BlackRock's Samara Cohen Declares Public Blockchains Superior for Tokenization
Speaking at the Bloomberg Invest conference in New York, BlackRock's Global Head of Market Development said the world's largest asset manager has abandoned its earlier preference for private blockchains, citing the proven superiority of public networks for tokenized financial products.
Samara Cohen, Global Head of Market Development at BlackRock (NYSE: BLK), told attendees at the Bloomberg Invest conference on March 3, 2026, that the world's largest asset manager now views public blockchains as categorically superior to private alternatives for tokenizing financial assets. The declaration marks a definitive strategic conclusion from a firm managing approximately $14 trillion in total assets and operating the largest tokenized money market fund in the world [1][2].
"A few years ago we believed private blockchains would dominate; now we see the superiority of public blockchains," Cohen stated during her conversation with Bloomberg's Tim Stenovec and Carol Massar at the New York event [1][3].
The remarks carry weight that extends well beyond rhetorical positioning. BlackRock's tokenization activities are already heavily concentrated on public infrastructure, and Cohen's comments signal that the firm's internal debate over blockchain architecture has effectively concluded.
BUIDL and BlackRock's Tokenization Footprint
The centerpiece of BlackRock's tokenization strategy is the BlackRock USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund (BUIDL), a tokenized money market fund launched in March 2024 in partnership with Securitize. BUIDL invests in U.S. Treasury bills, cash, and repurchase agreements, distributing daily accrued dividends to token holders monthly. The fund surpassed $2 billion in assets under management in late 2025 and has distributed more than $100 million in cumulative dividends since launch [4][5].
BUIDL currently operates across eight blockchain networks, all of them public: Ethereum, Solana, Polygon, Arbitrum, Aptos, Avalanche, Optimism, and BNB Chain. In February 2026, BlackRock took a further step by listing BUIDL on the Uniswap decentralized exchange, making it the first time the firm used decentralized finance infrastructure for institutional token trading [6].
Metric — Detail
Fund Name — BlackRock USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund (BUIDL)
Launch Date — March 2024
AUM (Late 2025) — $2+ billion
Cumulative Dividends — $100+ million
Tokenization Partner — Securitize
Blockchains — Ethereum, Solana, Polygon, Arbitrum, Aptos, Avalanche, Optimism, BNB Chain
Tokenized Treasury Market Share — ~33% (per RWA.xyz)
DeFi Integration — Uniswap (Feb 2026)
Collateral Use — Accepted on Binance (Nov 2025)
"Stablecoins are no longer niche; they're becoming the bridge between traditional finance and digital liquidity," Cohen said in BlackRock's 2026 thematic outlook, published in January [2].
The Public vs. Private Blockchain Debate
Cohen's Bloomberg Invest remarks bring closure to a longstanding debate within institutional finance over whether private, permissioned ledgers or public, open-access blockchains are better suited for regulated financial products. Early institutional tokenization efforts from 2019 through 2022 overwhelmingly favored private networks, with firms citing concerns about compliance, privacy, and counterparty risk [7].
BlackRock's own trajectory illustrates the shift. When BUIDL launched on Ethereum in March 2024, it represented the firm's first tokenized product on a public chain. By late 2025, the fund had expanded to seven additional public networks and was being used as collateral on centralized exchanges. The operational data from nearly two years of production activity appears to have resolved whatever reservations remained [4][5].
The broader tokenized real-world asset market reinforces this pattern. According to RWA.xyz, the total value of tokenized real-world assets exceeded $21 billion in January 2026, with Ethereum alone hosting $12.8 billion of that total, representing roughly 65% of the distributed market [8]. Tokenized U.S. Treasuries specifically reached $10.8 billion by late February, having grown from $8.9 billion at the start of the year [9].
RWA Metric — Value
Total Tokenized RWA (Jan 2026) — $21+ billion
Tokenized U.S. Treasuries (Feb 2026) — $10.8 billion
Ethereum Share of RWA Market — ~65% ($12.8B)
Growth Since Jan 1, 2026 — +$1.9 billion (Treasuries)
Sector Growth Since 2024 — ~50x (per Token Terminal)
Institutional Tokenization Momentum
Cohen's statements at Bloomberg Invest coincide with a cluster of institutional tokenization milestones. WisdomTree received SEC exemptive relief for 24/7 trading and instant settlement of its tokenized Treasury money market fund (WTGXX), representing the first time registered tokenized fund shares have been permitted to trade around the clock within the U.S. regulatory perimeter [10]. The Depository Trust and Clearing Corporation (DTCC), which processed $3.7 quadrillion in transaction volume in 2024, announced in December 2025 that it will launch an asset-tokenization service beginning with U.S. Treasuries [9].
BlackRock CEO Larry Fink has consistently framed tokenization as a generational transformation. In his 2025 chairman's letter, Fink wrote: "Every stock, every bond, every fund, every asset can be tokenized. If they are, it will revolutionize investing" [2]. The firm named crypto and tokenization as one of three key themes driving markets in its 2026 outlook, alongside artificial intelligence and geopolitics [2].
BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) became the fastest-growing ETF in history, surpassing $70 billion in assets within 341 trading days of its January 2024 launch. By comparison, the previous record holder, SPDR Gold Shares, took 1,691 days to reach the same milestone [2].
Implications for Blockchain Architecture
The practical consequence of BlackRock's public-chain preference is a reinforcement of Ethereum's role as the primary settlement layer for tokenized financial products. Ethereum hosts approximately $12.8 billion in tokenized real-world assets, and its smart-contract infrastructure underpins BUIDL's largest share class [7][8].
However, BlackRock's multi-chain deployment of BUIDL across eight networks also signals that the firm does not view the public blockchain landscape as a winner-take-all market. Expansion to Solana, BNB Chain, and various Ethereum Layer 2 networks suggests a strategy calibrated for maximum distribution reach rather than exclusive loyalty to a single chain [4][5].
For competing asset managers, the message from Cohen's Bloomberg Invest appearance is unambiguous: the world's largest money manager has placed its infrastructure bets on public blockchains, and two years of production data have validated that choice. Private-chain tokenization strategies, still maintained by some banking consortia and enterprise platforms, now face an existential question about whether they can achieve comparable distribution, composability, and institutional adoption against the public-chain default that BlackRock is establishing [2][7].
References
[1] Bloomberg, "BlackRock's Samara Cohen on Public Markets and Role of Tokenization" (video), March 3, 2026. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2026-03-03/blackrock-s-samara-cohen-on-public-markets-tokenization-video
[2] Brave New Coin, "BlackRock Names Cryptocurrency and Tokenization as Major Investment Themes for 2026," January 22, 2026. https://bravenewcoin.com/insights/blackrock-names-cryptocurrency-and-tokenization-as-major-investment-themes-for-2026
[3] YouTube/Bloomberg Radio, "BlackRock's Samara Cohen on Public Markets, Role of Tokenization," March 3, 2026. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Y5ZlsBcikI
[4] PR Newswire/Securitize, "BlackRock's BUIDL Tokenized by Securitize Now Accepted as Collateral on Binance," November 14, 2025. https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/blackrocks-buidl-tokenized-by-securitize-now-accepted-as-collateral-for-trading-on-binance-and-launches-on-bnb-chain-302613374.html
[5] MEXC News, "BlackRock's BUIDL Crosses $2B in Assets as Tokenized Finance Grows," December 30, 2025. https://www.mexc.com/news/375835
[6] Yahoo Finance, "BlackRock Deepens Tokenization Push With BUIDL Trading and Uniswap Integration," February 13, 2026. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/blackrock-deepens-tokenization-push-buidl-131204189.html
[7] Intellectia.ai, "BlackRock's 2026 Strategy: Ethereum as Core for 65% Tokenized Asset Market," January 23, 2026. https://intellectia.ai/news/crypto/blackrocks-2026-strategy-ethereum-as-core-for-65-tokenized-asset-market
[8] Phemex News, "Tokenized Real-World Assets Exceed $21 Billion in Early 2026," January 19, 2026. https://phemex.com/news/article/tokenized-realworld-assets-exceed-21-billion-in-early-2026-54543
[9] CoinMarketCap, "Tokenized Treasurys Top $10.8B as Institutional Interest Grows," February 25, 2026. https://coinmarketcap.com/academy/article/tokenized-treasurys-top-dollar108b-as-institutional-interest-grows
[10] Nasdaq/Business Wire, "WisdomTree To Launch 24/7 Trading and Instant Settlement for Tokenized Money Market Fund," February 24, 2026. https://www.nasdaq.com/press-release/wisdomtree-launch-24-7-trading-and-instant-settlement-tokenized-money-market-fund