A group of foreign investors looking to buy the iconic Plaza Hotel in New York City is considering an initial coin offering to help fund the transaction.
The foreign group, under the name Chimera, is considering proposing the "Plaza Token," an asset-backed securitized token, according to a draft of a white paper on the project reviewed by CNBC and a source familiar with the matter. Talks are still early, and a deal has not yet been finalized.
The ICO platform Securitize is said to be advising the Chimera group on the potential Plaza Token offering. If this specific coin were to debut, it would give cryptocurrency investors the chance to diversify into luxury real estate and receive certain concessions inside the Plaza Hotel.
The Plaza Token would give an investor a small portion of equity in a group that is invested in Plaza Hotel. The Chimera group is hoping to raise more than $375 million in its token offering. No funds have been raised as of yet, and there is no guarantee that an ICO would be successful.
The Plaza Hotel declined to comment.
The talks are currently taking place between Chimera's principal investor, Shahal Khan, and India's Sahara Group, majority owner of the Plaza Hotel. Khan founded Colt Resources Middle East, a copper, lithium and gold mining company, in 2013, and is a chairman of Trinity White City Ventures, a Dubai-based family office, according to the draft white paper.
The Sahara Group has been trying to sell its investment in the New York Plaza for quite some time but has so far failed to find a buyer.
Subrata Roy, chairman of Sahara Group, has been embroiled in a scandal in India and was sent to jail in 2014 for refusing to pay billions of dollars back to bond investors.
Since then, Roy has attempted to offload his overseas assets, including the Plaza.