Altius, co-founder and CEO, Annabelle Huang, stated that the future of the crypto industry may depend less on creating the next new type of asset and more on building the infrastructure necessary to price a continuously expanding range of existing assets.
In the early days of the crypto industry, there was a concerted effort to create entirely new types of assets. Bitcoin and its derivatives were the first to emerge, followed by Ethereum and its competitors. Governance tokens, NFT, and meme coins also follow the same formula: creating a new category of digital assets and building a market around them.
However, as the industry matures, the focus has shifted from creating new assets to creating new markets. There are now three main examples: predictive markets, crude oil and gold perpetual contracts on Hyperliquid, and perpetual contracts on Pre-IPO. These products have established real-time, sustainable trading markets around existing entities—news, commodities, private companies—which previously did not have such markets.
Facts have proven that blockchain technology is very suitable for expanding the range of things that we can price. And the importance of this for the future of finance may ultimately exceed the ability to create entirely new digital assets.
Annabelle Huang is the co-founder and CEO of Altius Labs. The company is an infrastructure provider that designs high-performance blockchain solutions.
From new assets to new markets
Elections attract global attention, as do inflation reports, commodity prices, private company valuations, and major corporate milestones. The crypto industry is now pursuing the idea that attention itself has economic value. If people are concerned about a certain development, then there is likely to be a market demand that reflects the collective expectations of the market regarding it.
In fact, blockchain technology enables "observation" to be transformed into "participation" from anywhere in the world. People are no longer just bystanders to the development of events; they can participate in forming a market-based assessment of how much these events are worth or what the likelihood of their occurrence is.
Therefore, the range of things that can be measured through the market is expanding. Categories of human activity that in the past could only be discussed qualitatively can now be quantified through continuously updated prices.
At the same time, blockchain technology is also redefining the role of price discovery itself. Traditional finance often regards price discovery as a byproduct of trading activities: investors trade assets, and prices are thereby determined. However, in the crypto sector, price discovery is increasingly seen as the product in its own right.
What are these markets like?
Traditional financial markets are intermittent. Even for listed companies, price discovery only occurs during business hours. The situation is even worse for private companies, which typically only reprice during financing rounds or regular valuations. Although important information may emerge at any time, traditional markets often cannot respond immediately.
The decisive characteristic of blockchain-based markets lies in their continuous operation, that is, they are active 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. This means they can immediately absorb information as it becomes available, without having to wait until the next market opening or the next valuation event. As a result, the value assessment mechanism becomes more agile and more natural.
In addition, blockchain-based markets are more accessible than traditional markets. Trading private equity typically requires the status of qualified investors, special relationships, and a large amount of capital, which limits opportunities to a minority of participants. Today, we can see that the crypto industry is taking a different approach: anyone with an internet connection can express their market opinions. If we consider the market to be a system that aggregates information, then expanding the range of participants will improve the quality of that information.
Another important point is that, as mentioned earlier, these products provide exposure, not ownership. Holding a perpetual contract linked to a private technology company does not equate to holding equity in that company. Holders do not enjoy shareholder rights nor do they have a direct claim to future cash flows.
However, an increasing number of market participants believe that having an open position is sufficient. This also reflects a broader trend: for decades, the growth of the global derivatives market has been driven by this factor. Investors often care less about whether they actually hold a particular asset and are more concerned with being able to express their market views. Blockchain technology is the best way to achieve this.
What else is needed for the encryption industry to achieve this?
We can imagine such a world: the long-term value proposition of blockchain will increasingly focus on the information aspect, rather than just the financial aspect. It could become a global infrastructure used to answer the question, “How much is this thing worth now?”
This places high demands on the underlying technology, as establishing a continuously operating global market is not as simple as issuing a token. Informational markets can only function effectively when participants are able to trade efficiently. Throughput, latency, liquidity depth, and reliability all become of paramount importance.
Many blockchain networks still face significant limitations in these areas. Infrastructure bottlenecks can undermine the quality of price signals and limit market participation. If the crypto industry is to become a major engine for global price discovery, it must continue to enhance its ability to support high-frequency trading environments, complex risk management systems, and deep capital pools.
Therefore, the future of the crypto industry may depend less on creating the next new type of asset and more on building the infrastructure necessary to price the ever-expanding universe of existing assets.
Note: The views expressed in this column represent solely the author's own opinions and may not necessarily reflect those of CoinDesk, Inc, or their owners and associated parties.
