Blockchain Basics For Investment Managers: A Token Of Appreciation

 The global blockchain frenzy is creating a new — and swiftly evolving — paradigm for investment managers and regulators alike. This "disruptive" technology is challenging traditional ideas about how issuers raise capital, how investors invest, how value is transmitted through the financial system and how regulators regulate and adapt to new technologies. As interest in blockchain technology soars as fast and as high as the price that one bitcoin has ascended in the past year, many players in the capital markets are applying existing securities laws to new digitally-driven financial products and services.

Blockchain technology, which has been likened to the "second generation" of the internet, has begun to fulfill its "promis[e] to disrupt business models and transform industries,"¹ including through the introduction of digital assets and tokens, as well as related derivatives.