The most significant development for UK institutional markets came on 18th May, when the FCA and BoE jointly published a shared vision for tokenisation in UK wholesale markets, opening a Call for Input on the regulatory and infrastructure principles that will govern its development. Three concrete actions: a BoE consultation on extending RTGS and CHAPS settlement hours toward near 24/7 operation; PRA Dear CEO letters updating prudential guidance on tokenised asset exposures and stablecoins; and confirmation of a live synchronisation service, targeted for 2028, enabling tokenised assets to settle against central bank money in real time. HMT's pilot issuance of a digital gilt instrument, DIGIT, is receiving active Bank support as part of the same programme, while the DSS currently has 16 firms in live issuance and settlement. Deputy Governor Sarah Breeden was direct: the task now is to move from pilots to production.
In Washington, the SEC confirmed on 22 May it is indefinitely shelving its planned innovation exemption for tokenised stocks. The framework would have allowed crypto-native platforms to offer on-chain equity trading under lighter regulatory requirements than full broker-dealer registration. It was pulled after pushback from stock exchange officials over two specific concerns: liquidity fragmentation, the risk of the same stock trading across multiple disconnected venues simultaneously; and third-party tokens, digital representations of shares issued without issuer consent. Commissioner Peirce clarified any eventual exemption will cover only authentic tokenised securities, not synthetic price-tracking products. No new timeline has been set. The read-across for UK readers is direct: the same unresolved questions around secondary market structure and issuer consent apply equally here and are yet to be resolved.
Binance Research published its RWA market report on 15 May: headline of $31.4 billion distributed on-chain RWA value with a base case of $1.6 trillion by 2030. A further $370 billion in represented tokenised assets sits on blockchain rails but is not freely transferable, meaning total blockchain-adjacent exposure is closer to $400 billion, the majority of which is not yet composable or liquid. The interesting number, however, is the penetration rate: tokenisation currently represents ~0.01% of its TAM across fixed income, equities, real estate, private credit, and commodities.
In new product development, BlackRock filed with the SEC for two new on-chain Treasury products: a Stablecoin Reserve Vehicle and an OnChain share class for its existing $7 billion money market fund, both on Ethereum. BUIDL has grown to $2.5 billion with over $100 million in dividends distributed. Next, JPM filed on 12 May for JLTXX, its second tokenised MMF on Ethereum, explicitly engineered as a reserve asset for stablecoin issuers under the GENIUS Act and accepting stablecoin subscriptions alongside cash.
Looking ahead, the question for UK market participants is how quickly domestic infrastructure catches up. The FCA's PS26/7 is live, the DSS is running, but the US has a DTCC production timeline for July, a live cross-border settlement proof, and the world's largest institutions filing competing on-chain products. The GENIUS Act's July 18 deadline is nine weeks away. For London, the parallel date to watch is October 2027, when the FCA's broader cryptoasset regime comes into force and the UK framework moves from sandbox to standard.