Ondo Finance launched Ondo Private Markets on October 6, 2026, issuing tokenized notes that provide economic exposure to private companies starting with an unnamed pre-IPO artificial intelligence firm. The notes, structured under SEC Regulation S for non-U.S. investors, link payouts to per-share ...
"In the US, the majority of the investment options accessible for retail are public companies, yet 87% of companies with over $100m in revenue are private." — Ian De Bode, Acting CEO and President, Ondo Finance
Ondo Finance launched Ondo Private Markets on October 6, 2026, issuing tokenized notes that provide economic exposure to private companies starting with an unnamed pre-IPO artificial intelligence firm. The notes, structured under SEC Regulation S for non-U.S. investors, link payouts to per-share value at qualifying liquidity events such as IPOs or acquisitions. Secondary trading is expected to begin this week.
The product enters a market that is rapidly consolidating. Citigroup launched tokenized Digital Depositary Receipts for private company shares in June 2026 on infrastructure from SIX Digital Exchange. Robinhood's publicly traded Ventures Fund drew 150,000 retail investors after its March 2026 NYSE listing and deployed $75 million into OpenAI stock in April. Securitize, which went public on the NYSE in July 2026 with over $4 billion in on-platform assets, tokenizes private fund shares for KKR, Apollo, and BlackRock. Ondo enters this field from a DeFi-native position, with $3.9 billion in total value locked and over 1 million cumulative token holders across its existing tokenized stocks and Treasury products.
The broader tokenized real-world asset market surpassed $51 billion in 2026, up 40% year-to-date. Within that, private credit leads at $14 billion in cumulative on-chain origination. Ondo's move extends tokenization from fund wrappers into single-company note exposure — a structural distinction from existing products.
Ondo Private Markets issues tokenized notes tied to the per-share value of selected private companies. The notes are obligations of the issuer, not equity in the referenced company. Holders receive no ownership, shareholder rights, or voting privileges. Payout occurs at a qualifying liquidity event — defined as an IPO, acquisition, or comparable transaction — based on the per-share value of the referenced company's common stock at that event.
The tokens are freely transferable and composable on-chain. Eligible investors can hold them in self-custody wallets, trade on secondary markets around the clock, or deploy them within DeFi protocols. The first offering references a pre-IPO AI company whose identity has not been disclosed. The notes are issued under SEC Regulation S, restricting participation to eligible non-U.S. persons.
This structure differs from Robinhood's fund approach (pooled vehicle holding multiple private companies) and Citi's DDR model (depositary receipts representing actual ownership interests). Ondo's notes are pure economic exposure instruments — synthetic in nature, with counterparty risk concentrated on the issuer rather than the underlying company.
The race to tokenize private market access has attracted participants from three distinct categories: traditional finance, fintech, and DeFi-native protocols.
Citigroup — Launched Digital Depositary Receipts (DDRs) on June 11, 2026, through infrastructure provided by SIX Digital Exchange, a Swiss-regulated digital central securities depository. The DDRs represent actual ownership interests in pre-IPO companies. The product targets wealthy and institutional clients, initially available to international investors with planned U.S. expansion. Citi serves as both issuer and custodian — the first global financial services firm to hold both roles for tokenized private company receipts.
Robinhood — The Robinhood Ventures Fund I (ticker: RVI) began trading on the NYSE on March 6, 2026. The fund invested $75 million in OpenAI common stock in April 2026, at OpenAI's then-post-money valuation of $852 billion. The fund requires no minimum investment and no accreditation, though it carries a 3.13% expense ratio. It attracted over 150,000 retail investors, according to CEO Vlad Tenev. Portfolio holdings include Databricks, Stripe, Ramp, and Oura in addition to OpenAI.
Securitize — Listed on the NYSE under ticker SECZ in July 2026 via a business combination with Cantor Equity Partners II, raising approximately $400 million. The platform holds over $4 billion in on-platform assets and tokenizes private fund shares for BlackRock, KKR, and Apollo. KKR's Health Care Strategic Growth Fund II was the first major fund manager tokenization in 2022. Apollo's Diversified Credit Fund ($1.2 billion) followed. Securitize fractionalizes access — reducing minimum investments from $2 million to $10,000 in some cases. ARK Invest also tokenized its ARK Venture Fund (ARKVX) through the platform.
Ondo Finance — Enters with $3.9 billion TVL and a DeFi-native distribution model. Unlike the three competitors above, Ondo operates on permissionless rails without traditional brokerage accounts. The tradeoff: U.S. investors are excluded under Regulation S, and the notes carry issuer counterparty risk without the regulatory protections of a registered broker-dealer.
| Platform | Structure | U.S. Access | Min. Investment | Regulatory Framework | |----------|-----------|-------------|-----------------|---------------------| | Citi DDRs | Depositary receipts (ownership) | Planned expansion | Institutional | Swiss-regulated (SDX) | | Robinhood RVI | Publicly traded fund | Yes | None | SEC-registered fund | | Securitize | Tokenized fund shares | Accredited investors | ~$10,000 | SEC-registered transfer agent | | Ondo Private Markets | Tokenized notes (economic exposure) | No (Reg S) | Not disclosed | Offshore issuance |
The traditional private secondary market provides context for what tokenized alternatives are attempting to displace. Forge Global, acquired by Charles Schwab for approximately $660 million ($45/share) in March 2026, reported median secondary trades at a 7% discount to last primary funding rounds as of July 2026. Nasdaq Private Market processed $15 billion in tender offers in 2025.
According to research from Sacra, the market for pre-IPO liquidity reached approximately $225 billion. This market has historically been constrained by 30-to-90-day settlement timelines, 2.5% to 5% transaction fees, accreditation requirements, and minimum check sizes that exclude most retail participants.
The tokenized RWA market has grown substantially alongside these dynamics. According to multiple sources, the total tokenized RWA market surpassed $51 billion in 2026, representing 40% growth year-to-date. The asset composition is led by tokenized Treasuries at approximately $10 billion and private credit at $14 billion in cumulative on-chain origination. The Boston Consulting Group projects tokenized RWAs could reach $16 trillion by 2030.
Citi's own projection puts the figure at $8.2 trillion by 2030, driven by market-infrastructure adoption, digital cash rails, and clearer U.S. regulation.
Ondo Finance operates three product lines as of October 2026:
Combined TVL stands at approximately $3.9 billion with over 1 million cumulative token holders. Ondo Private Markets represents the fourth product vertical and the first to offer single-company private market exposure rather than fund-level or public-market tokenization.
The company is led by Acting CEO Ian De Bode, who assumed the role following the passing of founder Nathan Allman in May 2026. De Bode previously served as President after joining as Chief Strategy Officer from McKinsey's digital assets practice in March 2024.
Several structural factors warrant attention:
Counterparty risk. The notes are obligations of the issuer. If the issuer defaults or becomes insolvent, holders may lose their entire investment regardless of the referenced company's performance. This is fundamentally different from Citi's DDR structure, where receipts represent actual ownership interests held in custody.
Unnamed reference company. The identity of the first AI company has not been disclosed. Investors are pricing exposure to an entity whose financials, valuation, and business model remain undisclosed to note purchasers at time of publication.
Geographic exclusion. U.S. persons are excluded under Regulation S. This removes the world's largest capital market from the product's addressable base. Robinhood's fund and Securitize's tokenized fund shares serve U.S. investors directly.
Liquidity uncertainty. While 24/7 secondary trading is technically enabled, actual liquidity depends on market maker participation and demand from eligible non-U.S. investors. There is no guarantee of meaningful secondary market depth at launch.
Corporate governance uncertainty. Ondo Finance faces an ongoing legal dispute. Nathan Allman's mother has filed a lawsuit seeking control of the company and requesting the removal of current CEO Ian De Bode. The outcome of this litigation could affect corporate direction and product continuity.
Payout conditionality. Returns are contingent on a qualifying liquidity event for the referenced company. If the company remains private indefinitely, there is no mechanism described for interim distributions or redemption.
Ondo Private Markets has announced plans to expand beyond AI into:
No timelines or specific companies have been disclosed for these subsequent offerings. The breadth of the stated pipeline suggests Ondo envisions the platform as a comprehensive tokenized private market venue rather than a single-offering experiment.
Ondo Private Markets extends the tokenization thesis from public-market instruments and pooled funds into single-company private market exposure. The product addresses a real gap: 87% of U.S. companies with over $100 million in revenue remain private, according to Ondo, and traditional secondary markets impose 30-to-90-day settlement cycles and high minimum investments.
The tradeoffs are equally real. The notes carry concentrated issuer counterparty risk, exclude U.S. investors, and reference an unnamed company. These constraints limit the product's addressable market relative to Robinhood's zero-minimum public fund or Securitize's regulated tokenized fund shares.
What the launch does signal is the acceleration of competition for private market access. Four distinct models — bank-issued depositary receipts (Citi), publicly traded venture funds (Robinhood), tokenized fund shares (Securitize), and DeFi-native notes (Ondo) — now compete for the same pool of investor demand. The economic value ultimately flows to whichever model best solves the liquidity-access-regulation trilemma. None has yet achieved all three simultaneously.