Morgan Stanley, Blockchain Capital Lead $48M Investment in Crypto Firm Securitize

Blockchain company Securitize has announced it raised $48 million in an oversubscribed Series B financing round led by Morgan Stanley. 

For the Wall Street giant, which participated in the round through its venture capital arm Morgan Stanley Tactical Value, this marks the first investment in the blockchain space.

Pedro Teixeira, co-head of Morgan Stanley Tactical Value Investing, said that the firm’s investment is “a sign that we believe in the growth and adoption of digital asset securities.”

Co-leading the round is Blockchain Capital, joined by new and existing investors including Ava Labs, IDC Ventures, Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank, Borderless Capital, Ripio, and Ripple. In July 2020, Securitize raised $12.8 million in a Series A round led by Coinbase. 

Founded in 2017, Securitize is an SEC-registered broker-dealer, which enables companies to raise capital through so-called “security tokens.” These blockchain-based contracts represent a stake in an enterprise or an external asset, for example, real estate or corporate stock. 

Earlier this month, Bitcoin wallet provider Exodus announced that it will use the platform to convert $75 million in common stock into tokens on the Algorand blockchain so that they can be claimed by the company’s shareholders and later traded on secondary markets. The Series B raise comes as the company prepares the launch of Securitize Markets, a marketplace and trading platform for digital securities.