News Archives: May, 2026
Crane Data's latest monthly Money Fund Market Share rankings show assets down among the largest U.S. money fund complexes in April, after also declining in March. Assets have increased in 19 of the past 22 months (April 2025, March 2026 and April 2026 saw declines). Money market fund assets fell by $102.1 billion, or -1.2%, last month to $8.096 trillion. Total MMF assets decreased by $53.9 billion, or -0.7%, over the past 3 months, and they've increased by $778.7 billion, or 10.6%, over the past 12 months. The largest increases among the 25 largest managers last month were seen by BNY Dreyfus, DWS, Morgan Stanley, Vanguard and T Rowe Price, which grew assets by $10.7 billion, $6.0B, $5.4B, $3.9B and $1.1B, respectively. Declines in April were seen by Fidelity, JPMorgan, Schwab, First American and Goldman Sachs, which decreased by $24.6 billion, $21.9B, $14.0B, $11.4B and $10.7B, respectively. Our domestic U.S. "Family" rankings are available in our MFI XLS product, our global rankings are available in our MFI International product. The combined "Family & Global Rankings" are available to Money Fund Wisdom subscribers. We review the latest market share totals, and look at money fund yields, which were lower in April.
Over the past year through Apr. 30, 2026, Fidelity (up $151.5B, or 10.0%), JPMorgan (up $125.0B, or 16.4%), BlackRock (up $90.2B, or 14.6%), Vanguard (up $68.2B, or 10.0%) and Morgan Stanley (up $59.4B, or 21.0%) were the largest gainers. BlackRock, Invesco, Morgan Stanley, Fidelity and DWS had the largest asset increases over the past 3 months, rising by $11.8B, $11.6B, $8.3B, $5.7B and $5.2B, respectively. The largest decline over 12 months was seen by: American Funds (down $21.7B), PGIM (down $1.1B) and T Rowe Price (down $156M). The largest declines over 3 months included: JPMorgan (down $30.1B), Goldman Sachs (down $14.4B), Federated Hermes (down $10.7B), Allspring (down $9.0B) and UBS (down $8.8B).
Our latest domestic U.S. Money Fund Family Rankings show that Fidelity Investments remains the largest money fund manager with $1.672 trillion, or 20.7% of all assets. Fidelity was down $24.6B in April, up $5.7B over 3 mos., and up $151.5B over 12 months. JPMorgan ranked second with $887.0 billion, or 11.0% market share (down $21.9B, down $30.1B and up $125.0B for the past 1-month, 3-mos. and 12-mos., respectively). Vanguard ranked in third place with $748.5 billion, or 9.2% of assets (up $3.9B, down $4.3B and up $68.2B). BlackRock ranked fourth with $708.5 billion, or 8.8% market share (down $3.6B, up $11.8B and up $90.2B), while Schwab was the fifth largest MMF manager with $686.7 billion, or 8.5% of assets (down $14.0B, down $6.0B and up $49.3B for the past 1-month, 3-mos. and 12-mos.).
Federated Hermes was in sixth place with $509.3 billion, or 6.3% (down $10.3B, down $10.7B and up $37.7B), while Goldman Sachs was in seventh place with $458.8 billion, or 5.7% of assets (down $10.7B, down $14.4B and up $26.4B). Morgan Stanley ($342.1B, or 4.2%) was in eighth place (up $5.4B, up $8.3B and up $59.4B), followed by BNY Dreyfus ($341.3B, or 4.2%; up $10.7B, down $965M and up $49.6B). SSIM was in 10th place ($295.6B, or 3.7%; down $7.3B, down $5.2B and up $53.2B).
The 11th through 20th-largest U.S. money fund managers (in order) include: Allspring ($224.7B, or 2.8%), Northern ($195.5B, or 2.4%), First American ($194.1B, or 2.4%), Invesco ($164.2B, or 2.0%), American Funds ($154.3B, or 1.9%), UBS ($117.5B, or 1.5%), T Rowe Price ($52.4B, or 0.6%), HSBC ($51.4B, or 0.6%), Franklin Templeton ($47.5B, or 0.6%) and DWS ($41.2B, or 0.5%). Crane Data currently tracks 64 U.S. MMF managers, up 6 from last month.
When European and "offshore" money fund assets -- those domiciled in places like Ireland, Luxembourg and the Cayman Islands -- are included, the top 10 managers are the same as the domestic list, except: BlackRock moves up to the No. 3 spot and Vanguard moves down to the No. 4 spot. Goldman Sachs moves up to the No. 6 spot, while Federated Hermes moves down to the No. 7 spot. Global Money Fund Manager Rankings include the combined market share assets of our MFI XLS (domestic U.S.) and our MFI International ("offshore") products.
The largest Global money market fund families include: Fidelity ($1.696 trillion), JP Morgan ($1.175 trillion), BlackRock ($1.069 trillion), Vanguard ($748.5B) and Schwab ($686.7B). Goldman Sachs ($621.3B) was in sixth, Federated Hermes ($523.5B) was seventh, followed by Morgan Stanley ($450.6B), Dreyfus/BNY ($407.5B) and SSIM ($353.0B), which round out the top 10. These totals include "offshore" U.S. Dollar money funds, as well as Euro and Pound Sterling (GBP) funds converted into U.S. dollar totals.
The May issue of our Money Fund Intelligence and MFI XLS, with data as of 4/30/26, shows that yields were down in April across some of the Crane Money Fund Indexes. The Crane Money Fund Average, which includes all taxable funds covered by Crane Data (currently 744), was 3.37% (unchanged) for the 7-Day Yield (annualized, net) Average, the 30-Day Yield was down 1 bp to 3.36%. The MFA's Gross 7-Day Yield was at 3.73% (unchanged), and the Gross 30-Day Yield was down 1 bp at 3.72%. (Gross yields will be revised once we download the SEC's Form N-MFP data for 4/30/26 on Monday.)
Our Crane 100 Money Fund Index shows an average 7-Day (Net) Yield of 3.47% (down 1 bp) and an average 30-Day Yield at 3.47% (down 1 bp). The Crane 100 shows a Gross 7-Day Yield of 3.74% (unchanged), and a Gross 30-Day Yield of 3.73% (down 1 bp). Our Prime Institutional MF Index (7-day) yielded 3.59% (unchanged) as of April 30. The Crane Govt Inst Index was at 3.46% (unchanged) and the Treasury Inst Index was at 3.44% (unchanged). Thus, the spread between Prime funds and Treasury funds is 15 basis points, and the spread between Prime funds and Govt funds is 13 basis points. The Crane Prime Retail Index yielded 3.36% (up 2 bps), while the Govt Retail Index was 3.18% (down 1 bp), the Treasury Retail Index was 3.20% (down 1 bp from the month prior). The Crane Tax Exempt MF Index yielded 2.93% (up 81 bps) at the end of April.
Gross 7-Day Yields for these indexes to end April were: Prime Inst 3.83% (unchanged), Govt Inst 3.71% (unchanged), Treasury Inst 3.71% (down 1 bp), Prime Retail 3.84% (up 1 bp), Govt Retail 3.70% (down 1 bp) and Treasury Retail 3.71% (down 1 bp). The Crane Tax Exempt Index rose to 3.32% (up 81 bps). The Crane 100 MF Index returned on average 0.29% over 1-month, 0.85% over 3-months, 1.13% YTD, 3.88% over the past 1-year, 4.61% over 3-years annualized), 3.32% over 5-years, and 2.15% over 10-years.
The total number of funds, including taxable and tax-exempt, was up 16 in April at 855. There are currently 744 taxable funds, up 16 from the previous month, and 111 tax-exempt money funds (unchanged from last month). (Contact us if you'd like to see our latest MFI XLS, Crane Indexes or Market Share report.)
The May issue of our flagship Money Fund Intelligence newsletter, which was sent to subscribers Thursday morning, features the articles: "Crane Data Celebrates 20th BDay; A Tale of Two Decades," which reviews MFI's two decades of covering the money fund business; "ICI 2026 Fact Book Shows Money Fund Trends in '25," which excerpts from the Investment Company Institute's latest annual statistical compilation; and "JP Morgan Talk of AI Cash Tool Hot Topic on Q1 Calls," which discusses recent earnings call discussions on competition to cash sweeps. We also sent out our MFI XLS spreadsheet Thursday a.m., and we've updated our Money Fund Wisdom database with 4/30/26 data. Our May Money Fund Portfolio Holdings are scheduled to ship on Monday, May 11, and our May Bond Fund Intelligence is scheduled to go out on Thursday, May 14. (Note: Register ASAP for our upcoming Money Fund Symposium, which will take place next month -- June 24-26 in Jersey City, NJ!)
MFI's "Crane Data's 20th Birthday" story says, "Crane Data hits a milestone this month, celebrating our 20th birthday. While our first decade was dominated by the Great Financial Crisis, zero yield and the threat of regulatory extinction, the last 10 years have seen money fund assets triple. As we've done in some earlier May issues, we'd like to take a moment to review our progress and update you on our efforts."
It continues, "Our company, run by money fund expert Peter Crane and technology guru Shaun Cutts, was launched in May 2006 to bring faster, cheaper and cleaner information to the money fund space. We began by publishing our flagship Money Fund Intelligence newsletter, and we've grown to offer a full range of daily and monthly spreadsheets, news, database query systems and reports on U.S. and 'offshore' money funds."
We write in our "ICI 2026 Fact Book" article, "The Investment Company Institute released its '2026 Investment Company Fact Book,' an annual compilation of statistics and commentary on the mutual fund space. Subtitled, 'A Review of Trends and Activities in the Investment Company Industry,' the latest edition tells us, 'With stock markets rising around the globe in 2025 ... worldwide total net assets of equity funds ... increased by 19% to $42.6 trillion at year-end 2025. Bond funds -- which invest primarily in fixed-income securities -- saw their total net assets increase 21% over the same period, somewhat reflecting total returns (capital gains and interest income) in bond markets.... Net assets of money market funds, which are regulated funds restricted to holding short-term, high-quality debt instruments, rose by 15%.' We excerpt from the latest 'Fact Book' below."
It continues, "Discussing 'Worldwide' mutual funds (page 9), ICI writes, 'Worldwide net sales of money market funds declined somewhat in 2025 but still attracted $1.3 trillion in net inflows.... Investors across all geographical regions continued to demonstrate demand for money market funds, with the $901 billion in inflows in the United States accounting for more than two-thirds of total net inflows. Investor demand for money market funds in the Asia-Pacific Region and Europe was $217 billion and $169 billion in 2025, respectively.'"
Our "JP Morgan Talk of AI" story says, "J.P. Morgan Chase released its Q1 2026 Earnings last month (see the transcript here), and during the Q&A they were asked about a new 'AI cash tool,' 'which could potentially result in some consumer deposit pressure as well as drive some impact on increased competition [and] higher deposit betas.'"
The story continues, "JPM Chase CEO Jamie Dimon responds, 'Yes. It's a great question, and obviously, we're in the early stages for this particular product.... The question for us is, how can we make it easier for [clients] to manage their money in a way they're comfortable. Most [people] have money in a checking account and then write a ticket to a money market fund or a deposit account.... That's all we're trying to do.'"
MFI also includes the News brief, "MMFs Fall Again, Record Tax Drop." It says, "Crane Data's MFI XLS shows money fund assets falling $102.1 billion in April to $8.096 trillion, though assets have rebounded strongly month-to-date in May. The Investment Company Institute's latest weekly 'Money Market Fund Assets' report shows money fund assets falling by $11.0 billion to $7.626 trillion. MMFs fell $5.6 billion the previous week, and they fell by a massive $175.8 billion two weeks prior, the largest weekly drop ever, driven by huge April 15 tax-day outflows."
Another News brief, "FASB Proposes Disclosure of Cash, Stablecoin Holdings," tells us, "The Wall Street Journal's CFO Journal wrote a piece recently titled, 'Companies Would Need to Disclose Stablecoin Holdings Under FASB Proposal.' It tells us, 'The Financial Accounting Standards Board wants to require companies to disclose significant stablecoin holdings as part of a broader move to have companies break out their different types of cash equivalents. The accounting standard-setter voted ... to propose that all companies must annually disclose the dollar amounts of the significant components of their cash equivalents. These components include investments with maturities of three months or less, like money-market funds, Treasury bills, commercial paper and possibly, stablecoins, for which there are no specific accounting rules at present.'"
A third News brief, "Federated on Digital Treasury Fund," says, "Federated Hermes reported its First Quarter earnings and hosted its Q1'26 earnings call late last week. CEO Chris Donahue says in the press release, 'Investors with interest in capital preservation and liquidity continued to rely on our money market offerings and -- for those interested in moving further out the yield curve ... our ultrashort funds.' On the earnings call, Donahue comments, 'Market conditions remain favorable for cash as an asset class. In addition to the appeal of relative safety in periods of volatility, money market strategies present opportunities to earn attractive yields compared to alternatives like bank deposits and direct investments in T-bills and CP.'"
A sidebar, "MSIM Stablecoin Reserves," says, "A press release titled, 'Morgan Stanley Investment Management Launches Stablecoin Reserves Portfolio,' tells us, 'Morgan Stanley Investment Management (MSIM) ... announced the launch of the Stablecoin Reserves Portfolio (MSNXX), part of the Morgan Stanley Institutional Liquidity Funds trust. The Stablecoin Reserves Portfolio is a new government money market fund designed to align with the stablecoin reserves investment requirements of the ... GENIUS Act. The Fund offers payment stablecoin issuers an eligible money market fund option where they can invest their required reserves that back their outstanding payment stablecoins.'"
Our May MFI XLS, with April 30 data, shows total assets fell $102.1 billion to $8.096 trillion, after decreasing $56.6 billion in March, increasing $94.0 billion in February, $38.5 billion in January, $123.5 billion in December, $129.3 billion in November, $141.5 billion in October, $100.4 billion in September, $129.9 billion in August, $69.0 billion in July, $10.1 billion in June and jumping $90.3 billion last May.
Our broad Crane Money Fund Average 7-Day Yield was unchanged at 3.37%, and our Crane 100 Money Fund Index (the 100 largest taxable funds) was down 1 bp at 3.47% in April. On a Gross Yield Basis (7-Day) (before expenses are taken out), the Crane MFA and the Crane 100 averaged 3.73% and 3.74%. Charged Expenses averaged 0.36% and 0.26% for the Crane MFA and the Crane 100. (We'll revise expenses once we upload the SEC's Form N-MFP data for 4/30/26 on Friday, 5/8.) The average WAM (weighted average maturity) for the Crane MFA was 42 days (up 1 day) and the Crane 100 WAM was up 1 day from the previous month at 44 days. (See our Crane Index or craneindexes.xlsx history file for more on our averages.)
A press release titled, "State Street Investment Management and Galaxy Digital Bring Cash Management Onchain," tells us, "State Street Investment Management and Galaxy Asset Management, an affiliate of Galaxy Digital Inc. (GLXY) ... announced the launch of the State Street Galaxy Onchain Liquidity Sweep Fund (SWEEP), a tokenized private liquidity fund designed to enable 24/7 onchain cash management via stablecoin, subject to availability of stablecoin in the fund's portfolio. The launch represents a milestone in State Street's digital strategy to offer investment solutions onchain and support 24/7 programmatic trading and liquidity for cash management. Building on its legacy as an innovator, State Street continues to invest in foundational digital asset capabilities across investment management and custody, offering cutting-edge, onchain investment solutions to DeFi-native clients, as well as acting as the bridge to traditional institutional clients looking to move onchain."
The release explains, "SWEEP is powered by Galaxy's Digital Infrastructure, which provides the tokenization technology and digital infrastructure supporting the issuance and management of SWEEP tokens. The fund is built to allow stablecoin holders to sweep their stablecoin into a yield bearing asset. SWEEP launches on the Solana blockchain, with additional blockchain integrations planned, including Stellar and Ethereum. Anchorage serves as the fund's digital custodian for stablecoin investments, NAV Consulting serves as transfer agent, and Galaxy is leveraging Chainlink NAVLink to publish the fund's daily NAV onchain and Chainlink CCIP for secure cross-chain interoperability. State Street Bank and Trust Company serves as the fund's custodian for securities holdings."
The release states, "Announced in December 2025, SWEEP allows investors to use PayPal USD (PYUSD) stablecoins for subscriptions and redemptions, subject to portfolio availability, and is available to Qualified Purchasers that meet certain eligibility criteria and minimum investment amounts."
Yie-Hsin Hung, president & CEO of State Street Investment Management, comments, "State Street has played a leading role in market innovation for decades, from servicing mutual funds to launching ETFs, and we're proud to continue that role as digital assets reshape market infrastructure. This fund allows us to bring the TradFi landscape onchain in a resilient way, guided by our long-standing focus on innovation, risk management and client outcomes."
Galaxy CEO Mike Novogratz adds, "For years we've argued that traditional finance and crypto would converge on the same rails. We believe SWEEP is what that looks like in practice, with a fund managed by an experienced cash manager being available for investors onchain, on infrastructure Galaxy built for institutions."
Finally, SSIM writes, "SWEEP expands and deepens State Street Investment Management's relationship with Galaxy. In September 2024, State Street Investment Management launched three actively managed ETFs sub-advised by Galaxy that are focused on digital assets and disruptive technologies."
In other news, Crane Data published its latest Weekly Money Fund Portfolio Holdings statistics Tuesday, which track a shifting subset of our monthly Portfolio Holdings collection. The most recent cut (with data as of May 1) includes Holdings information from 63 money funds (down 11 from a week ago), or $4.081 trillion (down from $4.508 trillion) of the $8.158 trillion in total money fund assets (or 50.0%) tracked by Crane Data. (Note: Our Weekly MFPH are e-mail only and aren't available on the website. See our latest Monthly Money Fund Portfolio Holdings here and our April 13 News, "April MF Portfolio Holdings: T-Bills Inch Higher, Repo Falls, Agencies Flat.")
Our latest Weekly MFPH Composition summary shows Government assets dominating the holdings list with Treasuries totaling $1.826 trillion (down from $2.014 trillion a week ago), or 44.7%; Repurchase Agreements (Repo) totaling $1.479 trillion (down from $1.632 trillion a week ago), or 36.2%, and Government Agency securities totaling $450.0 billion (down from $466.0 billion a week ago), or 11.0%. Commercial Paper (CP) totaled $135.8 billion (down from $164.9 billion a week ago), or 3.3%. Certificates of Deposit (CDs) totaled $79.4 billion (down from $102.9 billion a week ago), or 1.9%. The Other category accounted for $70.2 billion or 1.7%, while VRDNs accounted for $41.3 billion or 1.0%.
The Ten Largest Issuers in our Weekly Holdings product include: the US Treasury with $1.826 trillion, Fixed Income Clearing Corp with $503.9B, the Federal Home Loan Bank with $272.9B, JP Morgan with $156.5B, Citi with $111.7B, Federal Farm Credit Bank with $102.9B, BNP Paribas with $91.0B, RBC with $86.9B, Wells Fargo with $74.6B and Bank of America with $51.7B.
The Ten Largest Funds tracked in our latest Weekly include: JPMorgan US Govt MM ($322.0B), JPMorgan 100% US Trs MM ($312.7B), Goldman Sachs FS Govt ($266.8B), Fidelity Inv MM: Govt Port ($256.0B), Morgan Stanley Inst Liq Govt ($210.2B), BlackRock Lq FedFund ($184.1B), BlackRock Lq Treas Tr ($181.5B), State Street Inst US Govt ($179.9B), Fidelity Inv MM: MM Port ($162.6B) and Dreyfus Govt Cash Mgmt ($157.6B). (Let us know if you'd like to see our latest domestic U.S. and/or "offshore" Weekly Portfolio Holdings collection and summary.)
As we wrote last Tuesday, the Investment Company Institute recently published its "2026 Investment Company Fact Book," an annual compilation of statistics and commentary on the mutual fund industry. We reviewed much of the money fund content in our April 28 News, "ICI Publishes 2026 Fact Book, Reviews US, Worldwide Money Funds in '25." But below we focus on the numerous "Data Tables" involving "Money Market Mutual Funds." ICI lists annual statistics on shareholder accounts, the number of funds, net assets, net new cash flows, paid and reinvested dividends, composition of prime and government funds, and net assets of institutional investors by type of institution. (Note: Register soon for our Money Fund Symposium show, which will be held June 24-26, 2026 in Jersey City, NJ!)
ICI's annual statistics show that there's been a steady decline in the number of money market mutual funds over the last 18 years. (See Table 35 in the Data Tables.) In 2025, according to the Fact Book, there were a total of 265 money funds, up from 258 in 2024, down from 275 in 2023, 291 in 2022, 305 in 2021, 340 in 2020, 364 in 2019, 802 in 2007, and down from 1,014 in 2001. The number of share classes stood at 955 in 2024 down from 1,009 in 2023, 1,044 in 2022, 1,060 in 2021, 1,108 in 2020, 1,126 in 2018 and 1,998 in 2008.
Table 36, "Money Market Funds: Total Net Assets by Type of Fund," shows that total net assets in taxable U.S. money market funds increased $893.9 billion to a record $7.746 trillion in 2025. At year-end 2025, $4.663 trillion (60.2%) was in institutional money market funds, while $3.084 trillion (39.8%) was in retail money market funds. Breaking the numbers down by fund type, $1.220 trillion (15.8%) was in prime funds, $6.375 trillion (82.3%) was in government money market funds, and $150.9 billion (1.9%) was in tax-exempt accounts.
Also, Table 37, "Money Market Funds: Net New Cash Flow by Type of Fund," shows that there was a 672.0 billion in net new cash flow into money market funds last year. A closer look at the data shows $445.0 billion in net cash inflows into institutional funds and a $227.0 billion cash inflow into retail funds. There were also $558.1 billion in net inflows from Government funds, versus $102.4 billion in net inflows from Prime funds.
Table 39, "Money Market Funds: Paid and Reinvested Dividends by Type of Fund," shows dividends paid by money funds were a new record, $304.4 billion, $228.8 billion of which was reinvested (75.2%). Dividends previous record was as high as $297.2 billion in 2024 (when rates were over 5%), and as low as $5.2 billion in 2011 (when rates were 0.05%). Reinvestment rates were 64.4% in 2007 and 62.3% in 2011, so they've remained relatively stable over the past decade.
ICI's Tables 40 and 41, "Taxable Government Money Market Funds: Asset Composition as a Percentage of Total Net Assets" and "Taxable Prime Money Market Funds: Asset Composition," show that of the $6.375 trillion in taxable government money market funds, 14.6% were in U.S. government agency issues, 36.0% were in Repurchase agreements, 39.7% were in U.S. Treasury bills, 11.6% were in Other Treasury securities, and -2.1% was in "Other" assets. The average maturity was 41 days, up 3 days from the end of 2024.
The second table shows that of the $1.220 trillion in Prime funds at year-end 2025, 19.6% was in Certificates of deposit, 24.2% was in Commercial paper, 45.3% was in Repurchase agreements, 0.2% was in US government agency issues, 3.1% was in Other Treasury securities, 1.0% was in Corporate notes, 0.3% percent was in Bank notes, 4.0% was in US Treasury bills, 0.0% was in Eurodollar CDs, and 2.5% was in Other assets (which includes Banker's acceptances, municipal securities and cash reserves).
Table 60, "Total Net Assets of Mutual Funds Held in Individual and Institutional Accounts," shows that there was $2.447 trillion of assets in money funds with Institutional investors, and $5.299 trillion in MMF assets in Individual accounts in 2025.
Finally, Table 62, "Taxable Money Market Funds: Total Net Assets of Institutional Investors by Type of Institution," shows of the total of $2.438 trillion in Total Institutional assets, $1.096 trillion were held by business corporations (44.9%), $1.029 trillion were held by financial institutions (42.2%), $210.3 billion were held by nonprofit organizations (8.6%), and $103.4 billion were held by Other (4.2%).
Federated Hermes reported its First Quarter earnings late Thursday and hosted its Q1'26 earnings call on Friday. CEO Chris Donahue says in the press release, "Investors with interest in capital preservation and liquidity continued to rely on our money market offerings and -- for those interested in moving further out the yield curve in the pursuit of higher yields than money market products -- our ultrashort funds." The release tells us, "Money market assets were a record $684.7 billion at March 31, 2026, up $47.6 billion or 7% from $637.1 billion at March 31, 2025 and up $2.1 billion from $682.6 billion at Dec. 31, 2025. Money market fund assets were $502.8 billion at March 31, 2026, up $37.9 billion or 8% from $464.9 billion at March 31, 2025 and down $5.6 billion or 1% from $508.4 billion at Dec. 31, 2025."
On the earnings call, Donahue comments, "Market conditions remain favorable for cash as an asset class. In addition to the appeal of relative safety in periods of volatility, money market strategies present opportunities to earn attractive yields compared to alternatives like bank deposits and direct investments in T-bills and commercial paper. Our estimate of money market mutual fund market share, including sub-advised funds, was about 6.9% at the end of Q1, down from 7.0% at the end of 2025. Let's have a little discussion on digital assets and what we're doing there. We are focused on this area as an infrastructure evolution, not a speculative asset class."
He explains, "We are working on digital initiatives designed to enhance distribution efficiency, settlement speed, transparency, operational automation, and global reach while maintaining regulatory, fiduciary, and governance standards. Importantly, digital structures must enhance access, efficiency, and integration into modern treasury portfolio and collateral workflows. They must operate within regulatory frameworks, preserve investor protections, and provide valuation integrity. Through deep engagement with our operational partners, we are well-positioned to properly evaluate governance, ownership representation, transfer restrictions, and risk management implications of tokenized funds as we build out our digital capabilities. While we are initially prioritizing products aligned with our core strength and liquidity management, we of course expect over time to see digital products developed for ETFs or other mutual funds, private market vehicles across many or all market classes."
Donahue continues, "The firm's digital initiatives include the upcoming launch of our Money Market Management Digital Treasury Fund, which is expected to support both traditional and on-chain distribution. The initial Reserve Shares class will provide a non-tokenized, GENIUS-compliant structure geared to institutional investors and stablecoin issuers seeking high-quality reserve assets."
He states, "We are also developing an on-chain share class intended to place official books and records on the blockchain infrastructure once a fully digital transfer agency model is available. This dual-track approach offers flexibility between traditional custody and fully on-chain models. We have selectively engaged with regulated digital asset intermediaries focusing on tokenized funds as regulated financial instruments. Initial use cases emphasize cash on-chain liquidity solutions with a longer-term view towards supporting additional asset classes as market structures evolve."
Donahue tells the call, "As we have previously mentioned, we are participating in the launch of a collaborative initiative between BNY and Goldman Sachs that will involve mirrored tokenization of money market fund shares to improve transferability, collateral utility, and real-time ownership tracking of money market fund shares. We are also expanding digital engagement beyond U.S. money markets towards a global strategy. In the U.K. and Europe, we are exploring digital sterling liquidity products and assessing tokenization for broader regulated fund distribution."
He also says, "We are participating in tokenized offerings where Federated Hermes funds are used as the underlying assets rather than being directly tokenized. This includes our alliance with Archax, the first FCA-regulated digital securities exchange, to offer tokenized access to a U.S. money market fund. The platform enables professional investors to hold beneficial ownership tokens across multiple blockchains and access money market liquidity directly on-chain. We are exploring similar partnership opportunities."
Donahue adds, "Finally, looking at recent asset totals as of a few days ago, managed assets were approximately $902 billion, including $668 billion in money markets, $107 billion in equities, $101 billion in fixed income, $22 billion in alternatives private markets, and $3 billion in multi-asset. Money market mutual fund assets were $487 billion."
During the Q&A, J.P. Morgan's Ken Worthington asks, "What portion of your existing clients today do you think care about and will utilize digital money market funds versus traditional cash product structures over time? And if you think out about a decade, what portion of the entire cash market do you think cares about tokenized money market funds versus other forms of tokenized cash?"
Donahue answers, "Out 10 years is pretty tough to see. Right now it's a very low percentage of the clients that are asking for, demanding or wanting these tokenized products. What you see with us and with others is a grand effort to get ready for tomorrow. If you want to say you're feeling us protecting our franchise, you're right. If you want to say you're feeling us with a little FOMO in it, you're right. This is not the usual customer demand, 'we got to have it' type deal. Over time, as you see the digitization of things catching on, we are going to be there. Over 10 years, I think it would be a routine deal, but it's really hard for me to say how much it would be."
Money Market CIO Debbie Cunningham adds, "Wow, 10 years, that's a long time.... To add to what Chris was saying, I mean, if you build it, they will come. That's sort of the attitude now with that historically, as sort of a premise, success has followed. I don't know, maybe, probably less than 25% of retail customers. I think from an institutional customer standpoint, you're looking at something that maybe is in the 25%-50% utilization. Once all the comfortability is there with the, you know, the fiduciary aspects of it that Chris was mentioning at the beginning."
Donahue adds, "I'll close with this one more, Ken. That is that, remember, the basic product is daily liquidity at par. However all the fancy stuff works, that's what you need. The next thing is, if they don't have fundamental trust in the whole thing, then it doesn't work. You got to work on those two things in addition to all of the neat toys that are being created."
Lastly, Patrick Davitt of Autonomous Research queries, "Deborah Cunningham, last quarter you suggested that money fund organic growth could be a bit lower this year. It's tough to tell what's going on in money funds the last couple of months, obviously, given the tax noise. With more signs the Fed could be on hold all year, I'd be curious to get your updated thoughts on the potential for more rotation into the asset class from either retail or institutional or both, given that change in outlook."
Cunningham replies, "You know, it hasn't changed much. I mean, we've seen double-digit growth in the high teens and then in the lower teens in both 2024 and 2025. 2026, in my opinion, is going to be more in the single-digit growth area. I do think it's something that from a safe haven standpoint and from a just a general utilization, with [govt] yields ... in the 3.72-3.75ish area, prime yields 3.86-3.90%. You know, with tax-free taxable equivalents, you're still looking depending upon what, you know, whether it’s state tax-free or just federally tax-free, you know, yields in the 4%, 5%, and 6% from a taxable equivalent standpoint."
She adds, "Those are real long-term returns in a very, very low risk product. I think the growth will continue. I think it probably we find new use cases as some of these digital product innovations are rolled out for the funds. I think that the traditional as well as new clients into the asset class will grow, just not as quickly as it has in the 2024 and 2025 timeframe. I mean, at assets reaching, it depends on who you're looking at -- whether it's Crane Data, iMoneyNet [or] ICI -- somewhere in the $7.5-$8.2 trillion range as a peak. I think that continues to grow steadily over the $8 trillion range. The larger it gets, the more, you know, obviously the percentage growth, even if it's the same dollar amount, starts to go down."
Franklin Templeton (BEN) released its latest earnings earlier this week, and the earnings call briefly mentioned tokenized money funds. During the Q&A, Brian Bedell from Deutsche Bank asks, "Actually, one on Franklin Crypto. Jenny, if you could just talk a little bit about ... what market are you targeting for that and the different product types as you evolve your Franklin digital assets? And then also on the tokenization of money funds and BENJI [Franklin OnChain US Govt Money Fund, FOBXX]. [What is] your view as to what extent we'll see the development of tokenized money funds accelerate given obviously, the use cases and the yield cases, especially within the digital asset platforms?"
CEO Jennifer Johnson responds, "So, first of all, why do I love blockchain? Because it's a really efficient technology that drives down costs. So that's a good thing for us as an industry and for our clients. But you have to have a wallet to actually hold a token. The wallet is just a cryptography that matches to that token, but you just have to have it. And all of our traditional distributors, very few of them actually have a wallet. So you have to go to the exchanges."
She continues, "So when you ask me, 'Where is the kind of immediate opportunity?' `It's an exchange, a crypto exchange, Kraken and Ondo, Coinbase, Binance that have wallets there. And two things are happening. One is ... it's an obvious place to integrate BENJI. So people want to put money into cash. If it's in their stablecoin, they don't earn any yield, so they can shift it into a money market fund and earn yield on that. So that's an obvious opportunity for us."
Johnson also says, "The second thing that's happening, and you just take the top 5 exchanges, they have 1 billion wallets there. So from a new client base, [it's] kind of interesting, and they're thinking about offering traditional products there. So we have launched, I think, 8 ETFs, tokenized ETFs on one of the exchanges and 5 on the other, and we're talking to other exchanges. So we've got 8 on Kraken and 5 on Ondo. And these are just in case those investors are interested in more traditional products.... You couldn't hold an ETF or a mutual fund unless it was tokenized and because they have no other way of holding it. So we think that's an interesting new opportunity for us."
In other news, a press release titled "Stable Sea Announces Strategic Relationship with WisdomTree to Bring Tokenized Treasury Access to Businesses" tells us "Stable Sea ... announced a strategic relationship with WisdomTree (WT), a global asset manager with more than $150 billion in assets under management, to bring tokenized treasury access to businesses. This collaboration enables Stable Sea users to earn yield by investing operating cash in, and gaining exposure to, WisdomTree's tokenized money market fund, which may have been challenging to access in existing workflows."
It continues, "Stable Sea users will be able to access WisdomTree tokenized funds in an embedded workflow in Stable Sea's technology platform. Leveraging this technology, eligible Stable Sea users may establish a limited scope broker-dealer relationship with WisdomTree Securities, Inc., an SEC registered broker-dealer, for the purpose of facilitating transactions in shares of select WisdomTree tokenized funds, beginning with the WisdomTree Treasury Money Market Digital Fund (WTGXX)."
The release explains, "Tokenized money market funds are one of the fastest-growing segments of on-chain financial products. Assets in tokenized U.S. Treasury and money market funds have grown from under $1 billion in early 2024 to more than $10 billion by early 2026, driven by offerings from major asset managers like WisdomTree. This rapid adoption reflects growing business demand for modern, always-on access to cash-equivalent products delivered through blockchain-based infrastructure."
Will Peck, Head of Digital Assets at WisdomTree, comments, "Tokenization is transforming how investors and institutions access financial products. Our connectivity with Stable Sea extends that innovation to a new audience enabling businesses to access registered funds in an efficient and digitally native way. Treasury management use cases have been a leading driver of the adoption we have seen of our tokenized money market fund WTGXX in the past year. We're thrilled to bring this product to more businesses throughout the United States through our collaboration with Stable Sea."
For more, see our Crane Data News, "March MFI: More Tokenized MMFs; Money Market ETFs Live; Cunningham" (3/6/26), Crane 100 Money Fund Index Ticks Back Up to 3.50%; SEC, WisdomTree" (2/24/26) and "WisdomTree Treasury MM Digital Fund" (9/5/25).
In related news, Bloomberg writes, "BlackRock Targets the Idle Cash Piling Up on Crypto Exchanges." The article says, "BlackRock Inc. is bringing its roughly $2.5 billion money market fund to cryptocurrency exchange operator OKX, with Standard Chartered Plc holding the underlying assets -- the latest sign that Wall Street infrastructure and digital-asset markets are converging. Under the arrangement, the tokens of the BlackRock USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund (BUIDL) sit in regulated custody at Standard Chartered while showing up as available collateral on OKX, meaning traders can post it as margin while it keeps earning interest instead of sitting idle."
The piece adds, "The setup solves a basic inefficiency: cash posted as collateral on crypto exchanges has traditionally earned virtually nothing. BlackRock's fund, which invests in Treasuries and repurchase agreements and is designed to hold a stable $1 value, turns what would otherwise be idle cash into a productive asset, a structure that is starting to grow in crypto markets. For now, access is limited to investors in the Middle East."
The press release, "A New Utility Framework for Tokenized RWAs, Delivered with BlackRock and Standard Chartered," explains, "Today, through our collaboration with BlackRock and Standard Chartered, we are introducing a new utility framework for tokenized real-world assets in digital asset markets. With this new framework, a tokenized U.S. Treasury fund can serve as both yield-bearing on-exchange margin and off-exchange collateral within one integrated framework. Qualified investors can deploy BlackRock's BUIDL, a tokenized U.S. Treasury fund issued on public blockchain rails, as trading collateral on OKX while continuing to earn U.S. dollar yield benchmarked against the U.S. Federal Funds rate. At the same time, assets can be held in regulated custody with Standard Chartered, marking the first-ever G-SIB-backed off-exchange tokenized collateral framework."
Finally, Circle writes on "The Role of Financial Institutions and Fintechs in a Stablecoin World." They state, "When stablecoins first emerged, some treated them as a threat to traditional finance. Digital dollars that moved near-instantly across borders seemed to leave little room for financial institutions and fintechs such as banks, payment service providers (PSPs), or other intermediaries. But payment systems rarely change by replacing one model overnight. They evolve through integration, regulation, and new forms of coordination."
