Overstock CEO Predicts Late 2019 Boost in tZERO Token Trading

Patrick Byrne, the CEO of Overstock, believes a market boom for its security trading platform tZERO lies just around the corner.

Speaking to CoinDesk in an interview Wednesday, Byrne said he expected volumes to soar after the year-long lock-up period for the tZERO Preferred token ends in August and the platform opens up to retail investors to register and trade.

Still, Byrne is planning additional updates that will help boost liquidity on the exchange, first envisioned in 2014 as a kind of alternative stock market and now realized as an alternative trading system for crypto tokens.

Specifically, tZERO is also looking into getting more broker-dealers to work with, other than Dinosaur Financial Group, which is maintaining the trading exclusively now.

To introduce new broker-dealers, tZERO will have to get approvals for each one with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Byrne said, which could slow down the process.

tZERO, the favorite child of Overstock and its subsidiary Medici, is led by former executives of the Overstock-Medici team: CEO Saum Noursalehi, who previously was the president of Overstock, and president Steven Hopkins, who used to be Medici's general counsel and COO. Medici's team in general is actively involved in helping the portfolio companies to strengthen the weak parts and lending its staff when needed, Byrne told CoinDesk.

"At Medici, there are different kinds of talent, and we're pushing it to the companies as they need it," Byrne explained.

In the meantime, two important deals that are supposed to boost tZERO and the entire Medici portfolio with cash seem to be stumbling so far.

Another important deal for tZERO that seems as though it could be delayed is the one with the Hong-Kong-based firm GSR Capital that was going to invest up to $404 million in Overstock and tZERO, announced at the end of last year.

Since Byrne became actively involved in the space a few years ago, Overstock's image has become closely connected to the cryptocurrency market, even though the company never announced large investments in crypto.