Could Some Vaults Trigger Securities Law? Yes, but It's Case by Case
Unchained | Aug 09 2026 | 00:34:04
Onchain vaults now hold $67B. Veda's CEO maps out how they work, and why the SEC just hinted some could be securities.
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SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce warned recently that some crypto vaults could trigger federal securities law, invoking the same Howey Test language crypto has argued over for a decade, just as onchain vaults have quietly become a $67 billion vehicle for parking assets.
Sun Raghupathi, cofounder and CEO of Veda, joins Laura Shin to untangle what a vault actually is, why splitting the infrastructure, curator, and distributor roles matters for the entrepreneurial-effort question Peirce raised, and why he reads her statement as bullish rather than a warning shot.
Raghupathi maps the real risk stack behind vaults, smart contract flaws, the key-management failures behind incidents like KelpDAO and Drift, and the economic risk exposed when Stream Finance blew up and left $285 million in vault exposure.
He also details Veda's Kraken partnership, now scaled past $600 million across 80,000 users, and makes the case that the biggest constraint on vault growth isn't security anymore. It's clarity.
Host:
Laura Shin, Host / Unchained
Guests:
Sun Raghupathi - Co-Founder and CEO of Veda
Timestamps
📣 00:41 Cape: Get 33% off your first six months with code unchained at https://cape.co/unchained
🏦 00:57 What is a vault, and why DeFi needed the primitive
🎢 02:25 Sun's path from an ML PhD to launching Veda
⚙️ 04:43 The three things vault infrastructure must solve: access, control, verifiability
💰 06:45 Where vault yield actually comes from, and how it differs from TradFi
📣 10:57 Cape: Get 33% off your first six months with code unchained at https://cape.co/unchained
🏗️ 11:03 Veda's role as infrastructure vs. curators and distributors
⚠️ 13:06 What happens when a vault loses money, in the worst case
🛟 16:31 Why Sun is skeptical of vault insurance until a real claim gets paid
🔑 18:08 How to vet vault partners on key management, not just smart contracts
📉 20:28 The Stream Finance blowup and how curator risk-taking has changed since
📊 23:00 The metrics Sun uses to evaluate vault curators
🏛️ 24:31 Why Sun reads Hester Peirce's vault statement on vaults as bullish, not a warning
🦑 28:46 Kraken's $600M vault partnership, and Veda's competitive edge
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
========================================================
Thank you to our sponsor!
Cape: Your biggest crypto vulnerability isn't your wallet, it's your phone number. Cape is America's privacy-first mobile carrier that rotates your SIM identity daily and blocks SIM swaps before they happen. Get 33% off your first six months at cape.co/unchained (use code: UNCHAINED).
========================================================
SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce warned recently that some crypto vaults could trigger federal securities law, invoking the same Howey Test language crypto has argued over for a decade, just as onchain vaults have quietly become a $67 billion vehicle for parking assets.
Sun Raghupathi, cofounder and CEO of Veda, joins Laura Shin to untangle what a vault actually is, why splitting the infrastructure, curator, and distributor roles matters for the entrepreneurial-effort question Peirce raised, and why he reads her statement as bullish rather than a warning shot.
Raghupathi maps the real risk stack behind vaults, smart contract flaws, the key-management failures behind incidents like KelpDAO and Drift, and the economic risk exposed when Stream Finance blew up and left $285 million in vault exposure.
He also details Veda's Kraken partnership, now scaled past $600 million across 80,000 users, and makes the case that the biggest constraint on vault growth isn't security anymore. It's clarity.
Host:
Laura Shin, Host / Unchained
Guests:
Sun Raghupathi - Co-Founder and CEO of Veda
Timestamps
📣 00:41 Cape: Get 33% off your first six months with code unchained at https://cape.co/unchained
🏦 00:57 What is a vault, and why DeFi needed the primitive
🎢 02:25 Sun's path from an ML PhD to launching Veda
⚙️ 04:43 The three things vault infrastructure must solve: access, control, verifiability
💰 06:45 Where vault yield actually comes from, and how it differs from TradFi
📣 10:57 Cape: Get 33% off your first six months with code unchained at https://cape.co/unchained
🏗️ 11:03 Veda's role as infrastructure vs. curators and distributors
⚠️ 13:06 What happens when a vault loses money, in the worst case
🛟 16:31 Why Sun is skeptical of vault insurance until a real claim gets paid
🔑 18:08 How to vet vault partners on key management, not just smart contracts
📉 20:28 The Stream Finance blowup and how curator risk-taking has changed since
📊 23:00 The metrics Sun uses to evaluate vault curators
🏛️ 24:31 Why Sun reads Hester Peirce's vault statement on vaults as bullish, not a warning
🦑 28:46 Kraken's $600M vault partnership, and Veda's competitive edge
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices