Bitcoin Daily: Ether Climbs 7 Pct To Record; Babel Finance Nets $40 Million In Funding For Crypto Financial Services

Cryptocurrency Ethereum surged past $4,000 on Monday (May 10), CNBC reported.

The coin, which is the world’s second largest after bitcoin, was at its all-time high of $4,196.63 at 12:15 p.m. Eastern time, according to the report.

The total market value of the coin has now hit $483.4 billion. That number, however, is still less than half of the $1.09 trillion total market value that bitcoin has hit, CNBC reported.

Ether has seen a surge in growth despite once being in bitcoin’s shadow. Investors have been looking for other cryptos as bitcoin fell over 2 percent in April, according to the report.

In other news, Babel Finance, a global crypto financial service provider, has completed its Series A fundraising as of Monday (May 10) and come away with $40 million, according to a press release.

Zoo Capital led the round along with Sequoia Capital China, Dragonfly Capital, BAI Capital and Bertelsmann, and Tiger Global Management. Existing investors also participated, the release stated.

“The alliance with our new investors from traditional finance is a critical step for us to offer more innovative products, strengthen compliance controls and ultimately provide a full suite of reliable services to meet the growing demand from mainstream investors who are keen to add crypto assets in their portfolio,” said Babel Finance CEO Flex Yang in the release.

Meanwhile, UBS Group is looking into plans to offer wealthy customers digital currency investments, putting it in-line with U.S. firms looking to offer broader access with increasing client demand, AdvisorHub reported.

The Swiss firm will be looking into new ways to offer the asset class, according to the report. Any investment offering would be a “very small portion” of the clients’ wealth as the digital currencies are still volatile. Options might include investing through third-party vehicles.

Lastly, Smartlink, which provides Trust-as-a-Service through enforceable escrow smart contracts, has raised $3 million in public and private token sales, according to a press release.

The platform, powered by Tezos blockchain, reached its $500,000 soft cap in under 2 minutes during a pre-sale and its hardcap within 48 hours of the launch, the release stated. Smartlink is looking to address the lack of trust in commercial transactions.