French Investment firm eyeing Bitcoin for remittance market

Digital currency has taken the global financial sector by storm with major banking and financial institutions recognizing its potential. The most prominent one in the list is Barclays, which has two bitcoin innovation labs and plans over 45 experiments with blockchain technology.

Yet another investment firm has taken steps to embrace the digital revolution. AXA, a French, multinational, investment banking firm headquartered in Paris, has recently announced the creation of Kamet, a €100m InsurTech incubator dedicated to conceptualizing, launching and accompanying disruptive products and services for insurance clients. 

"The digital revolution is transforming the entire insurance value chain. Kamet will become another pillar of our strategy to connect the Group to the InsurTech Ecosystem, joining forces with our existing trend spotter AXA Lab (based in San Francisco and Shanghai) and the investment structure AXA Strategic Ventures. Our goal is to imagine disruptive projects and incubate start-ups linked to our insurance business, for the ultimate benefit of our clients in terms of protection and services", said Henri de Castries, Chairman and CEO of AXA.

Moreover, the firm is also eyeing bitcoin to help streamline the remittance market, Minh Q Tran, the general partner of its VC fund, told CoinDesk. He said AXA is treating digital currency as an "investment thesis" through AXA Strategic Ventures, the bank's $223m fund, and its accelerator, AXA Factory.

"We think that many use cases related to bitcoin have not already been explored. In particular we are very interested in how bitcoin, and more generally cryptocurrencies, might be used in the remittance market", he said.

Although no bitcoin or blockchain startups have received AXA funding to date, Tran said the firm is in talks with various 'rebittance' companies looking to disrupt the $582bn sector.