LAB Radio Ep 70 – Bitcoin2019 – Chris Wittenborn – Velocity Markets

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Chris Wittenborn, Business Development and Strategy at Velocity Markets

On episode 70 of LAB Radio, Velocity Markets’, Chris Wittenborn chats with your host Chris Groshong from Bitcoin2019.

Chris first heard about Bitcoin back in 2010. He read the whitepaper, but couldn’t get around the fact that he meet someone in parking lot to buy bitcoins. After growing up in Chicago, he moved to Colorado for better winters, great skiing and to pursue a degree at the University of Colorado Boulder. He landed a research job with a little finance firm locally and was given some sage advice to go East.

It was in 2011 when Chris headed to New York and where he really dug into the financial world. In 2017 there was lots of rumblings about the Institutional world coming into the crypto space. Being on the Institutional side, he knew that ecosystem was not ready to support Institutional grade customers. Therefore, he left to start providing institutional consulting for Exchanges and Private Equity companies building products.

“Shorthop is an institutional caliber exchange technology in the hands of the retail user”

-Chris Wittenborn

Velocity Markets is the parent company for Shorthop, an institutional caliber exchange technology in the hands of the retail user. Shorthop aggregates liquidity across several markets to provide its users the best possible price. The user no longer has to worry about which exchange to transact on or moving funds around. The user only has to focus on their desired outcomes, Shorthop does the rest.

They have different levels of services for different levels of clients based on their sophistication. They really focus on providing the user, whether its a Hedge Fund or an individual, with the best execution possible across a wide variety of exchanges. Initially, they are launching in California. Over the next several months, as they receive money transmission licenses, they will be opening up their platforms to other jurisdiction within the United States.

Recently, Chris Wittenborn has been spending his time working on leveraging their existing Broker/Dealer license to launch a digital securities exchange. This exchange would be separate from Shorthop and only be available to institutions and accredited investors. Creating a secondary market for compliant offerings is the future. The company Circle was recently able to achieve this, which is promising for Chris and the Velocity Markets team.

In this episode Chris Wittenborn discusses:

Insight to the advice he was giving companies building for institutional clients
Bitcoin Volatility and whether aggregating price will reduce volatility.
Their efforts to launch a Finra registered digital securities asset exchange component.
How he approaches is job and how he stays engaged.
How he and his cofounders came together.
What he would change about the industry.