Switching to the Satoshi standard and Lightning Network connectivity makes Bitcoin more tangible and easy to use. AAX has made the first move in the crypto space, already providing BTC to SAT
PayPal Launches Its Cryptocurrency Service in the UK
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PayPal announced the launch of a new service enabling its customers in the UK to buy, hold and sell cryptocurrency with PayPal. This new service starts rolling out this week.
Customers can choose from four types of cryptocurrencies—Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin and Bitcoin Cash. By accessing their PayPal account via the website or the mobile app, they can view real-time crypto prices, access educational content to help answer commonly asked questions, and learn more about cryptocurrencies, including the opportunities and risks.
This announcement marks the first international expansion of the company’s cryptocurrency offering outside of the United States. With a trusted brand like PayPal now making an entry, access, knowledge, and the exploration of cryptocurrency has the potential to become mainstream in the UK.
“The pandemic has accelerated digital change and innovation across all aspects of our lives— including the digitisation of money and greater consumer adoption of digital financial services,” said Jose Fernandez da Ponte, Vice President and General Manager, Blockchain, Crypto and Digital Currencies at PayPal. “Our global reach, digital payments expertise, and knowledge of consumer and businesses, combined with rigorous security and compliance controls provides us the unique opportunity, and the responsibility, to help people in the UK to explore cryptocurrency. We are committed to continue working closely with regulators in the UK, and around the world, to offer our support—and meaningfully contribute to shaping the role digital currencies will play in the future of global finance and commerce.”
Buy, hold and sell cryptocurrency with PayPal
The introduction of this service offers customers a new way to explore cryptocurrency in the PayPal environment they know and trust. Customers can start by buying as little as £1 of cryptocurrency through PayPal. To purchase cryptocurrency, eligible customers can log into their PayPal account via the website or their mobile app, navigate to the new crypto tab to view the four cryptocurrencies available and view current pricing and trends.
Customers can choose from pre-determined purchase amounts or enter in their own purchase amount, before following the prompts to buy the cryptocurrency of their choice. Customers will be able to fund their PayPal account for the purchase using their bank account or debit card. If customers choose to sell cryptocurrency with this new service, funds are normally available quickly to spend in their PayPal account. There are no fees to hold cryptocurrency in a PayPal account. There are transaction fees and currency conversion fees for buying and selling applicable cryptocurrencies.
Create greater understanding and enable access
As part of this offering, PayPal provides account holders with educational content to help them understand the cryptocurrency ecosystem, the volatility, risks, and opportunities related to purchasing cryptocurrency. The company encourages its customers to do their research on the risks and opportunities for various cryptocurrencies before taking the step to buy, hold and sell cryptocurrency with PayPal.
Advancing the next generation of financial services infrastructure
PayPal is one of the largest companies globally to enter the market for digital currencies with its announcement last October that it would allow its millions of U.S. customers to buy, hold and sell cryptocurrencies. This March, the company announced ‘Checkout with Crypto’— enabling customers in the U.S. to use their cryptocurrency alongside other payment methods in their PayPal wallet to make purchases at businesses around the world. In April, the company introduced crypto services on its mobile payment service Venmo in the U.S.
In addition to providing these cryptocurrency services, PayPal has been exploring the potential of digital currencies through partnerships with licensed and regulated cryptocurrency platforms and with central banks around the world. For the past five years, PayPal has increased its focus on, and invested resources in its internal blockchain research team to explore the next generation of digital financial services infrastructure and enhancements to digital commerce.
The company has enabled its cryptocurrency offering through a partnership with Paxos Trust Company. PayPal’s venture capital arm has also made investments in blockchain and cryptocurrency-related start-ups including: TRM Labs, leading cryptocurrency risk management software; TaxBit, a provider of crypto tax software to customers and exchanges; and Talos, institutional-grade infrastructure technology for digital asset trading.
In the UK, PayPal’s new crypto offering which covers buying, holding and selling cryptocurrency will start to roll out this week and will be available within the next few weeks for all eligible customers directly in their PayPal account via the website and their mobile app.
Substack to accept Bitcoin payments on the Lightning Network powered by Bitcoin payment processor OpenNode
OpenNode, an industry-leading Bitcoin payment processor, announced today that Substack, an online publishing platform with over 500,000 paying subscribers, has integrated their Bitcoin API to offer Bitcoin payments on the online publishing platform. OpenNode will power both on-chain and Lightning Network Bitcoin payments.
Working together, OpenNode and Substack are starting by making instant, low cost payments available to a select group of crypto-focused publications. Readers will be able to use Bitcoin to pay for subscriptions to these select publications, and the publications will retain earnings in Bitcoin.
“We’re excited to be working with OpenNode to enable independent publishers on Substack to accept crypto payments,” said Nick Inzucchi, product designer at Substack. “Having this option will give writers more flexibility and freedom, and we look forward to doing more in crypto to meet writers’ needs.”
“Our partnership will allow content creators across the Substack ecosystem to accept Bitcoin payments, and retain earnings in Bitcoin or convert to preferred currency. Writers and podcasters have flocked to Substack to regain creative and financial freedom, and Bitcoin is a natural fit,” said João Almeida, Co-founder & CTO at OpenNode.
Smartsearch launches document verification system to combat money laundering
Leading UK anti-money laundering specialist SmartSearch has launched a new weapon in the ongoing fight against dirty cash being cleaned around the world through activity such as buying property.Organised crime gangs and fraudsters are now thought to be responsible for up to $2 trillion a year in money laundering, which is being enabled due to a lack of basic ID checks and document verification, according to SmartSearch.
In response the multi-award winning RegTech 100 firm has now launched SmartDoc, the most advanced document verification system on the market, using a combination of cutting-edge facial ID technology and a level of expert analysis at the same level as border security officials.
John Dobson, SmartSearch CEO, said SmartDoc would not only help businesses in the property, legal and financial service sectors prevent fraud, but also help them remain compliant with global regulations which would result in hefty fines and even prosecution if breached.
He said: “We have built a reputation over the past ten years for our market-leading digital verification solution, which is by far the most effective way to carry out anti-money laundering (AML) and Know Your Customer (KYC) checks.
“But we have launched SmartDoc to run alongside that as another weapon in the armoury for those businesses which feel the need to carry out document verification as part of their customer due diligence.
“The new SmartDoc solution incorporates facial recognition to identify forged ID documents which include photographs, such as passports, driving licences, work permits amongst others.
“SmartDoc will ensure regulated businesses can securely authenticate customer identities, preventing fraud and allowing them to remain compliant with AML legislation.
“While we would always advise customers that electronic verification is the quickest and most reliable way to perform KYC and AML checks, a document checking solution is a key tool due to the vast increase in attempted fraud as a result of the global pandemic.
“The lack of face-to-face interactions caused by lockdown opened a window for criminals to attempt to deceive, and despite restrictions being relaxed, this wave of fraud has not stopped.
“But businesses need to be aware that they are responsible for ensuring they comply with AML regulations and could face severe fines for allowing this activity to go on unchecked.”
The new feature has been developed in part in response to feedback from SmartSearch clients and, by combining leading document authentication technology and the latest biometric verification and liveness detection techniques, SmartDoc provides an accurate picture of the customer, which removes the need for face-to-face interaction.
Not only does the technology confirm whether a document is genuine and unaltered, but that it also belongs to the person presenting it, providing an additional layer of security to identity checks.
It then provides a pass-fail result and also screens the customer against politically exposed persons (PEP) and sanctions lists.
The SmartDoc service combines machine-learning interrogation and an optical character recognition algorithmic check on the ID document machine readable zone, verifying whether the document is genuine and unaltered, with a full data integration to identify document tampering.
Where necessary, it also uses visual scrutiny by a border security trained ID document expert, who will examine every aspect to check security features found in genuine documents, as well as key indicators of potential forgery.
Sydney Stock Exchange joins Fintech Australia
Sydney Stock Exchange (SSX) has joined FinTech Australia’s corporate partnership program, becoming the 13th new major member it has signed on in a year. SSX joins existing partners Xero, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Mastercard, EY, Facebook, Google, eftpos, IDEMIA, Regional Australia Bank, RSM Australia and the Newcastle Permanent Building Society.The partnership program embeds companies within the fintech ecosystem and networks them with its key players.
“We look forward to working with the SSX as it looks to grow its presence in the fintech industry,” FinTech Australia CEO Rebecca Schot-Guppy said. “With many of our members considering their options for capital and the fintech industry rapidly growing, we believe it’s an ideal time for SSX to help educate members on their options for fundraising.”
“As a growth company with international reach, the Sydney Stock Exchange is a natural partner for Australian fintechs. Our entry requirements are more supportive, and our ongoing administration is far more efficient. With the benefits of being listed, we help fintechs access the capital required to reach their potential.” Michael Go, CEO of Sydney Stock Exchange.
XREX Raises $17M to Expand Fiat Currency Portfolio and Partnerships
XREX, a crypto-fiat fintech company driving financial inclusion via blockchain, closed its $17 million Pre-A round, which was oversubscribed by 200%. XREX will use the funding to expand its fiat currency portfolio, acquire additional licenses, and forge partnerships with more financial institutions and digital wallets.
Led by CDIB Capital Group (TWSE: 2883), the consortium of global investors includes publicly-listed companies, major banks, venture capital firms, and top fintech investors from the US, Canada, Germany, Estonia, Singapore, Japan, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. The strong participation by publicly-listed companies underscores XREX’s commitment to compliance with regulatory bodies.
Other investors in this Pre-A round also include SBI Investment (subsidiary of SBI Holdings, TYO: 8473), Global Founders Capital, ThreeD Capital (CSE: IDK), E.Sun Venture Capital (TWSE: 2884), Systex Corporation (TWSE: 6214), Metaplanet Holdings, AppWorks, Black Marble, New Economy Ventures, and Seraph Group. XREX closed its $7 million seed round in 2019. The investors in that round included AppWorks (lead), Skype’s late-cofounder Toivo Annus, Metaplanet Holdings, Black Marble, CDIB, WI Harper, BitoEx, and the Taiwan government’s National Development Fund.
“CDIB was an early investor in XREX,” said Ryan Kuo, Head of CDIB Capital Innovation Fund. “After witnessing the company’s fast revenue growth and their commitment to compliance, we were determined to double our investment and lead this strategic round.”
“Our mission is to foster global financial inclusion by leveraging blockchain,” said XREX CEO and cofounder Wayne Huang, an internationally-recognized cybersecurity expert. “Many of our team members are from or have lived in the markets where we serve. We keenly understand the struggles faced by many cross-border merchants who lack safe access to US dollar liquidity.”
By working with local regulators and financial institutions, XREX has pioneered tools such as BitCheck and MyXchange to help merchants and SMEs in emerging markets reduce forex loss, gain access to US dollars and seamlessly cross over from informal to formal economy.
Capitalizing on a successful series of new features including their mandatory User Public Profile as well as their Risk Level Detector features, XREX will roll out a user Reputation Index next year to bolster safety, transparency and accountability while encouraging social networking.
In the last eight months, XREX successfully detected and prevented fraud rings from Russia and Nigeria from using the platform, attesting to XREX as one of the safest crypto-fiat currency platforms in the world.
“Helping entrepreneurs to succeed is a priority for us,” said Yoshitaka Kitao, Representative Director & Chairman of SBI Investment. “We believe XREX solutions open the door for underserved merchants to participate in global commerce on an even playing field.”
Jerry Horng, President of Black Marble Capital Management who serves on XREX’s board, said, “We were an early investor of XREX and we’re excited to continue our support in this round. XREX is uniquely positioned to connect Taiwan’s mature banking industry with the booming cross-border commerce currently seen in emerging markets.”
Recognizing compliance is core to digital currency adoption, XREX partners with several leading compliance and anti-money laundering providers such as CipherTrace, Sum&Substance, and TRISA.
“XREX has shown above-expectation growth since their graduation from our AW#17 accelerator batch in 2018. We are thrilled to back them again,” said Joseph Chan, a Partner at AppWorks who serves on XREX’s board. “This round will accelerate XREX’s capability of combining their unmatched cybersecurity expertise with leading compliance technologies to create a safer and cleaner ecosystem for crypto-enabled merchants, digital asset owners, and entrepreneurs.”
Binance Appoints ADGM’s Richard Teng as CEO
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Singaporean crypto exchange platform Binance appointed Richard Teng, the former CEO of Financial Services Regulatory Authority at Abu Dhabi Global Market (ADGM) as its Chief Executive Officer.
Teng played a pivotal role in enabling ADGM to gain international recognition by global regulators and industry bodies, with a Forbes article labelling him as “one of the world’s foremost innovative regulators”.
Under his leadership, ADGM grew from being a newly established financial center to having nearly 2,700 registered licenses in issue and more than 150 approved financial institutions in less than five years.
Prior to joining ADGM, Teng was the Chief Regulatory Officer of the Singapore Exchange (SGX). He led the regulation group responsible for policy, framework and rule formulation in the areas of listing, trading and clearing as well as regulatory solutioning for new products and services.
Before joining SGX, Teng spent 13 years with the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), where he rose to become the Director of Corporate Finance.
Teng’s appointment comes as the beleaguered crypto platform faces brickbats from regulators across the world over regulatory and licensing concerns.
Binance has since made moves to right the ship by appointing Greg Monahan, former US Treasury Criminal Investigator, as its Global Money Laundering Reporting Officer.
UK neobank Kroo receives banking licence
Fresh from a £17.7 million funding round, UK social banking startup Kroo has received a restricted banking licence from the Prudential Regulation Authority and the Financial Conduct Authority.
The authorisation with restriction means that Kroo can accept deposits up to £50,000 in total. This ‘mobilisation’ phase allows new banks a time to finalise their systems, infrastructure and controls ahead of public launch, which for Kroo is expected in early 2022, once the full banking licence is granted.
Kroo’s current product range – a prepaid debit card and app – enables customers to easily create groups with friends, track spending, and split and pay bills quickly and securely.
Once the restrictions are lifted in early 2022, Kroo intends to gradually close down the prepaid card scheme and offer its 5000 users the ability to transition their existing accounts over to the new Kroo current account.
As part of its product expansion, the bank – which has raised a total of £30m in venture capital funding since launch – will offer loans later in 2022 and grow its workforce across technology, marketing, risk, compliance and customer support.
Andrea De Gottardo, CEO of Kroo, says “It is incredibly exciting to finally be a bank that is authorised with restrictions. Very few firms in the UK get to this point and this represents a huge milestone for the entire team.”
Nymbus teams up with digital wealth tech firm Marstone
Marstone, Inc., a leading digital wealth technology firm, announced it is partnering with banking technology solutions provider Nymbus.
The collaboration brings together Marstone’s relentless focus of promoting financial health and literacy with Nymbus’ mission of accelerating growth for banks and credit unions through new routes to market.
“As we move forward in a post-pandemic environment, banking has shifted significantly with an arising need for greater financial planning tools as a core component to end-clients’ life and stability,” said Allison Netzer, Chief Marketing & Strategy Officer at Nymbus. “At Nymbus, we know that there are best-in-breed solutions already in the market to help our clients achieve their goals quickly and easily. Marstone’s digital wealth management platform will play a critical role as we continue to remove the hurdles historically associated with digital banking innovation.”
In addition to a complete suite of banking technology applications offered for core, onboarding, lending and CRM services, Nymbus formed a Labs unit to amplify the capabilities of traditional institutions and extend their reach to new niche customer segments. It brings together Nymbus’ world-class development, marketing, and user-experience teams—and key partners such as Marstone—integrating everything needed to build out and operate a full-scale digital bank positioned for success on day one.
Marstone offers a comprehensive, industry-leading digital wealth management platform and financial health and wellness toolkit that can be implemented in a fraction of the time it would take to build in-house, helping organizations create a seamless digital experience that creates backend efficiencies and cost-savings, all while meeting evolving end-user demands.
“COVID accelerated the already growing number of consumers shifting their wealth and banking to digital offerings,” said Margaret J. Hartigan, Co-Founder and CEO, Marstone. “To remain successful, financial institutions need to recognize that digital financial management and education are essential. We’re thrilled to be partnering with Nymbus as they incorporate our turnkey digital wealth management platform into their rapidly growing solution set for niche banking players.”
Today’s partnership comes on the heels of Marstone’s recent $5 million Series A financing announcement as well as the company’s partnership with Amerant Bank to accelerate customer-centric digital wealth management solutions.
Eurex launches Bitcoin ETF futures
With the new contract, Deutsche Börse Group’s derivatives arm offers clients access to the price of Bitcoin in a regulated on-exchange and centrally cleared environment. This offering will be the first regulated market in Bitcoin-related derivatives in Europe.
Launch of the new contract is planned for 13 September. The futures contract is based on the BTCetc Bitcoin Exchange Traded Crypto (ISIN: DE000A27Z304), which is listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange and has been among the most heavily traded ETF/ETN contracts on Xetra since its start in June 2020. The Bitcoin ETN was equivalent to 1/1000th of a Bitcoin at launch and is fully backed by and redeemable in Bitcoin. The new futures contract will be traded in euro and physically delivered in Bitcoin ETNs.
This set-up allows investors to track the price development of Bitcoins in a fully regulated on-exchange environment and based on a transparent price discovery of the underlying ETN. Both the underlying ETN, as well as the futures, trade, clear and settle on Deutsche Börse Group’s proven infrastructure. Bitcoin ETN futures are centrally cleared like any other derivatives traded on Eurex. Eurex’s standard clearing, netting, and risk management processes thereby come into effect, mitigating counterparty risk and reducing operational costs for market participants.
Randolf Roth, Member of the Eurex Executive Board said: “There is significant demand from instutional investors to gain Bitcoin exposure in a secure and regulated environment. We are pleased to be the first regulated exchange to offer this innovative contract. The new Bitcoin ETN futures enable investors to trade and hedge Bitcoin within Eurex’s proven trading and clearing infrastructure without the need to turn to unregulated crypto venues or set up a separate infrastructure, such as a crypto wallet. It is the logical extension of the ETN that already trades very successfully on Xetra.”
Meanwhile, Deutsche Börse has expanded its innovative offering of the world’s first centrally cleared Bitcoin ETN on Xetra with further ETNs on Ethereum, Bitcoin Cash and Litecoin. With an average monthly order book turnover of 1.0 billion EUR in H1/2021, Xetra has established itself as Europe’s leading exchange for crypto ETNs.
Binance Expands Global KYC Requirements to Further User Protection
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Binance, the world’s leading blockchain ecosystem and cryptocurrency infrastructure provider, has today announced the global rollout of its Intermediate Verification requirement for all users.
Intermediate Verification supports Binance’s Know Your Customer (KYC) and Anti-Money Laundering (AML) efforts as part of the organization’s redoubling of efforts to further enhance user protection and risk management protocols.
Changpeng Zhao (CZ), Founder and CEO of Binance, said: “User protection is an integral part of our DNA and core values. Our vision is to create a sustainable ecosystem that is safe for all participants. In the last four years we have laid the groundwork by investing heavily in security and user protection, supporting law enforcement from around the world with high-profile investigations and helping cybercrime victims recover millions of dollars worth of stolen funds.”
“We aim to work more collaboratively with policy-makers to improve global standards and discourage bad actors.”
In the last 30 days, Binance has announced significant investments towards user protection, including (but not limited to) senior compliance appointments, compliance technology deployments, Tax Reporting Tool launch, updates to leveraged trading, changes to withdrawal limits and updates to API services.
For more information on the updates to Binance’s global KYC requirements, please visit here.