Lorenzo Valente, director of digital asset research at ARK Invest, said Elon Musk’s decision to include Benji Taylor as lead designer of the X platform could provide an important signal about the company’s future strategic direction.
According to Valente, Taylor’s background represents more than just a typical fintech user experience (UX) development role. Taylor previously rose to prominence as the founder of Family, a self-custody focused cryptocurrency wallet project that was later acquired by Aave. During that time, he held product management roles and joined the Base team in 2024 as Head of Design.
Valente insists that this career path does not reflect a vision limited solely to traditional financial technology, saying that crypto-based solutions are increasingly likely to be included in X’s product roadmap. Specifically, it is believed that it will be possible to integrate cryptocurrency wallets, on-chain payment systems, and even decentralized finance (DeFi) applications into the platform.
The analyst said Musk’s selection of someone like Taylor, who has extensive experience in the Web3 and DeFi ecosystems, could accelerate X’s goal of transforming itself from a social media platform into an “everything app” that provides financial infrastructure.
*This is not investment advice.
