Robinhood Raises Another $363 Million Amid Crypto Push
*By Alisha Haridasani*
The free trading app Robinhood, which offers stocks and options trading without commission fees, announced Thursday that it closed a Series D round of funding with $363 million. That brings the fintech start-up's valuation to $5.6 billion.
With 4 million users, Robinhood has been able to overtake the online trading industry's biggest player, E*TRADE, which has 3.7 million users.
“E*TRADE has been around since the original dot-com boom and is kind of considered the industry standard of online brokerages,” said Dan Primack, business editor of Axios. “The fact that Robinhood has been able to outpace them in terms of users in such a short period of time, I think is quite remarkable.”
Much of Robinhood’s growth has come from its new cryptocurrency trading platform, co-founder and co-CEO Baiju Bhatt told [CNBC](https://www.cnbc.com/2018/05/10/trading-app-robinhood-surpasses-e-trade-in-user-numbers.html). That platform offers trading in Bitcoin and Ethereum, and is available in 10 states, with plans to expand.
Beyond crypto, Robinhood aims to build more products, said Primack, who spoke with one of Robinhood’s co-founders before the company announced its latest funding.
Robinhood's new initiatives could include its own credit cards, platforms to trade other securities, and possibly an insurance product, Primack said.
Since Robinhood doesn’t make any money from commissions, it relies on subscriptions for its revenue. The firm [reportedly](http://fortune.com/2018/05/10/robinhood-stock-crypto-trading/) plans to stick to that business model.
For the full interview, [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/robinhood-quadruples-valuation-with-363-million-round-of-funding).
A new poll finds that as the United States rapidly builds massive data centers for the development of artificial intelligence, many Americans are concerned about the environmental impact.
Brain.fm merges music and neuroscience to enhance focus, creativity, and mental health—Dr. Kevin Woods reveals how sound is transforming cognitive performance.
An internet outage on Monday morning highlights the reliance on Amazon's cloud services. This incident reveals vulnerabilities in the concentrated system. Cloud computing allows companies to rent Amazon's infrastructure instead of building their own. Amazon leads the market, followed by Google and Microsoft. The outage originated in Northern Virginia, the biggest and oldest cloud hub in the U.S. This region handles significantly more data than other hubs. Despite the idea of spreading workloads, many rely on this single hub. The demand for computing power, especially for AI, is driving a construction boom for data centers.
Ashley Fieglein Johnson, CFO & President at Planet, joins us to share the story behind the Owl launch—and how strategy, tech, and vision are fueling liftoff.
OpenAI has announced that ChatGPT will soon engage in "erotica for verified adults." CEO Sam Altman says the company aims to allow more user freedom for adults while setting limits for teens. OpenAI isn't the first to explore sexualized AI, but previous attempts have faced legal and societal challenges. Altman believes OpenAI isn't the "moral police" and wants to differentiate content similar to how Hollywood differentiates R-rated movies. This move could help OpenAI, which is losing money, turn a profit. However, experts express concerns about the impact on real-world relationships and the potential for misuse.
