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With the collapse of FTX and economic difficulties of 2022 behind him, Simon Barnby is excited for 2023. His company, Archax, a regulated digital asset exchange, broker and custodian, is rolling out their services and has received investments from large, conservative financial institutions that he believes are finally ready to adopt blockchain and tokenization.
“Businesses have leveraged technology to revolutionize themselves. It’s happened in music, in films, in retail with Amazon, accommodations with AirBnB, taxis with Uber,” says Archax’s CMO. “Now it’s the financial markets’ turn.”
While Simon acknowledges that traditional markets have transformed electronically and efficiently over the last few years, it’s the secondary trade space that is still inefficient.
“When a trade takes place, there are lots of post-trade processes, intermediaries like clearing houses and registrars, and reconciliations and discrepancies that must be taken into account,” explains Simon. “Blockchain makes trading instantaneous and all parties receive the same information. This is where the benefits are felt.”
Archax is regulated to trade, broker, and safekeep digital assets by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), the financial regulatory body in the United Kingdom. The company’s journey began by using technology from the cryptocurrency space that they believe “will disrupt and revolutionize financial markets.”
“When we looked at the crypto space, people weren’t building institutional grade solutions and there was a lack of regulation in the space,” states Simon. “We leverage what’s being pioneered in the crypto space but deliver products and services that are palatable to the regulated institutional financial markets.”
“Blockchain steps in and you have this single source of truth,” Simon continues, “this immutable record that is broadcast out and everyone who has access to the [trade] can see it all at once. It’s a big efficiency gain.”
The future looks rosy to this unabashed blockchain supporter. “We believe in time, all traditional financial markets will adopt this technology,” he says.
To hear more about Archax and their involvement in digital assets, listen to the full BlockSolid podcast with host Yael Tamar.
