Digital Securities
A Ferrari F12tdf is First Up as CurioInvest and MERJ Plan to Tokenize/Host Rare Assets
Mutually Beneficial
Some partnerships are simply one company helping another; then, there are mutually beneficial partnerships in which both parties offer something helpful to the other. With the recent announcement that CurioInvest and MERJ are partnering together, it is clear that this situation is the latter.
CurioInvest is a young company, which provides investors with access to the lucrative market of high-end automobiles. This is done through tokenizing ownership of a sought after vehicle.
MERJ, on the other hand, is one of the more established digital asset exchanges active, to date. By providing investors access to a secondary market, they hope to facilitate liquidity through the listing of traditionally illiquid assets…or say, automobiles?
In this partnership, CurioInvest finds a home for their tokens, which represent fractionalized ownership of specific vehicles, to be traded, while MERJ expands their listed offerings.
The pairing of companies has indicated that while the inaugural listing will see the tokenization of a Ferrari F12tdf, there is expected to be up to an additional 500 to come.
Commentary
Jim Needham, Head of Digital Strategy at MERJ, states,
“Right now, MERJ Exchange is the only regulated market globally that can support digital securities from end to end…CurioInvest has identified pent up demand from institutional investors such as hedge funds and wealth managers. Through its partnership with MERJ Exchange, we are creating an access point for these investors that is compliant through the full cycle of exchange, clearing, settlement and registry.”
Fernando Verboonen, CEO of CurioInvest, states,
“For years, many investors have had to sit and watch as rare and elite asset classes outperformed equities and bonds…Now we have created a way for all institutional and retail investors to gain access to this booming asset class. In this era of ultra low interest rates it seems likely that demand for collectables will continue to grow.”
He continued,
“CurioInvest and MERJ Exchange offer investors a unique combination of old world assets, tokenized on a distributed ledger, but now made available on traditional securities markets infrastructure…This is the best of all worlds and ensures that as wide a group of people possible is reached.”
Speaking with Ed
On multiple occasions, we have had the pleasure of speaking with MERJ CEO, Ed Tuohy. Not only have we completed an exclusive interview, discussing the ins-and-outs of MERJ itself, but most recently, a discussion on the state of digital securities as a whole.
Interview Series – Ed Tuohy, CEO of MERJ
A Global Perspective – Africa Edition
CurioInvest
Founded in 2019, CurioInvest is headquartered in Zug, Switzerland. The team behind CurioInvest has developed a solution for providing access to a lucrative asset class (automobiles), traditionally restricted to high-net worth individuals only.
CEO, Fernando Verboonen, currently oversees company operations.
MERJ
Founded in 2011, MERJ maintains operations within the island nation known as The Seychelles. This company has the distinction of being the first company to issue tokenized shares on a digital exchange. The team is currently ramping up operations, with global expansion in mind.
CEO, Ed Tuohy, currently oversees company operations
In Other News
One of the most intriguing aspects behind digital securities, are the doors that the sector stands to potentially open; Doors providing investors access to previously illiquid and non-traditional assets.
While real estate has, thus far, been the clear runaway trend in the sector, another example beyond it and automobiles is art. With a tagline ‘preserving wealth on the blockchain – with ART’, we saw TheArtToken successfully raise over $16M this past year in their own unique implementation of digital securities.
