Overview

• At the Digital Assets Conference 2025 organized by Mercado Bitcoin, the ex–Brazil central bank chief said the surge in stablecoins and other digital assets is shrinking bank deposits and weakening credit intermediation.
• He argued that deposits shifting into crypto wallets reduce banks’ capacity to lend and can blunt monetary policy transmission.
• Campos Neto said stablecoin reserves have lifted demand for U.S. Treasuries and can dollarize economies that were not previously dollarized.
• His policy prescription is to bring blockchain-based instruments onto bank balance sheets, citing Drex’s original aim of integrating tokenized assets into regulated finance.
• He added that asset tokenization remains smaller than he expected for 2025 and highlighted the underappreciated potential of combining tokenization, open finance and AI to reshape intermediation.