Overview
- Wintermute announced on Wednesday that it will invest roughly $1 billion over five years to build high-frequency trading systems and AI-ready data centers.
- The company’s U.S. affiliate has registered as an SEC broker-dealer and joined FINRA, which allows it to trade U.S. equities, options and to act as an authorized participant for ETFs.
- Wintermute will fund the expansion from retained earnings and plans to double its New York team from 17 people while increasing global headcount by about 40% over the next year.
- The push is driven by weaker crypto activity — average daily crypto volumes fell from about $15 billion last year to about $10 billion this year — and a goal to raise non-crypto revenue from ~10% today to over 50% by the end of 2027.
- The firm plans to use its large trading datasets, reported at roughly $3.5 trillion in annual volume across 70+ venues, to train models and try to compete with established low-latency market makers while some roles will still need further exchange approvals.