Business

Valora, which already has over 200,000 users, will now be a separate company, with cLabs’ Jackie Bona serving as its CEO Mobile-focused blockchain ecosystem Celo announced yesterday that Celo-native wallet Valora had raised $20 million in a Series A funding round which saw the participation of well-known backers such as Polychain Capital, Andreessen Horowitz and SV Angel. Valora will now operate as a separate company and cLabs’ former Head of Consumer Growth, Jackie Bona, will serve as Valora’s CEO. a16z General Partner, Arianna Simpson, commented, “Valora is tackling many of the friction points that have hindered the broader adoption of crypto and DeFi [decentralised finance]. It’s truly becoming the global gateway to crypto. We look forward to continuing to partner with the exceptional t...

Payment giant Mastercard has launched a cryptocurrency accelerator programme called Start Path in a bid to support more companies in the ecosystem Mastercard, one of the leading payment processors in the world, announced the launch of a cryptocurrency accelerator programme. The programme, called Start Path, is dedicated to helping cryptocurrency startups by giving them access to partnership opportunities and tools to grow. In its blog post, Mastercard said it has already chosen some startups to kick start the programme. “As a continuation of Mastercard’s digital assets works, seven startups have joined the program, including – GK8, Domain Money, Mintable, SupraOracles, STACS, Taurus, and Uphold, – and together with Mastercard seek to expand and accelerate innovation around digital asset te...

Goldman Sachs has filed with the US SEC to create an exchange-traded fund that would grant investors access to blockchain equities and decentralised finance Wall Street investment bank Goldman Sachs has filed with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to create an exchange-traded fund (ETF) that targets decentralised finance (DeFi) and blockchain equity. According to its filing, the ETF will be tied to the performance of companies working in the blockchain sector and DeFi. Goldman Sachs wrote that the “fund seeks to provide investment results that closely correspond, before fees and expenses, to the performance of the Solactive Decentralised Finance and Blockchain Index (the “Index”).” At the moment, it is unclear what the Index is composed of. “The Index is designed t...

RocketFuel’s solution has the joint benefits of better privacy for customers and lower fees for merchants People have long been advocating for crypto to go green, and now it seems it is, though perhaps not in the way many anticipated. Global payments solution provider RocketFuel announced yesterday that licensed cannabis merchants and dispensaries would be able to integrate its payment solution. RocketFuel enables merchants to accept Bitcoin and more than 50 other cryptocurrencies through a user-friendly, one-click checkout process, without the previous need for the cart paradigm. Advantages of the solution include no chargebacks or card declines, lower fees for merchants, better privacy protection for customers and the ability to generate new sales channels. The payment solution will mean...

Changpeng Zhao has revealed that Binance US is looking at the possibility of becoming a publicly-listed company The CEO of leading cryptocurrency exchange Binance, Changpeng Zhao, has revealed that Binance US, its trading platform in the United States, could go public. He made this known during the “Redefine Tomorrow” event organised by SCB 10X. Zhao pointed out that Coinbase listing on the NASDAQ stock exchange in April has made the United States a prime environment for cryptocurrency companies that wish to become publicly listed entities. “We are setting up those structures. Once those structures are in place, you may make it easier for an IPO to happen. So that’s not out of the question. But right now, we are still in the early stages,” he added. The Binanc...