The crypto circle is competing with the U.S. stock market, and Ondo quietly takes the lead.

Written by: Ma He, Foresight News

After a deep bear market in the crypto market, no one is picking up the stories of altcoins. In 2026, the hottest story in the investment field is not the seven giants of the U.S. stock market, but in storage. Stocks like Micron Technology have recorded a 10% increase in share price since August 2025.

This epic AI market has created countless new tech tycoons. However, for some investors without channels, issues like setting up a U.S. stock account have always been relatively complex. Now, players in the crypto space have another option: tokenizing U.S. stocks allows them to profit without needing such complicated account information.

The players in tokenized U.S. stocks have indeed entered the market.

Competing Forces for Tokenized U.S. Stocks

As of August this year, according to Token Terminal data, the market for tokenized assets is about to reach $340 billion, with all major categories seeing year-on-year growth over the past three years. Fund value has increased to $34.6 billion, up 56.7%; commodity value has risen to $7.4 billion, up 304%; stablecoin value reached $294.8 billion, an increase of 8.7%; while stocks have reached $2.8 billion, up an astonishing 6292%.

Looking back over the past year, this track has become suffocatingly crowded: just among exchanges, Robinhood, Kraken, and Bybit entered the market in 2025, and in the first half of 2026, Coinbase, Binance, OKX, Bitget, and Backpack all followed suit. The parent company of the New York Stock Exchange, ICE, strategically invested in OKX, and the Deutsche Börse invested $200 million in Kraken. Backpack launched its compliant U.S. stock brokerage "Backpack Securities," providing real U.S. stock trading.

On-chain players like Ondo, xStocks, and bStock are also frantically laying out in the tokenized U.S. stock track.

Multiple forces are competing at the same poker table for chips, while the chips themselves—tokenized Apple, NVIDIA, and S&P ETFs—are visibly transitioning from concept to infrastructure.

The U.S. stock tokenization track is filled with players eager to "quickly realize commercial value." Exchanges are busy converting stocks into internal points, while issuers are focused on releasing prospectuses to issue tokens. However, when everyone is at the same poker table scrambling for chips, Ondo's chips are compliance licenses, DTCC lists, and 190,000 on-chain holders. This is not a business of "selling stocks"; it is laying the foundation for a capital market on the chain.

When extending the timeline, the pace of the U.S. stock tokenization industry over the past year seems unusually dense.

In June 2025, Robinhood launched over 200 U.S. stock and ETF tokens in the European Union, based on Arbitrum, bringing the term "stock token" into the headlines of mainstream financial media for the first time. In September, Ondo Global Markets officially launched, initially offering over 100 assets. In December 2025, Kraken directly acquired the issuer Backed Finance and absorbed xStocks. By June this year, Coinbase launched CFTC-regulated stock index perpetual contracts, entering from the derivatives side; in the same week, Binance launched its self-developed bStocks, and Bitget launched Stocks 2.0. By early August, Dinari completed the symbolic action of selling the tokenized stocks back to Americans themselves.

On the supply side, there is a simultaneous easing of demand and regulation. Citigroup predicts that the size of tokenized securities may reach $5.5 trillion by 2030; the SEC Chairman speaks of an "innovation exemption framework."

The heart of U.S. securities settlement, DTCC, announced in collaboration with Ondo that the first batch of tokenized stocks based on DTC tokenized rights, generated through DTCC's tokenization services, is now available, retaining the same CUSIP codes and abbreviations as the underlying securities. Institutions participating in this plan include BlackRock, JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, Nasdaq, and the New York Stock Exchange.

This positioning was further solidified on September 16—Ondo Finance's subsidiary, Oasis Pro Markets, officially joined the DTCC's Fund/SERV network, becoming the first tokenized company to access this system. Fund/SERV handles over 85% of all mutual fund trading activities in the U.S., and Ondo's access means its tokenized assets are no longer just "shadows on the chain" but can directly interface with the clearing, reconciliation, and distribution systems of traditional fund companies.

The track is no longer about whether it will happen but rather about who will take the largest piece of the pie.

$1 billion, Ondo enters the arena

According to the latest data from DefiLlama, Ondo's total TVL is approximately $3.6 billion, with tokenized U.S. bonds products USDY at about $2.16 billion, Ondo Stocks (tokenized stock business) at about $1.03 billion, and OUSG at approximately $409 million.

Among these, the growth rate for the stock business is the steepest. The trajectory of asset quantity itself speaks volumes: there were only 100 stocks at launch in September 2025, limited to Ethereum; by January 8, 2026, an additional 98 stocks were added. By May 11, TVL surpassed $1 billion, making it the first tokenized stock platform to cross this threshold, having achieved a total trading volume of $18 billion in less than 8 months since launch; by July, when it was renamed Ondo Stocks, the cumulative trading volume had exceeded $26.9 billion, with assets spanning multiple public chains and over 190,000 on-chain holders.

Product pacing is equally intense: in July, Ondo Perps launched Pre-Alpha (up to 20x leverage, tokenized stocks can be used as collateral); that month, the first batch of over 25 high-demand assets achieved round-the-clock real-time minting and redemption (including SPCXon, NVDAon, MUon, QQQon, SPYon, etc.), and all platform assets supported 24/5 minting and redemption, as well as 24/7 permissionless transfers. Trading can also occur based on real market liquidity during weekends and the off-hours of the U.S. stock market, not just revolving on internal exchange ledgers; in the same month, Ondo also granted proxy voting rights for its approximately $700 million stock holdings, transferring traditional broker shareholder rights onto the chain, and by integrating Chainlink for price feeds, allowing stock tokens to enter the DeFi lending market as collateral.

Compliance is paramount. At the end of last year, Ondo acquired Oasis Pro—a firm holding SEC registered broker, ATS (alternative trading system), and transfer agent licenses; in November, the SEC concluded its two-year investigation into Ondo without any charges; this July, Oasis Pro Markets received authorization from FINRA to offer tokenized stocks and funds to institutional and retail investors in the U.S.

According to RWA.xyz data, year on year, the increase is about 400%. The most striking structure is the concentration: the top three issuing platforms account for over 80% of the share—Ondo leads with 34.6%, bStocks holds 24.6%, and xStocks occupies about 22.4%.

Competitors are selling stocks, Ondo is building Wall Street

Amid the hustle and bustle, the players who truly remain at the poker table are of two types: one is making quick money by "selling stocks," and the other is laying the groundwork by "building the market." Ondo belongs to the latter category.

The true advantage of a tokenized stock platform lies in a comprehensive comparison of multiple factors, rather than just quantity.

Ondo has over 440 stocks that are expanded vertically by industry themes—AI, semiconductors, biotech, defense, energy, robotics, and since July, it has also launched a 24/7 trading section specifically for the AI semiconductor supply chain (including AMD, Intel, TSMC, etc.).

xStocks and bStocks focus on large-cap blue chips. In terms of regional coverage, Ondo has connected EU's 30 countries, ADGM, and multiple chains in Asia, while xStocks relies on Kraken's global user base, Robinhood is stuck in the EU, and Dinari is reversing into the U.S. For institutions, deep coverage means they can allocate by industry chain; for retail investors, the differences lie in accessibility, timing, and self-custody.

Retail investors want low barriers, 24/7 access, self-custody, and the ability to enter DeFi as collateral; institutions look for licenses, custody arrangements, continuous information disclosure, and bankruptcy isolation.

The differences between Ondo and its competitors are not in a single metric, but in three structural aspects.

Broad distribution channels. xStocks relies on traffic from Kraken and Bybit, while Robinhood is stuck in its own app, whereas Ondo has flipped this around—Binance (wallet, Alpha, ADGM MTF three lines), Bitget, MetaMask, and others are selling assets issued by Ondo. The CEO of Bitget revealed in a public letter in January that nearly 200 stock tokens on the platform come from collaboration with Ondo and xStocks; stock contracts in the Hyperliquid ecosystem, like trade.xyz, also anchor a large portion to Ondo's tokens. Decoupling issuance from channels allows Ondo to transform its competitors’ distribution networks into its own shelves. This is a direct reason why it has surpassed its competitors in issuance, as well as a point that is hardest to catch up with—channels can be bought with money, but cannot be actively chosen by the channel.

Compliance has shown advantages. Over two years, Ondo's SEC investigation resolved, Oasis Pro acquisition, registration submission, FINRA authorization, and DTCC listing have formed a complete regulatory narrative, each step raising the entry costs for later entrants. Comparisons are clear: Robinhood's public setbacks due to OpenAI and SpaceX token controversies, xStocks' Liechtenstein framework cannot enter the U.S., and Coinbase's stock index perpetual contracts deliberately circumvent the nature of tokenized stocks. While Dinari has already knocked on the door of the U.S. market, Ondo, holding a FINRA authorization, is the closest among offshore players to that door.

From selling products to being a foundation. U.S. bonds are foundational, stocks are the main focus, contracts (Ondo Perps) are an extension, and chain (Ondo Chain) is an incorporation—Ondo is building a full stack for an on-chain capital market, while most competitors are still stuck on single-point SKUs.

Ondo is building on-chain Wall Street, where the significance of a full stack is that assets can mutually nourish each other: stock tokens can serve as contract collateral, U.S. bond tokens can form a settlement layer.

As of August 14, Ondo Perps has surpassed a cumulative trading volume of $8 billion.

xStocks is the more senior player in this round of competition.

Launched on Solana in May 2025, it debuted with about 60 stock tokens, adopting the Liechtenstein prospectus framework, 1:1 pegged to real stocks, supporting 24/7 trading, self-custody, and DeFi composability—almost all subsequent players have copied this product definition. In December 2025, Kraken directly acquired the issuer Backed Finance, vertically integrating issuance and trading; in April 2026, Kraken received a $200 million strategic investment from Deutsche Börse, ensuring ample ammunition. In February 2026, Kraken also launched what is claimed to be the world's first regulated tokenized stock perpetual futures, covering over 110 countries and regions—extending from spot tokens to derivatives, with a strategy similar to that of the later Ondo Perps.

However, the numbers do not look good. On-chain TVL is about $400 million, less than half of Ondo's; although the official cumulative trading volume is claimed to exceed $25 billion, this includes centralized exchange ports from Kraken, and the disparity from the scale of on-chain issuance speaks for itself—most transactions occur on CEX internal ledgers rather than on-chain. The asset quantity has stalled at just over 100, focusing on large-cap blue chips.

Binance's strategy is a dual-track system.

On June 11, 2026, bStocks was launched by BTECH Holdings, with its prospectus approved by Abu Dhabi ADGM’s FSRA, minted on BNB Chain as BEP-20, pegged 1:1, with a minimum investment of $5, available for 24/7 trading. The first batch only had 5 stocks—NVDAB, TSLAB, CRCLB, MUB, SNDKB—by mid-July, it had expanded to over 30, with AUM surpassing $100 million, and margin collateral and Venus lending agreements were accessed. At the same time, Binance also opened up over 7,000 traditional U.S. stock trades to non-U.S. users through Nest Trading brokerage and Alpaca custody.

Currently, its latest data shows that on-chain AUM has risen to $460 million.

The numbers may be small, but no one dares to underestimate this competitor: Binance's user base and distribution capability are unparalleled in the industry. Just on August 13, Binance announced support for users to deposit eligible third-party tokenized stocks and convert them 1:1 into corresponding bStocks, which can be traded 24/7 or redeemed 1:1 for the underlying stocks, effectively directing strong traffic.

Interestingly, Binance is also one of the largest distributors of Ondo. In November 2025, Binance Wallet integrated Ondo's tokenized stocks, providing direct access to hundreds of millions of users. On one side, it develops its own products, while on the other, it sells others’ goods, clearly betting on both sides.

Robinhood is the loudest proponent of stock tokens but has the largest data disparity. It made a splash when it launched in the EU on June 30, 2025, but later faced public setbacks over its private equity token due to denials from OpenAI and SpaceX. By the time of the Consensus 2026 conference, its number of tokenized stocks and ETFs in the EU had expanded to around 2,000, with zero commissions and 24/5 trading.

However, on-chain data tells a completely different story: according to Dune Analytics, as of August 2026, the total on-chain value of Robinhood's tokenized stocks is only about $25 million. The reason lies in its structure—these tokens cannot be transferred out of the platform, and essentially serve as derivative vouchers on Robinhood's internal ledger, with neither self-custody nor DeFi composability. Its backup is the Robinhood Chain, which opened its public testnet in February 2026; real change would only come if assets were migrated there. Until then, it resembles a traditional brokerage labeled with an on-chain tag.

Securitize has a total scale of over $4 billion in tokenized assets, making it the player with the most money under management in the tokenization track, Securitize and Sky currently tie for first, followed by Ondo, Circle, and Franklin, with the bulk being fund products like BlackRock BUIDL, but its market share for stock business is only about 12.40%.

Its real significance lies in being a model: in July 2026, Securitize completed its merger with Cantor Equity Partners II, entering the New York Stock Exchange with the code SECZ and simultaneously issuing "issuer-native" tokenized SECZ shares (circulating on Solana and Avalanche)—not third-party packaged shadow shares, but rather the company putting its own stocks on the chain. However, Q2 financial reports show an unfavorable outlook, with revenues at $14.4 million, down 5% year on year; net losses of $21.7 million, with adjusted EBITDA losses of $5.5 million.

Dinari is the player with the most unique qualifications: the only issuer holding both SEC registered transfer agent and FINRA broker licenses, legally able to serve U.S. investors. In August, its partnership with Circle brought this advantage into its product: U.S. users can self-custody buy 724 dShares with USDC, covering all S&P 500 constituents. Its business has reached over 80 jurisdictions, cumulatively issuing over 6,000 tokenized assets; on July 8, it collaborated with tZERO to build a one-stop brokerage platform, with market-making provided by Flow Traders for 24/7 pricing. The scale is still small, but its positioning—U.S. retail—is precisely the segment that everyone hesitates to touch yet desires.

Bitget Stocks 2.0 is issued by the RWA platform Reality, pegged 1:1, priced in USDT, and dividends are distributed in USDT; currently, its on-chain AUM is only $145 million, a small scale.

The competition of tokenized U.S. stocks is about who can put stocks on-chain in the first half, and who can become the settlement and distribution layer in the second half. Ondo currently sits on the throne, but the poker table is far from reaching a conclusion—Kraken holds the channels, Robinhood has the brand, Dinari holds the ticket to the U.S. market, and Binance possesses a user base that no one can ignore.

In the second half of 2026, the real test will be how wide the door to the domestic American market will open.