Coinbase Launched OTC Crypto Trading Desk

Total News – Atlanta, GA 11/29/2018. U.S-based major cryptocurrency Coinbase launched its over the counter (OTC) trading desk for institutional clients.

The OTC trading desk has not been announced officially but it's already live according to a report by Cheddar.

In the report, Christine Sandler, head of sales at Coinbase stated:

"We launched our OTC business as a complement to our exchange business because we found a lot of institutions were using OTC as an on-ramp for crypto trading. We felt this was a huge benefit to our clients to actually leverage both our exchange and our OTC business."

It appears that the exchange is busy increasing its revenue from institutional clients. Coinbase previously launched Coinbase Custody, a crypto custodian service for institutions.

Sandler added that the company plans to expand the service offering to include delayed settlement and will potentially integrate the OTC desk with Coinbase Custody.

Speaking to Bitcoin Magazine, Sandler said:

"Circle and a number of others have complementary products, but they also trade on a proprietary basis, so they are the counterparty to each transaction, while we, in fact, are matching client orders. From our crypto first clients, we're hearing that nothing has changed with respect to technology, and they're still absolutely committed to crypto ... to the technology. I think that there's one small silver lining to this volatility ... [it's] that crypto's been front and center of the mainstream financial media for the last few weeks. I think that has driven ... forced a lot of institutions to think, really, is this an opportunistic investment point for crypto at this point."

With this launch, Coinbase is now one of the crypto firms offering OTC services. Circle has Circle Trade which is available for both individual and institutional investors. Circle is funded by Goldman Sachs and launched their OTC service through its February 2018 acquisition of the Poloniex exchange. Other businesses offering OTC trading services are Genesis Trading, itBit, and Kenetic Capital.