Australia could unlock A$24 billion in digital finance gains, is on track for just A$1 billion

Australia is home to just 26 million people, but OKX is betting the country could become one of the most important digital finance markets in the developed world if policymakers move fast enough.

A new report backed by the exchange estimates that Australia could unlock A$24 billion ($17 billion) in annual economic gains from tokenized markets, payments and assets provided lawmakers modernize licensing and market infrastructure rules.

The study by the Digital Finance Cooperative Research Centre argues that digital finance innovation could deliver gains equal to roughly 1% of GDP, driven largely by more efficient foreign exchange, capital markets, and cross-border payments.

Yet on its current regulatory trajectory, Australia is expected to capture just A$1 billion of that potential by 2030, missing out on the vast majority of the so-called digital finance dividend. The gap between A$24 billion and A$1 billion forms the core of the industry’s pitch to the government.

“It’s particularly important in Australia, where productivity is the No. 1 issue that the government is trying to track,” OKX Australia CEO Kate Cooper told CoinDesk in an interview, noting that national productivity growth has been largely flat for the past decade.

Cooper said the idea in the report came from policymakers repeatedly seeking data quantifying crypto’s impact on Australia’s economy.

OKX’s focus on Australia may seem counterintuitive at a time when many exchanges are prioritizing the U.S. — rival exchange Gemini recently left the country, as well as the U.K. and European Union — but Cooper argues the country offers a different kind of advantage.

“We have a broad strategy that is focused on what we call strategic markets, which are markets where there is a competitive advantage to entering the market onshore,” Cooper said.

The strategy hinges on regulation as a moat. In markets like Australia, where licensing standards are strict and compliance costs high, operating onshore can create a defensible position that offshore-only platforms cannot easily replicate.

For OKX, that means investing in local approvals and infrastructure to position itself for institutional flows, particularly as tokenized bonds, stablecoins and digital market infrastructure scale.

In a country with one of the world’s largest pension capital pools, Cooper explained, being regulated and embedded locally is less about retail trading volume and more about long-term access to concentrated capital.

If lawmakers enact appropriate legislation, that capital could help push Australia into the acceleration phase of digital finance adoption.

If not, Australia risks remaining in what Cooper describes as the “death spiral of proof of concepts,” capturing just a fraction of the modeled A$24 billion opportunity while the industry — and its capital — flows offshore.