Coinbase Wooing Wall Street
America’s leading cryptocurrency wallet provider and cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase is wooing Wall Street investors with the launch of its new suite of products. The exchange service announced this on its official blog on May 15.
Easing Investor Concerns
According to the company’s blog post, the suite of new products are focusing on easing institutional investors’ concerns about security and compliance with regulations in the cryptocurrency market.
Now, with these new products, Coinbase believes they can attract big institutional investors. Exchange’s vice president and general manager, Adam White, in an interview with CNBC said that the company feels it can now generate at least $10 billion in institutional investments. Additionally, Coinbase feels that these products will help increase awareness and adoption by mainstream investors in the cryptocurrency market.
Coinbase’s New Products
Coinbase is targeting institutional investors with four new product offerings – Coinbase Custody, Coinbase Prime, The Coinbase Institutional Coverage Group and Coinbase Markets.
Coinbase Custody focuses on addressing the topmost concern that institutional investors have regarding cryptos – security. The Custody solution for clients’ digital assets ensures that all funds undergo rigorous financial controls like audit trails, multi-signatory protection as well as withdrawal limits. Coinbase Custody will also partner with a third party auditor, which is an independent broker-dealer that is compliant with SEC regulations.
Coinbase Prime is going to be a separate trading platform only for institutional investors.
Coinbase Markets will be an electronic marketplace that will be run from Chicago and will provide customers with a centralized source of liquidity for all investors. This product will also offer clearing and settlement services in the future.
The Coinbase Institutional Coverage Group is a product designed to offer sales, trading, research, market ops as well as client services support to institutional investors. This group will be headquartered in New York and will offer personalized white glove services to its clients.
Not the Only One
Coinbase is not the only firm looking at targeting Wall Street with new product offerings. The New York Stock Exchange’s parent company ICE also announced its own plans earlier this month to open a SEC-compliant product offerings for Bitcoin. Goldman Sachs isn’t far behind either, announcing that it would opening its own crypto-trading desk within the new few weeks.
According to industry experts, as the cryptocurrency market matures and people find ways to work within regulatory frameworks, institutional investors will eventually move into the cryptocurrency industry too.