MoonPay Acquires Israeli Security Startup Sodot for $100M to Enter Institutional Market
In a strategic move to expand into institutional services, MoonPay has purchased Sodot, an Israel-based provider of crypto security infrastructure, establishing a new division under the leadership of Caroline Pham, former Acting Chair of the CFTC.
Following its acquisition of Sodot, an Israeli provider of crypto security infrastructure, crypto payments platform MoonPay is establishing an institutional division.
The acquisition of Sodot was revealed by MoonPay on Wednesday, with the company planning to utilize Sodot's key management technology as the foundational infrastructure for its newly created business unit that will cater to financial institutions, asset managers, trading firms and exchanges making their way into digital asset markets.
"We built MoonPay to be the world's leading crypto payments network," MoonPay co-founder and CEO Ivan Soto-Wright said in a press release, adding that its institutional arm is the next stage for the company.
As reported by Bloomberg, the transaction was finalized in April through an all-stock deal with an estimated value of approximately $100 million. MoonPay did not immediately respond to Cointelegraph's request for comment to confirm the deal's details.
This strategic acquisition pushes MoonPay's operations beyond its current retail crypto payments focus and signals the increasing appetite among traditional finance entities for robust wallet and custody infrastructure solutions as their digital asset ambitions grow.
MoonPay targets institutional demand
The newly formed institutional division at MoonPay is designed to cater to major traditional financial institutions across multiple service areas, encompassing trading, tokenized securities, payments, wallet management and stablecoin issuance.
Caroline Pham will oversee the unit, having joined MoonPay as its chief legal officer and chief administrative officer in December after serving as acting chair of the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission before joining MoonPay in late 2025.
"There is no one better suited to lead this business than Caroline, who brings decades of experience at the highest levels of financial regulation and capital markets," Soto-Wright said.
Security race heats up in crypto
Established in 2023, Sodot operates as a platform dedicated to crypto key management infrastructure, which represents a vital component for protecting digital assets and managing institutional wallets.
Sodot's expertise lies in self-hosted multi-party computation (MPC), a cryptographic technique that divides a private key into distinct shares that are distributed among multiple independent parties to enhance the security of funds.
This acquisition arrives during a period of expanding institutional service offerings backed by crypto custody providers. Last week, crypto exchange OKX integrated off-exchange settlement by BitGo, a publicly traded digital asset custodian.
In a prior development, BitMEX partnered with European crypto custody firm Zodia Custody to enable institutional crypto derivatives trading, with collateral held in segregated custody off-exchange.