Brevan Howard Asset Management is targeting "disproportionate returns" from digital assets, having predicted a boom in the space similar to that seen with the internet over the past 20 years, according to a report from Bloomberg.

The report quotes Gautam Sharma, chief executive officer of the digital investment unit of the hedge fund firm, as saying that while the digital assets sector still faces many challenges, blockchain and crypto are transformational technologies whose full potential has yet to be tapped.

Speaking at the FERI hedge funds conference in Bad Homburg near Frankfurt on Thursday, Sharma said: “We truly believe that this is a very disruptive technology and it can unlock value in many ways. And we are here to enable our institutional investors to find ways to get access to this space.”

Brevan Howard already bets a small part of its flagship hedge fund’s capital on digital assets, while co-founder Alan Howard has also invested his personal money into cryptocurrencies and companies involved in the digital assets sector.