Tokenized real-world assets hit $10B market cap in June 2024, fueled by BlackRock’s Treasury fund and Apollo’s private equity tokenization, while regulators intensify scrutiny of blockchain-based securities.
BlackRock’s BUIDL Treasury fund reached $462M AUM within three months of launch, as JPMorgan completed its first blockchain collateral settlement using tokenized shares with Barclays on 26 June 2024.
Institutional Onchain Momentum Accelerates
The tokenized RWA market crossed $10 billion in June 2024 according to RWA.xyz data, with BlackRock’s BUIDL fund overtaking Franklin Templeton’s BENJI as the largest tokenized Treasury product on 24 June. Apollo Global Management’s collaboration with Figure Technologies aims to tokenize $1 billion in private equity assets, leveraging Provenance Blockchain for instant settlement.
Yield Wars and Regulatory Frontiers
Tokenized Treasuries now offer 5.2% APY versus 4.8% for traditional money-market funds, with MakerDAO generating $185M annual revenue from its $5B RWA collateral pool. SEC Chair Gary Gensler warned in a 25 June speech that ‘many tokenized securities masquerade as innovation while circumventing registration requirements,’ signaling heightened scrutiny following the agency’s recent action against Debt Box.
Payment Giants Expand Blockchain Infrastructure
Visa extended its USDC settlement pilot to Solana this week, processing $10 billion in stablecoin transactions since 2023. Mastercard concurrently launched a tokenized asset settlement system on Polygon, with Citi reporting 80% faster cross-border settlements in trials. Circle’s integration of BUIDL conversions on 25 June created the first institutional-grade liquidity bridge between tokenized Treasuries and stablecoins.
Historical Precedents and Regulatory Lessons
The current RWA expansion mirrors the 2004-2007 securitization boom when mortgage-backed securities grew from $3 trillion to $7 trillion before the global financial crisis. Unlike that opaque market, blockchain’s inherent transparency enables real-time auditing of collateral pools – a feature Moody’s cites as key to BUIDL’s AAA rating. However, SEC enforcement actions against crypto staking products in 2023 demonstrate regulators’ willingness to retroactively challenge novel structures.
The 2017 ICO frenzy provides another cautionary parallel, where $6 billion raised through token sales resulted in 80% of projects failing by 2019. Today’s RWA market differs fundamentally through its focus on income-generating assets with established valuation frameworks, yet persistent questions about jurisdictional arbitrage remain unresolved. As BlackRock CEO Larry Fink noted in April 2024: ‘Tokenization isn’t about creating new assets – it’s about bringing 24/7 liquidity to the $300 trillion market of existing real-world value.’
