Ian Allison

Ian Allison is a senior reporter at CoinDesk, focused on institutional and enterprise adoption of cryptocurrency and blockchain technology. Prior to that, he covered fintech for the International Business Times in London and Newsweek online. He won the State Street Data and Innovation journalist of the year award in 2017, and was runner up the following year. He also earned CoinDesk an honourable mention in the 2020 SABEW Best in Business awards. His November 2022 FTX scoop, which brought down the exchange and its boss Sam Bankman-Fried, won a Polk award, Loeb award and New York Press Club award. Ian graduated from the University of Edinburgh. He holds ETH.

Ian Allison

Latest from Ian Allison


Finance

Rulematch, a Swiss Crypto Exchange for Banks, Goes Live With Spain's BBVA

The institutional crypto platform uses Nasdaq’s trading tech, and comes out the gates with seven banks and securities firms.

A train travels through the Swiss Alps with snowy peaks in the background.

Finance

BlackRock's Bitcoin ETF Now Invites Participation From Wall Street Banks

A change to the structure of proposed spot bitcoin ETFs would enable authorized participants (APs) to create new shares in the fund with cash, rather than only with cryptocurrency, essentially opening the door to banks who cannot hold crypto directly.

BlackRock HQ

Finance

Bitcoin Wallet Conio, Coinbase Team Up to Bring Crypto to Italian Banks

Conio is also looking at tokenization, and is involved in the Euro Token project overseen by the innovation center of the Bank of Italy.

Conio general manager Orlando Merone (Conio)

Finance

Starknet Foundation to Allocate 1.8B STRK Tokens 'Soon'

Starknet said 900 million STRK are earmarked for the foundation’s Provisions Committee, and 900 million will be dedicated to user rebates.

StarkWare co-founders President Eli Ben-Sasson and CEO Uri Kolodny (StarkWare)

Finance

Crypto Lending Firm Ledn Offers Low-Risk Custodied Loans

It’s the first time this type of loan, which is done through a centralized entity that can offer 24-hour disbursements, is being offered outside the U.S., according to Ledn co-founder Mauricio Di Bartolomeo.

Ledn co-founders Mauricio Di Bartolomeo (left) and Adam Reeds (Ledn)

Finance

IBM Introduces New Cold Storage Tech for Crypto Assets

The new Offline Signing Orchestrator tech is being used by IBM’s long standing partner in the crypto space, Ripple-owned custody firm Metaco.

IBM logo at Consensus 2018 (CoinDesk)

Markets

Asset Manager Abrdn, Crypto Exchange Archax Strive for Pole Position in Race to Tokenize TradFi

Having created trading pairs on Archax between bitcoin and tokens showing ownership of an abrdn money-market fund, the firms talk for the first time about using this institutional-grade token as collateral elsewhere.

(Shutterstock)

Finance

Standard Chartered-Backed Zodia Custody Joins Ripple-Owned Metaco’s Global Crypto Storage Network

The new sub-custody network is designed to give institutions around the world easy access to safe crypto storage and settlement.

(Pixabay)

Finance

Grayscale Gears Up for Spot Bitcoin ETF, Updating Trust Agreement for Sake of ‘Operational Efficiencies’

The changes involve the fee structure, and how assets can be custodied for smoother share creation and redemptions.

Michael Sonnenshein (CoinDesk)

Finance

Digital Finance Firm SoFi Hands Its Crypto Business to Blockchain.com

Blockchain.com President Lane Kasselman said in an interview that his firm’s SoFi partnership equates to hundreds of thousands of users and hundreds of millions of dollars.

SoFi (Shutterstock)