Singapore-based iSTOX becomes fully regulated DLT-based capital markets platform

Capital markets platform iSTOX has graduated from the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) Regulatory Sandbox and is now officially a fully regulated distributed ledger technology (DLT)-based platform.

The company had joined the regulatory sandbox in May 2019 to launch digitized securities trading. According to an announcement on Medium, iSTOX graduated from the MAS Fintech Regulatory Sandbox on Feb. 1, 2020.

MAS Chief FinTech Officer Sopnendu Mohanty considered iSTOX’s graduation a huge success for the program.

“We are delighted that the regulatory sandbox has enabled iSTOX to validate its technological innovation with actual customers in a safe manner,” Mohanty said. “This has again demonstrated that proportional regulations through sandbox experimentation can foster innovation and bring new benefits to consumers and the financial industry.”

iSTOX operator approved as RMO

ICHX Tech Pte Ltd (ICHX), the operator of the iSTOX platform based in Singapore, has received the approval from the MAS as a recognized market operator (RMO) and capital markets services (CMS) licensee. Following its latest accomplishment, iSTOX has become the first regulated capital markets platform using DLT.

“This is a big milestone both for iSTOX and for the financial industry as a whole,” said Danny Toe, Founder and CEO of ICHX. “We started this just over two years ago as a vision of how investing could be done better. Today we truly emerge as a 21st-century financial institution.”

iSTOX said that its graduation from the sandbox would translate into the removal of restrictions such as the limitations on the size of issuances that it can host and the number of investors it can onboarded.

Chief Commercial Officer Choo Oi Yee said that they are fully operational, adding that they are already working on a “pipeline of exciting issuances across different asset classes.”

ICHX is backed by Asia’s leading international multi-asset exchange Singapore Exchange (SGX); Heliconia, a subsidiary of Temasek Holdings focused on investing in fast-growing companies; Japan’s Tokai Tokyo Financial Holdings (via subsidiary Tokai Tokyo Global Investments); Thailand’s Kiatnakin Phatra Financial Group; and South Korea’s Hanwha Asset Management.

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