Formosa Financial, a one-stop platform for managing digital assets, announced that it will merge its operations with CEZEX Digital Asset Exchange and Katalyse.io. Together, the three businesses will combine to form a comprehensive ecosystem enabling an integrated solution for digitizing assets from token issuance, listing, treasury management, and trading of any digital asset for clients in both the blockchain industry and capital markets alike.
CEZEX, the first fully-licensed overseas virtual crypto exchange that has launched out of the Philippines Cagayan Economic Zone Authority (CEZA), offers cryptocurrencies and security token trading backed by assets such as stocks, bonds, real estate and derivatives (forex, commodities, CFDs).
Formosa Financial and CEZEX are further complemented by the addition of Katalyse to provide an integrated solution for operating a marketplace for digitized assets. Previously known as FundYourselfNow, Katalyse brings simplicity and ease of use to the token issuance process by providing a straightforward interface for programming compliant smart contract functions and parameters. As the industry begins to coalesce around standards for the digitization of different asset types (such as ERC 1400 for security tokens), it is essential that critical market infrastructure is supportive and interoperable with these standards.
CEZEX was established with the support of CEZA and forms part of the Philippine government’s wider initiative to establish a startup hub for fintech and blockchain related ventures in the region. Its ambition is to establish the Cagayan Valley as the “Crypto Valley of Asia.” CEZA has set up a Self-Regulatory Organization, the Asian Blockchain And Cryptocurrency Association (ABACA) to oversee the governance of the digital assets in the Cagayan Special Economic Zone and Freeport region, providing a regulated environment to ensure that participants of CEZEX comply the regulatory framework (KYC/AML/listing rules/trading rules).
Simultaneously, Formosa Financial has obtained a license from CEZA and its CEO, Ryan Terribilini, is a key advisor to ABACA.
“As we saw the shift from utility tokens to methods for digitizing traditional asset types, we saw an opportunity to generate accretive value by consolidating mission-critical technology and services for this new frontier under one banner. As a principal license holder in CEZA, Formosa Financial was eager to partner with a fellow license holder and tokenization platform to bring greater synergies to current and existing clients,” said Formosa Financial CEO, Ryan Terribilini.
“CEZEX Digital Exchange aims to create a more structured market environment for listing and trading digital assets, as well as support the development of the digital asset industry into a more professional, structured, efficient and sustainable sector, and it is, therefore, logical to combine our exchange with a professionally set up and well-established one-stop treasury management company for the digital asset class,” said CEZEX CEO and Co-Founder, Jack Ser.
“We are extremely excited about this development in the digital financial industry, which truly will revolutionize the traditional capital markets. The combination of CEZEX, Formosa, and Katalyse will enrich the global security token ecosystem and allow for more participants in the digital asset markets,” said Katalyse Co-Founder Kenneth Tan.
He also added, “Also, the merger will provide an integrated regulated environment of listing, treasury, and trading of a broad range of tokenized asset classes with the ability to fractionalize ownership and thereby unlock the liquidity of assets that were previously considered illiquid. It also offers investors with access to global digital asset markets within a more secure, transparent and regulated trading environment.”