Nasdaq Pushes For Crypto and Blockchain Adoption, Invests in Blockchain Tech

The US stock market exchange Nasdaq has recently invested a huge amount of money in the financing of a startup that develops Enterprise Blockchain solutions in a bid to push for wider adoption of Blockchain and cryptocurrencies.

According to an official press release, Symbiont, the company in question, successfully closed a $20 million series B funding round, led by Nasdaq and including other investors such as Citi, the Raptor Group and Mike Novogratz’s Galaxy Digital.

The money will be used to promote the growth of Assembly, a Blockchain platform created by the company with support for Smart contracts and tokenization solutions. The Co-founder and CEO of Symbiont, Mark Smith expressed his optimism regarding the new funding and the powerful investors who were behind the funding:

“Closing this round of funding enables us to accelerate investments in our platform and team …
Leveraging our financial markets and blockchain technology experience, our anchor partners like Vanguard, Lewis Ranieri, and Nasdaq will benefit from developing new distributed applications on Assembly, our enterprise blockchain and smart contract platform. Assembly provides the opportunity for new participants to enter the digital asset market and offers existing participants a superior infrastructure on which to build the future of financial markets.”

Nasdaq also reciprocated Symbiont’s CEO’s enthusiasm and said that they believed in the company’s success. According to Gary Offner, the Head of Nasdaq Ventures, products like Assembly can contribute to the economic growth of several companies on an industrial scale:

“We are committed to discovering and investing in innovative technologies to help build our future market infrastructure used by more than 100 marketplaces around the world …
Our investment will also include the integration of Symbiont’s enterprise blockchain and smart contract platform into the Nasdaq Financial Framework. We are pleased to support this important, growing area for creating unique institutional applications of blockchain technology.”

However, public opinion about cryptocurrencies is still quite unfavourable, following the bearish market of 2018. However, the President and CEO of Nasdaq, Adena Friedman said that she remains optimistic about the industry and the technology and the impact that cryptocurrencies can have on markets in the future.

She is also determined to launch Bitcoin Futures and maybe an exchange if conditions are favourable. Additionally, she expressed her views on the matter on Linkedin:

“It is difficult to ignore the huge amount that investors, including some of the most sophisticated global investors, have poured into digital currencies in recent years. The invention itself is a tremendous demonstration of genius and creativity, and it deserves an opportunity to find a sustainable future in our economy …”

She assured that the employees at Nasdaq are working their best to help investors to gain their trust in cryptocurrencies again, by offering the traders the technology for trade matching, clearing, and trade integrity to start-up exchanges. Additionally, she confirmed that Nasdaq has indeed invested in the international cryptocurrency marketplace, ErisX.