Bermuda is set to become a living lab for the digital finance world with the launch of its inaugural Digital Finance Forum, an ambitious plan aimed at transforming the island into a global hub for blockchain, stablecoins and decentralised finance.

The May event is the result of a collaboration between Penrose Partners, Salt, the Decentralised AI Society and the Government of Bermuda.

Beyond just speeches and panels, it is designed to drive real-world adoption of digital finance, on an island-wide scale.

“We could become the first digital-only country if we get our cards right,” said Sean Stapley, a senior partner at Penrose Partners. “Our goal here is to support Bermuda's adoption of digital finance, ensuring that Bermudian money continues to circulate within the local economy.”

The forum builds on Bermuda’s five-year journey into the digital assets space, which began in earnest in 2018 when David Burt, the Premier, introduced the Digital Assets Business Act during a keynote at the Consensus conference.

Mr Stapley described it as part of a broader vision to mirror Bermuda’s earlier success in building its global reinsurance sector.

“Finding a way to help Bermudians learn about what's going on and bring their own perspectives to these technologies has led to some interesting ideas,” he said. “It is about making sure that Bermudians can get educated about the space, and ideally to then get hired into roles that we can develop here.”

El Salvador made history in 2021 by adopting bitcoin as legal tender, but the country experienced challenges in mainstream adoption. The Central African Republic also adopted bitcoin as legal tender in April 2022 but repealed the decision a year later.

Could Bermuda be the success?

The opening day of the forum is a “Community Activation” event, giving residents a hands-on experience.

Organisers are offering a USDC stablecoin airdrop to local Bermudians who download web3 wallets, effectively putting blockchain into action on the streets of Hamilton.

The event has attracted major industry sponsors, including Coinbase, Circle, Near, Polkadot and Avalanche.

Attendees can expect panel discussions on stablecoins, tokenised finance and decentralised AI, with appearances from leading names across digital finance.

“We're anticipating a couple hundred folks coming on day one,” said Mr Stapley. “So for us, being able to work alongside both the Coinbase and Circle teams has been excellent to figure out how do we make this go off without a hitch, and really just make sure that folks are able to enjoy the technology and see its use cases.”

John Darsie, SkyBridge Capital partner, who is also the CEO of Salt, the global thought leadership forum which is co-hosting the event, said it is “a reflection of our evolution as a company, both Salt and SkyBridge”.

SkyBridge, which manages $2 billion in assets, has invested heavily in digital finance and views Bermuda as a prime location for the adoption of digital currency.

The forum is “meant to accelerate progress to what we think is the inevitable evolution of the financial industry, which is more tokenisation on blockchain and migration of money to things like stablecoins,” said Mr Darsie. “We think this is going to be a multiyear process of helping to educate local Bermudians and on-board people to this digital finance-based system.”

Mr Darsie also emphasised the reasoning behind the island’s appeal: “Bermuda has a proud history of innovative but responsible regulation in industries like alternative investments, insurance and more recently, in the digital finance space.”

This year’s forum can be the start of something bigger.

“By bringing large events to Bermuda, we hope it helps to catalyse the growth of the industry, the digital finance industry in Bermuda, which will create jobs, which will have different knock-on effects to the economy,” Mr Darsie said.

The long-term goal is to evolve the event into a full-fledged Bermuda Finance Week.

But this year, the focus is clear: connect global leaders, educate the local population and make Bermuda a model for the rest of the world’s digital finance future.

As Mr Stapley put it: “As a smaller, agile and innovative island, Bermuda has the unique opportunity to become the first truly digital jurisdiction through implementing these new technologies.”

Correction: this article has been changed to recognize appearances by stars at past Salt events, and not scheduled for this event