BlackRock CEO: The impact of tokenization on finance may be comparable to the impact of the early internet on the information sector.

PANews reported on December 2nd that, according to The Block, BlackRock CEO Larry Fink and COO Rob Goldstein stated that tokenization is becoming a transformative force in global markets, with a potential impact comparable to the early rise of the internet. On Monday, the two wrote an article in The Economist, simultaneously published on BlackRock's website. They believe that digital ledgers, which record asset ownership, can improve efficiency, transparency, and accessibility, driving the modernization of the financial system. They also wrote, "With the invention of self-repeating ledgers, ledgers have never been so exciting."

The two executives see tokenization as the next stage of technological change. Fink recalls his early career in the 1970s, when transactions were conducted by telephone and settlement relied on paper receipts delivered by courier. In 1977, SWIFT introduced a standardized electronic messaging system for interbank transactions, drastically reducing settlement time from days to minutes; today, global transactions can be completed in milliseconds. In 2009, Satoshi Nakamoto first applied blockchain technology to Bitcoin, introducing a shared digital ledger that records transactions without intermediaries, laying the foundation for tokenization and allowing various assets to reside in a single, independently verifiable digital record. Fink and Goldstein also stated that initially, the financial world struggled to grasp its significance because tokenization was intertwined with the seemingly speculative cryptocurrency craze. However, in recent years, traditional finance has discovered that tokenization can significantly expand the range of investable assets, going beyond listed stocks and bonds.