LO:TECH, a London trading firm that runs high-frequency infrastructure across crypto, traditional and prediction markets around the clock, has raised $12 million (about £9 million) in a Series A round led by MMC. The money will take it to New York and Singapore, where it will compete for institutional order flow with far larger market makers that, the founders argue, were built for exchanges that close at 4.30pm.

Image: LO:TECH market-making dashboard. Credit: LO:TECH, via Tech.eu.

Existing investors Faction and 13 Books Capital joined the round alongside Atka, the company said on Monday. It did not disclose a valuation. LO:TECH was founded by chief executive Tim Meggs, chief technology officer Marcus Horsley and Alex Williams, and last raised money in August 2025.

The firm makes money in three ways: designated market making, in which it is paid to keep buy and sell quotes live on trading venues; selling market data; and, from Monday, execution services that route institutional clients' orders across venues. It says it serves more than 50 clients, including listed companies, and that revenue has tripled and headcount doubled since its last round. It gave no absolute revenue or profit figures.

Built for markets that never close

"Capital markets were built for a world that opened at 8am and closed at 4.30pm. That's not how risk is traded any more," Meggs said in the announcement. "We built ours from scratch for markets that run 24/7, onchain and across every asset class."

The pitch rests on a shift in where trading money is going. By LO:TECH's own account, bitcoin fell around $62,000 from peak to trough in the year to June 2026 and the total value of crypto assets roughly halved. Over a similar period, the value of tokenised real-world assets such as bonds and fund shares on public blockchains nearly doubled, from about $20.6 billion to $38 billion, according to data provider RWA.xyz, and tokenised equities grew from about $960 million in March to $3.2 billion by late September. In June, NYSE owner Intercontinental Exchange and crypto exchange OKX announced a joint venture to offer OKX customers tokenised NYSE shares, subject to regulatory approval.

"Fintech and digital asset platforms are moving into territory that used to belong to Wall Street," Horsley said. "There is room for a capital markets firm that grew up in digital assets to compete with the largest names in traditional finance, and we think that firm can be built in London."

Ollie Ricards, a partner at MMC, pointed to "triple-digit revenue growth over the past year through exceptionally tough crypto market conditions" and said the fund had been investing in blockchain-based financial infrastructure for several years.

Why it matters

For European tech, the round is a small test of a large claim: that a London start-up can win business in a market-making industry dominated by US and Asian giants with balance sheets in the billions. Twelve million dollars buys offices and licences, not scale, and the company itself says it is still "exploring" US licences. Until those are granted, much of the New York plan remains an intention.

There is also a structural question clients are likely to ask. LO:TECH trades its own capital as a liquidity provider while now offering to execute other firms' orders on the same venues. Established brokers manage that tension with separation rules and regulators' oversight, and how LO:TECH does so will matter as much as its speed. The company did not set out those arrangements in its announcement.

If tokenised shares and round-the-clock venues do take off, the winners will be firms that already have the plumbing. LO:TECH is betting that is a European firm rather than a Wall Street incumbent retrofitting its systems.

Sources

• LO:TECH press release, 2 November 2026 (via UK Tech News)
• Tech.eu, "London-based LO:TECH lands $12M Series A led by MMC", 2 November 2026
• CFOtech Asia, 2 November 2026
• RWA.xyz data, as cited by LO:TECH