Arkham’s Token Soars 16% on Report Sam Altman-Backed Crypto Firm Plans Derivatives Exchange

Blockchain data company Arkham Intelligence’s token (ARKM) surged 16% on Friday on a report that it plans to launch a crypto derivatives exchange next month.

Arkham’s trading venue aims to target retail users and compete with other derivatives venues such as exchange giant Binance, Bloomberg reported citing a person familiar with the matter. The company has also relocated from London and New York to the Dominican Republic, where the upcoming marketplace will operate and is in the process of obtaining a license

Arkham CEO Miguel Morel confirmed in a Telegram message the firm’s relocation to the Caribbean island country, but said “no comment” on the derivatives exchange plans.

The crypto derivatives market has booked $3 trillion trading volumes last month, more than double of the size of the spot market, according to a CCData report. The implosion of FTX, however, dealt a significant blow to the sector, while market leader Binance’s dominance sank to a four-year in September.

Arkham’s platform is a popular tool for following blockchain transactions and identifying entities behind crypto wallets. The company raised $12 million from investors including OpenAI CEO and founder Sam Altman, big-name VC investors Peter Thiel and Tim Draper, and major crypto companies Coinbase, Wintermute and Digital Currency Group (DCG), according to Crunchbase’s database.

The firm rolled out a marketplace last year for on-chain intelligence offering bounties to identify crypto addresses. It also released its own token that’s used for bounty payments, which now boasts a market capitalization of $420 million, per CoinGecko data.

Recently, Arkham stroke a sponsorship deal with Turkish football club Galatasaray, following other crypto firms’ footsteps into sports sponsorships to expand their brand to a broader public.