Real-world tokenized assets are showing steady growth despite a bear market — a divergence that experts say reflects capital maturing within crypto rather than fleeing it altogether.
The RWA sector recorded 8.68% growth in the value of distributed assets over the past month, reaching $24.84 billion, according to RWA.xyz.
The value of represented assets, which tracks tokenized assets that cannot move between wallets or leave the issuance platform, remained largely stable, increasing just 0.51% to $372.97 billion.
In contrast, DeFi’s total value locked plunged 25% over the past month to $94.84 billion, according to DeFiLlama data. data.
This decline is the result of almost all major protocols, including Aave, Lido, Eigen Layer, and Binance Staked ETH, seeing double-digit declines over the past 30 days.
Still, the divergence reflects a maturing market where capital is rotating rather than retreating, experts said. Decrypt.
“DeFi yields have been compressed, so lending and staking have declined alongside the market,” said Sergej Kunz, co-founder of 1inch. Decrypt. “At the same time, tokenized treasures offer a 4% on-chain yield with minimal risk. People aren’t leaving the space, they’re entering it in a slightly less risky way.”
In contrast to DeFi’s declining TVL, the distributed asset value of real-world tokenized assets, excluding stablecoins, has shown sustained growth across several sectors.
Tokenized U.S. Treasury debt, commodities, and private credit, with a distributed value of $10.7 billion, $6.9 billion, and $2.9 billion, increased by 10%, 20%, and 15%, respectively, over the past month.
Rotation, rather than exit, drives structural change, according to Rico van der Veen, CEO of Programmable Credit Protocol.
“RWA protocols offer what DeFi never could: enforceable rights, regulatory clarity, and cash flow that is not dependent on token issuances,” he said. Decrypt.
Despite the strong fundamentals of RWA assets, tokens linked to the sector struggled – a dynamic that both experts said was a result of the broader market downturn.
“Prices across the entire market are going down. This is not specific to RWA projects,” Kunz said. “TVL continues to grow, which shows that demand is still there. Sentiment has not yet caught up with the fundamentals. When it does, these projects will likely be re-evaluated very quickly.”
Van der Veen proposed a more generous approach, explaining that the value accrues to the instruments and not the tokens.
“BlackRock’s BUIDL manages over $1.5 billion. This value resides in the fund, not in a governance token,” he said. “Most RWA tokens are still utility tokens with no rights to revenue flowing through the protocol. Adoption and price of the token become permanently decoupled.”
