With the addition of the Franklin OnChain U.S. Government Money Fund (FOBXX), which has more than $250 million under control, the Stellar (XLM) network became the first public blockchain to run a U.S.-registered fund. Stellar said in a press release on Monday that the fund’s transfer agent “maintains the official record of share ownership via a proprietary blockchain-integrated system that currently uses the Stellar blockchain network for transaction activity.” This is the first U.S.-registered fund to do this.
The fund’s fact sheet says that as of March 31, it has an AUM of $272.92 million and pays out a 7-day return of 4.53% every month. Franklin Advisers’ Benji Investments app for Android and iOS lets users buy, sell, store, and research tokenized shares and cryptocurrencies, as well as “invest in the world’s first tokenized money fund that is natively issued on a blockchain.”
Roger Bayston, the head of digital assets at Franklin Templeton, said, “We think blockchain technologies have the potential to change the way investment management is done by making traditional financial products more transparent and lowering their operational costs.” Stellar’s blockchain is important for the future of investing, and assets made on blockchain rails, like the Franklin OnChain U.S. Government Money Fund, will soon be able to work with the rest of the digital asset environment.
Franklin Templeton said that the fund “reflects a meaningful integration between blockchain technology and traditional financial institutions” and shows the possibility for more openness in the financial system. The Stellar Development Foundation (SDF), a non-profit group that supports the growth and development of the Stellar network and was formed in 2014, has put a lot of money into the fund to spread out its financial interests.
“Stellar is built and optimized for tokenizing assets, and the Franklin OnChain U.S. Government Money Fund is a great example of how the blockchain can be used,” said Denelle Dixon, CEO and executive director of the SDF. “Stellar is changing the way traditional financial products and processes work. This makes markets easier to get into and gives more people power.”
The statement says that the Fund is a controlled 1940 Act fund that invests at least 99.5% of its total assets in government securities, cash, and buyback deals that are totally backed by government securities or cash. The goal of the fund’s investments is to “provide investors with as high a level of current income as is consistent with maintaining shareholders’ capital and liquidity and keeping the share price at $1.00.”
One BENJI token stands for one share of the Franklin OnChain U.S. Government Money Fund, and token users can use the Benji Investments app to use the token’s features.
