Cathie Wood's ARK teams with Securitize to tokenize venture fund with OpenAI, Anthropic stakes

ARK Invest will tokenize its ARK Venture Fund (ARKVX) using Securitize’s infrastructure, initially issuing blockchain-based fund interests on Ethereum. The fund gives eligible investors onchain exposure to a mix of private and public companies including OpenAI, Anthropic, Stripe and Databricks while Securitize handles issuance and investor experience.

By AI Newsroom· Reviewed by Pranav, Founder & Editor-in-ChiefPublished 2 minutes agoUpdated 2 minutes ago0 views

Cathie Wood's ARK teams with Securitize to tokenize venture fund with OpenAI, Anthropic stakes

Why It Matters

The move signals growing interest from traditional asset managers in tokenizing more complex equity and private-market products, following earlier tokenized offerings focused on cash instruments. It also comes after a recent U.S. SEC "innovation exemption" designed to ease trading of certain tokenized U.S. stocks, potentially accelerating institutional experimentation onchain.

Key Facts

Fund: ARK Venture Fund (ARKVX)
Tokenization partner: Securitize (SECZ)
Initial blockchain: Ethereum
Portfolio highlights: OpenAI, Anthropic, Stripe, Databricks
Fund type: Actively managed interval fund investing in private and public companies.

Asset manager ARK Invest is moving its ARK Venture Fund (ARKVX) onto blockchain rails by tokenizing fund interests with infrastructure provided by Securitize. The onchain issuance will be handled by Securitize, which will also manage the investor experience; ARKVX will launch first on Ethereum, with the possibility of expanding to other networks. The tokenized interests will represent investors’ stakes in the fund, not the underlying companies themselves, meaning shares of the private firms in ARK’s portfolio will remain offchain. Securitize said it will provide a daily net asset value for the fund and enable trading of the blockchain-based fund interests on blockchain-based markets, potentially increasing liquidity for investors in the vehicle. The portfolio named by ARK includes stakes in prominent private technology companies such as OpenAI and Anthropic, plus firms like Stripe and Databricks. Securitize CEO Carlos Domingo said packaged exposure can help investors diversify across competing technologies — for example, by holding interests that include both OpenAI and Anthropic. The arrangement builds on a strategic relationship between the firms: ARK made a strategic investment in Securitize last year and agreed to collaborate on bringing more regulated investment products onchain. Market reaction included a jump in Securitize’s shares of as much as 15% after the announcement, marking a fresh high since the firm’s public debut in June; the stock had also nearly doubled in the prior week following the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s rollout of an "innovation exemption" for certain tokenized U.S. stocks. ARK’s move reflects a broader trend among asset managers exploring tokenization beyond cash-like instruments into equities and private-market products. Early tokenized funds from other firms largely focused on U.S. Treasuries and money-market products, but analysts and market participants are increasingly watching experiments that package private and public equity exposure onchain.