Coinbase Plays Catch-Up as Robinhood Chain Storms Ahead in Tokenized Stocks
On August 24th, Coinbase launched its tokenized stocks on Base, but the move is seen as defensive rather than innovative. The platform issued four stock tokens for Apple, Nvidia, Meta, and Alphabet through a Coinbase entity in Abu Dhabi, available only to eligible users outside the United States.
The real story, however, lies with Robinhood Chain, which went live on July 1st on Arbitrum's stack. Despite Base cleaning up its strategy after admitting it had spent a year on the wrong one, Robinhood Chain has shown remarkable growth in just two months, passing 328,000 RWA holders by late July.
Robinhood Chain's tokenized real-world assets have climbed from around $13 million to roughly $140 million, with Syrup USDG, a private-credit token, making up the majority of that figure. In contrast, Base's total tokenized RWA sits near $200 million, but its composition is mostly bonds and treasuries.
The two chains are making different bets: Coinbase's stock tokens carry shareholder rights, while Robinhood's are tokenized debt securities without ownership or voting rights. Both firms face the same asterisk, neither product is available to Americans due to SEC regulations.