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The Johan Cruijff ArenA hosted the 1998 UEFA Champions League final and the 2013 Europa League final. On 24 and 25 June 2026, it will host something different: the largest Web3 summit in Europe, with industry leaders, regulators, and institutional investors in the same room at the same time. Finonity is there as an official media partner.
What Dutch Blockchain Week Actually Is
Dutch Blockchain Week is an annual gathering built around the premise that blockchain adoption has passed the experimental phase and is now a question of scale, regulation, and institutional participation. The 2026 edition runs across two days at Johan Cruijff Boulevard 1 in Amsterdam-Zuidoost, accessible directly from Amsterdam Bijlmer ArenA station. The summit format combines main stage keynotes with breakout sessions and a dedicated exhibition area, with a separate VIP Night the evening before the conference opens.
The speaker lineup confirmed for 2026 gives a clear signal about where the event positions itself. Maike Hornung, Head of Crypto Europe at Visa, will be speaking alongside Brian Gahan, General Manager Europe at Kraken, and Kaj Burchardi, Managing Director at BCG Platinion. Lieke Helleman, who leads MiCAR supervision at the Dutch financial markets authority AFM, brings a direct regulatory perspective to the agenda. Charlie Lee, Director of the Litecoin Foundation, is confirmed, reflecting the event’s longstanding connection to the Litecoin ecosystem, which runs its own parallel summit during the week. Speakers from Bybit, OKX, Chainlink, Consensys, Glassnode, Blockdaemon, Bitwise, and Bitvavo complete a lineup that spans exchanges, infrastructure providers, asset managers, and regulators.
Why the Venue Matters
The choice of the Johan Cruijff ArenA is not incidental. The stadium, home of AFC Ajax and the Dutch national team, is one of the most recognisable venues in Northern Europe and signals the scale at which the organisers are operating. For an event built around the argument that blockchain has moved from fringe to institutional, holding it in a venue more commonly associated with Champions League football sends its own message. Previous editions attracted Deloitte, Fireblocks, OKX, and the Ethereum Foundation as partners, which sets the bar for the calibre of organisations that consider DBW worth their presence.
MiCA, Institutions, and the Regulation Turning Point
The 2026 edition arrives at a specific moment in European crypto regulation. The Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation applied to crypto-asset service providers from 30 December 2024, with a transitional period running to 1 July 2026 for existing providers to obtain full CASP authorisation. DBW 2026 falls exactly inside that window, at a moment when the compliance deadlines are live and the cost of non-compliance is no longer theoretical. AFM’s presence on the DBW 2026 stage, through Lieke Helleman’s session on MiCAR supervision, suggests the event will address implementation realities rather than the framework in abstract. For institutional participants considering European market entry or expansion, that conversation is the one that matters most right now.
The quantum cryptography thread is also increasingly relevant. Itan Barmes, Co-founder and CSO of Qiz Security, and Thomas Attema, Senior Researcher at CWI and TNO, are both confirmed speakers, reflecting growing industry awareness that the cryptographic assumptions underlying most blockchain infrastructure will need to be revisited as quantum computing capabilities advance. That is a longer-horizon risk, but one that infrastructure-layer companies are already planning for. Bitcoin’s own cryptographic security assumptions sit at the centre of that conversation, and the DBW agenda suggests it will be addressed directly.
What to Expect on the Ground
Tickets for the summit are available now. The Pro ticket, which covers both days with full access to the main stage, breakout sessions, and the exhibition area, is currently priced at €150 under the regular bird rate, which runs until 9 June. After that date, the price rises to €250. The VIP ticket, which adds all-day catering, access to the speaker and sponsor lounge, and entry to the VIP Night on 23 June, is priced at €625 until 9 June. Student tickets are available at €25 on presentation of a valid student ID, sent in advance to the organisers. A combination ticket covering both DBW and the Litecoin Summit is available at €200.
The venue is straightforward to reach. Metro lines 50 and 54 stop at Amsterdam Bijlmer ArenA, a five-minute walk from the Johan Cruijff ArenA entrance. For attendees travelling internationally, Amsterdam Schiphol Airport connects directly to Bijlmer ArenA via NS intercity train in 13 minutes, with services running up to four times per hour.
Finonity at DBW 2026
As an official media partner of Dutch Blockchain Week 2026, Finonity will publish editorial coverage across the two days of the summit and in the lead-up to the event. We will be focused on the regulatory and institutional dimensions of the agenda, the infrastructure conversations that rarely make it into mainstream crypto coverage, and the deals and partnerships that tend to be announced at events of this kind rather than via press release.
Full programme details, speaker announcements, and ticket information are available at dutchblockchainweek.com. If you are attending and want to connect with the Finonity team in Amsterdam, reach out through our contact page ahead of the event.
