Are we closer to tokenisation in trade?

What do digital assets actually offer in the current context of global trade? And how ready is the present regulatory and cultural climate?

24 July 2026

7 mins

Corporate & investment bankingDigital solutionsTrade & working capital

Any conference, interview, or conversation on the future of trade will inevitably discuss the inefficiencies which need to be addressed before that future arrives.

Although artificial intelligence (AI) is, by now, ubiquitous, a redefinition of value, risk, and information transmission can be solved by tokenisation. But what do digital assets actually offer in the current context of global trade? And how ready is the present regulatory and cultural climate?

For the final episode of Trade Finance Global (TFG) and Standard Chartered’s five-episode podcast series, Future of Trade, TFG’s Mark Abrams was joined by Standard Chartered’s Kevin Chang, Head of Trade and Working Capital for Hong Kong and GCNA  and Group Head of Trade Digital Assets, and Emily Chan, Director, Trade Product Manager, Digital Assets, to discuss the future of digital assets in trade.

According to Chang, digital assets are here to stay. “In the next 12 to 24 months, we will see a lot of advancements across the entire ecosystem, where digital assets will be readily adopted and integrated into our day-to-day financing, trade, and business,” he said.

The threefold impact of tokenisation on global trade

Stablecoins, cryptocurrencies, and central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) all sit under the broad umbrella of digital assets, which are digital representations of value or contractual right.

Tokenisation is the process of converting that right, value, or asset into a digital token that can be transacted and exchanged on-chain.

Kevin Chang

Head of Trade and Working Capital-HK & GCNA, Group Head of Trade Digital Assets

But in the context of global trade, that simple definition opens up applications spanning beyond payments, extending into the trade instruments and trade finance assets.

The first category is tokenising trade instruments. Tokenising documents such as bills of lading (BoLs) and bills of exchange (BoEs) creates a digital record of ownership that can be transferred on-chain, reducing the friction that has long plagued the historically paper-heavy documentary trade.

The second is tokenising trade finance assets. Receivables, payables, and invoices can themselves be tokenised, opening them up to financing and to a wider pool of alternative investors in creating access to a new asset class backed by real trade flows. Also, perhaps most intuitively, working capital can be immediately unlocked.

The third – and most immediately relevant – is tokenised money and payments. This is where stablecoins, tokenised deposits, and CBDCs come in, enabling faster, programmable settlement across borders without delays.

Tokenisation is not just about a technology capability or a technology upgrade. If you really think about what it does, the value it brings: it's the ability to shift how value, risk, and information can move cross-border in a context of global trade.

Kevin Chang

Head of Trade and Working Capital-HK & GCNA, Group Head of Trade Digital Assets

A core challenge of cross-border trade is that it’s slow and document-heavy. Tokenisation – across all three of these dimensions – offers a path to faster settlement, increased access to capital, and new payment channels, while bringing greater transparency to how cash flow moves.

Collateral mobility: A “killer use case” in tokenisation

To break it down: collateral refers to assets pledged to secure a loan or cover against potential losses for lenders, acting as a safety net against counterparty risk. Collateral mobility is the speed with which said assets can be moved across borders to meet the needs of different financial activities, including margin financing and repurchase agreements. Enhancing mobility enables ‘trapped’ liquidity to reach where it’s most needed, reducing friction across cross-border payments.

Tokenised assets can be used as collateral across different financial activities. Standard Chartered, for example, has launched a collateral mirroring programme that allows clients to use tokenised market funds as off-exchange collateral. Off-exchange collateral is a risk-mitigation approach where traded assets are held by a regulated third party.

Similarly, tokenised assets could also be used as collateral to support clients’ trade and working capital needs, while allowing them to continue earning yield or retain upside on the underlying assets, thereby enhancing overall capital efficiency.

The global harmonisation push towards stablecoins

One of the most notable regulatory pushes in digital assets came with the signing of the US GENIUS Act in 2025. The legislation established a comprehensive federal regulatory framework for payment through stablecoins: clarifying legal definitions, mandating the 1:1 currency backing, and distinguishing digital tokens from traditional bank deposits.

Stablecoins are a form of tokenised money designed to maintain a stable value relative to a national currency, where they are pegged to an underlying asset – most commonly the US dollar, which accounts for 99 per cent of all stablecoins by market capitalisation. Most are fiat-backed, holding one-for-one reserves in cash or cash equivalents.

These instruments were once treated as a kind of “alien technology,” Chan said. Frameworks were even announced to place punitive treatments on banks and corporates who leveraged these kinds of technologies.

Nowadays, a lot of these regulators are recognising a technology-neutral approach,” she explained.

The passage of the GENIUS Act and creation of a US regulatory framework for stablecoins have paved the way for global adoption. Less than two weeks later, the Hong Kong Monetary Authority implemented the Stablecoin Ordinance, establishing a licensing and regulatory regime for issuers of fiat-referenced stablecoins.

I think these stablecoin frameworks that we have seen have really been a catalyst that have motivated institutions and corporates to start looking into the digital asset area, and also investing into identifying new use cases, leveraging these new regulations.

Emily Chan

Director, Trade Product Manager, Digital Assets

Beyond stablecoin frameworks, regulators are expanding their scope. The US is looking at the Clarity Act, while in Asia, Singapore’s Project Guardian and Project Bloom, and Hong Kong’s Project Ensemble, are all working to build the infrastructure and interoperability that tokenisation at scale requires.

Yet, as Chang noted, regulatory progress is taking place at different speeds across jurisdictions. When one market is advanced in its adoption of digital assets while another still lacks regulatory clarity, it creates real uncertainty for suppliers and corporates operating across both.

Standard Chartered has predicted that, of the USD280 billion of current global stablecoin supply, about two-thirds is held by individuals in emerging markets, pointing not only to the democratisation of the USD, but also to the meaningful scope for stablecoin penetration around the world.

In emerging markets, stablecoin settlement reduces time zone friction, liquidity mismatches, and hedging exposure. The international appeal of digital assets could well be the strongest use case for stablecoins.

Examining the shorter-term applications of stablecoins can be microcosmic of the wider role of digital assets in global payments for cross-border trade: regulatory harmonisation is step one to driving digitalisation in emerging markets, which, in turn, allows for a more competitive and diverse face of global trade.

Internal and international collaboration

In the past, it was the client with a particular appetite and interest in technological innovation leading the move towards digital assets. Now, it’s less about personal initiative and more about an industry-wide expectation.

We are seeing more clients that come to us to inquire about these use cases because they're pulled into this ecosystem, because their counterparty is using stablecoin, or because they're basically being asked to change their operating model.

Emily Chan

Director, Trade Product Manager, Digital Assets

Digital assets don’t just concern a single department; they require a multi-faceted approach. Thereby, for corporates to adjust, they must begin by educating and upskilling their internal teams. They must understand how digital assets fit into payments, treasury management, procurement, and counterparty relations, and establish the foundational infrastructure needed to participate in digital asset ecosystems.

The role of the bank, in this context, is to act as a partner to the corporate client. According to Chang, banks must be first to understand the digital asset environment and position themselves as trusted advisors.

Digital assets have already moved beyond the initial experimentation stage and are dominating the minds of bankers and corporates, emerging as the new settlement rail for cross-border transactions.

What may seem like a challenge today will become a competitive advantage tomorrow. The corporates that engage with digital assets now will be best positioned to capture the opportunities ahead.