Mercado Bitcoin, the leading cryptocurrency exchange in Brazil, has raised $200 million from the SoftBank Latin America Fund, the parent company of Mercado, 2TM Group, announced today. The investment values 2TM Group at $2. 1 billion and is SoftBank’s capital injection into a Latin American crypto company.
Closely following SoftBank’s investment in the $250 million raised through Mexican cryptocurrency exchange Bitso in May, the deal shows a growing interest in introducing bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies into Latin America.
“This Series B cycle will allow us to continue investing in our infrastructure, which will allow us to grow and meet the developing demand of the blockchain-based money market,” said Roberto Dagnoni, executive chairman and chief executive officer of 2TM Group. to be the leading provider of answers for business actors. “
The São Paulo-based exchange aims to increase the number of indexed assets (the exchange lately lists around 50 tokens) and increase its team from 500 members to 700 by the end of the year. Other plans include a regional expansion with an on Mexico, Argentina, Chile and Colombia and an acceleration of expansion in the 2TM Group portfolio, which also includes virtual wallet provider MeuBank and virtual custodian Bitrust (both subject to regulatory approval).
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Founded through brothers Gustavo and Mauricio Chamati in 2013, Mercado Bitcoin has the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the country, and in January marked its first financing circular co-directed through G2D/GP Investments and Parallax Ventures with the participation of a variety of others. Investors.
Like many of its counterparts, Bitcoin Market has experienced an expansion over the previous year, with a visitor base reaching 2. 8 million in 2021, or more than 70% of the total number of individual investors on brazilian exchange B3. Approximately 700,000 consumers registered between January and May. During the same period, the volume of trades on the exchange increased to $5 billion, exceeding the total of its first seven years combined. “Every month [of this year], we trade the full volume of 2020,” Dagnoni says.
“Bitcoin Market is a regional leader in the area of encryption and the leading crypto exchange in Brazil. They exploit a massive local and regional addressable market measured through potential encryption use cases,” says Paulo Passoni, managing partner at SoftBank SBLA Advisers Corp. manages the SoftBank Latin America Fund). ” At SoftBank, we seek to invest in marketers who challenge the prestigious technology-driven or technology-enabled business models that revolutionize an industry – Bitcoin Market does just that. “
Despite the immediate expansion of the local crypto market, Brazilian regulators are lagging behind. In 2018, Brazil’s antitrust watchdog agency, the Administrative Council for Economic Defense (CADE), opened an investigation into the country’s largest banks for allegedly abusing their strength through the accounts of cryptocurrency brokerage firms. The investigation had been ongoing since last year. In April 2020, Senator Soraya Thronicke proposed an expanded set of regulations for Companies, custodians and issuers of Brazil’s “virtual assets”, customer protection, crypto taxes and enforcement however, Dagnoni says the country’s regulatory environment is favorable and that the company is working hard with regulators “to create a coherent framework for virtual investments of choice in Brazil , in accordance with his vision of a convergence of classic and blockchain-based money markets. “
I’m doing a report on cryptocurrencies and using blockchain instances. Born and raised in Russia, I graduated from NYU Abu Dhabi with a bachelor’s degree in Economics and Colombia.
I’m doing a report on cryptocurrencies and instances of emerging blockchain use. Born and raised in Russia, I graduated from NYU Abu Dhabi with a bachelor’s degree in Economics and graduated in journalism from Columbia University, where I focused on knowledge and business reporting.