Morgan Stanley Tokenizes US Stocks and Treasuries via DTCC Service

By Nodora News · 4 November 2026

Morgan Stanley says it is among the first banks to tokenize US stocks and Treasuries via DTCC's new service, as Wall Street moves real assets on-chain.

Morgan Stanley says it has become one of the first banks to tokenize real-world assets through the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation's new Tokenization Service (DTS), creating blockchain-based versions of US stocks and US Treasuries. The bank announced the move on its official X account on November 3, less than a week after DTCC switched the service on. The tokens run on the Canton Network (CC) and DTCC's own private Besu network, putting one of Wall Street's biggest names directly into the tokenization race.

Key takeaways

• Morgan Stanley says it has tokenized US equities and Treasuries using DTCC's Tokenization Service, which went live on October 28.
• DTCC's depository arm, the Depository Trust Company (DTC), holds more than $114 trillion in assets under custody.
• 20 firms signed up at launch, including JPMorgan, Citi, Bank of America, Fidelity, UBS and Citadel Securities.
• The service currently runs on Canton and DTCC's private Besu network, with more blockchains planned for 2027.
• Morgan Stanley separately expects to support tokenized equities on its own trading venue in the first quarter of 2027.

What Morgan Stanley announced

In a short post on X, Morgan Stanley said it is among the first banks to tokenize real-world assets following the launch of DTS, and that the service converts US stocks and US Treasuries into tokenized form. The bank did not say how much it has tokenized so far or when clients will be able to trade the tokens.

Amy Oldenburg, Morgan Stanley's head of digital assets strategy, said, according to The Block, that the hands-on experience of plugging tokenized securities into existing market plumbing will shape how the firm builds out its digital asset business from here.

The announcement is less about a single trade and more about a signal: a top-tier US bank is now using live, regulated infrastructure to put mainstream securities on a blockchain rather than running a pilot in a sandbox.

How DTCC's Tokenization Service works

DTCC is the company behind the clearing and settlement of most US stock and bond trades, so it sits at the centre of the traditional market. Its new service lets DTC mint tokens that represent securities it already holds in custody. In plain terms, the share or bond stays where it is, and a digital twin of it is created on a blockchain.

According to DTCC, those tokens:

• keep the same ownership rights, investor protections and economic entitlements as the original securities
• can be swapped back and forth between traditional and tokenized form
• can be delivered to a user's own digital wallet

At launch, the service covers stocks in the Russell 1000 index, exchange-traded funds (ETFs) that track major indexes, and US Treasuries. The Securities and Exchange Commission cleared the project with a no-action letter in December 2025, which means the regulator said it would not take enforcement action as long as the service sticks to the agreed terms.

DTCC says the design was shaped by input from more than 150 firms. The 20 launch participants include Alpaca, Apex Clearing, Barclays, Bank of America, BNP Paribas, Citadel Securities, Citi, Edward Jones, Fidelity Investments, J.P. Morgan, Morgan Stanley, State Street and UBS, with more to be onboarded over time.

Why tokenized stocks and Treasuries matter

Tokenization is the process of representing a real asset, such as a share or a government bond, as a token on a blockchain. Supporters say it can make markets run around the clock, speed up settlement and make it easier to move collateral between institutions in minutes rather than days.

DTCC itself pitches the service around three benefits: better liquidity, faster collateral movement and more efficient use of capital. For banks, being able to shift tokenized Treasuries instantly as collateral could free up cash that today sits idle while trades settle.

The move also comes at a sensitive moment for the sector. Large companies including Amazon, Tesla and SpaceX have objected to having their shares listed on the separate OKX and ICE tokenized stock venue, as Nodora covered in Amazon, Tesla and SpaceX block their stocks from OKX-ICE. DTCC's model is different because the tokens are issued by the depository that already holds the shares, rather than by a third-party platform.

Morgan Stanley's own plans are moving too. The bank now expects to support tokenized equities on its alternative trading system in the first quarter of 2027, later than the second-half 2026 target it had earlier set, according to The Block. The New York Stock Exchange and its parent, Intercontinental Exchange, are also working on a tokenized trading platform.

Market reaction

The news landed on a day when crypto markets were recovering from an overnight dip after Democrats won control of both chambers of the US Congress in the midterm elections. Prices on OKX at the time of writing:

• Bitcoin (BTC): about $78,500, up roughly 1.9% in 24 hours
• Ether (ETH): about $2,323, up roughly 2.4%
• Canton Coin (CC): about $0.099, up roughly 4.4%

Canton Coin, the token of the Canton Network that DTS runs on, ranks around 27th by market value on CoinGecko. It is worth noting that DTCC's tokens sit on permissioned infrastructure built for institutions, so the link between this kind of adoption and the price of any public token is indirect. You can follow these moves on the Nodora charts page.

What to watch next

• Scale: Morgan Stanley has not disclosed how much it has tokenized. Any figures from the bank or DTCC would show whether this is a test run or real volume.
• More banks: 20 firms have signed up so far. Watch for JPMorgan, Citi and others to confirm live activity.
• New blockchains: DTCC plans to add more networks in 2027, which could bring public chains into the mix.
• Morgan Stanley's trading venue: tokenized equities on its alternative trading system are now pencilled in for Q1 2027.
• Regulation: with Democrats taking Congress, the pace of US crypto market structure rules could slow, which may affect how quickly tokenized securities expand beyond today's no-action relief.

This article is for information only and is not financial advice.

#Tokenization #Morgan Stanley #DTCC #Real-World Assets #Canton Network

This article is general information, not financial advice.