In the first quarter, the spot trading volume of tokenized gold hit $90.7 billion, surpassing the total for all of 2025 ($84.64 billion). This is reported by CoinGecko.
Source: CoinGecko.Analysts attribute this growth to two factors: strong investor demand and increased availability of such assets on exchanges, primarily centralized ones.
The leading tokens in this segment remain PAXG from Paxos and XAUT from Tether. The monthly trading share of PAXG fluctuated between 34.2% and 82.5%, while XAUT ranged from 14.8% to 64.6%. The average trading volumes for PAXG over the last 15 months were $5.72 billion, and for XAUT, $5.32 billion.
RWA Market Grows More Than Threefold
Over the past 15 months, the total market capitalization of tokenized real-world assets (RWA) has surged by 256.7%, rising from $5.42 billion at the beginning of 2025 to $19.32 billion by March 31, 2026.
This sector now accounts for 6.4% of the stablecoin market, up from 2.7% at the start of last year.
U.S. Treasury bonds continue to lead among categories, with their volume increasing by $9 billion (+225.5%) during the reporting period. However, due to the growth of other asset classes, their share has decreased from 73.7% to 67.2%.
Source: CoinGecko.By the end of the first quarter, tokenized commodities held 28.7% of the RWA market, while stocks accounted for 2.5% and ETFs for 1.5%. CoinGecko noted that the latter two categories are rapidly gaining traction.
The segment of digitized securities emerged in mid-2025 and has since grown from $2.09 million to $486.69 million. The largest asset is Circle, with a market cap of $171.39 million and a 35.2% share. Other notable players include Tesla, Nvidia, Alphabet, and Strategy.
Source: CoinGecko.The spot trading volume for these stocks in the first quarter reached $15.12 billion. However, the trading volumes of the five largest stocks still do not exceed 1% of their traditional counterparts in the stock market.
The market capitalization of tokenized ETFs increased from $620,000 in July 2025 to $297.5 million by the end of the first quarter of 2026. There is no clear leader in this segment: the largest fund, SPDR S&P 500, holds 10.9% of the market, while iShares Silver Trust has 10.7%.
Source: CoinGecko.Perpetual RWA Volumes Hit Record Highs
According to CoinGecko, trading volumes for perpetual contracts on RWA exceeded $524 billion. The total for all of 2025 was $313.02 billion. This marks the fourth consecutive quarter of growth.
Source: CoinGecko.The average daily open interest for these assets reached $4.82 billion, more than five times higher than a year ago.
Nearly 30% of the activity comes from HIP-3 markets on the Hyperliquid exchange, with trading volumes of $130 billion in the first quarter. At the time of the update launch in October 2025, their share was estimated at 2.8%, with trading volumes around $12.6 billion.
It is worth noting that in early April, the International Monetary Fund warned that the growth of the RWA market could amplify risks for the global financial system.