For decades, the path to wealth was presented as a long, disciplined sequence: work steadily, save consistently, invest patiently and let time do the rest.

While this advice is not wrong, it was built around a world where stable employment, affordable asset accumulation and predictable economic cycles made patience feel rational. For many younger people today, those conditions feel a lot less dependable.

Rising costs, economic uncertainty and geopolitical instability have changed how people think about wealth, risk and opportunity. Instead of just waiting for rewards later, many are looking for ways to take action earlier and take charge in shaping their financial future.

This behaviour is commonly seen as being impatient. But that misses the point. For these young investors, waiting patiently while the world feels unstable no longer seems like a viable strategy. So in reality, it’s their natural response to a very different financial environment.

The old model is being challenged

The traditional wealth model was built on three assumptions: time would compound gains, steady income would provide security, and stability would make long-term planning realistic.

The cost of living has risen, traditional routes to wealth accumulation feel slower, and uncertainty has become a more constant feature of financial life.

Understandably, the promise of delayed reward is harder to trust when the path itself feels less secure.

But this does not mean long-term thinking has lost its value. Patience and discipline still matter, but they feel harder to trust when people do not see meaningful opportunities along the way.

That is why younger generations are not only asking how to build wealth over 30 years. They also want to know how to participate earlier, understand risk better, and avoid being left behind as financial systems evolve.

Also Read: Why investors are auditing your operation architecture, not your org chart

When curiosity moves faster than education

This desire to participate earlier has drawn many new investors into emerging financial markets, including digital assets. But access is not the same as readiness.

Having spent years educating new investors in this space, a recurring pattern becomes clear: many beginners are genuinely interested in digital assets, but lack the foundational knowledge needed to participate with confidence.

This gap is most visible in areas such as volatility, risk exposure, custody, platforms, wallets and transactions. New investors may understand the broad appeal of crypto, but not the operational details that shape real outcomes.

When mistakes or losses happen, the asset class is often blamed. In many cases, however, the issue starts much earlier: unclear assumptions, limited preparation or decisions made without fully understanding the risks.

Healthier participation requires a more deliberate approach. Investors should know why they are entering a position, how much risk they are prepared to take and what role the investment plays in their wider strategy.

That means setting exposure limits, avoiding all-in decisions, separating conviction from hype and understanding the basic mechanics before committing significant capital.

The problem beyond theory

Another key observation is that knowledge does not always translate into successful execution. A beginner may understand risk management, diversification and custody in principle. But navigating an exchange, setting up a wallet, managing decentralised custody and avoiding operational mistakes can still feel overwhelming.

This creates risk beyond market volatility. In digital asset markets, users can make reasonable investment decisions and still face losses because of poor execution, confusing tools or avoidable errors. This reinforces a larger point: education alone is not enough. Users also need systems that reflect how people actually behave, especially when decisions are being made under pressure.

How systems shape financial behaviour

Financial outcomes are shaped not only by individual choices but by the systems around them.

When tools are fragmented or difficult to use, users are more likely to take shortcuts: copying trades, chasing trends, reacting to market noise or relying too heavily on online communities.

These behaviours are not always reckless. Often, they reflect systems that do not support clear decision-making. Better tools, stronger guardrails and trusted infrastructure can reduce avoidable errors and help users participate with greater intention.

Also Read: The capital cost strategy: Why high initial investment is your strongest protection

Why regulation and usability matter

The regulations which have been set in Singapore are now a part of the wider system that influences behaviour and discipline.

While regulation can feel restrictive, it can also support trust, security and long-term viability. It does not replace education or personal judgment, but rather, has the potential to create clearer expectations and more sustainable participation.

This thinking points toward what the space still needs most: platforms and infrastructure that bridge the gap between digital asset education and practical participation.

Crypto as part of a wider innovation cycle

Like many venture-backed startup ecosystems, crypto has developed through familiar stages: early scepticism, fragmented tools, rapid adoption and, only later, the deeper understanding and infrastructure needed for mainstream trust.

Its rise also reflects a broader shift in how people think about wealth, especially as traditional paths to financial security feel less certain.

More people want earlier access to opportunity, but access alone is not enough. It needs to be supported by education, better tools and stronger safeguards.

A longer view on a fast-moving space

Crypto is still something to think about over the long term, and not just a quick trade.

The space is still finding its shape, and that process is likely to stay volatile for a while. But the more important story is not just what the technology becomes. It is how people are changing their relationship with wealth, risk, and opportunity.

For younger generations, the traditional 30-year playbook no longer feels as dependable as it once did.

The next wealth playbook will not be built on patience alone. It will need to combine long-term discipline with earlier access, clearer education, safer infrastructure and better systems that help people participate responsibly in a financial world that is changing faster than before.

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You have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars learning what your customers think. You have never once understood who they are.

Try this. Ask someone on your executive team to draw the letter E on their forehead — fast, without thinking. Some will draw it readable to themselves. Others will draw it readable to the person facing them.

The direction is not random. In a 2006 study published in Psychological Science, Adam Galinsky and colleagues at Northwestern and Stanford primed participants with feelings of high or low power, then ran this exact test. Those primed with power were nearly three times more likely to draw the E, facing themselves — 33 per cent against 12. Power does not sharpen your ability to see from another’s perspective. It systematically destroys it.

The researchers called this a “power-induced impediment to perspective taking.” I call it the occupational disease of every successful leader.

The deafness is not a character flaw. It is a side effect of the chair.

A lighthouse has the same condition. It throws light miles into the dark with total conviction — and cannot hear the ship scraping its own rocks. Most companies, after a certain age, become lighthouses. They broadcast. They do not receive.

Every company is broadcasting, but no one is listening.

The reason is structural. Sales is broadcasting. Fundraising is broadcasting. Recruiting is broadcasting. Every pitch, every earnings call, every all-hands is won by whoever stands up and explains, with conviction, why the world should bend toward their idea. For years, you are paid — in capital, in talent, in headlines — to transmit. So the beam grows brighter. And the faculty that no one ever promoted you for goes quietly dark.

No one was ever made CEO for what they heard

Here is where it gets expensive. Because you are not ignoring your customers. You are listening to them — or so the invoice says.

Every year, companies spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on surveys, focus groups, and NPS dashboards, then present the findings in slide decks as proof of customer empathy. It is nothing of the sort. A survey is a document you designed, with questions you chose, framed in language that fits your existing categories, delivered to people who answer in the format you provide. You are not hearing the customer. You are hearing yourself, refracted.

Also Read: The AI trust gap: Why SEA startups need proof before they scale

The focus group is worse. You bring people into a room — your room, your agenda, your moderator — and call it listening. Nobody tells the truth in a room they were paid to enter. Nobody says what they actually do in a life they were not asked to live in front of you.

The most expensive research in the world is still broadcasting, dressed up as a question.

CB Insights read 483 startup post-mortems. The leading cause of death was not capital, nor the team. It was “no market need.” Forty-two per cent. They built what the survey said people wanted — and found no one waiting.

Why startups die 

The leading cause of startup death is building what no one was asking for.

And the most dangerous signal is not the one you failed to survey. It is the one your own people already knew — and could not say.

When researchers interviewed 76 Nokia managers for a 2016 study in Administrative Science Quarterly, they found a company that had seen the smartphone threat clearly and could not speak. Engineers knew. Middle managers knew. Every report was softened on the way up until the truth reached the top floor, sanded into something survivable. Nokia did not lack the signal. It had built an organisation perfectly designed to dim it before it arrived.

Also Read: Great talent is what happens after AI creates the first draft

The market was talking the whole time. So were the people three floors below you.

There is only one way to understand a person. You have to go where they live, watch what they actually do — not what they say they do — and stay long enough to see the gap between the two. Nobody understands by watching from a distance. Nobody understands by asking. You understand by entering.

When Toyota redesigned the Sienna, the chief engineer did not commission a study. He drove 53,000 miles across North America — every US state, every Canadian province, into Mexico — because he believed he had no right to design for a life he had not lived inside. That is not a research method. That is a different idea about what understanding requires.

Hear. Then see. Then — only then — do.

Most companies stop at the first step and call it enough. Most never even get that far. They send a survey instead, then wonder why the product felt right in the boardroom and wrong in the world.

So before the next research budget gets approved, before the next focus group convenes, before you stand up at the all-hands and show the NPS score as evidence that the company is listening —

Draw the E on your forehead. Be honest about which way it faces. And ask yourself: when did you last enter a customer’s life, rather than summon them into yours?

This article is part of David Kim’s Value Creation column. It sits alongside the Asia Value Creation Awards, which aim to recognise PE and VC teams driving long-term, fundamentals-led value creation across the region.

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There is a number at the centre of Vietnam’s development ambition that does not get nearly enough attention: US$270 billion. That is the annual investment requirement the country will need to sustain by 2030 to meet its economic growth targets. This figure represents not just an aspiration but a hard structural constraint on Vietnam’s trajectory.

Today, Vietnam’s annual investment needs sit at approximately US$160 billion. According to the Vietnam Innovation and Private Capital Report by DO Ventures and Boston Consulting Group, that number is projected to grow to US$270 billion within five years, an increase of roughly 70 per cent in less than a decade.

Also Read: Vietnam’s biggest PE bet of 2025 was not on tech. It was on what 100M people eat every day

The drivers are well understood: a massive infrastructure deficit spanning roads, ports, airports, and urban transit systems; an energy transition that requires enormous capital to shift away from coal and scale up renewables; and the sustained fixed asset investment needed to support an economy targeting upper-middle-income status by 2030.

The arithmetic of this challenge is unambiguous. The Vietnamese state, however capable and motivated, cannot close a US$270 billion annual funding gap through public expenditure alone. Private capital, domestic and foreign, venture and institutional, debt and equity, is not a supplementary channel in this story. It is a structural necessity.

The infrastructure deficit is the immediate pressure point

Vietnam’s infrastructure has been a persistent drag on an otherwise exceptional growth story. The country’s road network, while expanding, remains inadequate for the volume and weight of industrial freight generated by its manufacturing sector. Port capacity in key export hubs is chronically congested. Urban public transport in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, both cities with populations in the millions, remains largely dependent on motorcycles and private vehicles, with metro systems that have taken years to build and are only now beginning to carry meaningful passenger volumes.

The scale of the infrastructure backlog means that even sustained public investment, which Vietnam has prioritised, maintaining one of the highest public investment-to-GDP ratios in the region, cannot close the gap at the required pace. Public-private partnership frameworks have existed on paper for years. Still, the track record of PPP deal execution in Vietnam has been patchy, constrained by legal ambiguity, disputes over risk allocation between government and private partners, and a regulatory environment that has historically been more comfortable with state-led development than with market-driven infrastructure finance.

Changing that dynamic is not optional if Vietnam is to fund its 2030 ambitions. The capital markets deepening that comes with the FTSE Emerging Market reclassification in September 2026 will help by broadening the institutional investor base that can participate in infrastructure bonds and listed infrastructure vehicles. But bond market development, regulatory reform of PPP structures, and the creation of bankable project pipelines that meet international investment standards will all need to accelerate in parallel.

The energy transition is the long-term capital challenge

If infrastructure is the immediate pressure point, energy is the structural challenge with the longest time horizon and the largest capital requirement. Vietnam has committed to ambitious renewable energy targets and signed up to international climate frameworks that require a substantial shift in its power generation mix.

Also Read: Vietnam’s AI funding just grew 13x in two years. Now comes the hard part

Coal, which still accounts for a significant share of Vietnam’s electricity generation, needs to be progressively retired and replaced. This process is capital-intensive at every stage, from financing new renewable capacity to decommissioning legacy assets and constructing grid infrastructure capable of handling variable output from wind and solar.

The global energy transition investment market is enormous, and Vietnam is increasingly competitive for a share of it. The country’s renewable energy potential, particularly offshore wind along its extensive coastline and solar irradiance in its southern regions, has attracted serious interest from international developers and infrastructure funds. Several large-scale offshore wind projects are at various stages of development, though regulatory uncertainty regarding power purchase agreements and grid access has delayed final investment decisions.

Private capital will not flow at the required scale into energy transition projects unless the regulatory environment provides sufficient certainty for investors to underwrite long-duration assets. This is as much a policy challenge as a market one, and the speed at which Vietnam resolves outstanding regulatory ambiguities around renewable energy investment will be a significant determinant of how much of the US$270 billion annual target can realistically be mobilised from private sources.

Domestic capital markets must do more of the heavy lifting

One of the less discussed dimensions of Vietnam’s investment gap is the role of domestic capital. The country’s household savings rate is high, and Vietnamese investors have historically channelled a disproportionate share of their wealth into property and gold, asset classes that are familiar and culturally embedded but do not efficiently intermediate capital into productive investment. The development of deeper, more liquid, and more diverse domestic capital markets (such as equity, bond, and alternative investment vehicles) is essential if the savings of Vietnamese households are to be redirected towards the infrastructure, energy, and productive capacity investment that the economy requires.

The growth of Vietnam’s domestic securities market has been significant: daily trading volume reached US$1.2 billion in 2025, and the number of domestic brokerage accounts has grown rapidly. But the bond market, which is typically the vehicle through which long-duration infrastructure assets are financed, remains relatively thin and illiquid by the standards of Vietnam’s peer economies. Corporate bond market development, in particular, suffered a significant setback following several high-profile issuance scandals in 2022 and 2023, and restoring confidence in that market will take sustained regulatory effort and time.

The opportunity framing matters as much as the challenge framing

There is a temptation to read the US$270 billion figure primarily as a problem, an obligation that Vietnam may struggle to meet, with uncomfortable consequences for its growth ambitions if it falls short. That framing is incomplete. From the perspective of global capital allocators, Vietnam’s investment requirements are also among the largest and most clearly defined deployment opportunities in emerging Asia.

Investors who can navigate the regulatory environment, structure deals that align with government priorities, and adopt a sufficiently long time horizon are positioning themselves in a market where capital is both urgently needed and, increasingly, structurally supported by policy. The FTSE reclassification, ongoing capital market reforms, and the explicit recognition in government policy that private capital is necessary, not merely welcome, all point to a market that is progressively lowering the barriers to large-scale institutional investment.

Also Read: 48 PE investors, US$3.96B deployed, and not a single IPO exit in five years. Something is broken.

The gap between US$160 billion today and US$270 billion by 2030 is not a forecast of failure. It is a statement of intent and an invitation. The question is whether the global investment community moves quickly enough and whether Vietnam’s regulatory infrastructure matures fast enough to convert that invitation into deployed capital at the scale the country’s ambitions require. The clock, as the report makes clear, is already running.

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The crypto market dropped 1.11 per cent to US$2.22 trillion over the last 24 hours. Bitcoin is now US$64,439.47; that’s after the first press conference by the new FED chair. Bitcoin led this selling pressure and dictated the broader downward trajectory across all cryptocurrency pairs. The cryptocurrency space currently shares a 63 per cent correlation with the S&P 500 and a 68 per cent correlation with gold. This shared macroeconomic movement defines the current environment and proves that digital assets now operate as a mature macroeconomic asset class.

The current downturn reflects a broader liquidity event rather than a fundamental failure of the underlying technology. Traditional finance and digital assets now move in tandem, reacting to the exact same macroeconomic triggers, employment data, and central bank policies that drive global capital flows. Investors must recognise that crypto no longer exists in a vacuum, and every tick in the bond market sends ripples through the blockchain ecosystem.

Bitcoin experienced a severe flash crash that wiped out over US$25 million in leveraged positions within a single hour. The price dipped below US$64,000 as the Royal Government of Bhutan transferred US$34.5 million in Bitcoin to Binance. This direct selling pressure, combined with technical breakdowns, accelerated the decline and triggered automated margin calls. Bitcoin maintains a 58.24 per cent market dominance, meaning any weakness in the primary asset pulls the entire ecosystem lower and drains liquidity from smaller tokens.

Traders watch the US$64,000 to US$65,000 support zone very closely right now to determine the next major move. If the price holds this level, the market might stabilise and find a local bottom for the week. A break below this threshold will likely trigger further liquidations and push the total market capitalisation down toward the US$2.1 trillion mark, causing significant pain for participants who use excessive leverage.

Also Read: SpaceX’s US$75B IPO will drain crypto liquidity. Here is what happens next

The pain extends far beyond the primary asset, affecting the entire altcoin ecosystem with brutal efficiency. Major tokens, including Cardano, XRP, AAVE, and CRV, fell between two per cent and four per cent, severely underperforming the broader market decline and exhibiting extreme weakness. The CMC Fear and Greed Index currently sits at 22, which indicates extreme fear among participants and a complete lack of buyer confidence.

Traders actively reduce exposure to higher-beta assets in this environment, where participants avoid risk and prefer to hold stablecoins or cash. The decline represents a massive sell-off across the board rather than an isolated incident, and we currently lack rotational support into alternative narratives. I will watch the Altcoin Season Index closely for any signs of recovery or shifting capital flows. A sustained rise above 50 will signal returning risk appetite, but we currently lack that momentum and must remain highly defensive.

The traditional finance world is experiencing severe turbulence, which directly impacts digital asset prices and overall market liquidity. US benchmarks slumped after Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh held rates at 3.50 per cent to 3.75 per cent during his first FOMC meeting. The updated dot plot signals a potential rate hike by year-end, shocking many market participants who expected relief. The US two-year yield jumped 13 basis points to 4.18 per cent, marking the highest level since February 2025 and increasing borrowing costs across the economy.

Nine of the 18 FOMC officials pencilled in a rate hike for 2026, while only one official forecast a cut, highlighting a deeply divided committee. This hawkish stance contrasts sharply with the March summary of economic projections, which anticipated 25 basis points of cuts to support growth. The Fed also revised its 2026 inflation forecasts upward, projecting 3.6 per cent for headline PCE and 3.3 per cent for core PCE, up from previous estimates of 2.7 per cent. They also lowered GDP growth expectations to 2.2 per cent from 2.4 per cent, signalling severe stagflationary risks.

Also Read: Why US$60K is the most important number in crypto right now

This hawkish pivot crushed sectors that remain highly sensitive to interest rates and consumer spending power. The S&P 500 index, which weights all companies equally, fell 1.50 per cent, underperforming the benchmark that weights companies by market capitalisation by 29 basis points, as large tech stocks offered minimal protection. The Discretionary, Real Estate, Staples, and Communications sectors all dropped more than two per cent as investors sought safety and reduced equity exposure.

Commodities also felt the immense pressure from the stronger dollar and shifting geopolitical dynamics. Gold snapped a four-day winning streak and tumbled 1.7 per cent amid elevated real yields and a lack of safe-haven demand. The US Dollar index rose 0.8 per cent to 100.3, tightening global financial conditions. Brent crude slid for a fifth straight session to about US$78 per barrel, hitting its lowest level in three months as the US-Iran peace deal prepares for signing in Geneva.

Meanwhile, retail investors continue to treat the stock market like a casino and ignore macroeconomic warnings. They poured into US stocks at a record pace on the day of the SpaceX initial public offering, surpassing the previous record by 58 per cent. SpaceX itself experienced wild volatility, rising 5.9 per cent in early trade before finishing the session down 4.9 per cent at US$191.82. I have always viewed these speculative financial activities as a form of gambling, albeit one with slightly better odds than traditional casinos.

The immediate trajectory of both traditional and digital markets hinges on clarity from the Federal Reserve and Bitcoin price action over the coming weeks. The current downturn stems primarily from an event Bitcoin drove, and altcoin weakness and caution ahead of the meeting exacerbated the decline. A hold above US$64,000 could lead to consolidation, but failure will test the yearly low at a US$2.1 trillion total market cap. I monitor daily Bitcoin ETF flows and derivatives volume to gauge institutional sentiment accurately and anticipate the next major liquidity shift.

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I’ve sat on both sides of that table.

The founder walks out thinking it went well. The VC was engaged, asked good questions, and said, “Really interesting space.” Nobody said no. The founder goes home and starts thinking about term sheets.

The VC closes their laptop and moves to the next meeting. They’re not being cruel. The deal just didn’t fit.

This happens hundreds of times a year across SEA. And in the impact and climate space, it happens even more, because the distance between a founder’s reality and what a VC can actually underwrite is wider than anyone admits publicly.

Here’s what the VC is actually thinking in that room. Nobody writes this down.

The problem isn’t the mission, it’s the shape

Impact VCs carry a double mandate. Financial return and measurable impact. That sounds like more reason to say yes to a great climate founder. It’s actually more reasons to say no.

The round size has to fit the fund. The stage has to match the thesis. The revenue model has to show a path the LP committee can follow. The impact has to be measurable in a way that satisfies the impact committee. That’s four filters before the founder’s deck gets to page three.

Most climate founders in SEA are building real things solving real problems. Solid waste, grid infrastructure, clean mobility, adaptation tech. The problem is the venture isn’t shaped for the instrument being offered. The VC isn’t rejecting the mission. They’re rejecting the misfit.

Also Read: The VC model isn’t broken, Southeast Asia’s LP ecosystem is

The gap nobody talks about

There is a layer of capital sitting between a climate founder’s current stage and a VC check that almost nobody in SEA is navigating deliberately. Catalytic grants. Development finance. Foundation capital. JETP-linked programs. Blended structures.

These aren’t consolation prizes. For a climate venture at the right stage, they are actually the smarter first move, cheaper, non-dilutive, and designed for exactly the proof points that make a VC say yes six months later.

But founders don’t know this map. And VCs aren’t drawing it for them. It’s not their job.

So the founder keeps pitching equity to people who can’t write that check yet. The VC keeps seeing deals that are one capital layer too early. Both sides leave the room frustrated. Nobody says why.

What actually needs to change

The meeting going well is not the problem. The problem is what happens before the meeting, how the founder structured the business, what proof they built, and what capital they used to build it.

A climate founder who walks into a VC room having already closed a catalytic grant, used it to hit a specific proof point, and can now show traction, that’s a different conversation entirely. That founder is raising equity to scale something proven, not to prove something unproven.

That’s the founder who gets the funding.

The ones who don’t aren’t less talented or less mission-driven. They just never got shown the door they should have walked through first.

That door exists. Most founders walk past it every week. And the VCs watching them do it don’t say a word.

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