Lily Liu, President of the Solana Foundation: About 180 out of 195 countries worldwide do not have access to capital markets, and blockchain provides a path to ownership

ChainCatcher reports live that Lily Liu, President of the Solana Foundation, delivered a keynote speech at the 2026 Hong Kong Web3 Carnival. She pointed out from a macroeconomic perspective that global production, users, and resources are distributed globally, but capital formation is not; only 20 stock exchanges in 14 countries account for 94% of the global market value of approximately $145 trillion, with two-thirds concentrated in the United States. This means that about 180 countries have almost no access to capital markets, and their economies can only rely on debt rather than equity financing, failing to provide ownership pathways for their citizens.

She proposed the vision of an "Internet Capital Market," where any asset from anywhere can raise capital from anyone globally, priced in dollars and settled on an open track. Stablecoins are the key infrastructure for this vision, enabling any country to participate in the global financial system, while Solana provides the underlying settlement and execution layers. She also contrasted "Universal Basic Ownership" (UBO) with the widely discussed "Universal Basic Income" (UBI) in the AI era, arguing that blockchain allows anyone with a mobile phone to hold a part of their country's economy, representing basic property rights in the digital age without resorting to placing everyone in a welfare system.