As Canada approaches a election election on April 28, 2025, Lucas Matheson, CEO of Coinbase Canada, positions giant cryptocurrency for influence in a market that he believes is primed for blockchain change. I talked to him about expanding the existence of a cryptocurrency exchange in Canada, the unique feature of the Canadian market, and his vision for the future of crypto in the country. Our talks have announced not only Coinbase’s strategic ambitions but also Matheson’s personal desire for the adoption of the blockchain adoption in his home country.
As a Canadian businessman with the experience of both traditional financial and tech startups to join Coinbase after nearly six years in Shopify, Matheson encouraged the Canadian government to move quickly to combine crypto with their economy.
This interview is reserved and lightly edited for clarity.
CoinDesk: Your career has taken you from traditional finances to Shopify to Crypto. Is there a specific moment if you realize digital assets will be financially again, or is it a gradual convincing?
LUCAS: I am a Canadian businessman and I work financially and business in most of my career. I spent the first part of my financial career, mostly M&A, and I founded a tech company after grad school with my best friend in Silicon Valley, where I started my journey with Coinbase. I’ve been a Coinbase customer for over 10 years.
After selling that company, I joined Shopify and I worked there for almost six years, helping to build their business, their operational and finance functions. In Coinbase, I help the leadership of a team building a platform for the people to change their digital economy ownership.
CoinDesk: How long does Coinbase run in Canada, and what regulations that have been milestones have you achieved?
LUCAS: Coinbase has been around for almost four years. We have officially pursued our registration here in Canada for many years. Canada is registered as a restrained businessman under CSA. We are the first international exchange registered in Canada.
We are fortunate to have a regime regulation here where we operate under a following regime in Canada to grow our business. We are now pursuing our Iiroc registration with Iiroc as a full registration of the dealer, it will expand the types of products and services we can offer to the people.
CoinDesk: Ethereum was born in Canada, however most of its ecosystems were developed elsewhere. Is there a definite irony in having to convince Canadian institutions to embrace a technology in Canadian roots?
LUCAS: Coinbase is looking for the clarity of regulation around the world, and we are looking for markets that provide stability and clear policies for us to work under a regime. Canada is one of the markets identified as open to providing clear policies and regulating cryptocurrency exchanges such as Coinbase.
When we look around the world, Canada is also a very crypto-literate country. This is the third most conscious crypto country of all the international locations we run, so we have a strong awareness about technology here.
The opportunity for this to help our financial system – as you know, Ethereum is established here in Canada. We have very strong roots here in Canada around cryptocurrency and around technology. We have a lot of great great universities in computing science -focusing on blockchain technology and helping our Canadian students understand the opportunity.
CoinDesk: That’s funny about Canada that is the third most aware of crypto. How is it translated into adoption rates?
LUCAS: When we examine countries around the world, we evaluate how citizens are aware of the specific types of cryptocurrencies, using cryptocurrencies and technologies. The Canadians are the third most aware of the crypto of all the international markets we review.
We see some surveys in Canada suggesting that up to 30% of the people at the end of this year is the owner of digital possessions. So we see a powerful adoption in Canada and a healthy difference in the asset class. Of course, Canada is the first to introduce Crypto-related ETFs, so we have a broad awareness about the opportunity for Canadians to vary in cryptors by traditional ETFs.
CoinDesk: Who are the people who use Coinbase? Is there a particular demographic profile?
LUCAS: We have a broad distribution of Canadian demographics. We have a very diverse user group in Canada -people who are different from students, immigrants looking for money.
We see a significant number of people building and diversifying portfolios, which accumulate digital assets for long-term diversity and treasure care. Then we have a significant amount of institutional investors in Canada that begins to vary with property in the crypto economy.
So we see very strong adoption throughout the retail, and in Canada in particular we see a healthy adoption from institutional investors and greater interest from institutional investors, pension funds, asset managers who also explore the variety of their Crypto clients.
CoinDesk: As the Canadian election approaches on April 28, what policy changes would you like to see from the next government?
LUCAS: We have suggested a number of changes for our new government to really think deeply about the next term. We recommend that they:
- Launch a government task force and create a national crypto approach
- Consider a Bitcoin Strategic Reserve
- Regulate stablecoins federally from a prudential regulator as a payment instrument
- Introduce a market structure bill as we see in the US where we clearly define crypto assets to be clear for the public, institution, and builder exactly how crypto assets are specified
- Make it easier for banks to have a crypto trading platform in Canada
Currently, our big banks-we have large banks with 80-90% of the money in Canada-aren’t crypto trading platforms, so we are diligently helping our government encourage our financial institutions to participate in the digital economy. (You can read Luke’s writing on Canada’s must do to become a global crypto leader Here.)
CoinDesk: You mentioned ‘Stand with Crypto’ as an advocacy initiative. How do you organize the industry to influence Canadian policy?
LUCAS: ‘Stand With Crypto’ is an organization that promotes clear policies worldwide for crypto, and we recently launched the stand along with Crypto here in Canada with many partners. We have a number of crypto trading partners who joined the Stand with Crypto to help us advocate for change.
Stand with Crypto is really an opportunity for our elected officials to understand this opportunity so that we can clearly put it first. Canada has many priorities and challenges within our economy, and crypto technology will help us rebuild our economy and economic freedom. That’s one of the ways we’re fixing it.
Canada also has two strong associations in the industry, the Canadian blockchain consortium And the Canada Web3 CouncilAnd these organizations help unify views and help us in the instances where we can engage with our regulators to drive more clarity in market regulation.
CoinDesk: Decentralized exchanges (Dex) are challenging centralized platforms such as Coinbase in the US. How can you see this trend affecting your business in Canada?
LUCAS: I think decentralized finances will develop a healthy and significant part of our financial economy. I think that’s the foundation of technology and ecosystem – to decentralize financial relationships in a trustworthy, safe, following way.
I think financial decentralization will be a healthy part of how some investors choose to participate. But centralized exchanges provide a very important onol to-ramp and off-ramp from the digital economy in a following way that helps governments and institutions around the world to be comfortable that platforms such as Coinbase manage the dangers that are appropriate, anti-money laundering, terrorist financing, which ensures that their people are in good faith.
CoinDesk: If you could say some things to the upcoming administration, what are they?
LUCAS: I will say that the residue in the world is moving fast to adopt crypto and incorporate it into their economy. It’s time for Canada to do – to integrate crypto in our economy, develop a national approach, and teach the people of the people about why the digital world.
CoinDesk: There seems to be an element of patriotic in your advocacy. Do you see Canada becoming a global crypto leader?
LUCAS: I think Canada could be the leader in crypto. Canada has the opportunity to embrace this technology in a significant way to help this country rebuild ourselves and grow our economy.
I think we are going to a time when we need to think about how we can fix our government, how we tax our government, how we make up profits, and how we spend money. I think we are entering a cycle where governments are expected to do more. That’s what technology traders do every day, and that is what governments around the world are beginning to embrace the opportunity to do less, to be better, to provide better government services through technology, to be more entrepreneurs.
