Paxos raises $142M Series C after PayPal agreement. Paxos has raised a fresh $142 million to facilitate the mainstream adoption of digital assets.
“We think that opportunity is now, our investors think it is too,” Paxos co-founder and CEO Charles Cascarilla said in an interview. “We want to really be able to put the pedal to the metal to make sure that we take advantage of that.”
The Series C round was led by Declaration Partners, which is supported by the family office of Carlyle Group co-founder David Rubenstein. Also joining the round were Peter Thiel’s Mithril Capital, newly formed Alua Capital and PayPal Ventures. Notably, the latest Bitcoin offering of PayPal is operated by the crypto brokerage service of Paxos.
“We want to make sure that we’re aligned as we grow together,” Cascarilla said of PayPal’s investment. “We are not a unicorn, that’s what I will say,” he said.
Series C will accelerate the firm’s efforts to offer blockchain and cryptocurrency infrastructure solutions to a wide variety of financial institutions, Cascarilla wrote in a blog post. In addition to PayPal, Paxos’ main clients include Credit Suisse, Societe Generale and Revolut.
The raise will also finance an important hiring push for the 130-person company. “We want to double the size of our team, expand our current product solutions and build new products that enterprises need,” Cascarilla wrote.
Paxos sent an application to the United States. Office of the Currency Controller to become a federally controlled bank earlier this month. The New York-based corporation also has a trust charter and a number of other regulatory certifications.
With institutional adoption seen as a leading driver of bitcoin’s emerging bull run, Cascarilla said his firm’s emphasis on infrastructure is starting to make sense to outside observers. “We invested for this moment. And now we want to invest even more,” he said.
