LONDON – 23 June 2025: ION announces that it has partnered with GFO-X, the UK’s first regulated, centrally cleared trading venue dedicated to digital assets. A global leader in trading and workflow automation software, high-value analytics and insights, and strategic consulting to financial institutions, central banks, governments, and corporate organizations, ION will provide software and infrastructure to power market access, clearing, and margin processing for the GFO-X ecosystem.
GFO-X will be supported on ION’s front-to-back offerings, including XTP Execution, XTP Clearing, and ION’s trade-processing platform, XTP. This integration ensures that a broad segment of the cleared derivatives industry can access GFO-X’s crypto derivatives products from day one. Intermediaries and their end-clients can trade on GFO-X alongside other crypto derivatives products already offered by US exchanges.
GFO-X is designed to bring digital assets into the mainstream through traditional market structures, supported by new technologies to solve the multiple risks associated with the digital asset market. By partnering with ION — whose technology underpins much of the traditional financial system — GFO-X enables market participants to trade and clear digital asset derivatives with the same reliability, security, and efficiency they expect from traditional markets.
Arnab Sen, CEO at GFO-X says, “We are delighted to announce our strategic partnership with ION. This collaboration evidences our shared commitment to innovation and excellence in the digital asset derivatives market. Working with ION allows us to use their expertise and cutting-edge technology to enhance our client connectivity and market infrastructure. Together, we are poised to deliver a seamless and secure trading experience for our clients, bridging the gap between traditional finance and the rapidly evolving digital asset space.
“Our partnership underscores our vision of creating a highly regulated and efficient market structure that meets the needs of large institutional participants. We believe that this collaboration will drive significant growth and diversification in the digital asset derivatives market, providing our clients with unparalleled opportunities,” Sen adds.
Francesco Margini, Chief Product Officer for Cleared Derivatives, ION Markets, says, “We’re proud to support GFO-X in bringing the security and efficiency of the traditional markets to digital asset trading. Exchanges increasingly seek to partner with ION to remove the entry barriers represented by the significant technology investment required to support the trading and clearing of new products. The GFO-X launch demonstrates the industry’s strong appetite to trade crypto derivatives across different regions and jurisdictions, and to trade all these products from a single technology platform.”
About GFO-X
GFO-X is the UK’s first regulated and centrally cleared trading venue dedicated to digital asset derivatives. Combining proprietary high-performance technology with industry-leading partnerships and infrastructure, GFO-X delivers the requirements necessary to grow the institutional digital asset derivatives market.
GFO-X provides comprehensive risk management for transactions in digital asset derivatives through clearing provided by LCH DigitalAssetClear. Backed by M&G Investments and authorised by the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) in 2022, GFO-X’s regulation-first approach has enabled it to partner with some of the largest financial institutions in the world.
GFO-X believes the digital asset futures and options markets will grow exponentially over the coming years as the asset class matures and more sophisticated investors begin to participate in greater size. By solving market constraints such as counterparty risks and technology challenges, GFO-X delivers a robust market structure and innovative products to propel the next leg of growth of the digital asset ecosystem. For more information, visit https://www.gfo-x.com
