Key Takeaways
- • Liquibit Market Neutral Arbitrage Fund won The Hedge Fund Journal's Digital Currency Performance Award for best performance in 2024 in the Market Neutral Digital Currency Arbitrage – Quant strategy category, validating its systematic approach to crypto trading.
- • The fund has grown assets to over USD 100 million as of November 2025, with a team expanded to thirteen professionals, including data scientists and technology specialists, demonstrating institutional-grade infrastructure development.
- • Co-Founder and CIO Joseph Chang brings 20 years of proprietary trading experience from tier-one institutions (Citi, HSBC, Merrill Lynch) in equity derivatives, applying this expertise to identify mispricings and arbitrage opportunities in digital assets since 2014.
- • The team leverages equity derivatives frameworks and traditional quantitative trading technology adapted for crypto markets, positioning itself at the intersection of established financial engineering and emerging digital asset liquidity structures.
- • Regulatory inflection points, including US enactment of major crypto legislation such as the Stablecoin Act, are reshaping market microstructure and creating both opportunities and constraints for systematic arbitrage strategies.
Summary
Liquibit Capital has established itself as a systematic player in cryptocurrency arbitrage by combining institutional-grade equity derivatives expertise with quantitative trading infrastructure. The firm's Market Neutral Arbitrage Fund, launched in 2020, earned recognition from The Hedge Fund Journal for best-in-class performance in 2024 within the market neutral digital currency arbitrage category. However, the operational pedigree extends significantly deeper: the founding team has been active in cryptocurrency arbitrage since 2014, providing over a decade of institutional experience in the space.
The firm's competitive positioning stems from its founding team composition. CIO Joseph Chang contributed two decades of proprietary trading experience at Citi, HSBC, and Merrill Lynch, specializing in Asian equity derivatives during a period when those markets exhibited characteristics paralleling current cryptocurrency conditions—high leverage, retail participation, sparse regulation, and persistent mispricings. Co-founders Ken Howlin and Grahame Webb, both former investment banking IT professionals, provided technological infrastructure expertise, while Adrian Kirk completed the founding quartet. This hybrid composition of trading acumen and technical capability enabled the team to recognize blockchain use cases earlier than traditional finance peers.
Asset growth to USD 100 million as of November 2025 has driven organizational expansion to thirteen team members, including portfolio manager Alen Pavlovic (hired 2022) and specialists across technology, finance, operations, and investor relations. This scaling reflects a transition from founder-led operations to institutional asset management infrastructure. Chang's analytical framework explicitly draws parallels between early Asian equity derivatives markets of the late 1990s and current cryptocurrency dynamics, suggesting structural mispricings remain exploitable through systematic methodologies rather than directional exposure.
The regulatory environment represents both constraint and opportunity. Chang identified a "major inflexion point" driven by US legislative action, specifically citing the Stablecoin Act and broader crypto regulatory frameworks. These developments reshape exchange microstructure, settlement mechanics, and counterparty risk profiles—variables directly relevant to arbitrage strategy execution. The fund's market-neutral positioning inherently limits directional regulatory risk while potentially enabling tactical advantage from regulatory clarity that disadvantages less-informed market participants.
The firm's competitive positioning stems from its founding team composition. CIO Joseph Chang contributed two decades of proprietary trading experience at Citi, HSBC, and Merrill Lynch, specializing in Asian equity derivatives during a period when those markets exhibited characteristics paralleling current cryptocurrency conditions—high leverage, retail participation, sparse regulation, and persistent mispricings. Co-founders Ken Howlin and Grahame Webb, both former investment banking IT professionals, provided technological infrastructure expertise, while Adrian Kirk completed the founding quartet. This hybrid composition of trading acumen and technical capability enabled the team to recognize blockchain use cases earlier than traditional finance peers.
Asset growth to USD 100 million as of November 2025 has driven organizational expansion to thirteen team members, including portfolio manager Alen Pavlovic (hired 2022) and specialists across technology, finance, operations, and investor relations. This scaling reflects a transition from founder-led operations to institutional asset management infrastructure. Chang's analytical framework explicitly draws parallels between early Asian equity derivatives markets of the late 1990s and current cryptocurrency dynamics, suggesting structural mispricings remain exploitable through systematic methodologies rather than directional exposure.
The regulatory environment represents both constraint and opportunity. Chang identified a "major inflexion point" driven by US legislative action, specifically citing the Stablecoin Act and broader crypto regulatory frameworks. These developments reshape exchange microstructure, settlement mechanics, and counterparty risk profiles—variables directly relevant to arbitrage strategy execution. The fund's market-neutral positioning inherently limits directional regulatory risk while potentially enabling tactical advantage from regulatory clarity that disadvantages less-informed market participants.
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