Coinbase has announced today on the company's blog, that it has raised, in a series B funding round, a total of $25 Million, in the biggest Bitcoin -related venture capital investment ever in the history of digital currencies.
This development might be seen by the markets as a great vote of confidence in the viability of the digital currency after its recent drop in value. Last week the Chinese Central Bank banned financial transactions in Bitcoin for banks in the country, leading some to ask if China is going to destroy Bitcoin.
Coinbase refers to the service offering as "an international digital wallet," allowing its clients to not only buy Bitcoins like at an exchange, but it also works with merchants allowing them to accept Payments in Bitcoin, as a sort of Paypal for Bitcoin. The company's user base has been growing very rapidly, averaging 10,000 new customer sign-ups a day, reaching 600,000 wallets and 16,000 merchants as of today.
The funding series was led by Andreessen Horowitz, with participation from previous investors' Union Square Ventures and Ribbit Capital, which already gave Coinbase $5 Million during the series A funding back in May of this year.
According to the announcement, Coinbase plans to use this round of funding to scale its operations to the recent surging demand for digital currencies, expanding its team of programmers, to promote the adoption of Bitcoin by educating the market, and expanding the referral program it operates.
Venture Capital funds have recently being showing ever-growing interest in investing in the Bitcoin ecosystem. Just recently in December it was announced that BTC China raised $5 Million, and an institutional Bitcoin exchange from Singapore, itBit, secured $5.5 Million in funding.
