Tokenized Real-World Assets Statistics 2026: Market Size, Growth & Key Data

Tokenized real-world assets, often called RWAs, are digital tokens on a blockchain that stand for an asset held outside the chain. That asset can be a US Treasury bill, a private loan, a bar of gold or a share in a building.

The market has moved from small tests to a sector tracked in the tens of billions of dollars. This article reviews the latest statistics from five public sources: MetaMask, Britannica, Ethereum.org, InvestaX and Learnsignal.

The figures come from different dates and data trackers, so they do not always match. Each number below is labeled with its period so readers can compare them with care.

How Big Is the Tokenized Asset Market?

As of mid-September 2026, tracked data shows about $38.8 billion in tokens distributed on-chain. These tokens represent underlying assets worth around $365 billion, according to Learnsignal. If stablecoins are removed, the underlying value is about $305 billion.

The two numbers measure different things. The $38.8 billion figure counts tokens that investors actually hold on-chain. The larger figure counts the value of the assets those tokens are linked to.

An earlier snapshot gives context. A 2025 academic study on arXiv, cited by InvestaX, looked at more than $25 billion in tokenized RWAs brought on-chain. Because the study and the tracker use different methods, the figures are not a direct like-for-like comparison.

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Large traditional firms are behind much of this activity. Learnsignal names BlackRock, Franklin Templeton, Apollo, Hamilton Lane and WisdomTree as institutions running live tokenized products. Franklin Templeton manages about $1.5 trillion, and its CEO Jenny Johnson has described tokenized assets as the biggest opportunity in finance.

Britannica lists 15 types of assets that could be tokenized in theory. They range from real estate and commodities to ships, cell towers and wine casks. In practice, today’s market is much narrower, as the next section shows.

A token can also mirror an asset instead of giving ownership of it. Britannica compares this to an ETF that tracks a stock or commodity index. Mirror structures are used when direct tokenization is impractical or legally limited.

Tokenized Assets by Category

Learnsignal’s September 2026 data shows the market is concentrated in a few categories. Tokenized US Treasuries are the largest at around $15.7 billion, or roughly 40% of the market. Private credit follows at around $8 billion.

Tokenized real estate is often named as a leading use case in industry talk. The data tells a different story. It stands at about $226 million, which is less than 1% of the tracked market.

If these categories share the same $38.8 billion base, about $14.9 billion sits in other categories. The source does not list them one by one. Other categories named in the sources include commodities, institutional funds and tokenized stocks.

Treasuries are about 70 times the size of real estate in this data. Put another way, for every dollar in tokenized real estate there are about $69 in tokenized Treasuries.

Learnsignal explains the pattern in simple terms. Tokenization is mostly an infrastructure and distribution tool added on top of familiar assets. A tokenized Treasury fund still holds Treasury bills, and a tokenized private credit product still holds loan receivables.

What changes is the record-keeping layer. Transfers can settle in minutes rather than days. Tokens can also be used as collateral in other on-chain transactions without a separate custody handoff.

MetaMask makes a related point about what a token stands for. Holding a token does not always mean owning the asset directly. It may be a stake in an SPV, a debt claim from the issuer or a right to payments.

Tokenized Treasuries and Top Funds

Tokenized Treasuries work as the blockchain version of a money market fund. InvestaX describes them as a consistent part of the RWA landscape. The rwa.xyz tracker reported more than $9 billion in tokenized Treasury value in November 2025.

Two products lead the group. BlackRock’s BUIDL fund holds about $2.7 billion, and Circle’s USYC holds about $2.6 billion, as of September 2026. Both hold short-term government securities and issue tokens that represent a claim on that pool.

BUIDL has grown over time. InvestaX reported over $2.3 billion in December 2025. Based on the rounded figures, that is a rise of roughly $0.4 billion, or about 17%.

Tokenized fund exposure more broadly stood at about $2.95 billion in November 2025, per rwa.xyz. Examples include JAAA, which tracks the Janus Henderson AAA CLO ETF, and USCC from Superstate. Franklin Templeton also runs a tokenized money market fund under Singapore’s VCC framework.

Yield reaches holders in different ways, according to MetaMask. Rebasing tokens, such as Ondo’s rOUSG, hold a price near $1 and add more tokens to a wallet as interest builds. Accruing tokens, such as OUSG, keep the balance steady while the price rises, for example from $100 to $105.

InvestaX also points to 2023 as a turning point. After the DeFi meltdown of 2022 and 2023 left crypto holders with few yield options, the first tokenized T-bills paid high yields. Holders of stablecoins such as USDC began buying them, and the RWA label spread.

MetaMask adds a comparison with traditional buying. A broker records Treasury ownership in its own systems. A tokenized Treasury records ownership on a public blockchain, which can allow transfers at any hour.

InvestaX lists four potential benefits of tokenized products. These are broader entry points, streamlined workflows, more predictable settlement and clearer visibility across the asset lifecycle. The source calls them potential gains that tend to show more as asset volumes grow.

Private Credit Statistics

Private credit has been the largest category in some data sets. According to rwa.xyz in November 2025, active on-chain private credit exceeded $18.91 billion. Cumulative originations reached $33.66 billion.

Active loans were therefore about 56% of all credit originated. The source does not say what happened to the remaining loans.

Issuers such as Maple, Centrifuge and Goldfinch typically package senior secured loans, small business financing and receivables into tokens. Borrowers often pay yields in the 8% to 12% range, based on InvestaX.

Learnsignal reports a lower figure, around $8 billion in tokenized private credit in September 2026. The two sources use different trackers and dates, and neither explains the gap. The numbers should be read as separate measures, not as proof of a rise or a fall.

Debt products also appear outside the loan platforms. Mikro Kapital’s ALTERNATIVE eNote is a tokenized microfinance debt instrument offered to institutional investors who want fixed-coupon exposure, according to InvestaX.

Debt tokens carry risks that are covered later in this article. Legal rights, custody and redemption terms vary by product.

Commodities and Real Estate Statistics

Tokenized commodities passed $3.5 billion in November 2025, according to rwa.xyz data cited by InvestaX. Gold dominates. The PAXG and XAUT tokens together hold more than $2.9 billion, which is over 80% of commodity token activity.

Ethereum.org explains how gold tokens work. Paxos turns a 400-ounce gold bar into 400 tokens on Ethereum, with each token backed by one ounce. Holders can redeem tokens for gold at any time, and the same is true for Tether Gold.

Britannica adds that PAXG is backed by physical gold held by the Paxos Trust Company. The gold is stored in vaults accredited by the London Bullion Market Association. Tether Gold tokens can be divided down to 0.000001 of a token, which makes very small purchases possible.

Real estate is the smaller story. Learnsignal puts it at about $226 million in September 2026. Ethereum.org points to RealT, whose tokens represent shares in an LLC that holds a property deed.

RealT says it has returned $15 million in net rental income to investors.

LABS Group lets people buy into tokenized property with as little as $100. Britannica adds the St. Regis Aspen Resort in Colorado, which is tokenized for fractional ownership through Aspen Coin.

Other physical assets have also been tokenized. Courtyard tokenizes graded trading cards stored in a secure US facility, and the person who tokenizes a card receives 1% of each later sale. CaskCoin issues tokens for cases of Titanic Distillers whiskey, and Masterworks sells shares in artworks as tokens.

A Short History: Security Token Funds Raised by Year

Britannica says RWA tokenization is not the same as the NFT craze of 2021.

The market is older than the RWA label. InvestaX traces it to 2017, when Blockchain Capital raised $10 million in a single day with a tokenized venture capital fund. At that time the sector was called the security token offering, or STO, market.

Funds raised grew in the years that followed. The 2018 total passed $1 billion, and 2020 passed $2 billion. The 2021 total fell back to over $1 billion, which InvestaX links to the COVID-19 pandemic, and 2022 rose to over $1.5 billion.

These yearly totals are minimums, since the source uses phrases such as over $1 billion. They also cover security token offerings, not the full RWA market as it is measured today.

Growth continued after 2022. The 2025 arXiv study found more than $25 billion in RWAs on-chain. By September 2026, Learnsignal counted $38.8 billion in distributed tokens.

Big asset managers have joined in. In 2024, Securitize partnered with BlackRock to launch an RWA fund, according to Ethereum.org. BlackRock has said it plans to tokenize $10 trillion of its assets over time, though the source gives no timeline.

Recent Growth and Market Momentum

Treasuries have grown fast. They were above $9 billion in November 2025 and about $15.7 billion in September 2026. That is a rise of more than $6 billion in about ten months, though the two numbers come from different sources.

Short-term data shows a mixed picture. In the 30 days to September 2026, tokenized stocks were the fastest-growing category at over 17%. Tokenized Treasuries contracted slightly over the same period.

Stocks remain a small share in dollar terms. Even so, access is spreading. MetaMask says users can reach more than 250 tokenized US stocks, ETFs and commodities through Ondo Global Markets, and these tokens do not require KYC.

Rules are also changing. In September 2026, the SEC created a path for some trading venues to offer tokenized versions of public US stocks, according to Britannica. Under that exemption, tokens must provide the same rights as normal shares, including dividends and voting, and companies can object to tokenization.

Learnsignal says the next test is breadth. The question is whether growth spreads from Treasuries and credit into assets that are harder to value, such as real estate. Their share in those areas stays minimal for now.

Forecasts, Risks and What to Watch

Long-term forecasts vary widely. BCG and ADDX project a $16.1 trillion opportunity by 2030. McKinsey’s base case is about $2 trillion in tokenized market capitalization by the same year.

The gap is roughly eight times. Both are credible institutional forecasts, which shows how uncertain the market size remains. Even the lower figure is about 50 times today’s $38.8 billion in distributed tokens, though the two measures differ.

Risks are well documented. IOSCO, the Bank for International Settlements and recent research point to legal clarity, technology, market structure and reliance on service providers, according to InvestaX.

Liquidity is one concern. The arXiv study found that most tokenized assets show low trading volumes, long holding periods and limited secondary market activity. Liquidity tends to be higher in Treasuries and some private credit pools, where holders expect shorter holding periods.

Legal rights are another. A token may represent a stake in an SPV, a debt claim or a right to payments, MetaMask explains, and the difference matters if an issuer fails. SIPC protection, which covers up to $500,000 at failed US brokerages, does not extend to tokenized equity holdings.

Rules differ by region. Ethereum.org names Singapore, the UAE, Hong Kong and Switzerland as early movers on legal frameworks. Switzerland introduced its so-called Blockchain Act in 2021, and the EU has begun to regulate RWAs.

InvestaX groups approaches into three types. The US integrates tokens into traditional securities law. Singapore, Hong Kong and Australia use hybrid approaches, while the UK and UAE lean on sandbox testing.

Redemption terms add friction. MetaMask lists minimum amounts, notice periods, set redemption windows and fees as common limits. Some products offer daily liquidity, while others do not.

Access rules add another layer. Some tokens need a wallet to be approved on an allowlist, and transfers are then limited to other approved wallets. If an approved wallet is lost, MetaMask says re-verification with the issuer may be needed.

MetaMask suggests reviewing custody documents, audit reports and legal opinions before buying. Britannica gives similar advice and warns that tokenizing an asset does not automatically make it more liquid.

The Bottom Line

Tokenized real-world assets are a real but narrow market. Tokens distributed on-chain total about $38.8 billion, and Treasuries make up about 40% of that. Real estate, often cited in headlines, is under 1%.

Growth has been steady, and the biggest names in asset management are involved. Yet forecasts for 2030 differ by about eight times, and most tokens trade thinly.

Readers should check the date and tracker behind any figure before using it. This article is for information only and is not financial advice.

Sources

• What are tokenized real-world assets? (MetaMask)
• Asset tokenization: Turning real-world assets into digital tokens (Britannica)
• Real-world assets (RWAs) (Ethereum.org)
• What Is Real-World Asset (RWA) Tokenization? A Full Guide for 2026 (InvestaX)
• Real-World Asset Tokenization Explained: Where the Market Actually Stands in 2026 (Learnsignal)