Asset Tokenization in Capital Markets Outlook 2026–2036: Market Size, Growth Drivers, Key Players, Strategic Developments & Adoption Forecast for Tokenized Securities, Funds, Deposits and Market Infrastructure — A Meticulous Next™ Foresight Brief

This Meticulous Next™ brief examines how tokenization — representing securities, fund units, deposits, collateral and other assets as programmable tokens on shared ledgers — will change how capital markets issue, trade, settle and service assets over the next 5–15 years. Today's markets run on a chain of intermediaries reconciling separate ledgers over days. Tokenization puts the asset and the cash on the same ledger, so that ownership transfers and settlement happen together, in minutes, with the rules of the instrument coded into it. The largest asset managers, banks and market infrastructures have moved from pilots to live tokenized funds, deposits and repo, and regulators in the major jurisdictions have built the frameworks. The brief maps the technology, its indicative market size and forecast, the factors behind its growth, the developments of the last 24 months, the key players operating in the space, and the adoption trajectory to 2036.

It is a focused 30-page decision brief for asset managers, banks and broker-dealers, exchanges and market infrastructures, custodians, corporate treasurers and issuers, regulators, technology and infrastructure providers, and investors. It presents an indicative trajectory rather than a segmented market model. Its purpose is to identify which asset classes and functions tokenize first, how public, permissioned and bank-run ledgers converge, and who captures the resulting value.

Tokenization represents an asset — a fund unit, a bond, a share, a deposit, a receivable — as a digital token on a shared ledger, with ownership recorded on the ledger and the instrument's rules encoded in smart contracts. Three properties matter for capital markets. Atomic settlement: the asset and the cash leg move together, eliminating settlement risk and the days of reconciliation between intermediaries. Programmability: coupons, distributions, compliance checks, collateral calls and corporate actions execute automatically. Composability and mobility: tokenized assets can be pledged, lent, swapped and moved across venues and time zones without re-registration. The settlement asset — a deposit token, a regulated stablecoin or wholesale central-bank money on ledger — is the piece that turns tokenization from a record-keeping upgrade into a change in how markets work.

Three ledger models are competing and converging. Public blockchains carry tokenized funds, treasuries and stablecoins with the broadest reach and the most regulatory scrutiny. Permissioned networks run by consortia and infrastructure providers offer privacy and control for interbank and institutional use. Bank-run and infrastructure-run ledgers host deposit tokens, intraday repo and issuance for their own clients. The direction is interoperability: institutions expect to hold and move tokenized assets across all three, and central banks are exploring unified ledgers that put commercial-bank deposits, central-bank money and securities on shared infrastructure.

Adoption is proceeding by asset class in order of how much tokenization improves on the status quo. Money-market funds and treasuries came first: yield-bearing, low-risk, and useful as on-ledger collateral and settlement assets. Deposit tokens and intraday repo followed, because they solve collateral and liquidity problems banks face every day. Bonds and structured products are being issued natively on ledgers in Europe and Asia under sandbox and pilot regimes. Private funds and credit tokenize to widen distribution and enable secondary liquidity. Public equities are the last and largest, gated by market-structure rules and infrastructure migration. Regulatory frameworks — US stablecoin legislation and securities tokenization initiatives, the EU's MiCA and DLT Pilot Regime, the UK's Digital Securities Sandbox, and regulatory programmes in Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan — now define the legal basis in the major markets.

Two measures describe the market. The value of tokenized real-world assets on ledger, excluding stablecoins, is estimated at USD 30–50 billion in 2026, led by tokenized treasuries and money-market funds, and is expected to reach USD 4–8 trillion by 2036 as funds, deposits, fixed income, collateral and private assets move on-ledger at scale. The tokenization infrastructure market — issuance, custody, settlement and post-trade platforms, tokenization-as-a-service, compliance and integration services — is estimated at USD 1.5–2.5 billion in 2026 and is expected to reach USD 25–40 billion by 2036, an indicative CAGR of 32–36%. Growth is gated by the availability of regulated settlement assets in major currencies, by interoperability across ledgers, and by market-structure rules for equities. The mix shifts from asset-manager and bank pilots toward infrastructure-run platforms and market-wide settlement over the period. North America leads on tokenized funds and stablecoin settlement; Europe leads on DLT issuance and pilot regimes; Asia-Pacific leads on regulatory programmes and cross-border settlement.

The base case assumes regulated settlement assets are available in the major currencies by 2028–2029 and interoperability standards are established by 2030. An accelerated case adds rapid equities market-structure reform and wholesale central-bank money on ledger in the US, EU and UK, pulling the inflection to ~2029 and the 2036 values to the top of the range. A delayed case assumes settlement-asset availability lags, ledger fragmentation persists, or a market incident triggers regulatory retrenchment, pushing the inflection to ~2032 and leaving tokenization concentrated in funds and collateral.

Growth drivers

• Settlement efficiency: atomic, near-continuous settlement eliminates counterparty risk, reconciliation cost and trapped collateral in a system that still settles over days.
• Collateral and liquidity: banks and dealers need to move collateral across venues and time zones on demand; tokenized deposits, funds and repo provide it.
• Distribution and access: tokenized funds and private assets reach new investors and enable secondary liquidity in previously illiquid instruments.
• Regulatory clarity: stablecoin legislation, tokenization frameworks and pilot regimes in the major jurisdictions have removed the legal uncertainty that held institutions back.

Enablers

• Regulated settlement assets: deposit tokens, regulated stablecoins and wholesale central-bank money on ledger.
• Institutional-grade tokenization platforms, custody and compliance tooling.
• Market-infrastructure DLT platforms for issuance, settlement and fund servicing.
• Interoperability standards and cross-ledger protocols.

Restraints and barriers

• Ledger fragmentation: assets stranded on incompatible public, permissioned and bank ledgers.
• Market-structure and securities-law constraints, especially for public equities.
• Legacy integration: tokenized assets must coexist with existing custody, accounting and reporting for years.
• Liquidity concentration: secondary markets for many tokenized assets remain thin, limiting the mobility benefits.

Five converging forces will determine how fast, and how far, tokenization reshapes capital markets: (1) the availability of regulated settlement assets in major currencies; (2) interoperability across public, permissioned and infrastructure ledgers; (3) regulatory frameworks and market-structure reform, especially for equities; (4) institutional product adoption led by funds, deposits and collateral; and (5) the migration of custody, post-trade and fund servicing onto DLT platforms. The brief assesses each force for direction, speed and confidence.

The key players operating in capital-markets tokenization include BlackRock Inc., Franklin Templeton, Fidelity Investments, Apollo Global Management, KKR & Co. Inc., JPMorgan Chase & Co. (Kinexys), Goldman Sachs Group Inc., HSBC Holdings plc, Citigroup Inc., BNY, State Street Corporation, UBS Group AG, DBS Group Holdings Ltd., SBI Holdings Inc., Securitize Inc., Tokeny Solutions, Ondo Finance, Superstate, Centrifuge, Figure Technology Solutions Inc., Digital Asset Holdings LLC (Canton Network), R3 (Corda), Fnality International, Partior, Broadridge Financial Solutions Inc., DTCC, Euroclear, Clearstream (Deutsche Börse), SIX Digital Exchange, Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Ltd., Nasdaq Inc., Coinbase Global Inc., Kraken, Circle Internet Group Inc., Paxos Trust Company, Chainlink Labs, and public-ledger ecosystems including Ethereum, Avalanche, Polygon and Stellar, together with the BIS Innovation Hub and central-bank programmes. The brief profiles representative players in each archetype and assesses which are positioned to run the tokenized market.

The competitive landscape is forming around six archetypes. Asset managers and issuers tokenize funds, fixed income and private assets. Banks and dealers run deposit tokens, repo, collateral and issuance ledgers. Market infrastructures and exchanges build DLT issuance, settlement and post-trade platforms. Tokenization platforms, custodians and compliance providers supply institutional-grade tooling. Public-ledger ecosystems, stablecoin issuers and interoperability providers supply the open infrastructure and settlement assets. Central banks, regulators and standards bodies define settlement assets, frameworks and interoperability. Competitive intensity is high in 2026 and is expected to consolidate around regulated infrastructures and a small number of institutional platforms by 2030.

Where value migrates.

In 2026 value sits in tokenized fund products, bank collateral platforms and tokenization-as-a-service for issuers. By 2030 it moves to regulated settlement assets, market-infrastructure DLT platforms and cross-ledger interoperability, as custody and post-trade begin migrating. By 2036 it settles in the infrastructures and banks that run the ledgers and settlement assets markets clear on, asset managers with tokenized ranges at scale, and platforms that provide compliance and interoperability across ledgers. Intermediaries whose role was reconciliation between ledgers lose it; platforms without regulatory standing are confined to the margins of institutional markets.

Capital is concentrating in institutional tokenization platforms, custody and interoperability providers, with banks, exchanges and asset managers investing in and acquiring platforms and stablecoin issuers scaling on regulatory clarity. Asset managers are funding tokenized product ranges, and infrastructures are building DLT platforms within modernization programmes. Patent and standards activity is concentrated in atomic settlement, cross-ledger interoperability, programmable compliance and privacy for institutional ledgers. The brief tracks four indicators: tokenized real-world assets on ledger by class, availability of regulated settlement assets by currency, native DLT issuance volume, and custody and post-trade assets migrated to DLT platforms.

North America leads on tokenized funds, treasuries and stablecoin settlement, with the largest asset managers, banks and platforms concentrated there and stablecoin legislation in force. Europe leads on native DLT issuance and pilot regimes, with market infrastructures and the ECB advancing wholesale settlement. Asia-Pacific leads on regulatory programmes and cross-border settlement, with Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan running structured tokenization initiatives and regional banks in production. The Middle East scales with sovereign and exchange-led programmes.