StockRadars expands its stock analysis app in Asia and begins to offer live trading
By Jon Russel for Techcrunch
US-startup Robinhood is one of a number of fintech companies using technology to open the public markets and other investment opportunities to anyone. Its product is at the cutting-edge, having recently enabled instant trading inside its app, but financial barriers aren’t just being pushed in Western markets.
StockRadars, a Thailand-based service providing mobile-based analytics and insight for trading, just followed Robinhood’s lead and enabled real-time stock trading inside its app for the first time. That live-trading feature is limited to Thailand for now, but the company has expanded its analytics service to eight new countries — China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, South Korea, Japan, New Zealand, India and Singapore — with a view to rolling real-time trading out in these places, too.
To help that regional push, Siam Squared, the company behind StockRadars, has closed new funding which was announced at a press event today. The round is undisclosed, but TechCrunch understands from a source close to the deal that it is $700,000. StockRadars raised $800,000 last year and this latest round is a bridge towards a larger raise later this year.
This latest round is led by Japan’s Cyber Agent Ventures, an existing investor, and it includes participation from a number of angel investors, including prominent stock traders in Bangkok. That, SiamSquared founder Teerachart ‘Max’ Kortrakul told TechCrunch, is an important validation from the market and likely to be strategic as the startup pushes to “democratize” stock investing in Thailand and Asia.
“Our technology and app has always helped people get ahead by analyzing stock performance, but now we offer the complete solution for investment,” he added.
Southeast Asia’s fintech space is emerging with potential, anchored by Singapore, the region’s hub for finance and startup investment. Trade Hero is arguably the biggest fish, having raised $10 million, but others outside of the stock investment vertical include social payments firm Fastacash, which closed a $15 million Series B last year, and payment enablers 2C2P and Omise which have each raised multiple millions from investors.
Updated to correct Fastcash’s round, which was a Series B not Series A.
the article first appeared in TC
