"Can you sell a few mill?"
The Fruhman brothers, Joel aged 29 and Dan 28, built a contact book packed with bitcoin miners they met on internet forums and apps as they grew interested in the emerging technology. Miners use computers to solve complex mathematical puzzles, competing against others and earning rewards in the form of new digital coins. As recently as a few years ago, individual crypto enthusiasts could mine bitcoin from their bedrooms. But many had a problem, the Fruhmans found: They were producing bitcoin faster than they could convert them to the cash they needed to clear the hefty electricity bills run up by their high-powered computing gear working overtime. "We saw something very clear: A bunch of guys with a lot of bitcoin valued in USD, who had no idea how to turn that into money," said Joel. "It started with one request, which was just one of these guys, our mate, who was like: ’Can you sell a few mill?’" Late last year, in an attempt to tap bigger investors and offer more sophisticated back-office services, the brothers swapped their contact book for a stake in a startup run by ex-financiers well-versed in the infrastructure of the financial system, from escrow accounts to settlement systems. The startup, BCB Group, then based in London’s financial district, offered something the Fruhmans lacked: regular access to clients from mainstream finance willing and able to buy the regular supply of digital coin offered by their mining contacts. "It’s not the stoned 22-year-old that we were dealing with a year and a half ago," said Joel. "And it’s not the equity traders, the Goldman Sachs. They’re kind of in between - it’s growing from one into the other."
Trade blossoms in bitcoin bubble
