Citrini's 79-page report backs tokenization's fee collectors over bitcoin and ether

In the report's example, a tokenized stock could be pledged as collateral for a loan straight from an investor's digital wallet, with no brokerage in between ^[18]. Each step in that chain is a service someone charges for. The report names the parties placed to charge: trading platforms, lenders, stablecoin issuers and the companies that keep securities ownership records ^[8]. Bitcoin and ether are not on that list ^[8].

"We can't assume that majors, primarily BTC and ETH, will make new ATHs on this," the report said, using the shorthand for all-time highs. "Even if they do, there are better expressions." ^[2] The second sentence is the bolder one. It allows that the majors could rally and still argues for the fee collectors, so the test is relative. The thesis fails on its own terms if bitcoin and ether beat both baskets while stocks and bonds move onchain.

The fees can land in three places. One is listed intermediaries such as Securitize, which maintains the legal link between blockchain tokens and the securities they represent ^[4], or Figure, which the report cites for tokenized lending ^[5]. Fees that land there pay the stock basket. Another is protocols whose tokens rise with usage. The report cites Aerodrome, which could collect fees on tokenized stock trades ^[11], and Pendle, which lets investors trade future income from interest-bearing assets ^[12]. The third is protocols that earn the fees while their tokens go nowhere, a case the report flags itself ^[17].

The quoted case for the tokens is about scope. "If we're right that stocks, commodities and other financial assets are moving onchain, then eventually all of the financial products built around those assets should follow them," the report said ^[14]. CoinDesk's account names at least nine tokens against eight stock-basket holdings ^[19]. Among the tokens are the perpetual-futures venues Lighter and Variational, which the report expects to gain traction alongside the dominant Hyperliquid ^[16].

In my view the stock basket is the cleaner bet on the report's own logic. A listed exchange or record-keeper that earns a fee reports it as revenue to shareholders. A token holder needs the fee and the price to move together, and the report says they do not always ^[17]. The counter-case is Citrini's own: if every product built around those assets follows them onchain, most of the fee base will sit with protocols outside the stock basket ^[14].