Bitpanda Raises $52M Series A Led by Peter Thiel’s Valar Ventures
European crypto brokerage Bitpanda, based in Vienna and founded in 2014, is announcing the completion of a $52 million Series A led by PayPal legend Peter Thiel’s Valar Ventures. This fundraising round, plus a seed round in 2016 and an initial exchange offering in 2019, means the 240-employee company raised roughly $100 million to date, according to the team.
Bitpanda co-CEOs Eric Demuth and Paul Klanschek said this raise, which included additional funds from SeedInvest, will help scale the company to 300 employees, and a variety of new products, in Q4 2020.
According to CoinGecko, Bitpanda Pro facilitates roughly $2 million in daily volume. Klanscheck said the platform also offers precious metal trading, in addition to other crypto options, totaling “over a $1 billion in volume in 2019.”
These co-founders said France, Spain and Turkey were among the fastest-growing crypto markets out of the roughly 34 countries the platform serves.
The recent buzz around decentralized finance (DeFi) has been a boon for Bitpanda. “We just launched a DeFi market on our broker and it went through the roof,” Demuth said. “People are really crazy about buying DeFi coins.”
Outside of crypto, Klanschek said roughly 100,000 people solely used Bitpanda this past year for trading gold options. Demuth said in 2021 Bitpanda will expand to include “all kinds of asset classes,” including stocks.
As part of the deal, Valar’s Andrew McCormack will join Bitpanda’s board. “Together, we’re going to ensure everyone in Europe has the power to access the financial markets and invest in their financial futures as we build Europe’s next fintech unicorn,” McCormack said in a statement.
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