Keyrock’s SC Ventures-led Series C values the crypto market maker at $1.1B as it expands from market making into M&A-driven asset and wealth management.
Summary
- Keyrock’s new Series C round, led by Standard Chartered’s SC Ventures, values the crypto market maker at $1.1 billion.
- Ripple joined as an existing investor, as Keyrock eyes up to $100 million to fund expansion and M&A.
- The Brussels-based firm now spans 80+ trading venues and is moving deeper into asset and wealth management.
Digital asset market maker Keyrock has secured a fresh Series C financing round led by Standard Chartered’s venture arm SC Ventures, pushing the company’s valuation to $1.1 billion as it targets up to $100 million in new capital to scale its global trading and asset management franchise. Existing backer Ripple also participated in the round, extending a relationship that dates back to at least Keyrock’s $72 million Series B, which was co-led by Ripple, SIX Fintech Ventures and Middlegame Ventures. The firm plans to use the new funds to reinforce its balance sheet, broaden its market making and options offering across centralized and decentralized exchanges, and pursue acquisitions in adjacent infrastructure and asset-management niches.
Founded in 2017 in Belgium by CEO Kevin de Patoul, Keyrock “deploys and operates proprietary, market-neutral, and highly scalable market making technologies across major centralized and decentralized exchanges,” according to its own project profile. As of 2024, the company was already operating on more than 85 exchanges and over 400 markets, a footprint that International Finance described as placing Keyrock “in advance of the competition” after it obtained Swiss regulatory clearance via VQF. “Securing the VQF membership reinforces Keyrock’s stance on upholding rigorous regulatory standards within the crypto space,” de Patoul said at the time, underscoring its push to court institutional flows.
SC Ventures, Standard Chartered’s innovation and fintech investment arm, has emerged as one of the most aggressive bank-backed players in digital assets, from backing crypto exchanges like One Trading to preparing a $250 million digital asset fund targeting Middle Eastern investors. Standard Chartered became the first global systemically important bank to offer spot crypto trading for institutional clients in 2025, and is now advancing plans for a crypto prime brokerage housed inside SC Ventures to optimize capital treatment under Basel III’s 1,250% risk weight on unbacked crypto exposures.
Ripple, meanwhile, has been building an enterprise crypto stack across payments, liquidity and tokenization, including a $250 million acquisition of Swiss custodian Metaco in 2023 that it said would help it “diversify into the fast-growing institutional crypto custody technology market.” “Keyrock has provided scalable liquidity solutions to all kinds of stakeholders in the digital asset space, including Ripple,” Maxime Fages, director of institutional markets at Ripple, said when joining the Series B, adding that the company had “watched Keyrock’s global success” over a multi-year partnership.
Alongside its core market making, OTC and options business, Keyrock has moved decisively into asset and wealth management via the acquisition of Luxembourg-based alternative investment fund manager Turing Capital for about $27.8 million. The deal adds a regulated AIFM structure in Luxembourg and a new Asset & Wealth Management division focused on tokenized, data-driven strategies for institutional and high-net-worth clients. “This expansion positions us to better serve our institutional partners across the full spectrum of digital assets, from liquidity provision to long-term investment strategies,” de Patoul said as the firm filed a MiCA application with Liechtenstein’s FMA to offer portfolio management and advisory services.
