Wall Street firms are unlikely to adopt fully transparent public blockchains, with DRW CEO Don Wilson arguing that open ledgers conflict with how institutions manage risk and execute trades.
Wilson said publishing every trade onchain would expose large investors’ strategies, potentially increasing price impact and enabling front-running by other market participants.
Instead, banks are expected to favour private or permissioned blockchain systems that provide greater control over data, access and compliance requirements.
“There is no world in which institutions are going to say, ‘Oh yeah, just publish all of my trades onchain,’”
Wilson said, warning that such transparency would breach fiduciary responsibilities.
He added that full visibility could distort markets, as large trades become detectable and influence pricing before execution is complete.
While Wilson sees strong potential in tokenising real-world assets, he believes the infrastructure will evolve away from public networks like Ethereum toward more controlled environments.
Major banks including JPMorgan have already developed private blockchain systems, reflecting a broader industry shift toward privacy-focused solutions over fully open networks.