Talos, a technology provider for the institutional trading of crypto-assets, revealed on November 23, 2020, that the order flow from six (over-the-counter) OTC liquidity providers has been successfully integrated into its “end-to-end” trading platform.
According to a release shared with Crowdfund Insider, these Talos partners include Alameda Research, B2C2, Cumberland, Galaxy Digital, Genesis, and Hehmeyer.
The announcement noted:
“With the addition of these liquidity partners to the Talos platform, which already includes connectivity to [various] cryptocurrency exchanges, institutional investment firms and broker-dealers can … access the vast majority of digital asset liquidity.”
Anton Katz, co-founder and CEO at Talos, explained that OTC liquidity providers play a key role in the crypto-assets trading landscape and they also account for a major portion of the institutional traded volume. Katz also mentioned that access to these sources of liquidity is important for price discovery and “best execution” for institutional traders and service providers as they increase their exposure to this nascent asset class.
Katz further noted that the addition of these OTC liquidity partners to the Talos platform allows the service provider to connect their clients with a large network of liquidity in real-time while offering them the “best execution capabilities.”
Paul Famighetti, Cumberland’s Global Head of OTC Technology, said that his firm sees “tremendous” opportunity in the trading platform developed by Talos, which provides the advanced trading capabilities that institutional investors are looking for as they increase their involvement in this emerging asset class.
Fainghetti added:
“Since its founding, Cumberland has been focused on bringing deep liquidity and a world-class experience to our counterparties, and Talos’ platform is a powerful tool to advance this work.”
Rob Catalanello, CEO and President of B2C2 USA, noted that his firm is pleased to now provide their competitive OTC pricing and “continuous” two-way markets to Talos’ institutional customers.
Catalanello remarked:
“With over-the-counter markets now dwarfing exchange trading, industry participants are increasingly demanding the bank-grade trading experience B2C2 is best known for.”
Chris Hehmeyer, CEO of global market maker Heymeyer, stated that for his company, the partnership with Talos will help with establishing the foundation for ongoing growth.
Hehmeyer added:
“Our skills are complimentary, allowing us both to do what we do best, and we firmly believe working together will provide institutional investors with vast opportunity in the digital asset space.”
Talos’ clients are able to leverage the trading platform’s network and resources to interact with exchanges or their preferred OTC liquidity providers (LPs), while being able to maintain direct relationships with their LPs.
As confirmed in the release, the Talos platform “supports several modes of execution, including RFQ/RFS (Request for Quote/Stream) and ESP (Executable Streaming Prices), while also allowing its clients to use sophisticated execution algorithms.”
The announcement further noted:
“Publicly launched at the beginning of October after a year of live trading with clients, the Talos platform is built … to support end-to-end trading of digital assets – from onboarding to price discovery, from execution through settlement – including bilateral access to liquidity providers. The platform provides solutions to meet the needs of investors and financial service providers, including prime brokers, OTC liquidity providers, lenders, custodians, and exchanges. Clients access the Talos platform via API or GUI, and it is highly configurable to their unique workflow requirements.”