A former employee of Goldman Sachs and BNP Paribas SA has started his own bitcoin exchange based in Japan, and according to a Tuesday report published by Bloomberg Businessweek, he’s already managed to receive a sizable investment.
The formation of Yuzo Kano’s bitFlyer began at the start of the year, just before the disastrous collapse of Mt. Gox in February.
Kano worked at Goldman Sachs beginning in 2001 (having graduated from Tokyo University with a degree in fluid dynamics) right out of college as an analyst, eventually moving to BNP Paribas SA to begin a trading career. Eventually, he found his way back to Goldman Sachs, where he remained for another 6.5 years as a trader.
“There is no stability in working for Goldman and doing something on my own has a greater upside,” he told Bloomberg Businessweek. “I like complex systems, that’s why I became a derivatives trader. Now it’s bitcoin.”
bitFlyer will allow individuals in Japan to easily acquire bitcoin using their Japanese bank accounts (much like Coinbase here in the United States).
The company is also working on opening a Japanese-language bitcoin exchange with bitcoin-to-yen (and vice-versa) trading — the first in Japan since Mt. Gox.
The aforementioned investment in bitFlyer is worth about 160 million yen, or about $1.6 million.
It represents continued venture capitalist interest in bitcoin/cryptocurrency-related projects, as interest in these financial instruments continue to rise seemingly on a day-by-day basis.
bitFlyer is already open for business. You can visit the website at bitflyer.jp.
[textmarker color=”C24000″]Source[/textmarker] Businessweek.com
