Crypto exchange OKX has raised new funding at a $25 billion valuation from a group of backers that spans a stablecoin issuer, a British bank, and a London quantitative hedge fund, according to Bloomberg.

Circle Internet Group, the issuer of the USDC stablecoin, blockchain payments firm Ripple, and Standard Chartered's investment arm SC Ventures all took part, alongside Qube Research & Technologies, which is new to the exchange's cap table. OKX declined to disclose how much it raised.

The round comes at the same valuation set in March, when Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), the owner of the New York Stock Exchange, invested roughly $200 million in OKX in a deal framed at the time around tokenized securities. Seven months on, the per-share price has not moved. The new money therefore arrives at ICE's entry price even as the exchange pushes further into tokenized U.S. equities and stock derivatives.

The fresh capital "focuses on strengthening OKX's long-term market infrastructure," Haider Rafique, the exchange's global managing partner, said in a statement.

QRT, a Credit Suisse spinout that already runs a crypto fund holding about $1 billion, said its investment reflects confidence in "the long-term growth of digital assets and 24/7 markets," according to Thomas Eaton, a quantitative trading director at the firm.

The raise deepens a partnership ICE and OKX have been building since March. Their joint venture, OKXICE LLC, said on Monday that it is seeking approval to offer tokenized stock in 63 U.S. public companies, with Nvidia, Apple, and Coca-Cola among them.

The offering would operate under the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's innovation exemption, introduced in September days after the Clarity Act stalled in the Senate. The exemption allows qualifying venues to trade tokenized U.S. equities on public blockchains for up to five years without registering as national securities exchanges. It covers only tokens carrying the same rights as ordinary shares, including dividends and voting, while synthetic products that merely track a price are excluded.

The framework also caps the number of stocks each venue can list and gives issuers 30 days to object to a third party tokenizing their shares. On that timetable, Nvidia, Apple, and Coca-Cola would each hold a veto over whether their stock appears on the venue at all. Whether the SEC approves the application, and whether any of the 63 issuers invoke their 30-day objection, are the next checkpoints for the venue.

OKX has been building equity exposure through other routes as well, having listed perpetual futures on Magnificent Seven stocks and the S&P 500.