Standard Chartered: Tokenization Could Drive DeFi Assets to $27 Trillion by 2030, a 37x Growth

June 15: Standard Chartered Bank projects in its latest research report that total value locked (TVL) in Decentralized Finance (DeFi) will hit roughly $2.7 trillion by 2030—an approximate 37x jump from current levels. The report attributes this growth primarily to two key drivers: the tokenization of Real World Assets (RWA) and the migration of crypto-native assets to on-chain protocols. Geoff Kendrick, Standard Chartered’s Head of Digital Assets Research, stated that the next wave of structural growth opportunities for digital assets will stem from DeFi protocols, with the share of tokenized assets entering the DeFi ecosystem expected to climb from around 3.5% today to roughly 30% by 2030. Current data shows only about 3% of stablecoins and 10% of tokenized real-world assets are actually utilized in DeFi protocols, highlighting significant untapped potential. The report emphasizes that hitting the $2.7 trillion target hinges on rapid expansion of tokenized asset volumes and a major improvement in on-chain capital efficiency. Previously, Standard Chartered forecasted that by 2028, the tokenized value of non-stablecoin real-world assets would reach $2 trillion, with money market funds and U.S. equities accounting for a large portion. On the infrastructure front, the report notes that decentralized trading protocols like Uniswap could become critical trading hubs for tokenized assets. It also points out that traditional financial institutions entering the on-chain market will place greater emphasis on security and stability. However, analysts caution that tokenization does not automatically lead to increased liquidity. Fragmentation across different blockchains and asset standards may still limit market depth and the ability to set uniform prices.