London-based BVNK, a cryptocurrency startup, has closed $40 million in Series A funding round. With this, the company has reached a $340 million post-money valuation.
The round was led by Tiger Global (invested in Zaraye, Grain and MoonPay) alongside other notable investors, including The Raba Partnership, Avenir, Kingsway Capital, Nordstar, Concentric, and Base Capital. Angel investors included the founders of Anchorage Digital, Coinlist, Eco.com and TrueLayer; Microsoft’s ex-head of strategy and former Stripe and Jump Trading executives.
Eyes to enter new markets
The proceeds of this round will fuel BVNK‘s launch into new markets, including the USA, accelerate its acquisition of regulatory licences, and support the expansion of product capabilities. Also, the crypto startup is looking to further expand its senior team with significant hires in product, engineering and commercial operations.
BVNK Co-Founder and CEO, Jesse Hemson-Struthers, said: “We are excited to partner with Tiger Global given their in-depth understanding of the global crypto, payments and banking landscape and with them having backed key crypto infrastructure companies, such as NEAR protocol and TRM, and payments companies Stripe and Revolut.”
Alex Cook, Partner, Tiger Global, said: “Rapid adoption of cryptocurrencies by global businesses adds complexity to treasury management, banking, and payments. BVNK’s platform helps companies seamlessly switch between fiat and crypto. We believe BVNK, with its focus on product differentiation and compliance, is poised to be a market leader, and we’re excited to partner with Jesse and the team.”
Crypto-powered payments and banking platform
Founded by Donald Jackson, Jesse Hemson-Struthers and George Davis in 2021 in London BVNK is a crypto-powered payments and banking platform for businesses.
Via a single account, customers can bridge between fiat currencies and digital assets to manage payment, yield, trading and custody in support of their business goals. With a focus on regulatory compliance and acquiring appropriate licences, and through partnerships with best-in-class institutional crypto custody solutions, lending desks and liquidity pools, BVNK is the banking and payments platform for crypto-native and crypto-curious businesses.
The company processes over $2 billion in annualised payments volume and has more than doubled monthly payment volumes since January 2022.
What does BVNK do?
BVNK is focused on serving global businesses that operate across borders in crypto and fiat currencies with ultra-fast, compliant and secure payments and banking. The startup sees an opportunity to build the next generation of what Visa and Mastercard built globally.
The API-first platform enables merchants to seamlessly integrate cryptocurrency-powered payments into their operations without having to manage any of the complexity of collecting and converting crypto, on-ramping customers, or managing payouts. Merchants can accept payments in cryptocurrency but receive settlements in standard fiat currencies. Using the BVNK Business Account, customers can integrate crypto into their payment and treasury flows.
Building on new, crypto-powered infrastructure rather than legacy technology, BVNK’s solution directly addresses a range of common pain points for international businesses.
