SBI Financial Services, a subsidiary of Japanese conglomerate SBI Holdings, has agreed to take a minority stake in B2C2, a crypto Liquidity provider, for $30 million.
Announced on Wednesday, the London-headquartered firm will serve as the primary liquidity provider of SBI as the giant expands its crypto offering to millions of existing customers.
In exchange, B2C2 can enhance its prime brokerage services with the Japanese conglomerate’s distribution network.
Commenting on the investment, Yoshitaka Kitao, president and CEO of SBI Holdings, said: “We expect a lot of synergies with B2C2, a firm which has a large number of clients globally and offers abundant liquidity, excellent price competitiveness, and a diverse suite of products for their customers. We will work to develop innovative new crypto products and deepen synergies across our group of companies.”
Expansion plans in the pipeline
The liquidity provider also has plans to launch a fully automated facility providing the most competitive two-way prices in the funding market later this month.
This might turn out to be one of the biggest deals inked in the crypto prime brokerage market. With an increasing institutional interest in digital currencies, new companies are tapping into this market while existing players are making their footprint stronger.
“Today’s deal with SBI takes B2C2 a big step forward,” Max Boonen, founder of B2C2, added. “Having claimed the top spot in our segment thanks to the technological edge of our single dealer platform, we found in SBI the right partner to unlock the next drivers of our growth.”
“B2C2 will benefit from SBI’s balance sheet, which is far larger than anything committed to the crypto market to date. It will complement our asset liability management framework - the most sophisticated in the market - to deliver an Execution platform that will not only be a game-changer in crypto, but also positions us to expand across asset classes as we set our sights on the $20bn-a-year prime brokerage market.”
