Less than a week after it raised $75 million in Series C funding from major financial institutions, Coinbase today launched the first regulated bitcoin exchange in the U.S.

Coinbase has approval from 23 U.S. states and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico for its bitcoin wallet, and those governments have also granted the company permission to operate the exchange.

Coinbase chief executive Brian Armstrong told the Wall Street Journal that the company sought to provide an exchange "to offer greater security for individuals and institutions to trade bitcoin and monitor real-time pricing of the cryptocurrency."

Armstrong told Coindesk that he expects the company will have secured regulatory approval in all states within the next six months.