Distributed Tokenized RWA Market to Hit $400B by 2030: Keyrock, Securitize

Market maker Keyrock and tokenization platform Securitize published a new report on the future of real-world asset (RWA) tokenization today, April 9. According to the research, the distributed RWA market — meaning tokenized assets that are freely transferable on-chain — is projected to grow from around $29 billion today to $400 billion by 2030 as a base case, an over 1,000% increase.

The joint report also flags perpetual futures as the fastest-growing on-chain channel for RWA exposure, already on track to dominate derivatives by 2028.

The report, titled “The $400T Future of Tokenised Assets,” covers five RWA classes — Treasuries, private credit, equities, commodities, and alternative funds — and maps the regulatory, liquidity, and infrastructure conditions needed for each to scale.

Today, tokenized RWAs represent less than 0.1% of the $400 trillion global market that is eligible for tokenization, per the report. In the base case, Keyrock and Securitize project the broader market of blockchain-tracked RWAs, often referred to as represented RWAs, hitting $5 trillion by 2030.

Equities represent the largest notional upside, while Treasuries are positioned to lead in the near term, scoring highest in the report's "readiness framework," which grades asset classes across standardization, liquidity, valuation frequency, redemption speed, regulatory clarity, and on-chain demand.

Demand for RWA Perps

RWA perps, namely perpetual futures tied to commodities like oil, gold and silver, have surged in popularity in recent months, driven by broader adoption of on-chain derivatives and demand for 24/7 macro exposure. Geopolitical tensions and, more recently, an escalating war in the Middle East, have likely contributed to short-term spikes in trading activity.

The new report found that RWA perpetual volumes grew 40x in six months to $67 billion in monthly volume, even as volumes across the broader on-chain derivatives market fell by half.

Specifically, RWA perps jumped from 0.1% to 10.1% of all on-chain derivatives volume since October 2025, the report states. At the current pace, the report projects RWA perps could account for 50% of all on-chain derivatives volume by 2028.

The engine behind that growth is largely Hyperliquid's HIP-3 upgrade, which launched in October 2025 and enables permissionless deployment of perpetual futures markets.

Monthly equity perp volume on HIP-3 grew from $760 million in October 2025 to $20 billion by last month, per the report. Commodity perps — spanning gold, silver, copper, oil, and others — hit $40 billion in March alone. The report frames perps not as a workaround but as a crypto-native evolution of tokenization: synthetic exposure to real-world assets without the compliance overhead of direct ownership.

Treasuries vs DeFi Yield

The report also highlights yield on tokenized Treasuries, especially against the backdrop of waning DeFi yields. Per the report, tokenized T-bills have paid more than DeFi's benchmark stablecoin lending rate on 64% of all days since mid-2024. In Q1 2026 alone, that figure reached 98% — with 3.6x lower yield volatility than DeFi lending rates over the same period.

Keyrock and Securitize identify 2027 as the first year where regulation, market depth, liquidity infrastructure, and distribution are likely to mature simultaneously — a "convergence window" they say will concentrate growth in whichever asset classes hit all four milestones first.

The findings arrive as institutional pressure on tokenization intensifies. The IMF recently argued that tokenization represents a "structural shift in financial architecture," while The Defiant has previously reported on how RWAs became Wall Street's gateway to crypto in 2025 and tokenized assets' shift from wrappers to DeFi building blocks.

This article was written with the assistance of AI workflows. All our stories are curated, edited and fact-checked by a human.