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Swyftx Acquires Caleb & Brown
Swyftx Acquires Caleb & Brown

Transaction Overview

On July 1st, 2025, Swyftx, one of the largest Australian cryptocurrency exchanges, announced a definitive agreement to acquire Caleb & Brown, a high-net-worth-focused crypto brokerage, for an undisclosed amount.

 

Target: Caleb & Brown

Caleb and Brown is a Melbourne-based, high net worth focused crypto brokerage that specializes in personalized trading services across the digital asset landscape. Caleb & Brown focuses on the relationship model used successfully across traditional  financial services – every client that comes onto their platform gets assigned a broker to assist them in executing trades  and handling all customer service needs. Caleb and Brown’s core services include 1) Brokerage Services, which provide personalized 24/7 trading support for 250+ digital assets, 2) an OTC Desk, which provides high volume trading solutions with deep liquidity and competitive pricing, 3) the Caleb and Brown Asset Management, an actively managed crypto asset fund for accredited investor, 4) crypto custody. 

 

The business has more than AUD $2 billion of digital assets under custody and was founded by Rupert Hackett and Dr. Prash Puspanathan in 2016. C&B is led by CEO Jackson Zeng and has 64 team members across both Australia and the US. Caleb & Brown has not raised any outside capital. 

 

Architect Partners’ Observations

Architect Partners acted as the exclusive financial advisor to Caleb & Brown. 

 

Swyftx’s acquisition of Caleb & Brown marks the largest acquisition targeting high net worth crypto investors. It also reflects two important shifts in the evolution of crypto exchanges, particularly within the ANZ region.

 

First, high-net-worth client service is becoming a strategic differentiator. Exchanges are beginning to recognize that personalized brokerage and deep client relationships offer a competitive advantage while greatly reducing attrition. This is a model that high-net-worth clients are accustomed to in their financial lives. Caleb & Brown’s approach, which assigns a dedicated broker to every client, stands apart from the high-volume, low-touch models that dominate the market. Swyftx gains access not only to clients but also to an established business model that emphasizes trust, service, and retention in a way few crypto exchanges have pursued.

 

Second, this is a milestone moment for ANZ crypto M&A. While there have been many plays for global expansion by exchanges, this is the first of its kind in Australia moving into the US, signaling that the region is entering a more active phase of market maturity. 

 

We believe this transaction will serve as a catalyst for further strategic activity to expand globally and to augment services as companies seek differentiation in both product and customer segments.

 

Strategic Rationale

Swyftx is acquiring Caleb & Brown to expand into the United States via C&B’s regulatory framework, and to acquire the relationship model inherently required with a higher-tier customer base. This acquisition will grant Swyftx entry into the U.S. 12 to 24 months faster than otherwise possible organically. Furthermore, the acquisition diversifies Swyftx’s primarily retail client base to include 25k+ high net worth individuals in numerous countries. 

 

“Caleb & Brown has quietly established one of the most impressive brokerage offerings in the world, with a heavily differentiated private client service. We see enormous growth potential.” – Jason Titman

Crypto M&A Snapshot

Week of July 07 – July 13

Eric F. Risley
July 13, 2025
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July 7th – July 13th

PERSPECTIVES by Eric F. Risley 

 

Context, and therefore insight, is often lost when using a microscope. Our weekly reports suffer from this challenge by virtue of the micro‑scale time frame. Let’s step back and consider year‑to‑date 2025 to better understand the current crypto M&A markets.

 

As we highlighted in our Q2 Crypto M&A and Financing Snapshot, published last Tuesday, the crypto M&A market is hitting its stride, and records have been falling each quarter. However, activity, and particularly the consideration paid, is not evenly distributed across the sub‑sectors we track. In fact, it is extremely biased, as shown in the chart below.

 

The Brokers and Exchanges sub‑sector is generally the strongest when considering both consideration paid and activity levels. This is not surprising, as it is by far the most mature segment within crypto and generally where the largest businesses have been built.

 

Blockchain Network Operators, primarily Bitcoin miners, fall into the second category. Last week’s Core Scientific | CoreWeave transaction does skew total consideration above Brokers and Exchanges; however, that deal is an anomaly, given both companies’ strategic shift to high‑performance computing (HPC) from Bitcoin mining. AI workloads are driving tremendous demand for data‑center capacity and raise the question, “What is the highest and best use of a data center?” Right now, HPC is winning.

 

Lastly, the Crypto Treasury Strategy phenomenon has affected our Investing and Trading Infrastructure sub‑sector. These companies are fundamentally capital aggregators, better known as asset managers. The trend has appeared in M&A through reverse mergers into public entities and de‑SPACs. Why? Because having a publicly traded equity is central to the treasury‑strategy model: equity valuations often trade at large multiples of the value of assets under management, commonly referred to as net asset value (NAV), an anomaly relative to how asset managers are usually valued in equity markets. Time will tell how persistent this premium to NAV becomes.