Ecosystem

To date in order to access sophisticated risk management tools without the ability or desire to build them in-house participants must turn to a custodian who acts as a middleman. This design is fundamentally opposed to the principles of the blockchain ecosystem and the practice suffers from exclusivity via high fees, removes the sovereignty of self-custody and introduces risks of asset freezing, government control and custodian liquidity risk. Custodians term their risk management controls a “policy layer” and importantly do not offer them separate from custody.

Whilst custodians dominate the landscape, smart contract wallets that offer self-custody along with basic policy management have been in existence for several years. However these introduce smart contract risk with exploits leading to loss of funds. This may be why such wallets only offer basic risk controls despite being available for several years.

The crypto ecosystem is embedded within a broader context of research and tooling relating to optimal resource allocation, AI, predictive modelling and data lifecycles. An internet native monetary system seems inevitable and offers exciting opportunities to reduce the time and effort that humans spend on wealth management. However, without sophisticated controls that empower digital agents to effectively manage risk, the ecosystem will remain siloed and stagnated by points of centralisation and trust.