Wintermute USA registered as an SEC broker-dealer, gaining equity trading, AP status for crypto ETPs, and self-clearing. The crypto market maker now faces a long road to compete with traditional firms.
Wintermute USA LLC registered as a broker-dealer with the Securities and Exchange Commission and became a member of FINRA on Aug. 6, 2026. The New York-based affiliate can now trade equities and equity options, act as an authorized participant for exchange-traded products including digital-asset ETPs, and self-clear digital-asset securities trades. All of that is for the firm's own proprietary account, not for outside clients.
The registration caps an 18-month regulatory push that included two filings with the SEC's Crypto Task Force. A September 2025 submission asked for clarity on dealer rules for tokenized securities, a DeFi carve-out, and confirmation that network tokens like bitcoin are not securities. An October 2025 follow-up was narrower: it requested confirmation that a dealer trading tokenized securities solely for its own account could settle those trades on-chain without triggering the Customer Protection Rule's bank-account requirements. That October letter closely describes what Wintermute USA's new registration now permits.
Wintermute's CEO, Evgeny Gaevoy, said the move reflects a long-held view at the firm: "Digital asset markets will evolve in more than one direction." The firm has operated entirely within crypto-native venues since 2017. This is its first direct foothold in the plumbing of traditional U.S. securities markets.
One rival moved faster. GSR, a larger crypto market maker, reached broker-dealer status in October 2025 by agreeing to acquire Equilibrium Capital Services, a dormant, already-registered broker-dealer, rather than building a license from scratch. The acquisition closed in June 2026, with the entity renamed GSR Securities, about two months before Wintermute's registration cleared. GSR's chief strategy officer, Joshua Riezman, said at the time that no other major crypto market maker held a U.S. broker-dealer license and predicted more would follow. The acquisition route got GSR to the status faster. Wintermute's direct path let it apply for the specific self-clearing and custody authority it wanted, rather than inherit whatever scope came bundled with a shell company.
Gaevoy has said he wants Wintermute to compete with Jump Trading, Jane Street and Citadel Securities within three to five years. That is a long way from where the firm stands today. BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust, which held $43.2 billion at the end of June, lists roughly a dozen authorized participants in its prospectus, including Jane Street, Citadel Securities, Virtu Americas, Goldman Sachs (Alpha Score 57), and JPMorgan (Alpha Score 64). None of them is a crypto-native trading firm. Wintermute's new registration makes it eligible to seek that kind of role. It does not yet have it. Coverage of the announcement suggests Wintermute has already lined up ETF issuers as clients.
The next 12 months should show whether registration converts into actual market share. The key markers: whether Wintermute lands authorized-participant status on a live digital-asset ETP, or wins any designated-market-maker role on a national exchange. Absent either, the license remains eligibility rather than revenue.
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