With the RWA market crossing $33 billion, the race to build infrastructure for tokenized securities is moving closer to Wall Street’s traditional market operators.
tZERO, a blockchain-based financial infrastructure company, has raised a new funding round led by existing investors Marc and Max Cohodes. It has also received participation from Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), Bill Fleckenstein, Dinari and other investors. Neighborhood Intelligence has also committed to support the financing under certain conditions. However, the company did not disclose the size of the round.
The funding comes just two weeks after ICE and tZERO signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) covering their work on infrastructure for public tokenized securities markets.
Under the August 31 agreement, tZERO is expected to serve as a design partner for digital transfer-agent and broker-dealer infrastructure. It will be supporting onchain settlement on ICE’s upcoming NYSE-affiliated tokenized securities platform.
For tZERO CEO Alan Konevsky, the partnership puts the company’s infrastructure closer to the core of traditional capital markets and moves his company’ vision further for tokenized securities.
@tZERO has announced a new funding round led by existing investors Marc and Max Cohodes, with participation from @ICE_Markets, investor Bill Fleckenstein, partner @DinariGlobal, and others. Neighborhood Intelligence also committed to support the financing round with its portion…
— tZERO (@tZERO) September 14, 2026
Why ICE and Investors are Betting on tZERO?
Well the answer for it lies in what the company does. tZERO is building the regulated infrastructure layer for tokenized financial assets.
The company provides technology and services across the securities lifecycle, including tokenization, trading, custody, clearing, settlement and asset servicing. Its platform allows issuers to digitize equities, debt, funds and other real-world assets. It also has regulated trading infrastructure which provides a venue for secondary-market activity.
tZERO also operates an SEC-regulated Alternative Trading System through tZERO Securities, while its digital-asset securities business provides regulated custody, clearing and settlement services. The company is also an SEC-registered transfer agent.
But an increasingly important part of the business is tZERO’s Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) model.
Instead of financial institutions having to build their own tokenization, trading, custody and compliance infrastructure, tZERO allows them to plug into its regulated technology and operational stack. Its API and white-label infrastructure can effectively put tZERO “under the hood” of banks, broker-dealers, fintech platforms and other institutional partners.
That model is already being tested through partnerships.
In June, tZERO said it would bring Archax’s tokenized short-term U.S. Treasury product, $GOVY, to U.S. qualified purchasers through its SEC-registered and FINRA-member broker-dealer and custody infrastructure. The arrangement gives Archax a regulated route into the U.S. market without requiring it to build the entire U.S. brokerage and custody stack itself.
More recently, Eddid Securities USA partnered with tZERO for digital asset securities trading, correspondent clearing and custody. tZERO CEO Alan Konevsky described the engagement as an example of its IaaS model. It allows institutions to retain their own brand and client relationships while using tZERO’s technology and regulated infrastructure behind the scenes.
Other Articles...
This is becoming central to Konevsky’s strategy. He isn’t building tZERO simply as another venue for buying and selling tokenized assets. But the company is attempting to become part of the infrastructure that allows traditional financial institutions to bring those assets onchain.
Tokenization Moves Toward Market Infrastructure
The timing also comes as U.S. regulators are creating more room for tokenized securities markets.
On September 17, the Securities and Exchange Commission introduced its Innovation Exemption. It provides temporary, conditional relief for certain Tokenized Securities Venues to trade tokenized U.S. stocks using permissioned automated market makers and liquidity pools.
The development gives companies building regulated infrastructure another framework within which tokenized securities markets can develop.
For tZERO, that regulatory shift aligns with the business it has been building for years.
The company already has a regulated ATS for digital asset securities and infrastructure spanning issuance, trading, custody and settlement. Its IaaS strategy extends that infrastructure beyond its own platform and into the systems of other financial institutions.
That distinction is increasingly important.
The next phase of tokenization is not only about putting stocks, bonds or funds on a blockchain. It is about figuring out who handles the transfer records, who provides custody, how trades settle, how investors access the assets and how all of it connects to existing financial-market infrastructure.
tZERO is betting that financial institutions will not all want to build those systems themselves.
Its latest funding round, backed in part by ICE, comes as the company tries to make that infrastructure available to them. And also as Wall Street itself begins preparing for securities markets that operate onchain.
Sneha Agrawal 
Share