Updated on:11/26/2025 01:45 PM 
CryptoSlate recently had the opportunity to speak with Steven Becker, the President and COO of MakerDAO. MakerDAO stands as a unique decentralized application that generates Dai, the world's first decentralized stablecoin designed to facilitate ecosystem growth on the blockchain and empower strategic blockchain implementations.
MakerDAO has been making headlines in the cryptocurrency community for the successful launch of multi-collateral Dai (MCD). This groundbreaking update introduces the highly-anticipated Dai Savings Rate (DSR) mechanism. This innovative feature allows Dai holders to lock their tokens in a smart contract and earn additional Dai as rewards, creating new possibilities within the decentralized finance landscape.
During our comprehensive interview, we explored Becker's journey into cryptocurrency, the significant advantages of decentralized finance, the successful implementation of multi-collateral Dai, the benefits of utilizing the Dai savings rate, his cryptocurrency predictions for 2020, and much more.
Could you share your professional background and how/when did you get involved in cryptocurrency?
Steven Becker (SB): Before entering the cryptocurrency space, I was deeply involved in traditional finance. I've engaged with a diverse range of businesses, from interest rate derivatives trading and managing an equity fund to energy finance and private equity. At the core of all these experiences has been risk management. So you could say that my professional expertise lies in understanding and managing risk.
I was aware of Bitcoin and Ethereum since 2016 but never paid much attention initially. I was more interested in the underlying blockchain technology than the tokens themselves. However, it was MakerDAO that truly drew me into the cryptocurrency space in April 2018.
Tell us why MakerDAO was created.
SB: Rune Christensen founded MakerDAO with the vision to create a decentralized stable store of value that would help grow the blockchain economy.
Where is your team located and why did you choose that structure?
SB: The Maker Foundation has a team distributed across numerous countries worldwide. The MakerDAO project attracted top talent from around the globe, so to a certain extent, the team and its locations developed organically.
How has the rollout of multi-collateral Dai progressed? Any notable statistics?
SB: The MCD rollout has been a tremendous success so far. In the first three days, approximately one hundred million Dai have been created in the new system. This significantly exceeded expectations, especially considering the migration to the new system depended on whether you held a vault (previously called CDP) or how you came to hold Sai (previously called Dai). Additionally, the protocol has integrated with approximately three hundred organizations, so getting all of them to migrate will naturally take some time and coordination.
What are some of MakerDAO's other notable achievements or milestones?
SB: To be clear, the Maker Foundation is the entity that houses the team. The purpose of the Foundation is to help bootstrap the Maker protocol. MakerDAO, the project, is the combination of the Maker protocol, the governance system, and stakeholders who hold and use the protocol.
As mentioned above, the Maker Protocol has integrated with roughly three hundred organizations.
Prior to the transition to MCD, the system reached an all-time high of one hundred and two million Dai.
The stakeholders in the system have grown significantly. There are four key stakeholder groups in the protocol:
What are the advantages of utilizing the Dai Savings Rate compared to other crypto yield-earning platforms?
SB: Using the Dai Savings Rate (DSR) helps maintain the protocol's stability and keeps Dai steady. While the Stability Fee serves as the lever for supply, the DSR functions as the lever for demand. Now MKR governance participants have two levers to help manage the protocol's supply and demand dynamics.
Transferring Dai into the DSR is nothing more than transferring Dai into a smart contract, and that's it. The Dai is not rehypothecated nor is credit generated against it, meaning it's not exposed to any counterparty risk. Other crypto yield-earning platforms have two layers of counterparty risk. The first is the crypto lending platform itself, and it depends on how well it manages the second layer. The second layer is the portfolio of borrowers underlying the crypto lending platform. Therefore, the advantage is that a user will be exposed to the risk of a decentralized protocol as opposed to a central party organizing loans on the blockchain.
The DSR is owned by the user, and other than gas fees to execute the transfer, there are no other fees. The DSR is open source and is free to use by any Dai holder with no minimum requirement.
The DSR provides a stable store of value AND protects against inflation.
Exchanges and wallets are beginning to integrate it for themselves and their users. Therefore, it's becoming accessible almost everywhere.
What can you tell us about the MakerDAO development roadmap? What upcoming features are you most excited about launching?
SB: That's ultimately up to governance to decide, and what they're discussing is really exciting.
Tokenized real-world assets are a major topic of conversation. Real-world assets will help the protocol scale and diversify the collateral portfolio. So watch for the DeFi space creating tokenized real-world assets and governance voting those assets as collateral types.
Tokenizing the DSR is another exciting topic of discussion. The ability to create Dai with DSR already embedded is something the community is already beginning to develop.
If you'd like to see for yourself, please join our governance discussions on the MakerDAO forum and on the Governance call (9 AM PT every Friday).
What are the significant challenges of building a decentralized stablecoin for crypto users?
SB: The biggest challenge is reminding crypto users that Dai is simply digital cash.
Everyone is very familiar with fiat currencies like the USD or Euro. Yet there are only a few who truly understand how fiat currencies work because they 'just work' and everyone implicitly trusts fiat currencies – but it's becoming clear that even that is changing.
Similarly, MakerDAO is such an innovative project that all the initial crypto users want to understand how it works, which is great. The downside is that the Maker protocol takes a little time to understand. If you don't have that time then you may perceive it as complex compared to the simple experience you have with the USD. But if you consider that it's just digital cash that uses the power of smart contracts, it's actually more transparent and arguably more secure than traditional payment systems – it's just as easy to use as the USD, and in some ways better.
How important is the price of the Maker (MKR) token to the MakerDAO ecosystem?
SB: The liquidity of Maker (MKR) is primarily what's important. More important than price. Traditionally, there has been a positive correlation between liquidity and price. It's not a perfect correlation but it is positive.
The MKR price is INDIRECTLY very important to the MakerDAO ecosystem as the effect on the liquidity of MKR is reflected in the price.
Liquidity is primarily important as it serves as an indicator of how robust governance is.
The more distributed the holding of MKR, the more use cases governance participants will have for holding MKR. Therefore creating a more robust governance system. A robust governance system will continuously address the issues of the protocol, which will be reflected in the trading landscape and thus contribute to liquidity.
What other projects and/or blockchain developments are you most excited about?
SB: First, I'm looking forward to Ethereum 2.0. I believe that will synergize a lot of the DeFi space with traditional finance.
Then with respect to real-world assets, I believe MakerDAO, UMA, Compound, Polymath and Securitize will certainly be projects to watch.
Do you have any blockchain and/or crypto predictions for 2020 and beyond?
SB: Many developing economies will demonstrate how blockchain can create a positive impact, tremendous value, and improve the living standards and thus lives of their people. They may do so well before their developed economy counterparts.
What are the significant obstacles for the mainstream adoption of crypto?
SB: Time is the biggest obstacle. A year or so ago, people in traditional finance were asking 'why would anyone use the blockchain?', those same people are now asking 'should I use the blockchain, and if so what is the best way?'.
When more people start finding answers to those questions, so will institutions and eventually, the traditional economy will have integrated with the blockchain economy.
What is your most controversial opinion relating to blockchain and/or cryptocurrency?
SB: That the true potential of crypto is at the intersection of traditional and blockchain worlds. Traditional finance needs blockchain to unlock modern potential, and blockchain needs traditional finance to scale.
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