Itaú announced this Thursday (14) the launch of its asset tokenization platform, Itaú Digital Assets.
According to the bank, traditional market assets, such as debt securities issued by companies, will be digitized through the blockchain network, with the aim of making these crypto assets accessible to a wider audience.
At the beginning of July, Itaú’s new business unit carried out a pilot project with a company that was already a customer of the bank, which accepted to carry out the tokenization process of receivables (debt securities) owed by a series of suppliers.
The operation moved around R$ 360 thousand, with a term of 35 days, and was restricted to a small group of clients in the private banking area (aimed at investors with a few million in portfolio) and employees.
The expectation is that, by the end of the year, the first issues of tokenized assets will be carried out, aimed at retail individual investors, through the Ion platform.
For 15 years at the bank, executive Vanessa Fernandes, based in New York, United States, was appointed to lead Itaú’s new digital operation.
“We started studying the blockchain about 5 years ago, and we are able to change the financial system by developing simpler platforms,” said the expert, during a press conference this morning.
According to her, with the new project, the idea is that assets structured by the bank today restricted to investors with large fortunes become accessible to the general public in tokenized format.
“We intend to democratize investments through tokenization,” he said.
She added that the assets tokenized by the bank’s new platform are not cryptocurrencies, with traditional market assets serving as backing for the issuance of crypto assets, unlike bitcoin, which is not tied to any other business. “It has nothing to do with cryptocurrency,” he said.
the executive of Itaú.
The environment of pressured inflation on a global scale, with central banks in developed markets having to increase interest rates in an increasingly accelerated way, has caused a sharp erosion in the prices of cryptocurrencies in the accumulated of 2022. Bitcoin has suffered a devaluation of about 60% in the year.
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