Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) plans to support tokenized equities on its alternative trading system (ATS), Trajectory Cross, in the first quarter of 2027.
Amy Oldenburg, the firm’s head of digital asset strategy, shared this updated timeline in an interview at Token2049 in Singapore.
This marks a shift from an earlier target of the second half of 2026 that she had outlined in March.
The bank’s team continues building the required infrastructure, but Oldenburg noted that viable products must exist before the ATS can support them, and that client demand remains limited because those products have not yet materialized.
She highlighted the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation’s (DTCC) planned tokenization service launch at the end of October 2026 as a key milestone that could stimulate broader market activity.
The firm is also monitoring the GENIUS Act, set to take effect in January 2027.
Oldenburg expressed confidence that the tokenized real-world asset market will reach between $3 trillion and $10 trillion by 2030, describing the trajectory as “the securitization of everything.”
Supporting tokenized equities through the ATS aligns with Morgan Stanley’s approach of raising, allocating, and managing capital onchain while serving clients in a hybrid traditional-digital environment.
The platform already handles conventional equities, ETFs, and American Depositary Receipts, so tokenized versions of selected assets would trade alongside them.
Industry research underscores rapid expansion in tokenized equities even as the segment remains small relative to traditional markets.
Onchain real-world asset value surged to around $39 billion from early 2025, with tokenized stocks among the fastest-growing categories—rising from roughly $678 million at the start of 2026 to $3.15 billion by September and accounting for about 82% of all RWA holders (approximately 3.77 million).
RedStone and related analyses showed tokenized stocks climbing from about $639 million to $3.17 billion year over year, a roughly 395% increase, though DeFi utilization stayed low at around 2.6% of supply.
Holder counts reached millions, with average holdings near $780, reflecting broad retail participation.
ST0x-commissioned research among professional investors found 65% expecting annual on-chain tokenized equity trading volumes to exceed $10 billion by June 2027, up from under $4 billion earlier in 2026.
Broader forecasts vary: Binance Research projected tokenized equities reaching a base case of $349 billion by 2030 (up from roughly $4.4 billion in mid-September 2026), while Citi Institute estimated the overall tokenized asset market at a $5.5 trillion base case by 2030, driven largely by public equities and Treasuries.
Token Terminal and RWA Foundation data for early October 2026 placed tokenized stock market capitalization near $3.6 billion across many chains, with substantial DEX volumes.
Tokenized equities can strengthen the traditional finance ecosystem by modernizing post-trade processes and expanding functionality without discarding established legal frameworks.
Conventional settlement often follows T+1 cycles that lock capital and introduce counterparty risk; blockchain-based representations enable near-instant or same-day finality using stablecoins or other digital rails, freeing capital and improving efficiency.
Round-the-clock trading becomes feasible beyond exchange hours, supporting global participants across time zones.
Fractional ownership lowers entry barriers, while smart-contract programmability can automate corporate actions, compliance checks, and dividend distributions.
These capabilities enhance collateral mobility—allowing equities to serve more fluidly in financing or margin contexts—and improve transparency and auditability.
At the market infrastructure level, initiatives such as DTCC’s digital twins of custodied securities preserve full investor rights and protections while adding on-chain transfer options outside traditional operating windows.
Financial industry participants can leverage these instruments in practical ways.
Institutional investors and wealth managers can build portfolios more efficiently, potentially integrate equity exposure with digital assets, and use capital better through faster settlement and more flexible collateral.
Traders benefit from extended hours, reduced operational friction, and opportunities for arbitrage or continuous price discovery, complementing the growth in equity-linked perpetuals.
Asset managers and alternative platforms can offer hybrid products that combine traditional economic exposure with on-chain settlement and, in some cases, DeFi composability (though utilization remains nascent).
Broader market participants, including custodians and prime brokers, can develop new services around digital twin issuance, wallet infrastructure, and interoperable settlement.
Other major financial institutions are similarly focused on this area, validating the strategic logic.
DTCC has advanced its Tokenization Service toward commercial launch in October 2026 after successful July production trades involving roughly 30–40 firms, including JPMorgan, BlackRock, Goldman Sachs, Vanguard, and exchanges; the service creates digital representations of DTC-custodied assets such as Russell 1000 stocks, ETFs, and Treasuries while maintaining legal equivalence.
Nasdaq has pursued equity token designs that keep issuers central to ownership rights and governance, with SEC approvals related to tokenized trading.
NYSE and others have engaged Securitize and similar platforms.
BlackRock, JPMorgan, and Goldman have participated in DTCC trials and broader tokenization efforts, reflecting institutional interest in efficiency gains, new distribution channels, and client demand for hybrid access.
For Morgan Stanley, pursuing support via an existing regulated ATS rather than a standalone crypto venue is a viable, measured strategy: it leverages established infrastructure, targets institutional clients already using Trajectory Cross, aligns with ecosystem readiness milestones like DTCC’s launch, and positions the firm for the projected multi-trillion-dollar market while managing regulatory and operational risks.
As products mature and infrastructure interoperates, tokenized equities are poised to become a complementary layer that modernizes capital markets rather than displacing them.