Circle intends to make USDC “the preferred form” of yield-bearing collateral by completely integrating it with USDY.
On March 13, Circle, the business that created the stablecoin USDC USDC$0.9999, declared that it will use its current Digital Assets Business Act (DABA) license to put its Hashnote Tokenized Money Market Fund (TMMF) under Bermuda regulatory supervision.
With a total value locked (TVL) of $900 million, USDY is the largest tokenized treasury and money market fund, issued by Hashnote, which Circle purchased in January 2025, according to DefiLlama. The fund’s TVL has reduced from $1.9 billion as of Jan. 7.
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The release states that Circle plans to completely integrate USDY and USDC, enabling communication between the stablecoin and the TMMF. As a result, the business thinks USDY will become “the preferred form” of yield-bearing collateral on cryptocurrency exchanges, including for brokers and custodians.
One of the earliest legal and regulatory systems for regulating digital assets was implemented in Bermuda, according to Freeman Law. In September 2021, Circle became the first cryptocurrency company to be granted a license by the Bermuda Monetary Authority. Companies operating under Bermuda’s Digital Assets Business Act are currently eligible for three different kinds of licenses.
Colin Butler, head of institutional capital at Polygon, stated in August 2024 that tokenized real-world assets (RWAs) represent a $30 trillion worldwide market opportunity. He thought that since tokenization brings liquidity to previously illiquid markets, the push would probably come from wealthy people who will invest in alternative assets.
Additionally, it was projected in August 2024 that by the end of 2024, tokenized US Treasurys will have a market valuation of over $3 billion. As of this writing, the market value of the tokenized US Treasurys is $4.2 billion, according to RWA.xyz. The platform claims that Hashnote is the second-best protocol for tokenized US Treasurys, despite a 21% decline in market value over the last 30 days.
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At the end of 2024, the total market value of RWAs had topped $15.2 billion, mostly due to institutional participants that launched tokenization initiatives using a variety of real-world commodities, including as carbon credits, gold, diamonds, and real estate. After first recovering an all-time high of $17.1 billion on February 3, the market capitalization has since increased even more, reaching $18.1 billion as of this writing.
Creating liquidity for illiquid assets and using the blockchain to enable transparent and effective transactions are just two of the ways that tokenization is revolutionizing the financial industry. Because it isn’t restricted to just one kind of asset, the technology has many applications.
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