The companies have entered into a strategic partnership aiming to set up a trusted and efficient digital asset ecosystem. The primary elements of the new ecosystem are to provide access to liquidity, custody, issuance, and banking services that leverage Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT). Additionally, this partnership is enhanced via cross-shareholdings in primary components of the ecosystem.

The leading Swiss Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Company, Swisscom, one of the largest market infrastructure providers worldwide, Deutsche Börse Group, and a Swiss and Singapore-based financial technology company, Sygnum are working together on this project. Before the project commences operations, the companies must obtain a Swiss banking and securities dealer license.

Managing Director, DLT, Crypto Assets and New Market Structure, Deutsche Börse, Jens Hachmeister, said that their primary target is to jointly develop and enhance a trusted and regulatory compliant financial market network serving the digital assets. According to the current trends, the next major phase of asset digitization is the tokenization of these assets which is believed to have the potential to reshape the entire world’s financial markets.

The nascent tokenized economy needs a fully trusted, comprehensive and regulatory compliant ecosystem to enable it to fully achieve its potential. Investors will have the opportunity to tap into these new asset classes while simultaneously accommodating future client needs once the integrated ecosystem around digital assets is launched by the strong and experienced partners.

According to InsideBitcoins, the Chief Digital Officer of Swisscom, Roger Wüthrich-Hasenböhler, all services that the new platform will offer aim at providing the best experience to transact and invest in digital assets in a regulatory compliant environment. The partners have agreed to grow and strengthen these core elements of the digital asset ecosystem while simultaneously aligning with the needs of all the market participants.

The Partners

The Deutsche Börse also plans to invest in Custodigit AG. This company was launched in 2018 as a Sygnum and Swisscom joint venture offering a technical solution for the custody of all digital assets for regulated financial services institutions. Also, Deutsche Börse and Sygnum are scheduled to become shareholders of daura AG.

The Daura AG Company has created a platform that uses DLT to issue, register, and securely transfer Swiss SME-shares. That will let non-listed companies to access the capital markets. Sygnum and Deutsche Börse will be extensively involved in the companies’ future development.

Sygnum and Deutsche Börse are also conceptualizing the development of a further building block of the ecosystem. Mathias Imbach, Founding Partner & CEO Singapore of Sygnum, explained that the ecosystem in question is a listing and trading venue aimed at introducing more digital assets in the Swiss market. Once the project is completed, the platform will provide access to liquidity using an open and regulatory compliant marketplace.

Sygnum is required to get a Swiss banking and securities dealer license provided by the Swiss regulator FINMA. Once it is fully licensed, it will offer extensive banking services including deposits, custody, and credit & lending, brokerage, capital issuance via tokenization, and asset management. All services will be available within the digital asset ecosystem.

The Decentralized Ledger Infrastructure that supports this ecosystem is developed and operated by Swisscom. It meets all security obligations of all the financial services institutions and additionally allows for scalability. The first products and services offered via the new ecosystem are scheduled for launch in the course of 2019. However, the transaction is subject to merger control clearance.