Lily Liu argues DeFi is not just a vertical but the economic engine driving blockchain toward financial self-sovereignty for 5.5B users.
Lily Liu is making a bold case for what blockchains are truly built for.
The prominent crypto figure took to X to share her vision for decentralized finance. She argues that DeFi is not just a feature.
It is the entire reason most blockchains exist. Her post is drawing attention across the crypto community.
Lily Liu on Blockchain as Financial Infrastructure
Liu frames blockchains as technology built specifically for finance. She traces the idea back to Bitcoin’s original moonshot.
Over the years, the vision has carried many labels: open finance, internet of money, and TCP/IP for money.
But Liu says all these labels point to one thing. The goal is moving financial infrastructure from analog to digital.
She ties this directly to the 5.5 billion internet users worldwide. Her position is that blockchains should give every one of them access to always-on, permissionless financial rails.
This access, she says, cannot be separated from self-sovereignty. That principle sits at the heart of her argument.
Blockchains are tech for finance.
The moonshot that Bitcoin originally proposed, that many of us came to build, has gone by many characterizations over the last decade: open finance, decentralized finance, internet of money, tcp/ip for money to name a few.
All point to the…
— Lily Liu (@calilyliu) March 14, 2026
Why She Believes the Path to Self-Sovereignty Is Economic
Liu does not see self-sovereignty as a purely ideological goal. She believes economics must drive it. She points to patterns across ancient and modern history.
Every empire, every major religion, and every successful city-state built its economy first. Cultural and political influence followed later.
She applies that logic directly to blockchain networks. Liu argues that on-chain economies must follow the same path.
A strong and differentiated economy, she says, is the only real road to self-sovereignty. For blockchains beyond Bitcoin, that economy is DeFi.
Liu is clear that DeFi is not a niche application vertical. She calls it the core reason these networks have any reason to grow. Without it, blockchains cannot deliver real value to billions of users.
Related Reading: USDCx Hits Cardano: DeFi Liquidity Explosion?
Open Systems vs. Corporate Infrastructure in Crypto
Liu draws a sharp line between two camps in the industry. On one side sit open systems committed to neutral, global, and permissionless access.
On the other are what she calls “corpo infra” projects. These are networks backed by large corporate structures and private interests.
She acknowledges that corporate crypto infrastructure brings strong day-one distribution.
But Liu argues these projects serve the same ownership models that define traditional finance today.
That, in her view, disqualifies them from carrying the original ethos of blockchain forward.
Liu states that open systems are the only legitimate path to the founding promise of crypto.
That promise includes radical equality of opportunity and access for the broadest range of users. She describes it as something that can reach anyone on the internet instantly.
For Liu, networks must stay neutral and performant to reach that scale. Anything short of that falls outside what blockchain was meant to build.
