Max Krupyshev ’s path in crypto began with curiosity, not a business plan — yet today, he heads one of the most widely used crypto payment gateways in the market. As CEO of CoinsPaid, he’s helping businesses embrace crypto payments with confidence. CoinsPaid is a leading crypto payment ecosystem serving over 800 merchants worldwide. The company provides a secure, compliant, and user-friendly platform that enables businesses to accept and manage digital asset payments with ease. We sat down to talk about building secure infrastructure, bouncing back after a crisis, and the discipline of doing things right. Bridging digital assets and traditional businesses Q: Max, for those unfamiliar with CoinsPaid, what exactly do you do? A: At its core, CoinsPaid is a crypto payment gateway. But that’s a simple answer. We connect two worlds that have historically been isolated from each other: traditional businesses and digital assets. Our position is simple: crypto is no longer a speculative asset. It has steadily become a functional payment tool. When used correctly, it solves very specific business problems: international settlement delays, high transaction fees, and banking restrictions. That’s the space we operate in. Q: Some still view crypto payments as a niche. What would you say to business owners still undecided about accepting digital assets? A: Cryptocurrencies were making headlines for long enough to stay imprinted in the minds of an average user as something to steer clear of. In that sense, I get the hesitation. But there are two points worth addressing here: the knowledge gap and how much the landscape has changed. First, the more people learn about crypto, the more open they become. The skepticism usually fades once they understand the difference between crypto as an investment and crypto as a payment method. The latter — especially when handled by licensed gateways — comes with minimal risk for merchants. Second, the market has matured. Over 650 million people now own crypto. Visa, PayPal, Stripe, and other financial giants are all building crypto infrastructure. That doesn’t sound niche to me. Q: What helps you keep payments smooth when crypto markets get volatile, especially with cross-chain transactions? A: Cross-chain does introduce some friction. We handle it by maintaining asset reserves on each chain and managing liquidity across bridges. This allows us to fulfil payouts on the destination chain without delays. And because we abstract complexity from our clients, they only see a single smooth payment flow. Q: Can you share a recent use case of a merchant scaling fast or saving big using CoinsPaid? A: Absolutely. We onboarded Mirai Flights, a private jet booking platform. Their customers expect speed and discretion, which fiat wire transfers couldn’t guarantee. Once they onboarded crypto payments, they saw an increase in the number of last-minute bookings. This eventually resulted in a 30% growth in revenue and a 75% drop in transaction costs. CoinsPaid team and hiring process CoinsPaid CEO Max Krupyshev Q: How do you keep your team focused and motivated, considering your product isn’t always visible to end users? A: We’re building a product that works — that’s a different kind of motivation. Our product is infrastructure. If we’re doing our job right, most people won’t notice — and that’s exactly the point. This mindset runs through the team. We’re attracting people who are pragmatic, outcome-driven, and okay with being the engine behind our clients’ growth. Q: When hiring, do you prioritize Web3 experts or people who just get things done? A: We look for mindset first, skills second. You can teach someone how blockchain works, but you can’t teach resourcefulness or integrity. We hire Web3-savvy folks, of course, but we’ve also got great professionals from outside the space. Q: If you could change one thing about the crypto payments ecosystem today, what would it be, and why? A: I’d love to see stronger interoperability standards across chains and providers. Right now, every integration feels custom-built; every wallet is slightly different. If we could standardize the core flows, it would lower friction and make the entire crypto ecosystem more accessible. Q: What’s something about the CoinsPaid team you’re proud of but never put on a hiring page? A: The way people show up for each other when things go wrong. When we were under pressure (and we’ve had our moments), nobody gave up. CoinsPaid’s comeback following the 2023 security incident Q: Speaking of those moments, Max, let’s address the elephant in the room. You faced a security incident in 2023. A lot of companies would’ve gone quiet. You didn’t. Why? A: When something of that scale happens, you have two options: protect your ego or protect your ecosystem. We chose the latter. We were transparent with our partners, clients, and team. It was a value decision. Q: How did you manage to bounce back? Not just technically, but in terms of team morale and client confidence, too? A: Our response was swift: we took the loss and kept our clients 100% protected. But along with patching systems, we were trying to hold the team together and show our clients we could take ownership and fix the damage caused. We doubled down on communication and leaned into what we’d already built. The response from our partners was humbling. Many stayed, and I believe that was due to the trust we’d earned before the incident and the transparency we showed during it. That was the hardest test of leadership I’ve ever faced. Q: Most people see security as just tech. But what did you learn about your team or yourself through the experience? A: Security is never just tech. It is a mindset that guides everything you do. That experience proved it yet again. Some of the most important contributions didn’t come from leadership, but from cross-functional collaboration between engineers, support, and partnership teams. People stepped up beyond their roles. Q: What steps have you recently taken to strengthen the security of your organization? A: The most significant step we have taken is changing how we think about security. We’ve embedded preventive measures into every layer of our operations, from development to infrastructure to team training. We also earned ISO 27001 certification as formal proof of these improvements. It means our security processes are formally audited and held to a high global standard. Q: Security is one side. But compliance, and especially KYC, is where a lot of businesses feel the friction. How are you balancing protection and client experience? A: We treat compliance as an integral part of how we operate rather than a formality. Our approach combines advanced blockchain analytics tools, such as those provided by Chainalysis and Crystal, with direct oversight from our in-house AML specialists and MLRO. Our team maintains up-to-date expertise through regular ACAMS-certified training to stay ahead of regulatory changes. As an EU-licensed provider, we adhere strictly to KYB and AML regulations. Our systems undergo regular independent cybersecurity audits and incorporate transaction risk scoring, fund segregation, and freezing mechanisms, all within a robust three-lines-of-defense framework. Transactions are monitored in real time to flag any suspicious activity while allowing legitimate users to continue transacting smoothly. We automate what we can, and where human touch is needed, we make sure it is fast and clear. CPD token and the future of CoinsPaid Q: Everyone in crypto is talking tokenisation. Where does CoinsPaid stand, and what role, if any, did the CPD token play in your long-term vision? A: The CPD token was initially introduced as part of a loyalty and partnership initiative, more of an exploratory mechanism than a core component of our infrastructure. At the time, we were interested in testing whether token-based incentives could improve engagement and add value to our ecosystem. However, over time, it became clear that the token wasn’t critical to the core functionality we were building. We officially stopped supporting it in 2024. Since then, we’ve bought it back from the open market and burned it — the process is fully transparent and can be verified on-chain . In retrospect, it was a useful experiment. But the infrastructure layer — secure, scalable crypto payments- remains our real focus. That’s where we believe the long-term value lies. Q: You’ve been in the crypto space for years. Is it still exciting? A: It is exciting, but in a different way. In the early days, building a crypto payment gateway felt like an exploration. Today, it’s more precise — we’re building a reliable infrastructure. I’d say it’s less adrenaline and more discipline. Q: You’re not exactly loud on social media. Is that intentional, or just not your thing? A: I’ve never felt the calling to be loud. My job is to make sure the product works. That said, I do believe it’s important to close the knowledge gap and address the myths that still surround crypto. That’s why I speak, just in longer-form formats. One example is the CoinsPaid Merchant Academy , where I walk listeners through the fundamentals of crypto payments. Q: Imagine someone stops you in the street and asks, “What’s CoinsPaid, and who are you?” What do you say? A: CoinsPaid is the company behind a crypto payment gateway trusted by hundreds of merchants. It’s also the team that built and continues to develop the payment infrastructure powering over 500,000 transactions and around €600 million in crypto volume each month. Finally, it’s also a culture of care, precision, and innovation that runs beneath everything we do. And I’m the one steering it toward even broader adoption. Q: What’s the thing that keeps you up at night? (And no, you can’t say “bad UI.”) A: Regulation. It’s outside our control, but it impacts our clients anyway. That’s what we try to anticipate and build buffers for. My team and I monitor regulatory developments in our target markets and adapt early. That could involve adjusting internal processes, updating compliance procedures, or guiding our clients through the changes. Q: What’s next in your roadmap that you’re particularly excited about? A: We’re focused on expanding geographically and bringing CoinsPaid to new continents. Beyond that, we’re seeing growing potential in more traditional industries not usually associated with innovation, like e-commerce and even real estate. Lately, there’s been a rise in demand for crypto payments from these sectors, and we’re excited to make crypto a payment option for them, too.