Sorin Jitaru
Digital Assets expert

The highly regulated finance industry takes a prudential approach to investment and technological innovation, and is now facing its next big transformation. Asset tokenisation, or converting real-world assets to digital tokens held on a blockchain, could revolutionise the hedge fund industry.

For hedge fund managers, institutional investors, and distributors, this new technology could democratise access to the sector and enhance liquidity across long/short equity, global macro, and fixed income arbitrage strategies. The adoption of tokenisation technology could strengthen Europe’s position in terms of financial innovation and enable more investors to benefit from hedge fund assets within their investment portfolios.

Tokenisation’s potential is greater than mere technological innovation. By combining traditional hedge fund structures with blockchain technology, the investment industry could meet longstanding challenges related to investor access, operational efficiency, and portfolio liquidity.

Democratising hedge fund access through fractional ownership

Hedge funds have historically been the preserve of large institutional investors and ultra-high-net-worth individuals due to high minimum investments and regulatory barriers. Tokenisation fundamentally challenges this exclusivity using several key mechanisms.

Firstly, fractional ownership converts fund shares into digital tokens, allowing investors to purchase fractions of units in previously inaccessible strategies. It is exactly the same approach as used in traditional money market funds.

There are also the streamlined administrative processes that could see lower costs associated with serving a broader investor base. And finally for hedge fund managers, this technology enables targeted outreach to a growing segment of younger digitally-native investors who increasingly expect seamless digital experiences. 
Tokenisation’s benefits extend beyond accessibility as by broadening the investor base, hedge funds could also develop more stable capital bases while offering sophisticated strategies and investment diversification opportunities to a wider range of investors, including previously excluded retail investors …

Read the full article on The Digital Assets Edge website

Scott Foster
Head fo Digital &
Governance Solutions
CACEIS UK

The UK pensions sector is undergoing a significant transformation, driven by a combination of regulatory ambition and economic growth agenda. With the government's recent "Workplace Pensions: A Roadmap" setting out a comprehensive reform agenda, and new legislation making its way through Parliament, pension professionals face both unprecedented challenges and opportunities. Here we seek to understand the key developments set to reshape the UK pensions landscape, from scheme consolidation and investment reform to the emergence of new pension models that promise to deliver better outcomes for members while supporting broader economic growth.

Continued Consolidation: Building Scale for Better Outcomes

The government's analysis (Pensions Investment Review: Final Report from May 2025) of the UK's pensions market reveals a stark picture of fragmentation, with 5,000 DB schemes holding around £1.4 trillion in assets and hundreds of DC schemes with fewer than 100 members.
This sub-scale operation has tangible consequences for savers, including costly governance requirements and limited economies of scale in asset diversification, which are putting pressure on the value for money proposition of smaller schemes.

The government's solution, articulated in the Pension Schemes Bill, is clear: create "a smaller number of bigger, better governed, better value pension providers". The evidence from both the UK and internationally from markets such as Australia supports this direction. In the DC trust market, consolidation into Master Trusts has already driven significant acceleration in assets under management, permitting higher efficiency through scale. The push for consolidation also presents an opportunity to address the long-standing difficulty in comparing pension fund performance – a challenge in a market where thousands of funds operate with different objectives and approaches to benchmarking ...

Read the full article on The Pensions Management Institute (PMI) website (page 42)

Eamonn O’Callaghan
Group Product Manager

The key benefits that ETFs deliver; liquidity, ease of access, cost and transparency consistently resonate with investors, both institutional and retail, that drove their decision to purchase the product. Below we summarise some of the key themes in the European market over the past year, which despite some macro headwinds has again proved to be very positive.

“With ETF assets currently hovering at 25% of mutual funds, and forecasts it can grow to 40%, this points to a promising 2026 and beyond”, Eamonn O’Callaghan, group product manager at CACEIS Ireland Limited

Growth

Following the same trend as previous years, ETF assets continue to grow rapidly. In 2025 inflows peaked at >$333bn, representing significant 36.7%YTD growth. September marked a new milestone with total ETP assets rising above the $3trn mark. Many commentators point to ETF assets doubling by 2030 with 2025 certainly viewed as a building block to reach that target.

New kids on the block

The influx of new asset managers entering the ETF space has continued with 25 new entrants over the past year. This was largely comprised of US managers looking beyond their borders to distribute product into Europe and domestic European managers stepping into the ETF space for the first time.

The flexibility and recognition of the UCITS wrapper is important in these decisions. UCITS products can be sold across Europe and there are also a number of markets outside of Europe where they can be distributed, such as Hong Kong, Singapore, Chile and Mexico.

Ireland continues to be the domicile of choice now holding >75% of all European ETF assets ...

Read the full article on Funds Europe website