STBL Announces OKX Ventures Funding for X Layer Stablecoin

Stablecoin protocol STBL announced that it has secured a strategic investment from OKX Ventures, the investment arm of the OKX exchange. Alongside this funding, STBL revealed a partnership with Hamilton Lane (Nasdaq: HLNE) and Securitize to launch what it calls the first Ecosystem-Specific Stablecoin (ESS) on X Layer, OKX’s Ethereum-compatible Layer 2 blockchain.

The collaboration brings together an institutional private credit fund, a regulated tokenization platform, and a stablecoin yield protocol. While these are notable names in their respective sectors, the initiative is still in its early stages, and the practical impact will depend on adoption and execution.

The OKX Ventures Investment

OKX Ventures, which operates with an initial capital base of $100 million, focuses on blockchain infrastructure, DeFi, Layer 2 solutions, and Web3 projects. The firm’s 2026 investment outlook highlights what it calls the “Kinetic Finance” era, where the emphasis shifts from network speed to the efficiency of onchain asset flows and yield generation.

The specific financial terms of OKX Ventures’ investment in STBL were not publicly disclosed. Prior to this round, STBL had received backing from Wave Digital Assets. The new investment from OKX Ventures adds the protocol to a portfolio that already includes projects across infrastructure, DeFi, AI, and RWA categories.

Jeff Ren, OKX Ventures Founder, stated that the collaboration “strengthens the foundation for highly capital efficient RWA products across the network” and that working with STBL and Hamilton Lane would help “bring users a more mature RWA ecosystem”.​

The Hamilton Lane and Securitize Partnership

The centerpiece of the announcement is the integration of a feeder fund for Hamilton Lane’s Senior Credit Opportunities Fund (SCOPE) into STBL‘s architecture, tokenized via Securitize.​

SCOPE is a senior private credit evergreen fund launched by Hamilton Lane in October 2022. It targets floating-rate, senior secured loans typically the safest part of a company’s capital structure in sectors like healthcare, IT, and business services. Securitize has previously worked with Hamilton Lane to make portions of SCOPE accessible to individual investors, reducing minimum investments from $2 million to $10,000.

In this new arrangement, the tokenized SCOPE fund will serve as an institutional-grade component within STBL’s collateral architecture. This means that the stablecoin issued on X Layer would be backed, at least in part, by real private credit assets rather than purely by government securities or algorithmic mechanisms.​

Carlos Domingo, CEO of Securitize, noted that this structure shows how tokenization unlocks effective utility when it’s paired with regulated issuance and programmable settlement. Dr. Avtar Sehra, STBL’s CEO, added that RWA markets are entering a new phase, where tokenization must deliver real utility, not just representation.​

The Ecosystem-Specific Stablecoin (ESS) Concept

As part of this initiative, STBL plans to introduce the first Ecosystem-Specific Stablecoin on X Layer. The idea behind an ESS is to create stablecoins tailored to specific blockchain ecosystems in this case, X Layer using STBL’s dual-token architecture to separate liquid settlement (via USST) from yield generation (via YLD).

STBL describes its broader ambition as building “Money-as-a-Service” infrastructure, enabling ecosystems to issue their own branded stablecoins backed by RWAs. While the concept is interesting from a design perspective, it remains to be seen whether ecosystem-specific stablecoins can gain enough traction and liquidity to be practical alternatives to widely circulated stablecoins like USDT and USDC.​

Team and Background

STBL’s leadership team brings relevant experience from the stablecoin and digital asset sectors:

• Reeve Collins: Co-Founder and Chairman; previously co-founded Tether.​

• Dr. Avtar Sehra: Co-Founder and CEO; background in digital asset infrastructure.​

• Bundeep Singh Rangar: Co-Founder and CEO.​

• Sudeep Mehta: Chief Operating Officer.​

The founding team’s track record is one of the project’s more notable features, though past involvement with other projects does not guarantee the success of STBL.