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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 September 9 – September 15

Eric F. Risley
September 15, 2024
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It will happen soon, hopefully…

 

Crypto as an industry is perceived by most laypersons (and many in our industry) to be all about novel assets called tokens.  Of course, perfectly natural given collectively tokens of all forms represent well over $1 trillion in U.S. Dollars.  However, tokens are only a feature of something far bigger, a collection of technologies that form a new platform upon which to build applications.  Applications are simply software and online services that “do something useful” for people as individuals and as members of companies (and perhaps AI as well!).  Chris Dixon, in his book “Read Write Own: Building the Next Era of the Internet”, describes this new platform as “Blockchain Networks” or “Blockchain” and others call it “Web3”.  So far these labels seem to come up short but the combination of technologies which comprise blockchains like Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, Avalanche,… offer “Web3” application developers a platform upon which to build applications that promise capabilities and features that are “better” than existing applications.  Chris Dixon cites examples including games and social networks.  “Better” are games where users actually own the in-game assets they earn from gameplay and can easily convert these assets to money useable both inside and outside the game.  Another example of “better” is social networks where the users directly benefit financially from their “social graph and persona” rather than Facebook keeping all the benefits (roughly $140 billion in annual revenues or $45.00 per active user) in return for offering a “free” service.

 

There are thousands of Web3 application developers working to discover where the capabilities offered by Blockchain Networks make better or allow a new class of applications and services to emerge.  There are also many companies and foundations who are supporting various blockchains dedicated to assisting these developers to make it easier to build.  A small subset includes companies like Alchemy, Consensys, Forte, Blockdaemon, Amazon Web Services and blockchains such as Ethereum, Base, Solana and Avalanche.  Each caters to developers as their customer.  Each offers a variety of solutions, some unique and many overlapping.  This week a relatively newer entrant to this effort, Nirvana Labs, announced an acquisition of Vektor.  Nirvana Labs is offering a Web3 application optimized version of Amazon Web or Google Cloud Services.

 

We will see if this rapidly developing ecosystem of Web3 development tools and services allows Web3 application developers to discover the big breakout Web3 application(s) that shift our industry’s focus from token value speculation to real-world applications that “do something” of value.