# Dan Mitrea - Unlocking value through tokenization - Channel: [ETHCluj Meetup](https://streameth.org/ethcluj-meetup) - Date: 2025-10-07 - Duration: 27:31 - Watch: https://streameth.org/watch/yt-V7bG_ElPdLQ - YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7bG_ElPdLQ ## Description This presentation explores how blockchain-powered tokenization is reshaping the financial and digital asset landscape. We begin by highlighting the limitations of traditional financial systems—low transparency, illiquidity, and reliance on intermediaries—and present tokenization as a scalable solution that enables asset digitization, automation, and accessibility. Drawing from recent institutional case studies and market data, we illustrate how tokenized assets like bonds and money market funds are rapidly gaining adoption, with forecasts estimating a $30–50 trillion market by 2030. Moreover, we highlight why Ethereum is the leading platform regarding institutional tokenization and why others fall short. Beyond the basics, the talk dives into ecosystem design and token standards, focusing on how thoughtful token engineering (e.g., ERC-3643, CMTAT) and positive-sum economic structures can ensure long-term success. We analyze why hyper-tokenization often leads to fragmented markets and illiquidity, and contrast this with real-world examples of positive sum ecosystems. We provide multiple use cases of tokenization, in multiple fields, such as financial markets, maritime industry and privacy focused tokenization and end up with challenges and the regulatory plane. Through this presentation, we aim to clearly show why tokenization matters and what the institutional trends are. We want to highlight why Ethereum is the leading blockchain chosen by Institutions regarding tokenization. We want to provide an overview of brief technical aspects and also economic designs, while highlighting Institutional preferences towards custom solutions on Eth and what the current trends are in the field. ## Transcript Hello everyone. So my name is Dan. I am just finishing my PhD at the technical university of Klnapoka and I'm also head of blockchain development at fully tokenized. So today we will present to you unlocking value through tokenization and let's let's keep going. Okay, this is the outline of the presentation and now I don't know should this be working? Okay. So when studying the evolution of financial assets uh long time ago so before 1980s uh they were stored as paper certificates which led to manual processes and fragmented record keeping. This led to settlement times of even 5 days after the actual uh event. Then digitization occurred because and these documents began being stored on computers which greatly reduce the settlement times to two days after the event. However, they were they are stored in centralized systems and uh which limit transparency and are dependent on intermediaries. As a result, uh we believe tokenization is the future because it enables uh storing documents on a distributed ledger and through smart contracts, we can implement automation of these uh tokenized assets as well as uh track ownership digitally and the most important aspect is that settlement becomes instant. Okay. So what actually is tokenization? We hear this term a lot lately. It represents digitally representing an asset or the rights of an asset uh on a blockchain. In the simplest of terms, you just take an an asset uh divide it into one or more tokens. You launch these tokens on a blockchain and then users can own one or more parts one or several parts of the asset. The most important thing here is that we it enables three main properties. So it enables proof of ownership which assigns agency of the asset to the rightful owner digitally. Then it enables fractional ownership which enables a high value asset to be split into multiple parts allowing multiple people to co own the same asset. And finally, it enables traceability because through blockchain, we obtain an immutable temperproof record of all past transactions and this is verifiable on chain. Many people confuse tokenization with digitization and they are both relevant in today's society but they are also different. So we live in the digital era where everything is digital from just storing documents as a PDF on a computer to uh I don't know uploading pictures on social media this type of representation also whe is important however uh it's they represent mostly static records which have limited programmability on the other hand tokenization enable storing assets on blockchains and these assets become programmable through smart contracts and as I said they enable ownership tracking uh digitally. Okay. So we want to dive deeper into each element of the initial diagram about tokenization and we will start with blockchains. In the simplest of terms, block a blockchain is like a distributed database which is the so blockchains have two main properties and the fact that they can be seen as a distributed database is the first main property. Each peer in the network has the copy of the entire database. Regarding this, there are two types of mainly two types of blockchains. Permissionless and permissioned blockchains. Permissionless blockchain is one that allows any users to have access to create accounts and to uh launch tokens. Think of the you can access the database anyone can access the the database. The other type of blockchain is a permission blockchain where only restricted they have restricted access to certain entities. So someone needs to give you access to the database. Moving on, not only we are at it clu so we will talk about Ethereum but we need to understand that even if we are on public blockchains we can enforce compliance and rules through smart contracts. So in order to not have a mess and each smart contract to be I don't know however the developer wants uh ERC standards have appeared on Ethereum and they have been propagated to other blockchains to enable greater interoperability among smart contracts and also with other platforms and third party services. Here I think the most popular uh token standards on Ethereum are ERC20 and ERC 721 for nonfgeible for funible and nonf fungeible tokens and lately a lot of standards have appeared especially for in our case for tokenized realward assets. So ERC3643 is the now the most relevant standard in Europe for tokenized assets and there are also specific standards for certain countries and their laws such as ERC 2980 for the Swiss laws. Now just to touch on an important subject, blockchains through their immutability and traceability properties expose all transactions to all users, especially on permissionless blockchains. This enhances trust because it enables peers to see all transactions. However, it also exposes sensitive information. So when talking about financial institutions, they generally don't want to expose their users data or to expose the amounts they transfer. So it is an active challenge to implement privacy on blockchains. Here are just to mention two of the most popular techniques of implementing privacy on blockchains. There are zero knowledge proofs which enable validation without exposing the real data. Uh for example, think that you want to prove that you have a code to open a door without showing the code. So if you want to prove that to someone, you place the viewer in the room and you just open the door with the code without showing the code. So this is how you can prove something without showing it to the to the one you prove it. Homorphic encryption is another very good solution for this privacy because it enables computation over encrypted data. However, both of these solutions are in active development because implementing them especially onchain is complex. It leads to slower execution times and increased costs. Okay. Now moving on to the next important aspect of tokenization. We want to touch upon digital asset custody and to begin with uh we will start with your identity on a blockchain which is a wallet and more specifically your identity is represented by your public and private key. I mean your private key is the identity but okay for it's okay. So how do we understand these two better? The public key is used to share it to others in order for them to send you money. Think of your public account number on a bank. On the other hand, the private key is your way of signing transactions and proving that you were the ones taking that action. And this one should be kept secret because otherwise other people will get access to your funds. Similar to the PIN of your card. And moving on, we can distinguish between two main types of wallets, custodial and non-custodial wallets. A non-custodial wallet such as MetaMask or Phantom uh lets the user keep their private key locally. So they have a higher control of the assets. However, it comes with greater self responsibility because losing the access to the key would mean losing the access to your funds. On the other hand, custodial wallets represent wallets where a a third party holds your private keys. Here we have common examples such as Binance or Coinbase. If they involve centralized access where you login with credentials and here I will leave you with a popular saying to let you think. They say that if there are not your keys it they are not your funds. So you we have to be careful who we leave our funds into whose hands. So if this is general wallet custody in tokenization custody it's more than that because we need a secure way of storing our keys but we also need a secure way to hold the real world assets in a legal framework. So tokenization custody implies not only storing your keys safe safely on chain but also storing your offchain real world assets in a secure manner and bridging this information is essential for tokenization custody and regarding tokenization custody there are two main players in the field so Fireblocks and zodia fireblocks is a company that offers the text tech in order to manage your private keys securely and they are leveraging multi-party computation for this which is another popular technique privacy technique. It enables dividing a an information into into multiple shares. In this case you divide your private key into multiple shares. Let's say with the previous example of the PIN of your card you split it into three parts. Each entity that holds the their part of the private key needs to sign the transaction in order to approve it. So you remove single points of failure. So Fireblocks offers the text tech for using uh multi-party computation. However, they are not a licensed custodian. So they don't have means of securely holding your real world assets that are linked to your uh account. Here Zodia comes into play and there are other players but Zodia may might be the most popular. They are backed by a standard chartered bank and they have bank grade custody of legally holding your assets in a secure manner. Okay. Now moving on to token types and token solutions. We can identify two main token types which are utility tokens and security tokens. Utility tokens are tokens that we use to access rights to a service or a platform and holders do not usually uh expect profits from holding these tokens. For example, think of chain link which have the the their oracle service. In order to use the oracle of chain link, you need to pay with link tokens. On the other hand, security tokens represent ownership of an asset over a comp or or equity in a company and holders usually expect profits from holding these tokens. I already said an example. Another key difference between these two is that they are uh regulated under different laws. So utility tokens together with stable coins fall under the mika regulation. On the other hand, security tokens in Europe are under the MIDI 2 law. So this is another thing to consider. And now moving on to an integral part of tokenization and token solutions is the tokconomics which represents the economic design behind a token. They tackle the creation and distribution of tokens. They are very important because if they create a healthy ecosystem for the token, they not only uh encourage user adoption, but they also attract attract investors. And here we think that the most important aspects and the most basic ones of tokeniza of tokconomics are their supply dynamics. So if the supply is limited or variable they can be inflationary or deflationary from with various mechanisms and uh how are the tokens distributed and vested. I think there was a previous talk about this. So to give you a small example the Trump memecoin was launched recently and they had a total supply of 1 billion tokens. However only 200 million were available to the public. The rest of 80% were distributed automatically to entities close to Trump administration and are vested for three and something years. So over the course of three years, they will be gradually released. Okay. And now to debunk some myths about tokenization. Uh some say that tokenization provide instant liquidity. However, as I already said, there might be lockup periods or even KYC verification that might prevent users to sell tokens between them. Another myth is that many believe tokens are like casino chips because especially because of memecoins which are highly volatile but token tokenization and tokens might provide utility in their ecosystem through various ways. So this is not always the case. Finally, I already said that tokenization is different than digitization because it enables programmability and ownership verification on a blockchain. Now we want to discuss a very important aspect and property that tokenized assets bring over traditional finance. So in traditional finance there are high for many traditional uh financial assets there are high entry barriers that prevent access to retail or limit the access to retail. Also trading these assets is possible only in working hours from 9 to5. When talking about tokenized assets, uh due to fractional ownership, it enable they enable lower entry barriers and multiple people to own high value assets together. Moreover, these tokens tokenized assets can can be sold on secondary markets 247. And talking about secondary markets, they represent mediums in which users who already own tokens can trade them between them. There are three main types of secondary markets. Over-the-counter ones represent private custom deals made between entities. Here the terms are negotiated offchain and the final transaction might or might not be registered on chain. These are suited for large deals. As I said, delivery versus payment. Secondary markets represent deals that are made to a limited set of users. So, not everyone has access to them, just a subset of entities. However, the pricing and the deals the deal is set in smart contracts. So each entity that has access to this secondary market uh will pay the same price that is set in the smart contract and the the settlement is instant because it's executed in the smart contract and onchain. Finally, order books back okay are public matchings of sell and buy orders. Here we have the main uh exchanges such as Binance, Coinbase or whatever you may think of. Here based on supply and demand, the price is set transparently. So everything is transparent here. Now when talking about how should a company or a client launch their tokenization solution, there are two main approaches they can take. There are off-the-shelf white label solutions that can generate the tokenization for the token for you. They use preconfigured templates and are accessible through web interfaces and they might be slightly customizable. However, these solutions are hard to scale because you are locked the vendor who set and deploy the solution for you. On the other hand, most of enterprise clients and from our experience do prefer custom solutions because they need solutions that can be adapted to their internal processes as well as to the local regulations they fall under. More than that, these enterprise, these clients usually have systems that can adapt over time that that will adapt over time due to these factors and also internal processes. That's why institution institutions and big players usually leverage proxy smart contracts that allow them to upgrade the their implementation of the token and adapt it to their changing need. This in this case is not an a big problem because the trust is not necessarily in the trustless nature of the smart contract but in the institution itself. So having proxy contracts doesn't decrease the trust. Moreover, custom tokenization solutions usually come with life cycle management from deployment until management and other aspects of the token life cycle process as well as affiliated DeFi or analytics tools for the token itself. Now, when talking about about institutions, there are they are actively deploying capital and infrastructure around tokenization. A few examples are crypto ETFs which have marked a a big milestone in crypto adoption because it allowed institutions to trade crypto under regulated frameworks. Moreover, stable coins are one of the hottest topics in crypto right now because they enable automation and automatic transfers as well as crossber payments and all big financial players are deploying their own stable coins. Finally, tokenized money market funds have gathered between one to two billion dollars in 2025 alone. And when talking more about the uh financial markets, we have we have identified the five main classes that have gathered over $50 billion in uh tokenized assets. Uh the most important ones are are tokenized depth and equity which are tokenized depth is US treasuries tokenized on chain enabling stable payments and automatic payments in stable coins and equity are shares in companies. Now we want to present a few case studies but I will hurry up because I don't think I have more time. Uh Black Rockck Bule I hope I pronounce you right. Uh represents a turning point in onchain finance because it represents tokenized US treasuries on chain. Launch on Ethereum. It expanded to five more blockchains and although they are reserved for financial institutions, they enable as I said payments and deal distribution directly through smart contracts. We have identified a case study of tokenized real estate in Thailand. We have here also hopefully in Romania. uh they launched uh they tokenized luxury condos and uh enabled 24/7 secondary market trading of these assets on BitCub exchange. Uh also we have there is a ship of $100 million ship that was tokenized and investors could earn daily uh yield from the vessel's daily income and these payments were automated uh and distributed onchain uh in stable coins. Now a more theoretical example. How can to tokenization increase traceability in supply chains? Uh when a manufacturer for example a medicine and pharmacy company creates batches of medicine they can tokenize them. Each element in the supply chain can when they receive the goods they will also receive the tokenized counterparts of the goods. This enables a temper uh this creates a re immutable record of where the assets have been who owned them and for how long. So they reduce counterfeiting and uh they increase authenticity. Lastly uh we would like to have uh greater uh adoption of crypto. However, lack of clear regulations are still the main issue in this field. On a study on one more than 1,000 uh CEOs and bank managers, the lack of clear regulation is still the biggest concern when talking about adoption and I will leave the conclusion. Tokenized assets provide great benefits and have big potential. However, we need to carefully design the token as well as the infrastructure around it and the lack of the regulation is still an ongoing challenge. Thank you very much. This is the next. [Applause] Um, if anyone has any questions, please do put your hand up or feel free to go through the QR code where there will be some nice prizes to be won at the end of the conference. In the meantime, um I've got a question. So, do you believe that Ethereum is the best place for RWA tokenization? Let's say is it better or worse than another L1 that's built purely for the purpose of RWAS? I believe that for the specific use case of financial institutions and banks, Ethereum is the most preferred medium because it offers not only a mature mature smart contract platform but also a more secure and bigger user uh base for them. I know that there are other blockchains with various properties and I think that some clients might prefer those over Ethereum but for especially for big institutions uh Ethereum is the >> okay so it's the user base that wins out. Okay, makes sense. >> And one add-on here when talking about permissionless blockchain so many institutions also prefer permission blockchain so private blockchains. >> Makes sense. Okay, thanks. Question here from validator Victor 221. What are the first steps for a new person in the field if they want to own tokens of any kind? What's what's the beginner the 101 the uh the five steps to ownership would you say? So the first step will be to learn and to document yourself because I know a lot of people who tell me all the time about token X or token Y and uh in a few months or weeks those tokens go to zero. So information is key and then uh of course to yes this is the most. So then you have the technical steps of creating your own wallet choosing the platform on which you want to own those tokens on a centralized exchange or or a or on other types of wallets and yes >> okay I >> think the information is the most important one to inform yourself and know what you're doing. >> Makes sense. Any questions from the crowd? Anyone? Oh, we got one over here. >> Uh, since I heard you mentioning before about the multi-party computation for from Fireblocks, um, have you ever been um um in the position to compare this multi-party computing um with uh multi- signature and to explain to your client that those things are not the same? um and if this affects your business based on uh the choice whether it's multi-party computing versus multi- signature. Yes. So I think that when dealing with clients uh a very important part is also to consider the provider of the technology and for the solution. And I think that Fireblocks is the most one of the most popular providers for management of keys. And yes, usually clients prefer uh solutions that are more well known and they don't care necessarily about exactly the all the details of the implementation and behind the scenes.