2025 in review: 7 key trends shaping digital assets in finance

INNOPAY’s Digital Assets team outlines seven major trends shaping digital assets in finance today and the strategic implications for industry leaders.

The digital assets revolution has moved from the fringes of finance to its core, reshaping how banks, payment providers, and market infrastructures compete and grow. As the underlying technology matures and regulatory clarity improves, both institutional and retail demand are accelerating. Headlines from banks, payment firms, and schemes now arrive weekly, often with ambitious timelines and bold targets that are difficult to benchmark. Amid this noise, many incumbents struggle to distinguish signal from hype, and without a holistic view, it becomes hard to assess the market or make confident strategic commitments.

This article brings structure to that chaos by outlining seven major trends shaping digital assets in finance today and the strategic implications for industry leaders:

1. Banks form stablecoin consortia
2. Tokenized deposits gain traction
3. Institutional-focused blockchain networks are emerging
4. On-chain securities markets are advancing
5. Incumbents offer in-app crypto trading and custody
6. Crypto-native firms expand into traditional financial services
7. Payment players enable stablecoin-powered merchant payments

Taken together, these trends define the new digital assets playing field in which incumbents need to decide on where, and how, to play.

Seven adoption trends in digital assets

1.    Banks form stablecoin consortia

Incumbent banks are moving from isolated pilots to coordinated, large-scale stablecoin initiatives. Across Europe*, Japan**, and the US***, consortia of major banks are launching euro, yen, and multi-currency stablecoins tied to G7 fiat. The shared objective: keep deposits and transaction flows on-bank and avoid runs to Tether, Circle, PayPal, or, recently, new stablecoin issuer Klarna.

Banks have learned that solo efforts fragment liquidity, are slowly adopted, and create integration friction. Consortia pool liquidity, align technical and compliance standards, and present a single credible alternative to non-bank issuers. This reduces onboarding complexity, spreads regulatory and infrastructure costs, and lets other ecosystems and organisations plug into new rails without custom integrations for each bank.

For incumbents, this marks a strategic shift from defending accounts to competing for wallet-centric, programmable money flows. The battleground is less about access to rails and more about who orchestrates the customer experience and value-added services around payments, cross-border flows, and treasury. Banks must decide which flows stay internal, where to partner or embed into third-party environments, and how to upgrade UX to match neobanks and crypto-native players—or risk core revenue pools migrating away.

2.    Tokenized deposits gain traction

Tokenized deposits are gaining traction after the recent ‘stablecoin summer’. Banks and regulators are experimenting with on-chain deposit tokens, including JPMorgan’s USD token, Singapore’s Project Guardian BLOOM, and GBTD in the UK. These pilots show tokenized deposits moving from whiteboards to real use cases.

For incumbents, tokenized deposits feel familiar: they sit within existing licenses, capital rules, and KYC/AML, while unlocking blockchain benefits: 24/7 availability, faster settlement, lower marginal cost, programmability, and interoperability with new forms of money. They reduce the perceived leap compared to public stablecoins by preserving the deposit relationship and balance sheet treatment. At the same time, they provide a controlled environment for regulators to observe on-chain money and manage risks.

Strategically, financial institutions must define a tokenized-money roadmap and decide where to use stablecoins versus tokenized deposits. Customers should be convinced—corporates, platforms, and eventually consumers—to use (possibly yield-bearing) tokenized deposits over third-party stablecoins, with strong privacy guarantees and an easy-to-use interface. To ensure new rails reinforce rather than erode profit pools, banks need to modernise system architecture and integrate tokenized deposits into treasury, liquidity, and risk processes.

3.    Institutional-focused blockchain networks are emerging

Institutional blockchain networks are emerging as financial players seek compliant, high performance transaction rails. Rather than relying only on mainstream public chains, firms are launching their own or backing others’ Layer 1s, e.g. Regulated Layer One, Stripe’s Tempo, and Circle’s ARC. These infrastructures are built for predictable throughput, embedded governance, and enterprise controls—offering a hedge against legacy batch systems and fully open, retail networks.

Financial institutions favour these networks because they embed compliance and risk controls at the protocol layer, reducing integration friction and regulatory uncertainty. They also unlock 24/7 liquidity, programmable settlement, and lower cost corridors, while enabling enterprise friendly interoperability and permissioning. At the same time, they give banks and PSPs leverage in negotiations with legacy schemes and messaging networks which don’t facilitate new infrastructure, providing options across public chains, specialised consortia networks, and fully proprietary rails with tailored governance.

For incumbents, choices around institutional Layer 1s become a strategic consideration. Options range from leveraging large public chains for liquidity to joining institutional networks like SWIFT to co-creating purpose-built rails with partners such as Stripe’s Tempo. Control over rails can confer governance, data, and economic advantages, but margins on pure infrastructure are likely to compress—making scale, interoperability, and ecosystem wide total value locked (TVL) more decisive than rail ownership alone.

4.    On-chain securities markets are advancing

Exchanges and custodians are moving issuance, trading, and settlement onto distributed ledgers. Robinhood was an early mover in offering tokenized stocks and other securities, letting users gain exposure via digital tokens instead of holding underlying assets. Traditional infrastructures are following. In the US, Nasdaq enables on-chain tokenized securities with shareholder rights like dividends and voting, while initiatives such as xStocks alliance build shared rails for tokenized equities. Meanwhile, the EU already shifted gears to production with the first on-chain exchange for tokenized securities licensed under the EU’s DLT regime, and France is launching Lise (Lightning Stock Exchange).

Tokenized securities markets are maturing because they address long standing market pain points. Atomic settlement reduces failed trades and manual breaks across systems, cutting operational and counterparty risk. Smart contracts automate post trade steps and shrink the role of intermediaries, lowering costs and complexity. Around the clock rails, rather than narrow settlement windows, improve liquidity and experience—especially in cross border, collateral heavy, or highly traded assets. In the grand scheme of things, the volumes are still low, but acceleration lies ahead, once wholesale CBDC comes on-chain for interbank settlement of digital asset transactions.

For incumbents, on chain securities open new opportunities. Beyond choosing whether to build, join, or connect to tokenized markets, firms can offer clients new asset types (e.g., fractional, 24/7, or previously illiquid exposures) and use tokenized assets in their own portfolios and collateral management. Moving to ‘always on’ settlement requires holding cash or tokenized deposits at the ready, improving collateral mobility, and enabling instant pledging of tokenized treasuries, while maintaining clear intraday funding rules and cut offs.

5.    Incumbents offer in-app crypto trading and custody

Financial institutions increasingly let customers trade crypto directly from their existing banking apps. Neobanks moved first: players like N26 and Revolut embedded crypto deeply into their mobile apps. Incumbent banks are now following, initially focusing on custody and tightly scoped trading—for example, Deutsche Bank’s digital asset custody—shifting crypto access from specialist exchanges into mainstream banking.

Banks and other FIs offer crypto services because retail and wealth customers want simple in app access to digital assets without moving funds to external platforms. Banks neglecting this might see younger, digitally native clients shift balances and activity to competitors. Crypto trading offers a straightforward path to new fee income and lays the groundwork for future on chain products (tokenized deposits, securities, investment wrappers). Growing regulatory clarity, surveillance, and custody tools lower operational and reputational risk, making approvals easier.

Incumbents should consider the product scope of initial offerings and which customer segment to serve first. Some providers, such as Bunq in partnership with Kraken, offer a wide token universe to a broad retail base, while others, like BBVA, start narrow with only BTC and ETH. Rollout paths also differ: some start with retail, others with institutional or private banking clients. In the long-term incumbents won’t compete on listed assets but on designing segment specific journeys, calibrating perceived risk and education, and embedding crypto into risk, AML, and financial conduct frameworks so digital asset offerings deepen relationships rather than dilute trust or profitability.

6.    Crypto-native firms expand into traditional financial services

Crypto native firms are expanding into traditional banking services such as custody, payments, brokerage, blurring lines with traditional institutions. Firms that began as exchanges or infrastructure providers now seek bank like permissions closer to the core of the financial system. These players take aggressive and multi-route approaches, combining both organic expansion (e.g., Ripple and Circle going after bank licenses, Kraken launching Kraken Pay) and inorganic expansion through acquisitions (e.g., Ripple acquiring GTreasury) and partnerships (e.g., Binance partnering with BlackRock for tokenized money market integration).

The strategic play is to offer one place for fiat on  and off ramps, custody, and trading instead of having functionalities fragmented across platforms. By moving into banking services, crypto native firms capture economics and own the client relationship, without relying on intermediaries to distribute products or provide infrastructure access. Clearer regulatory paths—special charters, trust bank licenses, defined digital asset regimes—have made interwoven business models more feasible in key markets, lowering friction with supervisors and boosting credibility with risk sensitive clients.

For incumbents, this shifts competitive pressure from the edges of capital markets to the core of their current business. Next to deposit flight, banks need to anticipate share loss in payments, FX, and brokerage, while sharpening their offerings to retain customers, potentially focusing on niche markets. Crypto natives can be considered competitors as well as partners. Incumbents must consider where to compete versus where to embed or white-label and share a piece of the pie. A key consideration is how to integrate such choices into their digital assets roadmaps, whilst not being pushed into utility roles, losing client relationships.

7.    Payment players enable stablecoin-powered merchant payments

Payment platforms have started treating stablecoins as commercial rails, allowing merchant acceptance of stablecoin payments whilst having that same infrastructure supporting payouts to suppliers, gig workers, and marketplaces in real-time. Kraken’s partnership with Mastercard brings a debit card that spends digital assets anywhere cards are accepted, and TWINT is opening its platform to stablecoins. Together, these moves pull stablecoins from niche trading into mainstream merchant acceptance and payouts.

The commercial benefits are evident. Stablecoins move faster, are not reliant on batch windows or cut-off times, and settle directly, supporting 24/7 operations and cross-border collaboration. Moreover, wallets remove the dependency of acquirers and reach digital segments.

For incumbents, this reshapes who controls merchant relationships and payment economics. The battleground is shifting from processing cards or account transfers to end-to-end facilitation of acceptance and payout. PSPs need to assess which high-friction use cases merchants perceive as having the most added value of stablecoin acceptance and payout. The winners will likely be the ones simplifying wallet acceptance, receiving near-instant settlement, and easing conversion to fiat. 

What this means for incumbents in the next 3-5 years

The core task for incumbents is to lock in a clear digital asset strategy—making deliberate choices on priorities, partners, networks, and the first one or two scalable use cases. Over the next 3–5 years, digital assets will irrevocably shift from isolated pilots to structural building blocks of financial markets, with three implications for incumbents.

1.    Money is going on-chain – define your role, don’t inherit it.

Stablecoins, tokenized deposits, and institutional chains will coexist. Incumbents must define where they lead (e.g., tokenized deposits), where they follow, and where they simply plug in for access and liquidity—before those roles are set for them by others.

2.    Infrastructure choices will decide future economics and relationships

Early decisions on which networks to back, which partners to collaborate with, and which use cases to scale first will determine who owns the data, controls the client journey, and captures margins across payments, securities, and treasury.

3.    Winning will hinge on meeting customer expectations.

Customers will judge incumbents against the best digital experiences they know—not legacy banking standards. They will expect in-app access to new forms of money (knowingly or unknowingly), 24/7 settlement, real-time balances, and seamless cross-border flows. Incumbents should redesign their customer journeys around these expectations and get rid of the complexity of legacy infrastructure. 

Closing thoughts

The next wave of digital assets won’t be won by those who spot the most trends, but by those who thoughtfully act and move forward. What once looked like edge experiments is starting to impact financial services at its core. Incumbents that ignore the ongoing shift face the risk of losing grip on their own strategy, customers, and future infrastructure. Those that move now can pick their role regarding on-chain money, backing the right networks, and designing around customer expectations. The industry is experimenting and scaling at pace. The question is no longer if digital assets will reshape your business, but how deliberately you will reshape it yourself.

*Ten European banks are collaborating on a euro stablecoin
**Three leading Japanese banks are preparing stablecoins tied to local fiat
***A group of ten US banks is exploring a multi-currency coin linked to G7 currencies

About authors

Douwe Lycklama (Co-founder & Senior Vice President), Jelmer Koster (Senior Consultant), Tim van Diepenbeek (Senior Consultant), and Maurits Mulder (Consultant) are part of INNOPAY’s Digital Assets team. With years of dedicated exploration and practical experience in the digital assets space – collaborating with both Traditional Finance (TradFi) and crypto-native companies – they are committed to unlocking the vast potential of blockchain technology for a diverse range of stakeholders in the financial services industry.