Blockchain Company Paxos Closes New Funding Round Worth $300 Million

Paxos, a blockchain startup with PayPal Holdings as a client, announced the recent conclusion of a Series D fundraising round. According to company CEO Charles Cascarilla, the funding session led by growth equity investment firm Oak HC/FT saw $300 million infused into the New York-based firm. Other investors include PayPal ventures, Declaration Partners, Mithril Capital, and others.

Paxos Valued At $2.4 Billion Following Latest Investment

The crypto company is now worth $2.4 billion, per an official release. According to Paxos, the new funds will be used to accelerate the growth of its financial market infrastructure platform. Paxos would also use the additional funding to ramp up recruitment across major departments. Also, additional liquidity would be added to the platform to improve their customer experience and increase the use of their on-chain tokens. Cascarilla said that demand for Paxos' enterprise solution had grown exponentially in the past year in speaking with the funding round. He ties this down to the company's approach in providing the most innovative and regulated enterprise solutions to aid the development of a digital economy. Following this new funding round, Paxos plans to establish a National Trust Bank after it secured a preliminary charter from the Office of the Comptroller of Currency (OCC) in the past week. With the approval, Paxos becomes the third federally chartered financial institution to become a crypto custodian following in the footsteps of Anchorage and Protego. The company has also applied for a Clearing Agency Registration with the Securities and Exchange Commission and eyeing a Major Payment Institution license with Singaporean regulatory authorities. Cascarilla notes that this latest funding round is more of a "confidence capital," noting that investors believe in their ability to scale the business for the next decade. Paxos went mainstream following its partnership with payment giant PayPal back in 2020. The agreement saw the blockchain company powering PayPal's crypto trading service. Owing to the success of this deal and PayPal’s desire to explore the larger crypto market, Paxos has also been tapped by the Silicon Valley firm to help its Venmo app offer crypto services.

The Larger Crypto Market Growing

Cryptocurrencies have experienced exponential growth, all thanks to the pandemic-induced lockdowns, which have seen more people rely on online payments. Realizing the potential benefits crypto can bring to the financial space, institutional investors have flooded into the crypto space, making the once-disregarded sector suddenly significant. And this acknowledgment was seen when Coinbase went public on April 14 with a projected $100 billion valuation. This milestone has seen many experts forecast a litany of crypto public listings. One of these experts is Ripple's CEO Brad Garlinghouse, who reportedly said that more initial public offerings (IPO) should be expected in the blockchain space in the next 12 months.