A Month in Review – August 2019

Digital Securities in August

August brought various positive developments within the digital securities sector.  While there were a few hiccups experienced, these were not big enough to overshadow the continued adoption of digital securities that is being seen.  This edition of ‘The Digital' highlights exclusive interviews from industry participants, as well as a look at various announcements made throughout the past 31 days.

Partnerships

Vertalo was hard at work this past month, as they announced multiple strategic partnerships.  These newly formed alliances will see both, the adoption of Vertalo’s services, and their use of services from another.

Vertalo and InvestReady to Address Verification / Accreditation

Prime Trust to Utilize Various Services Provided by Vertalo

Spotlighting

While the pace at which companies are announcing STOs is far slower than the heyday that surrounded ICOs, there are still plently of participants.  The following are a pair of small companies looking to blockchain technologies in an attempt to build their unique offerings.

CurioInvest – Fractional Fine Automobile Investing

Elite Mining – The Future of Mining is Green

Licensure

Securitize, arguably the leading company within digital securities, received new licensing this past month.  The company successfully received the blessing of the SEC to act as a transfer agent.  The following article looks at their path towards this development, and what it means moving forward.

Securitize Receives SEC Transfer Agent Approval

Down But Not Out

tZERO, a product of Medici Ventures, was on the receiving end of bad news this month.  In what has been a long and tedious process, it was divulged to investors that an investment within the company by Makara Capital was withdrawn.  Despite this setback, tZERO remains a promising company, with a bright future.

Makara Capital Withdraws Planned Investment from tZERO

In Other News

BlockState Gains Clarity on STO Taxation within Switzerland

One of the few companies to see continued development and adoption through ‘crypto winter', Stratis has announced that they will be bringing support for STOs.  This support will come through tweaks to their recently released ICO platform.

The team states, “…issuance and the profit on the sale of own shares through a security token offering in this specific case does not trigger profit tax and added-value tax, but security issue tax. This is a unique tax clarification for the BlockState’s security token offering model and marks the first time that a Swiss tax authority has issued a ruling on the tax classification of an equity STO.” Read Here

MERJ and Globacap Target Expansion in Europe

With operations going well in their home of Seychelles, MERJ has made it known that they intend to expand on a global scale.  In their attempt to do so, they have partnered with Globacap.

MERJ CEO, Ed Tuohy, stated, “We will be the first entity anywhere in the world to hold an initial public offering of security tokens,” said Edmond Tuohy, CEO of MERJ Exchange. “For this ground-breaking event, it is essential for MERJ to have a partner on board with the right technology, systems and approach to grasp the significance of this milestone for financial markets. Globacap are among the leaders who are really executing in this space and that resonates well with us.” Read Here

Interviews

Luc Falempin, CEO of Tokeny

In this exclusive interview, we speak with Luc Falempin.  As the acting CEO of one of Europe’s most promising companies involved in digital securities, he brings unique insights to the table. Read More

Stephen McKeon, Assoc. Professor of Finance at the University of Oregon 

In this interview, we discuss both, the potential of digital securities, and their most appropriate implementations.  Through his various roles, Stephen McKeon is able to provide unique insights into where the industry is, and where it will go. Read More

Education

Titles and Designations Among Industry Participants

With Securitize recently being awarded licensure, making them transfer-agents, we thought it a good time to discuss various designations doled out to industry participants.  The following article does just this. Read Here

Around the Web

Former Visa Exec Speaks on the Future of Security Token – Finance Magnates

In this interview, Roel Wolfert, a former Visa Exec, speaks on security tokens, and where he sees them going in the future. Read More