Update Aug. 13, 7:00 am UTC: This article has been updated to change BNY Mellon to BNY and add comments from OpenEden founder and CEO Jeremy Ng.

Real-world asset (RWA) tokenization platform OpenEden partnered with The Bank of New York Mellon Corporation (BNY) to manage and custody the underlying assets of its flagship tokenized US Treasury product, TBILL. 

OpenEden announced the partnership Wednesday, bringing one of Wall Street’s largest and oldest custodians into the growing market for tokenized Treasurys.

OpenEden said TBILL is the first tokenized US Treasury fund with a Moody’s “A” rating to have its assets managed by a global custodian. 

A Moody’s “A” rating means that the asset is of upper-medium-grade quality, which indicates low credit risk and a strong capacity to meet financial obligations. It’s considered safe by traditional finance standards. 

OpenEden founder and CEO Jeremy Ng said combining their platform with BNY’s “deep fiduciary expertise” allows them to create a new standard of trust in the digital asset space. 

OpenEden says demand for tokenized US Treasury Bills grew

The company said demand for the product has increased, reflecting interest in regulated, onchain cash-management solutions.

RWA tracker RWA.xyz data shows that the TBILL’s assets under management (AUM) grew to $287 million, a 156% increase from $119 million on Jan. 1.

Ng told Cointelegraph that the asset is available exclusively to professional and institutional clients. He said both traditional and crypto-native institutions are interested in the asset.

“On one side, hedge funds and family offices are drawn to the regulated structure, investment-grade Moody’s rating, and access to low-risk yield in an otherwise volatile market,” Ng told Cointelegraph.

OpenEden’s TBILL product was launched in 2023 to give investors blockchain-based access to a pool of short-dated US Treasury Bills and overnight reverse repurchase agreements through the minting of the TBILL token. 

This means that the TBILL token represents a share of the underlying portfolio of US Treasury Bills that mature in the short term and their associated yield. 

OpenEden said BNY’s investment management arm, Dreyfus, will act as sub-manager of the TBILL fund. Meanwhile, BNY will serve as the primary custodian for the underlying assets, using its infrastructure.

BNY’s global head of investments and wealth, Jose Minaya, said the bank sees itself as a bridge between traditional finance and emerging technology in the digital asset space.

He said the partnership will allow BNY to extend its liquidity management expertise, adding that both companies aim to cover the full lifecycle of tokenized assets. 

Related: Tether’s US Treasury holdings hit $127B, surpassing South Korea

BNY deepens tokenization footprint

BNY has been active in the digital asset space since 2022, when it launched a digital custody platform to safekeep institutional clients’ Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) holdings.

The service lets the bank store private keys and access to funds, and provides bookkeeping services to fund managers in other assets. 

On April 3, the bank launched a digital assets data insights product that delivers onchain and offchain data across blockchain networks, expanding its footprint in the crypto space.

More recently, the bank partnered with Goldman Sachs on a money market fund project.

On July 23, the two companies announced that they were preparing to offer institutional investors access to tokenized money market funds, which could unlock 24/7 market access and real-time settlement in capital markets. 

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