These Wall Street Firms Are Ramping Up Efforts To Tokenize Assets

There is a strong push among Wall Street firms ramping up their efforts to tokenize assets on the blockchain.

Tokenization is when tangible and intangible assets are converted into digital tokens — everything from shares, and bonds to gold bullions, real estate as well as digital and physical art.

Earlier this year State Street Global Advisors showed an interest in tokenizing exchange-traded funds (ETFs).

At an ETF Stream event Matteo Andreetto, head of SPDR EMEA at State Street, said, “We will be looking at the tokenization of ETFs … and then the tokenization of private assets. That for me will be game-changing.”

In March, BlackRock BLK CEO Larry Fink also commented in his annual letter to shareholders that there is operational potential of some of the underlying technologies in the digital assets space which could have exciting applications.

The tokenization of asset classes "offers the prospect of driving efficiencies in capital markets, shortening value chains, and improving cost and access for investors," he said.

In September, U.S. bank Citigroup C announced it had started piloting “Citi Token Services” for cash management and trade finance — a tokenization service for institutional clients using blockchain technology.

According to analysts at the consulting firm Roland Berger, "asset tokenization will grow to become a market worth at least $10 trillion by 2030, representing a 40-fold increase in the value of tokenized assets from 2022 to 2030. This would mark a significant rise from the current value of around $300 billion."

Join the conversation around asset tokenization: Industry titans BlackRock, DTCC, OCC, State Street, Société Générale, Hedera, Citi, BMO, Northern Trust, Citibank, Amazon, S&P Global, Google, Invesco, and Moody’s will join our Nov. 13 Fintech Deal Day and Nov. 14 Future of Digital Assets. Secure a spot here to join them!

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