Crypto Firm FTX Trading Valuation Rises To $ 18 Billion After $ 900 Million Investment

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(Reuters) -FTX Trading Ltd said on Tuesday its valuation jumped to $ 18 billion after a $ 900 million funding round that included SoftBank Group Corp and that it was one of the largest raises of funds for a crypto company.

FILE PHOTO: Representations of Bitcoin, Ethereum, DogeCoin, Ripple, Litecoin cryptocurrencies are placed on the PC motherboard in this illustration taken on June 29, 2021. REUTERS / Dado Ruvic / Illustration

The cycle saw the participation of more than 60 investors, including venture capital firm Sequoia Capital, private equity giant Thoma Bravo, Daniel Loebs Third Point, the Paul Tudor Jones family and British hedge fund manager Alan Howard .

The latest funding comes as investor sentiment towards cryptocurrencies deteriorated somewhat after an initial euphoria earlier this year due to growing regulatory concerns globally.

Binance, another major cryptocurrency exchange, has come under intense scrutiny by regulators in the UK, Germany, Japan and Hong Kong. The United States is also investigating the exchange, according to a media report.

The tightening of controls weighed on the price of bitcoin, with the most popular cryptocurrency falling below $ 30,000 on Tuesday for the first time in a month.

Founded and run by Sam Bankman-Fried, a 29-year-old crypto-billionaire, FTX is the owner and operator of the FTX.COM cryptocurrency exchange.

The two-year-old company said it has more than one million users and an average transaction volume of around $ 10 billion per day, with revenues that have more than increased tenfold this year.

FTX, which also counts celebrity couple Tom Brady and Gisele Bundchen among its funders, caters to a wide variety of traders, including retail investors, family offices and institutional traders.

It plans to use the new injection of funds to expand its product offering and for other investments.

Coinbase Ventures, the venture capital arm of the recently listed cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase Global Inc, also participated in the round.

Report by Niket Nishant in Bangalore; Editing by Aditya Soni

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