KuCoin Raises $150M and Gets a $10B Valuation Despite Crypto Market Chaos

KuCoin users can now expect a broader portfolio of crypto wallets, GameFi, DeFi, and NFT platforms.

Key points

• KuCoin currently offers its 18 million users spot trading, margin trading, P2P fiat trading, futures trading, staking, and lending, but hopes to expand after a $150M financing round.
• Led by Jump Crypto, the round also included Circle Ventures, IDG Capital, and Matrix Partners, all big names in crypto.
• The company intends to use funds in the direction of Web 3, including crypto wallets, GameFi, DeFi, and NFT platforms.

KuCoin, a cryptocurrency exchange led by CEO Johnny Lyu, announced this week that as a result of its first financing round in four years, it has raised $150 million and earned a $10 billion valuation. This is significantly more than their 2018 series A round, which earned them $20 million in funds and a $100 million valuation.

KuCoin is currently one of the largest exchanges by daily SPOT trading volume, with over 18 million users in over 200 countries and regions. It runs alongside quite a few big name competitors, including Binance, Coinbase, FTX, and Crypto.com. Previously known for listing tokens with a small- to mid-sized market cap, KuCoin hopes to expand into several areas of Web 3 and gain loyalty from participants by inviting them into an open ecosystem.

KuCoin’s main supporters

Leading this round was Jump Crypto, a cryptocurrency arm of the major trading firm, Jump Trading Group. Head of Asia at Jump Crypto, Tak Fujishima, provided a statement of support. “We are pleased to support the company as it continues to grow and expand its offerings in futures and margin trading, lending, staking and passive yield generation to support the growth of Web 3.0 and the crypto markets.” Some other leaders in series B consisted of new investor Circle Ventures, and existing investors, IDG Capital and Matrix Partners.

Plans for funds allocation

Lyu recently commented on the motivation behind the series B round. “This concept is essentially why we raised this round, web3 is about openness, and we want to build KuCoin into an open ecosystem and an open system needs to bring many friends on board. The world of crypto is so new that we want to make sure we can leverage all sources of information to guide our decision making, and these prominent investors can keep us updated on the latest trends.”

To accomplish this, KuCoin intends to cater to all classes of investors, both centralized and decentralized. By expanding into the world of Web 3, it plans to use investment arms like KuCoin Labs and KuCoin Ventures to grow its presence in crypto wallets, GameFi, DeFi, and NFT platforms. It also plans to build a next generation core trading system, support their global regulation efforts, and make the platform more secure by enhancing security and risk management systems.

The bottom line

With KuCoin’s recent $150 million financing round, users could see some major advances in the exchange as they expand into Web 3 and aim to develop an ecosystem appropriate for all classes of investors. Keep an eye out for decentralized wallet products later this year and its NFT marketplace launch in the near future.