Getting US equities to crypto users turns on two things: access – holding the share without a US brokerage account – and composability – using it on-chain once you hold it. Access doesn’t require tokenization; a crypto-funded brokerage delivers it, with the share held off-chain. Tokenization’s distinct contribution is composability – putting the share on-chain so it can move into DeFi. Access is necessary; composability is the point.
Most tokenization stops at digitization – a16z term for records moved on-chain without composability – and Pantera’s Token Progress index puts over three-quarters of tokenized assets in its lowest “natively on-chain” tier. Holding alone clears a low bar.
Only Binance and Backpack deliver both: real-ownership access (held in a brokerage leg) plus a separate on-chain token bridged to it. Everyone else does one, or neither. But that parity is uneven – the scale is all on access: Binance holds 7,000+ real US stocks and ETFs, while its composable layer (bStocks) is currently ten names and Backpack’s is three, still in beta. Composability is early everywhere; Binance is just the only one pairing it with access at scale.
The matrix below maps how platforms bring public US equities to crypto users – from off-chain brokerage to fully tokenized, with a traditional broker as the baseline – not the wider tokenization market, which is far larger and mostly funds and treasuries. It scores them across ownership, access, composability, and mechanics.
Real ownership is the baseline – a traditional broker already provides it, with full voting. Among the on-chain platforms, four do: Binance, Backpack, Superstate and Securitize – but only Binance offers it across the whole market: its real-share leg gives beneficial ownership of 7,000+ US stocks and ETFs.
Superstate and Securitize run the transfer-agent model, where the token is the registered share, with legal title and voting – but each is narrow: Superstate ~5 crypto-native issuers, Securitize a handful of real listings (Currenc, FG Nexus). Backpack is real but in public beta: its real-share brokerage covers ~1,000 names, and each share bought there is the actual stock.
Everyone else gives a claim, not a share: Ondo, xStocks and Dinari issue a note, certificate or derivative – backed 1:1, but not the stock itself – and Robinhood gives an in-app derivative you can’t move or vote. Two of these claims double as bridges: Binance’s bStocks (10 names) and Backpack’s tokenized leg (3 – SPCX, MU, SNDK).
Each is a certificate, not ownership, but backed 1:1 by a share the platform’s own brokerage already holds and convertible to the real share – so holders move into DeFi (bStocks on BNB Chain, Backpack withdrawable to Solana) without giving up the stock. Because each token simply wraps a share the brokerage holds, any listed name is tokenizable in principle; the live catalogues are just early.
Voting is the clearest divider. Superstate and Securitize pass full rights – the token is the registered share, so the holder’s vote is the legal vote. Binance’s real-share leg has working proxy voting: holders are beneficial shareholders and Binance relays their instructions to the issuer – a genuine vote, though beneficial rather than registered, subject to record-date and market rules, and suspended while shares are lent.
Ondo offers the same beneficial route via its Broadridge relay. Backpack’s isn’t enabled yet, and the rest – the pure wrappers and Robinhood’s derivative – carry none. This has a regulatory basis: SEC staff guidance (January 2026) treats issuer-sponsored tokenized securities, where the token transfer maps to the ownership record, as a separate class from custodial or synthetic wrappers – and it drives redemption terms and recovery if the custodian fails: the further from direct ownership, the greater the exposure.
Implication: ownership is the entry bar, not the edge – only Binance clears it across the whole market; the rest narrow the catalogue, dilute the claim, or restrict who can hold it.
What the on-chain platforms share is crypto-native access – funded with stablecoins, held in a wallet or exchange account, no bank or US brokerage relationship required. That’s the friction the traditional broker baseline still imposes.
Breadth of access varies sharply across platforms. Binance’s real-share leg lists 7,000+ US stocks and ETFs. The rest are far smaller: Ondo 200+, xStocks ~164, Dinari ~200 across 85+ countries. Backpack’s brokerage offers real US stocks and ETFs (public beta), but its tokenized set is just three names (SPCX, MU, SNDK). Superstate is ~5 crypto-native issuers – Galaxy (GLXY), SharpLink (SBET), Forward Industries (FWDI) – no blue chips.
Securitize is narrower still: a handful of real listings (Currenc, FG Nexus) on its SEC-registered ATS. Robinhood lists ~200 names plus pre-IPO OpenAI tokens via an SPV – which OpenAI disavowed and which drew a Bank of Lithuania review.
That disparity in depth shows up in volume. Across 1-18 June, Binance – across both its CEX-listed tokenized equities and on-chain bStocks – held mostly a high-30s-to-high-50s% share of all tokenized-equity spot volume across CEX and on-chain venues combined, at times out-trading the rest of the market put together.
Access also splits onshore vs offshore. Binance’s access leg, the offshore wrappers and Backpack (tokenized leg) are all non-US – Backpack runs on US securities rails but isn’t open to US users (nor UK, EU, UAE or Japan). Dinari and Securitize are the onshore, SEC-registered options; Robinhood is EU-only. Securitize is the most gated: trading runs through its Markets ATS with discretionary eligibility, excluding non-US non-accredited investors – its genuinely retail-open venue, a planned NYSE 24/7 platform with Securitize as first digital transfer agent, is a late-2026 target still pending SEC and FINRA approval.
Implication: Binance’s breadth is also the cleanest – thousands of real public shares, no consent risk. The exposure sits with reaching for marquee names through SPVs, as Robinhood’s disavowed OpenAI tokens showed; the safe route to a hot name is the post-IPO real share, as Backpack did with SPCX.
Composability is whether a token can be used inside on-chain finance – posted as collateral, lent, plugged into DeFi – not just held and traded. Tokenized equity (~$3B) is currently under 10% of total RWA active market cap.
The deepest usage sits with the permissionless wrappers. xStocks leads -multi-chain and accepted as Kamino collateral, contributing to the ~$20M of tokenized-equity RWA TVL there; Ondo is DeFi-native too, with Ondo Perps (live June 9) letting its tokens post as collateral.
Superstate and Securitize are composable but permissioned – ownership tracked through their transfer agent inside a whitelist; Dinari and Robinhood are walled and not freely composable (Dinari recently launched SPCX on hypercore – but this sheds certain ownership rights). The wrappers’ pitch is 24/7 trading against the real share’s 24/5, but the peg isn’t guaranteed off-hours: xStocks’ own terms note the token can drift when US markets are closed, on thin liquidity or stale pricing.
Binance and Backpack pair an on-chain leg with real ownership behind it, and for Binance the rails are already live: bStocks is self-custodiable to BNB-Chain wallets, convertible 1:1 to the share, and already accepted as perp collateral on Aster – up to 90% LTV – and with Venus and Lista DAO also live. Backpack tokenizes on Solana via Sunrise (self-custody, 24/7, Meteora liquidity, redeemable) and is weeks old.
bStocks volumes (CEX and on-chain combined) climbed through the back half of June, peaking at ~$70M on 16 June – while the platform has hit $100M AUM – a meaningful milestone for a product which is two weeks old.
Implication: the deepest usage still sits with the ownership-light wrappers (xStocks, Ondo); the real-ownership platforms have live rails but thin usage behind them.
Three back-end mechanics shape the position: how dividends are paid, how you exit, and who holds the shares.
Dividends: USDC for Binance’s real shares, cash for Backpack, USD+ stablecoin for Dinari, crypto for Superstate, on-chain to a whitelisted wallet for Securitize, synthetic for Robinhood; the tokenized wrappers (Ondo, xStocks, bStocks) reinvest via multiplier or rebasing, net of withholding.
Redemption: the wrappers gate it – Ondo and xStocks redeem only at the institutional tier, so retail Ondo and xStocks holders exit on an orderbook (Ondo can also redeem to stablecoin). Backpack is cleanest – the real share transfers out via ACATS, and its tokenized leg converts back to the brokerage holding; bStocks converts to the share (market hours). Superstate and Securitize move holders between chain and register through the transfer agent (Securitize’s secondary exit via its ATS); Dinari burns to stablecoin; Robinhood can’t leave the app.
Custody is the shared risk as Alpaca clears or custodies ~94% of tokenized US equity – Ondo, Dinari, both Binance legs and xStocks’ in-kind route all sit behind it – and Binance now holds a stake in Alpaca plus 50% of its order-flow revenue and 65% of its stock-lending profit. Only xStocks (Swiss banks, proof-of-reserves), Superstate (transfer agent), Securitize (own transfer agent, custody, ATS) and Backpack (RQD Clearing / Atomic Vault) sit outside it – as does a traditional broker, via DTC.
Implication: Most of the field – both Binance legs included – clears and custodies through Alpaca, concentrating counterparty risk in a single provider; a disruption there would propagate across platforms that otherwise appear unrelated. Binance’s relationship differs in kind: it is both exposed to that concentration and a beneficiary of it, holding an equity stake and revenue share in Alpaca where the others are only clients. Only xStocks, Superstate, Securitize and Backpack custody outside it entirely.
A traditional broker already clears ownership and access – real shares, full voting, thousands of names – but nothing on-chain; composability is the gap tokenization exists to close. Against that baseline, most platforms still deliver only one function: xStocks and Ondo are composable but ownership-light; Dinari broad and onshore but non-composable; Superstate and Securitize offer real ownership but limited breadth – Securitize the most restricted, with real shares on a regulated ATS but no open retail yet; Robinhood a closed in-app derivative.
Only Binance and Backpack deliver both – real-ownership access plus an on-chain layer, connected by a redemption bridge – differing mainly in scale: Binance lists 7,000+ names with deep liquidity, Backpack is in beta with a ~1,000-name brokerage but only three tokenized names. Each pairs a real-ownership brokerage leg with a separate on-chain wrapper, rather than putting ownership on-chain directly. Binance has its own constraints: the shares custody with Alpaca and can be lent, and bStocks is a non-voting certificate across ten names.
Composability remains the underdeveloped dimension. On-chain volume is real but modest, and protocol integrations are emerging – bStocks is already collateral on Aster, Venus and Lista. The market is early; among the platforms holding both functions, only Binance operates at scale.
