tl;dr
NASDAQ-listed Verb Technology has raised over $558 million to pivot fully toward Toncoin, rebranding as TON Strategy Co. (TSC), becoming the first publicly traded company to hold TON as its primary treasury asset. The funding round, led by Kingsway Capital and including investors like Pantera Capita...
NASDAQ-listed Verb Technology has secured over $558 million to pivot entirely toward Toncoin, rebranding itself as “TON Strategy Co.” (TSC). This move marks it as the first publicly traded firm dedicated to holding TON as its primary treasury reserve asset. The oversubscribed funding round was led by Kingsway Capital and attracted 110 top-tier investors, including Pantera Capital, Animoca Brands, and Kraken, underscoring the strong institutional interest in TON.
This strategic shift follows earlier reports indicating the Ton Foundation’s plans to raise funds for similar treasury purposes. The new company aims to establish a crypto-native treasury model that blends long-term TON holdings with staking rewards, leveraging TON’s deep integration with Telegram’s massive user base of 900 million for potential widespread adoption.
To steer this ambitious transition, TSC has assembled an all-star leadership team: Manuel Stotz, Kingsway founder and TON Foundation President, will serve as chairman; Veronika Kapustina, formerly a Morgan Stanley banker, assumes the CEO role; and Sarah Olsen, ex-JPMorgan blockchain division, is CFO. They will maintain operations in social commerce through platforms like MARKET.live and LyveCom, while blockchain expert Peter Smith (Blockchain.com CEO) advises treasury operations.
The market responded positively to the announcement. Verb’s stock price soared, more than doubling on its first day of trading post-announcement and pushing its market cap above $1 billion. Meanwhile, Toncoin itself experienced a 4.55% price increase over 24 hours, reaching $3.59, with market capitalization climbing to $9.23 billion and a 10.5% increase in trading volume to approximately $386 million. Phased supply figures show a circulating supply of 2.56 billion TON out of a total 5.13 billion tokens, implying a fully diluted valuation around $18.49 billion.