MoonPay Acquires Sodot, Launches MoonPay Institutional

WHY THIS MATTERS

The acquisition of Sodot and the launch of MoonPay Institutional mark a significant shift for MoonPay as it pivots from a retail-focused payments gateway to a full-stack institutional infrastructure provider. Historically, the “institutional gap” in crypto has been caused by a lack of unified, venue-agnostic tools that meet the rigorous security and compliance standards of Tier 1 banks and asset managers. By acquiring Sodot, which has secured over $50 billion in transactions, MoonPay is providing the battle-tested key management foundation required to move digital assets from a speculative side-bet to a core component of global treasury and wealth management.

This move is strategically timed with the explosive growth of the stablecoin market, where transaction volumes reached $33 trillion in 2025. With 71% of institutional asset managers planning to increase their exposure in 2026, the demand for “on-chain order routing” and “cross-chain collateral mobility” is no longer theoretical. By appointing former CFTC acting Chairman Caroline D. Pham to lead the division, MoonPay is signaling to the market that it understands the regulatory “gold standard” required to handle institutional flow, effectively offering a bridge for firms that lack the in-house capability to build complex, protocol-agnostic DeFi gateways.

MoonPay, the leading crypto payments network, announced the acquisition of Sodot, the key management infrastructure company that secured over $50 billion in transactions and protected more than 10 million wallets for clients including eToro, BitGo, Flow Traders, and Exodus.

The acquisition forms the foundation of MoonPay Institutional, MoonPay’s new business serving financial institutions, asset managers, trading firms and exchanges entering digital asset markets. It provides a comprehensive technology infrastructure platform that enables access to the digital asset and DeFi ecosystem for services across banking, payments, trading, wealth management and treasury products. MoonPay Institutional will be led by Caroline D. Pham, CEO of Moon Global Markets and former acting Chairman of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). Pham also serves as MoonPay’s Chief Legal Officer and Chief Administrative Officer, and is an independent board director of CoinShares PLC (Nasdaq: CSHR). 

The launch comes as demand for institutional-grade digital asset infrastructure and access to both cross-chain collateral mobility and aggregated DeFi liquidity accelerates. Over two-thirds of institutional investors now want exposure to DeFi yields, according to Nomura Securities. Stablecoin transaction volume reached $33 trillion in 2025, with Q1 2026 alone exceeding $28 trillion, and total stablecoin market capitalization has surpassed $317 billion, growing over 50% since early 2025, according to Federal Reserve research. According to Goldman Sachs, 71% of institutional asset managers plan to increase their digital asset exposure over the next 12 months. 

The transition to next-generation open financial markets and payments infrastructure requires regulated firms to deploy stablecoin, tokenized asset, and crypto services to the highest standard that is both protocol and venue-agnostic. Most firms lack the capability to build this in-house, and sourcing each component from a separate provider adds operational friction and slows time to market.

MoonPay Institutional provides integrated technology solutions that are natively on-chain and interoperable across multiple protocol networks, with KYC and compliance tools for the entire digital asset transaction flow from wallet infrastructure, custody, on-chain order routing and trade execution, and collateral operations to stablecoin settlement. Client solutions are available through direct integration, embedded, or white-label products. Sodot’s infrastructure will serve as the secure key management foundation of MoonPay Institutional’s technology stack.

“We built MoonPay to be the world’s leading crypto payments network. Our institutional arm is the next stage, and together with Sodot’s infrastructure, it will allow us to bring this platform to financial services firms now entering the digital asset space. There is no one better suited to lead this business than Caroline, who brings decades of experience at the highest levels of financial regulation and capital markets,” said Ivan Soto-Wright, CEO and Founder of MoonPay.

FF NEWS TAKE

MoonPay’s expansion into the institutional sector is a direct challenge to incumbent custodians and prime brokers. By integrating Sodot’s infrastructure with its own payments network, MoonPay is creating a “one-stop-shop” that reduces the operational friction of sourcing wallet, custody, and trade execution services from separate vendors. This “full-stack” approach is essential in a 2026 market where speed to market and interoperability are the primary competitive advantages for financial institutions entering the digital asset space.

However, the transition from a retail brand to an institutional partner is a high-stakes evolution. While the technology stack is robust, MoonPay must now compete on the same playing field as established institutional players like BNY Mellon or Fidelity Digital Assets. The appointment of Caroline D. Pham provides the necessary regulatory gravitas, but the ultimate success of MoonPay Institutional will depend on its ability to maintain its “lightning-fast” tech-first DNA while satisfying the conservative, risk-averse requirements of global asset managers. As stablecoin transaction volumes continue to shatter records in Q1 2026, MoonPay is betting that the future of finance is a natively on-chain, interoperable ecosystem where payment networks and prime brokerages are one and the same.