There’s new activity in the Latin American market. Rayls, a public blockchain focused on bringing bank assets on-chain, just made big news—they’re directly investing over $1 million to kick off a developer incentive program.

The so-called Million Developer Program is essentially aimed at building up an EVM Layer 1 ecosystem. The money isn’t the main point; what matters is that they’re using reth as their technical foundation, which looks like an attempt to build a reliable bridge between traditional finance and DeFi.

If even a portion of the trillions in banking assets in Latin America actually move on-chain, that’s a massive opportunity. But right now, every public chain is competing to build its ecosystem. Money alone isn’t enough—it all depends on what kind of real applications the developers can deliver. After all, incentive programs are everywhere these days; what really keeps developers around is a solid tech foundation and genuine demand.