🏠 Largest Stablecoin Finds New Home

Moving is generally a pain – boxes to pack, load, and then unpack. 📦

We’d imagine it’s even more difficult when you’re a $60 billion+ company. 🧐

🎯🔥 Rapid Fire Takeaways:

💸 Tether Licensed in El Salvador, Strengthening Focus on Emerging Markets and Innovation

🧪 ProvLabs Targets $25 Billion in Tokenized Assets with Blockchain Solutions

💥 RWA is the number one use case in crypto right now, Research lead at CoinMarketCap says

📊 Circle: 2025 State of the USDC Economy - USDC Reaches $1 Trillion Monthly Transactions

📇 Standard Chartered granted license in Luxembourg to offer digital asset custody services

🧩 Economic Fragmentation to Cost Trillions by 2030

🦄 Crypto bank Sygnum hits unicorn status with new $58M raise

We can always ask Tether if the moving pains are worth it. They’re officially relocating to El Salvador after being granted a license in the jurisdiction following their wind-down of EURT and a general departure from Europe. ♟️

Do you think they’ll fly or arrive on horseback? If it’s the latter, they should call Lympid. These tokenization pros secured a 70% ROI in just four months through their flagship tokenized racehorse, Doriano. They also offer tokenized watches, designer handbags, and more! Read our recent report on what tokenized horses could mean for the future of RWAs. 🏇

🎯 Tokenization Targets and Achievements

Big moves out of the UAE, with Mantra agreeing to tokenize $1 billion of RWAs with property firm DAMAC and Tokinvest receiving its license for a UAE-based RWA marketplace. Dubai has been positioning itself as a tokenization leader for some time now, so this comes as no big surprise. 🐪

The writing is on the wall. The research lead at CoinMarketCap recently stated that RWA is the number one use case for crypto right now, and ProvLabs is targeting $25 billion in tokenized assets with its solutions. Even private credit is coming on the chain, with Qiro Finance partnering with Plume to tokenize up to $50 million of the asset class. 📜

Sustainability is also getting a makeover, thanks to tokenization. Plural Energy is one company targeting midsize green assets with easier funding, making scaling easier. NUS also piloted a tokenized green bond with Northern Trust and UOB. In case you missed it, RWA World’s head of research, Ray Buckton, was on a space talking about tokenized sustainability on Thursday – it’s worth a listen. ♻️

🕴️ Corporates on Board

More listed firms than ever are getting involved with tokenized assets, choosing Bitcoin as their first (naturally.) But that doesn’t mean they’re not experimenting heavily with the underlying distributed ledger technology – Republic and Hamilton Lane are working to bring other blockchain assets to retail investors. 🏛️

The OECD also released an excellent report on asset tokenization and DLTs, while Kadena Partners and Ownera are working to drive more institutional onboarding to distributed ledgers. The more participants you have in a network like this, the more beneficial confluences arise from the interoperability features and settlement efficiencies. The network effect is officially taking hold. 💽

Another big benefit of blockchain assets is their composability, which QCP Capital is taking full advantage of with the first BUIDL-Collateralized Trade initiative. Standard Chartered wants a slice of the pie and just secured a license in Luxembourg to custody digital assets, upping their stake in the tokenized game. 🎮

👀 Debanking Confirmed? 

However, not all tech grows without hiccups. The FDIC seemingly admitted that crypto debanking is indeed happening… what they plan to do about it is still undecided. Either way, the OCC’s Comptroller of the Currency, Michael Hsu, is probably ambivalent – he’s proud that he insulated TradFi from the 2022 crypto nuclear winter. ☢️

On the other side of the pond and coin, the UK passed legislation to exclude crypto staking in its definition of a collective investment. That no doubt gives many staking providers reason to breathe a sigh of relief. The BOE also released a paper showing their next plan of action, which is a digital pound, so more progress from Britain is to be expected. 🦁

Elsewhere in the world, Sberbank calls for a delay in the digital ruble launch, claiming it might not be ready for prime time, as it failed some earlier readiness tests. Some Filipino banks might find themselves in a similar situation as plans to launch a multi-issuer PHPX stablecoin using Hedera’s technology proceed. 👛

💰 Big Raises, Big Buyouts, Big Projections

All this progress has, of course, stimulated some coffers. DFNS raised $16 million in its recent Series A funding, while Sygnum hit unicorn status with its recent $58 million raise. While some are raising, others are buying, and MoonPay just acquired Helio for $175 million. 💵

In a caliber all its own, Sony is using its $125 billion market cap to get involved in Web3 in a big way. They recently launched their Soneium Layer 2 blockchain, having announced it earlier in 2024. What will be on the chain is yet to be disclosed, but we can imagine it’s related to their extensive product suite. 💻

One of Soneium’s partners is Circle, which released a report on the USDC economy. In it, they revealed an exciting fact – USDC has officially passed the $1 trillion monthly transaction threshold. Given a recent report showing that economic fragmentation will cost at least $1.6 trillion by 2030, USDC’s interoperability couldn’t have come at a better time. 🔌

⚾ Another Home Run

What a great week – we’re starting January so strong! 

If you’re looking for a tokenization company that’s knocking it out of the park, give Lympid a look.

And don’t forget to check out our report on tokenized racehorses to get a deep dive into that asset class. 

We’ll see you next week!