BlockFi Now Caters To Institutional Trading, Hedging

BlockFi, a secured non-bank lender that offers U.S. dollar loans to digital asset holders, formally introduced BlockFi Institutional Services on Thursday, an enterprise-grade financing solution for market makers, exchanges, funds and family offices.

The service will allow BlockFi clients to borrow digital assets for the execution of cryptocurrency trading strategies that are not limited to speculation and hedging.

“Our financial products are powerful for individual investors and consumers, allowing them to leverage their digital assets more practically without selling,” founder and CEO Zac Prince said in a statement. 

"For businesses that operate on scaled capital, this usefulness is amplified by magnitudes. Large financial institutions that execute trading strategies, hedge their positions and post digital assets on margin on exchanges can now borrow Bitcoin, ether, U.S. dollars and stablecoins from BlockFi to access critical working capital."

The company's institutional services team is led by Chief Risk Officer Rene van Kesteren, a former managing director of Prime Brokerage at Bank of America Corp BAC. 

Kesteren worked with institutional clients for over 20 years, developing lending and derivatives solutions for institutions, according to BlockFi. 

“Coming from a traditional background, I’ve seen first-hand the gap in infrastructure that exists in supporting crypto on an institutional scale that’s streamlined and profitable,” Kesteren said in a statement. 

“By offering our interest and lending products to institutional clients, they’re incentivized to use digital assets more frequently and have more flexibility when using them. We see strong and growing demand in the space and look forward to continuing to bridge the gap between traditional finance and digital currencies."

BlockFi is no stranger to institutional trading of digital assets; the firm played an instrumental role in the introduction of an ISDA/CSA transaction framework used in the sector, particularly for derivatives trading.

Going forward, BlockFi said it will conduct daily position and trade activity reports, communications security and service provider integration.

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