NEW YORK, NY / ACCESS Newswire / December 15, 2025 / For decades, global markets optimized for speed, scale, and efficiency. Supply chains stretched across continents. Materials moved faster. Costs came down. Profits went up. What did not evolve was identity. The assumption was simple. If something passed inspection once, it could be trusted forever.
That assumption no longer holds.
Across finance, manufacturing, energy, defense, and sustainability, the same failure point keeps appearing. Materials move, transform, blend, melt, shred, and re-enter circulation, but their identity does not survive the journey. Paper trails break. Certificates lose relevance. Declarations replace proof. What once felt like administrative inconvenience is now emerging as systemic risk.
This is the identity gap, and it is rapidly becoming the most expensive problem markets did not price in.
When Materials Lose Identity, Risk Multiplies Quietly
Gold bars in sovereign vaults carry stamps, not memory. Silver flows through industrial supply chains at speeds no audit system can follow. Cotton fibers lose origin the moment they are spun. Plastics become indistinguishable after shredding and recycling. Hardware components circulate globally with no persistent authentication.
Each of these systems relies on trust layered on top of documentation. That model worked when enforcement was light and incentives were aligned. It fails when regulation tightens, sanctions expand, and verification becomes mandatory rather than optional.
Unverified materials introduce invisible liabilities. They compromise ESG claims. They undermine sanctions compliance. They weaken reserve credibility. They expose manufacturers to recalls, fines, and reputational damage. The cost does not appear immediately. It accumulates silently until an audit, investigation, or geopolitical event forces the issue.
Markets do not tolerate unknowns forever. They eventually demand proof.
Regulation Did Not Create the Problem, It Exposed It
The identity gap did not emerge because regulators became aggressive. It existed long before enforcement caught up. What changed is that regulators, insurers, financiers, and counterparties are now aligned around one principle. Claims are no longer sufficient.
Carbon disclosures without verified inputs are being challenged. Recycled-content mandates are being scrutinized. Sanctions compliance now reaches backward through supply chains. Hardware authentication has become a national security issue, not an IT problem.
This shift exposes a hard truth. Legacy systems were never designed to carry identity at the material level. They were designed to record transactions, not preserve truth through transformation.
Once a material changes form, its history disappears.
SMX Targets the Gap Others Cannot Reach
SMX (NASDAQ:SMX) approaches the problem from the only place it can be solved. The material itself.
Instead of tracking paperwork, SMX embeds molecular identity directly into physical materials. That identity survives melting, shredding, blending, recasting, and reuse. Gold retains its fingerprint. Silver carries its provenance. Plastics prove recycled content. Cotton maintains origin. Hardware components authenticate themselves.
This is not a software overlay. It is an infrastructure layer.
By giving materials a persistent, verifiable identity, SMX closes the gap that paperwork, stamps, and declarations never could. Proof becomes intrinsic, not inferred.
Why Every Sector Is Facing the Same Reckoning
The identity gap is not sector-specific. It is structural.
Precious metals face sovereign audits and sanctions scrutiny. Industrial metals face counterfeit risk and illicit sourcing. Textiles face forced-labor enforcement. Plastics face recycled-content mandates. Electronics face authentication and security concerns. Defense and aerospace face zero-tolerance requirements.
Different industries. Same vulnerability.
Once verification exists, anything without it becomes questionable. Markets do not wait for mandates. They preemptively discount risk. Materials that cannot prove identity lose mobility, pricing power, and financial utility.
This is how two-tier systems form. Verified materials become preferred. Unverified materials become constrained.
Proof Is Becoming Infrastructure, Not a Feature
What SMX is building is not a compliance tool. It is foundational infrastructure for a world that no longer accepts assumptions.
Identity that persists through transformation changes how markets behave. It enables pricing differentiation. It strengthens balance sheets. It supports enforcement without friction. It restores trust without reliance on belief.
Most importantly, it scales across industries without needing reinvention. The same identity framework applies whether the material is gold, silver, plastic, cotton, or silicon.
That universality is what makes the identity gap so dangerous and its resolution so valuable.
The Cost of Ignoring Identity Is Rising Fast
Markets punish late adopters. They always have.
Companies, institutions, and governments that move early to secure verifiable materials will gain credibility, access, and leverage. Those who delay will absorb the cost of forced transitions, rushed audits, and reputational damage.
The identity gap is no longer abstract. It is measurable. And it is closing.
SMX is not chasing trends. It is addressing the one structural weakness every modern system shares. When materials can prove who they are, markets can finally trust what they hold.
About SMX
As global businesses face new and complex challenges relating to carbon neutrality and meeting new governmental and regional regulations and standards, SMX is able to offer players along the value chain access to its marking, tracking, measuring and digital platform technology to transition more successfully to a low-carbon economy.
Forward-Looking Statements
The information in this press release includes “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, statements regarding expectations, hopes, beliefs, intentions or strategies regarding the future. In addition, any statements that refer to projections, forecasts or other characterizations of future events or circumstances, including any underlying assumptions, are forward-looking statements. The words “anticipate,” “believe,” “contemplate,” “continue,” “could,” “estimate,” “expect,” “forecast,” “intends,” “may,” “will,” “might,” “plan,” “possible,” “potential,” “predict,” “project,” “should,” “would” and similar expressions may identify forward-looking statements, but the absence of these words does not mean that a statement is not forward-looking. Forward-looking statements in this press release may include, for example: matters relating to the Company’s fight against abusive and possibly illegal trading tactics against the Company’s stock; successful launch and implementation of SMX’s joint projects with manufacturers and other supply chain participants of steel, rubber and other materials; changes in SMX’s strategy, future operations, financial position, estimated revenues and losses, projected costs, prospects and plans; SMX’s ability to develop and launch new products and services, including its planned Plastic Cycle Token; SMX’s ability to successfully and efficiently integrate future expansion plans and opportunities; SMX’s ability to grow its business in a cost-effective manner; SMX’s product development timeline and estimated research and development costs; the implementation, market acceptance and success of SMX’s business model; developments and projections relating to SMX’s competitors and industry; and SMX’s approach and goals with respect to technology. These forward-looking statements are based on information available as of the date of this press release, and current expectations, forecasts and assumptions, and involve a number of judgments, risks and uncertainties. Accordingly, forward-looking statements should not be relied upon as representing views as of any subsequent date, and no obligation is undertaken to update forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances after the date they were made, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as may be required under applicable securities laws. As a result of a number of known and unknown risks and uncertainties, actual results or performance may be materially different from those expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements. Some factors that could cause actual results to differ include: the ability to maintain the listing of the Company’s shares on Nasdaq; changes in applicable laws or regulations; any lingering effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on SMX’s business; the ability to implement business plans, forecasts, and other expectations, and identify and realize additional opportunities; the risk of downturns and the possibility of rapid change in the highly competitive industry in which SMX operates; the risk that SMX and its current and future collaborators are unable to successfully develop and commercialize SMX’s products or services, or experience significant delays in doing so; the risk that the Company may never achieve or sustain profitability; the risk that the Company will need to raise additional capital to execute its business plan, which may not be available on acceptable terms or at all; the risk that the Company experiences difficulties in managing its growth and expanding operations; the risk that third-party suppliers and manufacturers are not able to fully and timely meet their obligations; the risk that SMX is unable to secure or protect its intellectual property; the possibility that SMX may be adversely affected by other economic, business, and/or competitive factors; and other risks and uncertainties described in SMX’s filings from time to time with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Contact: info@securitymattersltd.com
SOURCE: SMX (Security Matters) Public Limited
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