Yesterday EDX Markets, the institution backed crypto exchange, announced it had started trading and has received additional funding. It was unveiled last September with backing from Charles Schwab, Citadel Securities, Fidelity Digital Assets, Paradigm, Sequoia Capital, Virtu Financial and others.
At the time it claimed a key differentiator was access via a traditional broker-dealer rather than a crypto exchange. With the collapse of FTX, now it emphasizes a non-custodial model designed to mitigate conflicts of interest.
The announcement states that “EDX also introduced a retail-only quote to the crypto markets, allowing participants the benefit of better pricing for retail-originated orders.”
So far the products supported are Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Litecoin (LTC) and Bitcoin Cash (BCH). Notably, these are all more likely to be considered commodities which is highly relevant given the SEC’s litigation with other exchanges.
“We are committed to bringing the best of traditional finance to cryptocurrency markets, with an infrastructure built by market experts to embed key institutional best practices,” said Jamil Nazarali, CEO of EDX.
It has plans to launch EDX Clearing later this year to settle trades matched on EDX Markets against a central counterparty.
The new investors include Miami International Holdings, DV Crypto, GTS, GSR Markets, and HRT Technology.
Last year it announced Paxos as its custody partner. However, the firm is not listed as a technology partner on its website. Instead, anchorage digital is mentioned alongside MemX for the trading engine. EDX uses cfbenchmarks, the same crypto index provider used by the CME and BlackRock. Other providers include Deltix, Talos, and Elwood Technologies.
