Every time you buy or sell a token on an exchange and the order fills instantly, a market maker is on the other side. These firms are not charities. They profit from the spread, negotiate listing deals worth millions, and hold enough inventory to move prices. This guide explains who they are, how they operate, and what their presence means for the tokens you trade.

When a retail trader places a market order on Binance or Coinbase, the order typically fills in under a second. That speed creates an illusion of seamless supply and demand. In reality, a specialized firm placed the limit order that absorbed the trade, pocketed a fraction of a cent in profit, and immediately replaced the order to do it again. Without these firms, order books would be thin, slippage would be severe, and most tokens would be effectively untradable during all but the busiest hours.

What market makers actually do

A market maker continuously quotes both a buy price (the bid) and a sell price (the ask) for a given token on an exchange. The difference between these two prices is the spread. On a liquid pair like BTC/USDT on a major exchange, the spread might be one or two basis points. On a smaller altcoin, it could be 50 basis points or more.

The market maker profits by buying at the bid and selling at the ask, capturing the spread on each completed round trip. This sounds simple, but the execution requires sophisticated infrastructure.

A single market making firm might maintain active orders on 30 or more exchanges simultaneously, quoting hundreds of trading pairs. Each pair requires real-time price feeds, inventory management across venues, and risk models that account for sudden volatility. The firms co-locate their servers as close to exchange matching engines as possible, because a latency advantage of even a few milliseconds can mean the difference between capturing a spread and being adversely selected by a faster trader.

The core challenge is inventory risk. A market maker that buys 1,000 ETH at $3,200 needs to sell that ETH before the price drops. If the market moves against the position before the offsetting sell executes, the spread profit evaporates. Managing this risk across hundreds of pairs and dozens of venues simultaneously is what separates professional market makers from simple limit order placement.

This is why market makers widen their spreads during periods of high volatility. When a significant news event hits and prices swing rapidly, the probability of being adversely selected, meaning a market maker fills one side of a trade just before the price moves against it, increases dramatically. The wider spread compensates for this additional risk. Retail traders often notice that slippage worsens during volatile periods and blame exchange infrastructure. In many cases, the real cause is that market makers have pulled back their quotes or widened their spreads to protect themselves, temporarily reducing the available liquidity.

The major firms and how they differ

The crypto market making landscape is dominated by a handful of firms, each with a distinct operating model.

Wintermute is the largest independent crypto market maker by reported volume. Founded in 2017, the firm operates across centralized exchanges, decentralized exchanges, and over-the-counter desks. Wintermute quotes on most major venues and has provided launch liquidity for hundreds of token projects. The firm lost roughly $160 million in a DeFi exploit in September 2022 when a compromised hot wallet was drained, but continued operations without interruption.

Jump Crypto is the crypto arm of Jump Trading, a Chicago-based high-frequency trading firm that has operated in traditional markets since 1999. Jump brings institutional-grade infrastructure and decades of quantitative trading expertise. The firm has faced regulatory scrutiny over its role in the Terra/LUNA collapse, with the SEC alleging Jump earned hundreds of millions of dollars helping stabilize UST before its failure.

GSR is a London-headquartered firm focused on providing structured liquidity to token issuers. GSR’s model emphasizes longer-term market making agreements with projects, handling token treasury management for several major protocols.

DWF Labs occupies a controversial position. The firm describes itself as a market maker and Web3 investment company, but its approach has drawn criticism. DWF Labs frequently takes large token allocations as part of investment-plus-market-making deals, then trades those tokens across exchanges. Critics argue this blurs the line between providing liquidity and trading for directional profit using insider access to project treasuries. The firm has denied these characterizations, stating that its investment and trading operations are separate.

How token listing deals work

When a new token launches on a major exchange, the project team almost always has a market making agreement in place. These agreements are the financial plumbing that most token buyers never see.

A typical deal structure has three components:

Retainer fee. The market maker charges a monthly fee, typically between $15,000 and $50,000, to maintain active quotes on specified trading pairs. Higher-tier exchanges and more trading pairs mean higher retainers.

Token loan. The project lends the market maker a large allocation of tokens, often worth $1 million to $5 million at launch price. The market maker uses these tokens to place sell orders on the order book, creating the appearance of liquid supply. At the end of the agreement (usually 12 to 24 months), the market maker returns the tokens or their equivalent value, depending on the contract terms.

Performance incentives. Some agreements include call options that let the market maker buy tokens at a predetermined strike price. If the token appreciates significantly, the market maker profits from exercising these options. This structure aligns the market maker’s incentives with the project’s success, but it also gives the market maker a financial interest in short-term price appreciation that may not align with long-term holder interests.

The token loan is the most consequential element. A market maker holding $3 million worth of borrowed tokens has no obligation to support the price. If the agreement is structured as a loan with a return obligation denominated in tokens (not dollars), the market maker can sell the tokens, push the price down, buy them back cheaper, and return the required number at a profit. Whether this constitutes market manipulation or legitimate inventory management depends on intent, and no crypto regulator currently has the tools to distinguish between them at scale.

Market making on decentralized exchanges

On centralized exchanges, market makers place traditional limit orders on order books. On decentralized exchanges, the mechanics are different.

Automated market makers like Uniswap use liquidity pools rather than order books. Anyone can provide liquidity by depositing token pairs into a pool, and the pool’s smart contract prices trades algorithmically. Professional market makers participate in these pools, but the dynamics differ from centralized venue market making.

On Solana DEXs and concentrated liquidity protocols like Uniswap V3, market makers can specify narrow price ranges for their liquidity. This concentrates their capital around the current price, improving capital efficiency but requiring constant rebalancing as the price moves. The rebalancing itself creates on-chain transactions that are visible to anyone watching, including MEV searchers who can front-run the market maker’s own repositioning.

The transparency of on-chain market making is a double-edged sword. Retail users can see exactly how much liquidity is available and where it is concentrated. But sophisticated actors can also observe when a market maker is withdrawing liquidity, which often signals an imminent price move.

The economics of spread capture at scale

Market making in crypto is a volume business. The spread on a single trade might be $0.01 on a $100 trade. But multiply that by millions of trades per day, and the revenue is substantial.

Consider a simplified example. A market maker quotes BTC/USDT with a one-basis-point spread (0.01%) and handles $500 million in daily volume on that pair alone. The gross revenue from spread capture is $50,000 per day, or roughly $18 million per year, from a single pair on a single exchange. In practice, spreads vary, not every trade captures the full spread, and inventory losses offset some of the revenue. But the arithmetic illustrates why well-capitalized firms invest heavily in this business.

The exchange itself typically benefits from this arrangement as well. Exchanges offer market makers reduced trading fees, sometimes zero, through maker fee rebate programs. The exchange gains because the market maker’s presence attracts retail traders who pay the full taker fee. The market maker’s quoted liquidity makes the exchange’s order book look deep and competitive, which draws more volume, which generates more fee revenue for the exchange. This symbiotic relationship explains why exchanges court market makers aggressively and why losing a major market maker can trigger a decline in an exchange’s overall trading volume.

The largest crypto market makers reportedly generate hundreds of millions of dollars in annual revenue. This revenue comes from three sources in roughly equal proportion: spread capture on liquid pairs, fees and option income from token listing agreements, and proprietary trading profits from directional positions and arbitrage.

The firms that survive long-term are the ones that manage inventory risk most effectively. Several prominent crypto market makers have collapsed or exited the market after large directional bets went wrong. Alameda Research, the trading firm affiliated with FTX, was the most prominent example. Alameda functioned as a market maker but increasingly took concentrated directional positions using customer funds, a practice that ultimately contributed to the collapse of FTX in November 2022.

How market makers affect token prices

The relationship between market makers and token prices is more direct than most retail traders realize.

When a market maker receives a token loan of five million tokens and begins placing sell orders, those sell orders create visible supply on the order book. A retail trader looking at the order book sees what appears to be natural selling interest. In reality, the supply is synthetic. It exists because a project paid a firm to place it there.

This has two consequences. First, the visible supply suppresses the price by making it appear that sellers exist at every price level above the current market. Buyers who would otherwise bid aggressively see the sell wall and reduce their bids. Second, if the market maker’s agreement expires or the firm decides to withdraw, the sell orders disappear. The sudden removal of supply can cause rapid price increases, which may look like organic buying interest but are actually the absence of artificial selling pressure.

The reverse is equally important. Market makers who place large buy orders below the current price create the appearance of a price floor. Retail traders see the support and feel confident holding their position. If the market maker removes those buy orders, the floor vanishes, and the price can fall sharply with minimal actual selling.

This dynamic means that a token’s visible liquidity profile is often a reflection of its market making arrangement rather than a reflection of genuine supply and demand. When the arrangement changes, the liquidity profile changes with it, and holders who relied on the visible order book discover that the support they trusted was temporary.

What this does not cover

This guide explains the operational mechanics and business model of crypto market makers. It does not cover:

• Regulatory frameworks for market making, which vary by jurisdiction and are evolving. The EU’s MiCA regulation and proposed US frameworks may impose new obligations on crypto market makers.
• Algorithmic trading strategies beyond basic market making, including statistical arbitrage, basis trading, and cross-exchange arbitrage.
• Retail stablecoin liquidity provision on decentralized exchanges, which shares some mechanics with market making but operates at a different scale and risk profile.
• The internal risk management systems that market makers use to hedge their inventory exposure, including options, perpetual futures, and cross-asset hedging strategies that are proprietary to each firm.

Practical checks for token buyers

Understanding market making dynamics helps token buyers make better decisions.

Check the token’s market making agreements. Some projects disclose their market maker in official communications. If a project’s liquidity is provided by a single market maker, the project is vulnerable to that firm withdrawing support.

Watch bid-ask spread width. A tight spread on a low-volume token is often artificial, maintained by a market maker as part of a paid agreement. If the agreement ends or the market maker exits, the spread can widen dramatically overnight, making it expensive or impossible to sell at a reasonable price.

Monitor order book depth. Visible depth on an exchange order book can be misleading. Market makers frequently place large orders close to the current price to create the appearance of support, then cancel those orders before they can be filled. This practice, known as spoofing, is illegal in traditional markets but rarely enforced in crypto.

Check for sudden liquidity changes. A token that suddenly loses 50% or more of its order book depth may be experiencing a market maker withdrawal. This is often a leading indicator of negative news or a failing project.

Understand the token unlock schedule. When market makers hold token loan agreements, the return or sale of those tokens at the end of the agreement period creates selling pressure. Check whether upcoming unlocks coincide with the end of known market making contracts.

Compare volume across exchanges. If a token’s trading volume is concentrated on a single exchange, the liquidity may depend on a single market making agreement with that venue. Tokens with volume distributed across multiple exchanges are less vulnerable to a single market maker exiting.

What to watch

Regulatory enforcement against market makers. The SEC’s case against Jump Crypto over its role in the UST collapse could set precedent for how crypto market making is regulated. Similar actions against other firms would reshape the industry’s operating model.

Consolidation in the market making sector. As regulatory costs rise and smaller firms exit, the remaining firms gain more pricing power over token projects. This concentration may increase the cost of listing and reduce competition for spread capture.

On-chain market making growth. As decentralized exchanges mature and attract more institutional volume, the balance between on-chain and off-chain market making is shifting. Protocols that offer better capital efficiency for professional liquidity providers will attract market maker capital away from centralized venues.

Transparency initiatives. Several token projects have begun publishing their market making agreements publicly. If this trend continues, token buyers will have better information about who provides liquidity and on what terms.

Market maker default risk. Market makers hold large inventories of volatile assets across dozens of venues. A sharp market crash can wipe out a firm’s capital reserves and force it to withdraw from all venues simultaneously, creating a cascading liquidity vacuum that amplifies the initial price decline across the entire market.

This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, or legal advice. Crypto trading carries significant risk, including the potential for total loss of capital. Always conduct your own research before making any investment decision. Information current as of August 4, 2026.

Bitdeer, a publicly traded Bitcoin mining and infrastructure firm, has agreed to a 16-year data center lease that could be worth up to $4.7 billion, tying its next phase of growth to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing capacity. The deal highlights a broader shift in the crypto mining industry: companies built around energy and compute are increasingly positioning themselves as AI data center providers as demand for GPU-based workloads rises.

Under the agreement, Bitdeer will supply 121 megawatts (MW) of IT capacity at its Tydal, Norway AI data center. The facility is expected to be configured for Nvidia GPU-based AI workloads, though Bitdeer did not publicly identify the tenant beyond describing it as a subsidiary of Volta Infra.

Key takeaways

• Bitdeer signed a 16-year lease for up to $4.7 billion to secure AI/high-performance computing data center capacity.
• The agreement covers 121 MW of IT capacity at Bitdeer’s Tydal, Norway facility, configured for Nvidia GPU-based AI workloads.
• Volta Infra is linked to the tenant, and Bloomberg reported its $10 billion cloud contract is with Anthropic.
• The lease is subject to customary closing conditions and is not yet effective; letters of credit are expected to back tenant payments.
• Bitdeer also stands out for having fully liquidated its Bitcoin treasury to zero earlier this year, to fund expansion.

A long-term compute bet tied to AI workloads

Bitdeer’s announcement says it will provide 121 MW of IT capacity at its Tydal, Norway AI data center to a tenant described only as a subsidiary of Volta Infra. The company’s release specifies that the site will be configured to support Nvidia GPU-based AI workloads, but it stops short of clarifying whether Volta Infra is the ultimate end customer or acting as an intermediary.

For investors and operators, the significance is less about a single facility and more about the contract’s structure and longevity. A lease spanning 16 years aims to lock in a long runway for revenues tied to compute demand—an area where AI infrastructure providers are facing intense competition for energy, cooling, and GPU capacity.

Volta Infra and Anthropic in the background

While Bitdeer did not name the tenant, Bloomberg News reported that Nvidia-backed Volta’s $10 billion cloud contract is with Anthropic, citing people familiar with the matter. The disclosure adds context to the strategic logic of the lease: if Volta’s cloud commitments involve Anthropic’s AI workloads, then the compute capacity Bitdeer will supply becomes part of a wider chain serving major AI model developers.

Still, the details that matter for due diligence remain partly opaque. Bitdeer has not confirmed whether Anthropic is the end customer for the contracted capacity or whether the tenant arrangement includes additional layers. Traders and analysts will likely watch for further clarification when the deal clears closing conditions and when operational timelines come into focus.

Deal mechanics: closing conditions and payment security

Bitdeer said the lease agreement is subject to customary closing conditions and is not yet effective. To help secure the tenant’s payment obligations, affiliates of JP Morgan and another unnamed global financial institution are expected to issue approximately $1.3 billion in letters of credit (or bank guarantees). In practical terms, letters of credit reduce counterparty risk for the landlord by providing a way to recover funds if contractual payments are not met.

That risk-control detail matters because long-duration infrastructure contracts can carry operational and commercial uncertainty—ranging from construction or configuration delays to changes in customer demand. The use of substantial financial guarantees suggests both parties are attempting to ensure the agreement is durable through the transition from contract signing to delivery.

Bitdeer’s pivot beyond Bitcoin mining

This lease is the latest step in Bitdeer’s broader effort to diversify beyond its core Bitcoin mining business. Alongside AI and high-performance computing infrastructure, the company has also been expanding into mining hardware manufacturing to lessen reliance on third-party suppliers.

Last month, Bitdeer announced a $36 million investment in a manufacturing facility in Nevada as part of that strategy, reinforcing the theme that the company wants more control over the full compute supply chain—whether the end use is mining or AI acceleration.

Notably, the market response to the lease announcement appeared immediately. Bitdeer shares reportedly jumped about 8% in early Nasdaq trading following the announcement, indicating investors may be treating the AI infrastructure expansion as a meaningful rerating driver rather than a side project.

Why selling the Bitcoin treasury may be part of the same plan

Bitdeer’s approach to capital allocation also differs from many publicly traded miners. Earlier in the year, the company reduced its Bitcoin holdings to zero—reportedly after holding roughly 943 BTC in early February—while stating it remains committed to the Bitcoin ecosystem. According to Bitdeer executive Ross Gann, the sales were made to help fund the company’s broader expansion strategy, including acquisitions of powered land for AI and Bitcoin mining infrastructure.

In contrast, several other major Bitcoin miners continue to hold large Bitcoin treasuries. BitcoinTreasuries.NET data cited in the coverage indicates that MARA Holdings, Riot Platforms, CleanSpark, and Hut 8 each hold at least 10,000 BTC, with MARA holding more than 36,000 BTC.

The contrast underscores a strategic asymmetry among miners: some treat Bitcoin holdings as a balance-sheet bet on future upside, while Bitdeer has chosen to convert its treasury into liquidity to finance expansion. For readers tracking the sector, this raises a key question going forward—whether compute-driven revenue growth can offset the absence of treasury exposure, and how that trade-off influences risk profiles during different phases of the crypto and AI cycles.

As the lease moves toward effectiveness, the next items to watch are the completion of closing conditions, further clarity on the tenant and end-customer structure, and whether Bitdeer’s AI infrastructure buildout scales alongside its existing diversification efforts.

Bitcoin mining companies with existing operations in Texas are likely to face limited direct disruption from a new state-level pause on certain data center approvals, according to Bernstein analysts. The move centers on heightened scrutiny of how quickly new data center projects are being lined up to connect to Texas’ power grid.

Governor Greg Abbott ordered the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUCT) and the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) to conduct an audit of data centers seeking to connect to the grid, The Texas Tribune reported. Bernstein said many Texas miners are already covered by electric capacity agreements that have been approved, which could reduce near-term operational risk.

Key takeaways

• Bernstein expects most Texas-based Bitcoin miners to be minimally affected because many are contracted for approved power capacity.
• The audit and moratorium are expected to slow or throttle speculative data center “pipeline” projects, potentially increasing the value of sites with development history.
• Miners most exposed may include those whose future growth depends on converting existing pipeline assets into grid-connected capacity during ERCOT’s approvals.
• Bernstein highlighted Texas operations of Cipher Digital, Core Scientific, CleanSpark, IREN and Riot Platforms as relevant to how the approval process evolves.

Texas audit targets data center grid connections

On Monday, Governor Abbott directed regulators to audit all data centers attempting to connect to the state’s electric grid system. The directive is linked to mounting public backlash over the pace of data center development in Texas, as The Texas Tribune noted in reporting on the order.

While the article describing the order did not specify how long the audit would run, the practical effect is already clear: new or pending grid-connection approvals are likely to slow while regulators review the pipeline. For electricity-intensive industries—data centers and Bitcoin mining in particular—grid access timing can be as important as total contracted capacity.

Why Bernstein says active miners may be spared

In a client note released Tuesday, Bernstein analysts argued that the direct impact on Bitcoin miners with Texas operations should be limited. Their central point: most miners operating in the state are under contracts for electric capacity that has already been approved.

That distinction matters for investors and operators. An audit that primarily affects approvals for new connections is less likely to interrupt existing operations tied to already-cleared power supply, especially where miners have scheduled energy use and infrastructure already in place.

Bernstein also suggested that throttling new approvals could create a different kind of market effect. The analysts wrote that the audit “throttles speculative data center pipeline” and, in turn, “makes genuine sites with development history more valuable.” They linked that value proposition to mining sites typically having “longest gestation” characteristics, self-funding infrastructure, and management at the local level.

Which miners Bernstein flags as more vulnerable

Even if day-to-day production is less likely to be disrupted for capacity that is already approved, growth plans can still run into delays. Bernstein pointed to miners it believes could be more exposed—particularly if their path to expansion depends on ERCOT approval processes to convert pipeline assets into grid-connected power capacity.

The analysts specifically named Cipher Digital, Core Scientific and CleanSpark as candidates that could face greater sensitivity to future public opposition and the timeline pressures created by moratoriums or directives affecting new capacity approvals.

They also highlighted IREN and Riot Platforms, noting that both have Texas mining operations that are described as fully ERCOT grid approved. In Bernstein’s framing, that approved status may matter more as new capacity becomes harder or slower to obtain.

From data center controversy to mining capacity economics

At the heart of the story is an electricity allocation question. Texas’ grid-connection process is a bottleneck for any load expansion, and public opposition can influence political and regulatory outcomes—especially when state leadership orders audits or pauses.

Bernstein’s view effectively reframes the risk from “immediate operational shutdown” to “capital planning and future capacity accessibility.” If ERCOT’s approvals become slower, and if speculative data center projects are paused or delayed, then existing—especially already-approved—capacity may retain or increase its relative value versus projects still in the queue.

For miners, this can change how the market evaluates expansion-stage assets. If new MWs (megawatts) are throttled by policy actions, then entities able to monetize power access sooner—either because they are already grid approved or because they have stronger development histories—may face fewer timing disadvantages.

Stock reaction and company updates

In Tuesday’s premarket trading, Cipher Digital shares were down more than 7%, according to Yahoo Finance data. Separately, Cipher Digital reported second-quarter results earlier Tuesday, showing a loss of $0.65 per diluted share that widened from last year’s loss of $0.12 per diluted share, according to the company’s posted update.

While the stock move is not automatically attributable to the Texas audit by the information provided, it underscores how quickly market participants can price in regulatory uncertainty, especially for firms tied to the broader data center and power-capacity conversation.

Going forward, readers should watch how long the audit lasts and how ERCOT and the PUCT handle conversion of pipeline assets into approved grid-connected capacity—because that timeline will likely determine whether the near-term “freeze” stays contained or begins to affect future miner expansion plans.

The Hell’s Kitchen megaproject on the shore of California’s Salton Sea is a $1.8 billion bet on a massive, first-of-its-kind geothermal power and lithium-extraction facility. Developers aim to start up the facility’s new geothermal power production first, with lithium mining to follow. While the county and Controlled Thermal Resources, the mine’s owner, last year defeated a lawsuit that attempted to halt operations there, community opposition remains strong and opponents are appealing. The project sits in a low-income, heavily Latino, environmentally over-burdened valley with some of the worst air quality in the country. Tensions are also rife over the mine’s water consumption and the terms of its community-benefit agreement. Meanwhile, as demand for lithium for EV batteries has softened, the company has emphasized that both its geothermal energy and minerals can serve the AI-driven data-center boom. 

Wells Fargo plans to launch tokenized deposits this fall, allowing corporate and commercial clients to move and settle funds outside traditional banking hours.

Wells Fargo tokenized deposits will support 24/7 settlement

Per an Aug. 4 WSJ report, Wells Fargo said the service will allow participating clients to transfer, program and settle funds around the clock within a regulated banking framework. The initial rollout will cover transactions between the U.S. dollar and British pound.

Unlike conventional bank transfers, which can face market-hour restrictions and settlement delays, tokenized deposits represent customer funds as digital tokens on a blockchain. This structure can support near-continuous settlement while keeping the deposits within the banking system.

The program will run on Wells Fargo’s proprietary blockchain platform, which supports internal custodial wallets. The bank said future offerings could also use its interchain connectivity technology to communicate with other blockchain networks.

“The program will roll out this fall with a limited U.S. dollar (USD) to British pound (GBP) exchange and will expand over the course of 2027 to more clients, countries, and currencies,” the bank said.

Chief Financial Officer Mike Santomassimo described the launch as an “important step forward” in expanding the bank’s payment options. Wells Fargo will determine additional currencies and markets based on client demand.

Why banks are turning to tokenized deposits

Tokenized deposits allow banks to offer some of the speed and programmability associated with stablecoins without moving customer funds outside the regulated deposit system. Banks retain control over issuance, transfers, and compliance checks.

Wells Fargo joins JPMorgan and Citigroup in developing blockchain-based settlement services. JPMorgan has expanded its deposit-token infrastructure across blockchain networks, while Citi has developed tokenized deposit and securities services for institutional clients.

The new product could help Wells Fargo serve businesses that require cross-border settlement outside normal banking hours. Corporate treasury teams could also use programmable transactions to automate payments when predefined conditions are met.

For U.S. companies, the first USD-to-GBP corridor could reduce delays between American and British banking hours. However, Wells Fargo has not disclosed pricing, transaction limits, or eligibility requirements for the pilot.

WFUSD trademark preceded the tokenized deposit plan

The announcement follows Wells Fargo’s March trademark application for “WFUSD,” which prompted speculation that the bank was preparing a dollar-linked digital asset.

The U.S. trademark filing covers cryptocurrency payment processing, electronic transfers of virtual currencies, and software used to tokenize assets. It also includes blockchain-based payment verification and platforms capable of processing stablecoin transactions.

Wells Fargo has not confirmed whether WFUSD is the name of its planned tokenized deposit product. A trademark application also does not guarantee that a commercial service will launch under that name.

Still, the filing showed that the bank was evaluating blockchain-based financial services months before disclosing its tokenized deposit rollout.

Wells Fargo deepens its digital asset exposure

Wells Fargo has also increased its exposure to crypto-related investment products. A regulatory filing reported by crypto.news in July showed that the bank raised its Strategy position by 125% to nearly 726,000 shares, adding about $41.5 million in exposure.

The bank simultaneously reduced its position in BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust by 75,102 shares. It also opened a new IBIT call position, increased its put exposure and added investments linked to Ethereum and Solana.

Those holdings are separate from the tokenized deposit initiative, but they reflect Wells Fargo’s widening involvement across digital assets and blockchain infrastructure.

The bank plans to begin with selected corporate and commercial clients before broadening access during 2027. The rollout’s next phase will depend on demand, regulatory requirements and the platform’s ability to connect with other private tokenized deposit networks.

In a July 8 meeting, US and UK regulators highlighted the implementation of the GENIUS Act, payment modernization and cross-border cooperation, reinforcing a shared framework for digital asset oversight.

The United States and the United Kingdom reaffirmed their commitment to closer financial regulatory cooperation during a recent bilateral working group, signaling continued policy alignment on digital assets as US authorities move to implement landmark stablecoin legislation.

During the 13th meeting of the UK-US Financial Regulatory Working Group (FRWG), held in London on July 8, officials discussed stablecoin regulation, digital asset market structure in the United States, tokenization and the UK’s Wholesale Financial Markets Digital Strategy.

An Aug. 4 joint statement summarizing the meeting said US officials updated their UK counterparts on implementation of the GENIUS Act, the country’s landmark stablecoin law, as well as ongoing work on digital asset market structure. Participants also discussed payment modernization and the G20 Cross-border Payments Roadmap, an international initiative to improve cross-border payments.

Although the meeting did not produce new policy measures, it underscored a shared commitment to coordinating regulation across key areas of the digital asset industry. The statement struck a broadly supportive tone toward “responsible” digital asset innovation while emphasizing financial stability and international regulatory cooperation.

That commitment was also reflected on July 14, when the Transatlantic Taskforce for Markets of the Future — a joint US-UK initiative focused on strengthening cooperation on financial innovation and capital markets — published its initial recommendations alongside a joint statement on stablecoins. The governments said the measures would lay the foundation for continued US-UK leadership in digital assets and capital markets.

Related: UK government defers capital gains on certain crypto with ‘no gain, no loss’ approach

UK rethinks stablecoin rules as US moves ahead

The UK’s renewed emphasis on stablecoins comes as some industry observers argue the country is losing ground to the United States, where the GENIUS Act has accelerated momentum behind regulated dollar-backed stablecoins.

The Bank of England has also softened its stance on stablecoin regulation. As Cointelegraph reported in May, the BoE is considering alternatives to temporary limits on stablecoin holdings and is reviewing whether its proposal requiring at least 40% of reserve assets to be held as non-interest-bearing deposits at the central bank is too restrictive. 

Separately, the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority said earlier this year that cross-border payments represent one of the clearest near-term use cases for stablecoins, underscoring growing regulatory recognition of the technology’s potential.

Magazine: Coldcard exploit sparks Bitcoin flight, ‘bullish’ crypto consolidation: Hodler’s Digest, August 2

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