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Pedro Gomes

Founder and Director, WalletConnect Foundation, WalletConnect (WalletConnect Foundation / Reown)

Search every verified Pedro Gomes interview, podcast appearance, and on-the-record quote — each transcript cross-checked by AI and human review to confirm speaker identity. Pedro Gomes, founder of WalletConnect, discussed the distinction between cryptocurrency transactions and payments at Pragma Lisbon in June 2026. He argued that while blockchains can move assets, a functional payment system requires coordination of authorization, clearing, settlement, merchant acceptance, and the exchange of goods or services. Gomes contrasted crypto’s common push-payment model with card and bank systems that pull funds after authorization, noting that simple wallet transfers leave merchants and consumers to manage timing, token, chain, and counterparty complexity. He stated that payments are the best path to mainstream adoption, as not everyone in crypto is speculating or trading. In a July 2026 fireside chat with MetaMask’s Francesco Andreoli, Gomes said WalletConnect created the WalletConnect network, which he described as the largest interoperability network across digital wallets, and launched WalletConnect Pay for merchants accepting crypto. He noted that demand for stablecoin payouts grew as the pipeline developed, and that WalletConnect’s network of over 700 wallets provided a competitive advantage. Gomes also emphasized the need for wallets to build guardrails and user experiences similar to those developed by Visa and MasterCard, including two-way authorization and granular controls for agents. In an April 2026 podcast, Gomes reflected on the evolution of WalletConnect and the blockchain ecosystem, discussing the importance of protecting core functions, balancing innovation with stability, and seeking external feedback. He also remarked that public goods are important but need economic balance, and issued a “wake-up call” to Ethereum regarding account abstraction, saying other blockchains had already addressed issues Ethereum had announced years earlier.

Recent appearances

Verified interview transcripts

Notable quotes

“I think that payments is really the best way for us to actually get mainstream adoption. Crypto has really revolutionized finance. That meant that there was a lot of trading. There was a lot of tokenization. But that doesn't really capture the broader audience. Not everyone is speculating. Not everyone wants to trade. Not everyone is in crypto because they just want a better price in the chart. They want just a bette”

“Payments is more complex than we think. Like we built something that is infrastructure for money movement. We can transact funds from A to B. But when you think about payments is a completely different problem because transactions are very technical objects like you're basically identifying how you're going to move funds from A to B, but payments live in a context of products and services and two parties actually hav”

“This is not a promotion for Solana. This is a wake-up call for Ethereum. You know, don't tell me we'll think about it when other blockchains already fixed this and we announced account abstraction 3 years ago.”

“Why was a Bitcoin white paper written in 2008 and Bitcoin was launched in 2009 and it's still in 2026 and payments is probably one of the most underserved categories in the whole crypto. Yes, we have tokenization. We have trading. We have perps. We have prediction markets. We have everything that we've possibly imagine. New primitives from both DeFi to TradFi. But payments is still not a solved problem.”

“This is a way that will completely change how Wallet Connect Foundation will work with wallets because now we can create a financial incentive for them to ensure the highest quality. I like to call this almost like our Visa moment where basically every bank that uses Visa has this great user experience and Wallet Connect will essentially have that same experience for all the wallets that are certified.”

“I think what embedded wallets did was a reaction to the ecosystem. The ecosystem got tired. Like it just got completely tired of like seed phrases and onboarding and all of this stuff. They just wanted to like rip the whole thing out and like start from scratch. And they basically ended up with what's more familiar. Like you go to an app, you log in with Google or Facebook or email or a telephone number. It was just ”

Other executives at WalletConnect (WalletConnect Foundation / Reown)

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