Chainlink CEO details how its bridging institutions and DeFi

Chainlink Overview - November 5, 2025

Welcome back to the Chainlink Overview. Every month, we dive deep into the Chainlink ecosystem to bring you up to speed on the network’s latest developments, metrics and more. All in one place.

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Chainlink By The Numbers

• Total Value Secured: $95.71B (-5.73%)

• Transaction Value Enabled: $26.42T (+2.24%)

• Total Verified Messages: 18.75B (+0.37%)

• Total Chainlink Reserve Value: $9.7M (+5.44%)

The metrics are accurate at the time of publication. The percentage change is over a 30-day period.

What Caught Our Eye This Month

• UBS executed its first live tokenized fund transaction leveraging the Chainlink Digital Transfer Agent technical standard, showcasing how fund management can be automated and synchronized to reduce operational friction.

• Global index provider FTSE Russell is bringing its indices and market data onchain using Chainlink to let protocols and networks in the Chainlink ecosystem access index data onchain.

• Chainlink announced its Automated Compliance Engine partners, who will leverage solutions for onchain compliance, monitoring and reporting solutions.

Day 1 of SmartCon 2025

Chainlink CEO Sergey Nazarov on bringing institutions onchain

At this year’s SmartCon, Chainlink co-founder and CEO Sergey Nazarov spoke about how the company is building the foundation to connect traditional finance and DeFi. The goal: make it easy and compliant for institutions and individuals to transact together on the blockchain.

Solving for trust and compliance

Nazarov highlighted one of the biggest hurdles in crypto: trust and verification. Institutions can’t move onchain unless they know assets are fully backed and compliant.

That’s where Secure Mint and Chainlink’s Cross-Chain Interoperability Protocol (CCIP) come in. Secure Mint only allows new stablecoins to be created if onchain proof of reserves confirms the backing exists. CCIP ensures that all compliance checks and transfers follow the same rules across chains.

Together, they create a trust layer for digital assets, giving banks and businesses the same confidence they have in traditional systems.

Real traction

Nazarov also highlighted recent milestones Chainlink has achieved that prove real world adoption. UBS used Chainlink’s Digital Transfer Agent (DTA) standard to tokenize one of its money market funds, completing the first fully onchain subscription and redemption.

Meanwhile, the Central Bank of Brazil and the Hong Kong Monetary Authority are testing CCIP to exchange stablecoins across blockchains, which is a major step toward global interoperability.

Together, these use cases show how Chainlink’s infrastructure can turn traditional assets into tokenized, programmable versions that settle faster and operate 24/7.

The next step: data and privacy

Later in the keynote, Nazarov announced DataLink and Confidential Compute, two new tools aimed at bringing institutional data and privacy onchain.

DataLink lets major providers like S&P Global and FTSE Russell securely publish real-world financial data for developers to use in DeFi apps. Confidential Compute introduces privacy-preserving smart contracts, allowing sensitive workflows to remain secure and verifiable.

“The next generation of capital markets won’t be built on isolated systems,” Nazarov said. “It’ll be built on networks that everyone can trust, verify and use together.”

Expanding The Ecosystem

• Chainlink co-founder and CEO Sergey Nazarov spoke at the Federal Reserve Payments Innovation Conference about Chainlink Proof of Reserve and Secure Mint

• Tradeweb and Chainlink collaborated to publish the Tradeweb FTSE US Treasury Benchmark Closing Prices onchain via DataLink for real-time pricinG

• OKX’s layer-2 blockchain, X Layer, joined the Chainlink Scale program, adopted Chainlink Data Feeds, and will integrate Chainlink CCIP

• Aave is adopting Chainlink’s Automated Compliance Engine for its institutional lending and borrowing market for tokenized assets

• Kiln integrated the Chainlink Runtime Environment and Automated Compliance Engine to power institutional yield products across Base, Ethereum, BNB Chain, Optimism, Arbitrum, and Polygon

• Learn about Season 1 of Chainlink Rewards, which gives LINK stakers the chance to earn by interacting onchain with various ecosystem projects

• Banco Inter leveraged Chainlink to enable small and medium-sized businesses to sell commodities abroad

• Ondo Finance partnered with Chainlink to establish itself as the data standard for tokenized stocks and ETFs for cross-chain initiatives

Get Active In The Ecosystem

Want to explore Chainlink further?

• Find the latest job listings at Chainlink Labs here

• Check out the VOD from day 1 of SmartCon for panels from the main stage

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This information is for entertainment purposes only. It should not be considered financial advice, nor should it be used to make investment decisions. Cryptocurrencies are high risk and you should consult a financial professional before making any financial decisions. Make sure you do your own research.