Corporate Role in Boosting Cryptocurrency Adoption

Despite the regulatory approval of the first spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) in the United States, corporate adoption and belief within the cryptocurrency industry are still in their early stages. Marc Degen, co-founder and chairman of Trust Square, highlighted this during his speech at the Web3 Corporate Innovation Day, stating that corporate adoption is currently in the “newbie league” compared to traditional finance.
Degen pointed out that the U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs have accumulated $58.4 billion in total on-chain holdings since their launch. However, this pales in comparison to the $489 billion in net new client inflows reported by JPMorgan in 2023 alone, demonstrating a significant gap between the crypto and traditional finance sectors.
A major barrier to broader digital asset adoption is the lack of mainstream trust in the crypto industry. A 2023 Pew Research Center study found that about 75% of people who have heard of crypto do not trust its reliability and safety. Degen argues that only corporates can build this necessary trust to foster wider adoption. New crypto users often prefer corporate-backed centralized exchanges (CEXs) over decentralized exchanges (DEXs), as evidenced by the higher trading volumes on CEXs like Binance.
Moreover, the cumulative Bitcoin ETF inflows don’t fully capture the extent of institutional adoption, partly due to significant outflows from Grayscale’s Bitcoin Trust ETF (GBTC), which has sold 18,207 BTC worth over $1.19 billion, affecting the overall inflow metrics.
In summary, while the approval of spot Bitcoin ETFs marks a milestone for the crypto industry, substantial work remains to build corporate trust and adoption, which are crucial for mainstream acceptance.