Malaysia’s HWGC Holdings Acquires Digital Payment Firm HWGG and Fintech Scion

HWGC Holdings, which is quoted on the OTCQB market, announced Friday (April 22) that it will acquire two financial technology companies, furthering the company’s blockchain ambitions in the FinTech industry.

The two target companies are Malaysia-based HWGG Capital and Fintech Scion, which is based in the United Kingdom. The price being looked at is likely to be around $150 million, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, with HWGC intending to issue shares for the targets.

HWGG Capital is a digital assets payment operation, the first one fully licensed under the Labuan Financial Services Authority, per the announcement. The company works with on-ramp and off-ramp decentralized application, letting companies make payments, transfers and settlements with various digital assets.

Meanwhile, Fintech Scion offers a “platform as a service,” supporting several things like credit card processing, exchange, eCommerce and wire solutions.

In its announcement, HWGC said the acquisitions will help launch the company “into the global digital financial marketing sector by leveraging the best of these two target companies, exploring new ways to store and move value, accelerating its international expansion effort, and breaking down barriers for companies and individuals to thrive in digital economy.”

In related financial technology news, Shaun Worley, BitPay’s head of product, wrote that crypto isn’t just “a flash in the pan” in the PYMNTS eBook, “Endemic Economics: 32 Payments Execs on the ‘Next Normal’ That Never Happened.”

Read more: Continuing Innovations Show Cryptocurrencies and Blockchain Aren’t a Flash in the Pan

Worley wrote that while there might be a tendency to dismiss newer kinds of business due to the prevalence of fads, cryptocurrencies “have made inroads into the collective consciousness, and are making inroads, bit by bit, into mainstream commerce in ways that would have been scarcely imaginable only a few years ago.”

He wrote that the early years’ focus on bitcoin was giving way to more of a broad variety of cryptocurrencies, which have come to market in more frequent ways. He continued that the evolution has seen the payment mix of assets changing over time, and BitPay’s experience is something of a microcosm.

“Not all that long ago, bitcoin comprised a significant percentage of payments, but now is around 50% to 60% of the mix, with the remainder tied to stablecoins, Ethererum, Litecoin and a host of other options,” Worley wrote.