into the funding mechanism - leveraging blockchain rails to make loans more transparent, efficient, and accessible.
"Although money influences, it doesn't necessarily change the system for the better. Technology... actually provides a way to bring people into that."
Cryptocurrencies in the classroom
Siu states that the cryptocurrency sector continues to suffer from a perception problem, especially among those unfamiliar with financial tools or the native blockchain culture. That’s why educational use cases must go beyond intellectual NFT art or meme coins and offer something universally relatable.
"When you're sitting at the table and someone asks, 'What are cryptocurrencies really for?', what do we tell them?" he asked. "Meme coins? Or do we say student loans? That’s something everyone understands."
Siu also emphasized the long-term impact of early student engagement, both for the growth of crypto literacy and for building a foundation for adoption. "They need to be brought in at the earliest levels and allowed to understand what's going on," he said. "That's what Apple did with educational discounts. At first, it wasn't about making profits, but about influencing the future."
Ripple's donation can be a step forward for awareness and the much-needed funding support in the education sector, but Animoca's approach aims to make cryptocurrencies indispensable, not just visible, in educational systems worldwide.
"We have to demonstrate what [cryptocurrencies] are for. We have to start from the ground up."
