At Stellar's Meridian conference, Anthony Scaramucci tells banks to "kill the iPod in your business"

Anthony Scaramucci bought his first bitcoin at about $6,000. In October 2020, he bought nine figures' worth for himself and his clients, and some of those clients fired him for it. He had been a skeptic, and he had already missed the run from $500 to $2,000. What changed his mind was working out what money is, and he now runs SkyBridge Capital as a crypto and late-stage private equity firm managing a couple of billion dollars. He also runs the SALT conference series, which began in 2009 and has held roughly 30 events worldwide.

His current bet is tokenization. Tokenized assets are growing, and he wants stocks to be the next wave. He argues that putting the 10 largest U.S. stocks on chain would draw the most attention, and that once a few work without glitches, competing CEOs will have to match them. The sequence starts with SEC guidance from Chair Paul Atkins, since the Clarity Act has stalled, and continues with a name like Larry Fink or Jamie Dimon moving first. In his view, the industry has about two years to build that momentum.

His advice to bank product leaders is blunt: kill your own iPod before a competitor does.

Scaramucci spoke with Tearsheet at Stellar's Meridian conference in Lisbon. He covers what stands in the way of tokenization, why settlement can shrink from days to minutes, how SkyBridge runs tokenized and traditional funds side by side, and what Wolfgang Puck taught him about rebuilding a business that is already working.