INX Closes Openfinance Acquisition

INX Limited, a cryptocurrency exchange that went public on Ethereum last year, has completed the deal it needed to launch its digital securities trading platform.

On Tuesday, the company said it had received approval from the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority to close its acquisition of U.S. broker-dealer and alternative trading system (ATS) Openfinance Securities. The deal was first announced in October.

The purchase of Openfinance means INX can offer investors a digital securities trading platform in addition to a crypto exchange.

“We’ve got security tokens and crypto trading side by side,” Douglas Borthwick, chief marketing officer and head of business development at INX, said in an interview. “Coinbase doesn’t do that.”

Read more: Publicly Traded INX Crypto Exchange to Acquire Broker-Dealer Openfinance

The digital securities market offers traditional investors a way to trade tokenized equity 24/7 in true crypto fashion, Borthwick added. The closest competitor to INX would be security trading platform tZERO, which also has a U.S.-regulated ATS and is reportedly looking for a buyer.

INX’s platform is available in 75 countries, and its native token is held by 7,200 investors. Token holders will receive 40% of distributions from the company with no voting rights, while equity holders will receive 60% of distributions with voting rights.

The distribution means that investors can come to INX as a place to trade tokenized equities with thousands of other investors who are ready to trade, Borthwick said.

"If you think about GameStop and Reddit, the power of having a community can change things,” he said. “We are harnessing a huge community of folks that are going to be very powerful in deciding on our future."