Denelle Dixon expressed:  The virtual nature of our conference is a reminder that things are still changing, developing, and may be aren’t as simple as they once were. We are still living with the global pandemic.

It has had a disproportionate impact on the world’s most vulnerable. In a time where economic instability and financial insecurity are very prevalent.  Communities around the world are looking for ways to protect what they have and build resilience.

Throughout the past 2 years, we at the Stellar Development Foundation have taken time to reflect on our work and how best to accomplish our mission, creating equitable access to the global financial system. We recognize it now matters more than ever.

If 2020, knocked us off our feet; 2021 is the year we regained our balance and planted our feet on the ground.  Discovering new ways to nurture the Stellar Ecosystem.  This year required us to look around and ask what needed tending to and decide how to act.

The reality is that despite the shared challenge of financial access and inclusion that spans the globe, there is no one size fits all solution to this problem. Because each region of the world, has its own values, its own culture and its own set of rules. Building long term solutions that issues comprehensively, responsively, and sustainably is a huge undertaking.  But it is possible.

We just have to start at the roots. To grow and extend the roots of the stellar network we have remained focused on the 3 pillars of our Roadmap to guide our work. Supporting the robustness and usability of the stellar network, helping stellar to be the network that people trust, and fostering sustainable stellar use cases for cross border payments.

By making significant progress with what Stellar can offer, we helped local solutions scale their impact.

The biggest development of 2021 is the Stellar USDC. At the beginning of the year Stellar’s USDC’s stable coin went live on the Stellar network. The impact of the world’s fastest growing digital dollar currency entering the Stellar ecosystem was huge.  With USDC immediately becoming the catalyst for the growth of the ecosystem’s Fintechs, Wallets, Exchanges and developers. They saw the potential to leverage the speed and low cost of the Stellar Network to operate a global digital dollar and integrate Stellar USDC in to their own products and services.

Those who want to know more might want to check the video content on You Tube.