Banking veterans who have steered divisions at HSBC, Citigroup and Merrill Lynch in the Asia-Pacific region are ditching traditional finance to invest in cryptocurrencies.
People familiar with the matter told CoinDesk that Joseph Chang, head of equities trading and prime finance at Merrill Lynch, HSBC and Citigroup Asia-Pacific from 1997 to 2016, and Grahame Webb, formerly head of technology for HSBC and Citigroup Asia-Pacific prime finance and securities services, have been trading cryptocurrencies since June through a new Hong Kong-based fund, Liquibit Capital.
Liquibit Capital, also managed by a former Barclays Capital vice president and two current JPMorgan and Wells Fargo technicians, will manage assets worth $50 million, the people said.
Liquibit is said to arbitrage a portfolio of bitcoin, bitcoin cash, ether, litecoin and eos, custodied with Fireblocks.
It is expected to expand to trading derivatives, options and futures on BitMEX, Huobi, OKEx and Deribit – cryptocurrency exchanges with a largely Asia-based presence.
Chang, now Liquibit Capital's chief investment officer, said regulatory bloat and a surplus of middlemen at investment banks convinced him and his partners to switch to cryptocurrency markets.
Webb, chief technology and operating officer at Liquitbit Capital, has also previously structured custody and clearing architecture for securities flowing between wealth managers.