News
Spiko launches tokenized mutual funds
- Two tokenized mutual funds for US Treasury and European bonds have been launched by Spiko and will be available on the Ethereum and Polygon blockchain.
- €4 million ($4.2 million) was raised through a pre-seed round to support and fund the platform.
Polygon (MATIC) announced Spiko’s launch of two tokenized mutual funds as part of plans to transform financial markets by leveraging blockchain databases. Based on U.S. Treasury bonds and European government bonds, tokenized mutual funds were designed to offer easy access to previously inaccessible investments. As explained in the announcement, this represents a major change in the way financial instruments are issued and managed.
French start-up, @spiko_xyz, has launched two tokenized mutual funds based on US Treasuries and European government bonds, democratizing access to safe investments, with $50 million already committed. available on Ethereum and Polygon PoShttps://t.co/sotyzDGxra— Polygon | Aggregates (@0xPolygon) June 13, 2024
Spiko operates as a licensed financial investment advisor with its platform known for the lowest barrier to entry into issued bonds. According to our research, investors can start with as little as €1,000 or $1,000. Previously, investing in US Treasury bonds or European government bonds was not easy for small portfolios as the entry fees were mostly tens or hundreds of thousands of euros.
On top of that, there were high fees with caps in place. Interestingly, the arrival of Spiko made it possible to invest in smaller amounts.
According to the announcement, this innovative offering will be available on Ethereum and Polygon with investors who have the opportunity to benefit from a return of up to 5% per year and without limits.
Spiko raises funds to support the initiative
To support this initiative and finance the development of the platform, 4 million euros (4.2 million dollars) were raised as part of a pre-seed round with the participation of several funds such as First, Blockwall or Kima.
Recounting the journey to this goal, Spiko said they set themselves a “crazy” challenge a year ago. According to them, the challenge was to launch the first USD and EUR denominated money market funds issued on Ethereum.
To stand out from the competition, the fund’s shares would be accessible to retail investors rather than just a few qualified buyers. As expected, these assets would be self-guarded. This implies that they would be held in EVM-compatible wallets. Additionally, they would be transferred around the clock on the chain and used as collateral DeFi.
The blockchain would be the authoritative ledger, not a mirror of transactions conducted in a centralized database managed by the transfer agent. Ownership of the tokens would grant governance rights, allowing influence over the issuer’s decisions.
It is important to note that $USTBL and $EUTBL are the shares of the Spiko UD Treasury Bills FCM. According to EU legislation, these funds are UCITS MMFs and are approved by the French Financial Markets Authority. An open-ended investment company based in France, Spiko SICAV, will issue the assets. Furthermore, the holders of such assets are shareholders of Spiko SICAV and have the right to participate in the governance and election of board members.
According to the company, Spiko MMFs are managed through the collaboration of third parties such as CACEIS (a subsidiary of G-SIB Crédit Agricole and Santander).
We are building the next generation platform to issue, manage and distribute securities, moving securities from traditional to more efficient settlement systems. $USTBL and $EUTBL are just the first products in a long line as we embark on this journey.
At the time of writing, MATIC was trading at $0.6, having fallen 2.5% in the last 24 hours.