Blockbank, a blockchain bank, has today announced that it bought a stake in Kenya's Spire bank. After the purchase, both will go ahead to partner on several services.
"Blockbank purchase[s] stake in Spire bank & declares strategic FinTech partnership," read the press release.
According to the details in the press release, Spire Bank, will be "instrumental in facilitating a wide variety of international Crypto banking activity in association with Blockbank".
In the end, this will help them in the journey to "present the world's first fully licensed crypto bank with low-cost funding availability.
Spire Bank, headquartered in Nairobi, has total assets worth $180 million with 350,000 existing customers.
As part of the partnership, Spire bank will also incubate a DDMS smart contract blockchain system. This will enable Blockbank to "provide lower cost funding solutions via Spire Banks' infrastructure".
Blockbank is already carrying out an ICO which will close on October 28, 2018. The bank says that a "staggering $12,830,000 worth of their BBRT tokens have already been sold during the pre-ICO phase."
Kristian Wilkinson, a Marketing Adviser, and Manager at Blockbank, declined to respond to some of the questions about the purchase of Spire bank, the partnership as well as future plans when I contacted him on Telegram.
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"Unfortunately I am not currently permitted to answer commercially sensitive questions or divulge this information yet," he said. Pointing out that they will issue another press release in approximately two weeks.
Founded by Adam Cuffe (CEO) and Yusuf Sozi (Sales), Blockbank - in its ICO pitch deck - values itself at $210,000,000. If further points out that they are looking at a possible IPO. "We are looking at taking the company public," they state. Adding that "this will be our three-year plan."
In the deck, they also point out Uganda, Kenya, United Kingdom (HQ), UAE, Bahrain, and St. Vincent and Grenadines among the countries they are targeting.
Though they point out on their website that they are an "international Bank" and will, therefore, adhere to the "Basel iii international regulations" as well as the "regulations of any jurisdiction of which Blockbank is conducting business."
In this white paper, Blockbank describes itself as the "first fully licensed bank on blockchain". It adds that they capitalize on the "security, speed, transparency, and immutability" of Ethereum blockchain technology to "offer asset-backed, low-cost accessible commercial funding in FIAT currency".