By Jean-Marie Mognetti, CEO, CoinShares
The recent Bitcoin crash showed how quickly conviction can turn into capitulation. In a market increasingly shaped by implied risks, from regulatory fears to quantum computing, perception can overwhelm fundamentals.
To complete this growing convergence, between traditional and digital markets, what digital assets still lack is not infrastructure or liquidity, it is the institutional-grade asset management that transforms a speculative market into a mature one. Despite the growth of institutional infrastructure and rising investor interest, persistent knowledge gaps and a lack of trust are holding back retail investors from engaging with digital assets. Crypto doesn’t lack demand or opportunity; it lacks widespread understanding and trusted expertise.
Amid persistent concerns about financial literacy, adding complex, relatively new assets such as cryptocurrencies to investment portfolios risks exacerbating an already significant issue. The knowledge gap among advisors and retail investors is not a failure of curiosity, it is a failure of supply. Without credible asset managers providing structured education, the vacuum is filled by platforms with an interest in trading volume, not investor outcomes. According to research from the OECD, in 2023, among OECD countries, financial literacy rates were about 71%, with only a 57% financial literacy rate in the United States. Higher levels of digital financial literacy can provide individuals with the knowledge and skills to safely use crypto-assets in accordance with their individual risk appetite and raise awareness of their specific risks.
With the emergence of new asset classes, institutions have a responsibility to educate retail and institutional audiences. There is already a clear demand for credible education in the cryptocurrency market. A 2025 survey by CoinShares found that 80% of financial advisors are willing to pay for educational resources to improve their understanding of digital assets, signaling that even professionals feel underprepared. The survey also found that 43% of advisors cite biased or low-quality information from crypto platforms as a barrier to learning. Many advisors feel tension between serving client demand and maintaining professional standards without adequate education.
When asked, fund managers among those who have not yet invested say volatility remains the primary reason. This is puzzling since Bitcoin’s 30-day volatility has averaged just 32% this year so far, lower than gold. Education acts as a stabilizer. Investors who understand portfolio construction, risk management, and the role digital assets can play within broader allocations are less likely to react emotionally to volatility. Instead of chasing momentum or capitulating at lows, investors are more likely to approach crypto as a long-term allocation within a diversified strategy.
Implied or perceived risks, such as the long-term threat of quantum computing to cryptographic security, can often exert a greater short-term influence on markets than the realistic, near-term impact of those risks. ETFs are naturally a stabilizer for the market, however. While the underlying Bitcoin price has experienced sharp declines in the last few months, ETF investors have not retreated proportionally. Fund flows are holding steady or only modestly declining, suggesting greater resilience among ETF holders compared with the broader spot BTC market. That resilience is not accidental, it is the direct result of institutional intermediation, risk framing, and the disciplined governance that professional asset managers bring to the table.
This is precisely where real asset management earns its place. Markets are forward-looking, but they’re also narrative-driven. When a technological development is framed as existential, even if it remains years or decades away from practical implementation, it can trigger disproportionate reactions.
Asset managers are in the perfect position in the market to solve this issue, serving as a stabilizing voice during market stress. They are able to anchor perception, replacing narratives and fear-driven headlines with evidence and empirical data that will enable financial advisors and retail investors to distinguish structural shifts from temporary sentiment swings. Through fund flows data, asset managers are able to quantify what is actually happening beneath price action, debunking exaggerated or implied risks as the market is currently seeing with the “threat” of quantum computing. They are additionally able to build institutional-grade research standards and provide consistent long-term data.
Trust remains the most critical ingredient for the next phase of digital asset adoption. While interest in cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin continues to grow among both retail and institutional investors, many remain cautious about entering a market historically shaped by fragmented infrastructure, opaque platforms, and inconsistent standards. This is where established asset managers play an essential role. By bringing familiar frameworks of governance, risk management, transparency, and investor protection to digital assets, established asset managers are not just participating in this market, they are the condition for its maturity. Trust follows. It does not arrive on its own.
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