Citi is set to launch an innovative solution in the third quarter of 2025 by collaborating with a Switzerland-based digital exchange to enhance liquidity and accessibility in the private market through tokenization of unlisted company stocks.
According to Crypto News on the 6th (local time), Citi announced a new partnership with SIX Digital Exchange (SDX), a Switzerland-based digital exchange, on Tuesday and plans to tokenize companies on the digital exchange.
This collaboration, disclosed at the Swiss Point Zero Forum, aims to address long-standing inefficiencies in the private market ecosystem for both issuers and investors.
Under this agreement, Citi will serve both as a digital custodian and tokenization agent on SDX's regulated Digital Central Securities Depository (CSD) platform. The two companies are developing a set of scalable and compliant solutions, scheduled for release in the third quarter of 2025.
The service will initially focus on tokenizing equity of pre-IPO and late-stage companies, making these illiquid assets more accessible to global institutions and qualified investors.
For issuers, this initiative provides a compliant and efficient mechanism to improve liquidity for early sponsors and employees while maintaining control over the capital table.
For investors, this represents a step forward in democratizing access to high-growth, venture-backed private companies that were traditionally difficult to approach due to high entry barriers and opaque processes.
This partnership will combine Citi's global securities service expertise and customer reach with SDX's regulated-grade digital infrastructure. SDX's representative David Newns said, "We are pleased to welcome Citi to the SDX platform."
He emphasized that "this project is characterized by providing efficient access to private equity using regulated blockchain technology and meeting strong investor demand for high-quality private assets."
Marni McManus, Citi's regional head for Switzerland, highlighted the unique opportunity enabled by Swiss regulations and SDX's technology: "We are helping to modernize a traditionally passive and paper-intensive industry by providing issuers and investors with digitized and scalable solutions."
Ryan Marsh, head of innovation and strategic partnerships for Citi's investor and issuer services, added, "As tokenization gains traction, we are ensuring our customers can participate in the evolving digital asset environment."
He said, "Our collaboration with SDX supports our broader innovation agenda and reinforces our commitment to creating new opportunities."
In an interview with Crypto News, Dea Markova, policy director at Fireblocks, said the team is focusing on infrastructure expansion to handle increasing customer base diversity, especially in the payment sector. However, in the long term, the company is making a big bet on tokenization beyond finance.
Markova stated, "We are imagining a world where everything is tokenized. We are already collaborating with Sony in Japan. Think about supply chains, gaming, non-financial processes."
Citi and SDX's latest initiative also supports the broader development of the Swiss digital asset ecosystem. Sygnum and SBI Digital Markets will play crucial roles by expanding access to tokenized pre-IPO stocks for customers across Europe and Asia.
As digital assets continue to evolve, the Citi-SDX collaboration represents a key movement to make the private market more transparent, accessible, and efficient for global participants.
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