Twenty-two US-listed companies had objected to having their shares tokenized on the proposed OKXICE venue as of October 23, according to the venue’s public notice of that date.
Six of the objections were added in the week before the notice, and Wells Fargo, Arm Holdings and Intuit were reportedly among them, joining Microsoft and Alphabet, which had objected the week before. None of the three companies has commented. Wells Fargo and Arm Holdings spokespeople declined to comment.
OKXICE is a joint venture between crypto exchange OKX and NYSE parent Intercontinental Exchange, filed with the SEC on October 4 with a proposal to tokenize stocks of 62 companies, or 63 tokenized stocks. A third of those companies have now objected, and the count is expected to grow. OKXICE co-chair and former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said the venture expects more objections as firms avoid being the first to test the stock model.
The objections run through the SEC’s innovation exemption, a five-year sandbox created by the Commission’s order of September 17 that allows National Market System stocks to be put on blockchains. Under the framework, an issuer can block third-party tokenization of its shares: the venue must give written notice and wait at least 30 calendar days before a tokenized share is barred from trading. Three objectors, reportedly Wells Fargo, Arm and Cerebras, were never on the original roster at all, meaning they objected proactively rather than opting out.
Sixteen of the 22 objectors are Nasdaq-listed and six trade on the NYSE. Nasdaq itself issued guidance in September warning issuers considering the exemption that they “must be cautious about their participation” , and that the “consequences for liquidity, price discovery, and long-term shareholder value may not become apparent until well after the experiment is underway” .
The rollout lands amid a broader retrenchment on tokenized securities: the SEC has postponed its broader Reg Crypto rulemaking without a new date, while rival venues such as Coinbase push into stock trading by direct listing rather than third-party tokenization.
