Formation Securities files notice for Solana tokenized stock venue

Formation Securities LLC notified the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Nov. 9 that it intends to operate a tokenized securities venue on Solana, the company said in a press release distributed Monday morning. Trading is expected to begin in early 2027, with tokenized shares of Exodus Movement, Forward Industries and Galaxy Digital anticipated at launch.

The venue would run under the SEC's Innovation Exemption, the conditional framework the agency released in September for trading tokenized U.S.-listed shares on public blockchains. Decrypt described the relief as permitting eligible tokenized stocks to trade through permissioned automated market maker pools on qualifying venues. Those tokens must carry the same voting and dividend rights as ordinary shares, and access would be limited to verified investors.

Formation Securities licenses its trading technology from Orca, the Solana-based decentralized exchange. Trades would settle against stablecoins and other eligible assets in a single onchain transaction, and the company's transfer agent would keep the official shareholder record while each trade posts to a public ledger, the release said. Christopher Montagano, president of Formation Securities, said the firm intends to build the market with listed companies rather than around them. "Tokenized stocks will succeed only if public companies see the value in them, and we intend to build this market together with issuers," he said.

Superstate and Securitize are expected to supply the tokenized shares. Securitize CEO Carlos Domingo said in the release that each of its tokens is backed by a real share held by the company's broker-dealer. Robert Leshner, co-founder and CEO of Superstate, said the exemption lets the companies his firm works with trade their shares onchain around the clock on Formation's venue.

The exemption comes with conditions. The release said the venue would face limits on listed securities and trading volume, along with mandated public disclosures and customer diligence requirements, and that access would be restricted to verified participants. Verified investors would hold the shares in their own digital wallets rather than leaving them with the venue.

Formation said it chose Solana for the network's speed, low cost and track record with tokenized assets, and it pointed to more than $5 billion in tokenized real-world assets held on Solana, citing RWA.xyz data. Solana's token standards let issuers impose transfer restrictions that govern which wallets may hold or move the tokenized securities, the company said.

Investors would reach the venue through Formation's platform plus Alpaca, CoinList's Passage, the custodians Anchorage Digital Bank, BitGo and Fireblocks, Jito's JTX interface, and the wallets Solflare and Squads. The release lists Predicate, Sec3, Solidus Labs and TRM Labs as launch service providers.

The entry adds to a crowded field. Solana held roughly $575 million in tokenized stock value on Monday, against $747 million on Ethereum and $1.7 billion on BNB Chain, Cointelegraph reported, citing RWA.xyz data. More than 50 companies had objected to having their shares tokenized on OKXICE, the venue proposed by crypto exchange OKX and NYSE parent Intercontinental Exchange, as of early November, according to the same report.

Under the exemption, venues must notify issuers in writing and wait at least 30 calendar days before trading shares tokenized by an unaffiliated third party, which gives companies a chance to object. Nasdaq warned in September that tokenized stock trading could have unforeseen effects on liquidity, price discovery and long-term shareholder value, Cointelegraph reported.

Formation's effort grows out of Project Open, an April 2025 proposal to the SEC's Crypto Task Force from a coalition that included Orca, Superstate and the Solana Policy Institute, Decrypt reported. The proposal set out how shares could be issued and traded on public blockchains, and the coalition worked with SEC staff ahead of the exemption's release in September. The company competes with the NYSE's planned tokenized securities platform on Avalanche and the OKX-ICE venue, where every Magnificent Seven stock opted out.