Paxos
 | |
| |
| Private | |
| ISIN | 🆔 |
| Industry | Financial Technology |
| Founded 📆 | 2012 |
| Founder 👔 | Chad Cascarilla |
| Headquarters 🏙️ | New York City |
Area served 🗺️ | Worldwide |
Key people |
|
| Products 📟 | itBit, Paxos Standard token |
| Members | |
Number of employees | |
| 🌐 Website | www |
| 📇 Address | |
| 📞 telephone | |
Paxos is an American financial technology (“fintech”) company, established in 2012 under the name itBit. It was rebranded as Paxos in 2016, while maintaining the name itBit for its crypto asset exchange. The company is based in New York City, with international offices in London and Singapore. Paxos uses blockchain technology to exchange assets and payments simultaneously, and in doing so, eliminate settlement risk.
History[edit]
Founded in 2012 under the name itBit, and headquartered in Singapore, this bitcoin exchange sought to differentiate itself from consumer-focused exchanges by delivering a higher level of security and compliance. The goal was to attract interest from institutional investors, and make trading in bitcoin similar to a traditional currency exchange. Security was enhanced with a cryptocurrency wallet, multi-factor authentication and DDOS attack mitigation. Identity verification was built in, as well as screening and monitoring for suspicious activity.[1]
The New York State Department of Financial Services issued its first charter for a bitcoin exchange to itBit in May of 2015. The move allowed the company to accept customers in the United States, and granted a measure of legitimacy to virtual currency. The process of obtaining the charter took itBit more than a year. The company had previously been serving its foreign customers from Singapore.[2]
At the same time, the company announced it had raised $25 million in new financing, as well as the appointment of three members to its board of directors, Sheila Bair, former FDIC chairwoman, Bill Bradley, former Democratic senator from New Jersey and member of the Senate Finance Committee, and Robert H. Herz, a director of both investment banking firm Morgan Stanley and mortgage financier Fannie Mae.[3]
In 2016, itBit was rebranded as Paxos, and the company expanded to provide services using blockchain, the technology underpinning virtual currency.[4]
In 2017, Paxos completed the first pilot for a new London bullion settlement service, Euroclear Blockchain. During the pilot, over 600 over-the-counter test bullion trades settled over a two-week period. Among the participants were Citigroup, INTL FCStone, MKS PAMP Group, Scotiabank and Societe Generale. Settlement of unallocated gold is a capital-intensive process, and the platform aimed to reduce costs incurred by participants through instant settlement and simultaneous delivery versus payment.
The state of New York's Department of Financial Services authorized Paxos to trade cryptocurrencies such as ether, litecoin, stellar lumens and bitcoin cash on its exchange. The announcement was made on June 14 of 2018.[8]
In September 2018, Paxos received New York state approval to issue a stablecoin, the Paxos Standard, which is tied to the U.S. dollar in order to give it more stability. Paxos has set up relationships with traditional banks to hold the U.S. Dollars. The tokens are held by the exchanges. Rather than using computers to audit the blockchain through the mining process, third-party auditors are employed to help ensure that the number of dollars held exactly matches the number of tokens issued.[9][10][11]
Funding[edit]
Paxos has raised a total of $93,250,000 in funding over 3 rounds. Their latest funding was raised on May 31, 2018 from a Series B round.[12]
References[edit]
- ↑ Ryan Lawler. "itBit Raises $3.25 Million To Launch A New Global Bitcoin Exchange For Institutional Investors". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2018-10-21.
- ↑ Nathaniel Popper (May 7, 2015). "Bitcoin Exchange Receives First License in New York State". New York Times. Retrieved 2018-10-21.
- ↑ Dean Starkman (May 7, 2015). "N.Y. issues charter to bitcoin firm". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 2018-10-21.
- ↑ "Crypto-startup Paxos wins NY approval to trade ether, litecoin". Reuters. June 14, 2018. Retrieved 2018-10-21.
- ↑ Helen Bartholomew (December 20, 2016). "Euroclear Bankchain completes gold settlement pilot". Reuters. Retrieved 2018-10-21.
- ↑ Bloomberg (August 17, 2017). "The Blockchain Revolution is Gunning for the Gold Market". Fortune. Retrieved 2018-10-21.
- ↑ Luzi-Ann Javier and Susanne Barton (August 17, 2017). "New Currency in Race to Remake One of World's Oldest Markets". Bloomberg. Retrieved 2018-10-21.
- ↑ Paresh, Dave (June 14, 2018). "Crypto-startup Paxos wins NY approval to trade ether, litecoin". Reuters. Retrieved 2018-10-21.
- ↑ Annie Massa and Matthew Leising (September 10, 2018). "Winklevoss Twins Receive New York Approval to Launch New Crypto Coin". American Banker. Retrieved 2018-10-21.
- ↑ Gertrude Chavez-Dreyfuss (September 10, 2018). "New York regulator approves Winklevoss, Paxos dollar-linked tokens". Reuters. Retrieved 2018-10-21.
- ↑ Michael del Castillo (September 17, 2018). "3 Clever Ways To Reach Crypto Price Stability, And One Giant Leap Of Faith". Forbes. Retrieved 2018-10-21.
- ↑ "Funding Rounds". CrunchBase. Retrieved 2018-12-04.
This article "Paxos (company)" is from Wikipedia. The list of its authors can be seen in its historical and/or the page Edithistory:Paxos (company). Articles copied from Draft Namespace on Wikipedia could be seen on the Draft Namespace of Wikipedia and not main one.
- Multinational companies headquartered in the United States
- Financial services companies of the United States
- Financial technology companies
- Cryptocurrencies
- Bitcoin exchanges
- American companies established in 2012
- 2012 establishments in New York (state)
- Companies based in New York City
- Companies based in New York (state)
