Kantox is looking to help users avoid the burn of high fees and long waits associated with foreign currency exchange by employing a person-to-person (P2P) platform to directly exchange one currency for another.
A source in Europe told Bank Innovation that Kantox is raising another round of funding. Company officials declined to comment.
Foreign currency exchange (sometimes abbreviated FX) is a pain point for anyone unlucky enough to have experienced it. The fees are high and often obscure, money can be held up, and it’s not uncommon to feel poorly served by the process.
Kantox looks to make switching dollars for pounds as easy as using a P2P program like Popmoney or Square Cash. For companies engaged in import/export that are paid in multiple currencies every day, Kantox could have a transformational effect on their businesses.
The platform allows spot trades — that is, trading the currency immediately — as well as hedging currency to minimize risk. Hedging foreign currency is a complicated process involving contracts and lawyers. Easing the pain of hedging was the original function of the Kantox platform, which launched in 2011. Spot trades were introduced in early 2013.
In the spot-trade scenario, users post their dollars or other currency on the Kantox platform and choose the exchange currency they’re looking for. From there, Kantox negotiates the transaction between the holders of the currencies. Currently, some $11 million dollars worth of value is floating on the platform. Kantox facilitates the transfer between currencies at what it says is up to 80% lower than that offered by banks. Its rate was described as 0.09%-0.29% in a February 2013 report. All fees and exchange rates are displayed on the site alongside the other mechanics of the transaction.
Kantox trades more than 20 currencies, but not, at the moment, bitcoins. (They would require some serious hedging.) The company has offices in Spain, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom.