Major gold trade group releases framework for tokenized gold

The World Gold Council says it will develop a platform to connect physical gold to the systems used to issue and manage tokenized gold products.

The major gold trade association, World Gold Council, and the Boston Consulting Group have proposed a new platform to modernize how the precious metal operates in digital financial systems.

The World Gold Council on Thursday that it published a white paper on “Gold as a Service,” a new platform to “support the issuance and operation of scalable, interoperable digital gold products.”

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The open platform would connect the physical custody of gold with the digital systems used to issue and manage tokenized gold products. 

“By standardizing essential market processes such as custody coordination, reconciliation, compliance, and redemption, the model aims to reduce operational complexity, improve access, and enable greater consistency across digital gold products,” the World Gold Council said. 

Crypto-native tokenized gold products include Tether Gold (XAUT) or Pax Gold (PAXG), which have formed their own custody, compliance and redemption models, but the World Gold Council’s standard could have more sway with institutions due to the trade group’s prominence.

Features include audits, fungibility, and liquidity 

Key features of the Gold as a Service would include standardizing tokenized gold issuance and management, increasing digital gold’s fungibility, embedding audits and assurance, enabling interoperability with existing finance rails, and improving liquidity in lending and borrowing markets. 

World Gold Council CEO, David Tait, said that financial services are undergoing a “rapid and pervasive digital transformation” and gold must also evolve to maintain its role in the global financial system. 

“Shared infrastructure can help gold become more accessible, more easily traded and fully integrated into modern financial systems - ensuring it remains as relevant tomorrow as it has been for millennia,” he added.

Matthias Tauber, a managing director and senior partner at Boston Consulting Group, said, “The question is no longer whether gold will be digital; it’s how it can participate in modern financial systems without compromising physical integrity.” 

Commodities are 20% of tokenized asset market

According to RWA.xyz, tokenized commodities such as gold account for around $5.5 billion, or 20% of the total on-chain value of tokenized real-world assets, a segment that has grown by 340% over the past 12 months, as demand for gold has skyrocketed. 

Tether’s tokenized gold product has a market capitalization of $2.6 billion, up 17% over the past 12 months, while Pax Gold has a market cap of $2.3 billion, according to CoinGecko. 

On Thursday, crypto exchange Bybit launched a yield-bearing tokenized gold product that lets users earn interest on Tether Gold.