Abstract:
BlackRock is quickly rising as the spine of tokenized finance. Via merchandise like its BUIDL tokenized cash market fund and its spot Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs, the agency is positioning itself at the heart of regulated, programmable collateral that may function seamlessly throughout conventional and on-chain markets.
As soon as a crypto skeptic, BlackRock (BLK -1.32%) CEO Larry Fink has modified stance on digital property considerably, now recognizing Bitcoin (BTC -0.23%) as a reliable various asset.
Fink believes the main cryptocurrency is helpful for diversification, like gold. He has described Bitcoin as an “asset of concern” that buyers flip to amid financial uncertainty or considerations about fiat debasement.
This represents a notable shift from Fink’s earlier dismissals, which he has acknowledged publicly. He said he was unsuitable in previous assessments of crypto’s legitimacy and that his views have advanced in response to market maturity, institutional demand, and infrastructure growth.
Past Bitcoin, Fink has praised blockchain know-how and its potential to modernize conventional markets with transparency and effectivity.
Tokenization of real-world assets is his predominant focus, which he compares to transformative technological shifts like the adoption of the web. He has publicly referred to as for a speedy transition to tokenized finance, emphasizing that tokenization can cut back friction, decrease prices, democratize entry, and finally unify on-chain funding processing.
Late final yr, Fink said the business is at “the starting of the tokenization of all property.”
Throughout BlackRock’s recent earnings call, Fink doubled down on “tokenized cash market funds” as the future of money administration, following the large success of their very own tokenized cash market fund, BUIDL.
He famous that, regardless of capital markets rising bigger and turning into extra digital, money received’t disappear; as a substitute, it’ll develop into extra necessary. Equally, tokenizing conventional property received’t cut back money holdings; moderately, it will enhance them by creating a good better want for money.
“As international capital markets develop, money is going to develop alongside it. So the base holdings of money will probably be elevated so long as the international capital markets proceed to develop. And in case you overlay, if tokenization turns into extra actual and the alternative to have a tokenized cash market fund alongside tokenizing different property, I truly imagine you’re going to see in all probability above-trend holdings in money.”
– Fink
Tokenizing cash market funds makes money programmable, tradable, and at all times accessible. Placing these low-risk, extremely liquid, short-term debt securities on-chain makes money extra central as quicker, bigger, and extra digital capital markets require larger swimming pools of money. As Fink defined:
“As the capital markets develop and as extra folks’s wallets are in the capital markets, the function of the cash market fund simply grows. I feel that is one in every of the foundational the explanation why we proceed to imagine that cash market holdings will proceed to be fairly massive.”
BlackRock sees tokenization as inevitable, with cash market funds serving as the bridge between TradFi and on-chain markets.
The Disruptive Tech: Tokenized Treasuries
The whole worth of real-world property (RWA) tokenized now sits at $23.23 billion.
In 2022, RWA worth surpassed the $1 billion mark for the first time. At the starting of 2024, it stood beneath $2 billion, solely to finish the yr above $6 billion. Then in 2025, the market noticed an exponential leap, surging past $20 billion.
Tokenization refers to the technique of placing real-world property like wonderful artwork, actual property, shares, money, commodities, personal credit score, personal fairness, public fairness, company bonds, and even intangible property like mental property on-chain.
On this course of, RWAs are represented on the blockchain utilizing tokens to extend liquidity, improve accessibility, and enhance transparency.
Liquidity is elevated by changing illiquid property into fractional shares that may be purchased and bought extra simply. This fractional possession lowers minimal funding thresholds, rising accessibility and selling monetary inclusion.
On condition that blockchain know-how is borderless, tokenization permits for international entry. Crypto platforms allow around-the-clock buying and selling worldwide. Blockchain’s transparency and immutability allow verification of possession rights and cut back fraud.
By streamlining asset transactions and eliminating intermediaries similar to banks and brokers, tokenization additionally reduces prices and accelerates settlement.
Regardless of these advantages, which place tokenization as transformative for monetary infrastructure, it continues to face challenges: a disparate authorized atmosphere, restricted interoperability throughout totally different blockchain platforms, and safety dangers similar to sensible contract bugs and vulnerabilities.
The potential of tokenization, nonetheless, is large. The market is anticipated to be price trillions of {dollars} in the coming years.
This development will probably be pushed by stablecoins, which preserve a secure worth by being pegged to fiat currencies like the US greenback. The whole market cap of stablecoins has already grown previous $310 billion, led by USDT and USDC.
Past stablecoins, one other key driver is U.S. Treasuries, seen as the basis of world finance.
By streamlining the shopping for and promoting of property by eradicating intermediaries similar to banks and brokers, tokenization additionally reduces prices and accelerates settlement.
Regardless of its advantages, which place tokenization as transformative for monetary infrastructure, it continues to face challenges, together with a disparate authorized atmosphere, restricted interoperability throughout totally different blockchain platforms, and safety dangers similar to sensible contract bugs and vulnerabilities.
The potential of tokenization, nonetheless, is large, with the market anticipated to be price multi-trillion {dollars} in the coming years.
This development will probably be driven by stablecoins, which preserve a secure worth by being pegged to a fiat foreign money like the US greenback. The whole market cap of stablecoin has already grown previous $310 billion, led by USDT and USDC.
In addition to stablecoins, one other key driver of the tokenization pattern is the U.S. Treasuries, that are seen as the basis of world finance.
“In our view, as tokenization continues to rise, so will the alternative to entry property past money and U.S. Treasuries through the blockchain,” believes BlackRock, the world’s largest asset supervisor, in its 2026 Thematic Outlook, the place AI and vitality infrastructure take heart stage and crypto and tokenized property are highlighted as necessary funding tendencies shaping markets this yr.
The widespread adoption of stablecoins, mixed with the rising demand for native yield alternatives, has led to U.S. Treasuries rising as the main candidate for large-scale tokenization.
Issued by the U.S. Division of the Treasury, these government-backed securities are the world’s most secure and most liquid property. They provide stability and risk-free yields and are key not simply to funding portfolios but in addition to central financial institution insurance policies.
The U.S. Treasury market, which has over $38 trillion in excellent debt, is formed by inflation expectations, shifts in rates of interest, and the international demand for safe-haven property.
Regardless of its huge scale and significance, its infrastructure is antiquated, with trades usually deciding on a T+1 foundation, creating counterparty threat and tying up capital. The settlement chain additionally includes varied events: clearing banks, custodians, depositories, and a number of brokers, including value and operational complexity. Furthermore, retail participation in the market is restricted.
So as to decrease settlement instances and prices, cut back counterparty threat, and enhance operational effectivity, each crypto-native corporations and conventional monetary establishments have been more and more tokenizing treasuries.
Transferring the “boring” US Treasury bills onto the blockchain means the investor holds the token moderately than a certificates or a brokerage account entry to indicate their possession. It additionally permits them to be traded 24/7, not like conventional T-bills, which aren’t traded on weekends.
By representing authorities debt, similar to T-bills or bonds, as tokens on a blockchain, these innovators have created a universally accessible asset that may function a retailer of worth, prompt collateral, a hedge towards crypto’s volatility, and a supply of native risk-free yield for the rising, dangerous on-chain financial system.
Consequently, the worth of tokenized treasuries has now surpassed $10 billion. It was solely in late March 2024 that tokenized treasuries first hit the $1 billion mark.
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| Issuer | Product | Tokenized Asset | TVL / AUM | Main Chain |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| BlackRock | BUIDL | U.S. Treasuries | ~$1.9B | Ethereum |
| Circle | USYC | U.S. Treasuries | ~$1.6B | Ethereum |
| Ondo | USDY | U.S. Treasuries | ~$1.3B | Ethereum |
This market is led by BlackRock USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund (BUIDL), boasting a price of $1.68 billion. Circle (CRCL -1.33%) USYC ($1.64 bln) and Ondo US Greenback Yield ($1.27 bln) are the solely different funds with valuations over $1 billion. One other TradFi large, Franklin Templeton, is additionally concerned in tokenizing treasuries, with its OnChain U.S. Authorities Cash Fund (BENJI) holding over $892 million in worth.
Amongst these, BUIDL is the one recognized for its large success, turning into the largest tokenized U.S. Treasury fund in lower than two months.
The whole worth locked (TVL) in the fund is presently $1.95 billion, up from lower than $525 million at the starting of final yr. Launched in March 2024, BUIDL grew shortly with its TVL reaching $2.90 billion in Might earlier than falling to $2.1 billion in September. From there, it started its ascent again to $2.86 billion, solely to fall below the $2 bln mark. With BUIDL tokens, buyers get to earn a dividend yield immediately on-chain, with $100 million already distributed in payouts.
BlackRock’s tokenized cash market fund is issued on a number of public blockchains, with the SEC-registered broker-dealer Securitize as the switch agent. Virtually half a billion {dollars} of BUIDL’s market cap is hosted on Ethereum (ETH -0.76%), which the asset supervisor famous in its new analysis is residence to the majority of tokenized property globally.
In addition to Ethereum, BUIDL is issued on BNB (BNB +0.07%) Chain (nearly $504mln), Aptos (APT +1.45%) ($291mln), Solana (SOL -0.22%) ($175mln), Avalanche (AVAX -0.49%) ($138mln), Arbitrum (ARB -0.41%) ($31mln), Optimism (OP -0.17%) ($26mln), and Polygon (MATIC +3.51%) ($18mln).
Holding a dominant market share in the tokenized U.S. Treasuries and short-term devices, BUIDL is broadly utilized by institutional backends. It has additionally been accepted by main centralized exchanges like Binance, Crypto.com, and Deribit as collateral for buying and selling, enabling yield-bearing, regulated property to immediately help derivatives and margin positions.
So, tokenized treasuries evidently signify the clearest real-world use case for blockchain adoption at scale. And as they develop into foundational infrastructure, tokenized treasuries backed by BlackRock are poised to function the bridge connecting conventional finance to a 24/7, programmable international capital market.
The Funding Angle: BlackRock (NYSE: BLK)
In the case of investing in the digital asset house, buyers are likely to give attention to crypto startups because of high-return potential and early entry to innovation. However the publicly traded BlackRock might supply buyers a greater various, because it quietly turns into the largest “decentralized” issuer of real-world worth.
BLK isn’t simply an asset supervisor anymore; it’s evolving right into a “Tech Platform” for digital property.
This shift builds on BlackRock’s current funding and know-how infrastructure. For starters, the firm offers a spread of funding administration and know-how companies to each retail and institutional shoppers. Its huge product vary consists of fairness, multi-asset, mounted revenue, and cash market devices.
Its merchandise are provided immediately and thru intermediaries throughout a spread of autos, together with mutual funds, iShares exchange-traded funds (ETFs), and actively managed funds, amongst others.
BlackRock is truly one in every of the Large 4 index fund managers, providing over 1,700 ETFs overlaying various asset lessons. Its hottest ETF choices, primarily by way of its iShares ETF platform, includeiShares Core S&P 500 ETF (IVV), iShares Core MSCI EAFE ETF (IEFA), and iShares Core U.S. Mixture Bond ETF (AGG).
One among BlackRock’s most notable and fast-expanding merchandise, nonetheless, is iShares Bitcoin Belief (IBIT), which is a spot Bitcoin ETF that has develop into wildly in style amongst buyers. IBIT has attracted $68.33 billion in net assets and $62.9 billion in net inflows since its launch in Jan. 2024, making it one in every of the most watched crypto ETFs.
Most lately, BlackRock filed to launch one other Bitcoin product, the iShares Bitcoin Premium Revenue ETF. The ETF would function BTC, Money, and shares of IBIT, giving consumers publicity to the cryptocurrency together with some yield.
Along with Bitcoin, BlackRock has additionally launched the iShares Ethereum Belief ETF (ETHA), which tracks the worth of Ethereum (ETH) immediately. Launched in June 2024, ETHA has captured $12.49 billion in net inflows and $9.98 billion in net assets.
Ethereum is presently the largest beneficiary of the tokenization pattern, underpinning greater than 65% of tokenized property, which, in line with BlackRock’s report, might have “a use-case exterior of purely speculative crypto buying and selling” and will broaden to non-public credit score, structured merchandise, and different markets.
In its research referred to as “Might Ethereum Signify the ‘Toll Street’ to Tokenization?” BlackRock famous that whereas competing networks like Solana (SOL), Stellar (XLM), Avalanche (AVAX), Polygon (POL), Arbitrum (ARB), and the XRP Ledger make up the remainder of the share, none of them comes near Ethereum.
At Davos, BlackRock CEO Fink additionally famous that “we’ve extra dependencies on possibly one blockchain,” however “these actions are in all probability processed and safer than ever.”
He referred to as for speedy tokenization on a single, standardized blockchain, warning that fragmented infrastructure might hinder adoption and lift dangers. A common blockchain platform, he argued, would ship decrease prices, quicker transactions, better transparency, and probably even cut back monetary corruption.
Tokenization is one in every of BlackRock’s key areas of focus. Fink predicts that the whole lot from shares to bonds will finally be tradable on-chain.
“Each asset — might be tokenized,” Fink wrote in his annual letter to buyers final yr, noting that it will be a “revolution” for investing. He went additional: “If we’re critical about constructing an environment friendly and accessible monetary system, championing tokenization alone received’t suffice. We should remedy digital verification, too.”
Along with all of this, BlackRock affords know-how companies, together with the proprietary Aladdin system, which is the spine of the firm’s transformation right into a tech platform. Aladdin is an end-to-end threat administration, buying and selling, analytics, and portfolio administration system utilized by the firm and exterior shoppers like pension funds, insurers, and banks.
The platform handles asset information, threat modelling, compliance, execution, and reporting. Greater than $25 trillion in property are managed globally by way of Aladdin.
Now, if we have a look at BLK’s market efficiency, it has been having fun with an uptrend over the final decade. In 2021, BlackRock’s inventory worth got here near hitting the $1,000 milestone solely to fall to about $550 a yr later.
BlackRock, Inc. (BLK -1.32%)
Since then, BLK has rallied to go as excessive as $1,220 in mid-October final yr. As of writing, BLK shares are buying and selling at $1,121.54, up 4.48% YTD and eight.89% in the previous yr. It has an EPS (TTM) of 34.66 and a P/E (TTM) of 32.60.
BlackRock, which has a market cap of $174 billion, pays a dividend yield of two.03%. Just lately, the firm elevated its quarterly money dividend by 10% to $5.73 per share, making it a lovely funding choice.
In complete, the asset supervisor returned $5 billion to its shareholders final yr, together with $1.6 billion in share repurchases. One other 7 million shares had been lately licensed for repurchase below the current repurchase program.
In the case of the firm’s monetary place, BlackRock boasts a powerful standing.
“BlackRock enters 2026 with accelerating momentum throughout our complete platform, coming off the strongest yr and quarter of web inflows in our historical past,” mentioned Fink. “BlackRock is at the forefront of a few of the largest new development channels throughout the business – from personal markets to wealth and 401(okay), to lively ETFs, to non-public markets information, to digital property and tokenization.”
Earlier this month, the firm reported monetary outcomes for the three months and yr ended December 31, 2025, with its diluted EPS for the yr being $35.31, or $48.09 as adjusted.
BlackRock’s full-year income elevated by 19% due to energy throughout ETFs, personal markets, systematic lively equities, outsourcing, and money, leading to 12% annualized natural base price development in the fourth quarter.
Nevertheless, quarterly revenue fell because of one-time prices stemming from its latest acquisition spree. The agency additionally reported $106 million in web funding losses, primarily because of a non-cash mark-to-market loss on its minority funding in Circle. It nonetheless maintains about 1.1 million shares of the USDC stablecoin issuer’s widespread inventory.
Notably, for the first time, BlackRock property crossed the $14 trillion mark because it captured a file $698 billion in web inflows for the complete final yr. In This autumn, it attracted $342 billion in web inflows.
In the meantime, as of Dec. 31, 2025, holdings in its spot Bitcoin ETF had been 771,000, reinforcing the agency’s digital asset technique. Fink famous:
“BlackRock is differentiated as a scale operator in private and non-private markets investing and know-how, which is enhancing our positioning with shoppers worldwide. We’re a frontrunner in private and non-private markets, and in know-how and information. We’re a foundational participant in each conventional and decentralized monetary markets.”
All of this exhibits that BlackRock is not simply an asset supervisor. It is truly rising as the working system for digital capital markets. As BlackRock embeds itself deeper into each conventional and on-chain finance, BLK affords publicity to the underlying infrastructure that establishments will depend on no matter market cycles.
Takeaway
Whereas proudly owning crypto means taking up the dangers of worth volatility, regulation, tech, and even custody, proudly owning BlackRock affords publicity to recurring income, custody management, and core monetary infrastructure, making BLK a extremely enticing crypto participant.
As the crypto market has matured and gained regulatory readability, BlackRock has advanced from skeptic to vocal advocate. Its CEO now views Bitcoin as a reliable various asset and tokenization as the future monetary plumbing of world markets.
With over $14.04 trillion in AUM, the world’s largest asset supervisor is deepening its foothold in blockchain by way of its Spot Bitcoin ETF, Spot Ethereum ETF, and BUIDL Fund. Via these autos, BlackRock is turning into the largest regulated holder and administrator of crypto collateral and, crucially, is making that collateral programmable by way of tokenization.
In that context, the most secure approach to play the crypto growth is probably not by proudly owning the cash themselves, however by proudly owning the firm that controls the collateral powering the ecosystem.
