Anna Wroblewska, chief business officer at Dinari, joins J.D. Durkin on the New York Stock Exchange floor to discuss tokenized U.S. equities, regulatory compatibility, and the push toward expanded trading hours.
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J.D. Anna Wroblewska joins us now down here on the trading floor of the Big Board. She is the chief business officer at Dinari. Happy Friday and thanks for joining us on the show. Really nice to have you.
Anna: Thank you I appreciate it.
J.D.: Give me a little bit of an introduction for any of our viewers who don't know too much about Dinari. What is it all about and what are some of your top priorities here in early 2026?
Anna: Absolutely. So we're a tokenization platform. We focus primarily on U.S. public securities. So stocks, ETFs, BDCs rates you name it, we can tokenize it. And we are special in that we have pioneered what the SEC calls the custodial model of tokenization. What that means is that all the benefits, rights and regulatory structures that make being a shareholder in this country so great are passed through to the token holder. So we're very excited for 2026 and beyond.
J.D.: It seems like a really exciting moment to be in this space. We're talking a lot more about tokenized equities. Why is that conversation you think so important right now?
Anna: It's important because we are seeing, you know, this ability for institutions to start understanding blockchain technology a little bit more and what it can offer both themselves and their end customers. I think this has been a long time coming. in the space have been talking about this for years.
The institutions are coming, the institutions are coming. And now we've finally gotten to a point where they are here and I think work like what we're doing, where we're building something that's compliant and compatible with existing financial infrastructure is helpful in doing that, because we can kind of speak that same language and start to communicate those benefits in a way that's understandable and viable.
J.D.: Anna, what does regulatory compatibility look like as part of this broader conversation? And talk to me a bit about the significance of making sure that that's part of the consideration.
Anna: Yeah. So there's of course, there's a number of approaches to tokenization, you know, around the world. One thing that we thought was really important is, you know, securities laws exist and they've existed for a long time. And so our kind of North Star was let's build a platform that speaks to those regulations. It's built to that spec because that way, again, you can start to have really productive conversations with institutions about, you know, what are the benefits of moving on to blockchain infrastructure and what, you know, what utility can that really start to offer you?
J.D.: Over the course of the last year, we've talked so much about the changing rules of the road, the blueprint shifting, the new look regulations in the space for all the progress that has already been made is there's still a lot more work. You think systemically for the industry that still needs to be done for lawmakers and policymakers?
Anna: Well, I think I'm not a policy person, but I mean, obviously there's, you know, ongoing conversations in DC around, you know, stablecoin regulation. I think these things are really important. They're going to help the industry move forward. Obviously, you know, for anyone that's operating in a regulated space, we need rules of the road. Again, we took a particular path towards that of saying there are already rules governing securities, but there's so much more involved in crypto and even in tokenization that goes beyond that. So we're very excited to see those conversations continue to happen and hope we'll see some great market structure regulation soon.
J.D.: I got less than a minute left. Obviously we just did the closing bell right now for the for the world of regular equities. We have a trading day- 9:30 to 4:00. Do you see the world of tokenized assets maybe having expanded hours outside of what we may be used to?
Anna: Yeah, I mean, I know this has been a conversation in traditional markets for a long time is, you know, expanding the hours and moving towards a more 24/7 marketplace, you know, pros and cons of both. But one of the benefits of crypto rails is 24/7 marketplace. And there's a lot that can be unlocked with that. And we do think tokenization can be really helpful for that.
J.D.: Anna Wroblewska is the chief business officer at Dinari. Congratulations on all the success. Come back on the show anytime. Really nice to have you.
Anna: Thank you so much for having me, I appreciate it.