Cryptocurrency Firms Headline Fintech 250 List

A number of the crypto industry’s biggest firms have been included in this year’s CB Insights Fintech 250 list. Compiled annually, the list ranks 250 of the most promising businesses in the Fintech space ranging from capital markets to insurance to wealth management and digital banking.

Drawn from a global pool of almost 4,000 applicants and nominees, inclusion on the list is based on a number of factors including data submitted by the firms, market viability and business models.  The company’s Mosaic Score, a holistic algorithm developed by CB Insights that measures the overall health and growth potential of private companies.

“Insurgent Startups”

Referencing the increasing importance of crypto startups within the space, this year’s announcement speaks of the transformation of the financial services space by “insurgent startups”, which is borne out by the number of new companies on this year’s list.

In total, there are 113 new companies on this year’s list. Coins.ph, BitPesa, Revolut, Robinhood, Xapo, Ripple labs, Coinbase and BitFlyer are among the most noticeable blockchain and cryptocurrency firms that feature prominently on the list following a year of continued, and in some cases record-breaking growth in spite of a general and sustained crypto market downturn.

In January, CCN reported that Philippine bitcoin wallet app Coins.ph achieved a milestone of 5 million customers, in the process becoming one of Asia’s hottest financial companies making serious headway into the $400 billion overseas remittance market with crypto.

Data from CB Insights show that the 2018 Fintech 250 raised nearly $53 billion in funding in the past five years. Listed among the 30 unicorns, companies that have reached a valuation of $1 billion are United States based Robinhood valued at $5.6 and Coinbase at $1.6. Robinhood is also featured as 2018 top most well-funded Retail Investing & Secondary Markets company.

In total, no fewer than 15 blockchain and cryptocurrency-related comapnies are represented on the list including bitPesa, Ripple Labs, Polychain Capital, Digital Asset Holdings, Coinbase, Chain, Brave Software, bitFlyer, Factom, Juzhen Financials and Blockstream among others.

The report reveals that among them, the fintech 250 companies have raised $31.85B from 373 deals in one year. Ribbit Capital is tagged top venture capital investor company on the 2018 Fintech 250 list; it invested in Robinhood, Wealthfront, Gusto, Coinbase, Cross River Bank, and Upgrade. The current year’s list has recorded more equity investments and venture funding than that of the preceding year- 2017 with  Ant Financial raising an unequaled  $14B.in the second quarter of 2018. The Top Acquisition for the year is PayPal’s takeover of iZettle in the second quarter for $2.2 billion, double the amount the company sought to raise with an IPO.