As the industry has matured, however, its focus has shifted to creating new markets instead of new assets. We have now three major examples in the form of prediction markets, oil and gold perpetuals on Hyperliquid, and pre-IPO perpetuals. These products created real-time, continuously tradable markets around existing things (news, commodities, private firms) that previously lacked them
It turns out that blockchain technology is very well suited for expanding the range of things that we can price. And that might end up being more relevant to the future of finance than the ability to create new, digital assets
Annabelle Huang is the co-founder and chief executive officer of Altius Labs, an infrastructure company that designs high-performance blockchains
Elections attract global interest. So do inflation reports, commodity prices, private company valuations, and major corporate milestones. The crypto industry is now pursuing the idea that attention itself is economically valuable. If people care about any given development, there is probably demand for a market that reflects collective expectations about it
In effect, blockchain technology enables the transformation of observation into participation from anywhere in the world. Rather than simply watching events unfold, individuals can contribute to a market-based assessment of what those events are worth or how likely they are to occur
So there is an expansion of scope of what can become measurable through markets. Categories of human activity that were previously discussed qualitatively can now be quantified through continuously updated prices
At the same time, blockchain technology is redefining the role of price discovery itself. Traditional finance often treats price discovery as a byproduct of trading activity; investors trade assets, and prices emerge as a consequence. But the crypto space increasingly treats price discovery as the product
The appeal of pre-IPO perpetual futures illustrates this dynamic. Traders may never own shares in a private company, but they value having a real-time market signal regarding its perceived worth. In this sense, the market becomes an information engine. The price is not merely the result of activity; it is the primary output
Traditional financial markets are sporadic. Even with publicly-traded companies, price discovery only occurs during business hours. And it’s worse for private firms, which are repriced only during funding rounds or periodic valuation exercises. Despite the fact that important information can emerge at any time, conventional markets often cannot react immediately
But the defining characteristic of blockchain-based markets is that they operate continuously, on a 24/7 basis. That means they can absorb information as it emerges rather than waiting for the next market session or valuation event. The result is a more responsive, organic mechanism for assessing value
Furthermore, blockchain-based markets are much more accessible than conventional ones. You typically need accreditation, special relationships, and significant capital to trade private equity, which restricts the opportunity to a small group of participants. We can now see the crypto industry taking a different approach by allowing anyone with an Internet connection to express their market views. If we take the view that markets are systems for aggregating information, then expanding participation improves the quality of that information
Another important point, which we alluded to earlier, is that these products provide exposure rather than ownership. Holding a perpetual contract linked to a private technology company is not equivalent to owning equity in that company. There are no shareholder rights, and no direct claim on future cash flows
Yet many market participants increasingly view exposure as sufficient. This mirrors a broader trend that has driven the global growth of derivatives markets for decades. Investors often care less about possession than about expressing a market view. Blockchain technology is the best way to do this
We can imagine a world in which blockchain’s long-term value proposition becomes increasingly informational rather than purely financial. It may be the infrastructure for answering, at a global scale, “What is this worth right now?”
This places significant demands on the underlying technology, because creating continuous global markets is not as simple as launching a token. Informational markets only function when participants can trade efficiently. Throughput, latency, liquidity depth, and reliability all become critical
Many blockchain networks still face meaningful limitations in these areas. Infrastructure bottlenecks can undermine the quality of price signals and limit market participation. If crypto is to become the world's primary engine for price discovery, it must continue improving its ability to support high-frequency trading environments, sophisticated risk management systems, and deep pools of capital
The future of crypto may therefore depend less on creating the next novel asset and more on building the infrastructure required to price a growing universe of existing ones
Note: The views expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of CoinDesk, Inc. or its owners and affiliates
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