XStocks’ tokenized Circle stock CRCLx deploys $3M in DeFi

Tokenized versions of Circle’s stock are now doing something that traditional shares sitting in a brokerage account simply cannot: earning yield in DeFi. Roughly $2.9 million worth of CRCLx tokens, which track the price of Circle Internet Group shares, are currently deployed across various decentralized finance platforms.

The product, part of the broader xStocks suite issued by Backed Finance, represents a quiet but meaningful milestone in the push to bring traditional equities onchain.

What CRCLx actually is

CRCLx is a tracker certificate, meaning each token is backed 1:1 by underlying Circle shares held by the issuer. The tokens are available as SPL tokens on Solana and ERC-20 tokens on Ethereum.

CRCLx launched in June 2025, and its net asset value has recently hovered between $71 and $74. Instead of letting the tokens sit idle in a wallet, holders are deploying them into lending protocols, liquidity pools, and other DeFi applications.

XStocks’ dominance in tokenized equity DeFi

XStocks commands 58% of all tokenized equity deposits across 15 different DeFi applications. In the narrower category of tokenized-stock lending, the dominance is even more pronounced: 86.5% of total value locked belongs to xStocks products.

The total transaction volume across the xStocks suite has exceeded $35 billion.

Why Circle stock specifically

Circle is the company behind USDC, one of the most widely used stablecoins in DeFi. Circle went public in 2025, giving crypto-native investors a way to gain equity exposure to the stablecoin giant through traditional markets.

Bybit has accepted select xStocks tokens, including CRCLx, as collateral starting July 31, 2026, giving holders the ability to leverage their tokenized equity positions for trading on that platform.

The broader tokenized equity landscape

The regulatory picture remains complex. Tracker certificates like CRCLx navigate securities law by structuring themselves as financial instruments that reference an underlying asset rather than as the shares themselves, and are designed for eligible non-U.S. investors.

The risk profile is worth noting. Holders of CRCLx carry not just the market risk of Circle’s stock price but also issuer risk from Backed Finance, smart contract risk from whatever DeFi protocol they deploy into, and potential liquidity risk if secondary markets thin out. With xStocks controlling 58% of tokenized equity DeFi deposits, a single issuer dominating an emerging market means the entire category’s credibility is tied to one entity’s operational performance.

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