Grayscale Investments' parent business, Digital Currency Group Inc sells $700 million of shares, securing over $10 billion in valuation in a secondary capital round from institutional investors such as CapitalG and Softbank, among others.

The 6-year-old firm is allowing current investors to sell shares to new backers, including SoftBank and Alphabet's venture capital arm, as part of a second investment round. The $700 million investment was led by SoftBank, with participation from Ribbit Capital and CapitalG, a subsidiary of Google's parent company, Alphabet.

Digital Currency Group is one of the largest companies in the cryptocurrency ecosystem. Grayscale Investments, the world's largest digital asset management, recently filed to change its Bitcoin Trust into an exchange-traded fund. If the Securities and Exchange Commission(SEC) approves the idea, consumers would be able to trade digital assets through conventional investing accounts rather than using a cryptocurrency exchange. An exchange-traded fund (ETF) is a fund that trades on a stock exchange. 

According to the company's website, Digital Currency Group's FinTech subsidiaries include the Luno digital asset market, CoinDesk, which covers blockchain news, and foundry, which focuses on digital asset "mining and staking." One of the most well-known is Genesis, which offers financial services to institutional investors interested in bitcoin trading.

Grayscale Bitcoin Trust, manages more than $55 billion in assets, including more than 3% of all bitcoin in circulation. 

According to a press release made by Digital Currency Group about two weeks ago, the business allowed the purchase of up to $1 billion worth of shares of Grayscale Bitcoin Trust. According to a report, Digital Currency Group bought $388 million worth of shares as of Oct. 19.

According to CNBC, Digital Currency Group does not currently plan an IPO, but it has not ruled out going public in the future. Wall Street Journal reports that the company has enough capital to buy shares from investors and employees.

Pavan A

CBW - External Analyst

INDIA