Cryptocurrency custody firm Copper is actively seeking a buyer willing to pay approximately $500 million for the platform, according to reports from Cantor Fitzgerald has been appointed to facilitate the sale process. The company and Cantor Fitzgerald did not respond to requests for comment regarding the potential transaction.
The primary value driver in the sale is Copper's ClearLoop settlement system, which enables network participants to conduct delivery versus payment (DvP) transactions from within custody without bringing assets onchain, thereby eliminating settlement risk. The system, launched in 2020, caters to dozens of institutional firms and has demonstrated significant scale with more than 1,000 active counterparties and over $50 billion in monthly notional trading volume, as reported on Copper's website.
Copper made a strategic decision to close its enterprise custody business in 2023 to focus exclusively on the ClearLoop platform. The company has established partnerships with other crypto custodians, including a collaboration with Bitgo on the ClearLoop application, positioning itself as a key player in the institutional digital asset custody market.
The potential sale comes amid challenging market conditions, with bitcoin trading below $80,000 and artificial intelligence absorbing significant capital, creating a holding pattern in the crypto IPO market. Earlier this year, Copper was reportedly considering an IPO, potentially following Bitgo's footsteps, but the current market environment has made such public offerings less attractive.
The crypto market has seen active deal-making this year, with Mastercard agreeing to acquire U.K.-based stablecoin infrastructure firm BVNK for up to $1.8 billion, while Kraken's parent company Payward acquired derivatives platform Bitnomial. Bullish, owner of CoinDesk, announced a $4.2 billion deal to acquire Equiniti for tokenization infrastructure. Most recently, Standard Chartered announced it will acquire the remaining shares of Zodia Custody that it doesn't already own, following the bank's venture capital division reportedly taking a stake in crypto trading firm GSR at a valuation of more than $1 billion.
