A recently launched fintech investment fund managed by Lombard Odier Investment Managers, the asset management arm of the historic Swiss private bank founded in 1796, is looking for companies focused on "tokenization".
The "picks and shovel" approach to invest in companies focused on tokenization
The fund manager launched his new fintech strategy in May and has since accumulated $ 250 million in assets despite difficult market conditions. Jeroen van Oerle, global fintech equity portfolio manager for the fund, said his team is taking a "picks and shovel" approach to invest in the field of digital assets, with particular attention to the companies involved in the tokenization process, a process that relates real assets to distributed ledgers.
Proponents of tokenization believe it can bring greater efficiency and liquidity to markets. So far, this approach has led the group to invest in a consulting and software firm, whose names van Oerle has not disclosed.
As an investor in public markets, the Lombard Odier fintech fund is aimed at companies with a market capitalization of at least $ 500 million. According to van Oerle, there is a shortage of publicly traded companies that focus solely on tokenization.
Expand the fund's objectives to cover all fintech within five years
The fund's investment criteria limit its universe to digital asset companies. But its mandate goes beyond tokenization. Van Oerle's definition of fintech is “all technology that improves existing financial services or enables the creation of new ones”.
This includes payment companies, cybersecurity, personal finance, and software. Regarding digital assets, Van Oerle believes the fund will be able to move beyond its “picks and shovel” approach within the next five years.
After this initial phase, the bank will be able to choose the winners, he said. “A couple of years ago, every encounter started with 'imagine a world', right? Now, I think we have moved into a proof of concept phase, which has been developed over the past three years.
And now we are moving back to early signs of an early implementation phase, ”he said. "Within the next five years we will certainly see who will benefit from these kinds of new assets coming to market and my prediction is that they are mostly companies we don't know today, which are not publicly known but which can grow quite fast. once there is traction in this field of innovation. "
