a16z: Three charts to understand the tokenization stock frenzy

Author: Robert Hackett Source: a16z Translation: Shan Ouba, Jinse Finance

Tokenized stocks (more commonly known as "tokenized securities") are proving just how deeply cryptocurrencies are penetrating Wall Street. These assets are tokens built on a blockchain, backed by traditional stocks such as company equity, ETFs, and index products.

Unlike traditional stocks, tokenized stocks can be self-custodied in digital wallets, transferred without permission, traded 24/7, and seamlessly used as collateral in on-chain finance. In the past two months alone, Coinbase, DTCC, NYSE, and Robinhood have all made moves, some moving transactions on-chain, some forming new joint ventures, and others simply issuing their own blockchains.

This momentum is clearly visible in the data. As of the end of June, the market capitalization of tokenized stocks reached approximately $1.7 billion, compared to only $329 million a year ago, representing a more than fivefold increase. This makes it one of the fastest-growing categories of tokenized assets (sometimes referred to as "real-world assets"). Figure 1: Market Capitalization Growth Curve of Tokenized Stocks How much of this growth comes from new issuances, and how much from the price increase of the underlying stocks? This question isn't so easy to answer. Stablecoins are different—one token corresponds to one dollar, and the circulating supply directly reflects demand. But tokenized stocks fluctuate with the underlying stocks, and market capitalization cannot be cleanly separated into the effects of "newly minted tokens" and "revaluation of existing tokens." However, the evidence points to the issuance side. Currently, over half of the market capitalization is tied up in assets that weren't even on-chain a year ago. And most of the remaining balance came in mid-year—by then, the current price surge of the underlying stocks had already ended.

While the tokenized stock market is young, its internal structure has changed dramatically in the past year:

Figure 2: Changes in Market Composition

Previously, crypto-related products dominated this market. However, by market capitalization, its share has fallen from 79% a year ago to 21% in June.

The top spot has been relinquished to the "Others" category—a long tail of hundreds of niche listed companies, now accounting for 35% of the market, up from only 15% a year ago. The rest of the market is also climbing. Mega-cap tech stocks (tech companies with a market capitalization of approximately $100 billion or more) now account for 10.6% by market capitalization, up from only 0.6% a year ago. During the same period, ETFs and index products rose from 4.5% to 17.3%. The most dramatic increase, unsurprisingly, is in the AI ​​and chip category. In June 2025, it was less than $1 million—representing only 0.3% of the market; a year later, that figure has reached 15.5%. Transfer activity is also heating up. In June, the monthly transaction volume of tokenized stocks reached $9.22 billion, compared to only $53 million in June last year—an increase of more than 170 times. This metric tracks all on-chain fund flows: transactions, transfers between wallets, and collateral deposited into DeFi protocols. Figure 3: Monthly Transfer Volume. The foundation of the institution is being laid. The institutional foundation is being built piece by piece. In the past month alone, DTCC has completed its first live trading of tokenized US Treasury bonds and stocks on Digital Asset's Canton Network. (A wider rollout of tokenization services is planned for October, giving Wall Street a direct entry point onto the blockchain—and DTC holds approximately $114 trillion in assets.) Earlier this month, Robinhood launched its public blockchain, bringing traditional markets, crypto assets, and real-world assets into a single open network. On June 22, the NYSE's parent company announced a joint venture with OKX to offer users tokenized NYSE-listed stocks, pending regulatory approval. A week earlier, on June 16, Coinbase announced it would offer non-US users fully backed tokenized US stocks with dividends, full shareholder rights, and 24/7 trading. A few days ago, Binance also launched its own version. Compared to the traditional stock market, the market for tokenized stocks is still small—the latter's monthly trading volume is in the "trillions of dollars." But the trend is clear: more and more issuers and platforms are launching tokenized stocks, and this category is growing.