Japan Govt-Backed Investors bring iSTOX Series A to US$50mn

Global digital securities platform iSTOX has announced that two government-backed investors in Japan will invest in the company, as iSTOX closed its Series A funding round with US$50 million raised. 

The two investors are the venture capital arm of Japan Investment Corporation (JIC), or JIC Venture Growth Investments (JIC-VGI), and Development Bank of Japan Inc (DBJ) – a financial institution wholly owned by the Japanese Government. 

Also joining iSTOX as new investors are Japan’s Juroku Bank and venture capital firm Mobile Internet Capital (MIC).

Existing investors Singapore Exchange (SGX), Japan’s Tokai Tokyo Financial Holdings and Korea’s
Hanwha Asset Management also made fresh investments. 

Other existing investors of iSTOX include Temasek Holdings subsidiary, Heliconia Capital Management and Thailand’s Kiatnakin Phatra Financial Group.

Founded in 2017, iSTOX is a financial technology company regulated by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) as a multi-asset platform for the issuance, custody and secondary trading of digital securities. 

iSTOX plans expansion in China, Europe and Australia

According to Oi Yee Choo, CCO of iSTOX, the support of government-backed investors JIC-VGI and DBJ and other new investors in this round "signals a rising confidence in the iSTOX digital securities platform and our business model". 

With the new financing, "iSTOX will expand our footprint both geographically and in terms of investment offerings", states Choo. "We will roll out private issuances by blue-chip issuers that individual investors on our platform can subscribe to in bite-size portions. 

"Our expansion in China, where we recently signed an agreement with Chongqing city, will continue apace. Also in the iSTOX pipeline are issuance deals involving other regions, including Europe and Australia.”