Coinsquare Acquires Stellar-Based Wallet BlockEQ

Coinsquare is sometimes called the Coinbase of Canada. Even though it’s not the biggest Canadian exchange by daily trading volume (a close second to LakeBTC), Coinsquare may have the biggest ambitions in the Canadian crypto trading space. Within the past few months they’ve successfully co-launched a crypto ETF on the Toronto Stock Exchange (something American exchanges can only dream of).

Now, Coinsquare has acquired BlockEQ, a powerful wallet built on the Stellar blockchain ecosystem. The creators of BlockEQ have had close social and business ties to Coinsquare since their inception, so by all accounts the new partnership is a natural one. Coinsquare hasn’t announced the full set of features that they’ll be able to offer customers following this $12 million (CAD) acquisition), but based on what we know of BlockEQ, Coinsquare users have big things to look forward to.

What Can Coinsquare Do With BlockEQ and Stellar?

BlockEQ is a Stellar wallet, and it does what you’d expect a Stellar wallet to do, on the surface. You can safely store, send, and receive Stellar Lumens XLM, just like you can with any other coin-specific wallet. But that’s not all BlockEQ can do.

Stellar is more than a currency. It’s also a decentralised digital asset exchange. Any asset on the Stellar blockchain can be simply added to BlockEQ, and users can trade them with other users, P2P, in the decentralised environment Stellar is so famous for.

It’s this decentralised ecosystem that is so interesting for a centralised exchange like Coinsquare. Stellar watchers are excited that BlockEQ is now owned by a company with a hand in traditional securities exchanges (the Toronto stock exchange ETF). This move brings Stellar Lumens XLM, and its related assets, one step closer to trade in conventional markets.

Earlier this year, Coinsquare announced its intention to become a publicly traded company on that same exchange. It was looking at a $150 million valuation (CAD) at that time. Unfortunately, the bears stormed the crypto markets in January 2018, and no amount of good news and positive development has reversed fortunes.

Even though Coinsquare won’t be publicly traded anytime soon, it’s clear that this is where at least some of its ambitions lie. For anyone who believes in Stellar (either for its fast and affordable cross-border payments, its digital asset marketplace, or both) will see this as a step towards the all-important Real World Adoption.

Only time will tell if Coinsquare integration is a significant step for Stellar, or just another blip on the radar. But regardless, we’re always happy to see a high-quality project like Stellar in the news, and to see that adoption and development is ongoing, no matter how low prices sink.

Featured image source: Flickr