Crypto Trading Firm Zodia Markets Goes Live in UK

The company is backed by the venture arm of British banking giant Standard Chartered.

By Ian Allison

Jul 28, 2022 at 11:51 a.m. UTC

Updated Aug 11, 2022 at 9:19 a.m. UTC

Zodia Markets CEO Usman Ahmad (Zodia Markets)

Ian Allison

Ian Allison is an award-winning senior reporter at CoinDesk. He holds ETH.

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Zodia Markets, a cryptocurrency exchange and brokerage focused on institutions, has gone live with the backing of a banking giant Standard Chartered.

U.K.-based Zodia Markets is a sister company of Zodia Custody, the digital assets safekeeping platform, and both firms share the same majority shareholder in SC Ventures, the venture arm of Standard Chartered.
Zodia Markets is also working closely with Hong Kong-based BC Technology Group, the owner of crypto trader OSL, the companies said on Thursday.
The firm, which has been granted Financial Conduct Authority approval, has gone live with spot trading of bitcoin (BTC) and ether (ETH), Zodia Markets CEO Usman Ahmad said.
“What most large financial institutions have done for now is entered crypto via the custody space, as has Standard Chartered with Zodia Custody,” Ahmad said in an interview. “We looked around and saw a gap in the market when it comes to a crypto trading firm with the backing of a bank.”
Major banks have been exploring crypto custody with a number of deals announced in recent months.
Crypto trading is readily available in the Far East and the U.S., a situation that informed Zodia Markets' decision to focus elsewhere, Ahmad said.
“We want to focus on the U.K., Europe, Middle East and Africa as a starting point,” he said. “We looked across this time zone, and this jurisdiction feels, relatively speaking, underserved.”

UPDATE (Aug. 11, 2022, 9:30 UTC): Updates Zodia Markets’ backers

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