In late March 2023, Securitize announced that it had partnered with the digital asset wealth platform, Onramp, with a goal to ‘streamline private equity investing’. Five months later, news has broken that this partnership has evolved into an acquisition that will see Onramp become a subsidiary of Securitize.
Details of the Deal
While full terms of this acquisition have yet to be released, investors can expect to see Onramp boast higher levels of integration surrounding services on offer by Securitize. This means that registered investment advisors (RIAs) will now be able to provide clients exposure to the following asset classes.
- private equity
- private credit
- secondaries
- real estate
Importantly, by integrating Securitize services into the Onramp platform, existing users will gain access to such opportunities through the use of a platform they are already familiar with.
Currently, Securitize notes that the Onramp platform boasts a community “…representing over $40B in cumulative AUM,”.
Commentary
Upon announcing this development, Securitize CEO Carlos Domingo stated,
“Our acquisition of Onramp is another big step forward in expanding investor access to top-performing alternative assets and in democratizing private capital markets. Onramp already offered RIAs easy access to digital assets, so it is a very natural extension to offer them tokenized alternative assets to complement their portfolios…Most wealth is generated in private market alternative assets and bringing Securitize and Onramp together enables registered investment advisors to give their clients access to that wealth generation.”
Meanwhile, Onramp CEO Eric Erving stated,
“We started Onramp with the goal of breaking down barriers for advisors to access meaningful investment opportunities for their clients, and there’s no better way to continue that mission than working with Securitize…More advisors would choose alternatives for their clients because the benefits are clear, but challenges like illiquidity and restricted access were previously significant problems to overcome. Securitize solves for this through offering lower minimums, lower fees, and potential for exit liquidity through secondary markets. Tokenization will be a major player in the investment space, and it’s imperative that all financial professionals are able to embrace this change.”
Final Word
This pending acquisition marks yet another step forward for Securitize, further cementing it as a leader in the world of asset tokenization. Once a niche subset of the broader digital asset sector, digital securities are increasingly being viewed as one of the more potential-laden implementations of blockchain technology. So much so that many believe tokenization efforts will represent billions in assets in the coming years. If such beliefs become reality, Securitize should be well positioned to capitalize.