On August 17th, 2020, Robinhood, a stock and crypto trading app, reported that they had raised $200 million in a Series G funding round. Robinhood further said that according to D1 Capital Partners, the platform had increased in value, bringing the total valuation of the app to $11.2 Billion. Apart from the $200 million raise, in July 2020, the trading app had raised $320 in a funding round at a $8.6 billion valuation with investors like IVP and TSG Consumer Partners. In May, they surpassed their financing goal by raising $280 million in a Series F funding round at a $8.3 billion. The series F was led by Sequoia, NEA Ribbit Capital, Unusual Ventures, and 9 yards Capital.
The trading app later disclosed that they would use the investment to add value to its core product and customer experience. This is after the company faced multiple outages due to its poor platform performance. The platform is reported to have gone down three times, first on March 9th and March 12th during peak trading. Many traders were unable to access their accounts during this time and reported heavy losses; these traders demanded for compensation. On June 18th the platform was reported to have gone down again despite the trading app having received $280 million Series F round which was led by Venture Capital firm Sequoia. Robinhood team later issued a report stating that they were fixing the issue and that they were offering a $15 compensation which the traders found to be insufficient.
Despite this incidence, the platform is still popular especially among young traders since it has a gamified user-friendly interface. In December 2019, the cofounder of Robinhood, Vladmir Tener, reported that over 200,000 people had signed up for an upcoming app for fractional stock trading which was yet to be released. Currently, the popular stock and the trading app has gained 3 million new accounts in the first quarter of 2020.
Currently, the trading app has put its global expansion plan on hold including that of the United Kingdom. The expansion to the United Kingdom had been confirmed in August 2019 after the app secured regulatory approval. After the indefinite postponement, the Silicon Valley-based stock and cryptocurrency investing app informed its British based customers that it would be focusing more on strengthening its core business in the United States.
Image by HeatherPaque from Pixabay
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