US Goldman Sachs, Nyca Partners Lead Investment Round in Blockchain Company Axoni

The US-based blockchain software developer Axoni has raised $32 million in investment procedure led by the bank giant Goldman Sachs and Nyca Partners, the investment fund of former Visa president Hans Morris, Axoni said in a press release on Tuesday. Some of the leading global financial players, including J.P. Morgan, Citigroup and Well Fargo, also participated in the Series B funding round of the New York-based crypto company, which targets capital markets with DLT solutions. 

Axonс did not disclose the exact amount of money raised by each of the 12 companies, including the US billionaire Andreessen Horowitz’ fund. Coatue Management, Digital Currency Group, F-Prime Capital, Franklin Templeton Investments, NEX Group, and Y Combinator also participated in the round.

Axoni will use the funding to upgrade its data synchronization technology and to expand its distributed ledger technology (DLT)-based system, called AxCore. The crypto company has raised more than $55 million since the beginning of the year. Currently, Axoni is working with the US post-trade financial services provider Depository Trust and Clearing Corporation (DTCC) for moving DTCC Trade Information Warehouse to blockchain-based system.

“The adoption of distributed ledger protocols in capital markets resembles the early days of adopting TCP/IP for distributed enterprise applications,” C. Thomas Richardson, head of Market Structure and Electronic Trading Services at Wells Fargo Securities said in the statement.

The most significant participation is the leading role of Goldman Sachs as this crypto investment comes several weeks after the US bank welcomed its new chief executive officer David Solomon, who is considered to be ‘crypto friendly’ compared to his predecessor, the long-running CEO Lloyd Blankfein. 

Sachs backed Axoni as the company is “delivering solutions that can be used at scale across financial markets. We are pleased to work with them as they execute their strategy”, Ashwin Gupta, Managing Director of Goldman Sachs, explained in a press release. 

Under Blankfein leadership, the bank engaged in Axoni’s pilot project for blockchain-based management of equity swaps but the test was no so direct participation as the involvement of funding round.

Last week, a report revealed that Goldman Sachs is planning custody service for cryptocurrency funds, which will be a significant development in the virtual coin market.