Mastercard buys a crypto analytics firm 👀; BNPL Zip Co goes crypto 🤷♂️; Crypto ETFs triple in value 🤯; NFT platform raises largest Series B🇪🇺

In case you missed it, I've launched a daily newsletter on all things where Finance meets Technology. Delivered every morning, it will be the only newsletter you need to keep a pulse, and most importantly - make sense, on FinTech.

3 stories with 3 takeaways, things worth watching, and money moves will focus on the things that matter for the industry professionals and practitioners like myself. Easy to read, digest, and see the bigger picture, it will help you to save time and most importantly - stay ahead. Always.

Check it out here👇🏼

September was a really hot and super exciting month in Blockchain & Cryptocurrency space. We will look at Mastercard buying a crypto analytics firm; Australian buy-now-pay-later firm Zip Co going crypto; crypto ETFs tripling in value; NFT platform raising the largest Series B round to date for a European startup, and other interesting news and developments.

Without further ado, let us dive into what has happened in the Blockchain & Crypto sector last month. Let’s connect the dots.

Another one - Mastercard buys a crypto analytics firm 👀

The scoop 🤝 Payments giant Mastercard has agreed to buy CipherTrace, a firm that scans blockchains for illicit transactions.

The acquisition comes immediately after the card network giant has bought Danish Open Banking startup Aiia.

The USP 🥊 The acquisition gives Mastercard the ability to track over 900 cryptocurrencies. Details of the acquisition were not disclosed.

Based in Menlo Park, California, CipherTrace develops tools that help businesses and law enforcement root out illicit digital currency transactions. The company’s competitors include New York-based Chainalysis and London start-up Elliptic.

✈️ THE TAKEAWAY

The crypto focus 🔎 The deal is the latest sign of robust activity in the crypto tracing sector as governments and banks look to ramp up monitoring and compliance. More importantly, it’s another illustration that Mastercard has serious ambitions to be one of the dominant players in the digital assets space. Their recent moves illustrate that just perfectly - in July, the payments giant said it would be piloting the use of the Circle-administered USD coin as a key bridge between crypto-using buyers and cash-loving merchants. In February, Mastercard said it was planning to let merchants accept crypto through its network by this year’s end.

BNPL player Zip Co goes crypto 🤷♂️

Crypto plans🥊 Australian buy-now-pay-later firm Zip Co is planning to cater to the “millennial finance diet” by offering the ability to buy, sell, hold and pay in crypto using the company’s mobile app. Not a surprise, is it? 🤷♂️

The timeline 👀 Although no commencement date for the service was announced, Zip co-founder Peter Gray said in July its crypto offering would be available within 12 months.

Zip said it will be developing a number of features based on crypto and buy-now-pay- later (BNPL) plans – the company’s bread-and-butter business model that allows customers to pay for goods in installments.

First - US🇺🇸 Crypto features will initially be rolled out in the U.S., with plans to expand more “broadly” in the future. Zip is among the first BNPL firms to offer crypto services to its customers.

✈️ THE TAKEAWAY

The differentiation. It’s obvious that BNPL is one of the hottest FinTech verticals right now. Yet, with interest comes a lot of competition and peer pressure. Hence, Zip is among the first BNPL firms to offer crypto services to its customers, and that could be its unique niche. What’s also interesting is that the data is on their side. Research previously undertaken by the company and presented during the Retail Investor Day showed BNPL customers were 67% more likely to trade in cryptocurrency than non-BNPL customers. If you know where’s the money going - you follow it!

Crypto ETFs triple in value 🤯

The jump 🚀 Total assets held in crypto ETFs aka exchange traded funds globally reached $9 billion as of June, up from $3 billion the year before, per the Financial Times. That’s x3 increase in a single year 🤯

Definition 📚 A cryptocurrency exchange-traded fund (ETF) is a fund consisting of cryptocurrencies. While most ETFs track an index or a basket of assets, a cryptocurrency ETF tracks the price of one or more digital tokens. Based on investor sales or purchases, the share price of cryptocurrency ETFs fluctuates on a daily basis.

The geography 🌎 While the investment vehicle is yet to be legal in the US, investors have access to crypto ETFs elsewhere, like Canada and Switzerland.

The demand 📈 Crypto ETFs have become increasingly popular in conjunction with the global adoption of crypto over the last couple of years. What’s the proposition you ask? Well, ETFs have the added benefit of giving investors exposure to a wide range of cryptos without buying separate tokens. Pretty much the say way traditional ETFs expose you to the stock market without buying separate stocks.

Furthermore, it must be noted that crypto ETFs also avoid the additional costs and headaches that come with direct ownership, such as paying for custody services or trying to understand the advantages and risks of custodial and non-custodial wallets.

✈️ THE TAKEAWAY

Huge stakes on the United States. Crypto ETFs are not yet legal in the US which has a massive market. Market players are attracted by the AUM- and revenue-generating opportunities. Many financial giants including Goldman Sachs have submitted applications for a crypto ETF but the SEC has delayed making any decision and called for greater investor protections from applicants. Once the SEC gives the green light to crypto ETFs, global AUM growth will accelerate as investors flood in. The market will become even more mature and mainstream. So the stakes are really high here!

NFT platform raises the largest Series B round to date for a European startup 🤯

The massive fundraise💰 Paris-based Sorare, developer of a global fantasy soccer game where players can buy, trade and play with official digital cards, announced that it raised $680 million in a Series B round led by (one and only) SoftBank. This is just mind-blowing when you think about it… 🤯

The newest funding round values the 3-year-old French company at $4.3B.

The size 👀 Sorare says the round is the largest Series B to date for a European startup. Founded in late 2018, the company previously raised just over $50M, with most of that coming from a $50 million Series A round in February.

Some numbers 📊 The company says it now has over 180 clubs, 6000 licensed athletes, and 600,000 registered users on its platform.

The Paris-based startup has notched $150 million in cards sales so far this year.

The platform’s monthly active paying users grew by 34 times between the second quarter of 2020 and the second quarter of this year, with quarterly sales up 51 times over the same period. Not too shabby!

✈️ THE TAKEAWAY

Sports on a blockchain. Soccer aka football is the biggest global sport and a top 10 sport in all countries measured, as well as the dominant sport in South America, Europe, and Africa. For instance, the world cup final is watched by an estimated 600 million people. Hence, there are millions and millions of fans who are following their favorite club and top players - daily. Some are just crazy about them. Thus, one of the reasons sports NFTs have become popular is because they allow football fans a new way to connect with clubs and participate in the sport, even when there isn’t a match on. Add the ability to collect, own, and trade and tokens associated with football, and it’s not that crazy anymore as to why Sorare is now a $4.3B company. It looks like NFTs are only getting started here…

Extra Reads & Quick Bites for Curious Minds🧠

• CBDCs go global 🌍 Central bank digital currencies (CBDC) are being trialed for cross-border payments in Australia, Malaysia, Singapore, and South Africa. The pilot project will enable financial institutions (FIs) to use their own CBDCs with one another and determine if cross-border payment transactions are settled faster and with fewer expenses.
• Moody’s goes DeFi 🤷♂️ Moody’s Investors Service, one of the world’s largest credit-rating companies, is looking to hire crypto analysts to get to grips with “the potential wide-reaching impact of decentralized finance (DeFi) on existing ecosystem,” according to a recent job posting. Moody’s said the right candidate for the positions, advertised in London and New York, would: “Develop deep understanding and working knowledge of blockchain and crypto-assets, plus DeFi to support research analysis on DeFi, CBDCs, stablecoins, NFTs and other crypto-assets,” referring to central bank digital currencies and non-fungible tokens. Crypto is taking over! 👀
• Bitcoin under management🇩🇪 German asset manager Union Investment revealed its plan to include bitcoin in a few of its investment funds available to its private investors, according to a published report. The investment arm of DZ Bank Group, which has approximately $457.6B in assets under management, will set the maximum bitcoin exposure of 2% of total assets for each fund.
• EU + IOTA🇪🇺 Germany-based open-source distributed ledger and cryptocurrency IOTA Foundation has been selected for the narrower group of projects with which an EU-wide blockchain called EBSI could be built.Under the name European Blockchain Services Infrastructure (EBSI), the EU member states aim to create an infrastructure that securely documents digital identities, tax data or certificates and makes them available across national borders. The IOTA Foundation prevailed among over 30 applicants in a first selection round to be one of the 7 projects with which EBSI could be put into practice.

Money Moves💸

• Eden Network, a priority transaction network for Ethereum, has raised $17.4M via a token sale.
• SubQuery Network, a data indexing protocol for the Polkadot and Kusama ecosystems, has raised $9M in a new funding round.
• Huobi Ventures and the Chainsmokers are backing a new $25M fund investing in the metaverse.
• Steve Cohen-backed NFT platform closed Series A at a $333M valuation.
• Crypto wealth manager Abra has closed a $55M Series C fundraise a little over a year after settling charges with U.S. regulators.

Continue reading by subscribing to Linas's Newsletter. You will receive fresh news about FinTech, Blockchain & Crypto with hot takeaways every day.

P.S. You might enjoy my earlier pieces as well:

👉 The Perfect Pitch Deck: How Coinbase Raised Seed Capital and Began Journey Towards $100B Worth Public Company

👉 Cutting Through the Noise: Bitcoin Fundamentals & Why it Was Created

***

About: I am a business developer, sales professional, FinTech strategist, as well as Cryptocurrency and Blockchain enthusiast. I'm highly passionate about Financial Technology and Digital Innovation, and strongly believe that it will change the world for the better. Apart from my daily job at a global payments startup where I'm leading the company's expansion into Europe, I'm an active member of the FinTech community and a TechFin evangelist.

If you've enjoyed this piece, don't hesitate to press like, comment on what you think, and share the article with others. Let's spread the knowledge together!

For more, hit the subscribe button, follow me on LinkedIn & Twitter. I'm building the best community the social world has ever seen!🔥🚀