Real-World Asset Tokenization

S&P Global announced on September 17, 2026 that it has acquired OpenZeppelin, the industry standard for smart contract security, in a move that extends the ratings firm's risk-assessment mandate into the technology-risk layer of digital assets. OpenZeppelin's libraries underpin over $37 trillion in cumulative transfers and power 8 of the top 10 stablecoins, including USDC, and 10 of the top 10 tokenized money market funds, such as BlackRock's BUIDL and Franklin Templeton's BENJI. OpenZeppelin will operate as a separate business unit led by CEO Demian Brener, who will report directly to Yann Le Pallec, President of S&P Global Ratings. The deal lands on the same day the SEC granted a 5-year exemption for tokenized NMS stock trading, aligning with the broader GENIUS Act framework, and ahead of the DTCC Tokenization Service launch in October 2026. S&P Global is positioning itself as the gatekeeper of the technical standards regulators are expected to require for tokenized markets.

The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission submitted a regulatory proposal on crypto asset trading and markets to the White House for review on September 17. According to review records published by the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, which operates under the Office of Management and Budget, the item is under review at the "pre-rule stage" and is titled "Regulation of Crypto Asset Trading and Crypto Asset Markets." The public record does not indicate specific draft rules or which entities would be covered, and the submission does not mean a new rule has been finalized. To establish oversight rules for the crypto asset market, the CFTC and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission made Project Crypto a joint effort in January 2026, and in March they published interpretations and guidance on applying federal securities law to crypto assets; this submission is the CFTC's follow-on move toward rulemaking. Meanwhile, the CLARITY Act, which would set the SEC's and CFTC's supervisory scopes in law, has stalled, and the U.S. Senate on September 15 rejected a cloture motion to begin debate by a vote of 49 in favor to 50 against.

Coinbase Global has filed for regulatory approval to list perpetual futures tied to individual large-cap U.S. stocks, opening the door to 24/7 leveraged trading of shares such as Apple, Microsoft, Tesla and Nvidia on a regulated U.S. platform. The exchange plans to offer contracts linked to roughly 50 to 60 major stocks, with trading potentially starting later this year if regulators approve the products, according to The Wall Street Journal. Coinbase submitted a Form 1-N to the Securities and Exchange Commission earlier this month, a filing that allows Coinbase Derivatives to register with the SEC as a national securities exchange for security futures products. The move follows Coinbase's push to expand perpetual futures beyond crypto; the exchange launched stock perps for eligible customers outside the U.S. in March, and earlier this month launched regulated crypto derivatives for eligible Canadian traders, offering 23 crypto futures tied to assets including Bitcoin, Ether and Solana, alongside futures for gold, silver, oil and the COIN50 index. U.S. regulators have also taken steps this year to open the market to perpetual contracts, with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission approving a bitcoin perpetual futures contract submitted by Kalshi on May 29 and saying market participants could seek approval for other perpetual products. Coinbase is not alone in seeking to bring the products into the U.S. regulated market, as Kalshi has also moved toward offering single-stock perpetual futures.

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission submitted its crypto market rulemaking to the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs on September 17, 2026, just two days after the Senate rejected the CLARITY Act by a narrow vote of 49 to 50. The filing, identified on Reginfo.gov as RIN 3038-AF80 and titled Regulation of Crypto Asset Transactions and Crypto Asset Markets, sits at the prerule stage, meaning it is an advance notice of a proposed rule rather than a rule exchanges can currently comply with, and its contents remain confidential while under review. Chairman Michael Selig, confirmed as the agency's 15th chairman on December 18, 2025, said on the day of the Senate vote that the agency was locked in and ready to ship rules, and his plan would create a new designated contract market category, a crypto asset market, allowing both current registrants and non-registrant crypto exchanges to offer leveraged or margined crypto trading under CFTC oversight without Congressional action. The process still requires two comment periods and two OIRA reviews, with Executive Order 12866 giving the White House up to 90 days plus a one-time 30-day extension, so publication could come in November or December 2026, a proposed rule in 2027, and a final binding rule potentially not in effect until late 2027. JPMorgan analysts noted on September 16 that agency rules are less durable than legislation because a future Commission could revise them and anyone with standing can challenge them in court under the Administrative Procedure Act, a concern relevant to XRP, which was among 18 digital assets classified as digital commodities in the March 17 joint interpretation by the SEC and CFTC, while Bitcoin's market structure rather than its status would change. The rule cannot grant the CFTC full authority over the spot market for digital commodities, which was central to the CLARITY Act and would require an act of Congress.

CFTC staff on Thursday issued a no-action letter making it easier for apps to offer prediction markets without registering as brokers, expanding a model already used by Phantom. The relief lets qualifying "passive software" providers offer access to regulated derivatives, including prediction markets, while receiving a share of trading revenue or charging users transaction-based fees, provided they do not hold customer assets, generate buy or sell signals or control how trades are executed. The relief is temporary and lasts until the CFTC issues a rule or other guidance on broker registration for software developers. The agency first tested the model with crypto wallet Phantom, which offers prediction markets powered by Kalshi to its more than 20 million users and received individual no-action relief in March; Thursday's letter makes similar relief broadly available to other software providers that meet the agency's conditions. Robinhood generated $156 million from event contracts in the second quarter, more than its $129 million from equities or $100 million from cryptocurrency trading, and its Robinhood Derivatives unit can hold customer funds for derivatives trading, while Rothera, its exchange and clearinghouse joint venture with Susquehanna International Group, contributed $17 million of second-quarter event-contract revenue. Coinbase Global occupies a similar position, with its Coinbase Financial Markets subsidiary operating the brokerage behind Coinbase's U.S. prediction-market offering.

The Stellar Development Foundation announced on the 17th that it has launched a new protocol upgrade, "Adapter" (Protocol 28), on the mainnet. It is a major update centered on developer-focused improvements, implementing several Core Advancement Proposals, or CAPs. One of the highlights, CAP-83, allows validators to begin voting without waiting to fully receive a transaction set, speeding up consensus processing and expected to boost throughput during congestion. CAP-85 introduces a mechanism to update large numbers of deployed smart contracts in bulk, so that simply updating a shared code reference updates all contracts simultaneously, eliminating the risk of partial inconsistencies. CAP-86 is a new feature that makes contract updates and data migration easier, adding a new "sparse" host function that does not raise errors even when fields are missing or extra, allowing developers to safely proceed with schema changes. With these improvements, Stellar evolves into a developer-friendly platform suited to practical financial applications, without sacrificing its speed and low cost.

The Canary Staked TRX ETF, trading under the ticker TRXS on NASDAQ, has launched as one of the newest single-token crypto funds that pass through on-chain staking yield to shareholders, giving conventional brokerage accounts exposure to Tron without wallet, custody, or exchange friction. With only six trading days of history and a most recent close of $24.80 on September 16, 2026, the fund is too young to judge on trailing returns, so the first quarterly distribution notice will be the single most informative document, revealing the effective net staking APR versus Tron's advertised network staking rate. The dominant macro driver is the health of the Tron network itself, where weekly USDT transfer volume and the active staked TRX ratio determine both token demand and the staking rewards that fund distributions. Layered on top is the SEC's evolving stance on staking-inclusive crypto ETFs, with any enforcement signal or amended exemptive order flowing directly through to the fund's distribution profile. Two early-stage mechanics also matter: tracking error to TRX spot, which can widen around weekend crypto market opens when the ETF is closed, and bid-ask spreads on this new low-AUM fund, which can erode a quarter or more of expected annual yield if investors trade at market rather than using limit orders.

Crypto.com has been authorized to bring single-stock futures to the market, CEO Kris Marszalek said in a post on X. The company is working with the SEC and the CFTC to offer single-stock perps in the US. Earlier this month, media reports said Robinhood Markets is expanding its prediction-markets business through a multiyear partnership with Crypto.com, bringing yes-or-no event contracts to its trading app.

Circle, the major US stablecoin issuer, announced on September 16 that it has launched the mainnet of Arc, its underlying layer-1 blockchain. Arc is designed so that transaction processing fees are paid in the dollar-denominated stablecoin USDC, with settlements finalized in under one second, and it also offers security features for institutional investors such as confidential transactions and quantum-resistant signatures. The founding validators that approve transactions include 11 companies, among them BlackRock, the US DTCC, Visa, Mastercard, SBI Group, and Sumitomo Corporation. Arc is linked to StableFX, a foreign exchange platform that exchanges multiple currencies around the clock, and JPYC, the company issuing the Japanese yen stablecoin JPYC, is also listed as a participating partner currency. By the 16th, Circle had completed the issuance of an initial supply of 10 billion of its own token, ARC, and aims to migrate to proof of stake around 2027, saying it is the world's first listed company to issue its own token on a new layer-1.

The US Securities and Exchange Commission and the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission indicated separately on September 16 that they will use their existing legal authority to advance rulemaking on crypto assets. On September 15, the US Senate held a cloture vote to begin consideration of the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, a bill aimed at building a comprehensive federal framework to regulate the crypto industry, but the vote was 49 in favor and 50 against, falling short of the 60 votes needed. As a result, the focus of US crypto regulation may shift from Congress to the regulators. SEC Chairman Paul Atkins said on X that regardless of whether legislation is enacted, the SEC will "act resolutely" within the scope of its legal authority, and expressed his intention to provide regulatory certainty to US investors and the entrepreneurs driving technological innovation. CFTC Chairman Michael Selig also called the Senate vote result "unfortunate," stressed that the crypto market needs regulatory clarity, legal certainty, and consumer protection, and indicated a policy of advancing rulemaking using existing legal authority, saying "we are ready to publish rules for a new frontier in finance."

Federal prosecutors in Manhattan have charged two former Robinhood engineers with front-running crypto listings, sending Robinhood shares down 5% to $105.1 and Webull shares down 9% to $7.92. The U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York announced charges against Hefu Chai and Huaisong Xiang, each facing one count of violating the Commodity Exchange Act; prosecutors allege the two bought perpetual futures tokens on the decentralized exchange Hyperliquid ahead of Robinhood's public announcements that the underlying tokens would be listed on Robinhood Crypto. U.S. Attorney Jamie McDonald said each is alleged to have profited more than $50,000. Robinhood itself is not accused of wrongdoing, and the sell-off reflects broker-specific regulatory and reputational risk rather than a broader crypto move, with the iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF down 0.6% to $42.86 and the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust up 0.4% to $760.33. The Senate's failure to advance the CLARITY Act digital asset bill in a procedural vote on Tuesday had already pressured crypto-linked equities before the charges landed.

The US Senate voted down a motion to end debate and advance the CLARITY Act by a margin of 49 to 50 on Tuesday, falling short of the 60 votes needed, after Democrats raised concerns about President Donald Trump's crypto investments, stalling the key bill designed to set a regulatory framework for digital assets. Crypto industry leaders are now looking to US financial regulators to fill the regulatory gap, viewing rulemaking from the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission as the next best source of regulatory clarity. Brad Garlinghouse, chief executive of Ripple, said the SEC under Chairman Atkins and the CFTC under Chairman Selig will continue to work hard to issue rules that fill the legal gaps. SEC Chairman Paul Atkins pledged at the Solana Policy Institute Summit on Monday to deliver clearer crypto rules with or without legislative support. Abhishek Vaidyanathan, chief legal officer of NEAR, sees the next Congress as the next opportunity to address crypto market structure, after Senator Thom Tillis filed a motion to reconsider the failed effort on Tuesday. Meanwhile, the odds on Polymarket that the CLARITY Act will be signed into law in 2026 fell to 5% on Tuesday, the lowest probability since the market opened for trading in January.

The US Senate failed to pass a motion to end debate on the Digital Asset Market Clarity bill, or CLARITY Act, the legislation that would establish the country's first regulatory framework for digital assets. The motion drew 49 votes in favor and 50 against, falling just short of the 60 votes needed to advance the bill to debate on the Senate floor. With fewer than 36 working days left before 2027, when the new Congress is scheduled to be sworn in following November's midterm elections, the bill is likely to see no further action for the remainder of the year, leaving the question of US crypto regulation unresolved, including the respective oversight roles of the CFTC and the SEC. The bill had been stalled since before Congress's August recess over ethics provisions proposed to bar public officials and their families from issuing digital assets or profiting from them while in office. Although President Donald Trump agreed to accept most bipartisan proposals to tighten those restrictions ahead of Tuesday's vote, fresh opposition emerged on Monday from the attorneys general of 18 states, who argued the bill would weaken states' ability to crack down on fraud and corruption in the crypto industry. After the procedural vote, digital asset prices fell, with Bitcoin briefly dropping below $75,000, down more than 5% on the day, according to data from CoinMarketCap.

Bitcoin fell as much as 4.9% on Tuesday from Monday's high of nearly $80K after the Clarity Act failed to advance out of committee, with the largest cryptocurrency by market cap sliding to $76.1K Tuesday afternoon, down 2.7% over the past 24 hours, and a low of the day of $75.7K against Monday's high of $79.6K. Ethereum, the second-largest digital token by market cap, dropped 4.5% to $2.40K at about 3:05 PM ET. The odds of the Clarity Act becoming law before Jan. 1, 2027, slid to 7.7% at about 3:45 PM ET from as high as 39% at 7:27 AM ET, after a procedural vote to advance the bill to the Senate floor for a full vote failed Tuesday afternoon, with major sticking points including ethics over legislators and the president profiting from stablecoins and other digital assets and whether platforms should be allowed to pay interest on stablecoin holdings. Vladimir Tikhomirov, founder of Theorem and co-founder of Algebra, said the development was a setback but "doesn't change the direction of the crypto market either, as prices are still too heavily dependent on rates, dollar liquidity, and macro conditions," adding that the RWA market remains in an uncertain position with no regulatory blueprint for how these assets can be traded, how liquidity is formed around them, and how investors can actually exit their positions. Crypto stocks slumping the most in Tuesday trading included Circle Internet at -10%, Coinbase Global at -9.5%, Gemini Space Station at -7.3%, and Bakkt at -6.9%, while crypto mining stocks also dipped, with Riot Platforms at -5.5%, CleanSpark at -4.6%, Core Scientific at -4.0%, Hut 8 at -4.2%, and IREN at -3.6%.

The Digital Frontier Finance Parliamentary League, a caucus of lawmakers within Japan's Liberal Democratic Party, is expected to begin studying how to handle "prediction markets," where participants trade on forecasts of future events such as election results and economic indicators, according to party officials interviewed by NADA NEWS. The caucus was established in 2023 by developing and dissolving the Commodity Futures Trading Promotion Parliamentary League, which had worked to promote commodity futures trading, and includes online banks, securities firms, and crypto asset exchanges among its participants. In prediction markets, Kalshi and Polymarket of the United States are the leading players, with monthly trading volume reaching the tens of billions of dollars, and some forecasts see the market hitting 1 trillion dollars by 2030. On the other hand, the New York State Attorney General filed suit on April 21, arguing that the prediction market services of Coinbase and Gemini are illegal gambling that violates state law, and sought a total of 3.4 billion dollars in damages. In Japan as well, at the House of Councillors Finance and Monetary Affairs Committee on April 21, opposition Democratic Party for the People Councillor Shuichi Harada raised prediction markets in the Diet for the first time, and Toshitake Inoue, Director-General of the Financial Services Agency's Planning and Markets Bureau, said the agency currently has no regulatory law covering them, adding that given the risk they could be regarded as gambling, "we need to respond with extreme caution." Under current law, a mechanism in which people stake their own funds and vie for gains or losses of property depending on the outcome cannot be ruled out as falling under the criminal offense of gambling, so the barriers to introducing or expanding such businesses remain high. Still, a party official said it is highly significant that an LDP parliamentary caucus has decided to treat prediction markets as one of its discussion topics, and revealed that executives from Kalshi and Polymarket are planning to visit Japan soon.

Anthropic launched "Claude for Financial Advisors," a suite of tools for financial advisors, on Monday, September 14, connecting the Claude chatbot to the investment data analytics and wealth management software of leading firms including BlackRock, Charles Schwab, and Addepar. The toolset helps advisors prepare information ahead of client meetings, review investment portfolios, and follow up on tasks after meetings. It also connects to the data and software of Envestnet, iCapital, Orion, Wealthbox, Wealth.com, and SS&C. The launch comes just days after OpenAI introduced a version of ChatGPT for the financial sector aimed at investment bankers and securities analysts, with tools for financial research, building financial models, and preparing client presentations. This expansion into the financial services sector builds on tools Anthropic has developed from its Claude AI model to support investment research, portfolio analysis, financial modeling, and client documentation. Meanwhile, the speed and cost of AI development are drawing increasing scrutiny, with industry leaders beginning to question whether companies can continue to bear costs at this level and how quickly the technology should advance, amid concerns about misuse of AI.