Aplo registered as crypto Prime Broker by French SEC

Paris, October 20th, 2020 - Aplo, an electronic prime broker for crypto-currency, has just been registered as a Digital Asset Service Provider with the French SEC (AMF) both as a custodian and broker-dealer. This registration will be mandatory starting December for companies providing these services to French investors, and is extendable to European customers as well.
Official website: www.aplo.io

In 2019, Aplo's four founders are brought together by a common realisation: the crypto-currency market is too fragmented, and is not ready to host institutional investors. There are currently over 50 venues on which to buy and sell crypto-currency. Each has its own price, onboarding process and obligation to pre-fund the trading account before being able to submit orders. In order to get the best price and maximise the chance of filling their orders, participants should be connected to all platforms at the same time, which is too expensive and time-consuming for an investor.

Oliver Yates, Simon Douyer and Arnaud Carrere, freshly graduated from the top French engineering and business schools, have been in the crypto space for years, and actively contribute to its development in France and the USA. Jacques Lolieux has managed high-frequency trading teams in major European banks for 25 years across three countries and two continents, and has created the largest equity Dark Pool in the world at Credit Suisse. With their combined experience, the team launched an electronic broker that aggregated dozens of trading venues in one platform.

Aplo is an execution desk for any investor or trader looking to minimise crypto trading costs while maximising capital efficiency. Aplo provides custody, low touch and high touch execution services as well as a cloud-based trading platform. They also offer access to their privacy-preserving Dark Pool, in order to prevent information leakage on large trades while providing additional price improvement. All the while, customers face a single, EU-regulated counterpart for settlement.

Aplo went through the Berkeley Blockchain XCelerator, before joining leading French deep tech incubator Agoranov. In May the company raised a 1M€ Seed round with French and American VCs in order to finalise its registration with the French SEC and develop its sales efforts. In June, the company launches its beta test with select companies in order to validate the technology.

As of October, Aplo is registered as a Digital Asset Service Provider (DASP) by the French SEC, both as a custodian and broker-dealer. This registration will be mandatory starting in December for companies providing these services to French investors. In addition to that, this registration will encourage foreign investors who need to trade with a serious partner. This regulatory framework places France at the forefront of crypto-friendly jurisdictions, where others have struggled to publish clear and unified rules.

“This registration represents a huge milestone for the company and the crypto ecosystem in Europe, as there is currently no solution similar to ours that is compliant with European regulations, and thus suited for European investors”  adds Oliver Yates, CEO of Aplo.

Press contact: contact@aplo.io

List of registered DASP here.