Blockchain Could Be a “Threat to Fidelity Investments”

The head of Fidelity Institutional, Mike Durbin, has said that blockchain could end up posing an “existential threat” to what the company does.

While speaking to The Block’s Frank Chaparro at Consensus 2021, Durbin pointed out that Fidelity Institutional was primed to reap the benefits of efficiency that come with adopting blockchain technology. However, the same technology could be a “threat” to the financial giant and what it does.

“There is the intellectual curiosity of what this technology [blockchain] could do for us, or to us, over the coming years,” he added. He also talked about the cryptocurrency space, noting that developments so far could be just the “tip of the spear.”

Easy and frictionless

According to Durbin, Fidelity’s foray into the crypto industry primarily comes from the need to meet client demands. Most of these customers, he said, are “first-generation wealth creators” whose main interest is to find easy and frictionless ways of entering the crypto space.

But the volatility that hit the crypto market recently in reaction to Elon Musk’s comments had impacted confidence in some of the new investors.

To him, those who entered the space because they viewed Bitcoin as a store of value might have been shaken by the massive price crash. Despite this, Durbin thinks the sell-off provided nothing more than a “blip” as crypto continues to mature.

Fidelity Institutional is a leading investment management firm that serves the US institutional marketplace, with $3.7 trillion in assets under administration as of records published on 31 March 2021. Some of its clients include financial advisors who use the firm’s resources to tailor investment strategies that suit their respective investors.