Ken Griffin Drops $400M on Crypto.com, Wall Street Finally Takes the Bait 🐳

Crypto.com said Thursday it has secured a $400 million strategic investment from Citadel Securities at a $20 billion valuation, marking the Singapore-based exchange's first-ever institutional funding round. The deal hands the Chicago-based market maker, founded by billionaire Ken Griffin, a stake in the company and underscores Wall Street's accelerating push into digital asset infrastructure.

The investment is intended to accelerate Crypto.com's expansion across "all asset classes," including tokenized securities and derivatives, the company said in a statement. "We are thrilled to work with Citadel Securities to continue driving the crypto industry into a new era of institutionalization," said Kris Marszalek, co-founder and CEO of Crypto.com. "The size of the opportunity in front of us is staggering, as crypto increasingly becomes the rails for finance." Jim Esposito, president of Citadel Securities, said the deal reflects broader market evolution. "The convergence of traditional financial markets and digital asset infrastructure is an exciting evolution with the potential to further improve market efficiency," Esposito said.

Founded in 2016, Crypto.com had never previously taken institutional capital. The exchange currently ranks 11th by trading volume according to CoinMarketCap and offers crypto, stocks and prediction markets to retail users. In February, the company received conditional approval for a U.S. national trust bank charter. The Citadel Securities investment follows a string of traditional finance moves into crypto infrastructure: Citadel Securities committed $200 million to rival exchange Kraken last November alongside market maker Jane Street, Intercontinental Exchange, owner of the New York Stock Exchange, has taken a stake in OKX, and Nasdaq invested $50 million in Gemini.

Citadel Securities and Crypto.com both framed the partnership around the push to move stocks, bonds and other financial products onto blockchain rails and enable around-the-clock trading. The deal comes as crypto-native firms increasingly expand into adjacent financial services, with Coinbase adding stock trading for U.S. users in February. The companies did not disclose the percentage stake acquired by Citadel Securities, and terms of the investment were not made public.