A Chicago startup that helps institutional trading firms offer cryptocurrency trading to their clients has raised new funding from billionaire New York Mets owner Steve Cohen.
Cohen's firm Point72 Ventures led a $35 million round in Zero Hash, a Chicago startup that helps fintech firms launch their own digital asset offerings. Other investors in the round include NYCA Partners and DriveWealth.
Zero Hash, founded in 2015 and previously known as Seed CX, has now raised around $60 million to date. It raised $15 million in a Series B round in 2018.
The startup works with firms like Chicago's tastyworks, an online brokerage firm from tastytrade, which was acquired this year by IG Group for $1 billion. Zero Hash also counts digital banks like MoneyLion and Wirex among its customers.
Co-founder and CEO Edward Woodford told Chicago Inno that Zero Hash is doing "tens of millions" in annual revenue and is profitable. It currently has about 50 employees and expects to grow to 90 in the next six months. The startup's APIs allow any groups to offer digital assets to their customers, allowing users to buy and sell crypto, as well as issue crypto rewards on credit cards.
Woodford said the vote of confidence from Cohen's Point72 shows just how mainstream digital assets have become.
"Traditional financial services and crypto used to be seen as two separate worlds," he said. "They are very quickly becoming one in the same."
