Luno Cuts 20% of Staff: Betting on Automation and B2B

South African crypto exchange Luno is cutting about 20% of its global workforce and shifting its business from retail trading toward institutional infrastructure. Bloomberg reported the move on Monday, citing comments from CEO James Lanigan.

The Luno cuts became the twelfth round of layoffs announced by crypto companies in July alone. This time, though, the company isn't blaming falling markets or a drop in customers. It points directly to automation. That is what sets this July wave apart from past crypto winters.

Luno's Second Major Cut in Three Years

This isn't Luno's first move like this. In January 2023, the exchange laid off 35% of its staff, close to 330 people, after Bitcoin and the broader market crashed in 2022. That earlier round came amid a sharp drop in revenue and industrywide panic, as major crypto platforms collapsed one after another.

The new round is smaller, but it has a different character. The company isn't describing a crisis. It's reshaping how it operates at a time when crypto prices look far steadier than three years ago, and trading on Luno itself, according to management, hasn't slowed down.

Automation Is Replacing Part of the Team

Lanigan said Luno had invested in automation and operational improvements that changed the staffing the business needs. Some functions once handled by people are now covered by internal systems and outside partners. That mostly covers routine work: customer checks, user support, and parts of back-office processing, tasks where human labor is easiest to replace with scripts and bots.

At the same time, the exchange is trimming costs in line with market conditions, though not across every area at once. It's still spending on compliance, core infrastructure, and retail products. That distinction matters. The cuts aren't blanket, they're targeted at functions already replaced by technology, not the business as a whole.

Digital Currency Group and the Push Toward B2B

Founded in South Africa, Luno is owned by Digital Currency Group, the holding company that also runs lender Genesis and asset manager Grayscale. Genesis itself filed for bankruptcy in 2023 after the credit market collapsed, so this isn't the first restructuring inside DCG's portfolio in recent years.

Over the past few years Luno moved beyond standard retail trading and started offering crypto infrastructure to banks and fintech firms. That's the direction the exchange now calls its priority, services for businesses rather than individual traders. The reasoning is straightforward. Institutional clients pay for infrastructure more consistently than retail users react to price swings.

12 Crypto Firms Announced Cuts in July Alone

According to jobs tracker CryptoJobsList, at least 12 crypto companies and adjacent fintech firms reported layoffs or restructuring in July. Earlier this month, wallet provider Exodus announced a shift toward card issuance and stablecoin payments, a move it said should save the company $10 million to $13 million a year.

The same week, blockchain infrastructure developer Gnosis disclosed a restructuring. The company reviewed its consumer-facing Gnosis App on July 17 and is now inviting other firms to reach out for candidates among its laid-off staff. Custody provider BitGo made a similar move earlier, cutting 15% of its staff to focus on AI and stablecoins.

The July list of cuts already looks longer than any single month last year, even though the market isn't formally in a crash. One thing ties all four companies together: none of them blames customer losses or falling revenue, only a shift in cost structure.

• Luno cut roughly 20% of its staff, shifting focus toward B2B and automation
• Exodus let go of a quarter of its team to pivot toward cards and stablecoin payments
• Gnosis restructured after reviewing its consumer app
• BitGo: cut 15% of staff to focus on AI and stablecoins

7,254 Job Cuts a Year Don't Add Up to a Crisis

CryptoJobsList has tracked more than 7,254 disclosed job cuts across 47 companies in 2026. Market conditions are the most commonly cited reason in the reports, not direct losses or shutdowns. But the number itself is heavily skewed by one event. Block's 4,000-person cut back in February alone accounts for more than half the yearly total.

So the tracker is better read as a broad mood indicator for the industry than an exact count of crypto-only job losses. It covers adjacent fintech firms and one-off outliers like Block, so a direct month-to-month comparison always looks inflated. Still, the number of companies involved, twelve in July alone, shows the trend goes beyond a single exchange or sector.

Interestingly, the exchange-side cuts contrast with the opposite picture at public fintech companies. The same week, Robinhood posted a record quarter, even as revenue from its crypto business specifically fell 38%. That points to something else: company revenue and headcount no longer move in sync.

Where the Crypto Job Market Is Headed

Luno's story reflects a shift playing out across several companies at once. Exchanges and wallets are hiring fewer people for routine operations and putting more money into automation and B2B products. The pattern isn't limited to crypto. Similar AI-driven cuts have been happening for several quarters at large tech companies well outside the crypto market.

For customers, this transition mostly carries the risk of slower support responses during the changeover, not a worse product. Companies like Luno typically keep the product itself intact and change who or what handles it behind the scenes.

For people working in the industry, July signals a shift in what employers want. Support and manual-operations roles are shrinking, while demand is moving toward automation, compliance, and security specialists, exactly where Luno, according to Lanigan, keeps spending despite the broader cuts.

The coming months will show whether July's wave of restructuring turns out to be a one-off or the start of a longer cost-cutting cycle across the industry. So far, none of the companies named has announced plans to shut down products, only changes to team structure and a shift in budgets toward automation.