The London-based company Keyring announced on Tuesday that it has raised $6 million in venture capital funding to extend its on-chain compliance platform, which is aimed towards institutional investors and procedures.
The seed funding round was headed by Gumi Cryptos Capital and Greenfield Capital, with participation from Motier Ventures, Kima Ventures, and other investors, according to the startup.
The investment takes place at a time when major international financial centres’ regulatory authorities are establishing guidelines for businesses on how to deal with digital assets, opening the door for more banks to provide cryptocurrency services. While the U.K.’s financial watchdog has opened the door for issuing cryptocurrency-focused exchange-traded notes (ETN) on regulated exchanges to investors, Hong Kong’s central bank is initiating a regulatory sandbox for stablecoin issuers.
Keyring uses zero-knowledge (ZK) proof technology to protect sensitive data and privacy while assisting financial institutional investors in interacting with decentralised finance (DeFi) platforms in a compliant manner.
The business has developed a compliance shell over Circle’s USDC (USDC) stablecoin to enable a proof of concept trial with Laser Digital, the cryptocurrency division of massive Japanese bank Nomura.
According to Miko Matsumura, managing partner of main investor gumi Cryptos Capital, “variations in financial regulations prevent trillions of dollars from accessing the transparency, determinism, automation, and settlement advantages of blockchain technologies for financial applications.” “By giving these players the opportunity to communicate with vetted and compliant counterparties, keyring unlocks these benefits for most of the financial industry.”