Schroders Tokenizes an Emerging Markets Debt Strategy With Centrifuge in Its Solana Debut

Schroders is taking one of its emerging markets debt strategies onchain, starting with Solana. Tokenization firm Centrifuge announced on Nov. 4 that it launched the strategy, which offers tokenized exposure to the Schroder International Selection Fund Emerging Market Bond fund. The asset manager, which oversees over $1 trillion, had not deployed on Solana before.
Centrifuge framed the product as a widening of what bonds can trade onchain. “Until now, onchain fixed income has largely been built around cash and short-duration government securities,” said Anil Sood, Centrifuge’s chief strategy and growth officer, in the announcement. Emerging markets debt, he said, “introduces a fundamentally different source of risk and return.”

Get Unchained’s crypto news in your inbox with the free Unchained Daily newsletter.

Why It Matters
Unchained’s read: The Schroders deal follows Centrifuge’s work with Janus Henderson, which launched an onchain Nasdaq-100 fund, JQQQ, with Centrifuge on Oct. 27, offered only on the Stellar network. Two Centrifuge launches for large managers in eight days, on two different chains, show the firm selling itself as a chain-neutral tokenization partner for traditional asset managers.
What Schroders Brings
According to the announcement, Schroders has invested in emerging markets debt for more than 50 years and has more than 40 investment professionals dedicated to it, with strategies across sovereign, corporate and local-currency debt.
Marita Mcginley, Schroders’ head of operations for APAC and digital assets, said in the announcement that “working with Centrifuge enables us to make our expertise in this area available to a new generation of investors and continue to innovate in the delivery of investment solutions.” John Mensack, a senior investment director for fixed income at the firm, said Schroders recognizes “the importance of bringing relevant emerging markets debt opportunities onchain.”
Centrifuge put Solana’s tokenized real-world asset base at more than $4 billion. Nick Ducoff, head of institutional growth at the Solana Foundation, said the industry is “moving beyond tokenized cash products toward a market where sophisticated, actively managed strategies can be issued, distributed and integrated on public blockchain infrastructure.”
The announcement did not disclose investor eligibility, minimum investments, fees, the size of the tokenized offering or any DeFi integrations.
Related Listen: Bits + Bips: Why CLOs Are Suddenly DeFi’s Hottest Yield Play

The post Schroders Tokenizes an Emerging Markets Debt Strategy With Centrifuge in Its Solana Debut appeared first on Unchained.