Ondo Finance (ONDO): what it sells, what the token gives you and who controls the company

Ondo Finance is a crypto company that turns US Treasuries and US stocks into tokens. On 19 October 2026 its website showed $2.36 billion in USDY, a yield-bearing dollar token, $1.32 billion in Ondo Stocks spread over more than 450 assets, and $320 million in OUSG, a Treasury token with restricted access. The ONDO token is something else. It votes in the Ondo DAO and gives holders no share of that business.

Who runs the company is also unsettled. Founder Nathan Allman died in late May 2026, and Ian De Bode, then president, took over as chief executive. In July the representative of Allman’s estate asked a Delaware court to decide who controls Ondo Finance Inc. No ruling or settlement had been reported by 19 October 2026.

What is Ondo Finance? Tokenized funds and stocks, plus a DAO token

Allman, who had built crypto services for institutional clients at Goldman Sachs, founded Ondo in 2021, according to Cryptoast. The company’s documentation describes two sides: an asset management arm that creates and runs tokenized products, and a technology arm that builds DeFi protocols meant to run on their own, under separate governance, in time.

Two ideas carry most of the business. A tokenized Treasury is a token whose value rests on short-term US government debt held off-chain, usually through a fund. The holder earns the bills’ yield, minus fees, and can move the token on a blockchain at any hour. A tokenized stock does the same for a share: a regulated firm holds the real share, and the token tracks it.

Neither works without the off-chain side. A blockchain cannot check that a fund share or a stock really sits in an account, so the token is worth what the legal wrapper and the custodians make it worth.

On 19 October 2026 Ondo’s documentation listed five product lines: Ondo Stocks, Ondo Intelligent Portfolios, Ondo Private Markets, USDY and OUSG. ONDO is not one of them. Its documentation is published by the Ondo Foundation, a body separate from the company, Ondo Finance Inc.

OUSG and USDY: Ondo’s tokenized US Treasuries

OUSG came first, in 2023. According to Ondo’s trust and security page, the majority of its assets sit in BlackRock’s BUIDL fund, with funds from Fidelity, Franklin Templeton and WisdomTree also used, and Coinbase mainly handles the switch between USDC and dollars, with Circle as the alternative. Ondo is a client of BlackRock’s tokenized fund, not a BlackRock company.

Access to OUSG is restricted. Ondo’s documentation calls it a “qualified-access” Treasury token, and Ledger Insights reported in July 2025 that it was open only to accredited investors under the Regulation D Rule 506(c) exemption. The website advertises minting and redemption around the clock and says the token is built for institutional investors.

USDY followed on 3 August 2023, for individuals and institutions outside the United States; the launch release said it would not be sold to US persons. Ondo’s documentation calls it a tokenized note secured by US Treasuries, issued by Ondo USDY LLC, which is registered with FinCEN as a money services business. The website labels it a “permissionless yieldcoin”. Unlike a payment stablecoin, it passes Treasury yield on to holders.

USDY keeps adding networks: Ondo announced it live on BNB Chain on 4 August 2026 and on Tempo on 27 August. A separate service, Nexus, lets issuers of tokenized Treasuries and stablecoins offer instant minting and redemption. The partner tokens shown on Ondo’s site include BUIDL, USDC, Franklin Templeton’s BENJI, RLUSD and PYUSD.

Ondo tokenized stocks: how Ondo Global Markets works

Ondo Global Markets is the name behind Ondo Stocks, launched in September 2025. Each token tracks one US stock or ETF and carries the suffix “on”: SPYon for the SPDR S&P 500 ETF, CRCLon for Circle, SHVon for a short-term Treasury ETF. On 19 October 2026 RWA.xyz listed SHVon at about $294.5 million and CRCLon at about $98.1 million.

The count of assets has almost doubled in five months. On 11 May 2026 Ondo said the platform had passed $1 billion in total value locked, which it called a first for tokenized stocks, with $18 billion of cumulative trading volume and more than 260 stocks and ETFs on Solana, Ethereum and BNB Chain. The same release claimed over 70% of the market among tokenized equity issuers, citing RWA.xyz; we could not check that figure. By October the website showed more than 450 assets.

Most buyers do not come through an Ondo app. The May release named Binance, Bitget, MetaMask and Blockchain.com among the distributors. The website marks Ondo Stocks as not available in the US.

The most technical step came on 15 July 2026. Ondo announced what it called the first tokenized stocks based on DTC Tokenized Entitlements, generated through DTCC’s tokenization service, starting with Circle and the SPY ETF; the broker Alpaca connects Ondo to the DTC participant network. “Ondo is the only company simultaneously building all pathways for US securities tokenization,” De Bode said in the announcement, a company claim.

Other 2026 steps: proxy voting for token holders through Broadridge (28 April), a route for institutions to convert shares they already hold into Ondo Stocks (21 September), a listing on near.com and NEAR Intents (22 September), and a partnership with Kakaopay Securities on distributing Korean equities (29 September).

The rails Ondo used in July are now opening to others: the DTCC tokenization service began its rollout with 25 securities this month. In the US, the SEC’s innovation exemption gives listed companies notice of some third-party tokens of their shares and a chance to object, as our report on AMC, Robinhood and the SEC queue explains.

Perps, Private Markets and Ondo’s other new products

Ondo Perps was announced on 3 February 2026 with a waitlist: perpetual futures with leverage of up to 20 times, for non-US users only, with tokenized securities to be added as collateral shortly after launch. Ondo wrote on 27 July that it had gone live the week before. DefiLlama lists it, without TVL data.

The newest line, Ondo Private Markets, arrived on 5 October 2026. It sells tokenized notes that pay out according to the value of a private company’s shares at a liquidity event, beginning with an unnamed AI company that has not yet listed. The announcement speaks of “eligible investors worldwide” but names neither the issuing entity nor the eligibility rules.

Ondo Intelligent Portfolios, announced on 24 September 2026, packs a curated set of Ondo stocks and ETFs into one token. Few details were public on 19 October.

Flux Finance, a lending protocol for permissioned assets governed by the Ondo DAO, is small next to the rest. DefiLlama showed $43.64 million deposited and $34.69 million borrowed on 19 October 2026, and $138,896 in fees over the previous 30 days.

Ondo Chain became Ondo Network, which is not a blockchain today

At its first New York summit on 6 February 2025, Ondo announced Ondo Chain, a layer 1 blockchain for institutions and real-world assets. Cointelegraph noted at the time that no launch date was given, and none followed.

On 27 July 2026 Ondo introduced Ondo Network as “the continuation of what we set out to build with Ondo Chain”. The same post says plainly that it is not a blockchain today. Code runs inside hardware enclaves, known as trusted execution environments. Independent attestors, acting under a quorum, check that code and hold split key shares, and asset transfers settle on a public blockchain. Its first application is Ondo Perps.

For now one enclave does the work. A larger permissionless attestor set and proof-of-stake security appear in the post as possible future directions, without dates. There is no Ondo Chain network to use or stake on.

Ondo Finance TVL and usage in figures

DefiLlama does not show a value locked for Ondo’s tokenized products: its ondo-finance page lists the yield assets, Global Markets and Perps without a TVL series. The figures below come from Ondo’s website and RWA.xyz, read on 19 October 2026 unless stated.

Added together, the three main products come to about $4 billion, by our arithmetic. Ondo itself put its total value locked at $3.9 billion on 5 October. The two holder counts measure different things: the website figure appears without a label tying it to one product, and the blog figure counts everyone who has ever held.

The ONDO token: governance only, and a quiet DAO

ONDO is an ERC-20 token on Ethereum and the governance token of the Ondo DAO and Flux Finance. The Ondo Foundation’s token page mentions no right to the fees or profits of Ondo Finance Inc. Holding ONDO does not make anyone a shareholder of the company that issues USDY, OUSG or the stock tokens.

Voting is open to all holders. “Locked tokens can still vote in the DAO,” the Foundation’s documentation says.

Little has been put to a vote. Tally listed nine proposals on 19 October 2026, the latest being FIP-08, the release of the token lock-up, executed on 12 January 2024, and its page carries a notice that the DAO is paused there. In a thread on the governance forum opened on 8 March 2026, a holder argued that governance had been inactive since 2024 and that the success of Ondo’s products does not reach token holders.

The clearest attempt to change that is a “temperature check” posted on the forum on 18 June 2026 by a community member. It would send 20% of net protocol revenue, rising to 40% over time, to buying and burning ONDO. Its author calls it “not a binding on-chain proposal” and says the Foundation’s legal review would still matter. The thread was last active on 24 September, with replies only from community members. Ondo publishes no revenue figure.

ONDO tokenomics and the January 2027 unlock

Supply was set at 10 billion ONDO at launch, and the Foundation’s documentation says there is no scheduled or planned inflation. The FIP-08 allocation gives about 52.1% to Ecosystem Growth, 33% to Protocol Development, about 12.9% to Private Sales and about 2% to the community sale held on CoinList. CoinGecko counted about 4.87 billion ONDO in circulation on 19 October 2026.

ONDO became transferable on 18 January 2024, and the locked pools are released in yearly steps on that anniversary. The third falls on 18 January 2027: about 1.94 billion ONDO (19.4% of supply) under the FIP-08 charts, or 1.71 billion according to DefiLlama and Tokenomics.com. Our page on the 18 January 2027 Ondo unlock explains the gap and the two cliffs that follow, and our token unlock explainer covers how such releases work in general.

One holder matters more since May. CoinDesk reported on 17 September 2026 that the founder’s estate holds a very large amount of ONDO, part of it still to unlock over the next three years. The exact amount is not public.

Ondo Finance CEO: who runs the company after Nathan Allman’s death

Ondo announced on 26 May 2026 that its founder had died suddenly; CoinDesk later gave his age as 32. Ian De Bode, the president, was named chief executive. On 19 October 2026 Ondo’s team page listed Allman as founder and De Bode as “Acting CEO and President”.

The same page lists Patrick McHenry as vice chairman and Mark Janoff as general counsel, along with managing directors for institutions, partnerships, product portfolios and business development. Ondo hired Allison Parent, a former executive director of the Global Financial Markets Association, as chief policy officer on 28 August 2026, and CoinDesk reported on 6 August that Adam Schlisman, formerly of Blockchain.com, had become chief financial officer.

The Delaware case over control of Ondo Finance Inc.

On 24 July 2026 the personal representative of the founder’s estate, appointed by a Hawaii probate court on 26 June, filed a verified complaint against Ondo Finance Inc. in the Delaware Court of Chancery, The Block and CoinDesk reported on 6 August. The complaint alleges that the estate holds a controlling voting interest in the company; the size of that interest is redacted. It alleges that De Bode presented himself as CEO without board approval and made himself sole director.

The estate also alleges that, on 24 July, a board it had reconstituted voted to remove De Bode from all his positions and named the estate’s representative chair and chief executive. It asks the court to decide who lawfully controls Ondo and to block extraordinary corporate actions while the case runs. De Bode told The Block the claims are “meritless” and that the company keeps the support of its lead investors and the Ondo Foundation.

The latest status we found dates from 17 September 2026. CoinDesk reported then that, under a court order of 3 September, De Bode remained acting CEO and a board member. The estate also alleges breaches of fiduciary duty and seeks to void equity and token awards granted to him, part of a package CoinDesk valued at about $11 million. Ondo declined to comment to CoinDesk.

A final search on 19 October 2026 found no ruling on the merits, no settlement and no newer court date. Product launches continued through September and October.

Regulation: a US broker-dealer, a closed SEC probe and an approved prospectus in Europe

In July 2025 Ondo agreed to buy Oasis Pro, a FINRA member that brought an SEC-registered broker-dealer, an alternative trading system and transfer agent registration, Ledger Insights reported. The Block reported on 6 October 2025 that Ondo had completed the deal. On 16 September 2026 Ondo said its subsidiary Oasis Pro Markets had become the first tokenization member of DTCC’s Fund/SERV, a system Ondo says processes more than 85% of US mutual fund transaction activity.

The SEC had been looking at Ondo. Ondo said on 8 December 2025 that the agency had closed a confidential investigation without charges. According to The Block, the inquiry began in 2024 and looked at whether Ondo’s tokenization complied with securities law and whether ONDO is a security; an SEC spokesperson said the agency does not confirm or deny investigations. “Being early and being successful came with scrutiny,” Ondo said.

Ondo’s May 2026 release adds that it has confidentially filed a registration statement with the SEC. If approved, Ondo says, Ondo Global Markets would become the first issuer of transferable tokenized stocks subject to SEC reporting requirements. No decision has been reported.

Europe works through securities law. Ondo announced on 18 November 2025 that Liechtenstein’s Financial Market Authority (FMA) had approved its tokenized stocks and ETFs for the EEA, Cointelegraph reported. The FMA certificate dated 5 May 2026 approves a supplement to the base prospectus of Ondo Global Markets (BVI) Limited under the EU Prospectus Regulation 2017/1129, and it is addressed to every other EEA regulator, the AMF in France and CONSOB in Italy among them.

The certificate describes the securities as debt securities of less than €100,000. A European buyer of a stock token therefore holds a note issued by a company in the British Virgin Islands under an approved prospectus. It is not a crypto-asset authorised under MiCA, the EU rules that our MiCA regulation guide describes. Blockchain.com and Ondo said on 3 February 2026 that users in 30 EEA states could buy more than 200 tokenized US stocks and ETFs in its DeFi wallet; availability still depends on the distributor and the country.

We found no EU status for USDY or OUSG, and the ONDO token is not covered by the prospectus.

Ondo funding: Founders Fund, Pantera and Coinbase Ventures

Ondo’s token documentation lists a $4 million equity investment from seed investors. On 27 April 2022 The Block reported a $20 million Series A co-led by Founders Fund and Pantera Capital, with Coinbase Ventures, Tiger Global, GoldenTree Asset Management, Wintermute, Flow Traders, Steel Perlot and an unnamed Ivy League endowment. It was an equity round with token rights, and it brought the total raised to $24 million.

Seed and Series A investors each hold under 7% of ONDO, locked for a year and then released over 48 months, according to the docs. The CoinList sale came in two tranches, of about 0.3% and 1.7% of supply. Ondo Catalyst, a $250 million initiative announced with Pantera on 3 July 2025, invests in other tokenization projects. It is not money raised by Ondo.

Ondo Finance audits and security record

The audit page of Ondo’s documentation listed 28 entries on 19 October 2026. We checked seven of them on the auditors’ own sites or repositories. Code4rena ran three contests: the January 2023 report found one high and five medium issues, the September 2023 contest four medium issues, and the contest that opened in late March 2024 one high and four medium. Cyfrin reviewed Ondo Finance v2.0 in April 2024 and Ondo Global Markets v2.0 in July 2025.

Spearbit, through Cantina, reviewed the protocol between 25 February and 16 March 2025 and reported 25 findings, one of them medium; 20 were fixed and five acknowledged. Zellic’s report on Ondo Global Markets for Solana appeared in its public repository on 2 March 2026. The rest of the list, from Halborn, FYEO, Zokyo, Nethermind and later Cantina reviews, plus older reports on retired products, rests on Ondo’s own listing.

Ondo’s website links a bug bounty on Immunefi, with no amount given, and DefiLlama records no hack. Audits look at smart contracts. They say nothing about custodians, legal wrappers or who controls the company.

Ondo Finance risks: control, token rights and partners

The products hold billions of dollars and sit inside regulated US subsidiaries and a European prospectus. The weak points are elsewhere, and they are not the same for someone holding USDY and someone holding ONDO.

Until the Delaware court rules or the parties settle, it is not certain who will direct Ondo Finance Inc. A different outcome could reach strategy, hires and pay; Tech Times noted in August that decisions taken since May, such as the policy chief’s hire, could be questioned if the court sided with the estate.

ONDO holders face a different problem. The token gives votes in a DAO that has executed nothing since January 2024 and no claim on the company’s income, and the fee switch is a forum idea. Supply adds pressure: a large release on 18 January 2027, two more cliffs after it under FIP-08, and an estate with a large holding.

Product users depend on a chain of partners. OUSG relies on BUIDL and other funds plus Coinbase and Circle, the DTC-based stocks on Alpaca, and sales on exchanges and wallets that can change their offer. BlackRock is at once Ondo’s main supplier and a rival; Franklin Templeton, Securitize, Robinhood’s stock tokens and xStocks chase the same buyers, and the DTCC service could bring banks onto the same rails. We found no neutral market-share figure.

Then the rules. The products are securities, kept away from US retail investors and sold in Europe under a prospectus, and the end of the SEC probe rests on Ondo’s own account. None of this is investment advice.

What to watch next at Ondo

Three dates or decisions are in view: a ruling or settlement in Delaware, the 18 January 2027 unlock, and any answer from the Foundation to the fee-switch idea. Further out sit the SEC’s decision on the registration statement and whether Ondo Network ever opens its attestor set to outsiders.