RWA: A World on a Public Ledger of Real Assets

This month, centralized institutions and decentralized public chain projects and protocols such as BlackRock, Mantra Chain, Ondo, Alchemy Pay, Yala, and Ant Group have all made various advances and attempts in the RWA track regarding different types of assets and protocol infrastructure.

Now, the RWA track has reached a scale of 36.5 billion USD, with an industry growth rate of about 60% year-on-year, involving major areas such as private credit, US Treasury bonds, commodities, real estate, and stock securities, while the main direction of RWA in Hong Kong focuses on new energy assets.

Although RWA still faces many dilemmas and obstacles, as well as compliance implementation and global liquidity issues that need to be resolved, the involvement of traditional financial giants and the accelerated attempts by governments around the world make it possible for RWA to truly change the hollowing out and scaling issues of blockchain finance.

The value capture problem faced by the traditional blockchain world is precisely complemented by RWA as a blockchain financial derivative of the traditional asset world. Therefore, we believe that RWA is an important bridge for the cryptoization of traditional finance and the traditionalization of cryptocurrencies.

In the world of "The Three-Body Problem," Luo Ji uses his own life as a trigger mechanism, deploying nuclear bombs in the solar orbit, constructing a deterrent system against the Trisolaran civilization using the dark forest theory.

In the human world, he is the sword bearer of Earth.

The "dark forest" is also a nickname for blockchain among most insiders, which is the inherent "original sin" of its decentralized nature.

For some special fields, RWA may serve as the sword bearer of this parallel world.

The development of RWA is in full swing, with the true goal of RWA being to seamlessly link traditional finance and decentralized finance, reshaping traditional finance while bringing the opportunities contained in the real world onto the chain, rather than being a pile of private protocols on public chains. At the same time, we look forward to RWA providing us with a global borderless asset investment method and financial expression. We can imagine being able to buy Nasdaq stocks during the day in Hong Kong, deposit money into the Savings Bank of the Russian Federation in the early morning, and the next day invest in real estate in Dubai with hundreds of shareholders around the world whose names we do not know.

Yes, we believe that RWA can construct a world on a public ledger of real assets! A greater borderless world!

I. Recent Market Dynamics and Key Events

Market-Related Dynamics

1. Market Size Trend

As of April 21, 2025, the total market capitalization of RWA has reached 36.5 billion USD, growing by 0.7% in the past 24 hours, indicating sustained investor interest. The number of RWA-related crypto tokens has exceeded 185, with a total market capitalization of over 10.62 billion USD (March 2025 data), a year-on-year increase of 61% from the previous month.

Traditional financial giants such as BlackRock and Fidelity have begun to pay attention to the RWA field and are exploring the possibility of asset tokenization through blockchain technology.

Large fund management company BlackRock is seeking regulatory approval for the tokenization of its bonds and stocks, while JPMorgan has launched an internal tokenization platform and is actively exploring RWA opportunities. The rising market interest signals further growth, with the sector expected to surpass one trillion in scale over the next five years.

2. Regulatory Compliance Progress

Projects like Mantra Chain have obtained virtual asset service provider (VASP) licenses from the Dubai Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (VARA), marking positive progress in regulatory compliance for RWA projects, making Mantra Chain the first DeFi platform to receive this license.

Mantra is a Layer-1 blockchain built specifically for RWA, allowing ecosystem participants to build permissioned applications in a permissionless environment.

This dual model enables regulators to maintain oversight while allowing developers, institutions, and retail investors to leverage DeFi. Platforms adopting this approach will have unique advantages, meeting global compliance requirements without stifling innovation.

Mantra Chain allows ecosystem participants to develop and utilize time-shared risk-weighted assets (RWA).

Recently, Mantra Chain partnered with renowned real estate developer Damac, which has a diversified portfolio, aiming to tokenize assets worth at least 1 billion USD in its portfolio and use these assets for investment through time-sharing ownership.

3. Stellar Blockchain Cooperation Expansion

The Stellar blockchain announced partnerships with Paxos, Ondo, Etherfuse, and SG Forge, a subsidiary of Société Générale.

Lauren Thorbjornsen, COO of the Stellar Development Foundation (SDF), stated that the Stellar blockchain aims to bring 3 billion USD of real-world assets on-chain by the end of 2025, which means a tenfold increase from the 290 million USD RWA scale on the Stellar chain by the end of December 2024.

4. Alchemy Pay Products to Integrate RWAs

On April 1, crypto payment company Alchemy Pay announced that its products would integrate real-world assets (RWAs), bringing high-quality traditional financial assets such as US Treasury bonds and blue-chip stocks into the crypto ecosystem through partnerships with mainstream RWA providers, supporting users in multiple regions to purchase with fiat currency.

Alchemy Pay stated that this business aims to build a compliant channel connecting traditional finance and decentralized finance, providing users with diverse investment options and lowering the participation threshold for global users.

5. Yala RealYield Platform Launch

On April 5, Bitcoin liquidity protocol Yala officially launched its innovative product --- Yala RealYield, the first structured yield market platform based on Bitcoin that integrates real-world assets (RWA), aiming to provide users with highly flexible investment autonomy by aggregating diverse RWA providers.

The RealYield platform hopes to allocate BTC liquidity to tokenized high-yielding RWAs (such as US Treasury bonds, private credit, corporate bonds, and real estate mortgage assets), providing Bitcoin holders with institutional-grade stable income channels.

Users can freely choose and combine various yield-bearing assets while ensuring that all assets are fully on-chain.

6. RWA REAL UP Dubai Summit 2025 to be Held in Dubai

On April 30, the RWA REAL UP Dubai Summit 2025, led by Ant Group and joined by several Web3.0 partners including Solana, Sui, ZKsync, Pharos, ChainIDE, Chainlink, ZAN, and AAVE, will meet in Dubai.

Technical Innovation Dynamics Tracking

1. Quant Network Launches Overledger, an interoperable blockchain operating system that supports multi-chain applications, enhancing the liquidity of RWA across different blockchains. The multi-chain approach enables RWA assets to achieve liquidity and interoperability between different assets, significantly stimulating the issuance of RWA in multi-chain formats.

2. Securitize Launches sToken Vault Feature, enhancing the liquidity and composability of RWA in collaboration with Elixir's "deUSD RWA Institutional Program."

The sToken Vault launched by Securitize is an innovative feature based on ERC-4626 vault technology, primarily used to enhance the liquidity and composability of real-world assets (RWA) in decentralized finance (DeFi).

Core Function: Allows institutional investors to hold RWA issued by Securitize while obtaining liquidity in the form of deUSD (decentralized USD token) in DeFi and continuing to earn returns from the underlying assets.

Cooperation Model: This feature is provided through collaboration with Elixir's "deUSD RWA Institutional Program," aiming to connect traditional finance (TradFi) with DeFi.

Currently supports BlackRock's BUIDL token and other assets, such as Hamilton Lane's SCOPE, with plans for future expansion.

Project Financing Related Dynamics

1. Plume raised 20 million USD to build a financial ecosystem for real-world assets.

2. Tether announced an investment in Quantoz, planning to launch a stablecoin compliant with MiCAR regulatory standards and expand its tokenization capabilities through Hadron by Tether Tech.

Hong Kong and China's RWA Development Events

1. Conflux Network Partners with Ant Digital Technologies

Conflux Network has partnered with Ant Digital Technologies to promote the growth of RWA in Hong Kong. The two parties jointly participated in China's first renewable energy battery exchange RWA project, located in Hong Kong, utilizing blockchain technology to build a secure, transparent, and compliant digital infrastructure.

2. Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) Launches "Digital Bond Grant Scheme"

The "Digital Bond Grant Scheme" aims to encourage the adoption of tokenization technology in the capital markets.

Additionally, the HKMA has initiated the "Project Ensemble" sandbox project to support institutions in experimenting with tokenization applications, including traditional securities and RWA.

3. Web3 Festival 2025 Held in Hong Kong

At this year's Web3 conference, RWA tokenization became a focal topic.

During the conference, discussions were held regarding the HKMA's "Project Ensemble" initiative, which aims to explore innovative market infrastructure to support settlements using tokenized currencies and identify practical application cases domestically and cross-border.

A stable regulatory environment and diverse product offerings (including virtual assets and tokenized RWA) have attracted a large number of investors. However, due to strict requirements, retail investor participation remains limited.

4. China Pacific Insurance (CPIC) Tokenization Fund

China Pacific Insurance (CPIC) Investment Management Company has launched a tokenized USD money market fund (eStable Money Market Fund, MMF) on HashKey Chain.

The fund raised 100 million USD on its first day, focusing on short-term fixed-income assets and money market instruments denominated in USD. The fund is only available to professional and institutional investors, with the tokenization issuance platform being PAC, and fund management services provided by Standard Chartered Bank.

CPIC plans to continue using a compliance-driven blockchain platform to tokenize more traditional assets, indicating that China's exploration in the RWA field is ongoing.

II. Industry Observations and Reflections

Current Major Dilemmas in RWA Industry Development

(1) Regulatory Uncertainty

There are significant differences in the laws and regulations regarding Web3 technology and asset tokenization across different countries and regions, leading to a lack of a unified regulatory framework. This not only affects the global promotion of RWA but may also increase compliance costs. Large institutions tend to invest in fiat currencies rather than on-chain assets due to regulatory uncertainty.

European and American countries focus on compliance thresholds, while regions like Asia and the Middle East attract projects through experimental policies, but compliance thresholds remain high. Therefore, the current state of RWA protocols is that they can exist on public chains but must be supplemented by various compliance modules to fit the regulatory framework. These compliance protocols cannot directly interact with traditional DeFi protocols, and due to differences in jurisdictions, a protocol compliant with Hong Kong's regulatory framework cannot interact with compliance protocols in other regions. From the current situation, RWA protocols do not possess sufficient accessibility and are extremely lacking in interoperability, resembling "islands" and deviating from the ideal form.

By 2025, some regions like Dubai have begun to attempt regulatory frameworks (e.g., Mantra Chain obtaining VASP licenses), but global consistency will still take time.

Currently, different countries and regions adopt different regulatory frameworks, making it difficult for RWA to circulate globally.

A description and summary of the regulatory frameworks of different countries and regions are attached at the end of the article.

(2) Adoption Barriers

RWA needs a broader user base (including users of different ages and backgrounds) to accept and use it. This includes using cryptocurrencies as a payment method and overcoming the learning curve of new technologies. Currently, the participants and promoters of RWA are mainly institutions, with large institutions driving implementation in both the US and Hong Kong. The industry standards have not yet been established, leading to many retail investors not participating, and ordinary investors' understanding of RWA is still insufficient.

(3) Sustainability and Volatility

The tokenization of RWA may lead to excessive speculation, causing originally stable assets (such as real estate or bonds) to experience unreasonable price fluctuations, which may lead to market instability and affect the confidence of long-term investors.

(4) Technical Challenges

Vulnerabilities in smart contracts and scalability issues of blockchain platforms may affect the security and reliability of RWA. For example, processing a large number of RWA transactions requires efficient infrastructure, and existing technologies may not fully meet the demand. Technical risks may lead to asset security issues, undermining investor trust. Quant Network and DECO are developing privacy protection and scalability solutions, but time is still needed for validation.

(5) Liquidity Issues

Certain RWAs (especially less liquid assets, such as real estate or artworks) may still face liquidity shortages after tokenization, especially in unfavorable market conditions. Particularly in Hong Kong and China, RWA tokenization primarily involves institutional participation, and after the initial financing, liquidity is often lost.

Although standardized assets like US Treasury bonds provide a certain starting point for RWA, their on-chain implementation is more about technical packaging and has not released structural value. The key for RWA in the future lies in activating "silent assets" that have long been outside the traditional financial system, are difficult to value, and lack liquidity, achieving their value expression and free circulation through on-chain implementation, creating new market momentum. This will make RWA a window of opportunity for funds willing to take risks, attracting more types of funds onto the chain and achieving a dual qualitative change from the "asset side" to the "fund side."

(6) Investor Confidence

Building investor trust is key to the development of RWA, but insufficient transparency, security, and regulatory compliance may undermine confidence.

DePINone Labs Observations and Reflections

(1) Centralized Pre-Chain Regulation and Decentralized Post-Chain Circulation are the ultimate expressions of RWA.

Taking Hong Kong as an example, a three-tier collaborative mechanism has now been established between the mainland, Hong Kong, and Singapore.

The first layer is the domestic rights confirmation layer, where data is processed and standardized on domestic data asset trading platforms, completing asset preparation through sandbox mechanisms to ensure core data rights confirmation and other operations domestically.

The second layer is the offshore issuance layer, where licensed institutions in Hong Kong package processed data assets into compliant fund products, relying on License No. 9 to complete private placements.

The third layer is the global circulation layer, where Singapore leverages the advantages of the RMO license to undertake secondary market circulation, achieving compliant cross-border circulation through the China-Singapore international data channel.

The innovative value of this structure is reflected in three dimensions: first, the domestic link strictly adheres to data security bottom lines, avoiding regulatory risks from Document No. 38; second, Hong Kong leverages the professional advantages of licensed institutions, focusing on primary market issuance; third, Singapore opens up the secondary retail market, activating global capital participation.

(2) Activating the Secondary Market Vitality of RWA is the beginning of the RWA industry's takeoff.

Currently, RWA faces the phenomenon of "assets going online and then falling silent" in the primary market. Given that various compliance systems and regulatory frameworks have not been implemented, the liquidity of the secondary market is difficult to release, suppressing the market vitality of RWA.

To this end, we believe that a distributed digital identity (DID) system will form an important strategic watershed.

For example, in BlackRock's research, BlackRock clearly positions DID as the infrastructure for inclusive finance in public documents, attempting to break down barriers between institutional and retail markets through a verifiable credit system.

The development of RWA should not be limited to the professional investor market; building underlying capabilities such as digital identity authentication and on-chain settlement will be the most important infrastructure condition for introducing liquidity into the secondary market.

(3) RWA can both tokenize traditional finance and traditionalize cryptocurrencies.

The two are complementary, not contradictory.

Traditional assets rushing to blockchain are about value release and on-chain liquidity;

While cryptocurrencies rushing to traditional finance are about building niches for currency and capturing value, no longer relying on previously unsupported memecoins.

RWA can truly realize the process of turning bad money into good money for cryptocurrencies, making the crypto world genuinely value-supported, rather than a mirage built between decentralized dreams.

Appendix: Overview of Global Major Jurisdictions' Regulatory Frameworks for RWA as of April 2025

🇺🇸 United States

Regulatory Agencies: SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission), CFTC (Commodity Futures Trading Commission)

Core Regulations:

• Security Tokens: Must pass the Howey Test to determine if they are securities, subject to registration or exemption clauses of the Securities Act of 1933 (e.g., Reg D, Reg A+).
• Commodity Tokens: Regulated by the CFTC, with Bitcoin, Ethereum, etc., explicitly classified as commodities.

Key Measures:

• KYC/AML: BlackRock's BUIDL fund is open only to qualified investors (net worth ≥ 1 million USD), requiring mandatory on-chain identity verification (e.g., Circle Verite).
• Expanded Securities Recognition: Any RWA involving dividends may be recognized as securities. For example: SEC's penalties against the tokenized real estate platform Securitize (unregistered securities issuance in 2024).

🇭🇰 Hong Kong

Regulatory Agencies: HKMA (Hong Kong Monetary Authority), SFC (Securities and Futures Commission)

Core Framework:

• The Securities and Futures Ordinance includes securities tokens in regulation, requiring compliance with investor suitability, information disclosure, and anti-money laundering requirements.
• Non-security tokens (e.g., tokenized commodities) are subject to the Anti-Money Laundering Ordinance.

Key Measures:

• Ensemble Sandbox Program: Testing dual-currency settlement for tokenized bonds (HKD/offshore RMB), cross-border collateral for real estate (in cooperation with the Bank of Thailand), with participating institutions including HSBC, Standard Chartered, Ant Chain, etc.;
• Stablecoin Gate Policy: Only allows the use of stablecoins recognized by the HKMA (e.g., HKDG, CNHT), prohibiting unregistered coins like USDT.

🇪🇺 European Union

Regulatory Agency: ESMA (European Securities and Markets Authority)

Core Regulations:

• MiCA (Markets in Crypto-Assets): Effective in 2025, requiring RWA issuers to establish EU entities, submit white papers, and undergo audits.
• Token Classification: Asset-referenced tokens (ARTs), electronic money tokens (EMTs), and other crypto assets.

Key Measures:

• Liquidity Restrictions: Secondary market trading requires licensing, and DeFi platforms may be defined as "Virtual Asset Service Providers" (VASP).
• Compliance Shortcuts: Luxembourg fund structures (e.g., Tokeny gold tokens) become low-cost issuance channels, with compliance costs for small RWA platforms expected to increase by 200%.

🇦🇪 Dubai

Regulatory Agency: DFSA (Dubai Financial Services Authority)

Core Framework:

• Tokenization Sandbox (launched in March 2025): Divided into two phases (intent application, ITL testing group), allowing testing of security tokens (stocks, bonds) and derivative tokens.
• Compliance Path: Exemptions from certain capital and risk control requirements, with formal license applications possible after a testing period of 6-12 months.

Advantages: Equivalent to EU regulations, supporting distributed ledger technology (DLT) applications, reducing financing costs.

🇸🇬 Singapore

• Securities tokens are included in the Securities and Futures Act, subject to exemption clauses (small issuances ≤ 5 million SGD, private placements ≤ 50 people).
• Functional tokens must comply with anti-money laundering regulations, with MAS (Monetary Authority of Singapore) promoting pilot projects through sandboxes.

🇦🇺 Australia

• ASIC (Australian Securities and Investments Commission) classifies RWA tokens that confer rights to income as financial products, requiring a financial services license (AFSL) and risk disclosure.

Special Statement: All articles by DePINone Labs are for informational and educational purposes only and do not constitute any investment advice.

This report is produced by DePINone Labs; please contact us for reprints.