Startup Raises $50 Million ... “Tokenization Is Taking Hold in Mainstream Markets” [Crypto Briefing]

[Financial News] The tokenization market is gaining a foothold in traditional financial markets. In the United States, a tokenization startup has reportedly raised close to 70 billion won in an early-stage funding round.
According to sources in the crypto industry on the 11th, real estate tokenization startup Index Industries reportedly raised $50 million (about 67 billion won) in a recent early-stage (seed) funding round. The seed round was led by Lightspeed, with Polychain, Galaxy Ventures and Wintermute Ventures among the participants. Index Industries is developing the underlying technology for USHP, a tokenized product that tracks U.S. home prices. Before its launch, USHP secured commitments from institutional investors to invest up to $100 million (about 134 billion won). It is scheduled to launch on Ethereum in the fourth quarter of this year.
Tokenized products are seen as rapidly gaining a foothold in mainstream financial markets. Alan Konevsky, CEO of tZERO, a U.S.-based blockchain securities trading platform, recently told a media outlet in an interview that “tokenization will gain a foothold in the mainstream market within five years.” Citing the digitization of the securities industry and the traditional retail sector’s shift to e-commerce, he said, “It typically took five to 10 years for those changes to spread in earnest.”
CEO Alan Konevsky said, “Tokenization has already been underway for three to five years, so it won’t be long before it enters the mainstream market.” He added, “If traditional financial and digital asset companies take two to three years to build the relevant infrastructure in-house, they could fall behind in the market competition.”
However, there are also opposing views. Kash Dhanda, COO of decentralized exchange Jupiter (JUP), said, “To be honest, I think tokenization is somewhat overhyped.” He added, “Of the roughly $390 billion (about 521 trillion won) in tokenized assets, only around $4 billion to $5 billion (about 6 trillion to 7 trillion won) is actually traded or used in DeFi.”
[email protected] Han Young-jun Reporter