Bitcoin Group SE has bought 100 percent shares of investment bank Tremmel for an undisclosed amount. This is the German digital currency exchange operator’s second acquisition in 2018. Bitcoin Group, which holds current assets of $40 million, said Tremmel allows it to issue its own cryptocurrency-related products, conduct proprietary trading and operate bitcoin ATMs.
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Acquisition to Expand Bitcoin Group Services Portfolio
The Frankfurt Stock Exchange-listed company operates Bitcoin.de, Germany’s only regulated digital currency exchange, trading BTC, BCH and ETH. It hopes to use Tremmel’s banking license to expand the range of its service portfolio. For example, Bitcoin Group said it is now possible for the trading platform to maintain an order book and even quote prices, while simultaneously ensuring more liquid trading.
“We are very pleased that in Tremmel Wertpapierhandelsbank Gmbh…we have been able to gain an excellently positioned partner with in-depth knowledge of the market,” Marco Bodewein, managing director of Bitcoin Group, said in an online statement on Nov. 12. “This will enable us to take the corporate development of Bitcoin Group SE to a new level,” he added.
The deal is expected to be completed in the first half of 2019, subject to approval by relevant regulatory authorities. Bitcoin Group did not disclose the actual purchase price, but said “it is in the lower seven-digit euro range.”
Rainer Bergmann, the previous sole shareholder and managing director of Tremmel, is to continue working at the investment bank in the same capacity. The bank, which trades shares, bonds and other stock exchange products on behalf of local and foreign banks, insurance companies and asset managers, will be expanded into a deposit-taking institution, Bitcoin Group said.
Restructuring
Digital currency exchanges are looking for growth in new areas or to consolidate existing positions to help boost revenue and minimize risk from an uncertain regulatory environment in their home economies.
In January, Bitcoin Group, which has 753,000 investors actively using its exchange to buy and sell digital assets, bought a 50 percent stake in financial investment broker Sineus Financial Services Gmbh, to diversify risk. “In the future, this will enable the group to offer additional financial services in the cryptocurrency sector,” the company said at the time.
For the first six months of this year, Bitcoin Group reported net profit increase of 306 percent to $3.85 million from $0.95 million a year earlier. Revenues tripled to $6.57 million from $2.1 million in the comparable period a year ago. Operating profit climbed 368 percent to $5.64 million. The exchange said about $707.6 million worth of BTC was traded on the platform at the end of last year, when the price of the cryptocurrency peaked at $20,000.
After close Tuesday, shares of Bitcoin Group were down 0.36 percent at $31.41 in Frankfurt trading. Over the past 52 weeks, the stock has reached a low of $28.02 and a high of $97.18.
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