Current U.S. regulations are blocking a major financial shift that could open up private-market investments to everyday investors through tokenization, CEO of digital brokerage Robinhood Vlad Tenev said.

In a Wednesday opinion piece for the Washington Post, Tenev said that many high-growth companies like OpenAI, SpaceX and Stripe are increasingly avoiding going public, limiting investment access to a small circle of wealthy investors, widening the investment gap between retail investors.

Tokenizing private equity through blockchain technology that underpins crypto markets would allow retail to access companies early in their growth phase, lowering barriers while keeping proper disclosures and investor protections, Tenev argued.

“The world is tokenizing, and the United States should not get left behind,” Tenev wrote. “It’s time to update our conversation about crypto from bitcoin and meme coins to what blockchain is really making possible: A new era of ultra-inclusive and customizable investing fit for this century.”

However, U.S. regulators, particularly the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), have yet to provide a clear framework and rules for registering security tokens, while other key markets such as the EU, Singapore and Abu Dhabi are already advancing in this area, he said.

He proposed creating a security token registration framework as an alternative to IPOs, providing clear guidelines for exchanges and broker-dealers to support tokenized assets and updating accredited investor rules to allow access based on financial knowledge instead of wealth.

Tokenization is a booming sector at the intersection of crypto and traditional finance that could become a multitrillion-dollar market this decade, per forecasts by McKinsey, BCG, 21Shares and Go to Source to See Full Article
Author: Krisztian Sandor