Cathie Wood taps Securitize to tokenize $1.3 billion ARK fund

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Cathie Wood tokenizes $1.3 billion fund

Highlights

ARK is tokenizing its roughly $1.3 billion Venture Fund on Ethereum.
Securitize will provide the infrastructure for ARK’s first tokenized fund.
The move expands ARK’s involvement in blockchain-based financial assets.

The move targets ARKVX, a share class of ARK’s closed-end interval fund, and represents the investment manager’s first fund tokenization, Bloomberg reported. Securitize, the tokenization company in which ARK Invest holds a stake, will handle the transition to Ethereum. ARK’s official materials show the fund has about $1.3 billion in net assets across its share classes.

ARK takes its first fund onchain

Launched in 2022, the ARK Venture Fund invests across private and public markets, targeting companies tied to disruptive technologies. Its portfolio includes businesses in artificial intelligence, space, fintech, and digital assets. ARK describes it as a continuously offered closed-end interval fund with limited liquidity rather than an exchange-traded product.

That structure means investors generally purchase shares directly and obtain liquidity through periodic repurchase windows. The fund’s shares are not listed on a securities exchange, and ARK says investors should not expect a conventional secondary market to develop.

Tokenization will create a blockchain-based representation of fund ownership. ARK President and Chief Operating Officer Tom Staudt said the firm views ARKVX as an initial step and expects tokenization could eventually extend to more of its funds.

Wall Street pushes assets onchain

ARK joins a growing group of financial firms testing blockchain as infrastructure for conventional securities. Securitize already works with asset managers including BlackRock, Apollo, Hamilton Lane, KKR, and VanEck on tokenized investment products.

ARK also has a direct financial connection to the company. It made a strategic investment in Securitize in 2025, and Securitize subsequently became a public company in July 2026.

Tokenization can potentially support features such as fractional ownership, more continuous market access, and faster transaction processing. Securitize has already used its infrastructure to bring public-company shares onchain and has cited 24-hour trading and lower transaction costs among the potential benefits.

A test for traditional fund infrastructure

The ARK transaction is notable because it moves an established investment vehicle rather than a crypto-native asset onto Ethereum. It also provides another test of whether blockchain infrastructure can broaden access to investment products without changing their underlying legal and economic structure.

For ARK, the move is a starting point rather than a one-off experiment. The larger question is whether tokenization can progress from a relatively small segment of capital markets into infrastructure used across mainstream funds and securities.

We also reported ARK Invest predicts new wave of crypto company shutdowns.

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