Tokenization is creating a new pattern of investing on blockchain networks, with users favouring individual shares, round-the-clock trading and private credit rather than simply reproducing traditional financial products digitally, a report by data analytics platform Dune says.
The total supply of tokenized real-world assets passed $34 billion in 2026, according to Dune, while major categories including cash equivalents and commodities more than doubled over the past year.
Tokenized stocks recorded the fastest growth, rising by more than 2,000% as the number of active holders exceeded one million. The findings point to a financial system operating differently from conventional markets, rather than merely transferring existing products on to a blockchain.
“The way the market is wired is completely different,” Frederik Haga, Dune’s chief executive, said. “The whole underlying architecture of these venues [is] different, and so that creates different trading behavior.”
The expansion has accompanied growing institutional interest in real-world assets on-chain. Asset managers including Franklin Templeton and BlackRock have developed tokenized government money-market and Treasury funds, while Robinhood and Ondo Finance have introduced on-chain versions of stocks and exchange-traded funds to investors outside the United States.
Nasdaq also announced earlier this month a $100 investment in Payward, the parent company of crypto exchange Kraken, to support the development of tokenized stocks. The Securities and Exchange Commission has opened a limited route for compliant US venues to test blockchain-based equity trading.
Individual shares dominate tokenized equities
The clearest difference between traditional and on-chain markets is in equity investment. While passive, index-based products dominate Wall Street and more than 6,000 US-listed exchange-traded funds now outnumber individual stocks, Dune estimates that individual companies account for 81% of tokenized equities held in spot markets.
The value of those individual-stock holdings has increased ninefold over the past year, outpacing tokenized funds and ETFs.
“While a lot of the world’s financial system today has become indices and packaged products,… when people trade on the blockchain, it’s to express themselves more, as opposed to passive investing,” Haga said.
A similar shift is visible in decentralised lending. In traditional finance, US Treasuries are commonly used as loan backing because they are regarded as safe and straightforward to value. On crypto lending platforms, however, tokenized private credit — loans to businesses — is used more frequently.
Dune found that credit assets account for about three-quarters of real-world assets deposited in decentralised lending, while only a small fraction of tokenized Treasuries is used in that way. Haga said the attraction was partly the potential for yield: investors can earn interest on private credit holdings while using those same assets as collateral to borrow and finance other trades.
