Quantifeed eyes Australian expansion with $13.5m raising
The fintech is looking to expand its B2B robo-advice business in Australia as a part of a $13.5 million venture capital raising announced today. The series B funding was led by Taiwanese giant Cathay Financial Holdings, with participation from US-based asset manager Legg Mason, and will go towards Australia and Asia Pacific growth. “We will be growing the Australian team over the next six to 12 months and also open an office [on an undisclosed timeline],” Quantifeed co-founder and chief executive Alex Ypsilanti told Financial Standard. The five-year-old fintech has now raised a total of $24 million. This includes today’s $13.5 million, a series A funding of $6 million in […]
Bought Bitcoin? The Tax Office has you in its sights
Unless you are living under a rock, most of us have heard of the term cryptocurrency or, at the very least, Bitcoin. If you haven’t, cryptocurrency is generally used to describe a digital asset in which encryption techniques are used to regulate the generation of additional units and verify transactions on the blockchain. Not that most of us understand what that means. To most people, Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies were discussed at dinner tables and over drinks across Australia because they were the new black when it came to surging assets. Suddenly, it wasn’t just Dungeons and Dragons players or underworld types who were dealing in cybercurrency, everyone wanted to […]
Australian fintech success Optal seeks new global investor
Forget Prospa, SocietyOne and the like; a new fintech has popped on to dealmakers’ radars and it is one with more than a decade’s history and a significant amount of earnings. Street Talk understands there is at least a stake up for grabs in Australian-based but globally focused business to business payments company Optal Ltd, which is the liquidity event some of its early backers have been waiting for. Optal CEO Rob Bishop and his team have hired a boutique adviser in the United States, FT, to market the stake to potentially interested parties and set up a sale process. Optal is known in fintech and payments circles worldwide, and has had no shortage […]
Bitcoin futures could be hurting bitcoin’s price
A Wall Street analyst known for his bullish stance on bitcoin has flagged the possibility that bitcoin futures contracts could be hurting the cryptocurrency’s price. Bloomberg reports that Tom Lee, the cofounder of the research firm Fundstrat, said in a note last week that bitcoin futures contracts could be behind bitcoin’s recent “gut-wrenching” price declines. Lee said in his report that there was “significant volatility” in bitcoin’s price around the expiration date of CME Group and Cboe futures contracts. Both CME Group and Cboe launched bitcoin futures products in December, when bitcoin was trading close to record highs of about $US20,000. Bitcoin has tumbled since then. Bitcoin was down 0.35% […]
ETF Securities says ROBO ETF surpasses $100m as investors embrace global opportunities
ETF Securities Australia today announced that ETFS ROBO Global Robotics and Automation ETF (ASX code: ROBO) has achieved inflows of $100 million since its launch in September last year. This is the fastest growth of any ETF offered by ETF Securities since its founder and Australian philanthropist Graham Tuckwell launched the world-first GOLD product in 2003. ROBO is the first exchange traded fund in Australia to provide investors with access to global companies focusing on robotics, automation and artificial intelligence (AI) technologies. It represents a partnership between ETF Securities Australia and US-based specialist robotics and automation index and research provider ROBO Global, tracking the ROBO Global Robotics and Automation Index. […]
Automated advice to help Australians’ money grow
Cotton farmer George Stacey grows crops for a living and he’s also focused on watching his finances flourish. A long way from the hustle and bustle of city life, the 24-year-old works on a 97,000 hectare farm in Goondiwindi, 300km southwest of Brisbane, and said he loves investing in companies all over the world “from my couch in remote western Queensland.” Following in his father’s footsteps of investing, Mr Stacey said “ever since I was a young kid when the finance news would come I had a bit of an interest in it and my dad invested in a share portfolio”. “When I went out west and I started to […]
Bitcoin’s collapse is raising suspicions about price manipulation
Bitcoin extended losses, bringing its four-session slide to as much as 20 per cent, as questions mount about whether the world’s biggest cryptocurrency was manipulated during last year’s record price surge. After rallying more than 1,400 per cent in 2017 amid an investor frenzy for digital assets, Bitcoin is down almost 70 per cent to around $US6,325 as of 2:52 a.m. in New York, from its record high of $US19,511 set in December. It traded at a few cents after being launched in 2009. “Things have changed for Bitcoin and the crypto space,” said Craig Erlam, senior market analyst at online trading firm Oanda Corp. in London. “There doesn’t seem […]
Burgeoning innovation culture an opportunity for investors: Equitise
Australia may lag behind Silicon Valley when it comes to start-up culture, but the growing space is presenting increasing opportunities, an equity crowdfunding company has said. Chris Gilbert, managing director and co-founder of Equitise, which facilitates investment in start-ups and businesses, told Nest Egg that while Australia isn’t quite at the level of Israel, the UK or the US when it comes to innovation, Australia’s “evolving” landscape supplies opportunities. Responding to questioning around whether Australia lacked a strong business mindset, as Bernard Salt has previously opined, Mr Gilbert said, “I think that it definitely is true to a certain extent. “It was far more true when I was getting in […]
