Baillie Gifford adopts Ethereum as legal register for UK funds

UK fund law already requires a formal record of who owns shares in an open-ended vehicle, and Baillie Gifford has now tied that record to Ethereum for its UK funds. The arrangement places a mainstream asset manager inside a public-blockchain workflow rather than a closed internal database. That makes the register itself part of the story, not just the fund’s portfolio or performance.

For investors, administrators, and transfer agents, ownership records that sit on Ethereum or Solana can change how subscriptions, redemptions, and transfers are handled. A UK-regulated OEIC such as Baillie Gifford Enhanced Yield Fund still has to follow the legal framework around fund ownership, but the recordkeeping layer is now visibly blockchain-based. That can simplify some operational steps while also pushing more responsibility onto the systems that maintain the chain record.

The move sits at the point where traditional asset management meets public infrastructure, which raises the question of how much of finance should be run on open networks versus private ledgers. Baillie Gifford’s step also shows that blockchain use is no longer limited to payments or speculative trading; it is entering the plumbing of regulated investment products. The trade-off is between greater transparency and integration on one side and added dependence on a network architecture that is external to the fund house on the other.

Still open is how widely Baillie Gifford will extend this setup across its UK range and how the legal register will operate across Ethereum and Solana in practice. The reports do not say whether the arrangement is already live across all relevant fund processes or whether it applies only to the named fund and related UK products. The next useful detail would be the operational and legal rules Baillie Gifford is using to reconcile on-chain records with the official fund register.