London Stock Exchange Unveils Blockchain-Based Platform for Private Funds

The London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG) said it facilitated the first transaction on a new blockchain-based platform for private funds.

LSEG's Digital Markets Infrastructure (DMI), built using Microsoft Azure, is designed to use blockchain technology across the full lifecycle of an asset, from issuance to settlement, with greater scale and efficiencies than existing systems, according to a Monday announcement.

Investment manager MembersCap and digital asset exchange Archax were onboarded as DMI's first clients and conducted the first transaction, which raised money for MembersCap's MCM Fund 1.

LSEG said it will ensure DMI works with current market services in blockchain technology as well as traditional finance (TradFi).

DMI and its first transaction are "significant milestones demonstrating the appetite for end-to-end, interoperable, regulated financial markets" blockchain technology, Dark Hajdukovic, LSEG's head of digital markets infrastructure, said in the statement.

TradFi exchanges in numerous markets have been embedding blockchain technology into their platforms as a means of increasing efficiency and reducing costs. Last week, the Nasdaq filed a proposal with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to tokenize stocks on its exchange for trading on the blockchain with trades assigned the same priority as the legacy method.