In the evolving landscape of digital finance, Big Four consultancy EY has focused on what it believes is the next defining frontier: wallets.
Wallets are fast becoming the critical interface for the next era of financial services, not just tools for holding cryptocurrency, according to Mark Nichols, principal at EY.
“The wallet is the strategy,” Nichols, who co-leads the firm’s digital asset consulting business, told CoinDesk in an interview. “Whoever owns the wallet, whoever takes care of the wallet, will win the customer relationship.”
Nichols and his West Coast counterpart, Rebecca Carvatt, see wallets as more than infrastructure. They are the gateway to the storage, movement and management of tokenized value in a world where financial instruments, from payments to private credit, increasingly move on the chain, he said.
Not just custody: Wallets as the center of tokenized finance
The vision is expansive. Far from being a niche tool for crypto-enthusiasts, wallets are becoming the connective tissue of a wider tokenized financial system. Wallets will soon be indispensable for retail investors, asset managers, treasurers and even commercial banks, according to Carvatt, co-head of EY’s digital assets consultancy.
“They will be the access point for everything – payments, tokenized assets and stablecoins,” she said.
EY’s perspective positions wallets as the new bank accounts of the future, with services tailored not just to individuals, but to corporates and institutional investors that require sophisticated integration with risk systems, compliance tools and real-time capital flows.
The implication is clear: whoever controls the wallet controls the relationship. For financial institutions already losing ground to crypto-native platforms, the shift is existential.
Beyond Liquidity: The Real Promise of Tokenization
The broader shift to tokenization is often framed as a play for liquidity, but EY believes the narrative undersells the true impact. “It’s not just about liquidity,” says Nichols. “Liquidity isn’t everything, it’s about the utility that onchain funding enables.”
What EY sees instead is the emergence of blockchain as a real-time infrastructure for financial markets, one that allows for programmable transaction chains and fundamentally reshapes how capital is managed. Tokenization enables atomic settlement, of course, but its real power lies in margin optimization and operational efficiency.
Nichols points to scenarios where companies can use stablecoins or tokenized assets to meet margin calls more frequently and more accurately. This, in turn, reduces initial margin requirements, freeing up capital for investment. “It’s about better risk adjustment and real-time capital management,” he says. “And the wallet becomes the gateway to make that possible.”
A decade in space: EY’s deep crypto bench
While some firms are racing to catch up, EY has been building in the digital asset space for more than 12 years. Its early investments in crypto-native audit and compliance practices now span thousands of professionals supporting everything from hedge fund tax returns to tokenized M&A advisory.
“We’ve worked with all client profiles—big banks, asset managers, exchanges, digital natives, infrastructure providers,” says Nichols. “and has worked in the digital asset ecosystem for over a decade.”
EY’s hedge fund auditing business was one of the earliest to support crypto, and its advisory team has helped companies prepare for public listings and complex regulatory environments. The firm has developed tailored services for wallet monitoring, onchain compliance and token-native tax reporting. It also continues to advise traditional financial institutions on how to design secure, compliant digital asset strategies, particularly as they begin to develop or integrate wallet infrastructure.
Wallets for All: A Segment-by-Segment View
EY recognizes that wallet needs are not monolithic. Consumers want seamless UX and secure access to payments and crypto. Businesses need integration with treasury functions and regulatory compliance across jurisdictions. Institutional customers demand secure custody, connection to decentralized finance (DeFi) and staking products and embedded risk tools.
Self-care, EY argues, will not be mainstream. The average user or institution does not want to manage their own private keys. Instead, trusted wallet providers will emerge, banks, fintechs or specialized custodian banks; each tailor their offerings based on the segment they serve.
Supplying wallets therefore becomes a strategic necessity. Whether companies choose to build their own, acquire providers or enter into partnerships, the wallet is the new front door to financial services. Companies that act now will reduce future customer acquisition costs and own a more defensible position in the digital asset ecosystem.
Regulation: A catalyst, not a roadblock
One of the most persistent beliefs about tokenization is that regulation is a block. But EY’s executives disagree. “We already have the regulatory framework in place in core markets, and alongside the wider industry, the adoption of market structure legislation will enable any remaining issues to be ironed out,” says Nichols. “A security is a security, a commodity is a commodity. Blockchain is technology.”
In the US, the GENIUS Act and existing Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) exemptions provide avenues for compliant tokenized products. Globally, jurisdictions are racing to attract digital asset innovation with evolving licensing schemes. While harmonization is still ongoing, there is no mistaking the momentum.
EY sees this moment as a call to maturity, a turning point where the infrastructure is catching up with the vision. “We’re past the experimentation phase,” says Carvatt. “Now it’s about secure, scalable deployment.”
Rethinking asset management from the ground up
Perhaps nowhere is the impact of tokenization and wallet infrastructure more profound than in asset management. A typical fund currently requires a distribution network, an investment team, a custodian, a fund manager and regulatory reporting channels. With tokenization and smart contracts, much of that stack becomes programmable and potentially obsolete.
“Asset managers just want to build good portfolios,” says Nichols. “Blockchain lets them do that without all the old friction.”
By tokenizing the fund’s underlying elements and embedding logic in smart contracts, asset managers can automate functions such as distribution, compliance and reporting. This opens the door to lower fees, wider investor access and new types of products, particularly in private credit and alternatives where cost has historically been a barrier.
“From the unbanked to the non-broker, we’re seeing more people gain exposure to assets that were previously out of reach,” says Carvatt. “It’s strong.”
The future of finance is onchain
Whether it is crypto, payments or tokenized assets, wallets will be the gateway to a new financial reality. Companies that ignore this risk becoming irrelevant. Those who embrace it will own the infrastructure and customer relationship at the heart of the digital economy.
“The future of finance is on-chain,” says Nichols. “And the wallet is at the center.”
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