Luno, a leading crypto investment app and exchange, has been working with Fireblocks since 2022, and recently announced its Fireblocks Network Link integration. In the run up to the announcement, the Luno team answered a few questions about how Luno built their business:
What is Luno and where does it operate?
Luno is a crypto investment app operating primarily in emerging markets such as South Africa, Nigeria, and Malaysia. We aim to enable everyone, everywhere to buy, store, and grow their crypto safely and responsibly – whether that’s using our Instant Buy feature or exchange.
Since we were founded in 2013, we’ve helped more than 14 million people around the world invest safely in crypto.
We do this by working closely with regulators in all of the 40+ markets we operate in to be fully compliant, as we believe this is the best way to help people invest safely. This has enabled us to be among the first licensed crypto platforms in both South Africa and Malaysia.
You mention working closely with regulators. Why is this important for how Luno operates?
This focus on regulation means all products and cryptocurrencies on our platform must first meet stringent legal, risk, and technical security standards. Transparency is also vital. Luno stores all crypto on a 1:1 basis. We have rigorous processes in place and documentation, so customers can be confident their investment is secure. This includes publishing monthly proof of reserves, which are independently audited and use Merkle Tree technology so customers can have peace of mind.
Let’s shift gears a bit and talk about how you approached looking for digital asset infrastructure. What prompted you to do so and what were you looking for in a provider?
Luno had tried a number of solutions to support our digital asset storage offering, but encountered a level of service interruptions incompatible with our goal of being the most reliable crypto platform on the market.
Further to this, many market solutions had outdated multi-signature infrastructure, and were unable to cater to our expanding needs moving into the future.
What made Fireblocks stand out vs. the rest of the market?
Luno looked into Fireblocks, which had started gaining traction in the market as MPC (“multi-party computation”) wallet technology was supported. They enabled us to securely scale our coin/token offering 200% while providing a level of uptime that has enabled Luno to have better control over its digital asset storage.
So, MPC has helped you scale your coin/token offerings faster and more efficiently – how else is Fireblocks supporting Luno's specific needs?
Luno was on the lookout for a partner able to scale its coin offerings and was capable of integrating with other partners, such as staking service providers and regulatory compliance fintechs, with the goal of creating operational efficiencies in our back office and compliant products that customers want.
Fireblocks stood out as a long term partner for Luno that could support our immediate needs, but were also on an exciting development path which Luno could be a part of – such as Network Link.
What specific elements of the platform are you using and why?
Luno currently uses the Fireblocks wallet infrastructure for the storage of digital assets, but also uses the system for staking service provider integration.
Fireblocks was instrumental in Luno’s ADA and ETH staking product and will be to future plans to expand the staking offering to include other cryptocurrencies.
Luno is one of the fastest growing crypto exchanges, and one of the world’s only crypto trading platforms committed to providing 100% Proof-of-Reserves. The exchange supports millions of dollars in daily trading volume and we are constantly looking to improve the customer experience, which means being able to securely connect to a robust set of counterparties and liquidity providers.
Luno is at the early stage of connecting to v2 of Network Link, which will enable us to use the latest infrastructure and give access to over 1800 businesses for trading and direct settlement between 3rd party venues.
What is Luno’s vision for the business and where do you see it going in the future?
Luno started as a retail-focused exchange, but has since worked on building out its offering for institutions and business accounts.
Fireblocks Network Link provides our customers with instant settlement across their connected exchanges (eg., customers benefit from direct deposits and withdrawals between their 3rd party exchange accounts, are able to view balances across their portfolio, and can track the status of their deposits and withdrawals).
At Luno we fundamentally believe that the infrastructure we are developing in tandem with partners such as Fireblocks will become the future of not just crypto investing, but for the entire Financial Services Industry globally.
We regularly receive incoming requests from non-crypto industries, including behemoth listed companies, about if we would be able to help their Treasury needs or working capital cycles in a regulatory compliant manner. How? Having pioneered the local fiat-crypto rails, we own the liquidity. Where cash was king, now it is liquidity. Combine this with Fireblocks’ Network Link in particular, a stablecoin such as USDC or USDT, and regulatory approved processes and you have an instantaneous, cheap way to move millions of dollars at significantly lower risk, all within the same secure custody environment.
What normally takes 3-5 business days via fiat-rails black box, which would need to be reconciled, and cost up to double digit fees, would be done in minutes, for a fraction of the price, without crossing the FX spread. We are talking about improved efficiencies of magnitudes.
