Standard Chartered And SBI Holdings To Invest $100 M in Crypto Startups

It has been just reported that a huge partnership is taking place in the crypto space. Check out the latest details about this and how it will benefit the crypto space below.

SC Ventures, the investment arm of Standard Chartered bank, and SBI Holdings, the Japanese financial conglomerate, have teamed up to establish a $100 million crypto fund in the United Arab Emirates.

The fund will be set up as a joint venture and will focus on investing in various areas of the crypto market, including decentralized finance, tokenization, infrastructure, payments, and the metaverse. The two companies plan to invest globally, covering seed to Series C funding rounds.

This development comes at a time when crypto markets are displaying signs of recovery, signaling a potentially bullish sentiment.

Bitcoin is currently trading at approximately $36,800, with a year-to-date gain of over 120%. Spot crypto trading volume on centralized exchanges has also increased in October, following four months of decline.

These metrics indicate renewed interest in crypto and raise expectations of a spot Bitcoin ETF approval early next year.

The SC Ventures and SBI Holdings joint venture plans to make “strategic and minority investments” in crypto startups, said Alex Manson, CEO of SC Ventures, in a statement as related by the online publication The Block.

“The Joint Venture will leverage SC Ventures’ experience in digital assets through our ventures, such as Zodia Custody and Zodia Markets, and through our investments in fintechs like Ripple and Metaco,” he added.

In May, SC Ventures sold its stake in Metaco as Ripple acquired it for a whopping $250 million. Moreover, SC Ventures and SBI Holdings have previously invested in the same startups such as Solv, Zodia Custody, and myZoi.

As per the recent report by Nikkei, SBI Holdings is all set to launch a separate fund by the end of this year to invest up to a staggering 100 billion yen ($663 million) in web3, AI, and fintech startups.

What’s more, Japanese financial behemoths Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation, Mizuho Bank, Nippon Life Insurance, and Daiwa Securities Group have already committed to investing more than 50 billion yen in the fund.

Check out the original notes about the matter in the online publication The Block.