Today we are exploring a fascinating intersection of disciplines, Cryptocurrency and Economics, called Cryptoeconomics (aka Cryptonomics or Tokenomics).
To help dig deeper into these concepts we brought on Stephanie Hurder, a Harvard educated PhD economist, who is also a partner and co-founder of the Prysm Group, a consulting firm focused on economic and governance.
Stephanie is a Harvard-educated economist specializing in human capital, market design, and the future of work. While at the Boston Consulting Groups, Stephanie worked with Fortune 50 corporations and global NGOs to build effective organizations that are prepared for the future of work. She was recognized as a firm-wide expert on organizational effectiveness and design and co-authored multiple publications on these topics.
Stephanie has held research positions at MIT, Microsoft Research, and Merrill Lynch, and given invited seminars to faculty at half a dozen top research universities across the country. She holds a PhD in business economics, an AM in economics, and an AB in mathematics from Harvard University.
Stephanie now works with the Prysm group as a founding economist:
“We are a blockchain economics & governance design firm led by PhD-level economists disciplined by the world’s top universities, specializing in blockchain and cryptocurrency contract theory and market design. We use a first principles-based structured process in reaching a customized solution for your distributed ledger database or smart contract enabled enterprise, concentrating on: Community Governance, Consensus Governance, Token Structure, Coin & Token Sale, and Market Structure.”
After listening to this episode you will learn:
- What Economists study and do
- What the Prisoner’s Dilemma is (how it applies to cryptoeconomics)
- What Cryptoeconomics is (The difference between Protocol and dApp, Token Curated Registries cryptoeconomics)
- What tokenization is (and how it connects with economics)
- About Stephanie’s arguments in her article, the Economics of Tokenization
- Best practices, fundamental principles behind “token economics”
- How Blockchains are like mini-economies (Economic systems designed in code)
- Use cases, protocols and projects that most excites her
Further Reading and Resources
- MIT Cryptoeconomics LAB
- Prysm Group | Medium
- Introduction to Cryptoeconomics
- Tokens: Investment Vehicle or Medium of Exchange (Not Both)
- Stephanie’s Research and Articles
Here’s an event at the Harvard Club of New York City featuring Cathy Barrera, co-founder of Prysm group:
