My new blog is out today, featuring fresh data from our Fireblocks 2026 Financial Grid APAC report. 69% of institutions in the region are live or in client-facing pilots. Budget commitment reached 62% before the year began. Both numbers are meaningful. But what the data actually shows is a sequencing story. APAC is the only region where custody leads the use case priority ranking. That is not a conservative call. Custody determines what every other digital asset use case can run on. The institutions that made that decision early are not waiting for production to arrive. They are already in it. Which brings the real next question into focus. Interoperability is a problem no one solved during the innovation phase because it did not matter at pilot scale. But it is the problem that defines whether you can scale in 2026 and beyond. Which blockchains, which custodians, which exchanges, which regulatory perimeters your infrastructure can connect to is now a live commercial constraint, not a future consideration. Link to the blog in comments for my full analysis and data.
Custody leading the use case stack in APAC is the right sequencing signal — you can't build collateral management, lending, or settlement workflows on infrastructure you don't control. The interoperability point is where it gets expensive. Every institution that built custody in isolation is now discovering that connecting to counterparties, exchanges, and regulatory perimeters wasn't in scope for phase one. That gap is now a commercial constraint, not a roadmap item.
https://www.fireblocks.com/blog/financial-grid-apac