Mastercard has entered into an agreement to purchase blockchain analytics start-up CipherTrace for an undisclosed amount.
The deal marks the latest sign that major corporates are warming towards cryptocurrencies, following similar trends amongst companies like Amazon and PayPal.
Based in California, CipherTrace develops tools and solutions to help government agencies and businesses detect and stamp out illicit digital currency transactions.
The company sits alongside competitors like Chainalysis and Elliptic as the elite blockchain analysis firms that have been growing rapidly alongside digital assets this past year.
Ajay Bhalla, president of cyber and intelligence at Mastercard, said in a press release: “Digital assets have the potential to reimagine commerce, from everyday acts like paying and getting paid to transforming economies, making them more inclusive and efficient. With the rapid growth of the digital asset ecosystem comes the need to ensure it is trusted and safe.”
Although financial terms of the deal have not been disclosed, Mastercard shares increased by 1% over the day of the announcement, Thursday.
The anonymity of cryptocurrency and its preference amongst criminal organisations has left many major financial institutions hesitant to become too involved; however, service providers like CipherTrace are helping to break down this resistance as they garner information from blockchain networks.
Mastercard said the deal would help its customers protect themselves and comply with regulations as they start to build out their own digital currency offerings.
Meanwhile, CipherTrace CEO Dave Jevans, said: “We help companies – whether they are banks or cryptocurrency exchanges, government regulators or law enforcement to keep the crypto economy safe.
Our two companies share this vision to provide security and trust throughout the ecosystem. We are thrilled to join the Mastercard family to scale CipherTrace’s reach across the globe.”
Want to learn more from executives at the heart of this space? The Blockchain IoT Solutions Congress, on November 2 2021, will explore the convergence of these two technologies and the use cases and industries that will benefit.
