NEW YORK — The Nasdaq stock exchange has identified the approval of tokenized stock offerings as a “top priority,” with executives pledging to move as quickly as regulatory frameworks allow.
Matt Savarese, Nasdaq’s Head of Digital Assets Strategy, addressed the exchange’s timeline in an interview with CNBC on Thursday, emphasizing the company’s eagerness to modernize market infrastructure while adhering to strict compliance standards.
A Race for Approval When pressed on whether the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) might greenlight Nasdaq’s proposal before the end of the year, Savarese signaled urgency but acknowledged the procedural hurdles ahead.
“We’ll just move as fast as we can,” Savarese stated. “I think we have to really evaluate where the public comments come back in and then answer and respond to the SEC questions as they come through.”
The proposal, originally submitted on September 8, seeks regulatory permission to list and trade “stock tokens”—digital representations of shares in publicly traded companies. This move would effectively bridge the gap between traditional equity markets and blockchain technology, potentially allowing for benefits such as 24/7 trading and faster settlement times.
Evolution, Not Revolution Despite the forward-looking nature of the technology, Nasdaq is positioning the shift as a natural evolution of market mechanics rather than a disruptive overhaul. Savarese drew a parallel to the exchange’s historic pivot from paper-based trading to electronic systems, framing tokenization as the next logical step in efficiency.
“We’re not looking at upending the system; we want everyone to come along for that ride and bring tokenization more into the mainstream,” Savarese explained. “We want to do it in that responsible investor-led way first, under the SEC rules themselves.”
Industry Reaction and Skepticism The push for tokenization comes amidst a broader industry debate. While some leaders, such as Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev, have predicted that tokenization will eventually “eat the whole financial system,” others remain cautious about the implementation.
Rob Hadick, a general partner at crypto venture firm Dragonfly, noted that while tokenized equities could streamline traditional finance (TradFi), they might not inevitably boost the decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem. Hadick warned that if these assets are hosted on isolated networks or specific Layer-2 solutions, value might not flow back to broader public blockchains like Ethereum as investors hope.
Nonetheless, momentum is building. Earlier this year, Galaxy Digital CEO Mike Novogratz announced that his firm had become the first Nasdaq-listed company to tokenize its equity on a major public blockchain, launching on the Solana network in September.
As Nasdaq awaits feedback from the SEC, the financial world watches closely to see if the regulator will open the door to a new era of digitized Wall Street assets.
