Breaking: Crossover Markets Secures $12M in Series A Funding Round

Crossover Markets Group, established by two former Jefferies executives, has raised $12 million in a Series A funding round. Announced today (Wednesday), the round was led by Illuminate Financial and DRW Venture Capital (DRW VC).

“This fundraise comes at a time when institutional market structure is changing in digital assets,” Brandon Mulvihill, Co-Founder and CEO of Crossover Markets, said. “Illuminate brings enormous depth of knowledge across the institutional landscape, and DRW adds significant expertise as one of the largest multi-asset market makers in the world.”

"Discussions around 24/7 Trading"

Crossover was established in 2022 by two former Jefferies executives, Mulvihill and Anthony Mazzarese. While Mulvihill is steering the company as the CEO, Mazzarese is holding the role of Chief Commercial Officer.

The company launched CROSSx, a crypto electronic communication network (ECN), last year with promises to decrease trading costs, improve execution quality, and enhance market data capabilities. Although ECNs are very popular in forex, it was one of the first in the cryptocurrency industry.

As Finance Magnates reported earlier, Crossover Markets handled over $3.15 billion in notional trading value and processed 141 billion quotes in the first three months of 2024.

"Digital assets market structure is experiencing a pivotal change driven by institutional needs and activity," Mulvihill added. "Simultaneously, we are witnessing the early-stage emergence of discussions around 24/7 trading across traditional asset classes."

Big Backers of Crossover

Crossover is also backed by big names in the trading industry. Earlier, it closed its seed round by receiving funds from institutions including Flow Traders, Laser Digital, Two Sigma, and Wintermute, and retail brokers like Exness, Gate.io, GMO, Pepperstone, Trademax, and Think Markets.

Following the latest funding round, Mark Beeston, founder and Managing Partner of Illuminate Financial, and Kevin Wolf, CFO at American Financial Exchange and former CEO of Euronext FX, will join Crossover’s board of directors.

"Illuminate Financial has been building out a portfolio of institutional grade digital assets infrastructure companies since 2019 as part of our thesis around the convergence of traditional finance and digital asset market structure," Beeston said. "Crossover adds best-in-class execution capability to that portfolio."