S&P Global Leads Kaiko's $110M Series B Extension for Tokenized Markets (B)

S&P Global Anchors $110M Round

Wall Street's most established data franchises are now bankrolling the plumbing for tokenized finance. S&P Global has led a strategic investment that takes the Series B financing of crypto market data provider Kaiko to $110 million, with backing drawn from banks, exchanges and trading firms on both sides of the traditional-digital divide. The round, set out in Kaiko's official funding announcement, also includes BNP Paribas, Bpifrance, Broadridge, the Canton Foundation, Coinbase Ventures, DRW Venture Capital, Nasdaq Ventures, Royal Bank of Canada, Stellar and Susquehanna Private Equity Investments.

The composition of that list is the deeper signal. It spans pricing, banking, trading, market infrastructure and blockchain development — a cross-section of the functions established finance needs in place before assets can trade continuously, from valuation models down to order types for always-on books. Kaiko itself supplies institutional-grade market data spanning more than 150 exchanges and protocols, while a newer infrastructure unit feeds that data straight into smart contracts, converting raw onchain activity into standardized information that banks and asset managers apply to valuation, execution and risk management. The company has assembled this stack quickly, acquiring MiCA-regulated onchain infrastructure provider Cometh in May and rival data firm Amberdata in June, after linking with Bloomberg in February to put licensed financial data onchain.

The raise builds on a $53 million Series B completed in 2022 under the lead of Eight Roads. What has shifted since is scope rather than direction: Treasuries, money market funds, equities and bonds are migrating onto blockchain networks, and institutional demand has moved from custody and trading venues toward benchmark-grade pricing, compliance-ready data and infrastructure that never sleeps. Kaiko chief executive Ambre Soubiran described the new backers as partners rather than passive shareholders, saying the group would work together to define how institutional money moves onchain. Participants are also joining a Kaiko-led industry working group charged with developing data and infrastructure standards for tokenized financial products — a seat at the table for defining how tokenized market data is built as institutional adoption widens.

Tokenized Markets Move to Production

The raise lands as US market operators push tokenization from pilot to production. In March, Intercontinental Exchange, parent of the New York Stock Exchange, struck a deal with Securitize to build infrastructure and set standards for tokenized securities, extending plans ICE outlined in January for a platform engineered around 24/7 trading and instant settlement. Nasdaq also received SEC approval in March to trial tokenized stocks and ETFs on the same venues as conventional securities, and it partnered with Kraken parent Payward to connect regulated equity markets with onchain tokenized shares.

Clearing infrastructure is moving in step. In July, the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation ran live production trades with more than 30 financial firms using DTC-tokenized assets, ahead of a planned October launch for its tokenization service; DTC, the subsidiary involved, custodies $114 trillion in securities.

Regulators are drafting the rules for round-the-clock markets in parallel. The SEC is set to convene a roundtable on Sept. 17 examining preparations for 24-hour trading in US equities — covering market readiness, operational resilience and investor protections, plus possible later expansion toward 24/7 sessions. Kaiko said the fresh capital funds both its core digital asset data operation and its push into onchain financial infrastructure, including data services for tokenized Treasuries, money market funds, equities and bonds. If securities tokenization keeps expanding, the demand curve extends well past Kaiko: regulated data providers, oracle networks, settlement systems, cross-chain bridges and zero-knowledge proofs all become load-bearing components once equities trade without a market close. The sequence of ICE, Nasdaq and DTCC commitments within a single year, followed by a $110 million data-layer raise, turns tokenization from narrative into a build schedule with dates attached. Readers tracking the market in real time can follow live spot and futures prices on Bitget.

The Data Layer Becomes the Trust Layer

The primary document behind this story — Kaiko's official funding announcement — confirms the essentials: a strategic investment led by S&P Global that takes the Series B to $110 million, alongside named participants such as BNP Paribas, Nasdaq Ventures and Coinbase Ventures. The disclosure sets no valuation, so any market cap figure attached to the private data firm would be speculative, and COINOTAG flags that gap rather than filling it. Our reading of the round: by funding one data layer from both sides of the balance sheet, S&P Global and its co-investors are betting that standardized, always-on market data — not any trading venue — becomes the trust layer of tokenized finance.