Stellar RWA market surges to $4 billion as XLM price drops 50% in a year

Major bond issuers turn to Stellar

Several major institutional players have chosen Stellar’s Layer-1 blockchain for issuing tokenized assets, citing advantages such as network reliability and cost efficiency. Asset management firm Franklin Templeton, well known for its BENJI fund, was among the first to experiment with RWA tokenization on Stellar at a significant scale. Franklin Templeton manages a wide range of investment products and has pioneered blockchain-based securities in the US market.

Other institutional issuers soon followed. WisdomTree, a global asset management company, became another significant participant, launching millions of dollars’ worth of tokenized US treasury products on Stellar. The move was seen as a signal of wider institutional adoption of blockchain-based asset issuance.

By 2025, a new wave of projects led by Ondo Finance (noted for its USDY token), Mercado Bitcoin, Centrifuge, RedSwan, and PayPal’s PYUSD stablecoin had expanded the use cases for tokenized assets on the network. While stablecoins like PYUSD do not fall within the traditional RWA category, their presence highlights the growing diversity of assets leveraging Stellar’s chain.

In 2026, additional projects, including Spiko, Tradable, and Realiz, entered the Stellar RWA ecosystem. These issuers have contributed to a rapid spike in the total RWA market cap recorded on the network.

Mini dictionary: Real World Asset (RWA), refers to tangible, non-crypto assets—such as government bonds, real estate, or commodities—that are tokenized and represented on blockchain networks for enhanced liquidity, transparency, and accessibility.

Rapid growth in tokenized asset value

Data from Stellar’s dedicated Dune Analytics dashboard indicates that the total RWA market cap on the network jumped from $0.4 billion at the end of 2024 to approximately $4 billion by 2026. Most of this sharp increase occurred during 2026, driven by the launch of new large-scale RWA projects.

The largest contributors to Stellar’s RWA growth include Spiko, which expanded from almost zero to $1.5 billion; Realiz, valued between $500 and $560 million; Tradable, with tokenized assets worth roughly $550 million; Ondo, responsible for approximately $535 million (mainly via the USDY stablecoin); and Franklin Templeton (BENJI), maintaining a $550 million market cap.

XLM price trends and sentiment shift

Despite the substantial growth in tokenized RWAs on Stellar, the price of XLM fell by 50% over the past year, underperforming the significant activity in its ecosystem. Year-to-date, XLM has declined another 12%, reflecting ongoing uncertainty among large holders.

Nevertheless, there are indications of improving sentiment among significant investors, also known as whales, as the RWA sector on Stellar’s network expands. Observers point to the quadrupling of RWA market capitalization and more defined regulatory guidance as catalysts for optimism about the blockchain’s long-term potential.

Despite XLM’s 50% drop over the past year and a further 12% decline year-to-date, the native network’s RWA market nearly quadrupled, reaching about $4 billion in total value, fueled by new large institutional issuers.