Published Apr 22, 2026 · Mpost
ZKsync’s Alex Gluchowski on why zero-knowledge cryptography is the missing piece for institutional finance — and how banks are already building on it.
Stablecoins are eating banking — pulling deposits and cross-border flows away from traditional lenders with faster, cheaper, always-on rails. In this interview, Matter Labs co-founder and CEO Alex Gluchowski explains why tokenised deposits are banks' answer, and why ZKsync's Prividium infrastructure is quickly becoming the stack they're building on.
In the past month alone, two landmark deals have validated the thesis: Prividium now underpins Cari Network, a bank-governed tokenised deposit network backed by five major US regional banks, and a new joint stack with BitGo designed to bring tokenised deposits to hundreds of millions of banking customers.
Gluchowski breaks down why zero-knowledge cryptography is the breakthrough that finally makes institutional finance compatible with public blockchains — letting banks transact on Ethereum-secured rails without exposing balances or client activity to competitors, regulators, or the public. He explains the critical difference between tokenised deposits (FDIC-insured, bank-issued, balance-sheet friendly) and stablecoins (non-bank, optimised for 24/7 global payments), and why the two are complementary rather than competitive.
He also makes the case for why Ethereum — not a privately governed consortium chain — is the only settlement layer the global financial system can credibly agree to build on, and why mid-sized banks risk being sidelined in payments and small business lending if they don't move now.
Wall Street's entry into crypto, Gluchowski argues, is moving past speculation and into infrastructure. ZKsync is building exactly what that infrastructure requires.
BitGo and ZKsync are teaming up to offer banks a full-stack infrastructure for tokenized deposits, as financial institutions look to bring traditional money onto blockchain rails without stepping outside regulatory boundaries.
Five US regional banks are building the Cari Network on ZKsync — tokenized deposits with stablecoin-speed settlement, FDIC-insured and fully within the banking system.
