(Bloomberg) -- Jeffrey Wang, who used to run foreign exchange spot and derivatives trading for Asia at Morgan Stanley, has joined a cryptocurrency firm run by his former colleagues, part of a growing cohort of ex-Wall Streeters taking a shot in the volatile world of digital assets.

Wang will work out of Vancouver as head of Americas for Shenzhen, China-based Amber Group. He previously worked with four of Amber’s five founders at Morgan Stanley; two of them, Wayne Huo and Tony He, directly reported to him.

After taking the past three years off, Wang said he was enticed back to a full-time markets role by the appeal of working in a fast-growing nascent industry where infrastructure is being built on the go and where a background in professional finance can be a big advantage.

“As the more mature traditional markets are continuing to see compressed margins and moving to automation, the crypto financial market is still in its infancy,” said Wang.

Amber started in 2015 as a side project for four Morgan Stanley traders -- Michael Wu, Tiantian Kullander, Huo and He -- and a Bloomberg LP developer Thomas Zhu to explore machine learning for trading. In late 2017, when the crypto market was on a tear, the quintet went full time with Amber, pulled on board another Morgan Stanley colleague, Luke Li, and focused their attention on digital assets.

To contact the reporter on this story: Alastair Marsh in London at amarsh25@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: James Hertling at jhertling@bloomberg.net, Vernon Wessels

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