SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Institutions will now be able to trade on every single crypto market simultaneously thanks to GlobalX, an API platform launched on March 31 by San Francisco-based firm Apifiny. Apifiny hired former executives of Google X, Kraken and AlphaPoint to promote the service.
Specifically, Josh Li will act as Apifiny’s chief business officer, having previous experience in Google and Google X, Alphabet’s innovation arm. Michael Fertman will lead the B2B marketing efforts as VP Marketing of Apifiny, coming from the security tokens startup AlphaPoint. Scott Eilbeck was brought on as VP of strategic partnerships and institutional sales. He recently served as head of Over the Counter (OTC) markets at Kraken, while counting JP Morgan and Bear Stearns under past experiences.
GlobalX works by integrating all of the world’s exchanges into one platform available to institutional traders. The firm opens business accounts with as many exchanges as possible across the entire world, while presenting a unified interface to its clients.By distributing the order across global markets, the traders tap into global crypto liquidity, instead of just one crypto exchange.
The core proposition of GlobalX is “increasing the bandwidth” available for institutional trading desks. As Fertman highlighted, trading on multiple exchanges is complex:“If you look at before, in order to execute these global strategies, an institutional investor would have to set up accounts on multiple exchanges, globally. In order to execute rapidly, they would need separate sets of APIs to different exchanges. [...] On the front end, it is the equivalent of calling 17 different brokers to execute one trade, and not through one interface.”
GlobalX also provides a function that few institutional trading desks can have on their own — access to all local fiat-to-crypto markets.
GlobalX is driven by an institutional-grade REST/Websocket API, that will give traders, OTC desks, brokers, and market makers faster access to trade and easier reallocation of assets among a multitude of global exchanges. FIX API support for GlobalX is expected to be added soon.
GlobalX could be considered as a sign that the crypto industry is maturing as an asset class. Its team stressed that connecting global liquidity could finally bring large institutional investors on board.
