From Crypto to Mainstream: The Role of Banks in Digital Asset Adoption

in midweek trade, we are seeing a crypto rally with Bitcoin and soaring by at least 5% and the system on the two week ceasefire now in effect in the Middle East conflict.

Now the FDIC has approved a proposal to implement Genius Act requirements as well as standards, and this is a milestone in the legitimization of digital assets.

It provides the actual regulatory. for how banks can issue stable coins.

Meanwhile, there is an ongoing rush for banks to make deals with crypto firms and the rise in cross border payments as well as tokenized assets trap by crypto adoption can help to accelerate global defy adoption.

Well joining me this morning to weigh in is Kevin de Patoul, CEO and co-founder of Keyrock.

Good morning, Kevin.

Thank you so much for joining us.

First and foremost, Key Rock received a $1.1 billion valuation and backing from British bank Standard Charters SC Ventures.

So can you tell us what's going on here and what it signals for the broader market?

Sure, thank you very much for having me.

I think it signals that we're really at a tipping point in terms of the adoption of digital assets by larger financial institutions.

It's to be frank, it's something that has been an ongoing theme, you know, within crypto markets for the last 78 years, you know, institutions are coming.

Uh, what we've seen over the last 2 years is that we, we are there now and, you know, it's something that of course has started to gain, you know, more and more mainstream momentum with, with stablecoin, with, with Circle going public last year and I think that what we're seeing now is that this logic of You know, digital assets are not just about crypto but really about rewiring the financial markets at large.

Well, this logic is really something that's been accepted by institutions and they are keen, you know, to partner with with companies that have been building in this space for, you know, the last, the last 889 years.

And this is really what this signals we're, we're, we're, we're moving away from crypto as a separate kind of new exotic asset class and more and more towards a technology really reshaping and, and rewire, rewiring markets at large and this, this is, this is really what it signals. and Kevin, while I have you here, banks do need to upgrade their infrastructure in order to adopt blockchain, but one blockchains drawbacks could be a lack of privacy.

So tell us what banks actually want from the infrastructure.

I mean, of course, you know, there are different features in terms of privacy, openness, and those things can be modulated depending on the needs and the use cases.

I think that at the end of the day what matters is that blockchain allows to more efficiently move value and to do so fully digitally and I think that has, you know, very clear, very clear benefits in terms of cost, in terms of efficiency, in terms of, you know, 24/7 availability. but also in terms of distribution versus what you would see on more, more traditional rails.

So you have something that, you know, the same way that, uh, you know, digitizing information has made it, you know, a lot more widespread and a lot more scalable, we're seeing something similar now, uh, with, with value.

So you have benefits, you know, quite frankly, uh, throughout the entire value chain all the way from, you know, uh, uh, back office and cost savings all the way to, to the scale of distribution that you can reach with fully digital assets, which is why, what blockchain uh enables.

In addition to institutional adoption, tokenization has been a key theme as we kick off 2026, and the RWA tokenization market cap has jumped close to 9% over the last 30 days.

So give us your take on how tokenized assets are actually scaling and what you think still needs to happen.

Sure, I think the, you know, the first wave has really been around uh stablecoins, right?

And that is if you, if you include stablecoin in RW I mean very clearly this is still the biggest chunk.

I think that, so you mentioned a 9% growth.

The the key learning as well that things are still relatively small when you look at nominal value of, you know, total value lot, but the market is growing.

So what, what still needs to happen in my mind is really unlocking utilities.

So you have now the possibility to tokenize assets, which is great, but a tokenized asset isn't in and out of itself better.

It only becomes better if you can do more things with it thanks to its new tokenized.

For and that comes, you know, through utilities who initially 24/7 liquidity as well, making sure that you can easily get in and out of, of position on those tokenized assets, make sure, therefore, that they can be used as eligible collateral and really be used.

And I think that unlocking that utility is kind of the, the, the, the main theme, uh, for the, for the, for the coming year.

And of course, that's something that, you know, uh players such as Krock and in partnership with institutions such as Standard Chartered, we're very much focused on doing.

And finally, before I let you go, we've talked about infrastructure as well as institutional adoption and tokenization.

So what other trends are you paying attention to as we head into the rest of 2026?

So, you know, I, I think that at the end of the day, infrastructure is kind of the, the starting point is kind of the the base layer on which you build everything else.

I think that clearly the, the, I mentioned that uh tokenizing asset is a way to fully digitally represent and eventually exchange value.

Uh, now the question is like, who is exchanging that value and, and clearly today this would be done, you know, predominantly by people.

I do think that more and more with the, uh, the, the, the, the exponential speed of, of AI development, we are going towards more and more, you know, uh agentic uh value exchanges and so that's definitely a trend that we are, you know, Paying very close attention to because eventually I think that most of the value transfer done uh on these digital rails will not be done uh directly uh by, by, by people, institutions, but eventually by, by agents acting autonomously.

So I think that's, that's a very big trend for us as for, I guess, you know, every other part of the, the market, frankly.

Well, Kevin, we will have to leave it there for today, but thank you so much for joining us and thank you so much for sharing your perspective as well as your insights.

Thank you.