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There are multiple types of financial institutions and banking service providers out there. A group of them focus not on investments, but on providing infrastructure. Crypto-as-a-Service (CaaS) and Crypto-banking-as-a-Service (Crypto-BaaS) —like Striga’s platform— fall within that category, and though they sound quite similar, they are in fact quite different.
What is Crypto as a Service?
Crypto-as-a-Service (CaaS) traditionally refers to companies that allow other companies to use their exchange platform to trade as a company. The client company can then break down its own account into multiple smaller accounts to provide exchange features to its own users. So, in brief, CaaS provides exchange features to companies, and the liquidity to back them up.
Examples of them are Bitstamp, Bitpanda, and Zero Hash, though there are many others.
What is Crypto Banking as a Service?
Crypto banking-as-a-service (Crypto-BaaS) refers to companies that provide banking infrastructure —usually both crypto & fiat— for other companies to integrate into their own products. Crypto-BaaS usually offer features regarding:
- Crypto wallets
- Crypto exchanges
- IBAN accounts for individual users
- Virtual and Physical Cards
- KYC & AML controls
Examples of them are Striga in Europe or Solid and Synapse in the US.
Where do CaaS and Crypto BaaS overlap?
They share the exchange features, but not in the same way. Usually, Crypto-BaaS actually partners with a CaaS to be able to provide its features. The Crypto-as-a-Service provider is usually the one who holds control over the liquidity and sets the spread/fees for exchanging cryptocurrencies, while the Crypto-BaaS acts as an intermediary and infrastructure integrator.
But moving on to the actual article: How does Striga’s Crypto BaaS platform compare with Bitpanda’s Crypto-as-a-Service platform for those who want to build a crypto Neobank?
Striga Vs. Bitpanda:
Time to Market
Bitpanda: The time it takes to integrate CaaS depends on two things: Going through a round of calls with the provider (in this case Bitpanda) to get approval and exchange documentation, and developing the technical integrations. The expertise required to do the latter is usually high. The full process usually takes between 2 and 6 months, and the size and experience of the client’s developer team play a big role in it.
Striga: It takes between 6 weeks and 3 months to fully deploy a product, from the moment you make the decision, through the integrations, until going live. The simplest features may be deployed even in 2 weeks.
Verdict: Striga is the faster option, though these two categories are the fastest to set up among financial infrastructure providers in general.
Striga
Bitpanda
Time to Market
1.5 – 3 months
2 – 6 months
Striga Vs. Bitpanda:
Financials
The usual commercial structure is broken down into two: an upfront cost, and a monthly minimum or subscription fee. Then there are transactional costs, but we won’t get into those right now, as they should be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, given how many and how variable they are.
Bitpanda: The revenue model of a CaaS company is usually reliant on exchange spread or fees. They tend to charge no money either up front or as a subscription/monthly minimum. In brief, integrating them tends to be free.
Striga: The Crypto-BaaS platform of Striga charges EUR 5,000 as an upfront/integration cost, plus EUR 3,000 monthly.
Verdict: Bitpanda takes the win. Though they can get expensive at a transactional level, they are free to start with.
Financials
Striga
Bitpanda
Upfront Cost (EUR)
5,000
0
Monthly Minimum / Subscription Fee (EUR)
3,000
0
Striga Vs. Bitpanda:
Services Offered
Bitpanda: As mentioned above, a CaaS company focuses exclusively on providing crypto liquidity to enable exchange features. Bitpanda goes a step beyond offering white-label exchange infrastructure, which is not always the case with crypto as a service.
Striga: On the other hand, Striga’s Crypto-BaaS has a full list of services including, but not limited to:
- White label infrastructure
- Native crypto support
- Crypto Wallets
- Crypto exchange features
- Individual IBAN accounts
- Physical and Virtual Card Issuing
- Apple Pay & Google Pay support (Tokenization)
- Product lifecycle management via a dashboard
Verdict: Striga far outstrips Bitpanda in terms of the range of services, which is expected, given the different business models. When it comes to exchanging features though, CaaS providers are likely the experts.
Services
Striga
Bitpanda
White Label Infrastructure
Yes
Yes
Native Crypto Support
Yes
Yes
Crypto Wallets
Yes
No
Crypto Exchange Features
Yes
Yes
Individual IBAN accounts
Yes
No
Physical and Virtual Card Issuing
Yes
No
Apple Pay & Google Pay
Yes
No
Product lifecycle management via dashboard
Yes
No
Striga Vs. Bitpanda:
Technical Setup
While financials and services are essential to make a product great, you need to integrate the APIs first. Ask any developer team: if the technical setup is not properly designed, a simple —even enjoyable— setup, can become a months-long nightmare.
Besides the documentation being high-quality, the 4 following elements make the technical setup friendlier:
- Publicly available sandbox
- Number of partners required to build crypto & fiat Neobank
- Interactive setup guide
- Public API Documentation
Bitpanda:
- The company does not appear to have a publicly available sandbox
- It takes up to 6 partners to launch a Neobank (Bitpanda + Card Bureau, Card Processor, BIN Sponsor, IBAN provider, and AML/KYC if the client chooses to do it on its own)
- The company does not appear to have an interactive setup guide, just a static one
- The company does share its API documentation publicly
Striga:
- Striga has a publicly accessible sandbox
- It takes 1 partner (Striga itself) to launch a full crypto Neobank platform
- Striga has an interactive setup guide
- Striga shares publicly its API documentation
Verdict: Connecting to Striga requires substantially less effort given the availability of resources and simplicity of connecting to just 1 partner, as opposed to 6.
Technical Setup
Striga
Bitpanda
Publicly Available Sandbox
Yes
No
Number of Partners Required to Go Live
1
6
Interactive Setup Guide
Yes
No
Public API Documentation
Yes
Yes
Striga Vs. Bitpanda:
Regulation & Compliance
Once you launch a platform with the services you want and profitable financials, the only thing to worry about beyond growing your business in compliance. There are 3 core points to consider in that regard:
- KYC: Either the provider or the client company has to handle the responsibility of onboarding users and recording their data
- AML: Either the provider or the client company has to handle the responsibility of monitoring transactions to report potential money laundering
- Licenses: Either the provider or the client company has to hold a license to manage and hold virtual assets
Bitpanda: It is flexible regarding KYC, as it can handle it on behalf of clients, or allow them to do it themselves. AML is handled by Bitpanda, and they require their clients to be licensed or registered to hold digital assets legally.
Striga: Striga handles both KYC and AML for its clients (outsourcing it isn’t an option). The client does not need to have any license or registration to handle or custody of digital currencies, as Striga takes care of that*.
- Striga is currently pursuant to the newly updated (March 2022) Virtual Asset Service Provider License in Estonia.
Verdict: Though equivalent in AML, Bitpanda does have one extra roadblock when compared to Striga due to requiring a license to operate. At the same time, they are more flexible when it comes to KYC. There’s no clear winner here, it depends on each client company’s preferences.
Regulation & Compliance
Striga
Bitpanda
Outsourceable KYC
No
No
Outsourceable AML
No
No
Licenses or Commercial Registrations NOT Required
Yes
Yes
Verdict
Is Striga better than Bitpanda?
It really depends on what you’re looking for.
If what you exclusively want is direct access to cryptocurrency liquidity to offer exchange features with great flexibility, you have a solid development team to back you and can wait up to 6 months, Bitpanda makes sense.
If what you want is to build a full-fledged neo banking platform or integrate banking features into your own product, and you want to deploy it quickly, then your best bet is Striga.
Striga Crypto-native Banking as a Service:
Your path to building and launching financial products
Join the financial businesses that use Striga’s cloud platform to delight their customers and launch their own products without the complexities that come when dealing with core banking solutions’ relationships, licensing, compliance and payments methods.
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