Poland-based bitcoin payment solutions provider InPay S.A. has launched an equity crowdfunding campaign that makes it possible to buy company stock with bitcoin. The company claims to have secured the approval of Poland’s Financial Supervision Authority (KNF), the country’s equivalent of the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which makes it a unique project in the Polish digital currency industry, according to company representatives.
The initiative was launched on Poland-based equity crowdfunding site Beesfund.com, where potential investors can acquire InPay stock with bitcoin, becoming shareholders in the company. In total, InPay is aiming to raise the equivalent of 200,000 zloty (around $60,000) from the public offering to finance its further development and expansion to other markets.
At press time, the firm had sold just over a quarter of the 5% of its stock made available in the scheme, priced at 40 zloty per share, and which has been purchased by over 100 investors so far. The offering is scheduled to be completed by November 16th.
InPay said in a statement that, unlike the reward-based crowdfunding model popularized by sites such as Kickstarter or RocketHub, equity crowdfunding enables potential investors interested in innovative business models to acquire stock in the firms.
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Despite being paid for with bitcoin, InPay says that the stock will be printed on paper and sent by post to its new shareholders. “For crowdfunding platforms, such as Beesfund, bitcoin seems to be the ideal engine for growth,” said Arkadiusz Regiec, Beesfund CEO. “It makes the whole purchase procedure much quicker and lowers transaction costs.”
InPay says it is the first bitcoin payment solution in Central Europe, providing services to retail outlets in a bid to remove “the obstacles facing the owners of brick-and-mortar and online stores who want to start accepting bitcoin”.
Poland is in the top 10 countries for the number of downloaded bitcoin clients, which makes it a promising market for digital currency payment operators. Data obtained by InPay shows that, in terms of active bitcoin node numbers, Poland ranks 12th and eighth at the global and European levels, respectively.
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Additionally, there are more businesses accepting bitcoin in Warsaw than in a number of other major European cities, such as Munich, Brussels, Barcelona or Budapest, according to figures released by Coinmap.org.
“We use the bitcoin protocol to provide a quick and free flow of payments … for company owners, from buyer to seller,” said Lech Wilczyński, president of InPay.
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