It all started in 2019, when a relatively small software company called Microstracky (now known as strategy) knocked on investment bank Jefferies’ door after turning away by Wall Street Giants.

At that time, Michael Saylor’s company had a market capital of nearly $ 2 billion and was looking to raise capital to buy Bitcoin – some bulge fittings were reluctant to support.

Jefferies took a chance at Saylor and marked a central agreement for the investment bank and the sector for digital assets.

Now Saylor’s company is worth around $ 111 billion in market capital, other companies buy Bitcoin for their balance, and large Wall Street companies jump into the sector for digital assets.

And Jefferies? The company is now an investment bank with full service for crypto and blockchain rooms, and it makes billions in offers without a crutch of a billion dollar balance or FDIC-insured deposit.

“We don’t change our stripes too often, but when we see opportunities, we move fast,” Alexander Yavorsky, head of FIG -investing bank in Jefferies, told Coindesk in an interview.

Crypto -Engagement

The game-changing Microstrategy engagement in 2019 started a much deeper foray in the Jefferies asset class.

By 2020, Jefferies had become the first major investment bank with full service that dedicated exclusively a senior banker to Crypto. Tim Shea, now co-manager for digital assets coverage, spends 100% of his time on the asset class.

But do not call them a crypto shop, as Jefferies has consistently made agreements everywhere, and puts the company sixth globally in the last twelve months, according to data from Deailic.

Diving deeper into offers that Jefferies worked on, the company revealed that it has advised about 120 transactions with over $ 150 billion of deal value across fintech, market structure and exchanges since 2015.

This track record, especially handling offers involving applied technology and complex regulatory footprints, uniquely equipped Jefferies to deal with the hybrid world where crypto meets traditional funding.

“We are an investment company with full service instead of a crypto top,” said Yavorsky, “but we have built deep sector knowledge and we know how to structure offers and move quickly.”

Over the past three years, Jefferies has steadily increased its involvement in crypto and crypto-affiliated dealmaking, building a track record across capital markets, M&A and restructuring.

One of the prominent agreements that the company advised was Ninjatrader on its $ 1.5 billion acquisition, a remarkable example of consolidation between traditional trading platforms and digital asset exchanges.

The Jefferies team brings the “incredible expertise and talent required to advise on transactions of this size, they are incredibly named in the Crypto and Capital Markets universes,” Martin Franchi, CEO of Ninjatrader, told Coindesk in an E -mail declaration.

“Understanding the needs of people in the room was a resident of how they think and in our case helped gather worlds of tradfi and defi for a very strategic agreement that benefits not only both companies but also our customers,” Franchi added.

Navigation of complex cryptover

What really separates Jefferies is that the investment bank doesn’t just stick to the usual deal-making advice for the industry. With an industry as dynamic as crypto, the bank remained Kvikk to take on a much more complex mandate.

It played a key role in one of the industry’s most profiled collapse, which served as an adviser to the official committee for unsecured creditors in the FTX bankruptcy, where it worked to help recover value for stakeholders.

Meanwhile, the bank continued to support traditional financial institutions entering the crypto area.

JC Flowers advised about its investment in LMAX and worked with Victory Park Capital on the SPAC merger with Baked.

In addition to advisory roles, Jefferies has performed capital increases for larger players such as Galaxy Digital (GLXY) and DRW, and have been active in the crypto mining sector through several fundraising and advisory engagements.

The company has also provided strategic advice on a number of crypto exchange transactions, which reflects its wider involvement in infrastructure and the development of market structure in digital assets.

A growing influence

Although not a crypto-exclusive investment bank, Jefferies’ activity in the sector points to a growing comfort with the complexity of digital asset financing and a willingness to engage where traditional companies have often hesitated.

With the lines between centralized and decentralized financing that continue to blur, and infrastructure companies are increasingly in M&A Crosshairs, Jefferies seems to remain one of the most active and experienced investment banks in the digital asset space.

Read more: Bitcoin mining profitability down 7.4% in March as prices, transaction fees fell: Jefferies

Disclaimer: Parts of this article were generated with the help of AI tools and reviewed by our editorial team to ensure accuracy and compliance with our standards. For more information, see Coindesk’s full AI policy.