Narrative
RWA (Real World Assets) literally means real-world assets. Its value lies in building a bridge between traditional assets and the Web 3 world to realize the digital presentation of real assets, which can effectively utilize or dispatch real assets (such as real estate, artworks, etc.) and improve the liquidity of assets. And with the combination of RWA and blockchain technology, RWA can transcend geographical restrictions. Regardless of geographical location, monetary system or other influencing factors, through the combination of the two, users can easily complete transactions or other use of assets. When it comes to RWA, people often think of real estate, stocks, etc., and from the basic characteristics of RWA tokenization, stablecoins are also products in the RWA track. It seems that RWA is closer to us. This is also another level of narrative of RWA, namely "inclusiveness", which can enable investors who do not have enough capital to enter high-value markets to invest in high-value markets in disguised form by investing in corresponding high-value RWA tokenized products.
What does the future hold?
Over the past year, the overall TVL of RWA has shown a fluctuating upward trend. During this cycle, RWA, AI, and MEME are among the more popular sectors. RWA has always been one of the more closely watched sectors.
Image source: https://defillama.com/protocols/RWA
In the future, it is highly likely that RWA will continue the trend. The combination of RWA and DeFi sectors may attract more and more investors' attention. In fact, high-value assets like real estate and commodities face settlement difficulties in transactions, and the relevant laws and regulations in different countries also vary significantly. Therefore, projects related to such high-value assets are likely to be constrained in development by implementation and regulation. Thus, for projects in the RWA sector to achieve better development, there must be significant progress in PayFi or cross-border settlement regulation and RWA asset certification, rather than relying on third parties for clearing or certification as is often the case now. Furthermore, regarding stablecoin-related RWA projects, they tend to be relatively stable, with the mainstream market likely still dominated by the US dollar, followed by the euro and others. However, in the future, these types of projects may see differentiation by country/region, meaning that 'investors in a certain country/region basically choose a certain type of stablecoin.' In such cases, stablecoins that obtain local regulatory licenses can seize the market. The last trend is likely to be that the anchor assets of stablecoins, such as bonds, securities, stocks, or funds, may see more products and projects emerge in the future. The reason for this is that, as mentioned earlier, settlement and regulation have advantages over assets like real estate. However, in the early future, only projects involving institutions (like BlackRock) that hold certain influence in traditional finance may generate considerable economic benefits. After that, projects involving more influential organizations in the web3 space may emerge with community cultural characteristics.
Project
Below is an overview of recent financing projects, provided for discussion from an objective perspective.
OpenTrade
OpenTrade was established at the end of 2022 and is headquartered in London, UK. Its investors include a16z CSX, Circle, Draper Dragon, CMCC Global, Ryze Labs, Polygon, and Kronos Ventures. The total amount raised so far is $8.7 million.
Currently, four products are offered:
U.S. Treasury Bond Vaults: Fixed terms; fixed-rate USDC yields, guaranteed by U.S. Treasury bonds;
USDC Vault: Demand deposit; variable yield USDC, backed by short-term U.S. Treasury bonds, money market funds, and other cash equivalents;
EURC Vault: Demand deposit; variable yield EURC, backed by euros and short-term euro bonds, money market funds, and other cash equivalents;
Rates + Vault: Fixed terms; backed by investment-grade corporate bonds, commercial paper, emerging market bonds, etc.
Utilizing Vault tokens as indicators in accounting and other operations.
USUAL - Government Bonds
Currently, it has raised a total of $8.5 million and is a Binance Launchpool project.
Overall, it revolves around three types of tokens:
USD0: This is a permissionless and fully compliant stablecoin backed 1:1 by real-world assets (RWA), aggregating various U.S. Treasury bond tokens.
USD0++: This is an enhanced Treasury bond, locking the principal as collateral with USD0, using USUAL as an incentive.
USUAL is its governance token.
Tokenomics: Total supply of 4 billion tokens, with an initial circulation ratio of 12.37%.
Image source: https://docs.usual.money/usual-products/usual-governance-token/usual-tokenomics/distribution-model
Token distribution is as follows:
Huma Finance
Currently, it has raised a total of $46.3 million, with a co-founder being Chinese. Overall, it is a PayFi lending project. The latest round of financing includes $10 million in equity investment and $28 million in Huma platform physical asset investment. Distributed Global led the round, with participation from Hashkey Capital, Folius Ventures, Stellar Development Foundation, and others. On April 17, 2024, it will merge with Arf, focusing on the tokenization of real-world assets related to PayFi.
Using Huma Points to track contributors to the protocol. Currently providing cross-border payment financing and credit cards backed by digital assets. This is done through various funding pools, such as the Arf - cross-border payment financing pool (based on USDC instant settlement, simplifying cross-border payments); Rain accounts receivable pool (helping DAOs and other entities manage expenses through payroll cards); Jia Pioneer Fund pool (providing decentralized financing for small businesses, rewarding borrowers who repay with ownership. This is 'small business credit') and other funding pools to facilitate cross-border payment financing.
