United Kingdom-based Blockchain.com Group Holdings Inc., a cryptocurrency exchange and wallet service, announced Thursday that it has filed confidentially for an initial public offering in the United States.
The details of the IPO remain undisclosed, with the number of shares or expected price range undetermined as the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission reviews the application.
Founded in 2011, Blockchain.com began as a blockchain explorer, a type of analysis tool that allows visitors to view transactions on the global distributed ledger ecosystem and track them from their origin to their current state. As the company evolved, it became a cryptocurrency wallet and exchange, allowing users to buy, hold, sell and trade tokens on its platform.
A blockchain is a tamper-proof digital database, or ledger. It securely distributes recorded transactions between numerous nodes and cryptographically secures information about the activity without a central authority. This allows tracking financial activity similar to a bank, without the need for a middleman, and enables highly secure transactions that are almost impossible to change retroactively.
Blockchain.com describes itself as a leading infrastructure company with more than 95 million wallets created, facilitating more than $1.1 trillion in volume on its platform across over 20 products. These include consumer trading, wallet services, institutional products and blockchain data tools rather than a classic order-book exchange model.
This IPO filing follows blockchain and crypto leaders entering IPOs, including major firms such as stablecoin issuer Circle Internet Group Inc., cryptocurrency exchange Gemini Space Station Inc. and digital asset platform Bullish Inc.
The IPO of Bullish set an interesting precedent as well, as the company arranged to receive $1.5 million in proceeds from the deal in stablecoins, a type of cryptocurrency token that is pegged to another currency, such as the U.S. dollar. This represented the first time a cryptocurrency had been used as part of the payout for an IPO.
Cryptocurrency lending firm Figure Technology Solutions Inc. also filed for IPO last year.
However, it hasn’t all been roses for IPO filers in the crypto industry. Other leading firms, such as cryptocurrency exchange Payward Inc., known as Kraken, paused its IPO, and French crypto hardware wallet Ledger Inc. also delayed its IPO, citing volatile market conditions.
Image: Pixabay
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