(Bloomberg) — Chinese builder Seazen Group Ltd. plans to issue tokenized private debt by the end of the year, as part of its foray into the Hong Kong government’s favored digital asset space.
The Shanghai-based developer, one of the few to avoid default during the country’s prolonged property crisis, unveiled its strategy to explore such assets on Friday. It expects to establish a digital asset management unit and launch non-fungible token products related to its Wuyue Plaza investment properties by the end of the year.
“Having developed for 32 years, the group has accumulated substantial capital reserves and has conducted preliminary exploration in the real-world asset domain,” Seazen Chairman Wang Xiaosong said in a filing to the Hong Kong stock exchange.
Seazen is the first major Chinese developer to dip its toes into digital assets, testing the potential of raising money in the area while many of its peers still struggle with strained liquidity. Wang said in the filing that the company is working in line with the Hong Kong government’s efforts to encourage digital innovation in the city.
“Our first attempt will focus on the tokenization of financial assets, specifically private and convertible bonds, into RWAs,” Wang Yifeng, a Seazen executive and vice chair of Seazen Digital Assets Institute, told reporters in Hong Kong.
RWA is in the process of representing assets like bonds, stocks, art or even shares in office buildings as digital tokens on a blockchain. Owning the tokens grants ownership of the underlying asset, allowing for easy, near-instant transfer between crypto wallets. This process also enables fractional ownership, which can increase liquidity and make it easier to trade assets.
“We have met a small scale of intentional investors and discussed our first RWA private debt,” Wang Yifeng said. “We hope to launch it by the end of the year,” he said, adding that tokenized private debt will involve lower costs and be accessible to more investors compared with the traditional way of issuing debt.
The company will also try to tokenize its shopping centers — Wuyue Plazas — around the country and create NFTs related to the mall brand. It is also planning to launch a proprietary RWA trading platform.
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