Westpac's VC Fund Invests in Bitcoin Company Coinbase
Australia's second-largest bank Westpac has directed its venture capital fund, Reinventure Group, to invest in Coinbase, a San Fransisco-based Bitcoin startup. It is believed that the aforementioned vertical has joined the Coinbase's $75 million funding round, the same which received support from some of the biggest financial sharks, including New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and Citigroup's former CEO Vikram Pandit. In the latest Series C funding, Reinventure Group was joined by renowned venture capitalists like Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Andreessen Horowitz, Robbot Capital and Union Square....
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Reinventure Group, a venture capital firm backed by Westpac, the second-largest bank in Australia, has been revealed as one of bitcoin wallet and exchange service Coinbase's Series C backers. Coinbase announced in January that it had raised $75m in new funding, a round that drew support from Spanish megabank BBVA and Fortune 500 financial services group USAA, among others. The participation of Reinventure was disclosed in a 29th June blog post, in which Coinbase said that it planned to
The CEO of Westpac Group, Australia's second-largest bank, has claimed it is "too soon" to panic about bitcoin and blockchain technology. At a strategy briefing in Sydney yesterday, Brian Hartzer said the future of the technology - which has a number of "limitations" - is currently uncertain, the Sydney Morning Herald reports. He added: "I think it is a bit too soon to panic about it. It is potentially quite powerful from an efficiency point of view. It is one of the things we are keeping an eye on." In June, the bank went public with details of its current proof-of-concept with Ripple....
It has to be said, Australia is showing a very bullish trend where venture capital is concerned in 2016. The fintech industry is heating up in Australia as of late. Westpac is backing a second AU$50m startup fund for fintech startups in the country. The bank will do so in collaboration with Sydney-based VC firm Reinventure. The hunt for promising Australian fintech startups is in full swing, and it is positive to see Westpac being part of this initiative. It is not the first venture by Westpac in the fintech industry either. The financial institution had shown its support for the local....
Two of Australia's "big four banks," Westpac Banking Corporation and the Australia and New Zealand Bank Group (ANZ), are trialing Ripple payments for faster and lower-cost cross-border payments. Westpac, which is ahead of ANZ in its intention of integrating Ripple, said it is in the early stages of a proof-of-concept where staff members are testing the system by making small international payments to other countries. Speaking with the Australian Financial Review, Rachel Slade, general manager of global transactional services at Westpac, said that Westpac has been satisfied by the....
The multinational conglomerate holding company headquartered in Tokyo, Softbank operates a Latin America Fund that invests in startups focused on identification technology, e-commerce, education, fintech and now cryptocurrency solutions. The Softbank Latin America Fund revealed on Thursday that it invested $200 million in the crypto-asset exchange Mercado Bitcoin. Mercado Bitcoin’s $200M Capital Raise: Softbank Funds One of the largest Series B funding rounds in LATM The Softbank Latin America Fund has invested in Mercado Bitcoin’s parent company 2TM Group. The announcement....