# Crypto Built the Rails: Next Up Operating Them Safely | Andrej Bencic (Tenderly) at ETHConf

- Channel: [ETHGlobal](https://streameth.org/ethglobal)
- Date: 2026-07-09
- Duration: 19:00
- Topics: Tenderly, Andrej Bencic, ETHCom, blockchain operations, simulation, risk management, process risk, dependency risk, market risk, code risk, smart contracts, mainnet, audits, deployment, treasury management, DeFi, cascading liquidations, bad debt, institutional adoption, monitoring, stress testing, operational risk, security, exploits, onchain dynamics, DeFi Legos, blast radius, circuit breakers, volatility, live state, protocol upgrades, governance, time lock, mainnet deployment
- Watch: https://streameth.org/watch/yt-Axe-BaSuPH4
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Axe-BaSuPH4

## Description

In this talk, Andrej Bencic, co-founder and CEO of Tenderly, makes the case that the next decade of crypto requires shifting focus from building the rails to operating them safely. He opens with a story of a routine protocol upgrade where tests passed, the audit was clean, governance approved, and the time lock executed normally, yet within four minutes of mainnet deployment an asset valued at $2,200 dropped to $0, triggering cascading liquidations and nearly $2 million in bad debt. The smart contracts behaved exactly as intended. The failure wasn't in the code, but in everything around it.

Andrej argues that the industry has hyperfocused on getting protocols from idea to mainnet while neglecting operational risk in production with live state and live dependencies. He uses the analogy that the map is not the territory: smart contracts are the map, but mainnet is the territory full of traffic, congestion, and population density. He outlines four categories of risk that must be managed together. Process risk covers operational mishaps like signing transactions, treasury management, and deployment workflows, where he cites that process exploits now outnumber code exploits by 6 to 7 times. Dependency risk covers second, third, and fourth order failures across the interconnected web of DeFi protocols. Market risk recognizes that DeFi lacks trading hours, circuit breakers, and human checkpoints that traditional finance relies on, so multi day unwinds can happen in an instant. Code risk remains essential as ever but needs to test onchain dynamics, not just isolated sandboxes. He closes by introducing the concept of blockchain operations and pointing to simulation against live state as the unique advantage blockchain offers, comparing it to pilots in flight simulators or banks running stress tests.

00:00 Introduction
00:11 A Routine Upgrade Gone Wrong
01:04 $2 Million in Bad Debt in Four Minutes
01:33 The Smart Contracts Behaved as Intended
01:51 Andrej's Background at Tenderly
02:38 Why None of the Checks Triggered
03:03 Hyperfocusing on Reaching Mainnet
03:26 The Work Doesn't Stop at Launch
04:10 The Map Is Not the Territory
05:38 Smart Contracts Are Half the Equation
06:38 Crypto Becoming Finance Itself
07:11 Risk Management as the Next Decade's Discipline
07:47 Four Categories of Risk
08:20 Process Risk and Operational Mishaps
09:37 Six to Seven Times More Process Exploits Than Code Exploits
09:59 Dependency Risk and the DeFi Lego Tradeoff
11:18 Knowing the Blast Radius of Dependencies
11:53 Market Risk Without Circuit Breakers
13:19 Modeling Comfort with Exposure
13:36 Code Risk Remains Essential
14:23 Testing Onchain Dynamics, Not Just Isolated Sandboxes
14:52 Correct at Launch Doesn't Mean Correct at Scale
15:22 Frameworks From Traditional Finance
15:49 Simulation Against Live State as the Tying Piece
16:23 No Undo Buttons on Blockchain
16:48 Pilots, Banks, and Stress Testing
17:43 Blockchain Operations as a Category
18:16 Closing: Operating at the Level Global Attention Requires

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