Former US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Jay Clayton said digital assets will change the global financial infrastructure, but it’s unclear which types of assets will be most transformative.
“I see digital assets, whether [they are] in the form of a tokenized traditional security, a stablecoin or a new type of asset, being part of our global infrastructure,” he said in an interview with Blockworks.
Exactly what form those digital assets will take is yet to be determined. “You need to distinguish tokenization and crypto technology from cryptocurrencies,” Clayton said. “If you look at the prospects for the combination of tokenization and smart contracts in our financial infrastructure, two things stand out,” he noted. The first is efficiency gains that are available in the existing infrastructure and the second is the opportunity that efficiency brings to reach additional markets and create new ones, he added.
Clayton said the impact crypto technology has had on cross-border payments could provide a guide to future developments.
