One of Europe’s largest insurance investors has urged peers to get to develop and deploy a tokenisation and digital asset strategy – or be left behind.
Speaking at the IMpower Fund Forum event in Monaco at the end of June, Rémi Cuinat, head of unit-linked assets and operations – investment division at Generali, told delegates the time for discussion was over.
“My message is don’t think you have now the capability to choose if you want to tokenise or not,” said Cuinat. “We have passed the debate.”
For Cuinat, the move has been made, and the topics for discussion now revolve around “what to do with, with whom and [along] what timeline”.
“For me tokenisation of funds and organising that new relationship directly between asset owners and asset managers is no more a choice,” he said. “It’s going to be the future set up.”
Cuinat explained to delegates how Generali’s open architecture offered more than 7,000 funds, in and out of which money was moved every day.
“In a very practical point of view, that means that every day my team is forming around 2,000 orders, subscription reductions, and confirming that traditionally with a custodian bank using the post-trade infrastructure which is organised today.”
By employing blockchain technology for part of that activity, orders are reduced dramatically, despite the amount of assets being moved remaining high.
“Because that technology allows us to connect directly, peer-to-peer, with the fund, without going through all the infrastructure,” he said.
He gave the example of synchronising financial data between the fund repository and Generali’s internal repository, and transmitting all the other data to enrich the customer’s policy as corporate action notices, financial data, static and dynamic data.
“We’re using the blockchain for performing orders more quickly, safely, independently and with cost-efficiency, which is key,” he said.
“For us, it’s not anymore innovation. It’s preparation. In our ‘business as usual’, we are deploying the technology.”
At the end of 2024, Generali had €642bn in assets under management.
