Digital security platform iSTOX has acquired a stake in the Mapletree MERIT Fund and turned them into digital securities that provide individual accredited investors partial access to the fund or Mapletree Europe Income Trust. Last month, iSTOX announced it had tokenized Astrea VI private equity bonds.
According to iSTOX, the Trust targets a 12% internal rate of return and will be managed by Mapletree Real Estate Advisors Pte. Ltd., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Mapletree. MERIT will be Mapletree’s 11th private equity fund and the 4th in a series of fully seeded funds that are invested in real estate sectors such as Australia commercial, Europe and US, as well as student accommodation in the US and UK.
MERIT is said to have €507 million in total fund equity and is fully invested at closing and consists of seven Grade A office properties with a total asset value of € 1.2 billion. The Trust has a term of five years with a provision for two one-year extensions and will make distributions on a semi-annual basis in Euros.
A part of the fund has been made available to individual accredited investors in tokenised form (through Prometheus-2 Pte. Ltd.) and in smaller units.
Mapletree reportedly has more than SGD 60 billion of assets under management, with offices across 13 markets, including Asia Pacific, Europe, the United Kingdom and the United States.
Oi Yee Choo, Chief Commercial Officer of iSTOX, said that for an individual accredited investor, real estate funds can form a valuable component of a diversified portfolio but generally speaking, smaller accredited investors find it very difficult to gain access to private real estate funds. Choo said that with tokenization, iSTOX enables that access by using blockchain and smart contract technology
“Mapletree has demonstrated far-sightedness and progressive thinking in allowing a part of its Europe fund to be made available to smaller investors. At a time when companies and governments globally are increasing their efforts in promoting income and wealth equality, Mapletree is showing true leadership. At iSTOX, we expect digital securities to eventually become a regular part of the conversation for any company planning an issuance. As they are fundamentally more efficient, we expect digital securities to grow rapidly as a share of total securities issued – benefiting both issuers and investors.”
iSTOX is regulated by the Monetary Authority of Singapore as a multi-asset digital securities platform for the issuance, custody, and secondary trading of private market products, such as hedge funds, wholesale bonds, and private equity. iSTOX is backed by Singapore Exchange, Temasek-subsidiary Heliconia Capital and Japan government-backed investors JIC Venture Growth Investments (JIC-VGI) and the Development Bank of Japan.
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