Harvard Business Review published an article in 2017 analyzing the potential for blockchain technology to break into the mainstream. The study cited an overall lack of usability as the single largest barrier to widespread public adoption. Companies, the article concluded, must “…focus on replacements [for existing services] that won’t require end users to change their behavior much but present alternatives to expensive or unattractive solutions. To get traction, substitutes must deliver functionality as good as a traditional solution’s and must be easy for the ecosystem to absorb and adopt.”

“Easy” is not the first word that comes to mind when considering the current landscape surrounding digital assets. More often than not, a person must use one service to exchange fiat for Bitcoin, go to another website to exchange Bitcoin for other cryptocurrencies, and then transfer those currencies back into Bitcoin in order to transfer them out of the exchange and back to a fiat gateway in order to, finally, exchange them back into fiat. Or, to invest in- let alone actually use- one tokenized blockchain platform, a user must figure out which exchange sells the token, figure out how to buy the token, set up a unique client to have a wallet to store their token (sometimes being required to download the entire blockchain), and so forth.

To the grizzled hodler, keeping track of five or ten or fifty different master seed phrases for different wallets, managing a trove of air-gapped devices, and running command line clients on their favorite Linux distro is old hat; for the vast majority of people, however, all of this is a pretty big ask. Or, as HBR put it, this is an “unattractive solution.”

The potential for blockchain to radically transform the foundational infrastructure of almost every current institutional environment is massive. While it’s still up for debate whether we’ve reached the beginning of the “adoption” stage, it’s safe to say that public awareness concerning Bitcoin, at least, has skyrocketed during 2017. Coinbase added 100,000 new users in one day after the CME announced it was planning to launch Bitcoin futures. Twice in 2017 Bitcoin has graced the cover over Barron’s. Jamie Dimon, CEO of JP Morgan, called Bitcoin “stupid” to much fanfare (despite the fact that JP Morgan is both actively developing it’s own blockchain tech and, now, expressing interest in Bitcoin futures).

While there are many, many, many potential applications for blockchain beyond cryptocurrencies, and beyond finance, in general, the cryptocurrency space has been driving this tech since the beginning. As more possibilities for blockchain emerge, the role of cryptocurrency has evolved from the model of being exclusively a digital peer-to-peer currency into a diverse digital asset economy with many applications. While there is huge potential for a new class of tokenized assets and new frameworks for exchange, this space is still struggling with accessibility.

Cambridge University’s 2017 Global Cryptocurrency Benchmarking Study, by Dr. Garrick Hileman & Michel Rauchs, concluded that “…for cryptocurrencies to be useful to users they cannot live in a closed vacuum, but require interfaces and bridges to the broader economy.” We couldn’t agree more. That’s why we built CoinMetro.

Coming from a background in the financial sector, the team behind CoinMetro saw an urgent need for one platform that could perform all the functions that currently requires a user to rely on several different, sometimes complex, applications. We envisioned a platform where a new trader could buy their first Bitcoin, work with a professional trader, diversify their portfolio in a few clicks, and easily move between fiat currency and digital assets all in one place. Keeping our platform user-friendly, while at the same time offering an advanced trading interface for professional traders, has been a key component of CoinMetro’s mission.

One of the biggest issues facing the cryptocurrency and blockchain space today is how this new economy works with the traditional economy, particularly in terms of regulation and integration with existing financial institutions. Having already built a successful business in the Forex industry, FXPIG, we understand how to adapt to a changing regulatory environment, and we wanted to be proactive in terms of working with regulators.

CoinMetro is pursuing licensing in crypto-friendly regions, as well as in jurisdictions where we feel crypto will be umbrellaed in the near future. Doing this will help us expand our banking footprint, provide easy access to fiat deposits, and grant us the ability to offer our clients fiat withdrawals, as well as access to alternative payment channels.

Investing in digital assets needs to be an easy process. By creating a highly accessible user-interface with direct integration into both traditional banking and multiple blockchain platforms, CoinMetro is a framework for mainstream adoption. We’ve developed innovative trading models designed for the digital economy, a secure backend infrastructure that is hassle-free for users, and a dedicated customer support center that is available 24/7. The CoinMetro Ecosystem is an all-in-one platform committed to simplifying the digital asset economy and creating opportunities for users at every level of experience.