London-based cryptocurrency services provider Blockchain.com has raised $300 million in a new investment round that valued the firm at $5.2 billion — up from a $3 billion valuation just one month ago.
The investment round was led by DST Global, Lightspeed Venture Partners and VY Capital, and is the crypto industry's third-largest capital raise to date. The sum is equal to that raised in a single round by Bakkt in March 2020, trailing only behind BlockFi's $350 million earlier this year and Bitmain Technologies' $400 million back in 2018.
Just one month ago, Blockchain.com raised $120 million at a subsequently reported valuation of $3 billion. The Wall Street Journal notes that while capital raising in the crypto space declined from a total of $4.5 billion in 2018 to $2.7 billion by 2020, this year has already seen three of the si largest-ever capital raises in the industry's history.
Blockchain.com plans to use the fresh funds to recruit more employees and support its institutional business. According to CEO Peter Smith:
“The institutional side requires more capital. When you’re pitching asset managers they want to see a big balance sheet.”
Smith added that if the current Bitcoin (BTC) price boom continues, he expects Blockchain.com's profit for 2021 would hit an all-time high in the “mid-nine digits.” Its business has already reportedly over double since just the start of this year. According to Smith, the company has 31 million verified users across 200 countries and 70 million registered digital wallets. It has meanwhile raised a total of $1.5 billion since its founding back in 2011.
Smith also hinted that the company is “carefully considering its public-market options,” with a watchful eye on the outcome of Coinbase's much-anticipated initial public offering, or IPO, later this year. Coinbase had an estimated pre-IPO valuation of around $100 billion by early March and aspires to sell up to 115 million shares on the Nasdaq stock exchange, according to its recent filing with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission.