From experiment to blueprint: Why 43% of hedge funds plan integration with DeFi
Forty-three percent of traditional hedge funds holding crypto plan to integrate with DeFi within three years, driven by efficiency and regulatory clarity.Summary
A new report from AIMA and PwC indicates a significant shift in institutional strategy, with 43% of traditional hedge funds already invested in crypto planning to expand into Decentralized Finance (DeFi) over the next three years, primarily via tokenized funds and direct platform engagement. This move is fueled by the perceived efficiency, resilience, and programmability of on-chain rails compared to centralized systems, especially after observing DeFi's stability during recent market stress events. While 55% of these funds now hold crypto exposure, the primary barriers to full adoption remain legal uncertainty (cited by 72% of respondents), smart contract risk, and custody standards. Regulatory developments, such as the US SEC's pivot toward framework-building, are encouraging this integration by establishing supervised parameters for on-chain activity. If DeFi successfully transitions from an experiment to core infrastructure, it promises real-time fund administration and programmable custody, but failure to resolve fragmentation across global regulations or technical debt could indefinitely delay widespread adoption.
(Source：CryptoSlate)