by Jake ClaverQuick answer: I joined Mike Langford on the Modern Financial Advisor podcast to talk about how financial advisors should handle digital assets for their clients. The conversation was not about picking winners. It covered the practical questions advisors actually face: what to do with clients who already hold crypto, how institutional custody works, where regulation is heading, and how to have an informed conversation instead of dismissing the topic. The full episode is linked below; this post explains what it covered.
Updated 07/17/2026. By Jake Claver. Educational content, not investment advice.
Most digital-asset commentary aimed at advisors goes to one of two extremes: it oversells the technology, or it dismisses the whole space. Neither is much help if you are responsible for real client portfolios. The more useful conversation is about market structure, custody and regulation, and that is the ground Mike and I tried to cover.
What Mike and I talked about
The episode, published by Mike Langford’s finservMarketing, works through several connected themes for advisors weighing digital assets. Per the episode page, the conversation covered:
- How advisors can integrate digital-asset management into their services.
- “Digital lottery winners”: clients who built substantial wealth through crypto and now want professional guidance.
- Institutional custody, including how assets are held and insured.
- Client risk awareness, since many holders do not fully understand the hazards.
- The regulatory landscape and how coming rules could shape the market.
- Generational differences, with younger clients showing more interest.
- How blockchain could reshape future financial products.
Why advisors cannot sit this out
The practical driver is simple: clients are already asking. Some of them hold meaningful crypto positions, whether the advisor is ready for the question or not. An advisor who cannot have a grounded conversation about custody, risk and taxes on those holdings is not protecting the client, and the interest skews younger, so the question is not going away. The value here is not in forecasting prices. It is in understanding the infrastructure well enough to give a client a straight answer.
Custody is the real question
For advisors, the hardest and most important part is custody: who holds the asset, how it is secured, and what protections exist if something goes wrong. That is very different from buying a token on an app. Regulated custody arrangements and the rules around them are evolving, and the bank-charter and custody side is overseen in part by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, whose guidance and interpretive letters are worth tracking. Custody is where the advice conversation gets real, because it determines what actually belongs to the client.
Regulation and where to look
Digital-asset regulation in the U.S. is split across several agencies and still developing, so it pays to read primary sources rather than headlines. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission maintains a digital assets resource hub with customer advisories and educational primers, and it warns plainly that the digital-asset marketplace is largely unregulated and that fraud is a significant risk. On the tax side, the IRS treats digital assets as property, and its digital assets guidance is the starting point for reporting questions clients will inevitably raise.
How to actually use this
If you are an advisor, the takeaway is not to become a trader. It is to understand the space well enough to guide clients who are already in it: where the asset is held, what the risks are, and how it fits (or does not) in a broader plan. If you are an investor, the same logic runs in reverse. Understand what you are holding and why before you decide how much of it belongs in your plan.
Why this matters
Digital assets have moved from a fringe topic to something advisors get asked about in normal client meetings. The advisors who do well with it will be the ones who treat it as part of a wealth strategy, with real attention to custody, risk and tax, rather than a speculative side bet or a subject to avoid. That was the point of the conversation with Mike, and it is why the episode is worth a listen if this is anywhere on your radar this year.
Thanks to Mike Langford for having me on. You can find the full episode of the Modern Financial Advisor podcast wherever you listen, and you can connect with Mike Langford on LinkedIn.
Common questions
What is this Modern Financial Advisor episode about?
It is a conversation between Jake Claver and host Mike Langford about how financial advisors should approach digital assets for clients, covering integration into advisory services, institutional custody, client risk awareness, the regulatory landscape and generational differences in interest.
Should financial advisors manage digital assets for clients?
The episode argues that advisors increasingly need to be able to have an informed conversation about digital assets, because clients are already asking and some already hold them. The focus is on understanding custody, risk and regulation rather than picking winners. This is educational context, not a recommendation.
What are “digital lottery winners”?
It is the term used in the conversation for clients who built substantial wealth through cryptocurrency investments and now seek professional guidance on how to manage, protect and plan around those holdings.
Where can advisors learn the rules for digital assets?
Primary regulators are a good starting point. The CFTC maintains a digital assets resource hub with advisories and primers, and the IRS publishes guidance treating digital assets as property for tax purposes. Custody and bank-charter questions fall in part under the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.
Where can I listen to the full episode?
The full episode of the Modern Financial Advisor podcast is available wherever you listen to podcasts, and the episode page is linked above. The embedded video on this page also plays the conversation.
This content is educational only. It is not tax, legal, or investment advice. Check primary sources and speak with a qualified professional before making financial decisions.
