Digital assets going mainstream: UBS sees digital assets entering financial infrastructure, with value shifting toward regulated distribution, liquidity and orchestration.

Overview

This UBS deep dive examines how digital assets may reshape financial services through five themes: stablecoins as payment rails, capital-markets tokenization, blockchain-enabled agentic commerce, security and regulation, and infrastructure orchestration. UBS concludes that adoption is real but uneven: the most durable economics are likely to accrue to regulated, scaled providers that control customer distribution, liquidity, custody, compliance and cross-network connectivity.

Core views

UBS frames digital assets as both an increasingly investible asset class and a financial-infrastructure disruption theme. Institutional access has expanded through regulated ETFs and ETPs, listed derivatives and crypto-related equities. The first digital-asset ETF, launched in 2021, now represents about $100bn of combined assets under management, roughly 5% of the more than $2tr of on-chain crypto assets, with about $10bn of daily trading volume. UBS nevertheless considers digital assets primarily risk assets rather than defensive portfolio diversifiers: tokens are highly cross-correlated, relationships with equities, rates and the US dollar are unstable, and stress-period correlations can rise. Bitcoin has an R-squared of 0.86 with the Nasdaq in UBS's analysis; it may be relatively defensive within crypto, but not a broad safe haven. High volatility, severe drawdowns and 24/7 trading make direct exposure difficult for many investors, while adjacent equities offer thematic participation with less token-specific return dependence. Stablecoins are UBS's clearest near-term payment use case. The report defines them as tokenized claims backed by stable-value reserves, generally short-dated US Treasury instruments for USD tokens. USD stablecoins account for 99.5% of stablecoin market capitalization, and issuers hold more than $175bn of Treasury-linked exposure. UBS cites BIS research estimating that a $3.5bn stablecoin inflow initially lowers the three-month Treasury-bill yield by about 0.7 basis points and by about 4 basis points within ten days. The report argues that transaction volume is a better adoption measure than market capitalization because stablecoins create value chiefly as money in motion. Economic payments currently run-rate at about $500bn, less than 1% of the global payments opportunity and only 4% of raw stablecoin transaction volume after filtering non-economic activity. UBS estimates real-world stablecoin payments could reach about $3tr by 2031, based on greater penetration of emerging-market flows, use-case benchmarks including B2B and C2C activity, and bottom-up industry disclosures. Stablecoin demand determines supply in UBS's framework, making market capitalization an output rather than an input. Its base case produces a roughly $1.2tr stablecoin market capitalization by 2031, with about half driven by capital-markets activity and the remainder by payments and store-of-value uses. The $2.3tr upside case assumes stablecoins capture part of securities-settlement activity. Yet the report highlights a “velocity paradox”: faster circulation can allow rising payment volume to be supported by a similar stock of stablecoins, limiting the market-cap effect of real-world payments alone. Stablecoins are most useful where they reduce prefunding, accelerate cross-border settlement and improve working-capital efficiency; global nostro balances of about $3-4tr illustrate the capital potentially trapped in prefunded accounts. Emerging-market corridors may benefit most because they require three to four times more prefunding per US dollar than advanced-economy corridors. However, local payout, liquidity, interoperability, chargeback rules, compliance and regulatory clarity remain necessary for end-to-end scale. On tokenization, UBS sees the larger opportunity in capital mobility rather than simply tokenized equities or perpetual products. Tokenization creates standardized, transferable digital representations of securities, fund shares, deposits, collateral or ownership rights. Shared records, programmability and atomic delivery-versus-payment can reduce reconciliation, settlement delay and operational friction; tokenized collateral can be redeployed more rapidly. Tokenized assets excluding stablecoins have grown from less than $1bn in 2022 to almost $40bn, but remain only 0.01% of global assets under management. UBS notes that global assets under management are about $350tr and that tokenized funds remain meaningfully below 1% of total assets, so the addressable efficiency opportunity is large but early. The report illustrates the potential effect through repo and liquidity management. Global repo volume is about $8tr daily. If 20% of repo securities could be used twice daily, UBS's illustration shows $0.89tr of collateral unlocked and an annualized $246.2tr volume uplift. Broadridge DLR already processes more than $350bn of daily repo volume, although it lacks a tokenized settlement leg. Faster settlement may reduce liquidity and operational buffers for broker-dealers and support prime-broking economics, while banks holding more than $10tr of high-quality liquid assets could potentially improve asset mobility. UBS stresses that tokenization does not directly reduce customer capital or margin requirements and that constant settlement could itself increase liquidity needs. Banks, brokers and asset managers can benefit from shorter settlement and broader access, but direct tokenized trading, fee compression and lower-value back-office processes could pressure traditional broker-dealer, exchange, fund-administration and high-fee asset-management models. UBS views agentic commerce as an additional but more selective stablecoin opportunity. AI agents can discover, evaluate and purchase goods or services, and stablecoins can offer always-on, programmable settlement and viable micropayments for open, machine-native transactions. UBS forecasts AI subscriptions and application annual recurring revenue of about $1-2tr by 2030, with about 30% potentially enabled by stablecoins. It also forecasts AI agents could facilitate about $2tr, or roughly 15%, of global consumer-to-business e-commerce by 2030, within an ex-China e-commerce market of around $12tr. Yet UBS estimates only about $60bn, or roughly 3%, of the $2tr agentic-commerce opportunity will use stablecoins by 2030. Open agent ecosystems may favor stablecoins for API, data, compute and autonomous micropayments, while closed ecosystems can adapt cards through tokenized credentials, delegated spending controls, fraud protection, chargebacks and rewards. The report therefore expects stablecoins to complement rather than replace card networks and payment service providers in mainstream consumer commerce. Security, compliance and regulation are central gating conditions rather than peripheral issues. UBS argues that blockchain adoption redistributes risk toward wallets, smart contracts, validators, issuers, governance and control systems. Financial-crime compliance—KYC, KYB, sanctions and AML—costs financial institutions more than $200bn annually, while banks have paid more than $45bn in AML- and sanctions-related fines over the last two decades. Operational compromises represented about 15% of incidents in the first half of 2026 but approximately 76% of losses; five major attacks have affected about $2.4bn since 2025. UBS also cites approximately $154bn of illicit blockchain activity in 2025, up 162% year on year, with stablecoins accounting for about 80% of illicit on-chain flows versus about 10% in 2021. Regulation therefore concentrates value among institutions combining licenses, reserves, distribution, custody and institutional-grade controls. The GENIUS Act established a US federal payment-stablecoin framework on 18 July 2025, while MiCA has applied in phases since 30 December 2024; UBS regards clearer rules as a catalyst for licensed infrastructure, though approval frameworks and tokenization rules remain incomplete. Finally, UBS expects a multi-chain future in which users see simple interfaces while orchestrators hide routing, conversion, settlement and compliance complexity. More than 15 economically significant Layer 1 and Layer 2 networks create fragmented liquidity and user friction, yet fragmentation is structural because users optimize for different combinations of security, liquidity depth, cost and specialized functionality. The report expects liquidity to concentrate in several hubs rather than a single winner-take-all network, as liquidity is a difficult-to-replicate network effect. Banks are likely to retain client relationships and aggregate specialist providers across execution, custody, liquidity, connectivity and settlement. UBS concludes that the largest beneficiaries are participants controlling institutional distribution, liquidity or inter-network connectivity; providers slow to adopt technology and unable to build network effects face the greatest exposure. Across sectors, it expects Payments & FinTech, Exchanges and Asset Managers to see moderate positive effects and Banks to be broadly neutral, with company outcomes dependent on business mix, innovation, implementation speed and ability to manage change.

Analysis framework

UBS combines macro and asset-allocation analysis with proprietary market models, industry data and discussions with more than 30 operators. It examines adoption, payment volumes, capital efficiency, settlement mechanics, regulation, security and competitive positioning, then maps the five themes to payments and FinTech, banks, exchanges and asset managers. Its stablecoin forecasts use use-case-specific adoption assumptions, while tokenization analysis uses illustrative collateral and liquidity scenarios.

Methodology notes

• Industry AnalysisSupply-demand framework

  Stablecoin demand, supply, payment volume and velocity analysis

  UBS treats demand for stablecoin payments as the driver of stablecoin supply and market capitalization, while showing that faster velocity can support more volume without proportionate growth in supply.

• Industry AnalysisUpstream-Midstream-Downstream Transmission

  Financial-services ecosystem mapping

  The report traces effects from blockchain rails and stablecoin issuance through payment providers, banks, exchanges, custody, compliance, asset managers and end users.

• Event-Driven and Behavioral FinanceExpectation Gap and Expectation Management

  Base, upside and downside stablecoin adoption scenarios

  UBS varies adoption by use case and maturity, including capital-markets settlement, payments and agentic commerce, to show how outcomes can differ materially from the base case.

Asset mapping & comparison

Structured mapping from thesis to named assets (strengths, weaknesses, peers, risks).

• Payments & FinTech

  Moderate positive sector effect as stablecoins and orchestration can improve payment efficiency.

  Strengths

  Existing trust, merchant connectivity, compliance and last-mile payout capabilities.

  Weaknesses

  Potential transaction-mix shift toward stablecoin rails.

  Comparison

  Incumbent card networks can add stablecoin-linked cards and agentic capabilities at lower incremental cost than new entrants.

  Risks

  Cross-border corridors and open agentic commerce may see greater disintermediation.

• Banks

  Broadly neutral: tokenization may improve collateral mobility and settlement efficiency while stablecoins could create deposit and payment-revenue pressure.

  Strengths

  Distribution, client relationships, licenses, identity, funding, custody and settlement capabilities.

  Weaknesses

  Potential deposit flight, fee compression and risk of becoming white-label infrastructure partners.

  Comparison

  Large banks and scaled FinTechs have an advantage over smaller institutions because compliance additions are incremental.

  Risks

  Slow adoption and higher fixed compliance costs could weaken regional or subscale banks.

• Exchanges

  Moderate positive potential from tokenized products, liquidity concentration and institutional distribution.

  Strengths

  Deeper markets attract order flow and market makers through network effects.

  Weaknesses

  Fee pressure and possible mix shift if securities become more globally accessible.

  Comparison

  Crypto-native exchanges may serve as orchestration or white-label partners; traditional exchanges may not be primary blockchain connectors.

  Risks

  Competitive pressure and fragmentation can erode economics.

• Asset Managers

  Moderate positive potential from broader asset access and tokenized product distribution.

  Strengths

  New product access and potentially broader global buyer bases.

  Weaknesses

  High-fee managers may face fee compression and a shift toward passive, low-fee products.

  Comparison

  Regulated managers with strong governance and control frameworks are favored.

  Risks

  Tokenization benefits may be delayed by legal, operational and interoperability constraints.

Key data

• Digital-asset ETF assets under management~$100bnCombined assets under management; about 5% of ~$2tr+ on-chain crypto assets.
• Stablecoin market capitalization forecast~$1.2tr by 2031UBS base-case estimate; upside case is ~ $2.3tr.
• Real-world stablecoin payment volume forecast~$3tr by 2031UBS estimate based on emerging-market flow penetration and use-case adoption.
• Stablecoin economic payment run-rate~$500bnLess than 1% of global payments TAM.
• Stablecoin issuer Treasury-linked exposure~$175bn+Treasury bills, government money-market funds and Treasury-collateralized reverse repos.
• Tokenized assets excluding stablecoins~$40bnApproaching $40bn market capitalization from less than $1bn in 2022.
• Agentic-commerce stablecoin volume~$60bn by 2030About 3% of UBS's ~$2tr agentic-commerce TAM.
• AI agent-facilitated C2B e-commerce~$2tr by 2030About 15% of global C2B e-commerce in UBS's forecast.
• Operational compromise losses~76% of losses in 1H26Infrastructure and operational compromises were ~15% of incidents.

Impact & implications

UBS expects the principal opportunity to be modernization of financial infrastructure rather than an immediate replacement of incumbent financial firms. Scaled, regulated banks, FinTechs, exchanges, custody providers, compliance vendors and liquidity hubs can benefit if they integrate digital-asset capabilities; subscale, unlicensed, slow-moving or technologically undifferentiated providers face greater disruption and potential fee pressure.

Risks

• Regulatory or policy changes affecting stablecoins, tokenization, securities classification, AML, custody or taxation could reduce adoption, raise costs or limit addressable markets.
• Slower adoption of stablecoins, tokenized assets, blockchain settlement or agentic commerce could weaken volumes, network effects and valuation outcomes.
• Macro pressure, higher rates, weaker risk appetite or declining digital-asset prices could reduce trading activity, liquidity, investment and transaction-driven revenues.
• Competition among exchanges, payment providers, issuers, custodians, tokenization platforms and networks could compress fees and profitability.
• Smart-contract, cyber, bridge, custody, key-management, validator and governance failures could cause losses, reputational damage and lower confidence.
• Fragmented networks, standards, liquidity pools and jurisdictions may require costly interoperability, orchestration and compliance investment.
• Incumbent financial firms may use their distribution, licenses, compliance capabilities and customer relationships to limit disruption by digital-asset-native competitors.
• Persistent digital-asset volatility may impair transaction activity, asset values, treasury holdings, capital formation and adoption.

What to watch

• Stablecoin transaction volumes, payment-use-case penetration and progress toward UBS's ~$3tr 2031 real-world payment forecast.
• Growth in stablecoin velocity, liquidity and the ability to reduce prefunding while maintaining reliable local payout.
• Implementation of stablecoin and tokenization regulation, including issuer approvals and rules governing tokenized securities.
• Whether tokenization produces measurable gains in settlement speed, collateral mobility, repo usage and liquidity-buffer needs.
• Adoption of stablecoins in open agentic commerce, especially API, data, compute and micropayment use cases.
• Security incidents, compliance readiness, illicit-finance trends and the development of institutional-grade control frameworks.
• Whether liquidity concentrates in scalable hubs and whether orchestration providers can safely abstract multi-chain complexity.