Deutsche Börse Group has just made an initial investment of a single-digit euro million amount in securities lending and repo blockchain fintech HQLAX in exchange for a minority shareholding. Deutsche Börse’s corporate venture capital arm, DB1 Ventures, will manage the investment in HQLAX. This is the second blockchain investment made by DB1 Ventures after taking part in a $50 million fundraising round for Digital Asset Holdings in 2016.
In March, Deutsche Börse Group had announced that together with HQLAX it is building a securities lending solution leveraging the R3 Corda blockchain platform. Over the last five months, significant progress has been made: the onboarding process with an initial set of banks has been kicked off and detailed discussions with relevant regulatory authorities are taking place. The German exchange is likely to acquire further shareholdings in HQLAX around year-end.