Companies are staying private longer than ever, and Citi thinks blockchain is the fix. The bank has unveiled a new platform for trading tokenized shares of private companies, a direct response to what its global digital assets lead Artem Korenyuk describes as mounting pressure on liquidity in private markets.
The logic is straightforward. When companies like SpaceX and Anthropic delay their IPOs indefinitely, early investors and employees get stuck holding illiquid paper. Citi’s answer is to wrap those private stakes into tokenized depositary receipts that can sit in a portfolio right next to shares of Apple or any other public stock.
How the platform actually works
Citi issues tokenized depositary receipts on a blockchain, representing ownership interests in private firms. Those receipts can then be traded on secondary markets, giving holders something they currently lack: a way out that doesn’t require waiting years for an IPO or acquisition.
The key distinction from existing private share arrangements, according to Korenyuk, is clarity. Traditional secondary markets for private shares are notoriously opaque, with murky ownership structures and limited price discovery. The tokenized model provides clearer ownership records and more transparent liquidity than what currently exists.
