Brazilian Farmers Tokenize Dairy Cows on B3 Exchange to Secure Credit Amid Tighter Bank Lending
Key Takeaways
- •Farmers in Paraná raised nearly $20,000 by tokenizing 10 dairy cows on Brazil's B3 stock exchange, marking the first time live animals have been tokenized worldwide.
- •Cowmed's AI-powered Smarty Collars continuously monitor each cow's health, behavior, and location to generate encrypted digital identities registered with B3 as credit collateral.
- •The real-time tracking system eliminates the need for on-site inspections and prevents farmers from pledging the same animals as collateral for multiple loans simultaneously.
- •Cowmed currently tracks approximately 100,000 dairy cows across over 1,000 farms valued at more than $395 million and anticipates up to 20% network adoption of the tokenized financing model.
- •The initiative is part of the broader real-world asset tokenization market, which held $25 billion in total value as of March 2026 and is projected to grow to between $4 trillion and $30 trillion over the next decade.
Farmers in Paraná, Brazil, have tokenized 10 dairy cows on the country's B3 national stock exchange — Latin America's largest bourse — raising nearly $20,000 in credit backed by their livestock. The initiative represents the world's first tokenization of live animals and comes as small agricultural businesses in one of the world's top food-producing nations face increasingly stringent lending limits from local banks.
The project is led by Cowmed, a Brazilian agtech company that equips cattle with AI-powered tracking collars called Smarty Collars. These devices continuously monitor each cow's health, behavior, and location, converting the data into an encrypted digital identity tied directly to credit agreements registered with B3. This real-time monitoring allows the cattle to serve as movable collateral without requiring on-site inspections, while also preventing farmers from double-pledging the same animals across multiple loans — a risk that has historically complicated livestock-backed lending in markets where animals can be transported across regions.
"We take the cow, which is a real and tangible asset, and transform it into a digital asset backed by a unique code monitored in real time," Thiago Martins of Cowmed told CNN Brasil. "This digitization allows for formal registration with B3 as a movable asset. The process is simple and gives the producer an advantageous opportunity to finance themselves, opening a new alternative for collateral at a time of strong credit restrictions in agribusiness."
Martins and Cowmed did not immediately respond to a CoinDesk request for additional comment.
The system includes built-in safeguards that allow a farmer to replace a deceased animal with a live one, ensuring the integrity of the collateral pool. Cowmed currently tracks approximately 100,000 dairy cows across more than 1,000 farms, with the total herd valued at over $395 million. The company expects up to 20% of its network to adopt the tokenized financing model, which could unlock $77.6 million in new credit for the agricultural sector.
The initiative forms part of a broader push into real-world asset (RWA) tokenization, which uses blockchain-based records to fractionalize and trade claims on physical assets ranging from real estate to commodities. McKinsey & Company has forecast that the market for tokenized assets could grow to approximately $4 trillion by 2030 (CoinDesk), while Standard Chartered projected a figure of $30 trillion by 2034 (CoinDesk). As of March 2026, the total value of tokenized assets stood at $25 billion.
Source: CoinDesk