Swiss start-ups launch "Share Dispenser" for tokenised shares

With the Share Dispenser it is now possible to obtain shares of a corporation directly via its website, without any cumbersome registration process or other preconditions. Thanks to blockchain technology, a share can be bought simply by sending Cryptofrancs to a smart contract that in turn dispenses shares directly into the shareholder’s crypto wallet, without financial intermediaries.

“Out of the more than 600’000 companies in Switzerland, only a few hundred are publicly traded. Our vision is to change this. The Share Dispenser is an important step into this direction”, explains Markus Hartmann, CEO of Alethena. Already last year, fintech startup Alethena has tokenized its entire share capital on the blockchain. The corresponding holdings and all transactions are public, but anonymous, as usual with crypto assets. The names and addresses of the shareholders are kept in a traditional shareholder registry hosted by partner Ledgy.com. While the enjoyment of shareholder rights such as receiving dividends or voting in the general assembly requires a registration, the latter is not necessary for short-term trading. Lexr, the third startup involved in the project, is responsible for the legal setup of the Share Dispenser.

“Worldwide electronic transferability is not of much use if no one ends up making use of it. We do so with our Share Dispenser, allowing visitors of our website to swap cryptocurrency for shares”, says Tim Glaus, COO of Alethena. A certain level of technical know-how is still required, though. In particular, the browser-wallet MetaMask must be installed as most web-browsers cannot interact with a blockchain yet. Furthermore, a potential buyer also requires CryptoFrancs (XCHF), a cryptocurrency pegged to the Swiss Franc and issued by Swiss Crypto Token AG. at the moment Alethena is selling its own tokenized shares via the Share Dispenser website. 

This is the second project which aims to simplify equity trading for non-listed companies. Only Wednesday daura announced the launch of its blockchain platform for share transfers.

(Press release - SK)