In this article5 sections
Investors based outside the United States hold most of the tokenized U.S. government debt whose owners can be located, Crypto.news reported, citing a Chainalysis study released on October 14. Holders in Italy, Portugal and Singapore together accounted for 66.9% of tokenized Treasury value with identifiable geographic locations as of July 1, 2026. The United States accounted for 10.5% of that geolocated value, placing it fourth.
The research was published as part of the analytics firm’s North America report, North America: Inside the Growth of Agentic Commerce, which tracked how U.S. financial products reach investors through blockchain networks. Tokenized government debt emerged as the largest category of real-world assets in the dataset.
Also readNEAR adds 20 tokenized US stocks via Ondo
Key facts
- Italy held 29.9% of geolocated tokenized Treasury value, Portugal 18.8% and Singapore 18.2%, according to Chainalysis; the U.S. share was 10.5%.
- Japanese investors made up 16.4% of geolocated holders, the largest count of any country, but held only 0.4% of the recorded value.
- Tokenized U.S. Treasury assets rose 125% to $15.42 billion in the 12 months to July 1, 2026, from $6.86 billion a year earlier.
- Tokenized Treasuries represented 42.8% of a $36.07 billion real-world asset market measured in the report.
- BlackRock’s BUIDL fund reclaimed the top position among tokenized Treasury products in late August 2026, Cryptobriefing reported, a detail Crypto.news did not include.
A market that more than doubled in a year
The Treasury segment added $8.56 billion of tokenized value over the reporting period, a gain the report rounded to 125%. Corporate credit and private equity grew faster in percentage terms, at 3,156% and 1,340% respectively, but from much smaller bases. The overall tokenization market expanded 135% by the end of the second quarter of 2026, according to the same study.
Chainalysis tied part of the overseas demand to how tokenized products change access. Blockchain-based vehicles can lower minimum investment sizes and let investors gain exposure to Treasury-backed instruments without opening a conventional U.S. brokerage account. A tokenized Treasury product generally represents an interest in a vehicle that holds government debt rather than a security issued directly by the U.S. government, and its ownership and redemption terms depend on the issuer.
Also readTop RWA Blockchains to Watch in 2026: From Ethereum to Casper
The geographic figures cover only holdings whose owners Chainalysis could identify. The report does not disclose individual holders behind the largest balances, nor does it show that the three leading countries hold the same share of the entire market, including addresses with unknown locations. Earlier coverage cited by Crypto.news placed tokenized real-world assets at roughly $34 billion in May, with U.S. government debt near $15 billion; those figures came from different reporting dates and datasets and are not directly comparable with the July measurement.
Holding rather than lending
Lending against tokenized Treasuries contracted 23% during the period, the only real-world asset lending segment to shrink. Private credit lending grew 1,618% and accounted for 77% of value lent against tokenized real-world assets, while commodity-backed lending rose 875%. Chainalysis attributed the Treasury decline to the existing role of government securities as liquid collateral in conventional markets, saying tokenized Treasury activity leaned toward buying and holding.
The firm’s counts cover observable public blockchain activity and do not fully capture tokenized securities or settlement systems running on private networks, including Canton. For all tokenized real-world assets, U.S. holders were 11.7% of identified participants and controlled 11.4% of value, a far closer balance than in Treasuries. Cryptobriefing also reported that financial institutions have been building issuance and settlement systems for traditional assets on blockchains; Crypto.news noted that the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation formed a tokenization working group this year with Ondo Finance, BlackRock, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan.
Why it matters
The figures suggest blockchain-based Treasury products are functioning less as a U.S. retail alternative and more as a channel for overseas investors to reach dollar-denominated debt. That has implications for how demand for U.S. government securities is intermediated, and for issuers competing on access rather than on yield. The split between Japan’s large holder count and small value share also indicates that the market’s growth is concentrated in relatively few large positions abroad.
What to watch
Subsequent Chainalysis reporting periods will show whether the overseas concentration persists as more institutions issue tokenized Treasury products. The firm’s stated exclusion of private networks such as Canton means any meaningful shift of settlement onto permissioned systems could change the measured geographic picture.
This article reports research findings and is not financial advice; markets for tokenized assets remain volatile and uncertain.
Sources: crypto.news, Cryptobriefing
