Bakkt LLC, is a global, open and a regulated ecosystem built for digital assets. It was launched by the Intercontinental crypto exchange in August 2018. The firm will closely work with Microsoft, Starbucks and BCG to establish a seamless platform for institutions as well as consumers to buy, sell, store and spend digital assets.
The exchange has recently announced the acquisition of Digital Asset Custody Company (DACC) on April 29 via a blog post. According to the blog post, there are several new measures taken by the exchange in order to stimulate regulatory feedback which will be implied to DACC as well. However, the exchange did not reveal the exact amount spent to acquire DACC.
As per the COO at Bakkt, Adam White, apart from supporting 13 blockchains and 100+ assets and developing a secure digital asset storage solution, the entire team of DACC will join Bakkt. White also underlined:
“As we look to scale and support custody of additional digital assets, DACC’s native support of 13 blockchains and 100+ assets will serve as an important accelerator, and we’re pleased to welcome Matthew Johnson, Adam Healy, and the entire DACC team to Bakkt.”
The blog post also revealed that Bakkt has also applied in New York Department of Financial Services in order to become Qualified Custodian for digital assets. And then, it may be able to launch of physically-delivered bitcoin futures with contracts set so that it can be further traded on ICE Futures US (IFUS) and cleared on ICE Clear US (ICUS). The exchange is thinking to establish ICUS is a clearinghouse as well as an exchange which is governed by the United States Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).
Bakkt has ventured with a global bank BNY Mellon in order to build “geographically-distributed” private key storage. The bank has been keeping assets like hedge funds, asset managers and broker-dealers.
