The Nasdaq stock exchange in the U.S. is putting the SEC’s approval for its exciting proposal to offer tokenized stocks at the top of its agenda, as shared by the exchange’s crypto chief.
In a chat with CNBC on Thursday, Nasdaq’s head of digital assets strategy, Matt Savarese, mentioned they are eager to move forward. When asked if the SEC might greenlight their plan this year, he said, “We’ll just move as fast as we can!”
He added, “It’s essential for us to look at the public feedback and promptly respond to the SEC’s inquiries. We aim to collaborate with them quickly,” Savarese expressed.
Savarese Says Nasdaq Isn’t “Upending the System”
Nasdaq’s plan, submitted on September 8, aims to allow investors to trade stock tokens — digital forms of shares in publicly listed companies — directly on the exchange.
When asked if he anticipates other major exchanges following their lead, Savarese made it clear that Nasdaq isn’t about to flip the investment world upside down. “We’re not looking to disrupt the whole system; instead, we want to bring tokenization into the mainstream and have everyone on board,” he said.
He also emphasized the importance of doing this responsibly, sticking strictly to the SEC’s rules.
Just last month, Robinhood’s CEO Vlad Tenev predicted that tokenization could “eventually eat the whole financial system.”
The Crypto Industry is Divided on Tokenized Equities
Savarese highlighted that Nasdaq aims to be a trailblazer in the crypto landscape, pointing out that they were the pioneers in moving from paper trading to electronic systems.
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Tokenizing stocks has become a hot topic in the crypto community this year.
On September 3, Galaxy Digital’s CEO Mike Novogratz announced that they had become the first Nasdaq-listed company to tokenize its equity on a major blockchain, launching on the Solana network.
The discussion around tokenized stocks has sparked some skepticism within the crypto sphere, too.
On October 1, Rob Hadick from the crypto venture firm Dragonfly remarked that while tokenized equities could be beneficial for traditional markets, they might not provide the anticipated boost for the crypto sector.
Hadick explained that if these tokenized stocks use layer-2 networks, it can cause a “leakage” of value and might not benefit Ethereum or the broader crypto ecosystem as much as theorized.
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