NowCM, the Luxembourg-based digital bond issuance platform, has been involved in more than €10 billion in bond and commercial paper issues to date. Last week it announced a collaboration with Singapore’s Marketnode, the blockchain platform founded by The Singapore Exchange (SGX) and state investment firm Temasek. The two companies will work together on the digitization of the main debt markets in Asia-Pacific.

NowCM buys the assets of Nivaura

This follows news three weeks ago that NowCM has acquired the key assets of Nivaura, the London Stock Exchange-backed capital markets automation firm. The stock exchange has also implemented Nivaura’s technology as part of its DCM Flow platform. While Nivaura was not a blockchain company, it did provide a workflow solution for bond issuance in a DLT-ready solution, enabling tokenization independent of any particular blockchain technology.

At the time, Nivaura CEO Scott Eaton said, “Industry consolidation is a necessary step in bringing automation to the capital markets and NowCM is a great partner in taking our technology to the next level.”

Collaboration between Marketnode and NowCM

The Marketnode Gateway workflow solution for fixed income issuers has been integrated with NowCM’s transaction management platform targeting Asia-Pacific clients. It will support SGX-listed bonds, but also others elsewhere.

The goal is to eliminate manual steps in the process, allowing bonds to be issued faster with smaller minimum sizes due to lower issuance and maintenance costs.

Marketnode started by focusing on fixed income, with a syndicated bond issue for agribusiness Olam. In September 2021, it was announced that ten banks would use its platform, including Barclays, BNP Paribas, BNY Mellon, Citi, Deutsche Bank, HSBC, Orient Securities International, Standard Chartered, Societe Generale, and UOB. Since then, it has expanded its offerings to test fund settlement and tokenization of wealth management products.

NowCM is acquisitive

In the meantime, the purchase of the Nivaura assets may be part of an acquisition roadmap for NowCM. A little over a year ago, EPPF, founded by current NowCM CEO Robert Koller, acquired a majority stake in NowCP. The companies were partners prior to the acquisition.

NowCP was renamed NowCM (Now capital market). It provides a workflow solution for debt issuance and a Paris regulated market that started with commercial paper but recently expanded its license to support bonds and Schuldschein. NowCM’s founding minority shareholders include Amundi, Crédit Agricole CIB, Natixis, S2iEM and Orange.