Miami Beach, FL — Tokenization is not replacing the system overnight, but it is steadily reshaping the plumbing underneath, Wall Street executives said at Consensus 2026 in Miami.
From millions to billions in tokenized deposits
Citi’s tokenized deposit system was handling millions a year ago. Now it moves billions, said Ryan Rugg, who leads digital assets for the bank’s treasury and trade solutions unit. The demand comes from clients who want to move money around the clock, not just during banking hours.
JPMorgan’s Kinexys: $1 trillion processed
JPMorgan’s blockchain platform Kinexys has processed more than $1 trillion in transactions, said Kara Kennedy, head of market development for digital assets. She stressed the focus is on stitching blockchain rails into existing infrastructure for faster settlement and continuous operations, not on building parallel systems.
DTCC eyes $150 trillion migration
DTCC, the backbone of U.S. market plumbing, is working to bring parts of its $150 trillion securities infrastructure onto a shared digital layer. Nadine Chakar, head of digital assets at DTCC, said: “You can’t just replace what exists. This is an evolution.” Early tokenization efforts often looked for problems to solve; now firms target specific pain points like collateral, cross-border payments, and liquidity management.
Real-time treasury becomes possible
For large corporations, the ability to move funds in real time — across time zones and holidays — is reshaping treasury operations. Instead of pre-positioning cash days in advance, firms can react instantly to margin calls or investment opportunities.
Intermediation isn’t going away
Panelists pushed back on the idea that blockchain will remove intermediaries altogether. Core functions like risk management, compliance, and settlement guarantees remain hard to replicate in fully decentralized systems. “We will always need some level of intermediation,” Chakar said.
Crypto-native long view
Evan Auyang, group president at Animoca Brands, said the industry is in a transition phase. Fully native onchain markets are “not ready yet” given existing system scale and regulatory constraints. But if efficiency and cost savings materialize, “it will be adopted,” he said, adding that traditional finance and decentralized systems are now “converging.”