The leading crypto broker in Europe is set to formalize the completion of a $52 million Series A project
With the initial exchange offering, seed round and the fundraising round the company has collectively raised about $100 million. The Series A round was headed by venture capitalist Peter Thiel, who is known for his contribution to companies such as PayPal, Facebook and the Founders’ Fund.
Bitpanda’s executives Paul Klanschek and Eric Demuth revealed that the funds (including those from SeedInvest) would be used to bolster expansion plans for the company. This includes a range of new products in the last quarter of this year. The 240-employee company will be looking to add 60 more talents to take the figure to 300 employees.
CoinGecko reports that Bitpanda Pro handles a daily crypto trading volume in the range of $2 million. Klanscheck also disclosed that the brokerage platform offers precious metal trading with a volume summing up to $1+ billion last year.
The executives further said that out of the 30+ countries where their services are offered, Turkey, Spain and France topped the list of the fastest-growing crypto region markets. It is also worth noting that DeFi has been a great instrument for the broker.
“We just launched a DeFi market on our broker and it went through the roof. People are really crazy about buying DeFi coins,” explained Demuth.
The co-CEOs have plans to introduce other kinds of asset classes including equities into their offering in 2021. Klanschek stated that about 100,000 investors and traders used the platform last year to trade gold options.
Andrew McCormack, a founding partner at Valar Ventures, will be the newest member of the Bitpanda’s board as part of an arrangement between the two firms.
“Together, we’re going to ensure everyone in Europe has the power to access the financial markets and invest in their financial futures as we build Europe’s next fintech unicorn,” said McCormack.