Quick answer: Archax is a UK-regulated digital securities exchange, broker, and custodian that helps issue, trade, and safekeep tokenized real-world assets. In this interview Jake Claver speaks with Archax CEO and co-founder Graham Rodford about how tokenization works inside a regulated framework, and about the firm’s collaboration with Ripple on the XRP Ledger. Rodford’s forecasts are his own opinion, offered as commentary rather than advice.
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By Jake Claver. Educational content, not investment advice.
Tokenization is one of the most discussed ideas in finance, and also one of the most misunderstood. This conversation is useful because Archax operates inside financial regulation rather than around it, so the discussion stays close to how the plumbing actually works.
What Archax is
Archax was authorized in 2020 as the first digital securities exchange, broker, and custodian regulated by the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority. The company builds infrastructure to issue, trade, and custody tokenized assets, and it describes itself as a regulated bridge between traditional finance and digital assets (Archax about page). In 2025 it acquired a FINRA and SEC-registered broker-dealer to offer tokenized assets to institutions in the United States (CoinDesk report).
What tokenizing real-world assets means
Tokenizing a real-world asset means recording ownership of something like a bond, a fund share, or an equity as a token on a blockchain, so it can be issued, transferred, and settled digitally. The asset does not change; the record and the settlement rails do. The appeal is faster settlement, fractional ownership, and around-the-clock transferability. The Bank for International Settlements has studied how tokenization could reshape the monetary system and market infrastructure (BIS). The core question is not whether the technology works, but whether the legal and custody framework around it holds up.
The Ripple and XRP Ledger connection
Archax has received strategic investment from Ripple and has worked with it on tokenizing real-world assets on the XRP Ledger, including access to a tokenized money market fund. Archax has also used Ripple’s custody technology since 2022. The firm tokenizes across several networks, not one, which is why the discussion treats the choice of ledger as an engineering and settlement decision rather than a bet on a single token.
Why regulation is the point
Rodford’s recurring argument in the interview is that regulation is the feature, not the obstacle. Institutions will only move meaningful assets on-chain when issuance, trading, and custody sit inside a licensed structure with clear investor protections. That framing separates the technology story from the price story: tokenized infrastructure can grow whether or not any particular token appreciates. Treat his outlook as an informed industry view, not a guarantee.
Why this matters
If regulated tokenization scales, the effect shows up in market infrastructure long before it shows up in headlines: faster settlement, lower operational cost, and broader access to assets that were once hard to divide. Watch the full interview for Rodford’s complete explanation and Jake’s questions.
Common questions
What does Archax do?
It runs a UK-regulated digital securities exchange, brokerage, and custody service for tokenized assets, and in 2025 added a US broker-dealer to serve American institutions.
What is a tokenized real-world asset?
It is a traditional asset such as a bond or fund share whose ownership is represented as a blockchain token, allowing digital issuance, transfer, and settlement while the underlying asset stays the same.
How is Archax connected to Ripple and XRP?
Ripple is a strategic investor, Archax has used Ripple’s custody technology since 2022, and the two have collaborated on tokenizing real-world assets on the XRP Ledger.
Is this a reason to buy any token?
No. Tokenized infrastructure and token prices are separate questions. Nothing here is a recommendation, and Rodford’s forecasts are his own opinion.
This content is educational only. It is not tax, legal, or investment advice. Check primary sources and speak with a qualified professional before making financial decisions.
This connects to how real-world asset tokenization works.
Part of our guide: XRP Explained.
