Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev Pushes For Tokenization To Unlock Private Companies Like SpaceX And OpenAI For More Investors

Robinhood CEO and co-founder Vladimir Tenev made a case for the tokenization of private stocks on Tuesday, encouraging policymakers to explore the untapped potential of blockchains in the U.S. capital markets.

What Happened: In an op-ed piece published in the Washington Post, Tenev argued that tokenizing private companies would help the general public invest in these firms early in their development, potentially before they go public with sky-high valuations.

He said that the current situation is not fair, with a small cohort of wealthy entities having access to early-stage investment in private companies.

“This would also benefit the companies themselves, enabling them to draw additional capital by tapping into a global crypto retail market that is growing increasingly more sophisticated and investment-savvy,” Tenev highlighted a win-win situation.

Some of the most disruptive tech companies in the U.S. are privately held, including Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Sam Altman-founded OpenAI.

Private Companies	Estimated Valuation
Space X	$350 billion
Cargill	$160 billion
OpenAI	$157 billion
Stripe	$65 billion

Interestingly, the number of publicly listed companies in the U.S. has declined by as much as 42% between 1996 and 2022, according to data by the World Bank Group.

See Also: Robert Kiyosaki Predicts Yet Another Stock Market Crash, Pitches Bitcoin Investments — Here’s What The ‘Rich Dad Poor Dad’ Author Said

Kenev acknowledged regulatory obstacles, stating that the SEC has not yet provided the necessary regulatory clarity to list securities on domestic cryptocurrency platforms.

However, he expressed optimism that policies undertaken by President Donald Trump, including the establishment of a cryptocurrency task force under acting SEC Chair Mark Uyeda, could help overcome these bottlenecks.

Tenev pushed for shifting the conversation about cryptocurrencies away from Bitcoin BTC/USD and memecoins to the untapped benefits of blockchain technology.

Why It Matters: Real-world asset tokenization has emerged as one of the hottest cryptocurrency narratives in the last few years.

BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, threw its hat in the ring with the introduction of its tokenized U.S. Treasury product, BUIDL, built atop Ethereum ETH/USD, last year.

As of this writing, the tokenization market was worth $16.82 billion, according to Rwa.xyz, a platform that tracks the tokenized asset market.

Image via Shutterstock

See Also: Robert Kiyosaki Predicts Yet Another Stock Market Crash, Pitches Bitcoin Investments — Here’s What The ‘Rich Dad Poor Dad’ Author Said

Disclaimer: This content was partially produced with the help of Benzinga Neuro and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors.