In crypto, market makers are effectively the industry’s kingmakers. Silent engines whose capital reserves and formidable expertise keep the system from seizing up.
The critical backstop whose infrastructure ensures small-time traders can cash out their satoshis whenever they like, market makers also aid major institutions who want to move seven-figure sums without destabilizing the market. Like a well-oiled machine, their constant buy and sell orders mean investors can trade quickly and at a fair price.
With a huge number of crypto exchanges, projects and marketplaces now in operation, market makers aren’t exactly in short supply. Here are five of the best-known and most reputable.
Caladan
Starting as AlphaLab Capital in 2017, Singapore-based Caladan now processes over $50 billion in yearly trade volume, making it one of market making’s true heavyweights. Its battle-tested technology and bespoke tools (including options products) power over 65 exchanges and 1,000+ tokens, while its high-speed algorithms and round-the-clock customer support have been leveraged by no end of decentralized markets and apps.
Caladan’s new New York hub signals its growing U.S. ambitions, although its outlook remains global: of a workforce totalling over 100 employees, 5% will apparently be allocated to Stateside ops. The company is an engine of industry growth in other ways, to: it’s a prolific investor promising pre-seed and seed stage Web3 projects.
Keyrock
Founded in 2017 in Brussels, Keyrock delivers liquidity to over 85 centralized and decentralized exchanges, including leading industry players like Coinbase, Binance and Uniswap. Boasting proprietary tech that aggregates price data, tightens bid-ask spreads, and supports large trades without causing price disruption, Keyrock also offers tailored OTC desks and treasury solutions.
Caladan isn’t the only market maker spreading its wings in 2025: Keyrock also opened a New York office and acquired FCA registration in the UK, building on licenses in Switzerland and France.
Jump Crypto
Established in 2021 as the digital asset division of Jump Trading Group (founded 1999), the Chicago-based Jump Crypto leverages high-frequency algorithmic trading to provide deep liquidity for spot and derivatives markets. It’s much more than a market maker, though: a key contributor to Pyth, a high-performance oracle for crypto and traditional assets, Jump also recently joined forces with Aptos Labs to launch Shelby, a Web3 storage network. Like Caladan, it’s also a serial investor in decentralized startups.
Where market making specifically is concerned, Jump is known for its custom liquidity infrastructure and deep exchange integrations.
Wintermute
In common with Keyrock and Caladan, Wintermute was founded in 2017 during the crypto industry’s first major bull run. Today, the market maker powers liquidity for over 50 exchanges, and this year recorded a peak single-day volume of $2.24 billion as OTC volumes spiked by 313% on last year’s figure.
The New York-based Wintermute, which also has an office in London, operates seamlessly across centralized and decentralized platforms with an ability to absorb massive trades with minimal slippage. Interestingly, the firm recently secured a Bitcoin-backed credit line from investment bank Cantor Fitzgerald, with its CEO saying this would help it manage the capital-intensive nature of OTC trading and settlement.
GSR
Launched in 2013 by former Goldman Sachs executives, GSR brings over a decade of expertise to crypto – a fact that puts it in the minority given the industry’s relatively short lifespan. Specializing in bespoke risk/treasury management, algorithmic trading, and OTC services, the company caters to both centralized and decentralized exchanges and also partners with projects to ensure their token economy is sustainable, their incentives aligned and their launch a success.
This year, GSR and Polygon Labs announced the launch of a new Layer-2 blockchain called Katana pitched at high-risk DeFi traders, a market of its commitment to continuous innovation and industry investment.
The average crypto user doesn’t tend to hear much about market makers: they opt to operate in the shadows, quietly sidestepping the hoopla, investing in infrastructure, funding emerging projects, and stabilizing markets for retail and institutional traders. But without them, crypto’s growth would inevitably stall – leaving exchanges vulnerable to volatility.
For this reason, market makers shape the future of digital finance as much as the genius imagineers and visionaries building at the protocol level.
Also read: $16.1m Bet on PEP-20: How Bitcoin’s New Token Standard Went Viral
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