The trading of tokenized stocks has experienced explosive growth, with the market focus shifting from asset issuance to competition in distribution and on-chain applications.

Written by: Moulik Nagesh

Translated by: Wu Talk Blockchain

Abstract

• The growth rate of trading activity exceeds the scale of assets. The market capitalization of active tokenized stocks has increased by 314% year-to-date, reaching 4 billion USD; the monthly trading volume has surged from 237 million USD in January to 7.9 billion USD in August. The turnover rate has risen from 0.23 times to 2.14 times, reaching as high as 3.32 times in July.
• Distribution channels are becoming a key variable driving growth. The combined market share of bStocks and Robinhood in the tracking range of issuer trading volume increased from 0.8% in June to 82.3% in August, and has further risen to 87.8% as of September. At Binance, 58.5% of early bStocks users also use perpetual contracts and/or direct stock trading, indicating that the distribution channels of existing products can accelerate user adoption.
• The application value is gradually catching up with the scale of issuance. The active TVL in DeFi has increased from 21.6 million USD at the beginning of the year to 289.1 million USD, with its proportion of active market total market cap rising from 2.2% to 7.2%. The continuously improving DeFi infrastructure is creating new application scenarios, including lending, smart contract deployment, and stock pairing markets, indicating that tokenized stocks are evolving from passive holding to more practical uses.

The Growth Rate of Trading Activity Has Surpassed Asset Scale

Tokenized stocks have moved beyond the stage driven solely by issuance. The active market cap grew from 965 million USD at the beginning of 2026 to about 4 billion USD on September 9, with the on-chain market cap reaching 4.7 billion USD. The growth rate of DEX trading activity is significantly faster, with issuer monthly trading volume increasing from 237 million USD in January to 7.9 billion USD in August, a rise of over 33 times.

Figure 1: The growth rate of trading activity exceeds the scale of assets

As a result, the market's trading activity has significantly increased. The ratio of monthly trading volume to average active market cap rose from 0.23 times in January to 2.14 times in August, reaching 3.32 times in July.

Figure 2: Monthly market turnover rate from January to August 2026

Distribution Channels Are Replacing Issuance as the Driving Force for Growth

The most notable change in recent months is that trading activity is concentrating on new platforms. Recent data shows that distribution capacity is translating into trading scale. In June, bStocks and Robinhood stocks collectively accounted for only 0.8% of the issuer trading volume in the tracking range. This proportion increased to 34.3% in July, further to 82.3% in August, and has reached 87.8% as of September. Meanwhile, the trading volume distribution of bStocks has also become more diverse: the top five tokens by trading volume decreased from 98.7% to 84.6%, while the share of QQQ decreased from 95.2% to 66.0%.

A similar shift is also observed at the network level. The trading volume share of the two leading public chains, BNB Chain and Robinhood Chain, collectively grew from 2.3% in June to 39.3% in July, and further to 83.0% in August. As of September, the combined share has reached 88.2%. Thus, distribution channels not only change the market landscape for issuers but also alter the settlement network for tokenized stock trading.

Figure 3: Weekly trading volume of tokenized stocks by issuer

User behavior further explains why this shift can happen quickly. Among early bStocks users, 58.5% have also traded perpetual contracts and/or direct stocks, while only 41.5% of users used bStocks exclusively. Specifically, among SPCX perpetual contract traders, 8.6% converted to bStocks users, while only 0.6% converted to direct stock users. Therefore, existing trading relationships can serve as customer acquisition channels for tokenized products, allowing various products to build on an existing user base instead of starting from scratch.

Figure 4: About 58.5% of early bStocks users also use related products

On-Chain Application Value is Gradually Emerging

The second major shift is that tokenized stocks are moving from mere holding to actual use. The DeFi active TVL for tokenized stocks has increased from 21.6 million USD at the beginning of the year to 289.1 million USD as of September 9, a growth of 1,242%. During the same period, the proportion of DeFi TVL of active market cap rose from 2.2% to 7.2%.

Figure 5: DeFi utilization is on the rise

The composition of DeFi TVL also reflects the actual uses of tokenized stocks. Among this, 65.4% is located in liquidity pools, 28.1% is for lending, 5.7% for yield tokenization, with other uses accounting for 0.8%. From a network distribution perspective, TVL is highly concentrated, with BNB Chain, Robinhood Chain, and Solana collectively holding 90% of the market share.

Figure 6: Tokenized stock DeFi TVL is mainly concentrated in on-chain DEX liquidity and lending

bStocks has initially demonstrated the development model in this field. As of September 10, the proportion of outstanding loans to collateral deposited has increased from 5.5% at the end of June to 46.2%, with approximately 6.8 million USD in collateral generating 3.1 million USD in loans.

Figure 7: bStocks collateral is gradually converting into loans

Some bStocks have also been deployed to smart contracts, with the highest observed supply ratio being 28.3%, followed by 18.8% and 12.3%. Compared to the overall market, these scales are still relatively small, but the benchmarks for measuring market development are shifting: the focus is moving from "how many stocks are tokenized" to "what proportion of tokenized stocks is actually used after going on-chain."

Figure 8: Some bStocks have been deployed to on-chain smart contracts, with the highest supply ratio reaching 28.3%

Stock Pairing Meme Coins are Becoming an Independent Source of Trading Volume

Tokenized stocks are also starting to generate trading activity in the market for non-direct stock token trading, especially on BNB Chain and Robinhood Chain. Between July 26 and September 9, the trading volume from the stock pairing Meme coin market on Robinhood Chain and BNB Chain was approximately 2.49 billion USD and 2.9 billion USD, respectively.

Transactions in these liquidity pools involve direct exchanges of stock tokens. Chain analysis of SQD shows that in the sample from Robinhood Chain, as of August 30, 2026, the cumulative trading volume of stock token DEX accounted for 32.1% at 711.2 million USD, derived from trading between stock tokens and other tokens, most of which are Meme coins. Therefore, tokenized stocks are becoming a pricing asset for crypto-native trading, which can enhance market turnover without needing a proportionate increase in long-term demand for holding stocks.

Figure 9: Daily trading volume of stock pairing Meme coins

Looking Ahead

The market is shifting from a race for issuance to a race for distribution and application. While onboarding more assets still holds value, relying solely on issuance cannot determine where liquidity will ultimately manifest.

More competitive platforms will be those that can convert existing users into tokenized stock users, retain liquidity after product launch, support trading activities outside of traditional market hours, and give more utility to assets once on-chain. Currently, on-chain activities are mainly centered around DEX trading and the use of tokenized stocks as collateral or margin in lending markets, but this area still has significant growth potential. Therefore, the metrics to pay attention to are also shifting from token quantity and market cap to user retention rates, simultaneous turnover rates, market depth, net inflow, DeFi utilization rates, and cross-product conversion rates.

The competitive advantage in the next stage lies not in moving stocks on-chain, but in whether the distribution capability can be converted into sustained liquidity and practical uses.