Tokenized Alternatives & Bonds: Providing Small Investors Access to Institutional-Grade Finance & the $11 Trillion Private Markets

[GENERAL] Name and surname of main applicant

Shafiq Amiri

[GENERAL] Are you delivering this project as an individual or as an entity (whether formally incorporated or not)

Entity (Not Incorporated)

[GENERAL] Please specify how many months you expect your project to last (from 2-12 months)

5

[GENERAL] Please indicate if your proposal has been auto-translated into English from another language

No

[GENERAL] Summarize your solution to the problem (200-character limit including spaces)

We're removing minimum capital barriers and creating access and liquidity in a historically paper-centric and illiquid market by enabling tokenization of assets via a fully digital platform.

[GENERAL] Does your project have any dependencies on other organizations, technical or otherwise?

No

[GENERAL] If YES, please describe what the dependency is and why you believe it is essential for your project’s delivery. If NO, please write “No dependencies.”

No dependencies

[GENERAL] Will your project’s output/s be fully open source?

No

[GENERAL] Please provide here more information on the open source status of your project outputs

Our platform utilizes a public chain, however as investments are regulated, we have compliance issues to factor in. Open sourcing will not allow us regulatory oversight and may potentially divert from the vision of the project.

[SOLUTION] Please describe your proposed solution

Introduction

Private markets or alternative investments/assets are markets other than public stocks such as $AAPL (Apple) or $TSLA (Tesla). Alternatives include direct lending to companies, real estate, venture capital, private credit, commercial paper, natural resources, and others. These markets are not accessible to smaller investors due to the minimum capital barriers, usually requiring a minimum of $250,000 to invest. Unlike public equities, private markets are illiquid due to the absence of a standard exchange. This makes the private markets extremely inefficient and inaccessible.

Our Platform

We've studied the sector and understand the gaps in the market. We're addressing these issues by digitizing an asset as a native token and have built an integrated platform for primary market (issuance of a token) and secondary market (trading of token). Doing so would provide the following alleviation:

• Access to small investors by fractionalizing an asset into bite-sized offerings. We're reducing minimum investments from $250,000.
• Higher yields as we're dedicated to source top performing assets through our scrutinizing due diligence process.
• Reduced cost as we're creating a digital environment that removes costly and time-consuming paperwork for each transaction.
• Liquidity through the ease of swapping tokens in our built-in exchange. Since assets are tokenized, each token represents a smaller portion which can be bought and sold by users. In current market conditions, you can only exit an investment at the end of the investment's life cycle (5-10 years) or through a liquidity event which is rare.
• Alternative financing can be unlocked by creating a token offering. For safety of our users, we have a very high standard for onboarding issuers.

Who Do We Engage

Our platform is open for both institutional and individual investors seeking higher returns through private markets. We work with top-performing asset managers and funds to provide access to their strategies.

How Can We Demonstrate Our Impact

Based on our engagements with regulators and financial institutions, it's clear that tokenization is the future of capital markets. Our mission is to provide smaller investors access to highly sought after opportunities by removing their access barriers and bringing liquidity to the market. Therefore our impact can be measured through the ease of making transactions and the ability to trade your tokens.

We're using our experience in structured finance to provide an unparalleled access to institutional-grade finance. We have a strong distribution network that is attractive to issuers and user-friendly platform that not only caters to web 3 natives, but also is easy to use by web 2 players. This approach removes the burden of navigating through web 3 intricacies and contributes to the onboarding of more users to blockchain technology.

Our project is particularly beneficial to Cardano as we are bringing bonds - a $300 trillion market - and alternatives - $11 trillion market - on chain. The key benefit would be network productivity generated through transactions on our platform. Our origination strategy has already created a +$1 billion pipeline of issuance.

[IMPACT] Please define the positive impact your project will have on the wider Cardano community

Our project's value to Cardano includes:

• Increased utility of Cardano technology from the financial sector.
• Providing Cardano community access to risk-adjusted returns.
• Increased exposure to global financial institutions engaging through our platform.
• Becoming a leading chain for structured financial products.
• Cardano community receiving access to the top-performing fund managers.

Through our work in bringing real world assets and fund managers to our platform, the impact can be simply measured through our on-chain activity of issuance and secondary transactions.

These opportunities will be shared on our platform periodically, and would be made available to our users.

[CAPABILITY & FEASIBILITY] What is your capability to deliver your project with high levels of trust and accountability? How do you intend to validate if your approach is feasible?

Our team has worked in multiple capacities in both established corporate and startup stages. Our prudential expertise comes from backgrounds in such companies as Blackstone, BNP Paribas, Savills, Dataminr and others. As well as having dealt with and delivered projects of multi-million dollar budgets. We have worked with partners of different varieties, including state-owned entities, investment funds, corporates, real estate developers and more.

We have a track record that can attest to our capability in finance and technology, and trustworthiness in ensuring we deliver successful outcomes.

We aim to validate feasibility through the issuance of two tokenized assets on our platform. We will be working with globally reputable partners on these issuance. The aim of the first two tokenized asset issuance would be to ensure our platform caters to cross-asset classes.

We will utilize funds in a transparent manner, providing monthly reports of costs to relevant stakeholders.

[PROJECT MILESTONES] What are the key milestones you need to achieve in order to complete your project successfully?

Platform launch: 1st -2nd month

Finish the platform development and integrate the front- and back-end.

Acceptance Criteria

Functional platform capable of registering users and making basic transactions that can register user interest, and shows account information.

Evidence

Accessible through the website by logging in.

Objective: 2nd - 3rd month

Setting up legal structure which will serve as the tokenized entity holding the interest of the assets and users.

Acceptance Criteria

Successful legal entity registration with assistance from a counsel

Evidence

Public announcement and showcase of registration

Objective: Starting from 1st month and remains constant

Content creation and user onboarding

Acceptance Criteria

Expanding our user base and community across our dedicated social media channels and registered users

Evidence

Content will be publicly available through our website and social channels

Objective

Technical audit of our platform and smart contract by a reputable auditor.

Acceptance Criteria

Successful audit showing no vulnerabilities in our technology

Evidence

Audit report will be published with redacted sensitive information

Objective: 4th - 5th Month

Issuance of a tokenized asset, trading and testing of the platform by our institutional partners and users

Acceptance Criteria

• Successful offering of the tokenized asset which covers the entire offering amount.
• Successful trade of a token
• Feedback of users

Evidence

A report will be generated and circulated with our stakeholders and users, as well as to the public through our website and social media channels.

[RESOURCES] Who is in the project team and what are their roles?

Shafiq Amiri: Lead

• https://www.linkedin.com/in/shafiqamiri/
• Overall lead of the project and responsible for everything. Remits include business development, go-to-market strategy, user acquisition and partner-relation management

Zena Moafy: Finance

• https://uk.linkedin.com/in/zena-moafy-613b37b5
• Responsible for overseeing finances and business development

Alex Nguyen: Tech

• https://alexnguyen.co.nz
• Responsible for building the platform

Martin Chukwuneme: Blockchain

• https://www.linkedin.com/in/martin-chukwuneme-86a3a31a2
• Responsible for creating the smart contract

Chief investment officer:

• Director of fixed income at a $400 billion investment firm. We can't disclose this at the moment.
• Responsible for handling our institutional distribution network

Waheed Amiri: Partnerships and legal

• https://www.linkedin.com/in/amiriwaheed/
• Responsible for business development and coordinating with our legal team

Anayat Rahim: Marketing

• https://www.linkedin.com/in/anayat-rahim-00bb83209/
• Responsible for community management, content and design.

[BUDGET & COSTS] Please provide a cost breakdown of the proposed work and resources

Please find a high-level budget breakdown below in both USD and ADA. For accurate reference, the USD figure will take precedence in case of price fluctuation from the time of this application submission and the day of the grant receipt.

Total requested funds: $43,900 / ADA 99,781

Kick-off and development: $6,900 / ADA 15,682

• Infrastructure & hosting ($200/month)
• 1x developer hire ($1500/month)

Compliance: $10,000 / ADA 22,728

• Setting up a know your customer (KYC) check portal
• Anti-money laundering (AML) screening

Audit: $7,500 / ADA 17,045

• Platform and smart contract testing

Legal: $15,000 / ADA 34,091

• Setting up a legal structure for the tokenized assets.

Travel: $2,000 / ADA 4,545

• 7 days travel to meet with institutional financial partners

Marketing: $2,500 / ADA 5,681

• Community manager and content creator
• Promoted content/press release

[VALUE FOR MONEY] How does the cost of the project represent value for money for the Cardano ecosystem?

Kickoff and development

15,682 ADA allocated covers the cost of a new hire who will assist the team. The team is currently working on equity. We've marked the cost of a developer at below market standard as we're offering equity as well. Infrastructure and hosting costs amount to about $200 per month on AWS. This investment will alleviate some of the work from the core team.

Compliance

22,728 ADA allocated covers the licensing of KYC providers. The cost is of industry standard compliance service provider. This is an important feature as we need to be regulatory compliant with each user we onboard.

Audit

17,045 ADA allocated covers the cost of testing the code. The cost is on par with cyber security companies (e.g. Hacken, Omniscia, etc) offering these services. It's another significant part as we strive to create a safe environment for our users.

Legal

34,091 ADA allocated covers the cost of a lawyer assisting in setting up a legal structure. These costs are inline with the novelty of tokenized legal entities, and is a significant part of being regulatory compliant.

Travel

4,545 ADA allocated covers the cost a 7 day travel and accommodation to meet with our partners issuing the tokenized asset on our platform. We're taking a $175 hotel cost per night and a $775 return flight ticket cost.

Marketing

5,681 ADA allocated for marketing enables us to keep our community engaged and informed. It also allows us to persistently show our message to interested parties. The costs are inline with typical rates for content creators and community managers.

Overall value for money to the Cardano Ecosystem

The Cardano ecosystem will substantially benefit from our project. We envision the following value inflow to the ecosystem:

• Cardano network productivity through the issuance of real world asset tokens which includes the $300 trillion bond market and the $11 trillion alternatives market. This leads to utilization of Cardano technology.
• Use of Cardano technology by global financial institutions through our platform. We handle the relationship and engagement, which lowers their capex of implementing blockchain technology.
• Providing the Cardano community access to risk-adjusted returns and high quality investment opportunities. Our platform - Invnex will become the go-to platform for Cardano users and projects to manage their treasuries and their holdings.