Wall Street Financial Services Firm Lazard Plans to Create Tokenized Funds with Bitfinex Securities

Lazard
(LAZ),
a
175-year
old
global
financial
services
and
asset
management
company,
is
the
latest
among
traditional
financial
players
jumping
on
the
asset
tokenization
trend,
planning
to
create
tokenized
funds
with
Bitfinex
Securities
and
SkyBridge
Invest.

The
tokenized
funds
will
be
set
up
and
issued
under
Kazakhstan’s
financial
services
law,
under
regulatory
oversight
of
Astana
Financial
Services
Authority
(AFSA),
where
SkyBridge
and
Bitfinex
are
licensed
to
operate.
Bitfinex
Securities
is
responsible
for
the
tokenization
process,
while
SkyBridge
will
act
as
broker
and
manager
of
the
tokenized
fund.
The
products
will
be
available
to
retail
users,
but
with
certain
geographic
limitations,
and
available
to
be
purchased
with
Tether’s
stablecoin

(USDT).

Representatives
of
the
companies
involved
signed
a
memorandum
of
understanding
(MoU)
toward
creating
the
tokenized
funds
on
Friday
in
Lugano,
Switzerland
at
a
side
event
during
the
Plan
B
conference.

The
vehicle
will
offer
exposure
in
a
“fund
of
funds”
structure
to
various
existing
Lazard-managed
funds
focused
on
global
equities
and
emerging
market
equities,
which
have
been
available
only
to
professional
investors
and
institutions
before,
Matthias
Kruse,
managing
director
at
Lazard,
told
CoinDesk.

“We
are
a
B2B
[business-to-business]
investment
firm,
and
this
is
a
good
way
for
us
to
service
retail
investors,”
Kruse
said.
Kruse
also
touted
tokenization
as
a
process
that
improves
efficiency,
liquidity
and
helps
lower
operational
costs.

Tokenization
of
real-world
assets
(RWA)
is
a
rapidly
growing
sector
in
the
intersection
of
digital
assets
and
traditional
finance
that
involves
placing
assets
such
as
bonds,
credit
and
funds
on
blockchain
rails.
Participants
do
so
in
pursuit
of
faster
settlements
and
increased
efficiency
compared
to
traditional
financial
plumbing.

Lazard’s
asset
management
business
has

$245
billion
of
assets
under
management
(AUM).
SkyBridge
Invest
is
a
Kazakhstan-based
investment
services
firm,
different
from
SkyBridge
Capital
of
veteran
Wall
Street
hedge
funder
Anthony
Scaramucci.
Bitfinex
Securities
is
a
licensed
trading
venue
in
El
Salvador
and
Kazakhstan.
Bitfinex
Securities
is
the
tokenization
platform
arm
of
crypto
trading
venue
Bitfinex.