Follow the Collateral: How Tokenized Treasuries Are Entering Institutional Crypto

Retail adoption is measured in signups. Institutional adoption is measured in what a risk committee accepts as margin, and by that standard the tokenized US Treasury market has gone from roughly $1.7 billion in early 2024 to $15.2 billion across 76 products by early May 2026, on Kaiko's count. Posting an asset as collateral is a judgment about issuer, custody and legal claim that no adoption survey captures.

Collateral Is the Slowest Layer to Move

Of everything being rebuilt on continuous settlement, collateral moves last, for a reason that has nothing to do with technology. A payment that fails can be resent. A yield product that underperforms can be exited. A collateral that turns out to be unenforceable takes the position with it, so the bar is set by the worst plausible outcome rather than the expected one.

That makes the order in which assets become acceptable margin a better adoption signal than any volume figure. An asset qualifies only when the venue accepting it can value it continuously, liquidate it predictably and establish who owns it.

Books that never close change what a margin desk can hold, because a standing objection to volatile collateral has always been that it cannot be sold at three in the morning on a Sunday.