Bitget has announced a strategic partnership with Arkis, aiming to revolutionize the way institutional trading desks access liquidity and financing across various trading venues. This collaboration will introduce Direct Market Access (DMA) to Bitget within Arkis’s prime brokerage framework, enabling institutions to execute trades on Bitget while financing positions through a single, portfolio-level margin pool. This represents a significant shift from the traditional practice of managing isolated margin accounts spread across multiple platforms.
Through this integration, trading firms can seamlessly continue using their established sub-account and API workflows. However, they will now have the capability to borrow against a unified portfolio margin that encompasses both Bitget and other venues supported by Arkis. As a result, institutions will avoid the need to overcapitalise under separate, venue-specific margin regulations, allowing them to net positions at the portfolio level. This change is expected to enhance capital efficiency and reduce balance-sheet friction for firms actively engaging in various strategies. The underlying technical framework and commercial terms of this partnership are structured to reflect how professional trading teams operate, emphasizing operational clarity and speed in capital deployment.
Gracy Chen highlighted that institutions are seeking to deploy capital efficiently without the burden of managing fragmented margins across platforms. She emphasized that this integration offers institutional traders a practical approach to accessing Bitget while managing their risk and financing needs at the portfolio level. This announcement not only positions Bitget as an execution venue but also as an integral part of a broader institutional infrastructure ecosystem.
Arkis views this partnership as a reflection of its essential value proposition: to replace isolated, venue-specific collateral requirements with a comprehensive credit framework facilitating portfolio-level financing across both centralized and decentralized markets. Serhii Tyshchenko noted that trading firms require capital efficiency while maintaining sound risk practices. By enabling DMA for Bitget within Arkis’s unified margin framework, this partnership empowers institutions to finance positions comprehensively while adhering to the necessary controls expected in professional trading environments. The Arkis team has proactively developed its prime brokerage toolkit since its initial funding and private beta phases, with capital efficiency as its core offering.
The timing of this collaboration aligns with a noteworthy market trend. Bitget has been promoting its Universal Exchange (UEX) model, which seeks to integrate crypto, tokenized securities, commodities, and other assets into a cohesive operational environment. Independent research supports the notion that institutional interest is growing in platforms that offer bundled liquidity, execution, and financing solutions. An analysis by Messari of the UEX concept pointed out that features such as portfolio-level margin, direct market access, and integrated execution are increasingly anticipated by professional capital participants from modern exchanges. The partnership between Bitget and Arkis embodies this trend by delivering execution capabilities within a comprehensive multi-asset venue, along with prime-brokerage financing.
As the world’s largest UEX, Bitget continues to expand its institutional presence through new product offerings and partnerships. For institutional users, the Arkis integration promises a more straightforward approach to scaling trading activities across both spot and derivatives markets, eliminating the constraints of capital tied to specific venues. For trading firms employing diverse strategies across different markets, the relief from balance-sheet constraints can significantly enhance performance.
In the realm of professional trading, execution and financing are inherently linked. By combining Bitget’s execution environment with Arkis’s prime brokerage services, both firms are promoting a more streamlined experience for institutions navigating the complexities of digital markets, prioritizing capital efficiency, robust risk management, and operational simplicity. The partnership is poised to influence the evolving landscape of institutional involvement in crypto markets, signaling that effective operational frameworks will be crucial in the ongoing competition for market share.
