Nasdaq-listed investment firm Hamilton Lane has tapped Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT)-registered shares to lower the entry point for its evergreen funds.
The first fund to feature the new share class will be Hamilton Lane’s $3.8-billion Global Private Assets (GPA) Fund, according to a release on Thursday. Although the new share class is only available to investors who are clients of digital asset bank Sygnum, qualified investors can tap the Class I-DLT and Class R-DLT shares that require a minimum investment of CHF 1 million ($1.1 million) and CHF 1,000 ($1,137.5), respectively.
This is significantly lower than the CHF 2 million ($2.3 million) and CHF 125,000 ($142,298.9) minimum investment of Class I Shares and Class R Shares available to all investors, according to the private placement memorandum of the fund published by Hamilton Lane in February.
The Singapore- and Switzerland-based Sygnum will serve as the technology service provider, while Bermuda-headquartered financial service provider Apex Group will serve as the transfer agent and fund administrator.
As one of the world’s largest private market investment firms with $902.8 billion in assets under management and supervision as of December 31, 2023, the asset manager has ramped up its tokenisation efforts to expand investors’ access to its funds.
For example, Securitize, a firm that digitises the issuance, management, and trading of real-world assets, offered individual investors a tokenised exposure to Hamilton Lane’s evergreen private credit fund that lowers the minimum investment from $2 million to $10,000, according to an announcement in May 2023.
The tokenisation trend, though remains nascent, comes at a time when global private equity fundraising has become more challenging. 2023 saw a total of $669.2 billion being raised from 851 funds, a negligible growth compared to $666.9 billion raised by 1,464 funds in 2022, according to data company Preqin.
“Tokenisation can streamline, automate, and simplify most stages of alternative investments, benefiting individuals and institutions alike. It could also improve liquidity and collateralisation, automate capital calls, and enable portfolio customisation,” researchers commented in a report published by Bain & Company and JPMorgan’s blockchain platform Onyx, adding that it could potentially bring $400 billion in additional annual revenue for the alternatives industry.