# River

> River is a San Francisco-based, bitcoin-only financial services company offering brokerage, custody, mining, and Lightning Network infrastructure. Founded in 2019 by Alex Leishman and Andrew Benson, River serves individuals and businesses who want to buy, hold, earn yield on, and transact with bitcoin from a US-regulated, transparent, full-reserve institution.

- **Founded:** 2019
- **Headquarters:** San Francisco, California, United States
- **Founders:** Alex Leishman (Co-Founder, CEO & CTO), Andrew Benson (Co-Founder)
- **Team size:** ~140 employees
- **Products:** Bitcoin Brokerage, River Mining, River Cash (Interest on Cash), Lightning Services (RLS), Proof of Reserves
- **Notable:** Operates the fourth-largest node on the Bitcoin Lightning Network., Published a widely-cited Lightning Network adoption report showing $1.17B in monthly volume by November 2025., Launched the first comprehensive Bitcoin mining product offered by a bitcoin brokerage (2021).

## Products & services

- **Bitcoin Brokerage** — Buy and sell bitcoin directly with full self-custody options and zero-fee recurring orders.
- **River Mining** — Retail-accessible bitcoin mining: customers buy hardware that River procures, hosts in US data centers, and operates - daily payouts in BTC.
- **River Cash (Interest on Cash)** — USD cash accounts that pay interest in bitcoin (3.30% as of recent disclosures).
- **Lightning Services (RLS)** — Enterprise Lightning Network infrastructure powering exchanges and the Chivo wallet in El Salvador.
- **Proof of Reserves** — Periodic published attestations that customer bitcoin is held 1:1 in custody.

## Achievements

- Operates the fourth-largest node on the Bitcoin Lightning Network.
- Published a widely-cited Lightning Network adoption report showing $1.17B in monthly volume by November 2025.
- Launched the first comprehensive Bitcoin mining product offered by a bitcoin brokerage (2021).
- Series A of $12M closed March 2021.
- Publishes Proof of Reserves attestations.

## Latest updates

- **2025-12** — Lightning Network capacity referenced at 5,606 BTC; River cited a $1M institutional Lightning transfer to Kraken.
- **2025-11** — River's data put Lightning Network monthly volume at ~$1.17B across 5.22M transactions - ~400% YoY growth.
- **2025** — Published 'Looking Ahead: Lightning Payments in 2025' research piece.
- **2022** — Launched zero-fee recurring bitcoin buys.
- **2021-03** — Closed $12M Series A.

## Links

- Website: https://river.com
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/riverfinancial
- Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/River
- GitHub: https://github.com/RiverFinancial
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RiverFinancialOfficial/

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/river
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-05-23