Is this crypto’s ‘tokenization’ era?

The tokenized U.S. Treasury market has grown nearly 500% in the last year.

There’s never a dull moment on the blockchain. Here’s what you need to know this week:

Bitcoin rebounded to $88K before reversing. Also, BTC ETFs saw their longest streak of inflows since January, and the SEC dropped a lawsuit against Ripple.

The market for tokenized U.S. Treasuries hit all-time highs. BlackRock and Fidelity are among the finance giants pursuing onchain funds for “real-world assets.”

Strategy just reached a bitcoin treasury milestone. And more key numbers to know from around the cryptoverse.

$84,610.18

$1,595.25

$1.00

$2.10

$133.25

$1.00

See the latest prices

MARKET BYTES

Crypto markets reverse after early-week rally fades

After an extended period of volatility, crypto markets started the week with their best weekly performance in months — BTC jumped around 8% to $88,800, ETH rebounded more than 9% to $2,100, and a wide range of altcoins, including DOGE, also spiked. Crypto-related stocks, including Strategy and many mining firms, also rebounded sharply on Tuesday.

But by Wednesday morning, the rally had lost momentum as BTC fell below $87,000 and ETH dipped near $2,000.

What’s behind the price swings? Falling consumer sentiment, the White House’s evolving approach to tariffs, Wednesday’s tech-stock declines, and GameStop’s announcement that it plans to acquire bitcoin all seem to be pulling crypto markets in different directions.

Here are three more stories you should know about…

Bitcoin ETF inflows return, but ETH ETFs continue to struggle

After five consecutive weeks of ouflows, U.S.-based spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) finally began growing again, with seven straight days of inflows as of Monday — the longest run of inflows since January. According to CoinShares data, BTC ETFs tallied $724 million in new capital, clawing back some of the roughly $5 billion that left the asset class in recent weeks.

The picture for Ethereum ETFs was less sunny. As of Monday, ETH ETFs saw their longest streak of outflows since they debuted last summer, shedding about $415 million over thirteen straight days of losses.

Euro trip… BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, is launching a bitcoin exchange-traded product in Europe, doubling down on the success of IBIT, its $50-billion U.S. BTC fund.

SEC drops lawsuit against Ripple, signaling new era for crypto regulation

Last week, the crypto payments firm Ripple announced that the SEC had dropped a four-year-old lawsuit against the company. Earlier this year, the SEC also dropped actions it was pursuing against crypto firms including Coinbase, Kraken, OpenSea, and Uniswap — all part of the Biden-era SEC’s “regulation by enforcement” strategy.

As CNBC put it, “The Securities and Exchange Commission’s years-long crusade against the crypto industry appears to be over.” On Friday, the SEC hosted a crypto roundtable that, according to CNBC, signaled “a new approach of regulation through engagement, rather than enforcement.”

Ripple effect… XRP, which Ripple uses as part of its digital payment network, spiked more than 11% to $2.56 on the news, and remained around $2.40 as of Wednesday. Several analysts were bullish about the token’s potential, especially given that Ripple is now considering an IPO.

What might be next for markets?

Even though bitcoin is heading for what looks to be its worst-performing Q1 since 2020, some analysts see signs that this week’s rebound could set up a stronger Q2:

“There is a decent probability that we have passed peak tariff uncertainty,” Nansen’s head of research told the Block, “notably because the administration, especially Treasury Secretary Bessent, is striking a more pragmatic tone around tariffs.”

A wide range of policy moves in Washington could also boost markets — including the SEC’s new posture, plans around a strategic crypto reserve, and stablecoin legislation that the White House expects to take shape by this summer.

New standard… According to Standard Chartered’s main crypto analyst, BTC could be poised to return to $90,000 in the near term and could rise as high as $500,000 by the end of 2028.

ONCHAIN REACTION

Why tokenization has become crypto’s $10 billion-plus killer app

Right alongside some of the splashier crypto themes of the last few months, one corner of the market has been quietly booming: tokenized assets.

The tokenization of real-world assets (or RWAs) — which bridge the gap between digital finance and traditional markets — has quickly grown into a $10 billion-plus industry with the potential to reach $50 billion by the end of the year, according to global investment firm VanEck.

This week, Fidelity, which manages more than $5 trillion in assets, announced a major foray into the sector with plans to create a tokenized U.S. Treasuries fund, similar to products already offered by fellow Wall Street giants BlackRock and Franklin Templeton.

What does it all mean? Here’s what you need to know...

What is tokenization and what are the benefits?

Tokenization is the process of creating digital, blockchain-based tokens to represent pretty much any real-world asset: cash, stocks, bonds, real estate, royalties, art, and much more.

Compared to traditional assets, tokenized versions can typically be traded more quickly, more cheaply, and potentially without intermediaries.

Because blockchains aren’t limited by banking hours, tokenization can allow for 24/7 markets and near-instantaneous trading.
Bringing RWAs onto blockchains can also create new levels of financial transparency, because blockchains are generally open-source and accessible to anyone.
Tokenized assets also potentially gain some of the attributes that make crypto appealing to a wide variety of traders, like fractionalization — which allows users to purchase a small fraction of an asset that would otherwise be unobtainable.

“Among the benefits of tokenization, lowering barriers to entry into otherwise inaccessible markets and improving the liquidity of such markets are the most prominent,” said the Federal Reserve in a report on tokenization.

What kinds of assets are getting tokenized?

Funds from BlackRock (BUIDL) and Franklin Templeton (BENJI) currently hold more than $2 billion in tokenized Treasuries, enabling institutional investors to benefit from the onchain economy via traditional assets.

Aside from U.S. Treasuries, the most common tokenized assets from the world of traditional finance include stablecoins, stocks, corporate bonds, private credit, and commodities.

Paxos, which issues PayPal’s stablecoin, has tokenized more than 6,500 kilograms of gold (worth $646 million).

Tangible, a protocol focused on tokenized real estate, has nearly 200 tokenized properties on its platform worth more than $34 million in total, up 97% in the past month. (As an asset category, real estate may especially benefit from the enhanced liquidity and reduced red tape that blockchains can offer.)

And Plume Network, which is set to launch in the coming weeks, is planning to enable onchain stock trading with tokenized shares from major U.S. companies like Nvidia and Apple — a market that’s expected to grow to $2 billion this year.

The bottom line…

“Tokenization,” according to BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, “is the next generation for markets.” For asset managers, tokenization can streamline processes and significantly cut costs by making cross-border transactions cheap and nearly instantaneous — compared to potentially days of red tape via conventional payment rails.

And for consumers, tokenization can help increase accessibility by leveraging crypto attributes like fractionality, making it possible to buy shares of blue-chip artwork or real estate that would otherwise be out of reach.

As Plume Network cofounder Chris Yin put it, "[tokenization] is sort of foreshadowing what's to come, which is where the line between crypto and the real world begins to blend together.”

Learn more about RWAs

NUMBERS TO KNOW

$234 billion

New all-time-high market capitalization for stablecoins as of Wednesday, March 26, according to data from DefiLlama. This milestone happened in the days following key stablecoin headlines, including The U.S. Senate Banking Committee advancing the GENIUS Act; President Trump supporting U.S. dollar-backed stablecions during a crypto conference speech; and USDC’s market cap reaching all-time highs beyond $60 billion.

506,137 BTC

Total bitcoin holdings of Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy) after the company acquired 6,911 BTC over the last week. The firm’s bitcoin treasury, worth roughly $44 billion as of Wednesday, is the largest of any publicly-traded company, and more than 10-times the size of the second-largest corporate bitcoin position.

73%

Percent of surveyed institutional investors who indicated that their firms currently hold cryptocurrencies other than BTC or ETH, according to new research from Coinbase and EY-Parthenon. The report notes “that most investors hold just one or two altcoins, with Ripple (XRP) and Solana (SOL) being the most common.”