Wintermute secures Bitcoin lending facility from Cantor Fitzgerald under its $2B financing program

Wintermute has secured a Bitcoin-backed credit line from Cantor Fitzgerald as part of Cantor’s $2 billion Bitcoin Financing Business initiative.

Crypto market maker Wintermute has secured a Bitcoin-backed credit line from investment bank Cantor Fitzgerald. The size of Wintermute’s facility was not disclosed, but CEO Evgeny Gaevoy said it would help the firm manage the capital-intensive nature of OTC crypto trading and settlement.

The deal is part of Cantor Fitzgerald’s newly launched $2 billion Bitcoin Financing Business, which aims to offer secured credit facilities to institutional crypto firms. Launched in mid-2024, the program has already provided financing to FalconX Ltd. — which plans to draw over $100 million — and Maple Finance, which closed the first tranche of its facility earlier this year, according to Bloomberg.

Cantor’s entry into crypto lending signals a cautious revival of an industry rocked by high-profile collapses such as Celsius Network and BlockFi in 2022. Bitcoin (BTC) software company Blockstream Corp. recently raised several billion dollars to support its crypto lending funds, while crypto-focused private bank Xapo Bank started offering Bitcoin-backed loans of up to $1 million as of March.

According to Galaxy Research, the total size of the crypto lending market reached $36.5 billion by the end of 2024, more than doubling from its low in Q3 2023, though still significantly below its 2021 peak of $64.4 billion.