OKX-ICE tokenized stock venue objections hit 22 as Wells Fargo, Cisco opt out

Twenty-two U.S.-listed companies have told OKXICE TSV, the tokenized stock venue jointly built by OKX and NYSE parent Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), not to offer tokens of their shares. An updated public notice OKXICE published on Oct. 23 named six new objectors: Wells Fargo, Cisco, Marvell, Arm, Moderna and Intuit. Tokens of a company that objects cannot be traded on the venue.

Five notices, objections rise from one to 22

OKXICE published its first notice on Oct. 4 and revised it four times over the next 19 days. The objector list grew with each revision.

1. Sept. 17The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) issues an "Innovation Exemption" order allowing tokenized securities venues (TSVs) to operate under a temporary five-year exemption
2. Oct. 4First notice lists 63 tickers from 62 companies for trading; Cerebras is the only objector
3. Oct. 8AppLovin, Applied Digital and Rocket Lab join, bringing the total to four
4. Oct. 15CoreWeave, Verizon, Applied Optoelectronics, Broadcom and UnitedHealth join, bringing the total to nine
5. Oct. 19Goldman Sachs, Microsoft, Qualcomm, Caterpillar, McDonald's, Western Digital and Alphabet join, bringing the total to 16
6. Oct. 23Arm, Wells Fargo, Moderna, Cisco, Intuit and Marvell join, bringing the total to 22

Nineteen of the 22 were on the list of stocks the first notice said would be available for trading. Both Alphabet tickers, GOOG and GOOGL, dropped out. Cerebras, Arm and Wells Fargo were not on the original list but objected anyway. That means 19 of the 62 companies on the first list have dropped out. Starting with the Oct. 8 version, the notice no longer lists the stocks it plans to offer. Nvidia, Tesla, Apple and Amazon, along with crypto-linked stocks Strategy, Coinbase and Circle, were on the first list and do not appear among the objectors as of the Oct. 23 notice.

An objection only blocks that venue

Under the SEC order, a venue that wants to trade a stock token created by a third party rather than the issuer must first notify the issuer in writing and give it an opportunity to object. According to a summary by law firm Gibson Dunn, the issuer has 30 calendar days after receiving the notice to object in writing, and a timely objection bars that venue from offering the stock. If the issuer does not object, trading may proceed. An objection applies only to the venue that sent the notice. It does not block tokenization of the stock in general.

The objecting companies have not given reasons. Andrew Cuomo, the former New York governor who is co-chairman of OKXICE, said during a press call that objections were expected, according to CoinDesk.

"We always anticipated that, because this is such a dramatic and revolutionary change, many companies would want to wait and see how it goes rather than be the first to participate."

Andrew Cuomo, co-chairman of OKXICE

Cuomo also said limits on participating companies and trading volumes make the framework "a sandbox — a model demonstration."

Trading runs through Uniswap pools against stablecoins

OKXICE TSV is operated by OKXICE LLC, a Texas company owned 50% by ICE and 50% by OKC USA, OKX's U.S. holding company. There is no order book matching bids and offers. Instead, stock tokens are swapped for stablecoins through automated market maker (AMM) liquidity pools built on Uniswap v4 on XLayer, OKX's blockchain. Only wallets that pass identity checks can trade. Approved wallets receive a non-transferable soulbound token (SBT), which the pools check on every trade.

According to the notice, the company that issues the tokens holds the actual shares one-for-one through an SEC-registered broker-dealer, and token holders receive the same dividends and voting rights as holders of the underlying stock. Trading volume is also capped. For stocks in Tier 1 under the Limit Up-Limit Down plan, the order allows up to 75 symbols, with daily volume capped at 0.25% of the prior month's average daily volume. For Tier 2, the caps are 250 symbols and 2.5%.

Through the Oct. 19 version, the notice said each token would be paired with "either USDC, USDG, or USDT." The Oct. 23 version lists only USDC and USDG as examples, dropping USDT. No launch date has been set. OKX's information page says only that "OKXICE TSV is coming."