Original author: Attorney Zhao Xuan
Recently, I came across two interesting news items about Web3 and would like to share them with you.
First, Binance quietly launched Tesla (TSLA) related products, but instead of RWA (Real World Asset), it launched Perpetual (Perpetual Contract).
Secondly, U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Paul Atkins has recently made a series of public statements indicating that the U.S. financial market may be fully migrated to the blockchain within two years.
(Image source: Crypto Circle)
These two news items are strongly related, concerning the next direction of global asset liquidity, and involve both economic issues and some interesting legal issues.
Let's first discuss Binance's approach: from "brute force" to "stealth".
This is not the first time Binance has targeted Tesla.
Looking back at 2021, Binance launched a high-profile "equity token," attempting to peg it 1:1 to real-world stocks, allowing users to hold shares on-chain and receive dividends. However, this product faced strong opposition from regulatory agencies in Germany and the UK due to allegations of illegal securities issuance, and was ultimately delisted.
Back then, Binance's strategy was to "brute force"—directly transferring equity onto the blockchain—but it underestimated the power of traditional financial rules. Now, its approach has shifted to "stealth."
The Tesla perpetual contract, launched in 2026, will no longer be tied to share ownership, but will only track price fluctuations; it will not guarantee dividends, but will only offer a bet on whether prices will rise or fall. Users are not buying Tesla equity, but rather engaging in a pure price game.
The shift from "buying ownership" to "buying volatility" may seem like a retreat, but it is actually another roundabout exploration by crypto giants into the equity trading market within the existing legal framework.
Tesla on the blockchain: Is it buying "buy" or "delivery"?
Many people trading Tesla on Binance wonder if on-chain Tesla is the same as the US-listed Tesla. To answer this question, we must clarify the legal boundaries involved:
- Perpetual contracts (PERP) : You're buying a "bet." You're buying a contract and betting on price. The logic is simple, and the underlying asset is highly liquid, but legally it's a "derivative." If the platform faces liquidation risks, you have no physical assets to recover.
- RWA (Tokenized Assets) : You're buying "goods." A token on the blockchain represents a gold bar or a share of stock in the vault. Its core is "ownership confirmation." This involves complex cross-border legal adaptations, asset custody, and physical asset verification.
In the short term, perpetual contracts may drive away speculative fervor; however, in the long run, RWA (Renewable Wealth Agreement) in the US stock market is the ultimate solution to reshape global financial liquidity.
Backed by a Giant: SEC Chairman Paul Atkins' Two-Year Plan
If Binance's actions represent a race to the front by the public, then the repeated official statements from regulators signify the entry of the "regular army."
Paul Atkins, the current chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, made two public statements in December 2025 and January of this year, stating that the U.S. financial market may be fully migrated to the blockchain within two years.
Please note this timeline: two years . In his "Project Crypto" blueprint, blockchain is no longer seen as the mortal enemy of regulation, but rather as the underlying operating system for improving transparency and enabling T+0 settlement.
Currently, mature on-chain ownership transactions (RWA) have been implemented for major assets such as gold and silver. Putting US stocks on the blockchain is no longer a technical question of "can it be done?", but a procedural question of "when to move them." And with the specific roadmap already defined, these procedural issues are merely details that require proper compliance arrangements.
Exploring Dispute Resolution Clauses
Given the current context of traditional finance being continuously restructured by Web3 technology, the massive influx of capital, and the lack of clear regulations, another key issue I am concerned about is:
How can we achieve an efficient and fair resolution once a dispute arises?
On-chain transactions are characterized by "settlement is the end," while blockchain-related investment and financing often involve the legal rules of multiple jurisdictions. In the event of disputes such as default or protocol vulnerabilities, traditional court litigation often becomes a protracted stalemate due to jurisdictional disputes.
Compared to resorting to courts after the fact, agreeing to reliable arbitration jurisdiction in advance has become an industry consensus. Recently, my team and I have had several in-depth exchanges with professionals from major arbitration institutions such as the Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC) and the Shanghai International Arbitration Centre (SHIAC) to jointly explore how to combine the resolution of large-value blockchain disputes with the impartiality and strong enforceability of international commercial arbitration.
We look forward to further dialogue with more experts in the field of arbitration, both domestically and internationally. In today's world of increasingly transnational asset flows, there is an urgent need to establish a compliant arbitration pathway that both deeply understands the underlying technological logic and is recognized by mainstream legal jurisdictions.
Conclusion
What exactly has Web3 brought us?
Despite occasional tightening of regulations and growing pains in the industry, I firmly believe that the core of Web3 lies in freedom. It will inevitably reshape the entire financial system; the only uncertainty is how long this process will take—whether it will be the two years predicted by the SEC, or a little longer.
On-chain freedom means that assets are no longer bound by physical national borders, and it also means that ordinary people can share in the benefits of global liquidity. The liberation of global asset liquidity is a clearly foreseeable future, and it is also a key battleground in which our generation of legal professionals should personally get involved.
— Deconstructing the SEC's "two-year on-chain" vision: the path to Web3 freedom and further liberation of global asset flows.
