In the past, those who traded U.S. stocks did not understand why the crypto market was so booming; now, those who trade cryptocurrencies are beginning to wonder why U.S. stocks with a crypto label keep rising.

In July, under the blazing sun, the summer crypto scene welcomed a wave of tokenization of U.S. stocks.

Robinhood announced with great fanfare that European users could trade U.S. stocks on the Arbitrum chain 24/7; xStocks partnered with Kraken and Solana to launch on-chain tokens for 60 popular U.S. stocks, and Coinbase also applied to the SEC to launch tokenized securities…

In an instant, the tokenization of U.S. stocks became one of the few narratives that resonated in the otherwise dull crypto space, and this wave has taken over everyone's timeline.

But this is not the first time for the tokenization of U.S. stocks.

Old memories began to attack me again, making me nostalgic for that summer five years ago.

In August 2020, the summer of DeFi swept through the crypto space like a raging fire, with Uniswap's liquidity mining igniting fervor, Terra's Luna chain and UST soaring, and on-chain finance actually making many innovations, including the tokenization of U.S. stocks.

At that time, there was a protocol on Luna called Mirror, where I minted mAAPL (the token corresponding to Apple stock) using a few dollars of UST on Terra Station, without KYC, without opening an account, for the first time bypassing brokers to touch the pulse of Apple's stock price.

But there is a lyric that perfectly describes the feelings of old investors after experiencing all this:

"You left a clamor in my life, but after you left, it was terrifyingly quiet."

Luna eventually collapsed, and Mirror was crushed by the SEC's lawsuit, shattering the dreams of 2020. Aside from transaction hashes, it seems there is nothing to prove that tokenized U.S. stocks existed five years ago in the summer.

Now, xStocks and Robinhood are making a comeback, reigniting hope for on-chain U.S. stocks. Will this time be successful? What is different compared to five years ago?

That Summer of Mirror's Free Utopia

If you don't remember the Mirror Protocol, or if you weren't in the space at that time, let me help you recall those distant memories.

The core idea of the Mirror Protocol was: to use on-chain synthetic assets to track the stock prices of U.S. stocks in the real world. This gave birth to a type of asset called mAssets.

The so-called "synthetic assets" mAssets are tokens that simulate stock prices through smart contracts and oracle services. Holders do not own actual stocks; they merely act as "shadows on the chain" to track price fluctuations.

For example, mAAPL (Apple), mTSLA (Tesla), mSPY (S&P 500 ETF) rely on Band Protocol's decentralized oracles to obtain real-time U.S. stock data.

Although this differs from directly buying U.S. stocks, it excels in convenience:

Minting mAssets is simple; using the stablecoin UST on the Terra chain, you can over-collateralize 150%-200% and obtain the corresponding tokenized stocks on Terra Station without KYC, with transaction fees of only about $0.1.

These tokens could not only be traded 24/7 on Terraswap (the DEX of Terra at that time), as flexibly as Uniswap's token pairs, but could also be used as collateral in another lending protocol within the ecosystem, Anchor Protocol, for borrowing or earning interest.

You could enjoy the growth benefits of U.S. publicly traded companies while leveraging the flexibility of on-chain finance; it seemed that DeFi five years ago had already figured out the tokenization of U.S. stocks.

But the good times did not last long; that summer's dream shattered unexpectedly.

In May 2022, a well-known black swan event hit the crypto space. Terra's algorithmic stablecoin UST depegged, Luna plummeted from $80 to a few cents, and mAssets were wiped out overnight, with Mirror nearly coming to a halt.

To make matters worse, the U.S. SEC intervened, accusing mAssets of being unregistered securities, and Terraform Labs and its founder Do Kwon became mired in lawsuits.

From "Hold on tight, folks" to "Sorry, we failed," the collapse of the Terra system also made the tokenization of U.S. stocks disappear from the on-chain landscape. While reflecting and reminiscing, one could also see its fatal weaknesses:

Synthetic assets severely relied on oracles and the stability of UST, with no actual stocks backing them; the collapse of the underlying would render the upper-layer assets illusory. Moreover, while anonymous trading attracted users, it inevitably brushed against regulatory red lines; the regulatory environment and policies at that time were far from as open and lenient as today.

The fragility of synthetic assets, the risks of stablecoins, and the lack of regulation led to a painful price for this experiment.

What’s Different This Time?

Just because it didn't succeed back then doesn't mean it won't succeed now.

The summer of 2020 has passed, and this time, Kraken, Robinhood, and Coinbase, armed with more mature technology and a compliant stance, are attempting to rewrite the story.

As an old player who witnessed the summer of DeFi, I can't help but compare: what exactly is different this time compared to Mirror five years ago?

We might look at it from three aspects: products, participants, and market environment.

• Products: From On-Chain Shadows to Real Anchors

As mentioned earlier, tokens like mAAPL and mTSLA were merely "on-chain shadows" simulated by smart contracts, without holding actual stocks, only simulating price fluctuations.

Now, xStocks has taken a different path. xStocks is managed by regulated brokers, ensuring the cash value of stocks purchased can be redeemed.

The tokenization process for U.S. stocks is operated by Backed Assets, a token issuer registered in Switzerland, responsible for purchasing and tokenizing assets.

It buys stocks, such as Apple or Tesla, through Interactive Brokers' IBKR Prime channel (a professional brokerage service connecting to the U.S. stock market), then transfers the assets to Clearstream (the custodian of Deutsche Börse) for isolated storage, ensuring that each token corresponds 1:1 to actual holdings and undergoes legal audits.

In short, every on-chain purchase you make is anchored by a real stock purchase behind it.

(Image source: X user @_FORAB)

Additionally, xStocks allows token holders to redeem actual stocks through Backed Assets, a feature that allows it to break free from Mirror's purely on-chain speculative framework, connecting on-chain and off-chain.

• Participants: From DeFi Natives to TradFi Integration

The stage of Mirror belonged to DeFi native players. Retail investors and developers from the Terra community were the main force, and discussions on Discord and Twitter drove the popularity of mAssets. The success of Mirror was inseparable from the Luna and UST boom in the Terra ecosystem, and the community's experimental spirit made it shine like a comet.

This also makes one sigh that the era of adults has changed.

In this wave of tokenization of U.S. stocks, the main players are traditional financial giants and compliant enterprises within the crypto space.

For example, xStocks is provided by Kraken as a compliant platform, Robinhood brings traditional brokerage experience to the on-chain world, and BlackRock's tokenization pilot further signifies institutional entry.

The DeFi ecosystem of Solana (such as Raydium and Jupiter) indeed adds vitality to xStocks, allowing retail investors to use tokens for liquidity mining or lending, retaining some DeFi genes.

But compared to the community-driven Mirror, xStocks feels more like a grand production directed by exchanges and TradFi giants: larger in scale, less wild.

• Market and Regulatory Environment: From Gray Areas to Compliance as King

Mirror in 2020 was born in a regulatory gray area. The summer of DeFi was almost indifferent to compliance, and anonymous trading was the default rule of the community. In 2022, the SEC deemed mAssets as unregistered securities, and Terraform Labs became embroiled in lawsuits, with anonymity becoming a fatal flaw.

At that time, the market was small, and DeFi felt more like a testing ground for a group of geeks.

The market and regulatory environment in 2025 are completely different. Projects like xStocks prioritize compliance, enforcing KYC/AML, and adhering to EU MiCA regulations and U.S. securities laws.

After the Trump administration took office in January 2025, SEC's new chairman Paul Atkins referred to tokenization as "the digital revolution in finance," and lenient policies are loosening the reins on innovation. In June 2025, Dinari obtained the first U.S. brokerage license for tokenized stocks, further paving the way for Kraken and Coinbase.

The embrace of mainstream finance and changes in the market environment have allowed xStocks and Robinhood to avoid the legal pitfalls that Mirror faced, but it also seems to have stripped on-chain U.S. stocks of the grassroots flavor of the past.

The Echoes of Summer

The crypto space has changed over the years, yet it seems unchanged.

Five years ago, the tokenization of U.S. stocks in DeFi felt like an unrefined carnival, full of passion but lacking stability. Today, crypto has donned the cloak of compliance, walking a steadier path, yet it has lost some of its spontaneity and wild spirit.

Similar products, different circumstances.

As more people view BTC as digital gold, as institutions are gearing up, and as crypto gradually becomes a tool for boosting the stock prices of traditional capital markets, two waves of people, both inside and outside the crypto space, may have inadvertently completed a transformation of questions:

In the past, those who traded U.S. stocks did not understand why the crypto market was so booming; now, those who trade cryptocurrencies are beginning to wonder why U.S. stocks with a crypto label keep rising.

Only that summer, that fervor where everyone rushed to participate, that omnipresent wildness and geek spirit, may have long since vanished with the wind.

免责声明：本文章仅代表作者个人观点，不代表本平台的立场和观点。本文章仅供信息分享，不构成对任何人的任何投资建议。用户与作者之间的任何争议，与本平台无关。如网页中刊载的文章或图片涉及侵权，请提供相关的权利证明和身份证明发送邮件到support@aicoin.com，本平台相关工作人员将会进行核查。