In 2023, the excitement of the grand metaverse dream—a virtual, augmented-reality online existence championed by tech giants including Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg—vanished. While the concept had gained early traction among tech enthusiasts, most consumers didn’t get the appeal. As investors started pulling back on metaverse investments and flocking to generative AI, many business leaders were left questioning the broader value of Web3.

In short, Web3 is the vision of a decentralized, user-owned Internet built on three foundational technologies: blockchain (a distributed ledger); smart contracts (the ability to execute agreements without third party oversight); and tokens or tokenization (digital representations of assets, such as nonfungible tokens, or NFTs, stablecoins, cryptocurrencies or tokenized real-world assets). Despite the disillusionment of the past year, there are green shoots of value in this space, with a shift away from the casino mindset that pervaded in Web3’s earliest days and toward chasing real-world value.

The rise of stablecoins, cryptocurrencies pegged to a real-life currency or asset, which now tops $130 billion in global circulation, is enabling companies to make transactions faster and cheaper. The digital exchange platform Airtm, for instance, uses Circle’s U.S. dollar-tethered (USDC) coin to deliver low-cost cross-border payments, saving up to 35% when paying remote workers. Blockchain and smart contracts are enabling the tracking and tracing of materials—from gold to airplane parts to carbon—across complex ecosystems. Tracr, a De Beers company blockchain, now tracks more than 100,000 gold stones a month, roughly 15% of the world’s production. Brands such as Nike and Puma are also demonstrating success leveraging Web3 technologies in conjunction with physical campaigns for customer engagement.

This quiet shift towards more practical, value-based applications of Web3 has led industry leaders like Citi to estimate that $5 trillion of central bank-issued digital currencies, or CBDCs, could be circulating by 2030, with tokenization of real-world assets approaching $4 trillion. That’s a far cry from the Web3 obituaries that have been written over the past year.