Now Ono Finance and the Ono Foundation launch Ono Global Markets, bringing over 100 tokenized US stocks and ETFs on chain for non-US investors via Ethereum.
Now the platform is now live with plans to expand to over 1000 assets by the end of the year.
The tokenized equities are designed to be fully transferable, peer to peer, and compatible with major infra providers.
Now these assets do integrate directly into DI applications with chain link powering officials.
Speeds.
Meanwhile, Fidelity launching a tokenized money market fund on Ethereum.
Ono Finance is a key investor.
Joining me as we kick off today's trading session here at the New York Stock Exchange is Ian Duboud, chief strategy officer of Ono Finance.
So Ian, great to have you back.
Thank you so much for joining me.
Thank you for having me.
It's a pleasure.
Well, we've been hearing a lot about tokenization, so first and foremost, tell me what Ono is doing.
Yes, so as you mentioned, we launched on the global markets last week.
That is a platform to tokenize over 100 different US stocks and ETFs, really broadening access to US capital markets to a global audience.
It's almost like the way to think about it is what stablecoins did for the US dollar on the global markets is now doing for US capital markets, really starting to tokenize US stocks, ETFs, making it available to non-US investors in the primary market and making these stocks and ETFs 24/7 transferable, integrated into DFI and quite frankly just a better. of the traditional stocks, yeah, and you mentioned the word traditional.
You and I are here at the New York Stock Exchange on the trading floor, and when we think back to the intersection of tradie and Dy, we're talking about tokenization.
So what does what you're doing actually mean for the future of not just tray, but also finance overall?
Yeah, I think when you look at the current state of financial services, it has clearly done quite a few things really well, but one of the key things that Historically has not been that great is the concept of global access.
How do you truly get global access to assets that people really want, like the US dollar, like US capital markets?
The other area where traditional finance has lacked a little bit is really enabling cross-border payments and doing that in a 24/7 way or really 24/7 movement of assets across borders.
And for those both of those things, tokenization actually helps quite a bit.
There's a lot of emphasis.
Now on stablecoins really as a tokenized dollar and being a better version of the dollar, you can move it around 24/7 and really it is an interesting way for a global audience to get access to that US dollar.
We at Ono Finance are focusing on the next assets that will tokenize.
We started doing that with, you know, tokenized treasuries, really enabling access to essentially tokenized money market funds for institutional investors and retail as well.
And as of last week we did the same thing for US stocks and ETF.
Yeah, so you just mentioned that you have more products coming online.
So what can we expect in the near future?
Yeah, I mean, US stocks, ETFs, you mentioned there's 100 of them right now.
By year end we expect it to be 1000 or more.
Right now we've really focused on it being an access play, but these things work on blockchain rails.
They can work in DFI.
We're working on a couple of protocols and working with partners to really create more utility around these assets so that by year end people can use these things.
For 24/7 margin or however really they want to use it, so expect more integrations, more assets, more different networks that we're going to issue and tokenize all these assets on from us pretty soon.
We can't have a conversation about tokenized products without talking about regulation, and I understand that on the finance you have appointed Peter Curly as the head of global regulatory affairs.
So what regulatory questions do you think still need to be answered here in the US?
Yeah, it's a great question because you know we launched these products primarily to non-US investors in the primary markets, primarily because the current system in the US doesn't really allow us to offer these things in a permissionless beer format, kind of like the format of a stablecoin.
If you apply that to stocks and ETFs, doing that to US investors in the primary market is very.
Challenging.
So I think there's a conversation that we're having with the current administration, with the ACC and all the relevant agencies that kind of examines how can we put these stocks and ETFs on chain while protecting the integrity of traditional financial markets and truly making sure investors are protected while also enabling the permissionless innovation that DI enables and.
Striking the right balance, we believe in our model we found a way to do that, but obviously you know we need to have some conversations with the US admin and agencies.
Yeah, and speaking of which, I do want to ask you about Fidelity getting into tokenized funds, and there may be viewers out there watching right now, especially here in the US, so Americans asking what does all of this mean for traditional investors.
Yeah, as you mentioned, Fidelity just launched a tokenized Treasury fund themselves last week on Ethereum.
Ono is a very proud anchor investor into that fund.
It really exemplifies how a company like Ono likes to help the traditional financial companies on chain.
It's obviously a pretty meaningful moment for one of these. financial giants to make its way on chain and we're very excited to see that.
I think you'll see just more traditional finance move on chain whether that's the asset managers, the banks post Genius, and obviously the crypto native companies are there to partner up with them to make that journey more seamless for them.
Yeah, and Ian, before you came on air, we were talking about the last time you were here, which was Liberation Day, and so much has happened since then.
But as we look forward, we only have a few more months left for this year.
So as we look ahead, what does all of this mean when it comes to the future of real world assets, especially on blockchain?
What can we expect?
You'll start to see a lot of the current crypto exchanges start to list stocks, ETFs, and traditional financial assets.
People underestimate the sheer size that these crypto exchanges, particularly non-US crypto exchanges, operate at.
I think the latest estimate is around 400 million people have a crypto exchange account.
You know, if all of those individuals. start to have access to US capital markets via tokenized stocks and ETFs.
I think that could actually represent a pretty meaningful sea change in just access more broadly and how US capital markets operate over time.
Well, Ian, great to have you here at the New York Stock Exchange.
We'll see what the next couple of months bring and hopefully we'll have you back before year end.
Thank you so much for joining me.
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