Barclays ‘buys stake in crypto firm Copper’

Cryptocurrency

High street bank Barclays Plc is reportedly taking a stake in cryptocurrency company Copper.

Sky News reports that Barclays is to invest millions of dollars into the London firm, which counts former Chancellor Philip Hammond among its advisers, in its Series C funding round.

Founded in 2018 by CEO Dmitry Tokarev, Copper provides a gateway into the cryptoasset space for institutional investors by offering custody, prime brokerage and settlements. 

Its proprietary ClearLoop technology infrastructure for cryptocurrency trading powers hundreds of exchanges, trading firms and payment processors. 

The company, which is expanding globally, closed a £35 million Series B funding round in May 2021 and is expected to be valued at $2 billion by the latest fundraise.

The Series B was co-led by leading B2B software investor Dawn Capital and Target Global – which led Copper’s Series A round – and featured Illuminate Financial Management, Copper’s existing investors LocalGlobe and MMC Ventures, and a number of industry-renowned FinTech executives and entrepreneurs serving as strategic angels.

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Cryptocurrency shorts

Crypto lender Voyager Digital has rejected an offer from FTX and its investment arm Alameda Ventures to buy out its digital assets, saying it is “not value-maximising” and potentially “harms customers”. 

A proposed class-action lawsuit alleges Yuga Labs “inappropriately induced” investors to buy Bored Ape Yacht Club non-fungible tokens and the linked ApeCoin (APE) token. Law firm Scott+Scott claims that Yuga Labs used celebrity promoters and endorsements to inflate prices.

Another class-action lawsuit has been filed against Celsius Networks’ companies and key personnel by law firm Bragar Eagel & Squire. Inviting anyone who acquired Celsius securities in the last four years to join, the complaint alleges that Celsius and its leaders “intended to and did deceive retail investors… to purchase Celsius financial products at artificially inflated prices” and “made untrue statements of material fact”. Celsius collapsed into bankruptcy recently.

Research from Forex Suggest has found that just 21.6% of senior staff in the world’s top crypto companies are female.

Analysis by Boston Consulting Group has forecast that by 2030, there could be as many as a billion Bitcoin users worldwide. However a mere 0.3% of personal wealth is currently invested in cryptocurrencies, as opposed to 25% in stocks.

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Crypto prices

The overall market cap of the more than 20,300 coins is at $1.01 trillion at the time of writing (7am UK), down from 1.05tr on Friday morning, thanks to a more than 3% drop in the last 24 hours.

Market leader Bitcoin – the original cryptocurrency created by the mysterious Satoshi Nakamoto – lost more than $1,000 in the last three days to $21,925. BTC is 1% up in a week.

Ethereum, the second most valuable crypto coin – created as a decentralised network for smart contracts on the blockchain – fell $75 to $1,525. ETH is 7% up over the course of a week.

Binance Coin is a cryptocurrency created by popular crypto exchange Binance to assist its aim in becoming the infrastructure services provider for the entire blockchain ecosystem. Its BNB token lost $11 to $256, leaving it 1% down over seven days.

The XRP token of Ripple, a payment settlement asset exchange and remittance system, acts as a bridge for transfers between other currencies. XRP dropped 2 cents to 34.7c, with its price 4% down on seven days ago.

Cardano is an open source network facilitating dApps which considers itself to be an updated version of Ethereum. Its ADA token, designed to allow owners to participate in the operation of the network, shed 0.5c to 49.6c and is 5% up in a week.

Solana is a blockchain built to make decentralised finance accessible on a larger scale – and capable of processing 50,000 transactions per second. Its SOL token fell $5 to $38.54 and is 8% lower than its price a week ago.

Meme coin DOGE was created as a satire on the hype surrounding cryptocurrencies but is now a major player in the space. DOGE shed 0.5c to 6.5c and is 1% down over seven days.

Polkadot was founded by the Swiss-based Web3 Foundation as an open-source project to develop a decentralised web. Its DOT token, which aims to securely connect blockchains, dropped 46c to $7.10 and is 4% down on its price a week ago.

Polygon aims to securely connect blockchains as a sort of decentralised internet. Its MATIC token shed 7c to 84c, while it is 5% down in a week.

Avalanche is a lightning-quick verifiable platform for institutions, enterprises and governments. Its AVAX token fell more than $2 to $22.41 and is 3% down in a week.

To see how the valuations of the main coins have changed in recent times – and for round-ups of recent cryptocurrency news developments – click here.

For valuations of the top 100 coins by market cap in US dollars, plus 24-hour price change, see below.