F/m Investments, which oversees $18 billion in client assets, has filed with the SEC for permission to tokenize its flagship U.S. Treasury 3-Month Bill ETF (TBIL) on a permissioned blockchain ledger.
With this move, the company aims to improve operational efficiency and record-keeping while fully preserving the traditional trading, arbitrage and regulatory framework of ETFs.
Tokenized ETF shares are also expected to enable a modern digital interface and support automatic allocation functions, helping the fund securely adapt to the emerging tokenized securities market.
Under the proposal, tokenized shares would be created and redeemed on a one-to-one basis with regular ETF shares and would retain the same ownership, voting and economic rights. Secondary market trading continues only through broker-dealers registered on national exchanges or alternative trading systems.
Blockchain functions only as a controlled record-keeping and payment layer, with transfers limited to authorized activities.
Alexander Morris, CEO of F/m Investments, said the company aims to create a regulated pathway for tokenization, a fast-emerging digital topic that is increasingly being adopted by major institutions developing tokenized investment products and blockchain trading platforms.
“The question is whether this happens within the regulatory framework that investors have relied on for 85 years, or without a set of safeguards for investors,” Morris said. “We prefer to build an on-ramp that combines technological innovation and investor protection rather than watching from the sidelines.”