Ten firms launched ADAM to write a digital-asset market code

Ten firms launch a standards group

Ten financial-services and technology firms launched the Association for Digital Asset Markets, or ADAM, on November 27, 2018, with a plan to write a voluntary code of conduct for digital-asset markets. The founding group comprised BitOoda, BTIG, Cumberland, Galaxy Digital, Genesis Global Trading, GSR, Hudson River Trading, Paxos, Symbiont and XBTO.

The verified development was the organization and its stated program, not the adoption of binding rules. ADAM’s announcement said it would work with current and former regulators on standards for trading, custody, clearing and settlement. Its longer list of intended subjects included market integrity, risk management, know-your-customer and anti-money-laundering controls, record keeping, market manipulation, data protection and research.

That breadth made the launch consequential. By late 2018, crypto trading, over-the-counter dealing, custody and token issuance were developing across firms that did not share one market-wide rulebook. ADAM brought together liquidity providers, brokers, a regulated exchange operator, investment firms and blockchain companies around the narrower proposition that common conduct standards could make institutional participation more credible.

What ADAM was—and was not

ADAM’s founding principles set four objectives: protect participants from fraud and manipulation; provide standards for efficient trading, custody, clearing and settlement; encourage professional and ethical conduct; and improve transparency for the public and government. The group said its code should cover conflicts, price formation, security, licensing and disclosure as well as operational market infrastructure.

The distinction between industry standards and public regulation was central. ADAM explicitly described its planned code as a complement to existing law, not an alternative to government oversight. Contemporaneous reporting also recorded a spokesperson’s caution that the association had not yet earned or sought formal self-regulatory-organization status. That meant membership could create contractual or reputational obligations inside the group, but the November 27 announcement did not give ADAM statutory authority over the wider market.

The governance proposal remained unfinished. The founding paper envisioned a private nonprofit with an elected board, independent participation, committees, public comment on draft standards and an investor advocate. It also said adherence to the eventual code would become a condition of membership. On November 27, however, those were design commitments and intentions. Officers had not been announced, the code had not been drafted or adopted, and no compliance record existed to test whether members would discipline themselves when commercial interests conflicted.

Why the timing mattered

The launch addressed a live institutional problem rather than a protocol upgrade or token-price move. Market manipulation, customer-asset custody, cybersecurity and anti-money-laundering controls were all barriers to treating crypto venues and intermediaries like mature financial infrastructure. ADAM’s founders argued that practitioners could translate those concerns into detailed operating standards while lawmakers and regulators continued applying older legal frameworks to digital assets.

The claim required restraint. A coalition of prominent firms could pool expertise, but it also concentrated rule-writing influence among businesses that would be governed by the result. Voluntary standards could improve consistency without providing the examination, enforcement powers or public accountability of a regulator. The November 27 record therefore established an organized attempt at industry self-governance, not proof that crypto markets had become fair, orderly or institution-ready.

Later context

A February 2020 presentation hosted in the Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s records later described ADAM as a private, nonprofit, industry-led association and listed the same ten founders. It also showed that the group subsequently developed a principles-based code. That later record corroborates continuity after the launch, but it does not change what was knowable on November 27, 2018: ADAM had announced its mission, membership and drafting process, while the operative standards were still ahead.