Walmart and pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly have joined a growing wave of corporate opposition to OKXICE, a joint venture between cryptocurrency exchange OKX and Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), which owns the New York Stock Exchange. The two companies are among five new objectors disclosed in an updated public notice dated October 28.
Alongside Walmart and Eli Lilly, the latest companies to object are health insurance provider Cigna, cruise operator Carnival Corporation, and Arcos Dorados, the largest independent McDonald's franchisee globally. These additions bring the total number of objecting companies to 38 out of 63 initially targeted for tokenization, representing roughly 60% opposition.
The objecting companies represent combined market capitalization exceeding $19.4 billion. Previous objectors include Coca-Cola, JPMorgan Chase, Dell Technologies, AMD, Adobe, Microsoft, Alphabet, Intel, Oracle, IBM, Goldman Sachs, Wells Fargo, McDonald's, and Verizon.
OKXICE's proposed platform would enable eligible investors to trade blockchain representations of U.S. stocks around the clock using stablecoins. The tokens would be backed by actual shares held through registered broker-dealers, with trading conducted through permissioned Uniswap v4 liquidity pools on OKX's X Layer network.
The initiative operates under temporary regulatory relief established by the Securities and Exchange Commission in September. This framework allows qualifying platforms to facilitate tokenized stock trading without complying with certain traditional exchange requirements and permits publicly traded companies to object to third-party tokenization of their shares.
Public notices identify the companies submitting objections but do not disclose individual reasons for their opposition. With a majority of targeted companies now opting out, OKXICE faces a narrowing selection of equities for its initial platform offerings.
