How Tokenized Gold and Stablecoins are Changing Institutional Custody in Asia
“Tokenized gold can exchange with stablecoins or cryptocurrency and be used as collateral. It’s becoming a dynamic financial toolkit in modern finance.”
As stablecoins lay the foundation for real-world asset tokenization under frameworks like the Genesis Act, the next asset class is already here: gold. For banks modernizing their infrastructure, understanding tokenized gold isn’t optional, it’s operationally essential.
Cici Lu McCalman, founder of Venn Link Partners, a consultancy helping banks transition to blockchain-driven systems, explains why tokenized gold is more than a digitized commodity - it’s reshaping institutional operations and portfolio construction.
Why Gold, Why Now
Gold demand remains structurally strong driven by geopolitical tension, monetary-policy uncertainty, and central-bank accumulation. Tokenization turns this traditional store of value into a programmable, auditable, and highly liquid asset.
Bloomberg’s Gold-Bitcoin Index highlights the pairing: both are politically neutral and non-debt-driven, offering diversification and resilience across traditional and digital portfolios.
The World Gold Council’s “Pooled Gold Interest” initiative shows how tokenization combines allocated and unallocated gold via distributed-ledger technology, enabling institutional-grade fractional ownership.
The Three Questions COOs Must Ask
- Is the token 100 % backed?
- By what gold? (LBMA-accredited, 99.99 % purity, professionally vaulted)
- Can reserves be verified in real time?
Verification now relies on a dual-audit framework; traditional physical audits (bar lists, refiners, weights) paired with on-chain data validation from providers like Dune Analytics. The highest standard links each token to bar serial numbers, vault locations, and purity records, turning paper promises into verifiable trust.
The Operational Imperative
As stablecoins and CBDCs integrate into mainstream finance, tokenized gold offers COOs a compliant, operational bridge between physical value and digital custody.
“Tokenization is the inevitable next step for financial services,” Cici concluded.
Watch the full executive conversation with Cici for a deeper dive into tokenized-gold custody and the future of real-world asset operations.