Safiri Felix, director of Transfero, forecasts a heated market in 2022. Photo: Transfero.
Transfero, a cryptocurrency payments and purchase and sale company, which also owns stablecoin BRZ, will manage crypto investments. The company has just received authorization from the Brazilian Securities and Exchange Commission (CVM) to provide “securities portfolio manager services”.
Thus, Transfero takes another step in building its cryptoactive ecosystem. “The vision has always been to have a vertical operation,” Safiri Felix, the company’s director of products and partnerships, told Blocknews. For him, Transfero’s model is similar to that of an investment bank. “We intend to be an end-to-end blockchain financial services solution.”
Thus, Transfero is defining which products it will launch on the market soon in this asset management segment. And Felix says that they will have differentials in relation to investment and index funds (ETFs), for example, that exist in Brazil. At first, they must follow CVM’s rule of focusing on qualified investors. Therefore, aimed at those who have from US$ 1 million in investment and can prove it.
The assets arm (asset) in Brazil will be an independent operation, following what the regulation dictates. The company already offers in Brazil the possibility of investing in its products abroad through a discretionary mandate. In this way, the customer mandates the company to decide how to allocate the customer’s resources.
Transfer launched this month retail platform
This new business follows the launch, at the beginning of this month of November, of the retail operation, that is, a platform for the purchase and sale of cryptocurrencies. Until then, his focus was on B2B.
According to Felix, the retail platform has already well surpassed the initial goals. That’s because in 20 days it reached what was expected for three months, in a totally organic growth.
The expectation is, therefore, that the two new business arms will grow significantly in 2022. This is because the cryptoactive market is expected to continue accelerating. And as bitcoin proves to be an anti-cyclical asset, if the economic situation is not the best, such as rising inflation, it can pull the market up.
The director does not open company numbers because the holding company is in a silent period due to negotiations to raise funds. In October 2020, the startup raised R$ 40 million with Alameda Research.
Company will invest in DeFi
In decentralized finance (DeFi), Transfero is also watching. For example, he has already committed to making a contribution to a project and “is seeing other things”, said Felix. This deal will generate synergy with the group, he added.
The company is also looking at tokenization projects to be a co-investor. With the Solana Foundation, it launched a US$ 20 million fund for Brazil. The goal is to choose early stage cryptocurrency projects made in Solana. The project was announced as the largest financing of initiatives in cryptocurrencies ever made in the country.
In addition, it is looking to expand the use of its stablecoin, which it created in 2019. Crypto is backed in real and is the largest stablecoin in market value after those backed in dollars. A few days ago, the group announced the purchase of CryptoBRL (CBRL), stablecoin also backed in real and on the market for a year. According to Felix, BRZ accounts for about 95% of transactions, considering the two cryptos.
Plan is to expand use of BRZ in decentralized finance
O BRZ’s transaction volume was US$13,961,975.91 in 24 hours until 15:00 this Friday (26), according to CoinMarketCap. BRZ’s use is primarily on the crypto platforms it’s listed on, says Felix. However, Transfero is starting to explore the DeFi protocols, putting stablecoin as an option. And it will start with applications on the RSK network. “The idea is to be in relevant protocols”.
Transfero started as Bit.One in 2015 in payments involving cryptoactives. His base today is in Zug, where Switzerland created the Crypto Valley. Felix, who has been in cryptoactives for five years, says institutional investors are groping the crypto business to see how to get in there. That’s because “it became too big an opportunity for the financial market to ignore”.
However, it is always good to remember that you already have a professional finance manager with exposure to cryptocurrencies. It just doesn’t have a mandate from the client to invest their resources in this segment.