Overview
- Fortune reports that Mastercard is negotiating a purchase of Chicago-based Zerohash valued between $1.5 billion and $2 billion, with sources cautioning the deal could still fall through and all companies declining to comment.
- Founded in 2017, Zerohash provides stablecoin and blockchain infrastructure used for payments and crypto trading and recently raised $104 million at a $1 billion valuation from backers including Interactive Brokers, Apollo, Point72 Ventures, and Nyca.
- Zerohash offers broader capabilities than some rivals by helping companies launch crypto trading platforms and providing tokenization APIs for wrapping traditional assets on blockchains.
- The talks follow a burst of sector dealmaking, including Stripe’s $1.1 billion acquisition of Bridge and Coinbase entering exclusivity to acquire BVNK after a bidding process that included Mastercard.
- A successful acquisition would represent one of Mastercard’s largest stablecoin bets, building on its 2021 CipherTrace purchase and recent participation in a stablecoin consortium with firms such as Robinhood and Kraken.