Anchorage Digital has announced its integration with Binance to offer over-the-counter settlement for institutional cryptocurrency traders, giving customers access to the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange by volume without compromising custodial of their assets.
The partnership is supported by Atlas — Anchorage Digital’s wing Settlement Infrastructure – Represents the first OTC settlement implementation within that platform. Under the arrangement, institutions can trade on Binance while their assets remain in separate custody at Anchorage Digital Bank, the first federally chartered cryptocurrency bank in the United States.
The structure mirrors how institutional trading works in traditional financial markets, where custody and execution are separated. In those markets, assets are held with a custodian and are only transferred upon final settlement – and never appear on the trading venue’s balance sheet. Cryptocurrencies have long lacked this separation, requiring institutions to pre-fund exchange accounts and accept counterparty exposure in the same place.
“Institutions need a cryptocurrency market structure that reflects the standards they already rely on in traditional finance,” Nathan McCauley, co-founder and CEO of Anchorage Digital, said in a note. Bitcoin Magazine. “OTC settlement, powered by Atlas, is designed to separate custody from execution, helping institutions access exchange liquidity while keeping assets in secure custody.”
This arrangement also allows institutions to pledge cryptocurrency assets and USD accounts as collateral, enabling capital to be deployed while meeting trading margin requirements – an approach consistent with the workflow of traditional financial firms.
Binance has been building out its institutional infrastructure over the past several years, expanding its triple-digit banking and collateral management offerings to professional clients. Digital Integration Anchorage extends This effort.
“Working with Anchorage Digital gives institutional clients another way to access Binance’s liquidity while managing custody and collateral through a model more familiar to traditional financial markets,” said Catherine Chen, Head of VIP and Institutional at Binance.
Adopting cryptography and OTC settlement
Atlas is designed to support a range of OTC institutional workflows colonyincluding trading, lending, collateral management and other capital markets functions.
Anchorage Digital says the platform is designed for the current phase of institutional cryptocurrency adoption, where companies entering the market have compliance, custody, and operational requirements that previous cryptocurrency infrastructure was not designed to meet.
Anchorage Digital is backed by Andreessen Horowitz, Goldman Sachs, KKR, GIC and Visa, and is valued at $4.2 billion.
In addition to Anchorage Digital Bank NA, the company operates through Anchorage Digital Singapore, which is licensed by the Monetary Authority of Singapore, and Anchorage Digital NY, which holds a BitLicense from the New York Department of Financial Services.
