Torbjorn Jenssen
Founder, CEO & MD
Good morning, and welcome to this Q1 presentation for K33. My name is Torbjørn Bull Jenssen, and I’m the CEO of K33. Most of you probably know a lot about K33 already. But for those who don’t, K33 is a crypto exchange optimized for investors and corporate clients. We let clients trade against exactly the fee and currency they choose. We give them access to a named account manager and we offer deep liquidity, market research and superior custody solutions. And now new from Q1 this year, we’re also offering lending, enabling clients to borrow money against their crypto as collateral.
That way, they can free up liquidity to invest in other instruments, buy more crypto or pay taxes or use the funds exactly how they see fit. This is an important milestone for K33 and marks our broadening of our product offering from an execution and custody product complemented with research to a more full spectrum offering catering to more than just buying, selling and holding, but also now liquidity provision and lending and in the future, more asset management and broader services.
Taking a step back and looking at the market, it’s been a volatile quarter, and it’s been pretty quiet and dampened mood in the crypto sector actually since the start of the year. Bitcoin saw a sharp downturn and volumes fell generally in the industry. During Q1, market activity fell with 15%. And we see defensive positioning in the derivatives market with the longest period this decade with negative funding rates, meaning that participants are betting on fall in Bitcoin price. We see ETF outflows, and we see general risk aversion. However, we also see extremely strong
