Wall Street Engineers Embark on Expanding a Bitcoin Derivative

  • SFOX sees NDFs as vehicle for expanding crypto-related trading
  • Daily trading volume may reach $100 million a day, SFOX says

    

Photographer: Krisztian Bocsi/Bloomberg
Lock
This article is for subscribers only.

A group of engineers and traders at crypto prime brokerage SFOX are working on a way to expand access to Bitcoin for banks and big investors through a bespoke derivative.

SFOX’s co-founder, George Melika, said his firm is in talks with large banks and market makers including Jane Street to open a market that facilitates the trading of Bitcoin derivatives. The idea is to use NDFs -- non-deliverable forward contracts that are typically used for currency markets -- to give banks the wherewithal to expose clients to Bitcoin at a greater scale through a contract, at an agreed upon price, that settles in cash.