Amundi Launched Its First On-Chain Mutual Fund: Europe’s Largest Asset Manager Is Now Issuing Natively on Blockchain

Amundi, Europe’s largest asset manager with over €2.3 trillion in assets under management, has launched SAFO, a tokenized mutual fund built on Chainlink infrastructure in partnership with regulated digital asset firm Spiko, marking the firm’s first move from crypto-themed ETFs into native blockchain issuance of its own core financial products.

What SAFO Actually Is

The Stable Asset Fund On-chain invests primarily in short-term government bonds and high-quality money market instruments. The underlying asset class is deliberately conservative. The innovation is not what the fund holds but how it operates and who can access it.

SAFO offers round-the-clock transferability and near-instant settlement, removing the bank-hours constraint that governs traditional mutual fund operations. Institutional clients can subscribe to or redeem shares directly on-chain using stablecoins, bypassing several layers of traditional intermediary infrastructure.

The fund is launched under the French AMF regulatory framework and is fully compliant with EU financial standards. Regulatory compliance is built into the structure rather than retrofitted.

That combination of conservative underlying assets, 24/7 operational availability, direct on-chain access, and regulatory standing is precisely the package institutional investors have said they need before committing to tokenized fund products at scale.

Chainlink’s Role in the Infrastructure

Chainlink provides two distinct functions within SAFO. The Cross-Chain Interoperability Protocol handles secure data feeds and cross-chain compatibility, ensuring the fund can operate across different blockchain environments without introducing additional bridge risk. That infrastructure layer is what makes the 24/7 transferability operationally reliable rather than theoretically possible.

The second function is Proof of Reserve. Chainlink’s PoR allows investors to verify the underlying collateral backing the fund in real time, on-chain, without relying on periodic third-party audits. For institutional investors accustomed to monthly or quarterly reporting on fund composition, real-time verifiable reserves represent a meaningful transparency upgrade. It also removes a category of counterparty trust that traditional fund structures require.

Where This Sits in the Institutional Wave

SAFO does not arrive in isolation. BlackRock expanded its BUIDL fund on March 15. Fidelity announced a similar always-on treasury fund on March 17. Amundi’s launch on March 19 makes three major institutional asset managers moving into tokenized government debt infrastructure within a five-day window.

The tokenized government debt market has surpassed $1.8 billion in March 2026 according to industry estimates, driven by elevated interest rates and institutional demand for yield-bearing digital assets with low risk profiles. High rates make short-duration government bonds attractive as a base asset. Tokenization makes those bonds accessible in an on-chain format that integrates with the stablecoin and DeFi infrastructure institutions are increasingly building around.

Amundi’s entry is structurally different from BlackRock and Fidelity in one respect. SAFO is issued under European regulatory jurisdiction rather than U.S. frameworks. That distinction matters for non-U.S. institutional investors who face compliance barriers when accessing American-domiciled tokenized products. A French AMF-compliant, EU-standard fund fills a gap in the institutional RWA landscape that the American launches do not address.

What Distinguishes This From Amundi’s Prior Crypto Work

Amundi has previously offered crypto-themed ETFs, products that provide exposure to digital asset prices through traditional fund structures. SAFO is categorically different. It is not an ETF tracking a crypto index. It is a mutual fund natively issued on blockchain infrastructure, where the fund itself exists and operates on-chain rather than referencing on-chain assets from a traditional wrapper.

That distinction is the one the institutional market has been waiting for from a manager of Amundi’s scale. A €2.3 trillion asset manager issuing its own core financial products natively on blockchain removes a significant credibility barrier for other European institutions evaluating similar moves. The question of whether tokenized fund issuance is appropriate for serious asset managers has a different answer today than it did last week.

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