The trend of the crypto market remains in a downturn today, with the total market value decreased by 3.17% over the past month amid continuous selling pressure. However, one group goes against the trend, which is real assets that have been tokenized (RWA)
The value of decentralized assets continues to increase steadily, reaching an all-time high, even though market conditions are not favorable.
Bitcoin has been sold continuously, while the RWA sector in Thailand has not been significantly affected.
According to data from RWA.xyz, this sector now has a decentralized asset value of 19.06 billion USD, which is an increase of 4.59% compared to the previous month.
Meanwhile, the total value of displayed assets stands at 414.6 billion USD, mainly driven by institutional asset management of the Canton Network, which has reached 395.2 billion USD.
The number of asset holders has also increased, rising by 7.23% to 583,821. Stablecoins still account for a large share of this group, with a total value of 299.17 billion USD and the number of Stablecoin holders at 212.54 million, an increase of 4.12% during the same period.
Kevin Rusher, the founder of RAAC, an ecosystem for lending and borrowing RWA, stated that interest in the crypto market remains focused on the price of Bitcoin, which continues to decline steadily. He noted that recent developments indicate that selling pressure may still persist.
Typically, the majority of interest in the crypto market remains focused on the price of Bitcoin, which continues to drop as if stuck on a slide… The news yesterday that Strategy halted purchases of BTC and moved over 700 million USD into cash indicates that selling is likely to continue. Capital inflows into Bitcoin have also significantly decreased this year compared to last year, standing at 27.2 billion USD compared to 41.6 billion USD in 2024, Rusher said.
Tokenized gold is a key driver of significant growth.
Despite facing broader weakness, Rusher emphasized that selling pressure has not spread to the tokenized RWA segment. He noted that this segment remains overlooked by most of the crypto market, even though it has produced the strongest returns this year.
This growth has been partly driven by the increasing global demand for gold, as gold continues to set new all-time highs, and the tokenized version of gold has also clearly gained strong momentum.
In fact, tokenized gold has increased by 227% from 1 billion USD to over 3.27 billion USD since the beginning of the year, while this category – RWA assets in the commodities group – has become one of the key growth areas this year, starting 2025 with only four gold products but now expanding to 15 products, covering not only gold but also oil, wheat, platinum, soybeans, and others, said one executive.
Additionally, Shehram Khattak, legal advisor at Trust Wallet, also commented that tokenized gold could become a strong competitor to Bitcoin.
We are in a situation where we are starting to think about real-world assets, such as tokenized assets. When you have tokenized gold, and if that tokenization is done correctly, this is significant because Bitcoin is being used as a store of value extensively, and if that is the case, tokenized gold could be a formidable competitor to Bitcoin, he said.
At the same time, Rusher pointed out that the expansion of this industry is driven not only by demand from major institutions but also by an increase in retail investment. He noted that retail investors are turning to stable assets on the blockchain instead of exiting the market entirely during periods of high volatility.
The volatile year we have seen has resulted in this sector becoming robust and a fertile ground for growth, and this is a very positive sign for the overall growth of crypto because RWA will help provide a solid foundation for crypto, meaning liquidity will remain in crypto even during tough times. RWA is truly the future of crypto and deserves more attention, he added.
The Tokenization market could reach 100 billion USD by 2026.
Looking ahead, Jesse Knutson, head of operations at Bitfinex Securities, has predicted that the overall tokenization market will grow by at least 100 billion USD by the end of 2026.
He expects that tokenized debt securities will continue to hold the largest market share in the short term, while tokenized equity will gradually increase its share of the total tokenized assets.
Knutson also added that the continuous tokenization of equity securities is likely to attract more retail investors and help broaden and strengthen the base of tokenized asset investors.
Tokenization will open up opportunities to invest in regulated assets such as retail credit bonds, litigation funding products, or Bitcoin hashrate contracts, which are not available in traditional financial markets. We expect this momentum to continue into 2026 with more alternative assets, new Bitcoin mining-backed debt securities, and tokenized ETFs, he told BeInCrypto.
Previously, Chris Yin, CEO of Plume, predicted a 10-20x expansion in both value and user numbers in 2026, even under a neutral assumption. Therefore, as the RWA sector continues to expand, performance in 2026 is expected to be a key trend to watch.
