Japan-based banking giant Nomura, announced today that its digital assets subsidiary, Laser Digital, has made a strategic investment in Infinity, a non-custodial interest rate protocol built on Ethereum.
Infinity’s wholesale exchange, the first of several planned infrastructures, provides inter-exchange clearing, fixed and floating rate markets, as well as enterprise-grade risk management utilizing hybrid on-chain/off-chain infrastructures that deliver transaction efficiency, security, and scalability.
Infinity is a pioneering interest rate protocol that forms the basis for benchmark rates, institutional-grade lending, borrowing, and risk management in DeFi. The money market exchange protocol was founded by ex-Morgan Stanley Head of Structuring, Kevin Lepsoe.
“Infinity is building critical infrastructure for DeFi, and its protocol enabling price discovery and management of risk within DeFi is transformative for institutions, Infinity’s groundwork paves the way for institutional flows on-chain, new levels of rates, and risk innovation, and we are keen to support their advances in the hybrid finance space.” – Olivier Dang, Head of Ventures at Laser Digital
Laser Digital was recently unveiled by Nomura to spearhead its digital asset ambitions and is chaired by Steve Ashley, who previously led Nomura’s wholesale division, with Dr. Jez Mohideen as its CEO. Headquartered in Switzerland, Laser Digital’s investments are focused on DeFi, centralized finance (CeFi), web3, and blockchain infrastructure.
The investment comes as the Bank of International Settlements (BIS) published guidelines for crypto exposures in December 2022, with bank-prescribed risk weightings for tokenized assets to be treated on par 1:1 with their analog counterparts. The guidelines for banks come into effect on 1 January 2025.
With USD $300 trillion of credit securities outstanding and multiples of that in the loan, derivative, and equity markets, the new guidelines portend a major wave of tokenization across financial and real assets.
Presently in Beta, the Inifinity mainnet is scheduled to launch by the end of Q2 2023.
KR1, a blockchain and crypto-asset investment company, has now announced it has participated in the HydraDX (HDX) crowdloan and Polkadot (DOT) parachain auction. KR1 contributed a total of 350,000.00 DOT to the HydraDX crowdloan campaign, which successfully secured a parachain slot in the ongoing round of Polkadot parachain auctions.
HydraDX.io is a cross-chain liquidity protocol designed to enable frictionless liquidity for crypto assets across various chains. In contrast to most decentralized exchanges in production today, which rely on separate pools for separate assets, HydraDX’s solution enables deposits of ‘all’ assets into one shared liquidity pool, the ‘Omnipool’, unlocking unparalleled efficiencies.
The contributed DOT will be time-locked on the Polkadot blockchain for 96 weeks and will be returned to KR1 following the completion of the respective HydraDX parachain lease. Following the successful HydraDX parachain auction bid, KR1 is going to receive a to-be-determined amount of HydraDX tokens over a time period of 96 weeks in return for supporting the HydraDX crowdloan campaign.
This method of token distribution involves no direct investment of capital, instead, it is an indirect investment with the opportunity costs being the inaccessibility of the locked DOT funds as well as foregoing any staking yields on the contributed DOT for the time period.
In addition, KR1 will receive a total of 45,000,000 HDX tokens (and a yet-to-be-determined amount of Basilisk (BSX) tokens) in line with KR1’s previous backing of HydraDX’s seed funding round that was announced on December 22nd, 2020, and a much smaller, yet-to-be-determined amount of HDX tokens in line with the company’s contribution to Basilisk’s Kusama crowdloan campaign and parachain auction that was announced on September 22nd, 2021.
HDX is the native token of HydraDX. It will be used for governance, staking, and more.
“HydraDX winning a Polkadot parachain slot is the next big step for the project and a huge endorsement by the community of the protocol’s objective to bring all liquidity together in an ‘ocean of liquidity.’ We see HydraDX as the endgame of liquidity in a cross-chain world and we have a high conviction rate in the team’s ability to achieve this goal.” – Keld van Schreven, Managing Director & Co-Founder of KR1
Melbourne, Australia, Sep 29, 2021 — NewTribe Capital, a Venture Capital Private Equity Group has made a strategic investment in MRHB DeFi, the world’s first halal decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem.
This marks the seventh institutional investment in the DeFi ecosystem startup, following strategic investments from DeFi Mutual Fund Sheesha Finance, Dubai-based angel innovation investors Acreditus Partners and EMGS Group, the French Systems Integration company operating in the Middle East since 2003, to name a few.
NewTribe Capital: A Bold Investment Approach
With an ideology to‘Invest in People’, NewTribe Capital takes a bold stance in their approach to investing — they back only the projects they feel add value to the blockchain ecosystem.
“Our philosophy is successful because we invest in relationships, not deals,” says Dhaval Parikh, Partner at NewTribe Capital. “Deals are simply transactions. We build exceptional relationships with companies that last, collaborating on projects with conviction.”
Investing in the first ethical, inclusive and faith-based MRHB DeFi ecosystem platform aligns with NewTribe’s company ethos and strategic goals. As an early investor and supporter, NewTribe recognizes both the vision and the long-term market potential of the faith-based DeFi pioneer.
Besides investment funds, which will support the continuing technology development and growth of MRHB DeFi, NewTribe Capital will also offer network and cross marketing support for the DeFi startup.
“We’re excited about collaborating with the highly successful NewTribe Capital team who share our long term visions for ethical DeFi. This relationship creates additional opportunities and industry connections that will drive more value for our community members. NewTribe has a proven track record of helping their partners succeed, and we are delighted to welcome them amongst other strategic stakeholders in our ambitious journey,” says Naquib Mohammed, MRHB DeFi Founder & CEO.
“This strategic alliance with NewTribe Capital is the latest institutional move by MRHB DeFi as we work to establish ourselves as the dominant player in the ethical decentralized finance space,” adds Mohammed.
DeFi made accessible to Ethical and Faith-based Communities
MRHB DeFi’s vision of an inclusive and halal crypto-verse is underpinned by Islamic ethical finance principles but is suitable for all those looking for a socially conscious blockchain that avoids interest, usury, exploitation and other business practices deemed unethical.
Being Shariah-compliant means MRHB DeFi can apply a vast body of knowledge and literature of Islamic Finance to ensure higher ethical and moral standards that are typically seen in the DeFi space. These principles ensure that all business decisions are conducted in a fair and just manner and hence create an inclusive and simple crypto ‘safe-space’ for the faith-based, unbanked and communities who are currently excluded.
Global Portfolio and Partnerships
Crypto-minded investors who believe in the evolution of current capital market systems towards more decentralized and accessible models, NewTribe Capital has a portfolio of more than 70 investments with an average ROI of 4.2x and more than USD20M AUM (assets under management). Portfolio investments include Launchpool, Casper Labs, Fractal, to name a few.
Offering advisory, resourcing, legal and technical support, NewTribe also has a network of VC partners, media partners and global influencers. VC partners include Alphabit, A195 Capital, Draper Dragon and more.
About MRHB DeFi
MRHB DeFi is a halal, decentralised finance platform built to embody the true spirit of an “Ethical and Inclusive DeFi” by following faith-based financial and business principles, where all excluded communities can benefit from the full empowerment potential of DeFi.
Based on the tenets of blockchain such as trust, transparency, and security, MRHB DeFi has encapsulated universally applicable principles of Shariah into those tenets of blockchain to render a suite of offerings. It is a complete DeFi ecosystem whose products, protocols and crypto-assets are governed primarily by the ethical, inclusive, sustainable and charitable investment principles associated with the Islamic faith or ‘Islamic Finance’ (‘IF’ as it is commonly known).
The diverse team is comprised of researchers, technocrats, influencers, Islamic fintech experts & business entrepreneurs, who came together to ensure that MRHB DeFi prevails in a manner that will impact society as a whole, essentially bridging the gap between the faith-conscious communities and the blockchain world.
Read more about MRHB DeFi’s Shariah Concept Paper, Lite and White Paper here.
