What happened
Carlos Domingo, chief executive of tokenization platform Securitize, publicly called for US public issuers to abandon the paper-based proxy system and record shareholder ownership directly on blockchain rails, according to a CryptoBriefing report published Sunday. Domingo's argument, per the report, is that the current chain of custody that runs from retail broker to DTCC's nominee Cede & Co.
and back through proxy intermediaries like Broadridge produces an ownership record that is neither real-time nor reconcilable. Issuers get a snapshot. Beneficial owners get a ballot that may or may not reflect their actual position.
Securitize, which operates as an SEC-registered transfer agent and broker-dealer, is positioning onchain cap tables as the replacement layer. The firm already runs the BlackRock USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund, better known as BUIDL, and has tokenized vehicles for Hamilton Lane and KKR, so the proposal arrives with a live product behind it rather than a whitepaper.
Why it matters
The US proxy system is one of the most frequently cited examples of financial infrastructure that works despite itself. The SEC has flagged over-voting as a persistent problem for more than a decade, and corporate secretaries routinely describe reconciliation as a manual exercise that consumes weeks of each proxy season. Shifting registries onchain would collapse that reconciliation into a query.
It would also hand issuers something they currently do not have: a direct line to beneficial owners for governance votes, tender offers, and corporate actions. The commercial stakes are large. Broadridge Financial Solutions, the dominant proxy processor, booked more than $6 billion in revenue in its last fiscal year, much of it tied to the exact plumbing Domingo wants to disintermediate.