RWA reached a new all-time high for assets under management

Real World Assets protocols expanded their value under management by 300% year-on-year. BlackRock became the leader in issuing tokenized securities based on money markets. 

RWA projects increased their value under management by 300% year-on-year. The RWA market extended its gains from May, reaching another all-time high. 

Tokenized securities that use public chains are one of the gradually expanding sectors, led by BlackRock and other financial giants making their forays into crypto. Ondo Finance and Ethena Labs also participate with a significant share of tokenized securities, this time originating from crypto-native projects. 

The value under management in RWA projects climbed to an all-time high of $12.51B, rivaling some of the top DeFi protocols. The accrued value has multiple use cases within the crypto and DeFi ecosystem, multiplying the effect of inflows. 

In June 2024, TVL locked with tokenized securities projects was just around $3.72B, with some outflows linked to the market correction. Tokenized US treasury debt rose from $1.77B in June 2024 to more than $7.1B currently. 

In the past year, BlackRock’s BUIDL token was the main source of tokenized securities with a sufficiently high reputation. The BUIDL token was used in several protocols, serving as collateral for lending and other reserves. 

BUIDL now expanded to 49 holders, spreading within the crypto ecosystem. The supply remains under 500K tokens, created after on-demand issuance from specific known protocols. BUIDL is still not circulating like a regular token, as there are no rules on trading RWA on the open market. 

Based on the latest data, tokenized RWA products are used in lending, securing over $648M in DeFi loans. Currently, RWA is still testing out its use cases and working out a standard. Recently, Coinbase applied with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to offer tokenized stocks and other assets. Other exchanges and DEX offer RWA with no permission and no clear reporting and transparency requirements. 

RWA tokens mostly tap debt

The profile of RWA tokens shows most of the mints are linked to debt instruments for their predictable passive income. Tokenization has not delivered the promised expansion of multiple types of assets or alternative investments, including stocks, real estate, or commodities. 

Currently, tokenized private debt and US T-bills are the main basis of value for issuing tokens. Ethereum remains the busiest chain for RWA transfers and some decentralized activity. 

The one big exception is tokenized gold, where Tether is the monopolist with XAUt. However, most of the DeFi and lending activity is linked to short-term US Government debt. 

RWA tokens are also found in over 206K wallets in 2025, double the number of holders from 2024. A total of 533,606 addresses interacted with RWA tokens in some capacity to date. 

Despite the asset growth, RWA tokens have been sliding for the past year. RWA tokens are valued at a total $36B, with drops over 15% in the past week. The selection of tokens includes leaders like Chainlink (LINK) and Ondo (Ondo), following the crash of the Movement (MOVE) project.

RWA narrative tokens still have on average 28% returns since 2023. The tokens are also in the green for the past six months.

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