In this episode of The Smart Economy Podcast, host Dylan Grabowski is joined by Marc Tillement, Director of the Pyth Data Association, an independent entity pursuing decentralized financial data distribution through the Pyth Network ecosystem. Together, they explore how Pyth Network aims to transform financial data distribution through its oracle network that serves over 100 blockchains.

And much more!
Marc Tillement is the Director of the Pyth Data Association. With vast experience in traditional finance and blockchain technology, Marc leads efforts intended to revolutionize how financial market data is sourced, distributed, and utilized across more than 100 blockchain networks. Under his leadership, Pyth Network has established partnerships with major traditional finance institutions, like CBOE and NYSE, while onboarding over 100 data publishers, including prominent trading firms like Virtu and GTS. Marc brings unique insights on transforming the $30 billion financial data industry through decentralized infrastructure, offering high-frequency, real-time market data feeds to smart contracts across multiple chains.

[18:21] Revolutionizing Financial Data Infrastructure
Marc Tillement explains how Pith Network is creating a universal price layer that powers financial applications across blockchains. The network provides nearly 2,000 price feeds with sub-millisecond refresh rates available permissionlessly on over 100 blockchains. Rather than just sourcing existing data, Pith creates new financial data directly from trading firms and exchanges who generate it. Developers can integrate these price feeds directly into their DeFi applications without intermediaries. The platform's infrastructure-as-code approach allows seamless integration across chains while maintaining data quality and reliability.

[26:09] Building a Decentralized Data Publisher Network 
Trading firms like Virtex, GTS, and Jump Trading have joined Pith as data publishers, contributing their own market data rather than relying on exchanges. This direct-from-source model eliminates the traditional practice of exchanges repackaging and reselling traders' own data back to them. By aggregating data from multiple publishers, Pith can create synthetic asset prices that are decorrelated from any single exchange. The network has onboarded over 100 publishers including major institutions like CBOE and US stock exchanges. Publishers receive token rewards based on data quality and quantity contributed.

[39:32] Evolution from Solana Oracle to Multi-Chain Platform
Pith began as a Solana-native oracle but evolved to run its own application-specific blockchain for price aggregation. This sovereign chain allows publishers to run validator nodes and produce price proofs that can be verified across any blockchain. The app chain model solved scalability challenges of running directly on Solana while enabling permissionless access across chains. Developers can integrate Pith's price feeds by simply deploying smart contracts that verify proofs from the Pith chain.

[49:41] The Future of TradFi on Chain
Marc predicts traditional finance will increasingly move on-chain to enable 24/7 markets and trading. This transition may take years but will fundamentally change how financial markets operate. The blockchain industry will likely split between TradFi-oriented chains focused on real-world assets and pure DeFi chains maintaining the original crypto ethos. Privacy tools and technology will become increasingly important as more traditional trading moves on-chain. The key is being early to capitalize on this shift while maintaining decentralization principles.

Previous guests include: Rusty Matveev, Chief Strategy Officer at Calaxy; Andrew Lawrence, CEO and Co-Founder of Censo; Zac Townsend, CEO and Co-Founder of Meanwhile; Jesper Johansen, CEO and Co-Founder of Northstake; Tama Churchouse, COO of Cumberland Labs; Holly Wood of Boson Protocol; Sid Powell of Maple Finance; Chad Barraford of THORChain; and many others.

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