Brett Harrison, the former president of FTX US, has secured $35 million in new funding for his latest venture, Architect Financial Technologies, as he looks to bring crypto-style market efficiency to traditional finance.
The funding round was first reported by The Information and led by Miami International Holdings and Tioga Capital. According to a person familiar with the matter, the raise values Architect at approximately $187 million. The capital will support the continued development of AX, Architect’s global perpetual futures exchange designed for institutional investors.
AX offers perpetual futures contracts tied to traditional financial assets such as equities and foreign exchange. Perpetual futures, often called “perps,” allow traders to maintain positions without an expiration date. While the structure became popular in crypto markets, AX deliberately avoids listing contracts linked to digital assets. Instead, it applies the same market design principles to regulated, offchain instruments.
At present, perpetual futures are not available to U.S.-based traders due to regulatory constraints. Even so, interest in the product type is expanding beyond crypto-native platforms. In its 2026 investment outlook, Coinbase Ventures highlighted real-world-asset perpetuals as an emerging area, citing growing demand for derivatives that provide synthetic exposure to macroeconomic indicators, commodities, and other traditional assets.
Such products could offer traders new ways to hedge risk or express market views without holding the underlying assets directly. That use case, however, remains limited in the United States as regulators continue to assess how these instruments should be approved and overseen.
Harrison spent roughly 17 months as president of FTX US before stepping down in 2022, shortly before the exchange’s broader collapse. Since founding Architect, he has focused on building a platform that adapts the speed, liquidity, and capital efficiency of crypto market infrastructure to the framework of regulated global finance.
With fresh backing and a growing institutional audience, Architect is positioning AX as a bridge between two worlds: the innovation of crypto trading systems and the stability and oversight of traditional financial markets.
