“It’s the way the world will be [in] not just 10 years but maybe as little as two years,” SEC chair Paul Atkins told Fox Business.

“The next step is coming with digital assets, digitalization and tokenization of the market,” Atkins said, adding it will bring “huge benefits” for transparency and risk.

Tokenization, the idea that equities, assets and complex financial instruments can be traded as blockchain-based tokens, has been touted as a potential revolution for financial markets, with BlackRock’s chief executive Larry Fink throwing the weight of the world’s largest asset manager behind the technology in 2023.

“Tokenisation could advance at the pace of the internet—faster than most expect, with enormous growth over the coming decades,” Larry Fink, who leads the $10 trillion BlackRock, wrote in The Economist, suggesting the market could grow at the same pace seen by the world’s biggest technology companies in recent years.

“If history is any guide, tokenisation today is roughly where the internet was in 1996—when Amazon had sold just $16 million-worth of books, and three of the rest of today’s “Magnificent Seven” tech giants hadn’t even been founded.”

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BlackRock’s push to bring a fully-fledged spot bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) to Wall Street in 2023 was called the first step towards a blockchain-based tokenized revolution by Fink, who predicted it would help democratize finance.

“The flywheel effect of tokenization is now in motion,” researchers with crypto asset manager Hashdex wrote in their 2026 outlook report.

“The numbers already tell the story: over $8 billion in tokenized Treasury bills circulate on public blockchains today, up from a little more than $700 million two years ago and a more than 10x historical growth rate that mirrors early-ETF adoption curves. We believe the tokenized assets market will grow significantly in 2026, rising to close to $400 billion by the end of the year—more than a 10x from its current $36 billion.”

Earlier this month, Atkins unveiled the SEC’s “innovation exemption” crypto issuers, due for roll out in January, allowing crypto-based financial instruments to come to market without completing full SEC registration.

The planned framework is the latest step in the agency’s departure from the SEC’s hostile regime toward bitcoin and crypto under former chair Gary Gensler.

“It’s a new day and we want to embrace this new technology,” Atkins said.