Beyond Trading: Eugene Ng's Vision for Cryptocurrency as Global Financial Infrastructure

For most of the world’s population, accessing basic financial services remains a complex challenge fraught with barriers, high costs, and geographical limitations. While wealthy nations enjoy sophisticated banking systems and investment opportunities, billions of people face restricted access to savings accounts, cross-border payments, and investment vehicles that developed economies take for granted. This financial inequality has persisted for decades, entrenched by legacy systems that prioritize established markets over global inclusion.

Eugene Ng, whose career spans traditional Wall Street institutions and pioneering cryptocurrency ventures, sees digital assets as the foundation for a fundamentally different approach to global finance. Rather than viewing cryptocurrency purely as an investment opportunity or speculative asset, Ng envisions a world where blockchain technology creates seamless, accessible financial infrastructure that operates beyond the constraints of traditional banking systems.

“I truly believe that all this innovation is going to help allow people to access products in a more global-centric manner as well as save a lot more money and allow the world to be more connected through cryptocurrencies,” said Ng, articulating a vision that extends far beyond current market dynamics.

This perspective—cryptocurrency as essential financial infrastructure rather than alternative investment—reflects both the technology’s transformative potential and the practical realities Ng has observed throughout his international career in traditional finance and digital assets.

The Infrastructure Gap

The global financial system’s limitations become apparent when examined from an international perspective Ng’s experience working across Asia-Pacific markets, combined with his observations of everyday financial challenges, highlighted how existing infrastructure fails to serve large portions of the world’s population effectively.

“I have domestic help here in Singapore, which is very common,” Ng explained, describing a scenario that illustrates broader financial inclusion challenges. “And whenever my domestic help have to send money back to say Indonesia or Philippines, it’s expensive for them to do a wire transfer.”

This seemingly simple transaction—sending earned income to family members in another country—represents a fundamental failure of traditional financial infrastructure. Despite technological advances that enable instant global communication, moving money across borders remains costly, slow, and often inaccessible to those who need it most.

The problem extends beyond individual transactions to systemic inequalities in financial access. “One quarter of the world is unbanked and 90% of the world’s currencies are depreciating against the US dollar, and they have problems sending money,” Ng noted, highlighting how currency instability compounds access barriers.

These observations shaped Ng’s understanding of cryptocurrency’s potential to address infrastructure gaps rather than simply create new investment opportunities for already-wealthy populations.

Reimagining Global Market Access

Traditional financial markets operate within geographic and temporal constraints that limit global participation. Ng identifies this as a fundamental design flaw that cryptocurrency infrastructure can address through its borderless, always-available nature.

“Why is the world sort of why am I able only to buy Tesla Apple stock on the US stock on NASDAQ because it operates 9 to 5 in the US, but the world operates actually 24/7?” Ng questioned, highlighting the artificial limitations imposed by traditional financial infrastructure.

This observation extends beyond market hours to broader questions about financial access and democratization. While residents of developed markets can access US Treasury bonds—”actually the safest asset from a global sort of stage”—regulatory restrictions prevent citizens of many countries from participating in these investment opportunities.

“For example, in Korea or in China, you’re not allowed to buy US Treasury bonds,” Ng noted, illustrating how regulatory frameworks create investment inequality based on geography rather than individual merit or capability.

Cryptocurrency infrastructure offers a potential solution by enabling tokenized versions of traditional financial products that can be accessed globally without regulatory restrictions based on citizenship or residence.

The Streaming Money Concept

Perhaps most compelling in Ng’s vision is his concept of “streaming money”—financial infrastructure that operates with the same seamless, always-available characteristics as modern digital services.

“We have streaming videos in the form of Netflix. We have streaming data in the form of the internet, and money should be streaming, and being able to trade these assets should be streaming,” Ng explained, drawing parallels between entertainment technology and financial infrastructure.

This streaming approach to finance would eliminate many barriers that currently limit global financial participation. Just as Netflix enables instant access to entertainment content regardless of geographic location or time zone, streaming financial infrastructure could provide similar accessibility for savings, investments, and payments.

The concept challenges fundamental assumptions about how financial services should operate, suggesting that artificial constraints like market hours, geographic restrictions, and intermediary requirements represent legacy limitations rather than necessary features.

Stable Coins as Financial Innovation

Within Ng’s broader infrastructure vision, stable coins occupy a particularly important position as practical tools for addressing real-world financial challenges. Rather than viewing them as speculative instruments, he sees stable coins as foundational infrastructure for global financial access.

“I do see that stable coins is one, tokenized products two, a lot of people want to have a savings account or access US money market products and are able to, but with tokenization, with cryptocurrencies, you’re able to do that,” Ng explained.

This perspective frames stable coins as access enablers rather than investment vehicles. For populations dealing with currency instability or limited banking infrastructure, stable coins provide access to relatively stable value storage and efficient payment rails that traditional systems often cannot offer.

The innovation lies not in creating new financial products but in making existing financial stability accessible to previously excluded populations through cryptocurrency infrastructure.

Addressing Traditional Finance Limitations

Ng’s critique of traditional financial infrastructure extends beyond access issues to question the sustainability of current monetary policies. His experience on Wall Street trading floors during and after the 2008 financial crisis shaped his understanding of how conventional systems create rather than solve fundamental economic challenges.

“I don’t think kicking the can down the road is sustainable for any economy. It’s not just the US, for that matter,” Ng stated, referring to monetary policies that rely on continuous money printing to address economic challenges.

This perspective informs his view of cryptocurrency as necessary financial infrastructure rather than optional innovation. If traditional monetary systems face sustainability questions, alternative infrastructure becomes essential for long-term economic stability rather than merely convenient for technical enthusiasts.

The infrastructure argument gains urgency when considering global economic challenges like “aging population, productivity, the replacement of human by AI, standard of living” that existing financial systems struggle to address effectively.

The Democratization of Financial Products

Central to Ng’s vision is the democratization of sophisticated financial products that have historically been available only to wealthy institutions or citizens of developed nations. Cryptocurrency infrastructure enables global access to products like money market funds, government bonds, and professional investment management.

“There’s so many products that they’re not able to access in their web2 or traditional channels,” Ng observed, highlighting the gap between available financial technology and actual global access.

This democratization extends beyond individual products to entire categories of financial services. Yield-bearing products, cross-border payments, currency hedging, and professional asset management—services routinely available in major financial centers—could become globally accessible through cryptocurrency infrastructure.

The transformation represents more than technological advancement; it reflects a fundamental shift toward financial inclusion based on need and capability rather than geography or wealth.

Building for Global Connectivity

Perhaps most significantly, Ng’s vision encompasses cryptocurrency as infrastructure for global connectivity rather than merely financial transactions. Just as the internet created global communication infrastructure that transcends national boundaries, cryptocurrency could create financial infrastructure that enables global economic participation.

“All this innovation is going to help allow people to access products in a more global-centric manner as well as save a lot more money and allow the world to be more connected through cryptocurrencies,” Ng emphasized.

This connectivity vision addresses both economic and social dimensions of financial exclusion. When people can participate in global financial systems regardless of their physical location or local banking infrastructure, it creates opportunities for economic advancement that have historically been limited by geographic accidents of birth.

The infrastructure enables not just individual financial improvement but broader economic development as previously excluded populations gain access to capital, savings vehicles, and investment opportunities.

The Long-Term Infrastructure Vision

Looking ahead, Ng anticipates cryptocurrency infrastructure becoming as fundamental to global finance as the internet has become to global communication. This transformation would represent a shift from cryptocurrency as alternative investment to cryptocurrency as primary financial infrastructure.

“I think the more salient point is, for the very first time, you’re able to tokenize culture,” Ng noted, describing how blockchain infrastructure enables entirely new categories of value creation and exchange beyond traditional financial products.

This broader infrastructure potential suggests applications that extend beyond current financial services to include governance, intellectual property, and social coordination—areas where traditional systems struggle with global scale and accessibility.

Overcoming Infrastructure Adoption Barriers

Despite cryptocurrency’s infrastructure potential, Ng recognizes significant barriers to mainstream adoption that must be addressed before his vision can be fully realized. Current user interfaces, regulatory uncertainty, and technical complexity limit accessibility for non-technical users.

“I feel like maybe 10% of the world’s population is using crypto in one way or another, but I still feel like we’re not really scraping the tip of the iceberg,” Ng observed, acknowledging the gap between infrastructure potential and current adoption.

This adoption challenge requires continued development of user-friendly interfaces, regulatory clarity, and educational resources that make cryptocurrency infrastructure accessible to global populations without technical expertise.

However, Ng maintains optimism about long-term adoption trends, particularly as younger generations become more comfortable with digital-first financial services and as infrastructure improvements address current usability challenges.

The Infrastructure Imperative

Eugene Ng’s vision for cryptocurrency as global financial infrastructure represents more than technological optimism—it reflects a practical understanding of current financial system limitations and the potential for blockchain technology to address fundamental accessibility challenges.

“When I dawned upon the concept of cryptocurrency, I was wow, this is revolutionary, this is game-changing. This is like peer-to-peer money, censorship-resistant. It’s a good store of value,” Ng recalled, describing his initial recognition of cryptocurrency’s infrastructure potential.

As traditional financial systems struggle with sustainability challenges and access limitations, Ng’s infrastructure vision offers a compelling alternative that prioritizes global inclusion over geographical privilege. Whether this vision becomes reality will depend on continued technological development, regulatory evolution, and adoption by populations who stand to benefit most from improved financial infrastructure.

For now, Eugene continues building toward this infrastructure future, recognizing that today’s cryptocurrency experiments may become tomorrow’s essential financial utilities that enable global economic participation in ways that traditional systems never could.