The Theo Vision: Going Beyond Issuance

Earlier this year, we announced our $20 million raise with the goal to connect onchain capital to global financial markets. This starts with tokenizing high-quality assets, but in order to create truly compelling products, we’re going beyond issuance.

In this post, we’ll share our vision for a tokenized future where onchain markets rival traditional markets – with trading infrastructure to support deep liquidity and access to leverage.

Tokenization Isn’t Enough

With institutional demand at an all-time high and increased regulatory clarity, crypto has made substantial progress in making institutional-grade financial products accessible to the expanding pool of onchain money. So why aren’t we seeing the traction we anticipated?

At Theo, we believe that issuance is just the first step in bringing financial products onchain. In order to fulfill the true promise of permissionless rails, tokenized financial products must be as powerful as their traditional counterparts.

They need intentionally designed infrastructure to support:

• Deep trading liquidity – so investors can efficiently enter and exit with any size

• Efficient leverage – for greater capital efficiency and optional leverage

• Composability – powering the full spectrum of derivatives

The treasuries market is a great example; it's one of the most liquid markets in the world with trillions in cash traded daily. However, onchain treasuries remain gated behind tedious mint and redeem processes and low liquidity, creating user friction and a subpar alternative to traditional markets.

What's After Issuance?

At Theo, we’re driven to build the most powerful tokenized products without sacrificing resilience or accessibility.

This starts with the underlying assets – we’re partnering with leading financial institutions to tokenize robust, high quality assets. To represent them onchain, we’re utilizing custom smart contracts which are natively composable while remaining fully compliant.

It’s what comes after issuance that makes Theo the first full-stack tokenization platform. Instead of just waiting for liquidity to develop for tokenized assets, we proactively design financial ecosystems with strategic protocol integrations, integrated market making, and more.

For the first time, Theo provides truly compelling tokenized financial products to retail and institutional investors alike. Allocate with any size onchain, borrow or lever up, and utilize the full breadth of DeFi protocols.

The Right Team at the Right Time

Theo is built by a team with deep experience in trading and market structure: former market makers, hedge fund quants, and crypto-native builders.

We’ve bootstrapped liquidity for new markets both onchain and in traditional finance. We’ve seen market structures across all asset classes, from equities to commodities, and know what it takes to create successful markets.

And today, several trends are converging to make a tokenized future inevitable:

• Regulatory frameworks are defining how tokenized assets can be issued, held, and traded in compliance with existing rules.

• Blockchain infrastructure has matured to support the speed, scale, and security needed for real financial products.

• Institutions are tokenizing their assets, but lack the onchain distribution and liquidity to compel serious capital allocators.

  
  

The Road Ahead

Over the next few months, we’ll launch our first tokenized financial products, scale our partnerships with asset managers and begin opening up Theo’s infrastructure to other builders.

We’re building the foundation for how financial systems will operate for decades to come. A system where access is global by default. Where transparency is native. Where opportunity isn’t gated by geography or net worth.

The future is tokenized. And we’re going beyond issuance.

About Theo
Theo is an institutional-grade trading infrastructure platform founded by former quant traders from IMC Trading and Optiver. For more information, follow @theo_network on X