Flow Traders, one of the world’s top market makers in exchange-traded products, said Tuesday it is bringing its decades of TradFi expertise to tokenized assets with the launch of 24/7 over-the-counter (OTC) liquidity.

The move arms institutional clients with a new tool, allowing them to manage risk and keep capital flowing via blockchain versions of popular traditional assets when traditional exchanges are dark on weekends and after hours.

The new offering, delivered through Flow Traders’ Digital Asset OTC platform, provides proprietary, two-way pricing for tokenized money-market funds, equities and commodities, including Franklin Templeton’s BENJI and tether gold (XAUT), according to the press release shared with CoinDesk.

It means that the OTC platform will now constantly quote prices, ready to buy or sell the tokenized assets outside regular traditional market hours. The service is available immediately to permissioned counterparties, with institutions able to access liquidity via direct FIX connectivity and other standard trading interfaces.

“At Flow Traders, we have operated at the intersection of traditional and digital markets for many years, and we are pleased to launch 24/7 OTC liquidity for regulated tokenized equities and commodities for permissioned counterparties through our digital asset OTC platform,” Thomas Spitz, CEO of Flow Traders, said.

The OTC liquidity aims to address a nagging problem for institutions: The inability to adjust positions during weekends or overnight sessions. This has become brutally clear in recent weeks, as Iran-Israel tensions flared over the weekends, leaving traditional trading desks empty while crypto markets churned.

The demand mainly comes from institutions that want the ability to manage exposure outside traditional market hours,” Marc Jansen, co-chief trading officer at Flow Traders, told CoinDesk.

He explained that the OTC liquidity service will help large traders manage their risk better beyond market hours through tokenized equities and commodities, which are already gaining popularity on venues such as Binance, OKX, and Hyperliquid.

“All weekend long, with these markets getting pretty close to the traditional market open price as a result of that weekend price discovery. OTC liquidity helps support that activity, particularly for larger trades where public venue liquidity is still developing,” he said.

According to the firm, tokenization is growing fast and the tokenized gold and silver market alone is nearing $6 billion in value, up roughly fourfold since the end of 2024.

“Liquidity providers such as Flow Traders play a critical role in ensuring that tokenized assets like XAUT can trade efficiently across venues and reach a broader set of market participants,“ said Paolo Ardoino, CEO of Tether.

The asset tokenization market is reportedly worth $3 trillion as of this year and is growing at a CAGR of 44.25% and could reach over $18 trillion by 2031, according to some estimates.

This booming market, however, demands more than just enthusiasm; it requires battle-tested expertise, and this is where Flow Traders appears to have an edge, thanks to their 20 years of experience in market-making and liquidity provisioning for global exchange-traded products.

They operate across asset classes, including ETPs, digital assets, fixed income, FX, and commodities, and ranked among the top three global market makers by ETP trading volume in 2025.

“For us, with extensive experience in the ETF markets, it’s a more familiar problem. We’ve always priced and managed risk in products when parts of the primary market are closed. That already requires using models rather than relying purely on underlying market prices and we’ve built those pricing models over time in our ETF business, and they can be extended to tokenized markets,” Jansen said.

“Our role is to provide liquidity wherever the market develops,” he added.

The new OTC service will expand coverage and evolve, with asset availability guided by institutional counterparty demand, ongoing regulatory developments, and the integration of supported trading venues.

Product offerings will therefore vary by jurisdiction and depend on client eligibility, with different members of the Flow Traders group providing access based on their respective regulatory statuses.

Bhutan has transferred roughly $72.3 million in Bitcoin over the past 24 hours, continuing a steady pattern of trimming its sovereign holdings.

According to Arkham Intelligence data, Druk Holding and Investments, which manages the country’s crypto mining and treasury operations, has moved more than 973 BTC. The latest transfers come as Bhutan has continued to offload portions of its Bitcoin reserves in measured intervals.

DHI’s last major transfer was flagged on March 10, when it moved more than 175 BTC worth around $11.8 million.

Arkham noted that the country periodically sells Bitcoin in clips of $5 million to $10 million, but current transfers appear larger in scale compared to the activity seen around September 2025.

After the current transfers, Bhutan now holds more than 4,400 BTC, valued at over $322 million based on current market prices.

At its peak, Bhutan held 13,295 BTC in October 2024 and has since gradually reduced its holdings through a series of on-chain transfers.

Bhutan’s Bitcoin play

Bhutan has outlined a Bitcoin Development Pledge aimed at supporting the Kingdom of Bhutan’s long-term economic development through its mining operations and strategic reserves. Meanwhile, it has also committed to deploying part of its Bitcoin holdings toward the development of the Gelephu Mindfulness City.

Further, Arkham added that Bhutan-linked wallets have not recorded inflows greater than $100 million over the past year. Many in the crypto community are now speculating that the country may have scaled back or ceased its mining operations.

However, there’s been no confirmation of any halt in mining activity.

Early reports suggest the country has been using renewable energy sources, particularly hydroelectric power, to sustain its Bitcoin mining operations.

The latest transfers come as the Bitcoin price has dropped over 4.5% in the last 24 hours, falling below the $71,000 mark as investors reacted to hotter-than-expected inflation concerns in the US. 

Large-scale selling from sovereign entities like Bhutan could further exacerbate downward pressure on the asset, especially as the market remains sensitive to signs of reduced institutional conviction and potential sell-side liquidity from major holders.

Retail gold purchases have tripled over the last six months, while Wall Street selling has accelerated over the past four months, according to data from the Bank for International Settlements (BIS).

“Retail-driven exuberance,” increasingly channeled through exchange-traded funds (ETFs), “set the stage for outsize moves,” continuing the precious metal rally from 2025, reported the BIS in a quarterly review released on Monday. 

Since Q2 2025, retail investors have bought around $70 billion in gold ETFs, and these purchases have more than tripled over the last six months, observed the Kobeissi Letter, citing BIS data on Thursday.

“Retail investors are all-in on precious metals,” it noted. 

Gold has surged 60% over the past year, and some crypto proponents have speculated it has come at the expense of Bitcoin, which some argue competes with gold as a store-of-value asset.

BIS data shows cumulative retail inflows effectively tripled from around $20 billion to roughly $60 billion over the six months from late Q3 2025 to the end of Q1 2026.

However, institutional selling started around mid-November and accelerated after the precious metals market began to correct in January, according to the data. 

Leveraged liquidations amplified commodity drops 

Bitcoin (BTC) is not the only asset susceptible to high volatility from overleveraged positions. 

Prices of precious metals such as gold and silver reversed abruptly in late January and February 2026, while the “daily rebalancing of leveraged ETFs and margin‑triggered liquidations amplified the swings,” particularly in silver, BIS reported.

Smaller speculative derivatives traders, or “non-reportables,” had built up heavily leveraged long positions in silver heading into the crash, it added. 

Gold prices are currently down 9% from their late January all-time high, while silver has slumped much harder, dropping 34% over the same period, according to GoldPrice.

Related: Bitcoin vs gold: ETF flows point to early capital rotation signs

The abrupt price drop and the spike in precious metal volatility “point to the role of retail flows, and amplification of price moves due to forced sales by leveraged ETFs, trend-following investors such as commodity trading advisers, and margin dynamics,” BIS stated. 

Dollar strengthens as commodities and crypto weakens 

The bank concluded that gold and silver declines coincided with changing expectations around US monetary policy and the performance of the US dollar, which has gained 4.7% since late January, according to the DXY dollar index. 

“The precious metals crash seemingly coincided with shifts in expectations about the US dollar and the path of monetary policy, but it was hard to square with broader changes in fundamentals.”

Meanwhile, crypto markets have fallen around 43% from their October total capitalization peak as retail sentiment and interest in digital assets have dried up and remain at bear market levels.  

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