Digital Digest: The Latest Tech News

The latest technology news in the wealth management sector from around the world.

Baillie Gifford Baillie Gifford, a global investment manager founded in 1908, has launched the Baillie Gifford Enhanced Yield Fund (BAGEY) with New York-listed BNY, a global financial services company, delivering a publicly available fully native UK-regulated tokenised fund.

BAGEY, denominated in dollars, gives eligible investors access to an actively managed, short-duration portfolio of public corporate bonds through a UK-regulated OEIC structure on Ethereum and Solana, the firm said in a statement. Tokens are issued directly as the investor’s holding in the fund, with public blockchains used as the legal source of truth of ownership.

The product creates an asset that is truly native, rather than wrapping an existing product or legacy infrastructure. By using public blockchains compliantly as part of a fund’s core architecture, Baillie Gifford said it is extending the standards investors expect from regulated investment funds into infrastructure designed for markets that operate continuously, transparently and programmatically. This opens up new possibilities for how fund interests are issued, transferred and used.

The Enhanced Yield portfolio currently offers a yield of about 7 per cent, with two-year duration and an average credit quality of BBB. The fund is daily-dealt, and will be available to eligible investors in the UK, Switzerland and the Cayman Islands, subject to applicable laws, regulations and distribution restrictions.

“Tokenisation will only matter if it makes finance fundamentally better. A digital wrapper around yesterday’s infrastructure is not enough. Clients do not need novelty for its own sake; they need cleaner ownership, stronger governance, faster settlement and infrastructure they can trust,” Theo Golden, head of digital assets at Baillie Gifford, said. “That is what native issuance changes. The Baillie Gifford Enhanced Yield Fund is not a token placed on top of a fund. It is a fund issued onchain, with the blockchain serving as the register of record. Investors hold the fund directly: direct ownership, direct recourse.”

Baillie Gifford has collaborated with BNY, a long-term strategic relationship for the firm, in co-designing the product. BNY will be providing tokenisation and wallet infrastructure for the fund (subject to regulatory approval), supporting a direct issuance model designed to reduce operational complexity and improve transparency. NatWest Trustee and Depositary Services Limited will act as the fund’s depositary.

“Tokenisation has moved from concept to real-world application, and this launch shows how regulated fund structures can evolve to meet the needs of a more digital, connected marketplace,” Katey Neate, BNY global head of Investor Solutions at BNY, added. “We’re proud to be collaborating with Baillie Gifford on this first for the UK market, which will be a global blueprint for shaping how traditional financial assets can be issued, serviced and accessed through blockchain-enabled infrastructure.”

The focus on short-duration fixed income provides a strong foundation for the fund's design. Public government and corporate bonds offer the liquidity, pricing transparency and income-generating characteristics required for practical use within onchain financial infrastructure, while Baillie Gifford brings more than 25 years of experience managing dedicated bond strategies.

Eligible professional investors can mint and redeem fund tokens directly using stablecoins or fiat, with a minimum investment of $100.