TL;DR
- Eugene Y. Q. Shen, co-founder of Plume, passed away this week; he helped tokenize $4 billion in assets alongside his team.
- Since 2024, the company has tokenized renewable energy, minerals, and sovereign bonds, though the RWA market remains in its early stages.
- Despite growing institutional interest, incidents like Zoth’s recent hack highlight the security challenges the sector still faces.
Eugene Y. Q. Shen, co-founder of crypto firm Plume, passed away this week, the company confirmed in a statement. Shen had been a key figure in developing the platform, which specializes in tokenizing real-world assets, and played a central role in bringing $4 billion worth of these assets onto the blockchain. The news deeply affected the team, who announced they would take a few days to process the loss.
Following the announcement, Plume’s token price began to slide. It’s down 7.6% over the past 24 hours, now trading at $0.148 per unit. Over the past week, the drop has extended to 16%.
Digitizing Everything
Founded in January 2024 by Shen, Chris Yin, and Teddy Pornprinya, Plume set out to turn traditional assets into digital tokens. The platform has tokenized everything from renewable energy and minerals to private credit and sovereign government bonds. This strategy aims to improve traceability and transferability for physical assets through blockchain technology, connecting traditional markets with decentralized environments.
Before joining Plume, Shen earned a degree in engineering physics from the University of British Columbia and worked as a software engineer at Robinhood. According to the platform’s team, his ability to combine technical expertise with strategic vision was crucial for Plume’s rapid growth in under two years.
The tokenized assets market has gained significant attention from investors, though adoption remains limited. By the end of 2024, the platform reported bringing $4 billion worth of assets on-chain. However, CEO Chris Yin has cautioned that market estimates valuing the RWA space at $21 billion might be inflated, as many of these projects are still in experimental phases.
Plume Will Continue Operating, No Changes Announced Yet
Institutional interest in these solutions keeps growing, as shown by a recent agreement between Bergen County, New Jersey, and Avalanche to tokenize $240 billion worth of housing deeds. At the same time, the sector has faced security incidents like Zoth’s second hack in a single month, which resulted in an $8.4 million loss. The industry still has considerable work ahead to safeguard investor funds.
Plume now faces a difficult moment following the loss of one of its founders. The company confirmed it will continue operating but hasn’t shared details about immediate changes to its leadership or strategy.
