The directors present the strategic report for the year ended 31 December 2025.
The principal activity of the company is the provision of cryptocurrency benchmarking services, primarily through the design, calculation and publication of digital asset indices used as reference rates for regulated financial products and other institutional use cases, including the CF Bitcoin Settlement Price which underpins Bitcoin futures contracts and a range of exchange traded products.
During the year the company continued to expand its benchmark offering and client base, with turnover increasing to £14,519,444 (2024: £7,977,032) and profit after tax increasing to £5,325,645 (2024: £812,259). This growth was driven by a combination of new client wins and expanded licensing arrangements with both existing and new institutional counterparties, alongside higher assets under reference across products using the company’s indices.
The company is a wholly owned subsidiary of Crypto Research Limited, which is itself part of the wider Payward Inc group, the ultimate parent and controlling party. The company benefits from operational and financial support provided by the group, consistent with its role within the group’s broader digital asset strategy.
The company operates in a developing digital assets market which is subject to evolving regulation and significant price volatility. The directors have identified the following key risks and uncertainties:
Regulatory risk – changes to UK or overseas benchmarks or digital asset regulation could impact the demand for, or permissible uses of, the company’s benchmarks. The company is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority as a benchmark administrator and monitors regulatory developments closely, engaging with regulators and industry bodies as appropriate.
Market and concentration risk – the company’s revenues are influenced by digital asset market activity and by a limited number of large institutional customers and products referencing its indices. In particular, the company derives a significant proportion of its revenue from licensing arrangements with US-based counterparties, with 92% of FY2025 turnover attributable to the United States. A sustained downturn in digital asset markets, a change in terms with a key licensing counterparty, or the loss of a key customer or mandate could adversely affect revenues. The directors consider this concentration when assessing the company’s ongoing financial resilience and have regard to it as part of the group’s wider risk management framework.
Operational and technology risk – as a benchmark administrator the company relies on robust index methodologies, data sources and systems. Failures or weaknesses in these areas, including cyber security incidents, could result in benchmark errors, regulatory issues or reputational damage. The company mitigates these risks through robust governance and controls over benchmark methodologies and production, maintaining diversified client relationships, and by leveraging the wider group’s risk management, compliance and technology infrastructure.
Liquidity risk – the company is unlikely to face liquidity risks in the short to medium term. As at 31 December 2025, the company held cash at bank of £5,861,538 (2024: £798,618) and net current assets of £8,205,259 (2024: £2,254,160). The company also benefits from ongoing financial support from its ultimate parent, Payward Inc, including the settlement of certain operating costs on the company’s behalf through intercompany arrangements. The directors are satisfied that the company maintains, and is expected to continue to maintain, sufficient resources to meet its liabilities as they fall due.
Credit risk – the company’s principal credit exposure relates to trade debtors and amounts owed by group undertakings arising from its licensing arrangements. As at 31 December 2025, trade debtors were £588,006 (2024: £175,651) and amounts owed by group undertakings were £2,194,990 (2024: £nil). The directors regularly assess the recoverability of these balances and consider them to be fully recoverable, having regard to the financial standing of the relevant counterparties, including the group’s continued commitment to support the company.
Other regulatory and group risk – the company is part of a group VAT registration with other related party companies under common control and is jointly and severally liable for the liabilities of that VAT group. At the period end the group VAT refundable amounted to £69,436 (2024: £198,024), of which £24,814 (2024: £89,853) is owed to the company. The directors monitor this exposure as part of the company’s wider risk oversight.
The directors monitor the performance of the business primarily through financial measures including turnover, operating profit and profit after tax, together with non-financial indicators such as the number of benchmarks administered, mandates won and retained, and assets under reference across products using the company’s benchmarks.
For the year ended 31 December 2025, turnover increased by 82% to £14,519,444 (2024: £7,977,032) and profit after tax increased by 556% to £5,325,645 (2024: £812,259), reflecting strong growth in benchmark usage and careful cost management. Operating profit increased to £6,934,679 (2024: £1,084,731). The company also continued to invest in people and systems to support future growth and maintain the robustness of its benchmarks.
Future developments
The directors expect continued interest in regulated digital asset products and benchmark-based strategies over the medium term, although they remain mindful of potential market volatility and regulatory change. The company intends to broaden its benchmark range, deepen relationships with existing counterparties, and pursue new opportunities within the group’s overall digital asset strategy.
Going concern
The financial statements have been prepared on a going concern basis. In reaching this conclusion the directors have had regard to the company’s current financial position, including net assets of £8,205,114 (2024: £2,253,801) and cash at bank of £5,861,538 (2024: £798,618) as at 31 December 2025, together with detailed financial forecasts prepared for the period of at least twelve months from the date of approval of these financial statements. These forecasts reflect the continuation of the growth trends seen during the year, which were driven by new client wins and expanded licensing arrangements with existing and new institutional counterparties, and the directors consider these assumptions to be reasonable based on trading performance to date.
The company continues to benefit from the ongoing financial and operational support of its ultimate parent, Payward Inc, which has confirmed its continued commitment to support the company for the foreseeable future. Certain core operating costs, including payroll and shared services, are settled centrally by the parent and recharged to the company through intercompany arrangements, with these costs broadly offset against service income the company earns for its index-related contributions, resulting in a broadly neutral net cash impact.
Having regard to the above, and having considered the company’s trading performance, balance sheet strength and continued group support, the directors have concluded that there are no material uncertainties that would cast significant doubt on the company’s ability to continue as a going concern, and consider it appropriate to prepare the financial statements on this basis.
The Directors of CF Benchmarks Ltd have acted in a way they consider, in good faith, would be most likely to promote the success of the Company for the benefit of its members as a whole. In doing so, they have had regard to the matters set out in Section 172(1) of the Companies Act 2006, including the interests of key stakeholders, the long-term consequences of decisions, and the need to maintain a reputation for high standards of business conduct.
CF Benchmarks Ltd is a UK-based FCA-authorised benchmark administrator providing regulated digital asset indices and reference rates that underpin a wide range of global financial products, including derivatives, ETFs and structured products. The directors recognise that effective engagement with stakeholders is central to long-term value creation, particularly given the Company’s role in providing transparent and reliable benchmark data to global financial markets.
Stakeholder Engagement
The Company manages its engagements with its key stakeholders in the following ways:
Customers
The Company’s customers include leading financial institutions, asset managers, exchanges and product issuers that utilise CF Benchmarks’ indices in regulated financial products. The directors prioritise:
Integrity and reliability of benchmarks, ensuring all indices are calculated using robust, transparent methodologies and high‑quality input data sourced from vetted exchanges.
Regulatory compliance, maintaining adherence to UK and EU Benchmark Regulations, which underpin trust in the Company’s services.
Innovation and responsiveness, developing new indices to reflect evolving customer demand for digital asset exposure and institutional adoption.
Engagement with customers occurs through ongoing commercial relationships, licensing arrangements, product development collaboration, and industry forums. Feedback from customers informs strategic priorities, including product expansion and enhancements to calculation methodologies.
Suppliers
Suppliers primarily include cryptocurrency exchanges that provide input data, as well as technology providers and professional service firms, including fellow group undertakings that provide certain recharged services to the Company. The directors recognise the importance of:
Data quality and integrity from constituent exchanges, given that benchmark accuracy depends on reliable and representative market inputs.
Robust supplier selection and oversight, including the application of strict criteria for exchange inclusion to mitigate risks such as market manipulation and data inconsistency.
Long‑term partnerships with technology and service providers to support resilient infrastructure, security, and scalability.
The Company maintains formal governance, including methodology and constituent criteria, to ensure suppliers meet required standards and that risks are actively monitored.
Employees
The directors recognise that the Company’s employees are crucial to the business and the delivery of the future strategic aims. The success of the business depends on attracting, retaining and motivating highly qualified employees. The directors understand the importance of pay, benefits, safety and the workplace environment in achieving this objective. Management directly engage with all employees on a bi-annual basis through formal conversations, and monthly through business updates. Directors consider the implications of decisions on employees and the wider workforce, where relevant and feasible.
Culture
In its business conduct, the Company emphasises transparency and high compliance standards in order to comply with the requirements and rules imposed by its regulators, predominantly the Financial Conduct Authority. The Company continues to be ambitious in its strategic aims, seeking to maintain a trusted reputation in the market while continuously expanding the scope and quality of the services it offers its clients. The Company also focuses on technological innovation, allowing it to bring new and innovative products to market while ensuring that these meet the high standards the Company is committed to.
Community and Reputation
Given the Company’s role in emerging digital asset markets, maintaining a strong reputation is essential. The directors consider:
The Company’s contribution to institutionalising cryptocurrency markets through transparent pricing benchmarks.
The importance of ethical conduct and governance, including managing conflicts of interest and ensuring independence in benchmark administration.
Participation in industry dialogue and education, supporting the development of best practices.
Long-term Decision Making
In all principal decisions taken during the year, the directors considered:
The long-term sustainability of the Company’s business model;
The importance of maintaining trust in benchmark integrity;
The need to invest in systems, controls and talent to support growth in regulated digital asset markets.
The Board believes that by maintaining high standards of governance, fostering strong stakeholder relationships, and continuing to innovate responsibly, the Company is well positioned to promote sustainable long-term success.
On behalf of the board
The directors present their annual report and financial statements for the year ended 31 December 2025.
The results for the year are set out on page 10.
No ordinary dividends were paid. The directors do not recommend payment of a final dividend.
The directors who held office during the year and up to the date of signature of the financial statements were as follows:
As the company has not consumed more than 40,000 kWh of energy in this reporting period, it qualifies as a low energy user under these regulations and is not required to report on its emissions, energy consumption or energy efficiency activities.
Company law requires the directors to prepare financial statements for each financial year. Under that law the directors have elected to prepare the financial statements in accordance with United Kingdom Generally Accepted Accounting Practice (United Kingdom Accounting Standards and applicable law). Under company law, the directors must not approve the financial statements unless they are satisfied that they give a true and fair view of the state of affairs of the company and of the profit or loss of the company for that period.
In preparing these financial statements, the directors are required to:
select suitable accounting policies and then apply them consistently;
make judgements and accounting estimates that are reasonable and prudent;
state whether applicable UK Accounting Standards have been followed, subject to any material departures disclosed and explained in the financial statements; and
prepare the financial statements on the going concern basis unless it is inappropriate to presume that the company will continue in business.
The directors are responsible for keeping adequate accounting records that are sufficient to show and explain the company’s transactions and disclose with reasonable accuracy at any time the financial position of the company and enable them to ensure that the financial statements comply with the Companies Act 2006. They are also responsible for safeguarding the assets of the company and hence for taking reasonable steps for the prevention and detection of fraud and other irregularities.
We have audited the financial statements of CF Benchmarks Ltd (the 'company') for the year ended 31 December 2025 which comprise the statement of comprehensive income, the balance sheet, the statement of changes in equity and notes to the financial statements, including significant accounting policies. The financial reporting framework that has been applied in their preparation is applicable law and United Kingdom Accounting Standards, including Financial Reporting Standard 102 The Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the UK and Republic of Ireland (United Kingdom Generally Accepted Accounting Practice).
Basis for opinion
Conclusions relating to going concern
In auditing the financial statements, we have concluded that the directors' use of the going concern basis of accounting in the preparation of the financial statements is appropriate.
Based on the work we have performed, we have not identified any material uncertainties relating to events or conditions that, individually or collectively, may cast significant doubt on the company's ability to continue as a going concern for a period of at least twelve months from when the financial statements are authorised for issue.
Our responsibilities and the responsibilities of the directors with respect to going concern are described in the relevant sections of this report.
Other information
Opinions on other matters prescribed by the Companies Act 2006
In our opinion, based on the work undertaken in the course of our audit:
the information given in the strategic report and the directors' report for the financial year for which the financial statements are prepared is consistent with the financial statements; and
the strategic report and the directors' report have been prepared in accordance with applicable legal requirements.
Irregularities, including fraud, are instances of non-compliance with laws and regulations. We design procedures in line with our responsibilities, outlined above, to detect material misstatements in respect of irregularities, including fraud. The extent to which our procedures are capable of detecting irregularities, including fraud, is detailed below.
We ensured that the engagement team collectively had the appropriate competence, capabilities, and skills to identify or recognise non-compliance with applicable laws and regulations. The laws and regulations applicable to the company were identified through discussions with directors and other management, and from our commercial knowledge and experience of the benchmarking sector.
Of these laws and regulations, we focused on those that we considered may have a direct material effect on the financial statements or the operations of the company, including the Companies Act 2006, taxation, data protection, anti-bribery, anti-money-laundering, employment legislations and benchmarking regulations. The extent of compliance with these laws and regulations identified above was assessed through making enquiries of management and inspecting legal correspondence. The identified laws and regulations were communicated within the audit team regularly and the team remained alert to instances of non-compliance throughout the audit.
We assessed the susceptibility of the company’s financial statements to material misstatement, including obtaining an understanding of how fraud might occur, by:
making enquiries of management as to where they considered there was susceptibility to fraud, their knowledge of actual, suspected and alleged fraud;
considering the internal controls in place to mitigate risks of fraud and non-compliance with laws and regulations; and
understanding the design of the company’s remuneration policies.
To address the risk of fraud through management bias and override of controls, we:
performed analytical procedures to identify any unusual or unexpected relationships;
tested journal entries to identify unusual transactions;
assessed whether judgements and assumptions made in determining the accounting estimates were indicative of potential bias; and
investigated the rationale behind significant or unusual transactions.
In response to the risk of irregularities and non-compliance with laws and regulations, we designed procedures which included, but were not limited to:
agreeing financial statement disclosures to underlying supporting documentation;
reading the minutes of meetings of those charged with governance;
enquiring of management as to actual and potential litigation and claims; and
reviewing correspondence with relevant regulators.
There are inherent limitations in our audit procedures described above. The more removed that laws and regulations are from financial transactions, the less likely it is that we would become aware of non-compliance. Auditing standards also limit the audit procedures required to identify non-compliance with laws and regulations to enquiry of the directors and other management and the inspection of regulatory and legal correspondence, if any. Material misstatements that arise due to fraud can be harder to detect than those that arise from error as they may involve deliberate concealment or collusion.
A further description of our responsibilities is available on the Financial Reporting Council’s website at: https://www.frc.org.uk/auditorsresponsibilities. This description forms part of our auditor's report.
Use of our report
This report is made solely to the company's member in accordance with Chapter 3 of Part 16 of the Companies Act 2006. Our audit work has been undertaken so that we might state to the company's member those matters we are required to state to the member in an auditor's report and for no other purpose. To the fullest extent permitted by law, we do not accept or assume responsibility to anyone other than the company and the company's member, for our audit work, for this report, or for the opinions we have formed.
CF Benchmarks Ltd is a private company limited by shares incorporated in England and Wales. The registered office is 6th Floor, One London Wall, London, EC2Y 5EB.
The financial statements are prepared in sterling, which is the functional currency of the company. Monetary amounts in these financial statements are rounded to the nearest £.
This company is a qualifying entity for the purposes of FRS 102, being a member of a group where the parent of that group prepares publicly available consolidated financial statements, including this company, which are intended to give a true and fair view of the assets, liabilities, financial position and profit or loss of the group. The company has therefore taken advantage of exemptions from the following disclosure requirements:
Section 7 ‘Statement of Cash Flows’: Presentation of a statement of cash flow and related notes and disclosures;
Section 26 ‘Share based Payment’: Share-based payment expense charged to profit or loss, reconciliation of number and weighted average exercise price of share options, fair-value measurement
Section 33 ‘Related Party Disclosures’: Compensation for key management personnel.
The financial statements of the company are consolidated in the financial statements of Crypto Research Limited. These consolidated financial statements are available from its registered office, 6th Floor, One London Wall, London, EC2Y 5EB
The gain or loss arising on the disposal of an asset is determined as the difference between the sale proceeds and the carrying value of the asset, and is credited or charged to profit or loss.
Basic financial assets, which include debtors and bank balances, are initially measured at transaction price including transaction costs and are subsequently carried at amortised cost using the effective interest method unless the arrangement constitutes a financing transaction, where the transaction is measured at the present value of the future receipts discounted at a market rate of interest. Financial assets classified as receivable within one year are not amortised.
Financial assets are derecognised only when the contractual rights to the cash flows from the asset expire or are settled, or when the company transfers the financial asset and substantially all the risks and rewards of ownership to another entity, or if some significant risks and rewards of ownership are retained but control of the asset has transferred to another party that is able to sell the asset in its entirety to an unrelated third party.
Financial liabilities and equity instruments are classified according to the substance of the contractual arrangements entered into. An equity instrument is any contract that evidences a residual interest in the assets of the company after deducting all of its liabilities.
Basic financial liabilities, including creditors and loans from fellow group companies, are initially recognised at transaction price unless the arrangement constitutes a financing transaction, where the debt instrument is measured at the present value of the future payments discounted at a market rate of interest. Financial liabilities classified as payable within one year are not amortised.
Debt instruments are subsequently carried at amortised cost, using the effective interest rate method.
Trade creditors are obligations to pay for goods or services that have been acquired in the ordinary course of business from suppliers. Amounts payable are classified as current liabilities if payment is due within one year or less. If not, they are presented as non-current liabilities. Trade creditors are recognised initially at transaction price and subsequently measured at amortised cost using the effective interest method.
Financial liabilities are derecognised when the company’s contractual obligations expire or are discharged or cancelled.
The share based payment expense is recorded in the statement of comprehensive income with corresponding amount held in the other reserves.
In the application of the company’s accounting policies, the directors are required to make judgements, estimates and assumptions about the carrying amount of assets and liabilities that are not readily apparent from other sources. The estimates and associated assumptions are based on historical experience and other factors that are considered to be relevant. Actual results may differ from these estimates.
The estimates and underlying assumptions are reviewed on an ongoing basis. Revisions to accounting estimates are recognised in the period in which the estimate is revised where the revision affects only that period, or in the period of the revision and future periods where the revision affects both current and future periods.
The following judgements (apart from those involving estimates) have had the most significant effect on amounts recognised in the financial statements.
The company employees benefit from share options issued by its ultimate parent company, Payward Inc. The group allocates share-based expenses relating to the company employees based on a direct allocation of share-based expense to the employees of the group employed by the company less some employees time recharged back to the group and based on the actual shares granted to those employees. The group allocates expenses based on the fair market value of the shares vested, with that fair market value determined as required under U.S. Internal Revenue Code section 409A and the regulations promulgated thereunder. The section 409A valuation appraisal is prepared by a qualified independent third party.
The average monthly number of persons (including directors) employed by the company during the year was:
Their aggregate remuneration comprised:
The number of directors for whom retirement benefits are accruing under defined contribution schemes amounted to 2 (2024 - 2).
The actual charge for the year can be reconciled to the expected charge for the year based on the profit or loss and the standard rate of tax as follows:
Amounts owed by group undertakings are unsecured, non-interest bearing and repayable on demand.
Amounts owed to group undertakings are unsecured, non-interest bearing and repayable on demand.
The following are the major deferred tax liabilities and assets recognised by the company:
The company operates a defined contribution pension scheme for all qualifying employees. The assets of the scheme are held separately from those of the company in an independently administered fund.
The ordinary shares each carry one voting right and the right to dividends. Ordinary shares have no rights on winding up and are not redeemable.
Profit and loss account
The profit and loss account reserve represents cumulative profits or losses, net of dividends paid and other adjustments.
Other reserves
The other reserve represents the fair value of share options in issue which have been granted by Payward Inc. to the company's employees.
The company is part of a group VAT registration with other related party companies under common control. The company is jointly and severally liable for the liabilities of the VAT group to which it belongs. At the period end the group VAT refundable amounted to £69,436 (2024: £198,024) of which £24,814 (2024: £89,853) is owed to the company.