Investing.com– Digital asset financial services company Tok-Edge has raised roughly $1.5 million at a $15 million valuation from backer Marcus Meijer, as it prepares to launch an institutional cryptocurrency hedge fund, Investing.com has learned.
Along with a group of other investors, Meijer is due to anchor the fund with up to $10 million in capital. Meijer previously founded a fund with $10 billion in assets under management.
Tok-Edge is also looking to garner backers from family offices, venture capital names, and cryptocurrency-native firms.
Early interest in Tok-Edge has been strong. Tok-Edge is targeting a $100 million “first close” — a key milestone where a fund has enough investor commitments to begin deploying capital into digital assets — later this year.
Helmed by a leadership team with experience at traditional finance groups like CVC Capital Partners and Bain Capital, Tok-Edge aims to offer institutional investors a regulated and structured way to allocate capital to crypto markets.
“Institutional demand for digital assets is now validated with BlackRock’s Bitcoin ETF and Strategy’s digital asset treasury. But these are single asset products restricted to traditional finance rails – they don’t touch DeFi, where capital markets are being rebuilt on-chain with 24-hour settlement, no centralised intermediaries and programmable infrastructure,” Tok-Edge CIO Raees Chowdhury told Investing.com.
Unlike some crypto funds which lock up capital for years, Tok-Edge is structuring its fund as a liquid strategy, which would offer investors the ability to redeem capital at scheduled intervals. The company said this model is designed to resemble traditional hedge fund liquidity.
Meanwhile, Tok-Edge is also introducing a digital instrument it calls the “Redemption Token,” which will be issued to investors in the fund. The token is designed to trade freely on public blockchains, allowing investors to sell the digital asset on a crypto exchange or use on other apps.
Tok-Edge said it will carry out a smaller funding round capped at $21 million that will coincide with its token generation event. Each dollar committed to the fund at its launch will be mirrored by the issuance of one Redemption Token. Investor allocations are expected to be finalized in the coming months,.
