Illia Polosukhin, co-founder of NEAR, identified market fragmentation as the primary barrier for tokenized equities. He noted that liquidity is currently scattered across various networks, including Solana, Ethereum, and Base, which complicates large-scale transactions compared to traditional venues like Nasdaq.
To address this, NEAR introduced NEAR Intents, an aggregation layer designed to connect onchain assets with traditional market liquidity. The system allows users to specify desired assets and volumes, while solvers handle the routing across different chains, centralized exchanges, and traditional financial platforms.
In September, NEAR integrated Ondo Stocks, adding 20 tokenized US equities, ETFs, and commodities to its platform. Available assets include shares of Nvidia, Tesla, Apple, Microsoft, and Amazon. At the time of integration, Ondo reported over $1 billion in total value locked and $26 billion in cumulative trading volume.
The NEAR Intents model aims to unify liquidity rather than forcing it to concentrate on a single blockchain. By acting as an aggregator, the protocol enables users to execute large trades, such as $10 million in tokenized Nvidia stock, by sourcing assets through partners like Ondo across multiple networks.
