Crypto-asset investment almost triples to $14.4bn as big names start to see value

This year has already seen significant investment into hedge funds and venture-capital firms specialising in cryptocurrencies.

In the past 12 months, investments in crypto-related assets have nearly tripled to $14.4bn, across more than 700 companies and funds, according to Crypto Fund Research.

Despite initial scepticism Bitcoin and the like were met with, and considering even today companies put a lot more stock in the underlying blockchain technology than the digital tokens themselves, big firms are beginning to invest.

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In China’s highly regulated market, Ping An, Alibaba, Baidu, JD.com and many other large organisations have been among the first to list on the country’s register of blockchain service providers as China looks to develop its own government-backed cryptocurrency.

Facebook is also looking to develop its own cryptocurrency, with the social media giant set to integrate its new currency into the WhatsApp messaging platform.

In addition, PayPal has made its first blockchain investment, but instead of going down the crypto route it will look at the uses of shared ledger technology for data management with the help of Cambridge Blockchain.

Finally, it was revealed last month that Visa is looking at opportunities surrounding cryptocurrencies, with the firm placing adverts to hire an expert for its new cryptocurrency team.