Arthur Azizov is the Founder and Investor of B2 Ventures, a private fintech alliance encompassing a portfolio of financial and technology projects, including B2BROKER and B2BINPAY. A serial entrepreneur with over a decade of experience, he has been at the forefront of financial technology innovation, transforming liquidity, trading, and payment services.
In this interview, we explore how B2 Ventures is lowering barriers to institutional finance, expanding crypto infrastructure, and enabling the next generation of fintech operators.
You’ve built an impressive fintech ecosystem spanning liquidity, payments, and brokerage infrastructure. What originally inspired you to pursue this path—and what problem were you most passionate about solving when you started B2 Ventures?
When we launched the business in 2014, the biggest obstacle was the extremely high barrier to entry. Starting a financial company wasn’t just difficult—it was nearly impossible without substantial capital. You needed millions to build the infrastructure from scratch, a strong team of engineers, and the means to pay hefty fees to tech vendors. At the time, SaaS was only just emerging, and there were no plug-and-play solutions or fast deployment options.
This lack of accessibility meant the market wasn’t evolving. There were very few unique or high-quality products because the entry threshold filtered out most aspiring entrepreneurs. And when you don’t have strong competition, there’s little incentive to innovate. But competition is the true engine of progress—it pushes every company to build better, more valuable solutions for their customers. As Friedrich Hayek once said, “Competition is a discovery procedure.” That’s exactly how we see it—each new entrant can bring something unique, and that benefits the entire ecosystem.
Our core idea was to lower that barrier dramatically and make fintech infrastructure accessible to more people—especially young, ambitious founders with fresh ideas. That’s why we built B2CORE first, and from there, expanded into a whole family of products with the same mission: to enable anyone to get to market quickly, build efficiently, and challenge the status quo. We didn’t just want to participate in the fintech space—we wanted to open the door for the next wave of innovators to transform it.
You’re now launching a Liquidity Provider Turnkey solution through B2BROKER. What was the moment or insight that made you realize the market needed this specific offering?
B2BROKER was one of the first to lower the barrier to entry in fintech infrastructure. That early success sparked a wave—now everyone wants to enter the B2B space. On one side, you have major B2C firms like Revolut or Exness looking to expand into institutional markets. On the other, mid-sized brokers are seeking diversification and stronger revenue streams.
We saw this shift and realized something crucial: the market didn’t just need more access—it needed smarter, more efficient access. Many firms want to try B2B, but without the right partner, they’ll either waste massive resources or fail altogether. That’s where we come in—not as competitors, but as enablers. Our goal has always been to empower the market.
With our Turnkey Liquidity Provider solution, we’re taking that enablement to a new level. We’re the first to offer it at this scale, and we believe many firms will either attempt to build it themselves—with all the risk and cost—or partner with someone who already understands the path to success. That’s us.
Our model is built on mutual growth: the more our clients grow, the more we grow.
Brokers and banks are increasingly shifting from retail-focused models toward building institutional infrastructure. What’s driving this evolution, and how do you see it transforming the industry landscape?
The shift we’re seeing today is deeply tied to two big trends: growing global financial inclusion and the maturity of fintech infrastructure. More people than ever have internet access, and with that, access to financial tools. Trading and investing have gone mainstream—20 years ago, it was hedge funds and Wall Street pros. Today, everyone from students to entrepreneurs is becoming an investor.
This demand creates pressure on retail brokers and banks to evolve. They need to offer more than just front-end trading platforms—they need to build scalable, institutional-grade systems that can handle a diverse client base, from individual investors to fund managers. The retail era pushed accessibility. Now, the institutional era is about trust, depth, and durability.
We’re also in a high-stakes investment environment. With interest rates high and markets volatile, capital is moving more cautiously. Brokers are looking for new revenue streams, and entering the institutional space is a logical step. But it’s not just about offering better tools, it’s about becoming part of a new, more interconnected financial ecosystem.
That’s why we see this transformation as a natural evolution. Infrastructure providers like us are no longer just software vendors—we’re strategic growth partners.
Prime-of-Prime models—where brokers act as intermediaries offering institutional-grade liquidity from Tier-1 providers to smaller firms—used to be considered niche. What’s changed in the market to make this model a mainstream growth strategy for brokers today?
The main shift is access. Over the past few years, regulations have tightened significantly, and Tier-1 banks and prime brokers have become much less approachable. These institutions are already massively profitable—they simply aren’t interested in onboarding smaller or newer clients. So, for a new broker or liquidity provider, connecting directly to a Tier-1 is practically impossible.
You’re stuck in a catch-22: you need volume to get in the door, but you need access to grow volume. While retail financial inclusion is booming thanks to internet access, institutional access hasn’t caught up. That’s where Prime-of-Prime models come in—they bridge this gap. At the same time, building a B2C brokerage today is incredibly complex and expensive. You need local presence, regulation, marketing, sales partners—it’s a heavy lift. By contrast, acting as a liquidity partner for brokers across an entire region, like Latin America, is much more scalable and strategic.
So, yes, it started as a niche model. But now, it’s clear that with rising institutional demand and structural market barriers, Prime-of-Prime is becoming the logical growth path. It enables brokers to scale without being blocked by legacy gatekeepers—and that’s a powerful advantage.
What are the key pain points that your Liquidity Provider Turnkey product solves for brokers and banks trying to transition into institutional-grade offerings?
Launching an institutional-grade operation is a serious challenge. You’re no longer dealing with retail clients at scale—you’re working with fewer clients, larger tickets, and much higher expectations. The cost of errors skyrockets. That’s exactly the core problem we solve: helping our clients avoid costly mistakes by offering a complete, proven infrastructure.
First, there’s market access. Our liquidity is genuinely institutional, thanks to real aggregation and strong provider relationships. And it’s not marketing fluff, it’s execution quality you can feel across every instrument.
Second, the technical infrastructure. Setting up and maintaining a liquidity hub, integrating execution venues, and tuning internal aggregation logic is incredibly complex. Even if you find a Prime Broker, building the right setup from scratch is nearly impossible without a seasoned team. And finding experts in platforms like OneZero or PrimeXM? They’re rare and expensive. We’ve built that expertise over years—and we offer it as a ready-to-use service.
We also provide the full stack: from our B2CORE CRM to web development and payment infrastructure. Need help with licensing? We handle that too. Everything is designed to minimize cost and time-to-market. We’ve done this journey ourselves. We know how much it costs—and how many mistakes are waiting for those who try to go it alone. Our Turnkey solution is about transferring that experience, saving time, and accelerating our clients’ growth—because, as I mentioned earlier, if they succeed, we succeed too.
Can you walk us through what a typical launch process looks like for a client using your turnkey solution—from tech stack to licensing to compliance?
To run this kind of business legally, the first thing you need is a proper license. There’s just no way around it—without it, you’re not getting through compliance checks, and serious partners won’t even talk to you. In B2B, everyone’s looking at your counterparty and credit risk. You can try to cut corners with grey jurisdictions, but it’ll kill your credibility from day one.
So, licensing is usually the first and longest step—it can take up to a year. But we’ve got our own legal advisors who handle everything: preparing docs, managing communication with the regulator, and guiding the client through the whole process. If the client is fast and focused, we can do it in about 6 months. And if they already have a license or just need an upgrade, we can launch in a matter of weeks.
From the tech side, we assign a dedicated team, including an executive account manager and implementation specialists. We start with onboarding: we talk through the business model, fill out detailed questionnaires, and start configuring the platform. Our team handles training, opens payment accounts through B2BINPAY. The process itself is pretty structured: strategy discussions, compliance, legal paperwork, platform setup, website launch—it all runs in parallel. The only real bottleneck is licensing. But for serious players, that’s rarely a blocker. Most already have something in place, and we just help them scale it up quickly.
How do B2BROKER and B2BINPAY complement each other in your broader vision to unify traditional finance with digital asset infrastructure?
We’re seeing massive institutional adoption of crypto globally, and it is only picking up. Just look at the U.S.—with the recent SEC leadership changes, we’re already hearing a more supportive tone toward digital assets. The new chairman has openly said he’ll fight debanking of crypto companies and sees real potential in the space. Add to that the wave of spot ETFs and the clear regulatory progress, and it’s obvious we’re entering a much more mature phase for the crypto market.
This is where our two products come together perfectly. B2BROKER delivers the full IT and trading infrastructure, and B2BINPAY gives businesses a fast, secure, and scalable way to process crypto payments. It’s a powerful combination. For brokers, exchanges, or any fintech firm trying to build cross-border financial services, having a fast, crypto-native payment layer is essential. Traditional rails are just too slow and fragmented while crypto payments bring two big advantages: instant settlement and full ownership of funds. That’s why we’ve always believed in crypto adoption—not at all as a buzzword, but as a real infrastructure upgrade. B2BINPAY opens the door to new revenue channels and customer segments, while B2BROKER makes sure the backend is rock solid.
So yeah, while they’re technically different businesses, they’re tightly aligned in vision.
Your companies operate globally across jurisdictions with complex regulations. How do you approach compliance at scale—especially with crypto, payments, and cross-border liquidity?
That’s the hardest part of scaling any financial business today.
Our approach is pretty structured. First, we’re extremely selective with the jurisdictions we work in. We focus on clean, well-regulated environments where we can build long-term partnerships and operate with full transparency. We’ve also built a strong internal compliance team that works closely with local legal advisors in each region. This allows us to adapt quickly when regulations change—which they do all the time.
We also invest heavily in licensing from day one. Whether it’s EMI licenses, crypto authorizations, or broker licenses, we go the full route. It’s not fast, and it’s not cheap, but it’s the only way to scale sustainably. It also gives clients confidence—they know they’re working with a company that takes compliance seriously.
What role do you see KYC, KYT, and transaction monitoring playing in enabling scalable, institutional-grade liquidity infrastructure?
Сompliance plays an absolutely essential role in any financial business. It protects your company—from a legal side, yes, but also from a reputational one. In B2B, reputation is everything. You don’t want to onboard bad clients, and compliance is what helps you avoid that. It also ensures you meet regulatory requirements and don’t end up facing fines or restrictions.
KYC and KYT are both crucial. Every client you onboard needs to go through a full KYC process—you need to understand who they are, where the money is coming from, and what their business model looks like. KYT is equally important. You have to track where the money flows and make sure you’re not taking on any AML risks.
We help our clients here as well. B2BINPAY is integrated with Crystal and Chainalysis. We also have enterprise-level compliance tools that are fully connected to our own B2CORE platform. So clients get access to robust infrastructure that covers both licensing and reputation needs.
Without strong compliance, you can’t scale. Especially in this space, where everything is under scrutiny.
As someone actively bridging traditional finance and digital assets, where do you see the most meaningful innovation happening in the next 2–3 years?
We’re entering a really exciting phase of convergence between traditional finance and the crypto-native world. Over the next few years, we’ll see a few major innovation streams take off.
First, super apps—Revolut-style platforms—are going to become more common. Users want everything in one place: payments, trading, investing, even insurance. It’s convenient, sticky, and opens up multiple revenue channels for businesses.
Then there’s tokenization and RWA. Traditional capital markets infrastructure is expensive and fragmented—clearing, custody, cross-border settlements, it’s all slow and costly. Tokenization can simplify and accelerate all of that. It makes asset issuance faster and secondary markets more accessible.
And of course, AI. We’re already seeing it transform compliance, trading, and customer engagement. The pace of adoption is rapid, and the capabilities are evolving daily. Running your business without using AI is like trying to build a bank with fax machines.
Looking ahead, what’s your long-term vision for B2 Ventures—and what kind of legacy are you aiming to leave in the institutional fintech space?
Our long-term vision is to grow the B2 ecosystem into a global platform that empowers the next generation of financial innovators. We want to make it easier for institutional players to enter the digital asset space, and we want to lower the barriers for talented entrepreneurs to build their own financial businesses. We’re doubling down on crypto adoption because we believe this is where finance is heading. We’re building products and services that make this transition easier, safer, and more scalable for everyone—from established institutions to emerging startups.
If we can leave a legacy, I’d want it to be this: that we helped shape the future of institutional fintech by making it more open, more efficient, and more inclusive. That’s the mission we’re building toward every day.