Today Consensys, the developer of the MetaMask self custodial wallet announced that a range of 200 US “tokenized stocks” are now available through a collaboration with Ondo Finance. The quotation marks reflect that these are not true tokenized stocks in the sense that the token holder does not own the stocks. They are structured products, issued from the BVI by an unregulated entity, Ondo Global Markets.
The newsworthy aspect is that this gives a glimpse into the emerging unified wallet that spans cash (stablecoins), crypto and conventional assets such as stocks, with more to come. Trading is available 24 hours a day, five days a week, from Sunday at 8:05 PM ET through Friday at 7:59 PM ET, with tokens transferable around the clock.
“Access to US markets still runs through legacy rails. Brokerage accounts, fragmented apps, and rigid trading windows haven’t meaningfully evolved,” said Joe Lubin, Founder and CEO of Consensys and Co-Founder of Ethereum. “Bringing Ondo’s tokenized US stocks and ETFs directly into MetaMask shows what a better model looks like.” Many would agree that legacy rails are restrictive and need to evolve and a unified wallet is very appealing.
However, the very limited rights and consumer protections in Ondo’s structure do not necessarily show what a “better” model looks like. There’s plenty of room for improvement. In fairness, superior versions need to have a regulatory pathway. So far the only routes for genuine tokenized stocks are via transfer agents or the DTC pathway which is not yet live, with other options likely forthcoming from the SEC.
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