Asia’s richest man Li Ka-Shing just invested in a startup that’s like PayPal for Bitcoin

December 28, 2013 Leave a comment

Asia’s richest man just invested in a startup that’s like PayPal for Bitcoin

December 27, 2013

by Steven Millward

Asia’s richest man, Li Ka-shing, is worth about $29 billion. Though he’s not investing in Bitcoin, the volatile virtual currency, he has decided to invest in BitPay, a US startup that’s a sort of PayPal for bitcoins.Li Ka-shing’s investment in BitPay has beenconfirmed by the South China Morning Post. The funding comes via Li’s Horizons Ventures. The exact funding amount has not been revealed.

Economist John Greenwood explained to the SCMPwhy the multi-billionaire might have made such as investment:

Just like investors in days gone by made more money out of selling shovels and picks to gold-diggers than anyone ever made out of the gold mine, he is investing in the peripheral activity that bitcoin has generated.

This could be a valuable lesson for those watching bitcoins: invest in virtual currency infrastructure and services, but don’t risk buying into the currency itself.

On shaky ground

Hong Kong’s government has not ruled definitely on bitcoin usage by its citizens, but politicians have voiced caution on the part of solo investors. Hong Kong’s financial secretary John Tsang Chun-wah predicted a huge correction in its price-levels, saying bitcoin could not endure as there’s “no support from the real economy” for it.

Bitcoin’s price has fluctuated wildly since it come into the spotlight in October. Its price relative to the US dollar briefly rocketed to $1,200 in December before China’s central bank put a dampener on the party by ruling that mainland Chinese may not use Bitcoin for transactions. That does not effect Hong Kongers. Bitcoin’s current price is just under $800.

BitPay has received seed rounds of funding in the past, such as $2 million in May this year. It was founded in 2011 and is also backed by Founders Fund, the VC started by the gang commonly called thePayPal Mafia.

Filed under TMT Trends

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Kee Koon Boon (“KB”) is the co-founder and director of HERO Investment Management which provides specialized fund management and investment advisory services to the ARCHEA Asia HERO Innovators Fund (www.heroinnovator.com), the only Asian SMID-cap tech-focused fund in the industry. KB is an internationally featured investor rooted in the principles of value investing for over a decade as a fund manager and analyst in the Asian capital markets who started his career at a boutique hedge fund in Singapore where he was with the firm since 2002 and was also part of the core investment committee in significantly outperforming the index in the 10-year-plus-old flagship Asian fund. He was also the portfolio manager for Asia-Pacific equities at Korea’s largest mutual fund company. Prior to setting up the H.E.R.O. Innovators Fund, KB was the Chief Investment Officer & CEO of a Singapore Registered Fund Management Company (RFMC) where he is responsible for listed Asian equity investments. KB had taught accounting at the Singapore Management University (SMU) as a faculty member and also pioneered the 15-week course on Accounting Fraud in Asia as an official module at SMU. KB remains grateful and honored to be invited by Singapore’s financial regulator Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) to present to their top management team about implementing a world’s first fact-based forward-looking fraud detection framework to bring about benefits for the capital markets in Singapore and for the public and investment community. KB also served the community in sharing his insights in writing articles about value investing and corporate governance in the media that include Business Times, Straits Times, Jakarta Post, Manual of Ideas, Investopedia, TedXWallStreet. He had also presented in top investment, banking and finance conferences in America, Italy, Sydney, Cape Town, HK, China. He has trained CEOs, entrepreneurs, CFOs, management executives in business strategy & business model innovation in Singapore, HK and China.

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