Jeremy Almond: From Family Crisis to Building the $15 Billion Blockchain Payment Network

Jeremy Almond discovered Bitcoin in 2009, just months after Satoshi Nakamoto published the white paper. But unlike most early adopters who got excited about price speculation, Almond saw something else entirely: a solution to fix the broken financial system that had personally destroyed his family's life during the 2008 crisis.

Today, his company PayStand processes over $15 billion in annual transactions across more than one million businesses, capturing over 1% of all commercial account-to-account payments in the United States. Most of these businesses have no idea they're using Bitcoin infrastructure.

Recently, Sri Misra, founder of Aarna Protocol, sat down with Jeremy for an in-depth conversation on the alpha un# podcast to explore how this quiet revolution in enterprise blockchain adoption actually happened. Watch the full episode to hear Jeremy's unfiltered insights on building practical DeFi infrastructure.

The Personal Genesis Behind PayStand

Jeremy Almond's journey into blockchain didn't start with a computer science thesis or venture capital pitch. It began with a family tragedy that millions of Americans experienced during the 2008 financial crisis.

"My parents happened to be one of them, immigrant family, people who'd been here working hard. And that was really hard for me," Almond shared during his conversation with Sri. His immigrant parents, who had never attended high school or college, lost their home while the same financial institutions that caused the crisis received government bailouts.

This personal experience of witnessing financial system inequality drove Almond to research the root causes of the crisis. "I decided to basically go back to grad school and research why the financial crisis occurred. And that caused me to be very early in Bitcoin," he explained.

The timing was fortuitous. Bitcoin was still just a white paper when Almond discovered it in late 2009. Unlike the consumer-focused applications that other early Bitcoin adopters were building, Almond saw an opportunity in the commercial space.

"My experience was the corporate use case was not as clear. And because I'd studied the financial crisis, one of my views was the financial crisis was in part a commercial banking problem, not just a consumer problem."

From Engineering to Entrepreneurship

Before founding PayStand, Almond built his technical expertise through a decade in enterprise technology. He started as a DevOps engineer at Digital Instruments, which was later acquired by Veeco Instruments. At Veeco, he served as Enterprise Architect, responsible for global technology infrastructure in a company with $2 billion in market value.

His experience included leading worldwide ERP/MRP SAP rollouts, managing enterprise-wide technology initiatives, and serving as the operational liaison between technical staff and C-level executives. This background proved crucial for understanding the pain points that would later define PayStand's value proposition.

"I had spent about a decade of my life working in enterprise technology," Almond noted, describing how this professional experience combined with personal passion to create the foundation for PayStand.

Building PayStand: The Value-First Strategy

When Almond founded PayStand in 2013, he made a counterintuitive decision that would define the company's success: hide the blockchain technology behind tangible business value.

"We actually were kind of quiet about how much of our infrastructure was on chain, even though we natively built that way, because we wanted to prove the value first as opposed to the hype first," Almond explained to Sri.

This "value forward, tech back" approach addressed a fundamental problem in B2B payments. Traditional payment systems, dominated by banks and credit card companies, were extracting significant costs from businesses while providing slow, manual processes.

For a typical $500 million manufacturing company with 10-15% margins, paying 2-3% in payment processing fees represents a massive expense. "That's really expensive when your margins are 10%. Us taking that cost down to zero could put 10, 20, 30% back on your margin. That's a huge competitive advantage," Almond noted.

The Technology Architecture

PayStand's technical infrastructure demonstrates sophisticated blockchain implementation designed for enterprise scale. The company built what Almond calls a "layer two" solution that combines multiple blockchain networks:

• Bitcoin backbone: Serves as the primary settlement layer, leveraging Bitcoin's decentralization and security

• Ethereum integration: Handles complex smart contracts and business logic

• Assurety Protocol: PayStand's custom layer two solution for scaling transactions

"We are principally a Bitcoin house, so the primary payments go back to the Bitcoin network, but we run our own Layer 2 on top of that. We also use Ethereum for our more complicated smart contracts," Almond detailed.

This architecture enables PayStand to process massive transaction volumes while maintaining the decentralization principles that make blockchain valuable. The settlement at the end terminals runs on their layer two network and terminates on the Bitcoin blockchain for their core payment network.

Impressive Scale and Growth Metrics

PayStand's growth trajectory demonstrates genuine enterprise blockchain adoption beyond speculation:

Transaction Volume: Over $15 billion in annual payment volume

Network Size: Approximately one million businesses use the platform

Market Share: Over 1% of all commercial account-to-account payments in the United States

Revenue Growth: From $4 million in 2018 to $75 million in 2024

Growth Rate: 380% growth over the past three years

The company has achieved this scale while maintaining its zero-fee network model, which differentiates it from traditional payment processors that charge transaction fees.

Strategic Acquisitions and Platform Expansion

PayStand has strategically expanded its capabilities through targeted acquisitions:

Yaydoo Acquisition (2022): Enhanced PayStand's presence in Latin American markets and added capabilities for SME-focused solutions

Teampay Acquisition (2024): A $65+ million transaction that added expense management and accounts payable capabilities, creating what the company calls a "B2B payments powerhouse"

These acquisitions enable PayStand to offer comprehensive financial infrastructure covering both accounts receivable and accounts payable, making it "the only company on the commercial side that you can run your payments on both sides," according to Almond.

The Corporate Card Innovation

Beyond B2B payments, PayStand has expanded into corporate expense management with a unique value proposition. Their corporate card offers something unprecedented: Bitcoin rewards for business spending.

"We have a corporate card and expense that not only runs on our network, but pays out loyalty. So every time you spend on your hotel for your company, you earn sats back," Almond explained.

This positions PayStand as the only provider of Bitcoin-rewarding corporate cards, differentiating from consumer-focused offerings by companies like Coinbase, Gemini, and Fold.

Mission-Driven Capitalism in Action

What sets PayStand apart from typical Silicon Valley startups is its commitment to using profits for global impact. The company allocates 10% of its profits to philanthropic efforts focused on Bitcoin circular economies in developing regions.

Global Reach: 40 programs across 18 countries Direct Impact: 300,000 young people directly affected Focus Areas: El Salvador, Guatemala, Peru, and various African nations

"We're probably one of the largest corporate backers supporting the bottom of the pyramid use cases of things like Bitcoin, to see where it matters the most, which is the other 7 billion people on the planet," Almond told Sri.

This philanthropic approach reflects Almond's belief that successful crypto companies have a responsibility to drive financial inclusion. "If you create a company in the space that's doing well, and then you're not giving back, you kind of missed the point," he emphasized.

Industry Recognition and Leadership

Almond's leadership has earned recognition across the technology and finance sectors:

• Forbes Finance Council Member (2016-Present)

• EY Bay Area Entrepreneur of the Year Finalist (2023)

• Inc. 5000 List for five consecutive years

• General Partner at Sharkbait Labs: Boutique venture studio providing advisory, tech, and capital services

His involvement extends beyond PayStand through mentorship roles at UC Santa Barbara's Prime program and Founders Network, where he advises funded founders on scaling technology companies.

The Philosophy of Blockchain Abstraction

Almond's approach to enterprise blockchain adoption challenges the conventional wisdom in the crypto industry. Instead of educating clients about decentralization benefits, PayStand focuses on immediate business value.

"We'd first sell them on the solution, sell them on the value, and then eventually they'd go, well, how does it work? And then you tell them and they'd be like, oh, that's surprising," Almond shared.

This strategy recognizes that CFOs and finance executives care primarily about improving their company's performance, not learning about cryptocurrency. Money, as Almond puts it, is already "a little bit of an ephemeral" for large organizations that rely on financial software rather than bank account balances to understand their liquidity.

Vision for Blockchain Evolution

Almond sees blockchain development occurring in three distinct phases:

Phase 1 - Store of Value: Bitcoin's adoption as digital gold and treasury asset

Phase 2 - Payment Infrastructure: Stablecoins and settlement systems built on various blockchains
Phase 3 - Application Layer: Complex use cases built on layer two solutions

"My view is stable coins and other kind of blockchain experiments help bootstrap those other use cases," Almond explained to Sri, noting that most people understand the progression from speculation to utility to building.

He believes the most interesting innovation currently happens in layer two technologies, particularly those built on Bitcoin and Ethereum, though these applications remain "off the radar of most people right now, except for the biggest nerds."

Competitive Positioning and Market Strategy

PayStand's go-to-market strategy initially focused on integration partnerships with major ERP providers like Oracle, Microsoft, and Sage. This approach ensured they targeted companies with acute payment processing pain points.

"In the early days, we actually wouldn't even sell to you if you weren't in one of those ecosystems, because it was very acute, your problem," Almond noted.

The company primarily serves mid-market to enterprise clients in manufacturing, supply chain, logistics, and professional services - what Almond calls "the real economy" of companies actually building goods and services that contribute to GDP.

This focus on traditional industries rather than technology companies reflects PayStand's belief that the largest cost savings opportunities exist among businesses with tight margins, where payment processing fees represent significant operational expenses.

The Road Ahead

As PayStand continues scaling toward what many anticipate will be an eventual public offering, Almond remains focused on the fundamental mission that started the company: fixing the financial system to create more economic empowerment.

The company's combination of proven enterprise adoption, strong financial metrics, and mission-driven approach positions it uniquely in the blockchain infrastructure space. With over $100 million raised to date and consistent growth across all key metrics, PayStand demonstrates that practical blockchain applications can achieve both commercial success and social impact.

Jeremy Almond's journey from personal financial tragedy to building the largest commercial blockchain network illustrates how the most powerful technology applications often emerge from solving real human problems rather than chasing technological possibilities. In a space filled with speculation and hype, PayStand's quiet success provides a blueprint for sustainable blockchain entrepreneurship focused on genuine value creation.

For more insights on enterprise blockchain adoption and Jeremy's vision for decentralized finance, listen to his complete conversation with Sri Misra on the alpha un# podcast.