OKX secures $25B valuation in new funding round with Circle, SC Ventures

On Tuesday, OKX announced it had secured fresh capital at a valuation of $25 billion, with investments from several major digital asset firms.

In its statement, OKX confirmed that participants in the funding round included stablecoin issuer Circle, fintech company Ripple, and SC Ventures, the investment arm of Standard Chartered.

We're announcing a strategic investment from @Circle, QRT, @Ripple and SC Ventures by @StanChart at a $25 Billion pre-money valuation. This is how we're aligning critical builders behind our vision for the next generation of onchain markets.

The Intercontinental Exchange invested in the firm earlier this year as part of a push to accelerate tokenization. The joint venture between the two, OKXICE, filed with the SEC on Sunday to introduce a platform for tokenized securities enabling around-the-clock trading of U.S. stocks.

"Through strategic investment and partnership, OKX is aligning some of the most critical builders of financial infrastructure behind its vision for the next generation of onchain markets," OKX said in a statement.

Star Xu, founder and CEO of OKX, stated that the funds would assist in tokenizing real-world assets. "The exchange was our starting point, and we are evolving into a broader global financial technology platform," he added.

A growing number of top Wall Street firms are showing interest in the technology behind Bitcoin. For years, traditional finance heavyweights including BlackRock and Franklin Templeton have used blockchain infrastructure to tokenize money market funds. The concept of tokenization has gained more attention on Wall Street since the election of pro-crypto President Donald Trump.

The president has appointed regulators who have taken a friendlier stance toward overseeing the crypto sector. In September, the SEC approved tokenized stock trading.

Among other major deals linking traditional finance and crypto, the S&P 500 in January authorized crypto platform Trade[XYZ] to launch a new derivatives contract on decentralized exchange Hyperliquid, enabling 24/7 trading of the stock index.