Digital assets trading and conversion platform Bakkt LLC has agreed to acquire certain assets of Rosenthal Collins Group LLC, an independent futures commission merchant.

Bakkt was launched by New York Stock Exchange parent company Intercontinental Exchange Inc., in cooperation with Starbucks Corp. and Microsoft Corp., among other companies. The platform, which has already secured $182.5 million in funding, plans to physically deliver bitcoin futures contracts and act as a custody solution for digital assets. However, it still awaits regulatory approval by the Commodities Futures Trading Commission.

"Our mission is to build the first integrated, institutional grade exchange-traded markets and custody solution for physical delivery of digital assets," Bakkt CEO Kelly Loeffler said in a Medium post announcing the deal. "In parallel, we're building a secure, scalable platform for transacting with digital assets so that our regulated ecosystem serves consumers, merchants and institutions."

Bakkt's announcement comes nearly a month after Rosenthal Collins said that it would sell all its customer accounts to commodity broker Marex Spectron. "As part of that transaction, our aim was to purchase certain valuable assets related to developing our platform," Loeffler noted.

Rosenthal Collins will enhance Bakkt's risk management and treasury operations as well as the platform's customer service operations, and anti-money laundering and know-your-customer regulations, Loeffler said.

The companies expect to close the deal in February.