RWA Enters a New Phase: Tokenized Stocks Grow 40 Times Over U.S. Treasuries—Where Is On-Chain Finance Turning Next?

Over the past two years, the narrative around tokenizing real-world assets (RWA) has been almost synonymous with “on-chain U.S. Treasuries.” Institutional investors have brought the safest assets in traditional finance onto the blockchain via on-chain exposure, with products such as BlackRock’s BUIDL fund and Ondo’s USDY taking center stage in this space. But since the second quarter of 2026, this landscape has been undergoing significant change.

Based on data from RWA.xyz as of July 9, 2026, the total size of tokenized U.S. Treasuries is about $15.16 billion, having grown only 0.74% over the past 30 days. In sharp contrast, the market value of tokenized stocks is about $443k, growing 28.6% over the same period—an acceleration rate roughly 40 times that of Treasuries. The monthly transfer volume of tokenized stocks surged 87% to $8.76 billion, while the number of holders increased 24.5% to more than 443k.

What’s even more surprising is that the largest single tokenized asset today is not any fund product, but a home equity line of credit (HELOC) token issued by Figure Technologies. As of July 7, its size is about $20.1 billion, having increased by $730 million in three weeks. This figure already exceeds the total amount of all tokenized U.S. Treasuries.

Meanwhile, the total stablecoin market size has stayed near $321B since June 7, seemingly calm on the surface, while undergoing intense rotation behind the scenes. The regulated U.S. dollar stablecoin USDGO grew 54% to $6.12B in three weeks, while Ethena’s synthetic U.S. dollar USDe fell by about 16% over the same period.

Three sets of data point in the same direction: the growth engine behind RWA tokenization is shifting from “on-chain cash management” to “on-chain asset investing.” This article will break down the driving logic and industry impact of this structural shift across three dimensions: tokenized stocks, credit assets, and stablecoins.

From cash to assets: Why is the RWA market shifting toward stocks and credit?

To understand this shift, we first need to look back at why Treasuries were the focus of the previous phase.

From 2023 to 2025, tokenized U.S. Treasuries were virtually synonymous with the RWA track. The reasons were clear: steady yields, extremely low risk, and well-defined institutional demand. Funds such as BlackRock BUIDL and Franklin Templeton BENJI tokenized short-term Treasuries, providing institutions with an “on-chain risk-free rate anchor.” By the end of March 2026, the size of tokenized U.S. Treasuries had surpassed $10 billion.

But the essence of tokenized Treasuries is a “cash management tool”—it directs idle on-chain funds into short-term Treasuries to earn yield, rather than creating new investment exposure. As this demand gradually becomes saturated, growth naturally slows.

Tokenized stocks represent a completely different logic. They do not provide fixed income; instead, they provide access—enabling on-chain users to hold exposure to traditional stocks and ETFs without going through traditional brokerages. It’s a market where demand continues to rise.

A deeper change is the expansion of asset classes. RWA is no longer limited to stocks and bonds. Figure Technologies has brought the traditional process of securitizing loan assets on-chain by recording, financing, and trading home equity line of credit loans on the Provenance blockchain. Since 2018, Provenance’s cumulative transaction volume has exceeded $70 billion. This model suggests that the future of RWA may cover a wider range of asset types, including real estate, private credit, business loans, and structured finance products.

Why is tokenized stocks growing faster?

Tokenized stocks are growing much faster than Treasuries, driven by three structural factors.

First, it breaks the time-and-space limits of traditional stock investing. Traditional stock markets have limited trading hours and long settlement cycles. Tokenized stocks offer around-the-clock trading, global access, and on-chain settlement, and can be combined with DeFi protocols. Users can deposit stock tokens into lending pools, use them as collateral, or incorporate them into yield strategies. On July 1, 2026, Robinhood officially launched the Robinhood Chain mainnet, rolling out tokenized stock products that allow non-U.S. users to trade U.S. stocks and ETFs on-chain 24/7, and to deploy assets into DeFi lending pools. This move marks mainstream financial technology platforms formally bringing tokenized stocks into their core product lines.

Second, stock tokens are closer to user needs. Tokenized Treasuries mainly attract institutional capital, while stocks—especially tech stocks, AI concept stocks, and leading U.S. equities—have stronger market recognition and a larger user base. RWA.xyz shows that the number of holders of tokenized stocks grew 24.5% to more than 443k, with the growth rate exceeding the increase in asset size, indicating that retail participation is expanding. This aligns with listing trends on centralized exchanges in the first half of 2026—tokenized assets’ share of new listings rose from 6.6% in 2025 to 18.8%, while Meme coins fell from a high to 9.9%.

Third, the AI and tech stock boom provides a demand catalyst. In the first half of 2026, ongoing investment in the AI industry and rising valuations for technology companies led investors to seek ways to participate in traditional tech assets on-chain. In a June 2026 report, Binance Research noted that public-stock tokenization is the fastest-growing category among RWA sub-tracks (+422%). On tokenized stock trading volume, Solana has been leading for 50 consecutive weeks, and Backed’s xStocks platform has captured more than 95% of market share.

$2.0 billion HELOC: the overlooked credit-asset giant

Beyond tokenized stocks and Treasuries, the most counterintuitive discovery in RWA data is Figure Technologies’ HELOC token.

A home equity line of credit is a loan collateralized by home value. Figure records these loans on the Provenance blockchain and then completes financing and trading on-chain. As of July 7, 2026, the token’s size is about $20.1 billion—exceeding the total of all tokenized U.S. Treasuries ($15.16 billion), and also more than 10 times the tokenized stock market.

The significance of this scale is that: it is not a retail product for retail users, but an institutional-grade securitization infrastructure. It brings the traditional loan packaging process on-chain, offering investors an entirely new way to allocate credit assets. If all types of tokenized assets are included, the total size of on-chain private credit has surpassed $31 billion, making it the largest single category among non-stablecoin assets.

This case suggests that the true potential of RWA tokenization may not lie in simply copying existing financial products onto the blockchain, but in reconstructing the underlying securitization process with blockchain—faster financing, lower costs, and higher transparency. Through the Provenance blockchain, Figure has increased loan financing speed to 3 to 8 times that of traditional institutions, cumulatively cutting costs by 117 basis points.

Stablecoins look steady, but inside they’re rotating violently

Changes in the stablecoin market are another clue to understand RWA capital flows.

As of mid-July 2026, the total market value of stablecoins has stayed near $443k. But this steady number masks major structural changes. Since the peak in May 2026, the stablecoin market has shrunk by about $10 billion; June alone saw a decrease of $7.7 billion, the largest single-month drop since the 2022 Terra-Luna collapse. USDT fell from about $190 billion to $184 billion, and USDC fell from its March peak of nearly $80 billion to about $73 billion.

Capital is moving from high-yield synthetic U.S. dollars to regulated U.S. dollar stablecoins. Ethena’s USDe is down by about 16%. USDe’s yield comes from perpetual futures funding fees; when markets are range-bound and funding rates compress, its appeal naturally declines. At the same time, the regulated U.S. dollar stablecoin USDGO (issued by Anchorage Digital Bank) grew 54% to $20B in three weeks; Global Dollar (USDG, issued by Paxos) has already surpassed $3.2 billion in circulating supply.

Investors are shifting from chasing high yields toward focusing on reserve transparency, compliant issuance, and U.S. dollar safety. This trend resonates with RWA tokenization’s shift from “cash” to “assets”—both point in the same direction: on-chain finance is moving from speculation-driven to asset-driven.

Will RWA become the core narrative of the next crypto market cycle?

From the perspective of asset-class expansion, RWA has the conditions to become the core narrative of the next market cycle.

In the previous cycle, market hotspots revolved around Meme, GameFi, and NFTs—tracks that, in essence, create new asset classes within the crypto-native ecosystem itself. RWA, stablecoins, and tokenized securities connect the existing scale of traditional finance with the settlement efficiency of blockchain. As of July 10, 2026, the total value of on-chain tokenized assets tracked by RWA.xyz is $33.9 billion, up 3.51% over the past 30 days. Bernstein analysts have characterized 2026 as the first year of a tokenization “super cycle.”

More importantly, traditional financial institutions are accelerating their entry. On July 10, 2026, Circle received a trust bank license from the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), enabling it to directly manage USDC reserves. Swift piloted tokenized cross-border payments with 17 banks. DTCC executives predicted that in 2026 there will be more Treasuries, private markets, and 24/7 infrastructure moving on-chain. These signals suggest that tokenization is moving from crypto-native experiments to an upgrade toward traditional finance infrastructure.

Implications for the crypto market and trading platforms

For trading platforms such as Gate, the structural shift in the RWA track means opportunities and challenges across three dimensions.

Expansion of asset classes creates new listing and trading demand. In the first half of 2026, tokenized assets accounted for 18.8% of new listings on centralized exchanges. As more traditional assets move on-chain, user demand will expand from “trading crypto assets” to “trading tokenized digital financial assets,” including stock tokens, credit tokens, and commodity tokens.

Competition shifts from the number of coins to the ability to connect assets. Future competition won’t be only about who can list more crypto assets, but about who can connect more types of traditional financial assets and provide a compliant, secure, liquid trading environment.

Upgraded infrastructure requirements. Trading, settlement, custody, and compliance requirements for tokenized assets differ from those of traditional crypto assets, requiring more robust infrastructure support. This includes integration with regulated custody providers, cooperation with RWA issuers, and dedicated services for institutional users.

The RWA track is moving from a single narrative focused on “tokenized Treasuries” toward a new stage of symbiosis among stocks, credit, and stablecoins. For industry participants, this is both an opportunity and a moment to redefine the competitive landscape.

FAQ

Q1：What is RWA tokenization?

RWA (Real World Assets) tokenization refers to converting traditional financial assets (such as U.S. Treasuries, stocks, credit, real estate, etc.) into digital tokens using blockchain technology. Tokens represent economic rights to the underlying assets and can be traded and settled on-chain, and combined with DeFi protocols.

Q2：How do tokenized stocks differ from traditional stocks?

Tokenized stocks provide the same price exposure as traditional stocks, but enable 24/7 trading, global access, and on-chain settlement through blockchain. Users can transfer stock tokens from custody, integrate them into DeFi lending, or use them as collateral. However, tokenized stocks typically provide price exposure only and are not the same as directly holding actual stocks.

Q3：What is Figure Technologies’ HELOC token?

HELOC (Home Equity Line of Credit) is a loan collateralized by home value. Figure Technologies records these loans on the Provenance blockchain and completes financing and trading on-chain. As of July 7, 2026, its size is about $20.1 billion, already exceeding the total of all tokenized U.S. Treasuries.

Q4：What are the main current trends in the stablecoin market?

Stablecoin total market value has shrunk by about $10 billion since the May 2026 peak. Capital is moving out of high-yield synthetic U.S. dollars such as Ethena’s USDe and into regulated U.S. dollar stablecoins like USDGO and Global Dollar. Investors are placing more emphasis on reserve transparency, compliant issuance, and U.S. dollar safety.

Q5：What does RWA tokenization mean for crypto trading platforms?

RWA tokenization is expanding the asset categories on trading platforms—from trading crypto assets alone to trading tokenized digital financial assets such as stock tokens and credit tokens. In the future, competition will shift from “number of coins” to “asset connection capability”—who can connect more types of traditional financial assets will be better positioned to win in the next round of competition.