Professional investor interest in crypto hasn't been deterred by the bear market in cryptocurrencies and an uncertain regulatory environment, a survey by Laser Digital, Nomura’s digital assets subsidiary, shows.

As many as 96% of the surveyed investors working for pension funds, wealth managers, family offices, hedge funds and investment funds see digital assets as representing an investment diversification opportunity alongside traditional asset classes such as fixed income, cash, equities and commodities, the survey found. They said they were prepared to stash as much as 5% of their investments in digital assets.

Professional investors collectively manage $4.95 trillion in assets. Laser Digital polled 303 of them for the survey. Participants were interviewed online during April, and came from most major financial markets across the world.

“Our comprehensive study reveals that the majority of institutional investors surveyed saw a clear role for digital assets in the investment management landscape, and the benefits they can bring, such as greater diversification of portfolios,” CEO Jez Mohideen said in a release.

Some 82% of the investors had a positive outlook on bitcoin and ether, and 88% said they or their clients were considering investing in digital assets. This enthusiasm for digital assets, however, doesn’t mean they are doubling down on memecoins such as PEPE or DOGE, rather they prefer regulated products as such as exchange-traded funds (ETFs), the survey found.

Around 90% of those surveyed said that it is important to have the backing of a large traditional financial institution for any digital asset fund or investment vehicle before they or their clients would consider putting money into it – a potentially bullish sign for bitcoin ETF proposals such as BlackRock’s.