According to CoinDesk, UK investment firm abrdn and regulated exchange Archax have tokenized a money-market fund, offering a yield-bearing stablecoin that can also be used as collateral for trades. The two companies launched the institutional-grade token in October and are now onboarding customers seeking flexible capital allocation options. Archax, one of the first crypto firms regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority, and abrdn, which manages $626 billion in assets, aim to capitalize on the operational and cost-saving efficiencies of representing assets on blockchains.
The tokenized tranche of the abrdn fund is available for as little as $5,000, potentially attracting a new channel of investors. Simon Barnby, Archax’s chief marketing officer, said there is a $400 million pipeline of interested customers, including payment firms and those holding stablecoins like USDC or USDT that do not generate yield. The higher interest-rate environment is driving innovation in tokenization and decentralized finance (DeFi), with a focus on yield-bearing stablecoins.
Archax plans to introduce trading pairs of the abrdn money-market fund (MMF) token and bitcoin (BTC) early next year. The MMF ownership token could also be used as collateral in regulated DeFi, an area the companies are exploring for 2022. Abrdn has a long pipeline of financial products to tokenize, starting with the money-market fund, and sees potential for the token to be used for settlement of tokenized securities and other tokenized funds in the future.
