Bitfinex’s recent venture into tokenized bonds with the launch of the Tether USDT tokenized bond has not met the expected investment and interest levels.
Bitfinex Securities, which specializes in listing tokenized real-world assets (RWA), announced its inaugural tokenized bond, the ALT2611 Tokenized Bond, in October. This product became available on November 15.
Despite a two-week offering period, the bond has only attracted $1.5 million, falling short of its $10 million goal, as indicated on the official website. The initial target was to sell 100,000 ALT2611, equivalent to 10 million USDT, within two weeks of the launch. However, this period has been extended by another two weeks, with only 15,000 ALT2611, or 15% of the target, being sold so far.
ALT2611 is a 36-month bond with a 10% coupon, denominated in USDT, and issued by Alternative, a Luxembourg-based securitization fund managed by Mikro Kapital.
Tokenized bonds, which are digital versions of traditional bonds on the blockchain, offer several benefits over paper bonds, including improved liquidity, accessibility, security, transparency, and the ability to trade 24/7.
The minimum initial purchase for the bond was set at 125,000 USDT, and it can be traded on the secondary market in increments of 100 USDT. Notably, ALT2611 is not available to U.S. citizens or residents.
Crypto trader Novacula Occami remarked on the lackluster performance of Bitfinex’s first USDT bond issue, expressing skepticism about USDT’s potential to dominate capital markets and downplaying the impact of Bitfinex Securities Kazakhstan on traditional investment banking.
At its launch, Tether’s CTO Paolo Ardoino had hailed the bond as heralding a “new era for capital raises,” envisioning USDT as the foundational asset in this emerging financial system. The bond was issued on the Liquid Network, a Bitcoin sidechain known for its high throughput.
Cointelegraph reached out to Bitfinex and Tether for comments but had not received a response at the time of reporting.
In a related development, Bitfinex Securities obtained a Digital Asset Service Provider license in El Salvador in April. El Salvador has been exploring the issuance of its own Bitcoin bonds. The country’s sovereign dollar bonds have shown strong performance, with a 70% return in 2023, as reported by Cointelegraph in August.
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