Publication: The opinions and opinions expressed here are exclusively to the author and do not represent the views and opinions of the editorial editorial of crypto.news.
For the majority of its history, decentralized finances and traditional finances have been at odds. Positioned as opposite forces, claimed one transparency, permissionless access and composability, while the other was dependent on regulations, scale and institutional trust. But the confluence of finance and technology has never been a zero-sum game.
Maybe you also like it: The new ‘Decentralization Theater’: Crypto projects are still checked by the few | Opinion
The convergence is already underway. Institutional giants such as BlackRock experimenting with tokenized funds on public block chains, while supervisors in Asia and Europe are building policy frameworks for the integration of Defi -Rails in regular financial infrastructure. In East Asia alone, two-thirds of the activities on chains are powered by non-retail players, a sign that usefulness, regulatory clarity and risk standards are fundamental requirements for the next chapter of Defi. These meaningful shifts reveal that the future will not be built on the ruins of one system, but at the intersection of both.
Why Defi is not enough
Despite his promise, Defi still has to break the mainstream. In the field of UX, many products remain cumbersome, fragmented or opaque, designed by developers for developers, not by everyday users. From Frankenstein-like interfaces that intuitive design miss to complicated onboarding flows, too much from Defi still feels like a puzzle that only insiders are equipped to resolve.
From digital portfolios and transaction costs to the income of blockchain networks, entering the world of Web3 seems considerably discouraging. Although public enthusiasm for crypto has grown in recent years, almost one in five owners of cryptocurrency had difficulty gaining access to whether their funds from storage platforms are pulling.
Security remains a striking problem. Defi is often caricatural as a merger of risk problems and regulatory red flags, as demonstrated in 2024, in which $ 2.2 billion was stolen in crypto-related hacks and exploits, which revealed penetrating structural risks. But promising signs are on the rise: the US Senate has just accepted the Genius Act to regulate Stablecoins, while recent SEC discussions have positioned Defi as possible with core -regulating values.
This exposes an underlying reality that the current state of Defi is not equipped to scale itself. It needs allies. More specifically, it needs the infrastructure, legal frameworks and user confidence that Tradefi has built for decades. While the momentum of the regulations is shifting, Defi needs the Defi formidable, proven support to finally win Tradfi-Loyalists.
Rails again came up: when older pipes meet programmable money
We have already seen early examples of this paradigm. Centralized scholarships proven long ago that a friendly facade is what mysterious systems turns into mass market products: Binance now has around 275 million registered users worldwide. Solving the last mile problem explains why CEXS has held historically more investors and traders than their Defi-opposers, in no small part because of the great accessibility advantage.
The same principle is to supervise the next wave of financial products. Consider how BlackRock’s Buidl Fonds has collected $ 245 million in tokenized shares on Ethereum (ETH) within the first week of the launch.
That mutual exchange of Defi leans on the regulatory muscle of Tradfi, and Tradfi who takes on defit -free rails, becomes the natural next step to feed sustainable growth. This convergence is not a compromise, but a reconciling that offers a seamless access point in a parallel financial system, while retaining fame with Fiat payments and the confidence of traditional banking flows.
Invisible infrastructure, daily impact
Just like plumbing, a good financial infrastructure must be invisible. UR, our Borderless Smart Money app, embodies this principle with a uniform account for Fiat and Stablecoins under full custody of the chain, making blockchain the invisible enabler of daily finances.
But the real transformation is structural. By designing for both Tradefi and Defi, UR Bridges systems that have long undered parallel. This ensures that users do not have to choose between a dollar and a stablecoin, or between compliance and decentralized check. It gives them both because the boundaries are already solving.
Institutional interest in crypto is no longer abstract; It is a strategic necessity. Governments make tax exemptions, legal frameworks and policy for digital asset recognition. Banks test the issue of Stablecoin. The question is not whether the financial stack will evolve, but who will form it. The timing is also no coincidence. Institutional and regulatory interest in blockchain reaches new highlights, with a growing hunger for robust infrastructure and Real-World financial utility that uses the transforming powers of decentralization.
If a crypto wants to go from a speculative sidecar to a central pillar, it must offer tools that are legible for supervisors, usable for institutions and are able to integrate seamlessly into the lives of the consumer, without losing the open architecture that makes the technology revolutionary.
Banking built on block chains, not built to replace them
To matter, it must become part of the way people live – embedded, intuitive and reliable. Just as the early internet faded behind the apps and platforms that we use every day, Defi will merge into the financial systems that we are already trusting by beds in tools and interfaces that are usable, safe and intuitive.
As settings in decentralized infrastructures and modular architectures step, is what we witness is not to be in danger to fit into the old world; It is the financial stack that is being rewritten to display a new one.
To get there, we need more full-loop systems, equipped with products that erase abstract complexity without control. Above all, we have to build for the users that we have not yet reached. That is what the next chapter of Finance requires: not a parallel system but a uniform system that is open, resilient and built for how people really live, publish and save.
Read more: Defi at a crossroads: The new posture of the SEC could change everything | Opinion
Timothy Chen
Timothy Chen is the worldwide head of strategy at Mantle. He was previously a partner at MSA, a worldwide investment fund of $ 2 billion that invested worldwide in early and late phase technology companies, such as Uber, Airbnb, Palantir, Meitan, Nurbank and Animoca Brands. He also incubated his own Bitcoin mining activities of the fund and launched a Chinese stock-oriented ETF. He now stimulates Mantle’s initiatives in new financial products, including the MI4 (Mantle Index Four) Fund and UR, the Borderless Smart Money app.