VC Firm Dragonly Invests $10 Million in Crypto Exchange Bitget

Summary:
• Bitget has been expanding in a bear market and the new money comes on the heels of its $30 million acquisition of crypto wallet firm, Bitkeep.

Dragonfly, a VC firm with a focus on cryptocurrencies, just announced a $10 million investment in Bitget. Bitget, headquartered in Seychelles, is a cryptocurrency exchange that provides derivative and spot trading services. The exchange says it will use the funds to broaden its product lineup as well as its global efforts to promote crypto adoption.

Bitget, which first launched as a platform dedicated to derivatives, is now among the most prominent cryptocurrency derivative exchanges. Spot trading is based on the current price and delivery of an asset, while derivatives are valued depending on the performance of an underlying asset such as the future price of Bitcoin.

Bitget’s market-defying growth plans

As of February 2023, Bitget had more than 380,000 users on its copy trading platform, copying the techniques of more than 80,000 traders. These figures make Bitget the largest crypto copy trading platform in the world. Furthermore, the exchange says it will expand its ecosystem in 2023 to become a one-stop crypto investment platform, with a focus on spot trading, a launchpad, and earning products.

Dragonfly is a global, cryptocurrency-focused investment firm that partners with cryptocurrency founders from seed through series D. The firm’s global workforce of over 40 experts spans across the world. This latest development follows the exchange’s recent acquisition of a controlling stake in wallet provider BitKeep. In March, Bitget purchased BitKeep and brought on board the wallet’s 9.5 million users after spending an additional $30 million in the company.

Notably, the United States continues to impose stringent regulations on the trading of crypto derivatives. Recently, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) has brought an action against Binance and its founder, Changpeng Zhao, on the grounds that they have engaged in illegal activity. Bittrex, another prominent exchange, has said it will stop operating in the United States due to the country’s “harsh” regulatory climate.

But, Bitget is an outlier due to its significant growth during a weak market. While many other cryptocurrency companies have been laying off workers or going out of business in the past year, the exchange has grown from 200 to 1,300 employees.