History will remember this day: data, the "oil" of the information age, has finally obtained its property rights certificate. Article Authors & Editors: Liang Yu, Zhao Yidan Source: RWA Research Institute On January 25, 2026, the public consultation period for the "Draft Law of the People's Republic of China on State-Owned Assets" ended. In this law, which lays the cornerstone of national wealth management, a clause of epochal significance appeared for the first time: data assets were explicitly listed as an important component of state-owned assets, enjoying the same legal status as physical and financial assets. This signifies that, after years of preparation, data—the core production factor of the digital economy era—has finally obtained its "asset identity card" at the fundamental legal level of the nation. From "data resources" to "data assets," this change in terminology represents a profound confirmation of rights and liberation of value. The "property rights dilemma" that has long constrained the development of the data factor market now has the most solid legal basis for breaking through. This is not an isolated legal revision, but the final stroke of a grand institutional design. From data being listed as a production factor in 2019, to the "Twenty Articles on Data" constructing a property rights framework in 2022, and now being written into the basic national law, China has completed a crucial closed loop in its data infrastructure system. The law has issued property rights certificates for "data oil," and the next step will be to build a pipeline network and trading market to connect it to a vast economic landscape. This draft not only marks the birth of a new trillion-dollar asset class, but also represents a decisive leap in national governance thinking from managing "tangible entities" to operating "intangible factors." I. Core Breakthrough: Data Upgraded from "Factor of Production" to "Legal Asset" On January 25, 2026, the "Draft Law of the People's Republic of China on State-Owned Assets" concluded its public consultation process. Several clauses in this draft law explicitly mention data assets, officially recognizing data at the level of fundamental national law for the first time. The promulgation of this draft law marks a new stage of legal reform for the marketization of data elements in my country. The draft consists of seven chapters and sixty-two articles, systematically constructing a management framework for data as a state-owned asset. Its core breakthrough lies in the formal confirmation and legal positioning of the concept of "data assets." Since the Fourth Plenary Session of the 19th CPC Central Committee listed data as a factor of production in 2019, and the "20 Measures for Data Protection and Management" in 2022 proposed a path for the "separation of three rights" in data property rights, China has completed a systematic layout in the construction of basic data institutions. This legislation manages data assets alongside traditional assets such as physical assets and financial assets, fundamentally solving the dilemma of "no law to rely on" for data in economic activities and legal practice.This is not merely a conceptual extension, but a profound shift in the view of national assets from "tangible entities" in the industrial era to "intangible elements" in the digital age. II. Management Framework: How Three Clauses Construct a Governance Closed Loop The Draft State-Owned Assets Law systematically constructs a management framework for state-owned data assets through three clauses, each with its own focus and mutual support, forming a complete closed loop from responsibility implementation and capacity building to status establishment. Article 18 focuses on clarifying the source of management responsibility, explicitly defining for the first time at the legal level the proactive management responsibilities of state organs and public institutions. This clause formally upgrades public data such as social security data, geographic information, traffic flow, and government service records from traditional administrative performance records to state-owned assets requiring strict management, providing a clear legal basis for governments at all levels to manage public data. Article 41 proposes an upgrade requirement of "digital management," stipulating that the State Council and local governments should coordinate the digital construction of state-owned assets, achieve information interconnection and interoperability, and comprehensively grasp the situation of state-owned assets. This is not only an upgrade in technical means, but also a profound transformation in the concept of state-owned asset supervision. Faced with the characteristics of real-time asset changes, virtual forms, and fluctuating values, traditional static reports and post-audits are no longer sufficient. This clause promotes the shift of state-owned asset supervision from post-event reflection to a dynamic and precise governance model of pre-event warning and in-event intervention. Article 61, as a pillar clause of the entire system design, explicitly grants data assets a parallel management status with other types of assets. This means that in all management aspects, including asset statistics, property registration, revenue payment, transfer procedures, and even accountability, data assets will be subject to the same legal rules and standards as physical assets and financial assets. These three clauses together constitute a legal governance loop from clarifying management responsibilities and upgrading regulatory means to establishing equal status. III. Data Still Needs to Overcome Three Obstacles to Becoming a Financial Asset Although the "State-owned Assets Law (Draft)" provides legal status for data assets, there are still many practical gaps to overcome between "legal assets" and truly tradable and transferable "financial assets." The confirmation and valuation of data assets are the most pressing challenges. At a seminar in April 2025, Zhao Lifang, CEO of Data Asset Operations at China Economic Information Service, pointed out that data asset management faces three major challenges: "difficulty in asset identification," "difficulty in scientific quantification," and "difficulty in value assessment." These difficulties mainly stem from the difficulty in adapting accounting standards under the current framework to data elements, as well as the lack of operational application guidelines, leading to market entities having a vague understanding of the data carrier and a lack of basis for initial measurement when identifying data assets.Defining data ownership and ensuring compliant circulation presents another challenge. Although the "20 Measures for Data Protection" proposes a "separation of three rights" framework—the right to hold data resources, the right to process and use data, and the right to operate data products—in practice, determining ownership of data from different sources, such as data collected independently through public channels and data involving customer personal information, remains the primary challenge before data assets can be formally incorporated into the legal framework. The inadequacy of trading markets and infrastructure also hinders the financialization of data assets. While some regions have begun exploring this, such as the Shanghai Data Exchange's pilot program for "Representable Data Assets (RDA)," the overall market infrastructure, from registration and ownership confirmation to trading, settlement, and dispute resolution, still needs improvement. The unique characteristics of data as an asset lie in its non-competitive nature and low-cost reusability. Currently, there are issues such as low-quality data supply, inefficient circulation mechanisms, and insufficient release of application potential—all challenges faced in the development of data elements. IV. Who Will Participate in Shaping a New Ecosystem for Data Financialization? The formal inclusion of data assets into law will profoundly change the ecological landscape of the data element market, spawning a series of financial innovations and market changes. At the level of traditional financial institutions, banks, securities firms, and other institutions are actively exploring the financial applications of data assets. On July 31, 2025, the first approved data asset securitization project in China, "Huaxin-Xinxin-Data Asset Phase 1 Asset-Backed Special Plan," was officially issued and established on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange. This signifies that data assets have become feasible as collateral for financing. Inner Mongolia Rural Commercial Bank innovatively adopted a "data ownership confirmation + dynamic evaluation + pledge financing" model, using vehicle dispatch and operation data owned by the enterprise as the core pledge asset, successfully implementing the region's first data asset pledge loan. Bank of Communications Zhejiang Branch provided Zhejiang Lianxin Technology Co., Ltd. with a 10 million yuan data asset pledge financing credit line. In the field of technological innovation, the combination of data assets with technologies such as blockchain and privacy computing has given rise to new asset forms. At a closed-door seminar in July 2025, the Shanghai Data Exchange formally proposed the new "RDA" paradigm, aiming to incorporate data assets that can be identified, valued, and traded into a structure design similar to RWA. The basic operation of this path includes three steps: data ownership confirmation and encapsulation, structure design and pricing, and rights issuance and trading. The blockchain implementation of Langxin charging piles is a typical example. The blockchain object is not an isolated device, but a complete data asset of "device + operation data".However, the issuance of data assets under the current RDA framework still faces structural limitations such as the absence of data contributors, the lack of incentive mechanisms, and the lack of usage and verification paths. To overcome these limitations, some projects are exploring a user-centric DataFi model, transforming user behavior data into data units with structured labels and verification mechanisms. The DataFi model attempts to build a lightweight data asset circulation model with multilateral participation and sustainable operation through a combination of "user-led authorization" and "platform matching of needs." This represents another possible direction for the financialization of data assets. V. Global Perspective and Risk Warning: China's Pioneering Exploration and Prudent Progress China's data asset legislative practice has significant global foresight. Currently, no other country in the world has explicitly defined data as an "asset" in its national laws and incorporated it into the state-owned asset supervision framework. This legislative innovation has given China a first-mover advantage in the formulation of global digital economy rules. According to Redstone's latest report on RWA, as of June 2025, the size of real-world assets (RWA) has climbed from $5 billion in 2022 to over $24 billion, an increase of 380%. As the application value of data in AI training, advertising, and on-chain economy continues to rise, it has not only become a new factor of production but also possesses some of the characteristics of real, verifiable, and tradable RWA (Real Value Assurance). China's data asset legislation provides a legal foundation for data assets to enter this rapidly growing market. However, the financialization of data assets must be proceeded prudently to prevent potential risks. The lack of common standards for data asset valuation and the unclear ownership of pricing power can easily lead to unreasonable transaction prices. Data security and privacy protection are also significant risks. How to determine the ownership and compliant use of data involving customer personal information accumulated in business operations is a compliance challenge that requires special attention. Inadequate market infrastructure may trigger liquidity risks. Although some regions have begun pilot programs, a unified national data asset trading market has not yet been formed, lacking a mature market pricing mechanism and liquidity support, which may affect the discovery of the true value of data assets and their effective circulation. Finally, technological risks cannot be ignored. The application of technologies such as blockchain and privacy computing in the financialization of data assets is still in its early stages, with uncertainties regarding technological maturity, security, and interoperability, which may affect the stable operation of data asset financial products. With the draft State-owned Assets Law sealing the legal status of data assets, a new era has begun.This is not merely a revision of legal provisions, but a profound refresh of the nation's understanding of wealth—from tangible land and factories to intangible data and algorithms, the cornerstone of national governance is being reconstructed in the digital wave. The law has granted data the status of an "asset," but the real test has only just begun. From "legal confirmation of rights" to "market circulation," numerous practical gaps remain to be bridged, including valuation, compliance, and trading. It's like issuing a mining license to a vast oil field, but the extraction technology, pipelines, and trading markets still need to be built from scratch. The road ahead will be a journey of exploration jointly undertaken by rules, technology, and business acumen. For financial institutions, this means a completely new asset class is emerging, with innovations such as data-backed financing and asset securitization already visible on the horizon. For technology companies, a competition surrounding data assetization services (valuation, auditing, compliance, and trading) is about to begin. And for every enterprise and public institution possessing data resources, data governance is no longer just a cost center, but a mandatory course for future core competitiveness. This legislation is also a crucial move in the global competition for digital economy rules. In today's world, where data sovereignty is increasingly becoming a focal point of great power competition, China has clearly defined the asset attributes and management framework of data through its fundamental national laws. This not only releases institutional dividends for the domestic market but also provides a solid "Chinese solution" for participating in global digital governance. The law has opened that door. Behind that door lies a vast new continent where rules await writing, ecosystems await building, and values await discovery. This is no longer a discussion about "feasibility," but a practice about "how to implement it." There are no bystanders in this transformation; whether proactive or reactive, we will all become participants. History will remember this day: data, the "oil" of the information age, has finally obtained its property rights certificate. And all grand narratives about the digital economy now have their most fundamental legal starting point. The story to come will be written by the market, technology, and every participant. (Some of the information comes from the article: "Data Assets Defined as Assets for the First Time at the Level of Fundamental National Law!") "Draft Law on State-Owned Assets Includes Data Assets" · "Data Assets to be Formalized into Law, Institutional Development Takes a Key Step" · "Data Intelligence | Data Assets to be Formalized into Law, Institutional Development Takes a Key Step"