Prontoblock & Mercantile Bank team to enhance investment opportunities

By Delisha Fernandes

Prontoblock, a digital asset FinTech company, has announced its strategic partnership with Mercantile Bank International (MBI).

This partnership will help MBI clients to engage in the purchase and issuance of tokenised commercial paper using Prontoblock’s digital assets platform. Prontoblock will collaborate closely with issuers to identify the most suitable commercial paper instruments for tokenisation.

Bill Gleason, CEO of Prontoblock, said, “MBI, with its robust presence in the US digital asset space, is an ideal partner as they routinely generate excess liquidity and are in search of high-quality, short-term liquid instruments to invest their short-term liquidity and generate an attractive risk-adjusted return.”

The outstanding value of US commercial paper exceeded $1.25 trillion at the end of 2022. Commercial paper works like fixed-income investments but tends to have rates higher than Treasuries with similar maturities and even higher than bank savings deposit rates. Of the $1 billion in assets Prontoblock plans to tokenise by Q2 2024, $250 million will be high-grade commercial paper.

Prontoblock’s digital asset platform enhances investment opportunities such as hedge funds, private equity, fixed income and commercial paper. Leveraging the power of blockchain technology and smart contracts, the platform tokenises financial assets issued by its clients, streamlining investment processes and enhancing operational efficiency.

Leveraging its strong track record of enabling clients to participate seamlessly in the digital asset realm, MBI offers high-quality, high-yield, and liquid short-term instruments such as commercial paper that generate attractive risk-adjusted returns.

Bo Collings, CEO of MBI, said, “Our alliance with Prontoblock perfectly aligns with our strategic vision. Tokenising commercial paper allows us to provide a diverse array of investment opportunities to our clients while facilitating their access to liquidity. Through leveraging our advanced blockchain technology stack, we are poised to enhance client investment capabilities, yielding exceptional outcomes while meticulously adhering to US securities regulations.”