Stillman Digital

Stillman Digital is an institutional-grade digital asset market maker, OTC block trading desk, and trading infrastructure provider — a regulated liquidity layer for institutional participants operating across digital asset markets including Solana.

Origins and Company History

Stillman Digital was incorporated in April 2021, when co-founders Jonathon Milks, Jack West, and Luca Dumitru relocated to Miami to build a high-touch OTC trading desk for digital assets. Starting from a single service line, the company evolved into a full-stack institutional trading infrastructure business spanning electronic execution, algorithmic market making, OTC block trading, and stablecoin settlement.

Key milestones mark its growth arc:

• November 2022: First engineering hire
• May 2023: Reached $1 billion in cumulative lifetime trading volume
• June 2023: Launched electronic trading platform with web and API access
• September 2023: Established Bermuda regulatory entity and obtained Class M DABA license
• October 2024: Acquired by DeFi Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ: DEFT) in an all-stock transaction
• April 2025: Surpassed $50 billion in cumulative client trading volume

The 178% growth in on/off-ramp business during the 2022 crypto downturn — a period when most competitors contracted — became a core part of Stillman Digital's pitch to institutional buyers and ultimately to DeFi Technologies as a target.

Core Services

Electronic Trade Execution: A 24/7 trading platform accessible via web GUI and multiple API protocols — FIX for traditional institutional connectivity, WebSocket for real-time streaming data, and REST for programmatic access. The platform aggregates liquidity from 30+ global centralized exchanges. Co-location in Equinix NY4 (New York) and LD4 (London) data centers places Stillman's infrastructure physically close to the major exchange matching engines, reducing round-trip latency.

Algorithmic Market Making: Stillman provides continuous two-sided quotes across centralized venues using algorithmic strategies tuned for volume and spread management. The market-making desk handles approximately $400 million in monthly volume. Clients include trading firms, ETF/structured product issuers, and hedge funds that need reliable, deep, on-exchange liquidity.

OTC Block Trading: A request-for-quote (RFQ) desk for large, sensitive institutional block trades. Average trade sizes exceed $2 million. The desk processes over $1 billion in monthly block trade volume, offering a high-touch concierge approach that minimizes slippage and market impact. Client types include family offices, miners converting crypto production, and institutions requiring price certainty on large positions.

Stablecoin Settlement Network: Treasury infrastructure for clients running stablecoin-denominated operations, supporting automated settlement and payment workflows. This capability is particularly relevant for clients operating at the intersection of traditional payments and on-chain stablecoin networks.

On/Off-Ramp Services: Stillman acts as a global fiat-to-crypto on-ramp, handling $40-80 million in daily inflows. Total monthly trade volume, inclusive of all services, exceeds $500 million, with the broader book generating over $1 billion in combined monthly volume.

Technology and Security

Stillman Digital's custody infrastructure uses Multi-Party Computation (MPC) cold storage wallets, distributing key material across parties rather than relying on a single private key. This removes the single point of failure typical of conventional hardware wallet custody.

The engineering team's first hire came in November 2022, roughly 18 months after founding. The electronic trading platform launched in June 2023. Head of Technology Nikita Tolstunov leads the engineering function.

Regulatory Licenses

Stillman Digital maintains multi-jurisdictional regulatory standing:

• United States: FinCEN Money Service Business (MSB) registration
• Canada: FINTRAC (Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre) licensing
• Bermuda: Class M Digital Asset Business Act (DABA) license

The Bermuda entity — Stillman Digital Bermuda Ltd. — was acquired alongside the US entity in the DeFi Technologies transaction and is earmarked for expansion into custody services, foreign exchange trading, and proprietary trading activities.

Leadership

The company is led by its three co-founders:

• Jonathon Milks — Co-founder and President, primary public spokesperson and deal counterpart in the DeFi Technologies acquisition
• Jack West — Co-founder and Chief Operating Officer
• Luca Dumitru — Co-Founder and Head of Operations

Senior hires rounding out the leadership team include Paul Bozoki (CFO), Muhammad Darr (Chief Compliance Officer), and Nikita Tolstunov (Head of Technology).

Institutional Partnerships

Stillman Digital joined the Talos Provider Network, an ecosystem of over 80 institutional digital asset service providers — including centralized and decentralized exchanges, OTC desks, prime brokers, custodians, and settlement networks. The integration routes Talos's institutional client base to Stillman Digital's liquidity, extending Stillman's reach beyond direct relationships.

Acquisition by DeFi Technologies

DeFi Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ: DEFT) completed the acquisition on October 7, 2024, in an all-stock transaction comprising 2.5 million common shares, with 1 million shares subject to a one-year lock-up schedule. The strategic rationale operated on two levels: internalizing trading flows from DeFi Technologies portfolio companies (notably Valour, a digital asset ETP issuer) and diversifying revenue through Stillman Digital's external client base across trading firms, miners, and institutional funds.

CEO Olivier Roussy Newton of DeFi Technologies cited Stillman Digital's technological and regulatory infrastructure and operational resilience through prior market cycles as primary drivers of the acquisition decision.

Solana Relevance

Stillman Digital does not operate a Solana-specific product or named integration. As a multi-asset institutional liquidity provider aggregating liquidity across 30+ global exchanges, SOL trades alongside Bitcoin, Ethereum, and other major digital assets in both the electronic platform and OTC book. The stablecoin settlement network — supporting automated treasury workflows for institutional clients — is directly relevant in a Solana context, as Solana has become a primary settlement network for USDC flows at institutional scale. Client segments Stillman serves — stablecoin payment networks, ETF/ETP issuers, and on-chain institutional clients — increasingly operate on Solana rails, making Stillman Digital a component of the institutional infrastructure layer beneath those products.