The Chainlink (LINK) token could rally more than 25-fold by the end of the decade as tokenized real-world assets (RWA) scale toward $4 trillion, according to a forecast by Geoff Kendrick, global head of digital asset research at Standard Chartered, a London-headquartered multinational bank with a primary operational footprint across Asia, Africa, and the Middle East.

In a Monday report shared with Cointelegraph, Kendrick projected that the rapid expansion of tokenized assets will drive demand for secure onchain data delivery, boosting Chainlink's fee generation and lifting the LINK token to $200 by the end of 2030 — up from approximately $8 at the time of the report. The projection arrives amid growing institutional engagement with blockchain-based financial infrastructure, though industry estimates for the tokenization market vary widely: a 2022 Boston Consulting Group study projected tokenized illiquid assets could reach roughly $16 trillion by 2030, while a 2023 McKinsey report offered a more conservative base-case estimate of around $2 trillion for tokenized financial assets.

Broader Tokenization Forecast

The report also anticipates a 37-fold increase in tokenized and crypto-native assets deployed across decentralized finance (DeFi), bringing the total to $2.7 trillion by the end of 2030. Kendrick argued that this growth will depend on four critical infrastructure layers: trusted data, cross-network interoperability, privacy-preserving compliance, and integration with legacy financial systems. He stated that "only Chainlink is currently equipped to provide" these capabilities at the necessary scale.

Tokenized RWA Trading Hits Record High

The outlook comes amid surging interest in tokenized assets. Tokenized RWA trading volume on decentralized exchanges (DEXs) reached an all-time high of $141 billion in July, representing a 19.5% monthly increase driven primarily by public equities, according to data from CryptoRank.

Real-world asset tokenization refers to the process of issuing blockchain-based digital tokens that represent ownership or rights in traditional financial instruments such as bonds, equities, real estate, and commodities. Major financial institutions including BlackRock, JPMorgan, and HSBC have been exploring or launching tokenization initiatives. BlackRock's BUIDL tokenized money market fund, launched on Ethereum in March 2024, attracted hundreds of millions in assets within weeks, signaling growing institutional engagement with blockchain-based financial infrastructure.

Chainlink's Market Position

Chainlink operates as the blockchain industry's leading decentralized oracle network, providing cross-chain communication and off-chain data feeds to smart contracts. Oracles serve as a bridge between blockchain applications and external data sources, enabling smart contracts to execute based on real-world information such as asset prices, interest rates, and event outcomes. The LINK token underpins this ecosystem by compensating node operators for retrieving and delivering data, and participants can stake LINK as collateral to align incentives around data accuracy and reliability.

Chainlink's Cross-Chain Interoperability Protocol (CCIP), launched on mainnet in 2023, directly addresses the cross-network interoperability layer Kendrick identified as essential for institutional adoption, enabling secure message and token transfers across disparate blockchain networks.

According to data aggregator DefiLlama, Chainlink secures $34.4 billion in total value, while Chronicle ranks second with $7.36 billion.

Risk Factors

Kendrick acknowledged several risks that could affect the LINK price forecast, including slower-than-expected adoption of institutional tokenization, competition from specialized oracle providers, and potential technical setbacks within Chainlink's infrastructure.