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BlackRock's BUIDL fund is now the largest tokenized treasury fund, knocking off Franklin Templeton from the top spot.
BUIDL (BlackRock USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund) offers investors the opportunity to earn yields through Securitize Markets on Ethereum.
Last week, the fund grew by $70 million and now has $375 million of deposits, representing 30% of the market since its debut on 21 March.
Franklin Templeton's Onchain US Government Money Fund (FOBXX) slipped to $368 million in assets under management (AUM) over the same period due to minor outflows.
Ondo Finance, which leverages BlackRock's token for its OUSG treasury fund, saw $50 million of inflows in one week.
.@BlackRock's first natively onchain fund, BUIDL, has crossed the $350M AUM mark!
— Ondo Finance (@OndoFinance) April 29, 2024
Last week saw inflows of $50M into the fund, largely driven by Ondo's $OUSG.
We continue to see strong demand for more capital efficient cash solutions across the board, and we are proud to have…
Securing Securitize
BlackRock also led Securitize's $47 million strategic funding round, which the firm said will be used to accelerate product development and expansion.
Securitize CEO Carlos Domingo told Decrypt that the firm plans to launch in Europe under the EU's DLT Pilot Regime.
“For years, we've been grinding and working on our tech stack, getting all our licenses, and being regulatory compliant,” Domingo said. “The fact that this has led to work with the largest asset manager in the world, issuing the largest tokenized fund in history, [...] is a super big accomplishment.”
Blockhead
The funding round also saw participation from publicly traded TradFi firms including Hamilton Lane and Tradeweb Market, and Web3 natives, Paxos, Circle, and Aptos Labs.
BlackRock’s global head of strategic ecosystem partnerships, Joseph Chalom, has been appointed to Securitize’s board of directors as part of the investment.
“At BlackRock, we believe that tokenization has the potential to drive a significant transformation in capital markets infrastructure,” he said. “Our investment in Securitize is another step in the evolution of our digital assets strategy.”
Earlier this week, BlackRock's Bitcoin ETF saw its first day of outflows since its launch in January.
$36.9 million flowed out of the fund on 1 May, contributing to overall net outflows of $526.8 million. Fidelity Wise Origin Bitcoin Fund (FBTC) saw the largest outflows of $191.1 million while Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC), which has seen outflows since its launch, saw $167.4 million exit the fund.
Blockhead
Appealing to Pensions
However, the world's largest asset manager has another card up its sleeve: pensions.
Robert Mitchnick, head of digital assets for BlackRock, said financial institutions including sovereign wealth funds, pension funds and endowments could start trading these ETFs.
“Many of these interested firms – whether we're talking about pensions, endowments, sovereign wealth funds, insurers, other asset managers, family offices – are having ongoing diligence and research conversations, and we're playing a role from an education perspective,” Mitchnick said.
He added that BlackRock has been discussing Bitcoin for these institutions for years. “When we think about this space, we see the potential for digital assets to benefit our clients and capital markets, with a focus in three areas: cryptoassets, stablecoins and tokenization,” Mitchnick said.
“And these pillars, they're all interrelated. That's a really important thing for people to understand. And the work that we do across each informs our strategy and our insights for the others.”
