Peer-To-Peer Bitcoin Lending Platform BitBond Raises €600,000

Germany-based bitcoin lending platform, BitBond, has raised €600,000 in an angel funding round, bringing the company’s total funding to €800,000. The funds will allow the company to continue pursuing the mission to provide accessible loans to small and medium-sized enterprises.

Leading the round was Nine Points Capital, a prior investor in the company’s seed round. Other participating angels included the Founders of Project A, Florian Heinemann and Uwe Horstmann; Affinitas Co-Founder and early investor in ResearchGate, Christian Vollmann; and Home24 Co-Founder, Felix Jahn.

Nine Points Capital partner, Christoph Janz, said the firm was happy to double down on its investment in the company and was excited to see what could come from the Bitcoin lending platform. Janz is also an investor and board member of ZenDesk, Algolia and Vend.

“The additional resources will help us to continue realizing our mission which is to make lending and borrowing globally accessible,” said BitBond founder and CEO, Radoslav Albrecht.  “We are happy to have such experienced investors supporting us on this exciting journey.”

Since its founding in July of 2013, the bitcoin lending platform has facilitated over 600 loans and signed up 10,000 users from 120 countries. BitBond’s loan matching algorithm, AutoInvest, has won praise among the industry and was showcased at the annual fintech conference, Finovate London, last year.

The bitcoin lending industry is already a fairly mature market – at least for digital currency standards. BitBonds will be competing against BTCJam in the United States and BitLendingClub in Europe, both of whom have already processed thousands of loans and have an active user base.

If BitBond can carve a niche for itself, the bitcoin startup will be able to help solve the problem of financing for small businesses. According to a 2013 study by the International Finance Corporation of the World Bank (IFC), there is a USD 2 trillion “credit gap” between small and medium-sized businesses and large enterprise.

“Currently over 50% of small businesses are underserved by banks and don’t have access to credit,” added Vollmann. “Bitbond provides a technological solution to this problem. It’s great to see such an innovative approach being developed in the Berlin startup scene.”