By Nathan Ferguson
FTX, a well-known crypto exchange, is turning toward equity trading as FTX US (which is its subsidiary in the United States) is launching a venue for stock trading. FTX US’ operator and owner, West Realm Shires Services, declared on 19th May that it will start a service for stock trading, called FTX Stocks, that is provided straightly via the trading application of FTX US.
The unique venue for stock trading will offer investment and trading in several hundred shares of the U.S.-based exchange, taking into account EFTs (exchange-traded funds) as well as common stocks. As per the declaration, the status of FTX Stocks will be that of the earliest venue by which the retail investors will be permitted to fund the accounts with USDC (USD Coin) as well as the rest of fiat-backed stablecoins.
The option is offered through collaboration with the crypto exchange FTX US, giving a substitutive choice to primary methods of deposit linked to the United States dollar, such as deposits through credit cards, wire transfers, and others. Firstly, the availability of the FTX Stocks venue will be in a private beta stage for selected U.S.-based consumers that are picked up out of a waitlist.
Nasdaq will be the platform via which the service will first route the entirety of the orders to guarantee fair pricing as well as the transparent execution of trades, as noted in the declaration. It also mentions that with the FTX Stocks’ launch, a single integrated venue has been developed by them that the retail investors can utilize to conveniently trade conventional stock offerings as well as NFTs (non-fungible tokens) via an intuitive and transparent user interface, as stated by Brett Harrison (the President of FTX US).
According to him, there exists an unambiguous market requirement for exclusive investment experience to support complete transparency in order routing without any dependency on payment in terms of order flow. The respective news is witnessed just after the criticism made by Sam Bankman-Fried (the CEO and founder of FTX), on 16th May, on the efficiency of BTC (Bitcoin) while playing the role of a payment network.
He particularly pointed out apprehensions regarding the mining consensus of the Bitcoin network, asserting that it cannot process transfers in millions. The CEO has additionally been enthusiastically involved in purchasing shares of prominent players across the industry, keeping up to $650M under Robinhood (a crypto-friendly application for stock trading).