A New Chapter in Compliance Asset Tokenization: xStocks and Its Development Prospects

At the end of June 2025, several well-known cryptocurrency trading platforms launched the xStocks product provided by a Swiss compliance asset tokenization platform. These tokens are backed by real stocks on a 1:1 basis, with the underlying assets held by regulated third-party custodians. Issued as SPL standard tokens on the Solana public chain, xStocks supports round-the-clock trading and on-chain instant settlement, breaking the time and space limitations of the traditional stock market. According to current regulations, this product is currently only available to non-U.S. users.

Project Background and Team

The team behind xStocks was previously involved in a defunct blockchain project. Although the project ultimately did not succeed, the team members gained experience from it and founded a new project in 2021, dedicated to introducing traditional assets into the blockchain ecosystem in a compliant manner. After more than two years of development, the project has achieved key milestones such as feasibility validation, financing, and product launch, with a cumulative issuance scale exceeding $50 million. In April 2024, the project completed nearly $10 million in Series A financing, attracting investment from several well-known institutions.

Product System and Technical Implementation

Currently, the project provides on-chain tokenization securities services covering global blue-chip stocks, index funds, and short-term bonds through its two major product lines, xStocks and bTokens. All tokens have obtained EU Compliance certification and are issued on multiple mainstream public chains, while integrating various DeFi protocols to support diversified on-chain financial strategies.

From a technical perspective, xStocks is essentially a debt structure that tracks underlying assets by issuing bonds. This design allows tokens to be transferred freely like stablecoins, avoiding the complex registration procedures and additional taxes associated with traditional equity transfers. However, this also means that xStocks has certain limitations in handling dividends and corporate actions.

Market Performance and User Experience

Despite the support from well-known trading platforms, the actual trading activity of xStocks remains concentrated on a few popular assets. On the first day of launch, the on-chain trading volume was approximately $1.338 million, which increased to $6.64 million on the second day, but trading was mainly focused on a few tokens. The on-chain trading of most assets is extremely limited, and the issue of insufficient liquidity is common.

Whether it is on-chain transactions or internal exchange trades, xStocks is currently facing challenges of insufficient liquidity, resulting in low transaction efficiency for users and limited market depth. Compared to traditional contract-for-differences platforms, there is still a significant gap in the overall trading experience.

Target Users and Product Advantages

xStocks is primarily aimed at non-US users who find it difficult to access US stocks through traditional channels, especially those in the cryptocurrency space. Its advantages include support for stablecoin payments, small transactions, no need to open a US stock account, 24/7 trading, real asset custody, and EU regulatory compliance.

Future Development Direction

Considering the liquidity bottlenecks in the spot market, the industry has begun to focus on more trading-oriented derivatives pathways, particularly stock perpetual contracts. These products combine high volatility and high leverage mechanisms, which may better align with the trading preferences of crypto users. Meanwhile, the tokenization of equity in unlisted companies is also a potential development direction, promising to provide a more efficient and transparent solution for early equity circulation.

Summary

xStocks provides a viable path for the tokenization of compliant assets, demonstrating strong product design capabilities. However, the limitations of the spot model are also quite evident. In the future, innovations surrounding perpetual derivatives and early-stage equity tokenization may become key to driving the development of the on-chain securities market. Progress in this area is worth continuous attention, as it may open new possibilities for the integration of traditional finance and blockchain technology.