Former FTX Europe chief targets U.S. tokenized stock trading with new SEC exemption

Gruhn co-founded Digital Assets AG, a Swiss-based tokenization company that worked with German investment firm CM-Equity to bring digital tokens linked to stocks such as Tesla and Coinbase to crypto traders. Digital Assets AG was later acquired by FTX Group, becoming part of FTX Europe, which Gruhn led before the crypto exchange group's collapse in November 2022.

Those early products differed from the securities envisioned under the SEC's new framework. While they offered price exposure to underlying shares, Binance's stock tokens did not provide voting rights. Binance discontinued the offering in July 2021 amid regulatory scrutiny, including concerns raised by German regulator BaFin over the lack of a published securities prospectus.

"The Perpetuals team has long been trailblazers in tokenization, and this expansion into the U.S. allows us to further utilize our platform and deep expertise," Gruhn said in a statement.

The company already provides trading technology for Perpetual Markets MTF, a Cyprus-based marketplace licensed under Europe's MiFID II framework that also received authorization under the EU's Markets in Crypto-Assets regulation in August.

The firm reported $65.2 million in total assets at the end of April, while posting a $17.6 million net loss during its fiscal year.

It also announced an agreement with Datavault AI earlier this year to support trading infrastructure for planned tokenized commodity offerings involving copper, gold and other physical assets, with more than $300 million in targeted issuance.