Digital Securities Exchange Taps R3’s Blockchain for Post-Trade Activities

Digital securities startup Archax has inked a deal to use blockchain firm R3’s Corda Enterprise solution for handling post-trade activities on its exchange.

Revealed Friday, Corda Enterprise was chosen for mopping up trades using distributed ledger technology to “reduce friction in the post-trade process.” Post-trade activities normally include the changing of ownership records, transfer of securities and cash to settle the trade, and reporting.

Based in London and founded in 2018, Archax’s front-end trade activities will remain “blockchain agnostic,” the firm said, but a private, permissioned version of Corda was needed for managing data following trades.

“The current post-trade process in traditional financial markets is hugely inefficient, with many intermediaries involved,” Archax CEO Graham Rodford said in a statement. “This partnership … [will] remove friction and streamline activities to improve efficiency and reduce cost.”

The firm added that its request to operate a multilateral trading facility (MTF) in London is being considered by the Financial Conduct Authority.

The partnership comes months after R3 hired software sales veteran Cathy Minter as chief revenue officer to boost business adoption of R3’s Corda Enterprise. At the time, Minter told CoinDesk that the enterprise blockchain firm was seeing multiple inquiries despite industry-wide expectations of a 60 percent decline in 2019 sector investment flows.

Image courtesy of R3