Zebpay returned to India ahead of the momentous Supreme Court decision.

“There is a huge demand among traders and arbitrageurs in India for OTC desk services, and the recent Supreme Court decision reversing the ban has caught the attention of large investors and institutions eager to explore this new asset class,” says Nirmal Ranga, Vice President of Trade at Zebpay. Unsurprisingly, to cash in on this burgeoning interest in big-ticket crypto trading, Zebpay is launching an OTC Bitcoin (BTC) trading desk. (Bitcoin.com)

Zebpay’s OTC BTC Desk

The service will to go live on August 3, while registrations have already commenced.

The service is suitable for institutions and individuals wanting to press large orders. Such trades could be difficult to fill in most open exchanges due to liquidity issues. However, Zebpay’s OTC desk claims to surmount such issues because it offers “deeper liquidity and a private, more personalized service.”

Typical entities attracted to the Zebpay OTC BTC desk would be traders, arbitrageurs, HNIs, long-term investors, asset managers, and institutions that want to buy/sell bitcoin in bulk.

On a normal open exchange, these orders would immediately lead to a price action adverse for the trader.

How the OTC desk will garner liquidity

“Our OTC liquidity will come largely through active participants on the platform,” said Ranga. “We have existing long-term relationships with a few liquidity providers, through which we provide maximum liquidity with minimal or negative slippage.”

Zebpay is an old hand at OTC services. In its previous, pre-RBI-bank stint that lasted till 2018, OTC constituted nearly 90% of its business.

Zebpay could ride the healthy tailwind behind BTC prices

Meanwhile, the recent rally in BTC that took its price past $11,000 on Tuesday. That has rubbed off on Indian crypto traders’ sentiment. There is now a pronounced increase in trading momentum in India, with rising volumes of trading.

“The surge in bitcoin prices comes amid a rush for safe-haven assets that are considered alternatives to cash and stocks. It has been fueled by the COVID-19 pandemic that has driven the global economy into a recession,” said Sumit Gupta, co-founder and CEO, CoinDCX, to LiveMint. “There’s also the decreased supply of available bitcoin, attributed to the halving of coins in circulation that happened earlier this year,” he added.

CoinDCX, India’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, gained a strategic investment of $2.5 million in May. Polychain Capital led the round with participation from Coinbase Ventures.

Related Story:  In India, RBI Confirms No Ban on Crypto; CoinDCX Raises $2.5M; Crypto Volumes Fly