The blockchain-native sovereign bond is redefining sovereign finance, advancing blockchain infrastructure, expanding financial inclusion, and enabling compliant, institutional-grade digital assets for the future of global capital markets.
Mark, could you walk us through your professional background and the key experiences that shaped your perspective on building financial infrastructure like M1X Global?
Throughout my career, from founding Shipyard Software to serving on the board of GMO Trust, the NYDFS-regulated issuer of the world’s first regulated Yen stablecoin, my focus has been on bringing blockchain infrastructure into mainstream finance in a way that is safe, compliant and institutionally credible. Blockchain technology has now been developing for more than a decade. We see a major opportunity in identifying where blockchain rails can responsibly improve financial systems, expand access, reduce risk and support long-term economic development.
In the Republic of the Marshall Islands, we supported the country in their development and their issuance of USDM1: a blockchain-native sovereign bond structured under New York law and backed 1:1 by U.S. Treasury instruments.
We brought together some of the industry’s leading digital asset custodians, trust companies and blockchain intelligence providers, including Anchorage Digital, Surus and Inca. As a natively-issued sovereign bond that qualifies for use as institutional collateral, USDM1 illustrates how sovereign financial instruments can move with 24/7 programmable settlement and integrate into collateral workflows with robust U.S. close-out netting protections. In short, USDM1 provides enforceable protection for holders with legal certainty, while maintaining the capital efficiency, interoperability and regulatory compatibility global finance requires.
What gap in today’s sovereign finance system did you and your co-founders, including Jordan Goldman, originally set out to solve with USDM1?
In the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI), we worked in partnership with the government over several years to support their development and issuance of USDM1: a U.S. dollar-denominated, blockchain-native sovereign bond structured under New York law and backed 1:1 by U.S. Treasury instruments.
The Marshall Islands faces real-world infrastructure challenges shared by many geographically dispersed nations. Its banking system has come under pressure from the retreat of correspondent banking across the Pacific over the past 20 years, and delivering government support across more than 1,200 islands spread over an ocean area roughly the size of Mexico has historically been slow, costly and operationally complex.
USDM1 was designed to address these challenges in a responsible and practical way. Issued natively by the Government on the Stellar blockchain, USDM1 gives the government an additional instrument and digital rails to distribute funds to citizens quickly and securely, including to remote and underserved communities that are difficult to reach through traditional banking infrastructure.
To advance financial inclusion across the RMI, the Ministry of Finance, Banking and Postal Services announced a collaboration with the Bank of Guam in June, accepting USDM1 for deposits and withdrawals. The collaboration also saw the integration of the RMI’s Lomalo digital wallet for Bank of Guam deposit account holders.
As the first sovereign, USD-denominated bond issued natively on-chain and backed 1:1 by U.S. Treasuries, USDM1 combines the legal, regulatory and economic characteristics of traditional government bonds with the speed, programmability and 24/7 settlement capabilities of blockchain infrastructure.
That means the same system that can deliver funds into a citizen’s digital wallet in seconds can also serve as a secure, programmable bridge to global institutional markets. The same instrument can serve in the second instance as collateral. In the Marshall Islands, USDM1 is a live example of how blockchain infrastructure can modernize government finance, expand access, reduce operational friction and create new pathways between a domestic economy and global capital markets.
Sovereign debt has traditionally been highly static and institutionally constrained. How do you define the shift toward “internet-native” sovereign finance, and why does it matter now?
The Government of the Republic of the Marshall Islands issued USDM1 as a blockchain-native sovereign bond, structured under New York law and backed 1:1 by U.S. Treasury instruments. What makes USDM1 so unique is that the same foundation can serve two important purposes: it can help governments deliver benefits to citizens quickly and reliably, and also serve as a modernization of high-quality collateral for access by 24/7 institutional markets.
Unlike a stablecoin or a wrapped version of an existing asset, USDM1 is a fully secured, USD-denominated sovereign bond issued directly by a government operating exclusively on the US dollar standard. It is collateralized 1:1 by US Treasury instruments in the style of a Brady bond. USDM1 combines the legal and economic characteristics of a secured sovereign bond with the speed, transparency and always-on functionality of blockchain infrastructure.
Through partners including Anchorage Digital, USDM1 is able to be utilized across public-sector and institutional use cases. For the government of the RMI, it supports faster and more efficient disbursements to citizens. For financial institutions, it can serve as high quality collateral capable of supporting margin and financing workflows in a 24/7, always-on capital markets environment.
How do you balance blockchain-native design with established legal frameworks such as the UCC to ensure enforceability and trust?
USDM1 bridges the speed and efficiency of blockchain infrastructure with legal certainty, institutional agreement compatibility and rigorous compliance standards.
This is not a new type of financial product outside the existing system. USDM1 is a modernization of one of the most well-known and safely used structures that already exist in the global financial system – Brady bonds – which have supported over $150 billion in issuance, and over $10 trillion of historical use in secondary markets. USDM1 just uses modern technology as settlement rails.
When you zoom out, USDM1 is sovereign debt issued directly by the Government of the Republic of the Marshall Islands in the style of a fully collateralized Brady bond, with issuance, collateral and redemption under New York law. It is backed by U.S. Treasuries and held by a US trust company. The entire instrument is built to operate within established legal and regulatory frameworks – notably under New York and U.S. law – with an explicit waiver of sovereign immunity.
That distinction matters because USDM1 is not a stablecoin, a wrapped token or a digital claim on something sitting elsewhere. It is a government-issued financial instrument that combines the protections of traditional secured sovereign debt issued under a NY law indenture, with the ability to move and settle on modern digital rails.
USDM1’s availability through platforms such as Anchorage Digital demonstrates that balance in practice. Institutions can hold and use USDM1 in a way that feels familiar to traditional institutional holders. This familiarity with leading institutions is already paying off. Just last week, we were named in a tokenized collateral working group convened by ISDA and Global Digital Finance to simulate how tokenized collateral can be used to improve collateral mobility.
How does the infrastructure supporting the Marshall Islands’ Universal Basic Income initiative evolve into a form of high-quality, liquid collateral for global financial markets?
For citizens in the Marshall Islands, the impact is straightforward. Instead of waiting in long lines, relying on paper checks or travelling significant distances to access funds, eligible recipients can opt-in to receive distributions directly into a digital wallet in seconds.
The same infrastructure also has significance beyond aid disbursement. What enables faster benefit delivery for citizens can also support more efficient movement of collateral and liquidity for institutions. In that sense, USDM1 demonstrates how one sovereign financial instrument can serve both domestic public needs and global market use cases.
The idea of sovereign finance intersecting with public infrastructure is relatively new; how do you see this reshaping the relationship between governments, citizens, and capital markets?
We are entering a new era in finance globally where modern technology allows near-instant, low cost, 24/7 settlement. That means financial instruments like sovereign bonds can also become more flexible, more accessible and more useful in a digital global economy.
Older technology and systems impose constraints that create friction for institutions operating in a 24/7 global economy, and make it harder for governments to deliver services efficiently.
That is why we’re working with governments and leading global partners to understand how blockchain technology and existing legal and regulatory frameworks can modernize infrastructure and service delivery in a responsible way. Our focus is on using blockchain technology where it can create clear, practical value, while remaining fully aligned with the legal, regulatory and institutional standards that global finance depends on.
The project has attracted attention from figures such as Balaji Srinivasan and leadership connected to Coinbase, as well as advisors like Peter Dittus, what signals does this send about institutional readiness for digital sovereign instruments?
The backing we have attracted speaks to where the market is heading. M1X has attracted support from Balaji Srinivasan, former CTO of Coinbase, and Dr. Peter Dittus, former Secretary General of the Bank for International Settlements, in part because we are seeing a broader shift in digital assets from experimentation to real institutional adoption.
We have also seen significant interest from leading venture capital firms and strategic investors. Just 14 weeks after our angel raise, we closed a seed funding round in early July. The oversubscribed round was led by Paradigm, one of the largest and most prominent investment firms in frontier technologies, with strategic participation from Breed VC, and brings M1X Global’s total funding to $8.5 million.
Recent momentum reinforces growing demand for digital asset infrastructure that does not seek to bypass the financial system, but instead works within established legal and regulatory frameworks to make it more efficient and more accessible.
As M1X Global scales, how are partnerships with firms like Anchorage Digital and Surus shaping your path toward broader institutional adoption?
Anchorage Digital is a significant partner because it shows USDM1 fits into the regulated environments institutions already understand and trust. Anchorage is America’s first federally chartered digital asset bank, and is regulated by the OCC. It provides custody, settlement and account infrastructure needed for institutions to hold and use digital assets safely. USDM1 has been acknowledged by Anchorage as the first secured, USD-denominated sovereign bond on-chain. The instrument has also been shown to meet its rigorous standards for institutional use.
Making USDM1 available to qualified institutions through a federally regulated platform like Anchorage shows that blockchain-native sovereign instruments can operate inside regulated financial infrastructure, and be used by institutional participants as sovereign collateral in real-world settings.
Over time, natively issued sovereign instruments like USDM1 could become an important new form of 24/7 collateral for institutional markets. If sovereign assets can move securely in real time, delays and frictions built into today’s financial system that introduce cost and risk could become less necessary.
Finally, what advice would you give to founders and policymakers trying to build credible, compliant, and globally adopted financial infrastructure at the intersection of blockchain and sovereign systems?
We are committed to a responsible approach to innovation that prioritizes financial stability, regulatory alignment and long-term fiscal sustainability.
Innovation in sovereign finance carries obligations as well as opportunities, and USDM1’s structures are designed to be consistent with applicable law, established sovereign debt frameworks and best practices in custody, enforceability, compliance and creditor protections. At the same time – and our advice to policymakers – is to focus on ground-level issues, and how to improve them. Build a system that utilizes the best of new technology, while also being rooted in fixing real-world problems for regular people first. Additional use cases and implementations will follow.
Quote:
“Innovation in digital sovereign finance carries obligations as well as opportunities, and all governments and companies involved should prioritize financial stability, regulatory alignment, and long-term fiscal sustainability.”
