It feels like tokenization is everywhere in the news feed. But how is it actually being built?

Practically speaking, there are two main infrastructure paths available for tokenized assets.

1) The first is public, permissionless blockchains, primarily EVM-compatible networks. Ethereum remains the clear leader in this space. However, it has also faced some challenges in its evolution, especially considering the major issues with L2 as a scaling strategy.

2) The second is a fully permissioned ecosystem designed for institutional financial markets and confidential coordination between participants. Here, the number and quality of participants in the infrastructure layer are strictly controlled.

There is a fair amount of rational thinking behind this - why build critical financial capabilities on fully public infrastructure that is not directly governed by the institutions relying on it, especially considering the extremely high rate of attacks on smart contracts and RPCs, as well as Solidity constraints, even if EVM world offers certain privacy features (e.g., ZKsync ones)? Why not make privacy, access control and regulatory compatibility core properties of the network from the start, while preserving interoperability with the outside world, including the EVM ecosystem?

The rising star here is the Canton Network. To be fair, it is not the first one - there are similar projects like Hedera or Ripple available on the market - but Canton has received unprecedented support and attention from major financial institutions. While this blockchain is still relatively unknown outside institutional circles, it takes a different approach to smart contract design (based on the DAML language), data privacy and token economics.