The tokenized commodities market reached $5.55 billion by the end of March 2026, nearly four times its $1.43 billion valuation at the start of 2025. Gold-backed tokens account for almost 90 percent of that growth, but the real action is shifting toward income-generating structures: lending, leasing and collateral financing.
Paxos Labs' new PAXGy token represents this pivot. Backed by PAX Gold (PAXG) trading at $4,196.27, PAXGy deploys reserves to institutional borrowers and allows holders to accumulate additional gold as lending rates are repaid in ounce terms. It's gold that works for you instead of sitting idle.
"Gold lending historically required scale and established relationships that were inaccessible to most investors," said Bhau Kotecha, co-founder of Paxos Labs. "We're opening that to individuals, family offices and institutions." Kotecha flagged future borrowing against PAXGy as the next phase. The tradeoff: lending returns are not guaranteed, and borrower defaults could reduce token value.
Silver is emerging as the natural second play. Theo's thSLVR token passes income from institutional silver leases directly to holders while maintaining price exposure to the metal. "Silver has both industrial demand and an established leasing market," said Iggy Ioppe, Theo's Chief Investment Officer. "But it's more volatile and the available supply is tighter than gold."
Ioppe projects the tokenized commodities market will reach tens of billions within five years and exceed $100 billion within a decade. He expects tokenization to become standard in commodity settlement and financing within 15 years.
Oil represents the largest opportunity and the steepest logistical challenge. Energy Substantiation expanded its WTIC token—each representing one barrel of West Texas Intermediate crude backed by verified physical inventory—from Ethereum to Solana on Oct. 2. Natural gas and Brent crude tokens are in development.
"We're seeing demand from energy buyers and other market participants," said JP Thieriot, co-founder and CEO of EnSub. "This opens markets that were locked to large institutions."
The arc is clear: tokenized commodities are moving from passive holdings into active yield vehicles. Lend gold, lease silver, finance oil inventory. The protocols that crack income generation will capture the real capital flows.
