How TetraFi Is Rethinking Institutional Liquidity and Settlement Across Digital Asset Markets

The expansion of digital asset markets has drawn increased attention to the infrastructure that supports institutional transactions. Liquidity is distributed across centralized exchanges, decentralized platforms, and institutional providers, making access dependent on multiple venues, onboarding processes, and settlement arrangements. Even where liquidity is available, businesses may encounter delays or additional capital requirements when moving assets between platforms.

According to the Bank for International Settlements' Annual Economic Report 2026, stablecoin transaction volume was estimated at $28 trillion in 2025, highlighting the scale of activity and the growing relevance of efficient settlement infrastructure. The report also identifies opportunities to reduce prefunding requirements and improve interoperability across digital financial systems.

For businesses operating across international markets, these infrastructure considerations can influence pricing, liquidity access, and working capital. Liquidity providers may prefer delayed settlement to manage capital requirements, while institutional clients often require faster access to funds. These differing requirements can create operational friction, particularly in emerging markets. Christian Asare and Shane Miah, founders and co-CEOs of TetraFi, an institutional digital asset execution and settlement infrastructure company, see an opportunity to address these challenges through more connected financial infrastructure.

Their perspective developed through extensive experience across financial services, institutional trading, fintech engineering, and cybersecurity. Asare spent approximately 25 years in financial services, beginning his career at an American multinational financial services firm before moving into global macro hedge fund trading and technology consulting. Miah brings approximately 20 years of fintech engineering experience. Both played significant roles in building a Dubai-based digital asset company from its inception, with Asare serving as chief of staff and Miah as head of technology.

Their experience provided direct exposure to the operational requirements of institutional digital asset markets. Manual onboarding, fragmented liquidity, and settlement delays highlighted opportunities to improve processes across the transaction lifecycle. Asare explains, "The opportunity extends beyond solving individual institutional requirements. It may involve rethinking how capital moves across the entire transaction lifecycle, from onboarding and compliance to execution and final settlement." This thinking informed TetraFi's development as infrastructure intended to serve a broader network of institutional participants.

Its execution and settlement platform is designed to connect multiple exchanges, decentralized venues, and liquidity providers through a unified environment. Businesses can access a consolidated view of available liquidity and compare pricing across participating providers. The platform also introduces competitive pricing mechanisms that allow liquidity providers to assess their performance against other participants and identify corridors where their offerings may become more competitive. For clients, this could support access to deeper liquidity and potentially more favorable execution.

Settlement is another important component of the company's proposition. Through its bridging settlement facility, TetraFi can use its own liquidity to settle with clients immediately, while allowing liquidity providers to complete their obligations later. This arrangement is intended to accommodate the different settlement requirements of providers and clients. Its wider platform architecture also incorporates escrow-based settlement, where funds are released following verifiable delivery. The non-custodial design allows clients to transact through their own wallets or MPC vaults, with TetraFi remaining outside direct custody of their assets.

Beyond individual transactions, TetraFi is developing a multilateral netting model designed to reduce the capital required across institutional settlement networks. Obligations between participants could be represented through tokenized records and offset against one another across venues, counterparties, and chains. "For example, where several institutions have reciprocal payment obligations, the network could calculate their remaining net positions, potentially reducing the number and value of transfers required," Miah states. "Under the proposed model, client assets remain under their control until final settlement."

These capabilities are particularly relevant to TetraFi's initial focus on Africa and Latin America. The founders identify opportunities across East African and Asian trade corridors, alongside growing requirements in Latin American markets. Improved liquidity and settlement infrastructure may help businesses managing cross-border payments and international trade access financial resources more efficiently.

The opportunity also extends to real-world asset tokenization, particularly commodities. Tokenized gold, for example, could provide collateral for lending arrangements, allowing eligible businesses to explore borrowing against digital representations of assets. TetraFi's planned lending product is intended to support these applications, including borrowing against tokenized assets through digital asset vaults.

Building participation in these markets also requires institutional confidence in the underlying infrastructure. Asare and Miah believe their experience working with major financial institutions offers a valuable foundation for establishing relationships with prospective participants. Miah's engineering background informs the company's emphasis on cybersecurity and operational resilience. TetraFi states that its security practices follow ISO 27001 and SOC 2 Type I standards, with work toward these standards forming part of its ongoing development.

Over the coming months, the founders intend to bring their three principal offerings, execution and settlement, lending, and multilateral netting, into operation, expand adoption, and demonstrate measurable benefits for participating businesses. Together, these products are intended to support stablecoin transactions, tokenized commodities, and real-world asset-backed lending.

For Miah, the longer-term ambition extends to embedding TetraFi within the underlying infrastructure of financial markets. He remarks, "The opportunity may be to build infrastructure that becomes an integral part of how institutions transact, settle obligations, and develop new financial services across digital asset markets."