New York-based cryptocurrency exchange Paxos raised $300m in a Series D funding round taking its valuation to $2.4bn.
The funding round, which was led by Oak HC/FT, saw participation from early investors like Declaration Partners, PayPal Ventures, Mithril Capital, Senator Investment Group, Liberty City Ventures and WestCap among others. The Series D funding round comes just months after the company had raised $142m in a Series C funding round in December last year.
The firm aims to use the fresh capital to invest in the development of its infrastructure while prioritising regulation as well as accelerate growth by hiring new team members and increasing platform capacity. It will also continue adding more liquidity across the platform to improve customer experience.
The company, which provides blockchain-based services to financial institutions, and operates a cryptocurrency exchange with services including crypto trading and settlement, custody and the ability to issue tokens.
The company lets companies issue their own branded stablecoin. For instance, Binance worked with Paxos to issue BUSD on its platform which is worth $1. Paxos has also launched its own stablecoin called Paxos Standard (PAX).
Looking ahead, the platform plans to establish the Paxos National Trust Bank, support its application for a Clearing Agency registration with the Securities and Exchange Commission and pursue its Major Payment Institution license in Singapore. The platform has already received a conditional approval for a de novo Trust Bank charter for digital assets from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.
The cryptocurrency platform has now raised a total of $500m in four funding rounds and joins the growing league of crypto companies with a multi-billion dollar valuation such as Chainalyis and BlockFi.
It’s been a busy year for those at Paxos. In 2021, the firm supported the launch of crypto buying and selling services on Venmo through its partnership with PayPal and completed same-day settlement of traded stocks for Instinet and Credit Suisse via the Paxos Settlement Service. In addition, it tokenised more than 100,000 oz of investment-grade gold with PAX Gold as well as grew total stablecoin assets across three of the leading US dollar-backed stablecoins to nearly $10bn, it claimed.
Paxos boasts of global enterprises such as PayPal, Credit Suisse, Société Générale, StoneX, Revolut and more as customers.
Commenting on the funding, Paxos CEO Chad Cascarilla said, “Demand for our enterprise solutions has accelerated much faster than we could have anticipated.
“It validates our approach to providing the most innovative and regulated enterprise solutions to re-platform the financial system and create the digital economy of the future.”
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