When the news of the signing of the US (Genius Act) came, the social media of global Web3 practitioners was flooded with the same meme - Musk holding a sign that says 'Welcome to the Future,' with the silhouette of the Forbidden City in the background. Behind this dark humor lies a thought-provoking reality: while the US is competing for the high ground of Web3 talent with legal weapons, China is searching for a way out that is distinctly different from the cryptocurrency war. And RWA (Real World Asset tokenization) may be the key weapon in this 'asymmetrical war.'
1. The Strategic Anxiety Behind America's 'Talent Nuclear Bomb'
The introduction of the (Genius Act) is no coincidence. According to PitchBook data, in 2023, the total amount of venture capital in the global Web3 field reached $32.4 billion, with the US holding a steady 47% share, while China accounted for only 3.2%. This gap has created a strong sense of crisis in the US political arena - when the total locked value of DeFi surpassed $80 billion, although China led in the number of blockchain patents, breakthroughs in the application layer were concentrated in government affairs.
The core provisions of the bill target the essential issue: providing 'digital nomad visas' for Web3 talent, allowing crypto companies to pay salaries in tokens, and even planning to establish three 'Blockchain Special Zones' by 2026. This legislative-level 'saturation attack' essentially replicates the 'talent siphoning' strategy of the internet era. But the flip side of the coin is that the US's progress in the RWA field has been relatively slow. Goldman Sachs' (RWA White Paper) released in 2023 pointed out that the scale of global tokenized assets accounts for only 0.3% of GDP, while the traditional securitization market accounts for 97%. This contrast just provides China with a strategic opportunity window.
2. RWA: Opening a New Battlefield Under the Shadow of the Digital Dollar
The smoke of the stablecoin war has not yet cleared. USDT and USDC occupy 76% of the global crypto payment share, and the digital dollar's reach extends to 154 countries through Circle's cross-border payment network. But the logic of RWA is entirely different - it does not aim to create new currency, but to digitize the value anchor points of the real world.
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS)'s 'Guardians Program' provides an observational sample: through a tokenized bond platform, Temasek successfully issued $300 million in green bonds, compressing the settlement period from T+3 to T+0. The EU's (Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation) (MiCA) has even included security tokens in its regulatory sandbox, allowing real estate tokenization shares to exceed the 4,000 euro cap. These practices reveal a truth: the essence of RWA is 'Asset Internet,' not 'Currency Internet.'
China's exploration in this field is more distinctive. The HashKey exchange approved by the Hong Kong Monetary Authority sees 67% of its RWA trading volume coming from mainland enterprise assets, including new energy vehicle patent packages and cross-border e-commerce accounts receivable. This 'offshore + onshore' linkage model cleverly avoids direct regulatory conflicts and forms a unique 'digital special zone' effect.
3. Breakthrough Point or Fog? Three Key Doubts Await Resolution
Despite the enticing prospects, the path of RWA as a breakthrough point is still full of uncertainties:
The Challenge of Reconstructing the Regulatory Coordinate System
China's (Preventing and Dealing with Risks of Virtual Currency Trading Speculation) regulations potentially conflict with the asset tokenization of RWA. How to define the boundary between 'security tokens' and 'functional tokens'? The Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission sets the individual investor threshold at 8 million HKD; can this 'qualified investor' system truly activate liquidity?The 'Last Mile' of Value Capture
Ant Group's supply chain finance platform has realized the tokenization of accounts receivable, but the liquidity in the secondary market is less than 12%. This exposes a core contradiction: traditional financial institutions want to maintain asset control, while blockchain needs transparency. How to design a 'digital property' structure that balances compliance and liquidity?Intergenerational Leap of Infrastructure
Although Ethereum Layer 2 solutions have reduced RWA transaction costs to $0.30, there remains a 100-fold gap compared to the Shenzhen Stock Exchange's $0.003 stock trading cost. Can breakthroughs in technologies like zero-knowledge proofs enable RWA to achieve a hybrid structure of 'on-chain registration + off-chain settlement'?
4. China's Web3 'Da Vinci Moment'
Looking back from this historical turning point, the blockchain white paper of 2015 and the (Generative AI Service Management Measures) of 2023 sketch out a unique trajectory for China's digital economy. RWA may be that connecting point: it neither needs to challenge the existing financial order nor can it inject digital momentum into the real economy.
When BYD tokenizes battery asset packages for cross-border leasing, and the Dunhuang Academy attempts fragmented rights proof of cultural relics IP, what we see is not just a technical experiment, but a digital rebirth of civilizational genes. In this dimension, the ultimate value of RWA lies not in surpassing stablecoins, but in creating a whole new paradigm of value expression - allowing the Terracotta Army of the Qin Shi Huang Mausoleum and Tesla's autonomous driving data to complete value confirmation in the same digital space.
As the sound of the US (Genius Act) artillery fades, China's path to breaking through in Web3 may begin with a deeper understanding of the real world. While the digital dollar conquers virtual space, RWA is building a brand new 'Tower of Babel' between real assets and the digital world. The outcome of this war may not lie in the competition of technical parameters, but in who can more profoundly reconstruct the essence of value.
