Everything started with Bitcoin. In the meantime, the Viennese Fintech Bitpanda has more than 100 employees as well as around one million customers and has a billion-dollar trading volume. Now it’s time to leave the crypto niche, says CEO Eric Demuth.
Bitpanda has now been granted a license by the Financial Market Authority as a payment institution in accordance with European provisions (PSD2). “This allows us to offer different products”, Demuth told reporters on Thursday: “The next big thing can not just be a credit card.” Bitpanda wants more. Much more. “We want to shake up the financial sector. There is a lot of panic at many small banks because they overslept digitization”.
A few steps to make things easier for customers
But the Bitpanda customers, who can trade 19 more cryptocurrencies on the platform besides Bitcoin, still do not notice. In the first step, it should be possible to make euro transfers directly from the crypto accounts. “You can then pay your electricity bill with Bitcoin or Ethereum, if you want,” says Carina Wolf, Bitpanda’s chief lawyer. “Ultimately, we want to create an interface between crypto world and the classical financial world”.
The vision
Thanks to the blockchain, which stands behind the crypto currencies, one will be able to digitize many different assets in the future. Stocks, bonds and other securities as well as things that are not as easy to trade today as real estate. In a second step, Bitpanda is working on a product for the digitization of physical precious metal investments. But Demuth and Wolf did not want to reveal any details yet. Only so much: “A first new asset class will come this year”.
The young Bitcoin fans
Demuth, who founded Bitpanda about five years ago together with Austrian Paul Klanschek, wants to inspire the young Bitcoin fans for other areas of the financial market. And continue to grow. In Austria. “We have no problem getting skilled workers. The sector is attractive. We are happy to refute the opinion that you have to leave Austria to do something great”.