The wave of tokenization: the boundaries of assets are being reshaped. "When the great is like the lacking, its use will not be harmed; when the great is like the full, its use will not be exhausted." No matter what you call it: ETF, Delta-1 swap, stablecoin, RWA asset tokenization... Ultimately, they are essentially the same thing: a tool that anchors underlying financial assets to achieve a 1:1 synthetic exposure, with the purpose of allowing more people to access and trade these assets more conveniently and freely. An ETF (Exchange-Traded Fund) is essentially a fund product that tracks a certain type of asset or index, which can be traded on an exchange, allowing investors to efficiently participate in that asset class without having to manage a basket of underlying assets themselves. Although stablecoins sound trendy, their logic is essentially the same: they anchor to fiat currency prices and provide a price-stable, circulating digital tool on-chain, allowing users to hold the equivalent of US dollars or other fiat currencies in the blockchain world. Delta-1 swap contracts are tools commonly used by institutional investors. In certain regions with quota or tax controls on foreign capital, by signing a Delta-1 contract with a brokerage, investors can gain a 1:1 financial exposure to the price of the asset (i.e., delta is 1) without actually holding the asset itself, thus circumventing regulatory restrictions or compliance obstacles. Before we dive deeper, we need to return to two fundamental premises of the crypto industry: first, crypto assets are a new alternative investment asset class; second, blockchain is a new distributed ledger technology. These two are often confused, but the following discussion requires us to differentiate between them. The core goals of such synthetic asset products are only two: lowering the threshold and achieving diversified allocation. Take Bitcoin ETF as an example. Why did it attract significant attention from the market 18 months ago? Because it perfectly met these two goals. First, for traditional investors who do not understand how to buy coins, manage wallets, or sign transactions, Bitcoin ETF allows them to easily gain BTC exposure using familiar brokerage systems. Second, those who have never ventured into crypto assets can finally allocate 1%, 5%, or even 10% of their funds. When countless funds and accounts make small proportion allocations, the accumulated fund inflow becomes quite substantial. Thus, the launch of Bitcoin (as well as Ethereum, Solana, etc.) ETFs is a victory for cryptocurrencies as an "asset class," but it does not directly benefit blockchain as a "technical solution." On the other hand, the asset tokenization of xStocks is exactly the opposite. First, if you already hold crypto assets, converting funds into fiat, then transferring to a brokerage account and waiting for the market to open before investing in traditional assets is a cumbersome and inefficient process. Now, you can directly participate in the trading of traditional assets on the Gate platform using your existing crypto assets with just one click, offering an almost frictionless experience. Second, the logic of diversified allocation still holds. The entire cryptocurrency market is essentially a high-risk asset domain; if you do not want to bear excessive risk, you can only park your funds in stablecoins, which are relatively safe but also have limited returns. The entire industry actually lacks options for medium-risk assets, and asset tokenization just fills this gap, providing a whole new possibility for asset distribution. Therefore, tokenization is more like a victory for blockchain technology rather than for cryptocurrencies themselves. Think about it, we have achieved cross-market rotation within the crypto asset system for the first time: without cashing out or jumping to the traditional financial system, users can trade these tokenized assets 24/7; all trading pairs support USDT, eliminating the need to convert to corresponding fiat currencies, and supporting efficient cross-chain settlement and arbitrary transfers. This mechanism also avoids exchange rate fluctuations and bridge costs. More importantly, we have successfully implemented a cross-collateral mechanism: users can use existing crypto assets as collateral to gain long and short exposure to traditional stock-type assets. This is a problem that banks and brokerages have wanted to solve for years but have yet to achieve, and we have already done it. Synthetic assets are essentially a proxy tool. For example, if you are optimistic about future oil price rises, you would naturally not buy a barrel of crude oil to stack at home. From the day humanity moved away from barter, the financial concept of "representing value" has evolved and continued to extend to this day. Tokenization is just the latest stage, and the asset classes that can be anchored behind it will become even more diverse in the future. On the other hand, while the theory of asset allocation is not ancient knowledge, it has developed for more than seventy years. Modern Portfolio Theory has been widely accepted since 1952 and is applicable across all asset types. Now that there are single-coin ETFs on the market, it is only a matter of time before we see ETFs that represent a basket of crypto assets or crypto index ETFs. Conversely, the tokenization of traditional assets has only just begun; in the future, tokenized products that anchor a basket of stocks or track indices like MSCI will also become mainstream investment tools. So all of this is just the beginning.