Ex-Goldman, Paribas Execs Launch Bitcoin Derivatives Exchange

A new bitcoin derivatives trading platform called Crypto Facilities has launched in London, backed by a pair of co-founders with longtime experience in the City’s traditional financial markets.
Crypto Facilities currently lets customers trade just one instrument, a forward contract on the bitcoin price. It currently offers the contract with three expiry dates. A trader can lock in the price of a bitcoin by selling or shorting a forward.
The platform’s pedigreed co-founders are Timo Schlaefer, a former executive director at Goldman Sachs in London that worked on credit quantitative modelling, and Jean-Christophe Laruelle, who formerly built trading platform systems for BNP Paribas and Societe Generale.
Schlaefer is coy about his Goldman experience, saying that he isn’t comfortable discussing his history at the firm. He said, however, that he left his role there in order to work on Crypto Facilities full-time.
“I left [Goldman] to do this, basically,” he said. “It is not something you can just start with two weeks of preparation time.”
Schlaefer’s contacts in high finance have come in handy, as he courts institutional traders who want to get involved with cryptocurrencies, although he wouldn’t confirm if any professional investors are trading on his platform, citing client confidentiality.

This post was published at Coin Desk on February 26, 2015.