As Coinbase is about to go public in the U.S., another cryptocurrency company is having a blockbuster first quarter of 2021. Blockchain.com, the company behind a popular cryptocurrency wallet, an exchange, a block explorer and more, has raised a $300 million Series C round.
If you’ve been paying attention, you may remember that I wrote about Blockchain.com last month. At the time, the company announced a $120 million funding round. In other words, the company is raising once again just a few weeks after its previous funding round.
This time, DST Global, Lightspeed Venture Partners and VY Capital are leading the round. Existing investors also participated. Following today’s funding round, the company has reached a post-money valuation of $5.2 billion.
Originally named Blockchain.info, the company first launched a blockchain explorer. If you’re not familiar with the blockchain industry, an explorer lets you enter the hash of any transaction that occurs on a blockchain to get more information — you can retrieve the transaction amount, the number of confirmations, the wallet addresses of the sender and the reveiver, etc.
But Blockchain.com is better known for its open-source wallet. The company offers a noncustodial wallet, which means that you’re in control of your private keys. Blockchain.com can’t directly access your funds.
31 million users have verified their identities on Blockchain.com. The number of active users have tripled over the past 12 months.
Blockchain.com has diversified its activities over time. It has launched an exchange so that you can buy and sell cryptocurrencies from Blockchain.com directly. The startup also offers services to institutional investors. Blockchain.com can help you when it comes to buying and selling cryptocurrencies, custody, large over-the-counter transactions, etc.
When it comes to revenue, “Blockchain.com is highly profitable across each of our business lines,” co-founder and CEO Peter Smith wrote. The new influx of funding is all about working with late-stage investors and growing rapidly. You can expect some Blockchain.com acquisitions down the road for instance.
