How Long Will the Spring of RWA Be?

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2025-03-24 11:08

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Original Title: "How Long Will RWA's Spring Last?"

Original Source: Yekai (WeChat/Twitter: YekaiMeta)

Every 25 years, RWA's spring arrives, and it probably won't be long before it runs into summer. Looking back at the advocacy of RWA in 23/24, the 2.5 narrative and the institutional market used to be criticized frequently. However, the wind has shifted recently, with influential KOLs and various association alliances emerging one after another to promote RWA, creating a lively atmosphere that is akin to summer.

Spring is actually quite short, while summer brings unpredictable thunderstorms. Among those currently enthusiastic about RWA, many are merely interested in the trend, seeking to present a plan and receive some project funding without having the patience and dedication to truly study and practice RWA.

Latest Developments in New Energy RWA

On March 18, the National Development and Reform Commission, the National Energy Administration, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, and five other departments jointly issued the "Opinions on Promoting the High-Quality Development of the Renewable Energy Green Power Certificate Market," which, for the first time, explicitly requires certain industries to consume green power.

(V) Clarify the mandatory consumption requirements for green certificates. Steadily promote the mandatory consumption of green certificates in accordance with the law, gradually increase the proportion of green power consumption, and utilize green certificates for accounting. Accelerate the increase in the proportion of green power consumption by steel, non-ferrous, building materials, petrochemicals, chemical industry enterprises, data centers, and other key energy-consuming units and industries, aiming to reach a consumption ratio not lower than the national renewable energy power consumption responsibility weighting average by 2030; further enhance the proportion of green power consumption in newly built data centers at national hub nodes on the basis of 80%. In regions with conditions, create a batch of high-proportion green power consumption green energy factories, green energy parks, etc., encourage them to achieve 100% green power consumption. Incorporate information on green power consumption into listed companies' Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) reporting system.

Among them, green computing power is directly linked to green electricity consumption. Data centers are required to use not less than 80% green electricity, which coincides with the viewpoints in articles on green electricity computing power published last year: green electricity computing power assets have now become policy. In addition to direct green electricity computing power connections, there are also green certificate trading markets, green electricity computing power consumption, etc., all of which, apart from the overseas part mentioned in the articles, are gradually being implemented. Therefore, the essence of RWA is not just finding a client and issuing debt but delving deep into the industry, transaction structure, and future trends to design a truly effective RWA project framework.

At the same time, the third case of New Energy RWA in Hong Kong has emerged, and Ant Group's RWA projects are coming in quick succession. While this time it is still based on the New Energy theme, the main entity is no longer a listed company, and the assets are exchange cabinets for two-wheeled electric vehicles (last year, several two-wheeled electric vehicle exchange cabinet and charging pile companies approached us to discuss RWA issuance, but their asset scales and credit conditions did not quite meet the requirements and the plans were shelved); furthermore, the financing amount is getting smaller, only in the tens of millions of Hong Kong dollars. Interestingly, a Tree-Graph public chain has entered the scene alongside an ecological enterprise, making the situation suddenly more complex.

RWA is not just about issuing a bond and leaving it there, just like some companies had originally planned to issue a bond with assets worth billions, but without a secondary market and liquidity, they had to shelve the plan. RWA assets need to have liquidity and should be designed from a project perspective, integrating the industry ecosystem and the value space of the industry chain, considering the interaction between the primary, secondary, and even tertiary markets.

Can RWA Be Issued?

From the second half of last year to the beginning of this year, more and more companies and individuals have been asking if they can issue RWA. Most of them have been discouraged by me. If they are not a listed company, do not have asset scale, and do not have funding scale, I do not recommend considering issuing RWA in Hong Kong. Of course, it is not ruled out that some high-quality small and medium-sized enterprise projects or assets can issue offshore RWA. However, we do not want to just take the money and do the project. Instead, we hope to have a group of truly dedicated and willing comrades who are willing to go deep. We believe it is better to teach a man to fish than to give him a fish. We can provide in-depth training and coaching together to promote the rational and orderly development of the RWA market, rather than let the market be confused by some network marketing tactics and hot-handed investment speculators.

Some early project teams are very dedicated. For example, some teams will print out all my RWA articles from the past two years for internal circulation. Whenever there are different perspectives on RWA, those twenty-plus articles totaling tens of thousands of words cover everything. However, most people do not have the patience to read the articles and instead tend to ask very basic and newbie questions. Even worse, some are impulsive, adding you on WeChat right away, calling you brother, and then asking how their RWA proposal is. Then, upon looking at it, the content is from an article I wrote one or two years ago, or from a few frameworks I discussed during last year's roadshow, and some haven't even been modified before being included in the proposal. What can I say? I can't just say great minds think alike, right? You've beat me to it by over a year.

During our roadshow last year, from Shanghai to Suzhou, then Hangzhou and Shenzhen, and finally Singapore, it was all very lively on the outside, with various heroes starting all kinds of RWA projects, and we started to focus on our work. At last year's seminar, we released our six RWA frameworks: Product, Ecosystem, Track, Industry, Global Interdomain, and Future New Finance, among others. Several of these frameworks have appeared multiple times in the proposals of different RWA service providers. Regardless of whether they understand it well or not, at least it has driven the RWA market, just like how my book "Tokenomics Design Patterns" from 2018 is being used by many ICO projects as a guide for their tokenomic model, which is also a way to drive the market.

Serious Nonsense

As RWA becomes more mainstream, various situations of information asymmetry have arisen. The most crucial thing is that more and more KOLs and internet celebrities from different fields have also dived into the RWA space. Since it is still in its early stages, you can say whatever you want, so you can see a lot of serious nonsense being spouted. Of course, there are also some who know half of it and then speak half-truths and half-lies, appearing very professional, but much of the most crucial practical aspects are wrong, which is the most harmful.

In our previous liquidity article and industry RWA upgrade article, we mentioned Hong Kong Level One, Overseas Level Two, on-chain liquidity, debt issuance collateralization, and the four-layer phase of industry RWA. Recently, many KOLs and solutions have also started various content, but the most feasible point is that everyone's understanding of the secondary market is relatively narrow. Some understand it as a trading platform, and some even just transform a previous NFT art marketplace, calling it a secondary market.

Speaking of which, recently, there are quite a few NFT/art marketplace projects that have revived under the concept of RWA. Using NFTs to tokenize RWA assets, actually, when used properly, NFTs/art marketplaces are a good thing. Even in RWA projects, they can be combined with physical asset positions or minted as NFTs during redemption for verification purposes, which is a very good scenario. However, using the previous NFT art marketplace model to do RWAs, labeling it as a secondary market for pump and dump speculation, is also baffling.

Lastly, let's mention Hainan and Shanghai. Especially Hainan, many people have been promoting Hainan recently, saying that after the closed-door period, it will establish an RWA trading platform, allow virtual asset trading, or something similar. Over the past few years, when we were communicating with the Hainan Provincial Government to establish REITs trading platforms and participate in financing for Hainan Life Insurance, Hainan Commercial Aerospace, etc., we closely coordinated with the provincial government and the provincial financial regulatory bureau and are quite familiar with Hainan's legislation, regulatory compliance, and offshore finance.

In terms of compliance for trading platforms, Hainan cannot break through the "three red lines," and the core of Hainan's offshore finance lies in "Hainan + Hong Kong/Macau + Overseas," as a complement to Hong Kong and Macau. It is not possible to directly break through in Hainan. Hainan's advantages mainly lie in the VIE structure going out and the QFLP channel coming back, as well as overseas information access without the need for a VPN, which are the core advantages of establishing an RWA issuance and operation base in Hainan. As for the Shanghai Free Trade Zone, with its positioning as the mainland's only international financial center, it is the same.

#ARAW Always RWA Always Win!

By 2025, the RWA market will quickly find its place in rapid growth. WeChat cannot answer all questions individually. Following the core disciple class, there will be a partner class and a listed company study camp. If you have needs or questions, you can bring them to the classroom for serious learning, interactive discussions, and sandbox simulations. Friends who are interested in understanding RWA and wish to initiate RWA projects are welcome to reply "course" or "registration" in the official account to join the course preparation group, or add WeChat YekaiMeta to join the RWA course discussion group for participation.