Singapore’s largest bank is extending its blockchain strategy by offering tokenized structured notes on the Ethereum public blockchain, in a move that broadens access to complex financial products once reserved for its private clients.
DBS said Thursday in a release that it will distribute the instruments through local Singapore exchanges ADDX, DigiFT and HydraX, marking its first time offering tokenized products to accredited and institutional investors outside its own client base.
The debut product is a crypto-linked participation note that pays out in cash when digital asset prices rise, while limiting downside exposure.
Structured notes traditionally carry minimum investments of $100,000 and are often customized, making them non-fungible.
By tokenizing each instrument into $1,000 units, DBS said the securities become fungible and easier to trade, offering greater flexibility for portfolio management.
Demand for such instruments has been strong as investors seek to incorporate advanced investment strategies in their digital asset portfolios, the bank said in a release.
In the first half of 2025, DBS clients executed over $1 billion of trades involving these instruments, with trade volumes growing almost 60% from Q1 2025 to Q2 2025.
The bank sees this as particularly useful for family offices and professional investors, which have grown rapidly in Singapore. The number of single-family offices in the city-state topped 2,000 in 2024, up 43% year on year, it said in a release.
The move comes as Singapore deepens its role as a hub for tokenized finance. The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has been advancing industry pilots through Project Guardian, which explores tokenization of assets across fixed income, FX and funds, while developing cross-border infrastructure like Global Layer One to pool global liquidity.
DBS has been one of the most active banks participating in these initiatives, often using permissioned blockchains for pilots before expanding into public chains.
While the initial focus is on crypto-linked notes, DBS said it will also tokenize more traditional equity- and credit-linked notes.
“Asset tokenization is the next frontier of financial markets infrastructure,” said Li Zhen, head of foreign exchange and digital assets at DBS.
“Our first tokenized product addresses the growing institutional appetite for digital assets. With this initiative, a broader segment of investors can now tap our digital asset ecosystem to build exposure to the asset class,” Zhen continued.