BlackRock Tokenizes $311 Billion of European Money Market Funds via JPMorgan's Kinexys

BlackRock has launched twelve new tokenized share classes across six money market funds in its Institutional Cash Series. The funds hold a combined $311 billion in assets, and professional investors in 13 European jurisdictions can now access the tokenized shares. It marks BlackRock's first tokenized fund launch in Europe, and the firm frames it as a natural next step in a strategy it has built since 2024. By asset volume, this ranks among the largest single moves of a traditional cash management vehicle into tokenized form currently available on the market.

What Was Launched

The twelve new share classes cover six BlackRock Institutional Cash Series funds in euro, sterling and U.S. dollar versions, each offered in distributing and accumulating forms. The underlying funds are public debt constant net asset value funds and low volatility NAV funds regulated under Europe's UCITS framework. The difference between the two is simple: the first keeps its share price fixed at $1 or an equivalent, while the second allows small price swings depending on the market. Both types are traditionally seen as among the most conservative instruments for managing corporate cash. Access is now open in Bermuda, Estonia, France, Germany, Ireland, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Singapore, Spain, Sweden and the UK. That's thirteen markets at once. The share classes are reserved for professional and qualified clients only, with no access for retail investors. According to the company, this is the first tokenized fund access BlackRock has offered in Europe specifically, while similar products have existed in the U.S. for more than a year. The format of each fund stays the same for traditional investors, tokenization simply adds a new way to hold and transfer shares.

How the Kinexys Structure Works

Tokens are minted on Ethereum through Kinexys, JPMorgan's blockchain unit. Kinexys handles minting and burning of the tokens, while the fund's transfer agent continues to maintain the official shareholder register. Smart contracts move holdings between approved investor wallets, which makes transfers available around the clock and keeps positions visible in close to real time. BlackRock says the structure keeps the same standards for capital preservation, liquidity and risk management that apply to its ordinary share classes. Tokenization here doesn't replace the fund's traditional infrastructure, it adds a programmable record-keeping layer on top of it. For an investor, that means shares can move outside normal trading hours, without waiting on a standard settlement cycle. In practice, that means a corporate treasurer can move a fund share between wallets without routing it through a traditional clearing chain, which typically adds a day or two to settlement on orders placed through classic money market fund channels.

A Second Tokenized Launch in a Week

The European share classes arrived a day after BlackRock rolled out separate tokenized money market funds on Solana, Ethereum and Stripe's Tempo network. Those products target stablecoin reserve management, with Securitize acting as transfer agent instead of Kinexys. Using different partners for different regions suggests BlackRock isn't tying itself to one blockchain. It runs a bank-based network through Kinexys alongside a public one through Securitize, to see which fits different client types better.

Both launches build on the track record of BUIDL, the tokenized fund BlackRock opened on Ethereum in March 2024 with a $5 million minimum investment. The fund has since expanded to eight networks and now manages more than $2.6 billion in assets. BUIDL effectively became the testing ground where the firm worked out the mechanics of tokenized share accounting before these larger U.S. and European launches.

What BlackRock and JPMorgan Are Saying

Kara Kennedy, global head of market development at Kinexys, said tokenization has moved from concept to execution. Hannah Winter, BlackRock's head of digital cash, added that the tokenized share classes preserve the same approach to capital protection, liquidity and risk management as the firm's traditional funds.

"Today's launches represent an important evolution in how investors access and manage cash, while helping modernise capital markets infrastructure."

- Beccy Milchem, Global Head of Cash Distribution at BlackRock, from a company press release, August 4, 2026

In a separate comment to CoinDesk, Milchem said large cash management investors want size and liquidity above all, and that the tokenized share classes add a new digital way to hold and transfer shares on top of the usual investment process.

Who Benefits, and What's Still Unresolved

BlackRock points to several practical use cases for the new tokenized share classes.

• Managing operating and reserve cash for corporate treasuries
• Using tokenized shares as digital collateral
• Distribution through bank and wealth management channels
• Round-the-clock transfers between approved investor wallets

That flexibility matters most for large corporate clients, who typically hold cash across several currencies at once and need room to move funds between jurisdictions. At the same time, the firm hasn't disclosed how much of the $311 billion in assets it expects to move on-chain anytime soon. Secondary market liquidity for these tokens is also still an open question, since transfers are currently limited to a pool of approved wallets rather than free trading. The regulatory status of tokenized shares outside the EU hasn't been clarified either, even though the funds already meet UCITS requirements across 13 jurisdictions. How fast clients actually move to tokenized shares will also depend on how appealing competing offers from other asset managers turn out to be.

Where the Tokenized Asset Market Goes From Here

The tokenized real-world asset market has grown more than 200% over the past year and now tops $30 billion, according to rwa.xyz. Citi projects tokenized securities could reach $5.5 trillion by 2030. BlackRock CEO Larry Fink and COO Rob Goldstein have repeatedly called tokenization the next major step in market infrastructure. BlackRock isn't the only major player here. Franklin Templeton and Fidelity already run their own tokenized money market funds, and competition for institutional clients looking for digital cash management tools is picking up.

For comparison, the BUIDL token launched three years ago with $5 million and now manages $2.6 billion. If the European ICS funds follow a similar path, the share of tokenized assets in BlackRock's business could grow substantially within a few years, though the company is still avoiding specific predictions about how fast that shift will happen.