Tokenized finance faces a connection problem more than a technology problem. Banks must link legacy systems, several blockchains, and dozens of counterparties at the same time. Ami Ben-David, founder and CEO of Ownera, built his company to solve that problem. Ownera develops FinP2P, an open source interoperability protocol that orchestrates trades above the blockchain layer. The company also powered the sandbox for the Global Digital Finance and ISDA US report on tokenized money market funds as collateral, where 48 firms tested institutional margin workflows. Ben-David recently spoke with Genfinity founder Ryan Solomon about why institutions need this layer, what the tests showed, and when production arrives.
Why Institutions Need an Orchestration Layer
Ben-David and his co-founder Yuval Lerner started Ownera with a broad thesis. In their view, the infrastructure behind finance will run on blockchains, and the shift reaches well beyond a crypto story. They also expected many chains to coexist. Early on, they considered building a single chain themselves. However, they quickly saw that the market wants competition and optionality instead.
Ben-David asks listeners to imagine the chief technology officer of a financial institution. That executive must keep legacy systems running because they are not going away. In addition, the executive must support new public and private blockchains that appear constantly. Meanwhile, the institution must connect with many counterparties and run several applications, including trading, margin, and collateral management. Ownera sits between all of these pieces as what Ben-David calls an offchain orchestration and connectivity layer that connects everybody to everybody.
He contrasts this design with the alternative approach. One option asks every participant to choose the same blockchain and build business logic in its smart contracts. That model works only if the market accepts a single chain, along with its fees and throughput limits. Ben-David considers those expectations unrealistic. Ownera instead places business logic, orchestration, integration, and privacy one layer above the chains. It then calls each blockchain through connectors, including one for Hedera, when execution begins.
FinP2P carries this orchestration. The protocol is open and decentralized, so no single party controls a trade. However, every party must agree to each step. It also stays agnostic to the underlying blockchain. Ben-David describes the approach as classic software engineering, since an abstraction layer should sit above the chains and the legacy systems.
Why the Market Will Stay Multi-Chain
Ben-David argues that each blockchain makes tradeoffs among speed, throughput, privacy, and price. One chain might process ten transactions per second at a dollar each while offering perceived institutional suitability. Another might offer far higher throughput at a much lower price. Those networks then compete for institutions and the counterparties around them. Over time, different chains tend to specialize in payments, retail, onchain trading, or very high value transactions that stay inside an organization.
As a result, institutions make different choices from one another. Ben-David speaks with institutions daily and calls it rare to see two that chose identically. Some choose public chains, others choose private ones, and many combine them. This reality supports the case for a neutral layer. Without it, each new chain choice would force another round of custom integration.
Ben-David also expects the market to sort chains through use. In his view, nobody should read much into one chain inching ahead today. Real trading will expose practical differences. A chain that charges a dollar per trade becomes expensive at 10,000 trades a day. Another chain may look attractive but lack the stability a bank requires, and a third may carry a security history that institutions want to avoid.
How Regulatory Clarity Moved the Market
Ben-David dates the shift in institutional appetite to changes at US regulators. His company went to production on intraday repo with J.P. Morgan about a year and a half ago. He calls that deployment an outlier, because few players in the institutional market were doing similar work then. Apart from J.P. Morgan and a few others such as Broadridge, activity stayed thin. He blames much of the delay on regulators during the previous US administration, who in his view did not distinguish institutional activity from meme coins.
Leadership changes altered that picture. First came statements of direction that let banks act. For example, the CFTC told banks they could use tokenized assets as collateral. Ben-David calls that a big deal, since banks previously avoided the practice because nobody had said they could. Banks also gained the ability to hold gas tokens, which he says was impossible at one point. Next, the SEC made clear that tokenized assets are still assets.
He identifies the DTCC approval as the largest turning point. When DTCC secured its approval to proceed, the whole market took notice. Ben-David reasons that if DTCC takes tokenization seriously, others must follow. He credits DTCC and regulator leadership for moving quickly. Since then, progress has continued at what he calls the pace of institutions, which he describes as slow for good reason.
What the Sandbox Tested
The sandbox centered on collateral mobility, which Ben-David calls one of the lowest hanging fruits in tokenization. He explains that roughly 70% of the collateral posted against derivatives trades in the US is cash. Today, parties often call each other to confirm whether it landed. Trade execution and settlement also stay separate, which creates errors and reconciliation work. Ben-David compares the current process to the Middle Ages.
The sandbox connected the engines that calculate who owes margin to routers running FinP2P. Those routers then told each party what to post and what to receive. After every participant approved, the assets moved. Importantly, the design supports splitting a single posting across chains. For example, a party could post half of its collateral on Ethereum and half on Hedera. Both legs would then settle together as one atomic unit.
ISDA chose tokenized money market funds to prove the thesis. Ben-David notes that these funds hold north of $5 billion today, by his recollection. If they gain acceptance as collateral, he expects the figure to climb into the hundreds of billions. The work ran in two tracks. A working group of lawyers met weekly to document the legal, regulatory, and operational side in a report. Meanwhile, the sandbox executed the scenarios the group discussed. Treasuries, securities, and even digital cash could use the same flows.
The GDF and ISDA documents describe the broader effort. According to the GDF report, a working group drew participants from more than 120 firms. Ben-David added that Ownera ran a similar European and UK sandbox the year before, with roughly 30 institutions in its first round. Together, the two efforts covered Europe, the US, and some banks from Asia.
The Cost of Connecting Two Banks
Ben-David stresses that technology alone does not stop institutions from integrating. By his estimate, connecting two institutions directly costs between $1 million and $5 million. Much of that cost comes from coordination. Five people at one bank must schedule time with five people at another. If someone misses the meeting, the group starts again.
A router model changes the math. Each institution connects once to a router, and routers then connect to each other through FinP2P. Ben-David calls this practically the only way to finish such a project at scale. His team delivered the sandbox in record time with very little integration between the parties. He credits his team and the motivated people across the industry who wanted it done.
He also describes how a client switched stablecoin venues. The client first used USDC on Hedera. Later, it wanted USDC on Arc. Ownera built a connector to Arc, and within a week the applications kept running unchanged. The client did not need to alter its interfaces or flows.
From Sandbox to Production
Ben-David separates the easy part from the hard part. Getting approval for a test trade alongside GDF and ISDA is a no-brainer, he says, because the sandbox offers a learning experience. Production demands a far heavier approval process inside each bank. Ownera now focuses on that step. The technology stays the same, while the processes and approvals change.
He defends the slow pace. Institutions manage other people’s money and assets, so they must test and verify every piece. As an entrepreneur, he would like faster progress. Still, he says he appreciates the caution.
Two use cases lead the production push. The first is margin, covering initial and variation margin. The second is intraday repo, which Ben-David describes as a market that sometimes trades nine trillion dollars a day. Settlement there happens overnight, so participants cannot trade mid-day. A firm that needs a billion dollars for two hours must borrow it overnight and pay for the full period. Tokenization lets it borrow for an hour or two instead. Ownera also hosted a session at Sibos in Miami on collateral and intraday repo, which Ben-David moderated.
Ben-David gave a clear timeline. Some initial production trades should happen this year. He expects production at scale in 2027, running across multiple chains. After margin and intraday repo, he sees securities lending, foreign exchange, and eventually 24/7 trading as next steps.
What will allow tokenized infrastructure to integrate with legacy financial systems? @amibendavid will be moderating a panel at @Sibos Miami on Monday 28th September at 9:30 AM ET to give an insider view on the topic. Among the industry leaders speaking are Dan Doney, Digital Assets CTO of @The_DTCC, Brian Cunningham, Global Head of Financial Networks at @Bloomberg , and Thomas Dugauquier , Head of Digital Assets Platform at @swiftcommunity. Thank you to all those who are speaking, and we look forward to seeing you there. Those attending our panel, or SIBOS more generally, please reach out to contact@ownera.io
— Ownera (@OwneraIO) September 25, 2026
Precision Settlement and the Early Market
Solomon asked whether orchestration across several networks and settlement legs unlocks new possibilities. Ben-David agreed and added a caution. Tokenization promised simplicity, yet multiple blockchains and platforms risk adding complexity. An orchestration layer restores the simplicity. He uses the image of a dial, where traders choose their preferred blockchain or cash instrument and the rest works the same.
Settlement does not always need to be instant, in his view. Many markets rely on netting and will continue to. The real question is when to net, whether every second, hour, day, or three days. Ben-David calls the answer precision settlement and expects it to become a requirement.
He closed with a message for institutions worried about timing. Nobody is late, he said, because the market is just beginning. He compared its direction to a freight train that is completely inevitable. Ownera plans to keep working on moving from sandbox to production. Solomon invited him back in 2027 to review the results, and Ben-David accepted.
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