- Trading startup Trumid has raised $53 million in a new funding round led by Singapore Exchange.
- The investment will give Trumid access to the Asian market.
- Trumid matches buyers and sellers in the bond market at a time when some investors are complaining about reduced liquidity.
Electronic trading startup Trumid, which is backed by venture capitalist Peter Thiel and hedge fund pioneer George Soros, just raised more money.
The firm said on Tuesday it had landed $53 million in a new funding round to help grow its existing US corporate bond business, and to expand its platform to Asia.
The latest round was led by Singapore’s stock exchange, Singapore Exchange, along with Deutsche Boerse, the German stock exchange operator.
“Asian investor participation in US corporate credit markets is increasingly important,” said Mike Sobel, Trumid’s president. “We look forward to leveraging SGX’s established network in Asia to deliver global access to US dollar credit product.”
Launched in 2014, Trumid matches buyers and sellers in the bond market at a time when some investors are complaining about reduced liquidity.
Two years later, the firm revamped its strategy after struggling to gain traction and last year, it merged with rival Electronifie, a platform led by former Goldman Sachs trader Amar Kuchinad.
Trumid has a network of 400 buy-side and sell-side institutions on it. Its daily trading volume last quarter increased by three times compared with the same period in 2017, according to the company.
Corporate bond trades totaling over $5 million in size are difficult for investors to execute, according to a March report from research firm Greenwich Associates. While these large trades only make up 1% of the total orders in the market on a given day, they make up over 40% of the notional traded, which is leading to solutions like Trumid.