[WDAF 2026] Crypto treasury firms must look beyond token gains: experts

Industry execs stress income generation, liquidity management and shareholder value amid volatile crypto markets

Unlike bitcoin exchange-traded funds, which track cryptocurrency prices, companies that accumulate digital assets must prove they can generate returns on their holdings and cover operating costs without being forced to sell when markets fall, industry executives said Monday.

The challenges facing digital asset treasury companies, or DATs, took center stage at the World Digital Assets Forum 2026 in Seoul during a panel moderated by Chris Park, head of Korea commercial strategy at BitGo, with executives from Coinbase Institutional, GSR and Korea Digital Asset Custody.

Sagar Desai, Asia-Pacific head of wholesale at Coinbase Institutional, compared crypto treasury companies to real estate investment firms, arguing that the value of their assets should extend beyond potential price appreciation.

"A real estate management company may have multiple different assets that it is managing, and the best-performing companies are the ones that are able to make use of those assets in such a way that there are real operating incomes that are coming out of each of the underlying assets," Desai said.