Draft:River (company)

River Financial Inc., branded River, is an American privately-owned company that offers a bitcoin brokerage platform and investment tools for the long-term investor. River is headquartered in Columbus, Ohio, with additional offices in New York City, New York, and San Francisco, California.

History and Funding
2019-2021: Founding and early years

River was founded under the name Alto Financial in 2019 by Alexander Leishman and Andrew Benson, and began operations as a bitcoin-only brokerage firm. In June 2020, River announced a $5.7 million Seed funding round from investors including Polychain Capital, Slow Ventures, and DC Lab Fund, as well as individual investors.

2021-2023: Series A

In March 2021, River announced a $12 million Series A funding round by Goldcrest Capital with participation from Craft Ventures, Polychain Capital, M13, Castle Island, Slow Ventures, and The Kraft Group.

2023: Series B

On May 16, 2023, River announced a $35 million Series B funding round led by Kingsway Capital. Other investors included Peter Thiel, Goldcrest, Cygni, M13, Valor Equity Partners, Esas Ventures, and Alarko Ventures.

River Lightning Services (RLS)
In 2022, River announced the offering of an API-based service for payments over the Bitcoin Lightning Network, which is a payment protocol built on the Bitcoin blockchain intended to enable fast transactions among participating nodes.

El Salvador and the Chivo Wallet
El Salvador became the first country in the world to use bitcoin as legal tender, after having been adopted as such by the Legislative Assembly of El Salvador in 2021.

The government announced that it had set aside $150 million to purchase bitcoin for El Salvador’s national reserves, and would distribute US$30 in bitcoin to people who sign up to use an electronic wallet called Chivo (Salvadorean slang for 'cool'), at a cost of up to $75 million. River Lightning Services (RLS) has served as the backend provider for the Chivo wallet