Tokenized stocks used to feel like a niche experiment. Something cool, but far away from real adoption. That’s no longer the case.
Today, tokenized equities are moving fast. Across chains. Across platforms. And increasingly away from centralized exchanges.
At the center of this shift are two names: Ondo Global Markets and xStocks. Together, they’re kicking off a quiet but serious race to dominate tokenized stocks in DeFi.
Here’s what’s really happening, and why it matters.
Tokenized stocks are going multichain (and they’re not slowing down)
In 2025, one trend became impossible to ignore: tokenized stocks stopped living on just one blockchain.
xStocks, built by Backed Finance, launched on Solana first. Then it expanded to BNB Chain, Tron, and Ethereum. A TON integration is already on the roadmap.
Ondo Global Markets followed a similar path. It debuted on Ethereum in September, expanded to BNB Chain a month later, and now has bigger ambitions.
Ondo plans to bring 100+ tokenized U.S. stocks and ETFs to:
- Solana
- Its own proprietary blockchain
That’s not testing the waters. That’s scaling.
Centralized exchanges are stuck thinking single-chain
Centralized exchanges like simplicity. One asset. One chain. One setup.
Take Kraken as an example. All xStocks listed there are issued on Solana only.
That works, for now.
But it creates limits. If liquidity, users, or innovation move elsewhere, centralized platforms can’t easily follow.
DeFi doesn’t have that problem.
DeFi moves faster and wider
When tokenized stocks launch on a new chain, they don’t wait long to appear on major DEXs:
- PancakeSwap on BNB Chain
- Jupiter on Solana
- Uniswap on Ethereum
This gives users options. But it also creates a new issue: fragmented liquidity.
Unlike centralized exchanges that rely on institutional market makers, DEXs use automated liquidity pools. Spread those pools across chains, and trades can get messy.
That’s where aggregators come in.
Aggregators are the quiet winners here
On Dec. 11, Bitget Wallet integrated Ondo Global Markets on BNB Chain.
What does that mean in simple terms?
Users get one place to access tokenized stocks. Behind the scenes, the trades route through:
- PancakeSwap
- Uniswap
- Other DEX liquidity sources
No guessing. No hopping between platforms.
It’s a small change, but it removes friction. And friction is what kills adoption.
Why users are choosing DeFi (it’s not ideology)
According to Bitget Wallet CMO Jamie Elkaleh, decentralized platforms are gaining ground for one main reason: access.
Not buzzwords. Not decentralization slogans. Access.
DEXs allow:
- Global participation
- No regional listing restrictions
- No custody requirements
In markets where regulated exchanges can’t list tokenized stocks, DeFi fills the gap instantly.
And there’s more.
On decentralized platforms, tokenized stocks:
- Move across chains
- Plug into DeFi apps
- Stay under user control
That level of flexibility doesn’t exist on custodial platforms.
Centralized exchanges still matter but the trend is clear
Centralized exchanges aren’t disappearing. They still play a huge role in:
- User onboarding
- Institutional access
- Regulatory bridges
But behavior is shifting.
More users want self-custody.
More want portability.
More want assets that work across ecosystems.
As Elkaleh puts it, decentralized access points are increasingly where users hold and interact with tokenized equities.
And once users get comfortable with that freedom, it’s hard to go back.
The bottom line
Tokenized stocks aren’t just entering DeFi.
They’re evolving there.
Ondo and xStocks aren’t competing for attention; they’re competing for infrastructure dominance in a multichain, decentralized future.
And the platforms that win won’t be the ones that move slow and play safe.
They’ll be the ones that meet users where crypto is actually going.
