From Crypto.com To StraitsX: Major Players Roll Out New Deals In Early December
In Brief
The first week of December saw a wave of partnerships across exchanges, banks, fintechs, and stablecoin providers, advancing crypto adoption, institutional infrastructure, and seamless integration between traditional finance and digital assets.
The first week of December delivered a sweep of partnerships that reshaped the crypto landscape from both retail and institutional angles. Exchanges, banks, fintech platforms, and stablecoin issuers simultaneously expanded their reach, signaling a sector intent on maturing its infrastructure, strengthening connectivity, and building clearer pathways between traditional finance and on-chain activity.
Crypto.com Exchange Partners with CEDE Hub
Crypto.com Exchange has expanded its ecosystem with a new integration into Cede Hub, a platform known for organizing structured trading and holding competitions for highly active market participants. The collaboration gives Crypto.com Exchange users the ability to link their accounts directly to Cede Hub and take part in competitive programs that feature real-time standings, transparent performance metrics, and rewards tied to confirmed activity on the exchange.
By joining a hub that already runs competitions across both centralized and decentralized venues, Crypto.com Exchange broadens its toolkit for traders and token projects looking for professional, measurable, and community-oriented trading engagements.
According to Cede Hub Co-Founder and CEO Pierre Ni, the exchange’s global activity makes it an ideal partner; he noted that the integration brings users a fresh wave of trading experiences that are “competitive and rewarding,” emphasizing that the collaboration enables both platforms to deliver more community-focused initiatives to traders around the world.
Kwon Park, who oversees digital asset partnerships at Crypto.com, said the company sees the partnership as a way to offer its users a “unique experience” that strengthens both engagement and friendly competition. He added that the initiative reflects Crypto.com’s ongoing focus on innovation and nurturing its community.
Overall, the integration further solidifies Crypto.com Exchange as a performance-driven marketplace while giving token issuers a reliable channel for running fair, verifiable, and engaging trading activations.
Europe’s Institutional Crypto Push Gains Momentum With Kraken–Deutsche Börse Alliance
Kraken and Deutsche Börse Group (DBG) have entered a strategic collaboration aimed at accelerating institutional crypto adoption across Europe, marking one of the region’s strongest moves yet to compete with U.S. market leadership. The partnership brings together Kraken’s crypto-native infrastructure and U.S. market reach with DBG’s established clearing and custody pillars, including Eurex and Clearstream—whose custodial operations oversee more than $23 trillion in assets.
Kraken’s Head of Institutional, Gurpreet Oberoi, described the agreement as a sign that institutional participation is rapidly evolving, saying it represents “the clearest signal yet” of Europe’s intent to rival Wall Street. He added that institutions are no longer experimenting but building long-term strategies, and that the partnership stands as “powerful validation” of this shift.
The move comes as U.S. firms—bolstered by the GENIUS Act’s regulatory clarity—advance at a remarkable pace. Major financial players such as BlackRock, JPMorgan, Bank of America, and Fidelity have expanded crypto access for institutional clients, with several launching BTC ETFs that have become significant revenue drivers.
Europe is responding in kind. DBG, long considered the region’s most critical market infrastructure provider, has pursued similar initiatives, including agreements with Circle and Societe Generale-FORGE on regulated stablecoins. Its new alignment with Kraken underscores the Eurozone’s intention to compete directly in the global digital asset arena, a trend echoed worldwide as regulation becomes clearer and institutional appetite grows.
Coinbase Deepens Integration With Major U.S. Banks as Crypto Becomes Part of Everyday Finance
Coinbase’s strategy for the year 2025 has mainly been based on establishing more profound connections with some of the biggest financial institutions in the world, which is a clear indication that traditional banks are changing their perception of digital assets.
Coinbase is not only creating its main gateway between the old financial world and the new one – the crypto economy – but also allowing banks to offer modern, crypto-enabled services through their existing systems without any significant investment in technology infrastructure.
The most visible milestone came in July, when Coinbase and JPMorgan Chase introduced a wide-ranging partnership aimed at making crypto engagement seamless for everyday consumers. The rollout includes credit-card funding for Coinbase purchases, direct linking between Chase accounts and Coinbase wallets, and a rewards-program innovation that allows customers to convert points into “USDC,” a stablecoin expected to launch in 2026. Chase’s card support is slated to begin in Fall 2025, giving millions of users a frictionless on-ramp into digital assets.
Citi followed in October with a collaboration focused on institutional payment rails. The bank said the early phase will streamline fiat-to-crypto flows, with later stages potentially enabling continuous global settlement—an approach framed as a blend of traditional banking scale with Coinbase’s crypto expertise.
Regional institutions are joining the movement as well. PNC Bank adopted Coinbase’s “Crypto-as-a-Service” model to offer trading and custody while outsourcing the heavy regulatory and technical lift. The arrangement broadens PNC’s product suite and extends Coinbase’s reach across mainstream banking infrastructure.
KuCoin Institutional Teams Up With CryptoStruct to Deliver High-Performance Algo Trading Infrastructure
KuCoin Institutional has entered a strategic alliance with CryptoStruct, marking another step in the rapid professionalization of institutional crypto trading. The partnership brings CryptoStruct’s ultra-low-latency architecture directly into KuCoin’s institutional technology stack, giving trading desks a unified environment for developing and running algorithmic strategies without juggling fragmented tools.
The collaboration aims to eliminate long-standing pain points such as inconsistent data feeds and venue-specific quirks. CryptoStruct contributes normalized market data and a microsecond-level engine, while KuCoin adds deep liquidity and a growing institutional brokerage layer. KuCoin’s Head of Key Accounts, Alison, described the initiative as a way to merge the exchange’s liquidity with advanced execution technology to create an environment built for innovation, noting that it enables a platform where traders can scale “with confidence.”
CryptoStruct’s Head of Sales, Iain Clarke, said the integration allows professionals to concentrate on strategy design while relying on infrastructure engineered for institutional growth — a setup he characterized as supporting a “robust, low-latency” workflow across global digital asset markets.
The partnership underscores a broader industry shift: exchanges are now expected to operate as full institutional platforms, not just liquidity sources. By offering microsecond execution, normalized data, and multi-venue connectivity in a single stack, KuCoin and CryptoStruct are positioning themselves to capture order flow from firms seeking predictable, traditional-finance-grade trading conditions.
Uniswap Integrates Revolut to Streamline Fiat-to-Crypto Onramps Across Europe
Uniswap Labs has unveiled a new integration with Revolut, the region’s largest consumer finance app, enabling users to buy crypto directly through the Uniswap Web App or Wallet using their Revolut balance or debit card. The addition strengthens Uniswap’s expanding roster of fiat onramps—joining options like Robinhood, MoonPay, and Transak—and extends support to users across 28 countries.
Revolut, known for its broad global reach and multi-currency support, offers onramping in more than a dozen fiat denominations, including USD, EUR, GBP, CAD, AUD, and JPY. While the service is unavailable to customers in Hungary and the UK, it remains accessible in 26 other European markets. Through this integration, users can purchase assets such as ETH and USDC on Ethereum, POL on Polygon, and a variety of other major tokens.
One of the key advantages is Revolut’s fee structure: when users opt for Revolut Pay, they avoid Revolut’s usual charges and pay only network fees. The purchase flow is designed for speed—existing Revolut users face no additional identity checks and can fund purchases via Revolut Pay, Apple Pay, Google Pay, or standard cards, all without leaving Uniswap’s interface.
Uniswap noted that the integration arrives as the protocol surpasses a historic milestone: $4 trillion in cumulative trading volume since launch. The team framed the achievement as evidence that decentralised finance is steadily reshaping global markets, offering open, blockchain-based alternatives to traditional intermediaries.
StraitsX Expands Stablecoin Utility Through New UPay Integration
StraitsX is broadening the reach of its U.S. dollar–backed stablecoin, XUSD, through a new partnership with UPay, a crypto-focused payments platform known for its global merchant network and digital finance ecosystem. The agreement will embed StraitsX’s infrastructure directly into UPay’s system—alongside existing integrations with Apple Pay and Google Pay—enabling XUSD to be spent in everyday retail environments.
UPay’s core offering is its crypto credit card, which converts digital assets into fiat at the point of sale, allowing users to pay at millions of merchants without manually cashing out first. The platform also provides crypto-backed loans and a staking-driven savings feature, making it a multi-product hub for both crypto and traditional finance users.
XUSD’s entry into UPay’s wallet means users will be able to spend the stablecoin at more than 175 million VISA-accepting merchants. UPay CEO Owen Yang described the collaboration as an expansion of the company’s ability to bridge fiat and crypto systems, saying his firm aims to offer a “passport to the future of global finance,” with StraitsX serving as a key pillar of that bridge.
For StraitsX, regulated by the Monetary Authority of Singapore, the deal adds to a growing list of partnerships—including recent collaborations with Grab, Ant International, and RedotPay—that enhance stablecoin utility across payments, remittances, and cross-border settlement. Co-founder Tianyao Liu said the partnership extends beyond payments by laying the foundation for a system where value can move globally with fewer costs and less friction.
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About The Author
Alisa, a dedicated journalist at the MPost, specializes in cryptocurrency, zero-knowledge proofs, investments, and the expansive realm of Web3. With a keen eye for emerging trends and technologies, she delivers comprehensive coverage to inform and engage readers in the ever-evolving landscape of digital finance.
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Alisa, a dedicated journalist at the MPost, specializes in cryptocurrency, zero-knowledge proofs, investments, and the expansive realm of Web3. With a keen eye for emerging trends and technologies, she delivers comprehensive coverage to inform and engage readers in the ever-evolving landscape of digital finance.
