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Circle, the Goldman-Sachs funded crypto investment vehicle, just recently added a new feature on their app that makes it a whole lot easier for new investors to find and learn about cryptocurrencies.
As published in their announcement, the young internet company is launching a new “Collections” option. The option will allow users to invest in three “themes” of cryptocurrencies: platforms, payments, and privacy. This will all be possible with one simple tap.
Why Is This a Big Deal?
The scope of the many cryptocurrency projects on the market today makes it difficult to assess which ones are worthwhile. From privacy coins like Monero to platforms like ICON to the more classic payment rails like Bitcoin, all of these are in different niches. To make matters more complicated, each of these niches is often hard to group since there currently does not exist a clear-cut organizational method of doing so.
This where Circle makes the entire process easier. If you want to invest in payment collections, like Bitcoin, Litecoin and so on, then just click the “Payments” tab. Here, each coin in this collection is weighed by market capitalization and one can easily educate themselves in each category.
Even more interestingly, if the user likes the said collection, then the user can invest in all the coins in that collection in one swoop. However, the point is the consumer be made cognisant of the many differences between various cryptocurrencies. By breaking them down in such categories, this becomes much simpler to understand.
Circle Builds on Its Reputation
Circle has been generating a lot of buzz recently for rolling out many new updates to position itself as the de facto trading center for cryptocurrencies. Not only do they have prime investments from Goldman Sachs and others, but they have been rushing into legal compliance head-on.
It seems that this new announcement follows Circle’s general goal of making cryptocurrencies “beginner-friendly.” For example, just this past May the company announced another feature towards this end called “Buy the Market.” This feature allows users to try the entire the crypto-market by buying a little bit of every available cryptocurrency in the app — even if it is for as little as $1. Their investment would be split according to each coin’s market capitalization. It’s little features like this that make Circle an accessible platform: it gives beginner users a taste of what it is like to invest in the space and actually hold coins. In this way, it’s very much trying to merge the accessibility the Robinhood app has with stocks to the cryptocurrency market, and so far this seems to be a winning strategy.
However, even more pressing is the news released just last month that Centre, a wholly owned subsidiary of Circle, would be launching their own U.S. dollar-backed stablecoin called the “USD Coin.” The stablecoin has backing from major financial investors and will be listed on Huobi, OKCoin, Kucoin, and Coinbase’s own digital wallet. Naturally, the stablecoin will also be listed on Poloneix exchange which was purchased by Circle this year for around $400 million as a way to enter the established exchange market.
Now, Circle is eying another piece of fintech that it feels could quickly become a cryptocurrency hub in the next few years: crowdfunding platforms. According to recent reports, Circle is also moving to acquire SeedInvest which is crowdfunding platform for startups. If approved by regulators, it would allow startups to raise capital with the help of digital tokens. The move would also allow for the expansion of the Circle team by some 30 employees.
So, it seems that all of this is part of Circle’s larger plan to establish itself in all the potential avenues of the cryptocurrency space — from their own stablecoin, to a mobile investment platform, to a proper exchange, to even a crowdfunding aspect for startups. The depth of their influence, if successful, will be staggering.