Stocks tied to bringing traditional financial assets onto blockchains are taking a hit Friday morning after the anticipated “innovation exemption” for tokenized securities trading gets delayed.
Bullish (BLSH), the crypto exchange that owns CoinDesk and is acquiring transfer agent Equiniti as it builds infrastructure for issuing and servicing tokenized securities, dropped 9% in the early session, reversing gains on its second-quarter earnings report.
Securitize (SECZ), BlackRock’s tokenization partner and the issuer of its BUIDL fund, fell more than 5% extending its Thursday 27% plunge after missing earnings. Now the stock trades 60% off its late June-early July high following its public debut.
Crypto exchange Coinbase (COIN), which pursues its own tokenized-stock plans and recently picked Abu Dhabi as its offshore tokenization hub, declined 3%.
Circle (CRCL) also dropped 4.2%. While the company is best known as the issuer of the USDC stablecoin, Circle also has a growing footprint in tokenized U.S. Treasuries through USYC, which has the largest market share with roughly $3 billion in assets.
CoinDesk reported late Thursday that the SEC is set to further delay the innovation exemption, which was expected to make it easier for firms to offer trading in tokenized securities. Concerns from both the White House and Wall Street about the proposal’s legal footing and potential impact on markets have held up the plan.