🌑 BlackRock Make History Investing in its 1st Tokenised Bond

Sunday is here.

Welcome back to another newsletter from us at The Merge.

Tokenisation News

🌑 BlackRock Muni ETF uses blockchain to Buy Bonds

🪙 Ripple Labs’ Stablecoin RLUSD Officially Launched

🔗 IX Swap Integrates LINE app, Making RWA Tokens Accessible to 200M+ Users

Read Time: 6 Minutes

Global Market Overview

Real World Assets on-chain (excl stablecoins) are worth $14.47 billion (↑7.22% from last month).

There are 80,363 Total Asset Holders (↑2.32% from last month).

• $202.77b is in Stablecoins

• $9.54b is within Private Credit

• $3.38b is in US Treasury Debt

• $1.04b is in Commodities

• $115.15m is in Global Bonds

• $11.84m is in Stocks

The top 3 networks are 🥇Ethereum ($121.3b in Total Value Locked) 🥈Tron ($60.9b in TVL) &🥉Binance Smart Chain ($6.19b in TVL).

Fancy taking a look for yourself? Check it out here.

So, what’s being tokenised this week?

Private Credit

Currently, there are $9.54 billion in active-value loans and $16.1 billion in total loan value across all protocols.

As of today, the top 3 current protocols with outstanding loans are 🥇Figure ($8.9b)🥈Maple Finance ($270m) &🥉Centrifuge ($81m).

🔗 IX Swap Integrates LINE app, Making RWA Tokens Accessible to 200M+ users

IX Swap, a decentralised exchange specialising in Real-World Asset (RWA) tokens, has partnered with LINE, one of Asia's most popular super apps with over 200 million active users.

This integration allows LINE users to easily invest in tokenised assets such as real estate, fine art, and other high-value items directly within the app.

With investment entry points as low as $10, the partnership aims to make traditionally exclusive assets accessible to a much wider audience.

By leveraging LINE's massive user base and seamless interface, IX Swap democratises access to investment opportunities while boosting liquidity for tokenized assets.

Stablecoins

Currently, the market cap of stablecoins is $202.77 billion (↑9.46% from last month).

As of today, it makes up 0.97% (↑9.46% from last month) of all M2 Money Supply with Monthly Transfer Volume totalling $2.32 trillion (↑13.83% from last month).

The top 3 current entities are 🥇Tether ($139.8b)🥈Circle ($41.3b) &🥉Ethena ($6.01b).

Top stories this week?

🪙 Ripple Labs’ Stablecoin RLUSD Officially Launched

Ripple has officially launched its new USD-backed stablecoin, RLUSD, which is now available on global exchanges as of December 17, 2024.

Each RLUSD token is fully backed by U.S. dollar deposits, government bonds, and cash equivalents, ensuring both stability and liquidity.

Ripple will provide monthly, third-party attestations of RLUSD’s reserve assets to build trust and transparency. Initially, the stablecoin is available on platforms like Uphold, Bitso, MoonPay, Archax, and CoinMENA, with plans to expand to more exchanges.

Commodities

Currently, the market cap of commodities is $1.04b (↓1.5% from last month).

As of today, the Monthly Transfer Volume totals $275m (↓8.82% from last month) with 58.4k addresses that are current holders.

The top 3 current entities are 🥇Paxos ($516.69m)🥈Tether ($508.3m) & 🥉Comtech Gold ($11.36m).

Bonds

Currently, the total value of bonds is $115.15m (↑2.36% from last month)

As of today, the Average Yield to Maturity is 0%. There are 585 Holders (↓4.1% from last week).

The top 3 current entities are 🥇Spiko ($88.60m)🥈 Backed Finance ($20.18m)🥉 OpenTrade ($6.37m).

Top stories this week?

🌑 BlackRock Muni ETF uses blockchain to Buy Bonds

BlackRock, the world’s largest ETF issuer, has become the first to use blockchain for municipal bond transactions through JPMorgan’s Kinexys Digital Assets platform.

Its Short Maturity Municipal Bond ETF (MEAR) purchased $6.5 million of Quincy, Massachusetts bonds, marking the first U.S. municipal bond sale settled on a blockchain.

This move highlights BlackRock’s embrace of blockchain for efficiency and speed, aligning with its broader tokenisation strategy, which includes the BlackRock USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund.

Once sceptical of crypto, the firm now manages the largest Bitcoin ETF globally, reflecting a significant shift in its approach to digital assets.

BlackRock views blockchain as a transformative force in capital markets, with the potential to reshape the lifecycle of financial instruments.

Stocks

Currently, the total value of stocks is $11.84m (↓1.1% from last week).

As of today, the Monthly Transfer Volume totals $7.46m (↑697.9% from last month🔥) with 124 Active Addresses and 879 Current Holders.

The top 3 current entities are 🥇Coinbase Global ($5.8m)🥈iShares Core S&P 500 ($3.4m) &🥉Nvidia ($1.34m).

Weekly Resource List

👻 Phantom Wallet: Beginner-Friendly Wallet

Multiple chains, one wallet. No need for switching. Seamlessly access the largest NFT marketplaces. A multi-chain wallet that helps you explore web3, use apps, and buy, store, and trade crypto and NFTs across Solana, Ethereum, and Polygon. (link) 

💳 Coinbase Wallet: The Crypto Wallet of Choice

You’ve more than likely heard and probably used Coinbase, so no introduction is needed. This is by far one of the easiest and non-crypto native wallets to be picked up and used by anyone. They even have a ‘Simple Mode’ for beginners. (link) 

🌐 RWA.xyz: On-Chain RWA Analytics

Explore tokenised real-world assets and the investors, issuers and service providers participating in public blockchains. View protocol statistics, industry aggregate metrics, and the issuers all in one place (link)

🔎 Santiment: Crypto Intelligence Tool

A behaviour analytics platform for crypto, sourcing on-chain, social and development information on thousands of coins, including market signals. For RWA’s insights check out this (link) 

As always, thanks for reading.

Vote below and let us know your thoughts this week —we’d love to hear from you.

See you next Sunday,

Merge