a16z States That TradFi and DeFi Are Not Simply Merging but Selectively Adopting Blockchain Technology
a16z published a blog post stating that the core motivation for traditional financial institutions to adopt blockchain is to reduce costs, improve settlement efficiency, expand channels, and optimize customer management, rather than to embrace decentralization. In the future, it is more likely that a programmable financial infrastructure optimized for institutions will be formed based on blockchain.
Institutions selectively absorb DeFi technological capabilities such as atomic settlement, shared ledgers, and programmable funds, but characteristics like open access and anonymity conflict with compliance requirements. Cases like JPMorgan and BlackRock essentially aim to improve existing business processes.
The blockchain industry will have two parallel paths: institutions will drive the expansion of compliant infrastructure, while open networks will continue to innovate and provide technological reserves, allowing TradFi and DeFi to develop in different directions.
Source: Public Information
ABAB AI Insight
a16z has previously released multiple blockchain research reports, similar to early analyses of the interaction between crypto infrastructure and traditional finance, accurately pointing out that institutions will adopt based on practical value rather than ideological motivations.
On the capital path, traditional financial institutions are leaning resources towards compliant blockchain projects and programmable infrastructure, motivated by efficiency gains rather than a complete DeFi transformation, strategically maintaining control while absorbing technological benefits.
Similar to the coexistence of intranets and the open internet during the internet era, the current round of blockchain is in the early stages of dual-track development involving institutional transformation and open innovation.
This is fundamentally a structural judgment; TradFi's selective adoption of blockchain technology forms a hybrid infrastructure, where the mechanism is driven by regulatory and risk preference transformations that filter out DeFi's native characteristics, thus achieving efficiency improvements without altering the core power structure.
ABAB News · Cognitive Law
Technology is for use, not for belief; institutions only take what they need.
Two parallel paths are better than a single marginalized one.
Bottom-layer shared innovation and top-layer hierarchical control are the keys to stable integration.