Highlights of this issue
According to incomplete statistics from PANews, there were 23 investment and financing events in the global blockchain last week (September 22-28), with a total funding amount exceeding US$889 million. In addition, the total amount of financing for listed companies' crypto asset reserves exceeded US$471 million. The following is an overview:
- DeFi announced four investment and financing events, including the Solana ecosystem perpetual contract DEX BULK, which completed an $8 million seed round of financing;
- The Web3+AI track announced three investment and financing events, among which SuperImage completed a strategic financing of US$5 million, led by Genesis Block Capital;
- The Infrastructure & Tools sector announced seven investment and financing events, including Zerohash's $104 million Series D financing round, led by Interactive Brokers and participated by Morgan Stanley.
- The centralized finance sector announced six investment and financing events, including Kraken's $500 million financing, with a valuation of $15 billion.
- In other Web3 applications, two investment and financing events were announced. Among them, the on-chain music platform Coop Records completed a $4.5 million financing, with 1kx and other investors participating.
- In addition, three listed companies have completed financing to establish crypto treasuries. Among them, AgriFORCE Growing Systems, a listed company, plans to raise $550 million to transform its AVAX treasury strategy and has obtained $300 million in PIPE financing.
DeFi
Solana Ecosystem Perpetual Contract DEX BULK Completes $8 Million Seed Round
BULK, a perpetual contract DEX for the Solana ecosystem, has completed an $8 million seed round of funding, led by 6th Man Ventures and Robot Ventures, with participation from Big Brain Holdings, Wintermute, and Solana co-founder Anatoly Yakovenko. BULK aims to address issues such as surging priority fees and network congestion by integrating its execution layer directly into Solana's validator stack. BULK expects to launch a testnet in the coming weeks, with plans for a formal mainnet launch in Q4.
Divine, a blockchain-based microfinance company, has completed a $6.6 million seed round of funding, led by Paradigm and participated by Nascent. Divine reportedly launched Credit, an automated, low-collateralized lending system based on stablecoins, in December 2024 and has since disbursed 175,000 loans to over 100,000 unique borrowers worldwide.
Genie founder Scott Gray launched the social trading app Share, securing $5 million in funding from investors including Coinbase Ventures, Collaborative+Currency, and Palm Tree Crypto. Share supports the three major public blockchains: Solana, Base, and Ethereum, providing real-time insights into users' on-chain transactions, allowing users to track wallets, view market trends, and trade tokens. Each wallet automatically generates a Share profile, allowing users to link multiple wallets and Farcaster accounts. Share is poised to compete with similar products like Fomo and the social features of giants like Robinhood and Coinbase.
Institutional-grade liquidity vault startup RockSolid completes $2.8 million in Pre-Seed funding
RockSolid, an institutional-grade liquidity vault startup, has completed a $2.8 million Pre-Seed funding round led by Castle Island Ventures, with participation from Blockchain Builders Fund, GSR, Kindred Ventures, Rocket Pool, and the Stanford Blockchain Accelerator. The company also launched its first official rETH vault, integrated into the Rocket Pool front-end. The new funds will be used to expand its technical, operations, and marketing teams. RockSolid's first product is a white-label, single-click rETH vault, which integrates directly into the Rocket Pool staking application interface, providing holders with access to customized DeFi strategies. Castle Island Ventures founding partner Nic Carter emphasized that this initiative aims to lower the barrier to entry for institutional and community participation in DeFi. Currently, Rocket Pool is the third-largest decentralized staking protocol, with over $2.7 billion in locked value.
SegaSwap, a decentralized automated market maker built on Solana and Sonic SVM, has completed a seed round of funding led by Sonic SVM and 10K Ventures, with a valuation of $10 million. According to reports, SegaSwap is a decentralized protocol designed to support fast transactions, permissionless pool creation, and innovative yield opportunities.
NFT
NFT project Akio announced the completion of a $5 million seed round of financing, led by Pantera Capital, with participation from AMD Ventures, NVentures, Hasbro Ventures, NetEase Ventures, SBI Holdings, Susquehanna Crypto, LD Capital, MZ Web3 Fund, and B Dash Ventures.
Subsequently, Pantera Capital general partner Franklin Bi posted that Pantera did not invest in the NFT project Akio and had confirmed the same with several other investors mentioned in the tweet. Franklin Bi said that he had been blocked by the project and could not directly reply to the original tweet.
AI
Web3+AI project SuperImage completes $5 million in strategic financing led by Genesis Block Capital
SuperImage, the world's first decentralized AI image generation and editing platform, announced the completion of a $5 million strategic financing round led by Genesis Block Capital. This round of financing will drive product upgrades and global expansion, accelerating the adoption of decentralized AI image applications. In addition, SuperImage's Telegram platform has launched a text-to-image feature, providing a convenient AI creation experience for users worldwide. Founded in June 2023, SuperImage operates on a decentralized GPU network, aggregating idle computing power worldwide and allowing users to participate in mining using home or professional GPUs and earn $SIC token rewards. The platform supports three models: Hidream, Flux Dev, and Sana, providing a low-cost, highly efficient text-to-image solution with image generation costs at only one-tenth of those of centralized services.
Bullish Announces $4 Million Investment in USD.AI
Bullish (NYSE: BLSH), a digital asset trading platform, announced a $4 million investment in USD.AI, its first since its IPO in August. USD.AI provides an on-chain platform for financing AI infrastructure, has secured $250 million in private beta deposits , and supports AI companies in scaling their computing power through hardware collateralized lending.
Crypto development platform Crossmint receives strategic investment from Circle Ventures
Crossmint, a crypto development platform, announced a strategic investment from Circle Ventures, the venture capital arm of Circle. Crossmint will collaborate with Circle to develop stablecoin payment solutions centered around USDC, encompassing wallets, API access, fund transfers, and AI-powered payment agents.
Louis Amira, former Head of Crypto and AI Partnerships at Stripe, and David Noël-Romas, former Head of Crypto Engineering at Stripe, have secured $19.2 million in funding for their new startup, Circuit & Chisel, to develop ATXP, an AI agent payment protocol. In addition to its Stripe background (and financial backing), Circuit & Chisel has received investment from Primary Venture Partners, ParaFi, and Coinbase Ventures. Designed as the "HTTP for AI agent payments," ATXP aims to address the current lack of a standardized communication protocol between AI agents. Amira stated that if ATXP succeeds, it could enable microtransactions. In this scenario, intelligent agents could autonomously access information and pay small fees, such as scraping information from a private LinkedIn profile or accessing a paid Fortune article. These platforms would then be able to collect small fees.
(This round of financing is not included in the statistics of this issue's financing weekly report)
Infrastructure & Tools
Cryptocurrency infrastructure startup Zerohash has completed a $104 million Series D funding round led by Interactive Brokers, with participation from financial institutions including Morgan Stanley and SoFi. Strategic investors also include Zerohash clients and Apollo's fund. Founder and CEO Edward Woodford revealed that the company's valuation has reached $1 billion. Founded in 2017, Zerohash provides banks and fintech companies with the capabilities to launch blockchain-based products in three core areas: cryptocurrency trading, stablecoins, and tokenization. Interactive Brokers already uses Zerohash's cryptocurrency trading and custody services and will collaborate with the company to launch a stablecoin product. While Woodford declined to comment on whether Morgan Stanley and SoFi are also clients, he hinted that relevant information will be announced soon.
Stablecoin startup Bastion completes $14.6 million in new funding round, led by Coinbase Ventures
Stablecoin startup Bastion has completed a $14.6 million funding round led by Coinbase Ventures. Other investors include the venture capital arm of Japanese tech giant Sony, the venture capital arm of South Korean mobile phone manufacturer Samsung, the cryptocurrency arm of venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), and cryptocurrency venture capital firm Hashed. Bastion is a white-label stablecoin issuer, allowing businesses to more easily launch their own stablecoins without hiring lawyers to obtain regulatory approvals or software developers to write code. Bastion's differentiated advantage lies in its comprehensive stablecoin service offering, including a cryptocurrency wallet for clients to hold their tokens and access to cash-convertible stablecoins in 70 countries, including the United States.
Raiku Secures $13.5 Million in Funding to Promote “Predictable” Transactions on Solana
Web3 infrastructure startup Raiku announced the completion of a $13.5 million seed and pre-seed funding round from investors including Pantera Capital, Jump Crypto, and Lightspeed Faction. Raiku claims its tool can achieve predictable and guaranteed transaction execution by coordinating block space with Solana validators, addressing the issue of transaction uncertainty under Solana's high load. The product has launched on a testnet, with a mainnet launch planned for 2026.
Cloudburst Completes $7 Million Series A Funding to Expand Off-Chain Crypto Intelligence Platform
Cloudburst Technologies announced the completion of $7 million in Series A funding to develop its off-chain crypto intelligence platform. Borderless Capital led the round, bringing the company's total raised to $11 million since its founding in 2022. Additional support came from Strategic Cyber Ventures, CoinFund, Coinbase Ventures, Bloccelerate VC, and In-Q-Tel.
The company specializes in analyzing data sources such as chatrooms and regulatory filings to detect fraudulent networks, illicit actors, scams, and social media trends. The company says its tools are designed to provide real-time intelligence and predictive insights to regulators, law enforcement agencies, exchanges, investors, and other market participants. Its platform collects millions of off-chain data points, covering Telegram groups, niche forums, regulatory filings, and news sources, and applies proprietary artificial intelligence models to identify emerging threats and patterns.
Belfort, a company developing encrypted computing, announced the completion of a $6 million seed round of financing, led by Vsquared Ventures, with participation from Anagram, Protocol VC, Inovia Capital, Syndicate One, Prototype, Credibly Neutral, and Google Chief Scientist Jeff Dean and Naval Ravikant. The company supports data processing in encrypted form and can be applied to blockchain, finance, healthcare, government operations and other fields.
Digital asset infrastructure company Stablecorp completes $5 million in strategic financing
Stablecorp, a digital asset infrastructure provider, announced the completion of a $5 million CAD (approximately $3.6 million USD) strategic funding round led by FTP Ventures, with participation from existing shareholders and new investors. The company, previously backed by Coinbase Ventures, will use the new funds to expand its digital currency infrastructure. Stablecorp is a Canadian fintech company dedicated to building bank-grade blockchain infrastructure. Its flagship product, QCAD, is a digital currency fully backed 1:1 by Canadian dollar reserves.
Stable, the USDT-powered Layer 1 blockchain network, announced that users will be able to use PYUSD, a PayPal-issued stablecoin, for commercial and financial transactions on the Stable chain. PayPal Ventures, PayPal's global venture capital arm, also participated in Stable's latest funding round. Stable will integrate PYUSD into the Stable chain, leveraging the recent integration of LayerZero to programmatically enable interoperability between blockchains. Stable will also explore providing cross-chain compatibility and deposit and withdrawal capabilities for PYUSD, unlocking new use cases for the stablecoin across diverse blockchain ecosystems. Stable and PayPal have also agreed to explore potential new product developments around payments and stablecoin utility in the coming months.
other
Consumer entertainment:
Coop Records, an on-chain music platform, announced the completion of two rounds of funding, totaling $4.5 million. Led by 1kx and Nascent, this round included participation from 1confirmation and CB Ventures through the Base Ecosystem Fund. The funds will be used to advance the development of Coop Records' music launch platform.
Prediction market startup Melee has secured $3.5 million in funding from Variant, DBA, and angel investors to launch its pioneering "viral prediction market" platform. Drawing on successful examples like Polymarket, the platform allows users to create prediction markets on any topic. Its core mechanism achieves decentralized pricing by rewarding early, accurate traders, unlike traditional models that rely on professional market makers. The platform also places a strong emphasis on the creator economy, enabling influencers to create and profit from markets around fan interests. For example, a live streamer could launch a prediction market on a game release date.
Crypto asset reserves: ( not included in this issue's financing weekly report statistics )
AgriFORCE Growing Systems (NASDAQ: AGRI) announced its transition to AVAX Treasury Strategy, becoming the first Nasdaq-listed company focused solely on Avalanche blockchain technology. The company unveiled a $550 million fundraising strategy with the goal of accumulating over $700 million in AVAX tokens. This strategy includes a $300 million PIPE (Private Equity Investment) and plans to raise an additional $250 million through equity-linked instruments. The Strategic Advisory Board includes industry leaders such as Anthony Scaramucci of SkyBridge Capital and Brett Tejpaul of Coinbase Institutional. The initiative is backed by over 50 institutional and crypto-native investors, including ParaFi, Galaxy Digital, and Digital Currency Group.
Fitell Corporation (NASDAQ: FTEL), a global provider of fitness equipment and wellness solutions, announced that it has secured up to $100 million in financing to support the launch of its Solana Treasury, marking the first digital asset treasury based on Solana in Australia. Fitell has commenced dual listing on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX). Following the initial launch of the Solana Treasury, the company plans to change its name to "Solana Australia Corporation."
AlphaTON Capital completes $71 million in financing and acquires the first batch of TON
AlphaTON Capital announced the completion of approximately $71 million in funding, including a $36.2 million private placement and a $35 million loan from BitGo. The company has also purchased an initial approximately $30 million worth of TON tokens, becoming one of the world's largest holders of TON tokens. The company plans to increase its TON holdings to $100 million by the fourth quarter of 2025 and will participate in TON network validation, staking, and ecosystem project investments.
Centralized Finance
Kraken Completes $500 Million Funding, Valuing $15 Billion
Cryptocurrency exchange Kraken completed a $500 million funding round this month, valuing the exchange at $15 billion. This round, with no lead investor and terms set by Kraken itself, included Tribe Capital and its co-CEO Arjun Sethi. Kraken acquired NinjaTrader for $1.5 billion this year, adding 2 million users. This funding round prepares Kraken for an IPO, planned for 2026. Kraken primarily serves professional and institutional clients, and recently launched products such as xStocks to promote the integration of traditional finance and crypto assets.
Blockchain payments company Fnality completes $136 million Series C funding round, led by WisdomTree
Fnality, a London-based blockchain payments company, has completed a $136 million Series C funding round led by WisdomTree, with participation from Bank of America, Citigroup, KBC Group, Temasek, and Tradeweb. Existing investors include Santander, Barclays, BNP Paribas, DTCC, Euroclear, Goldman Sachs, ING, Nasdaq, State Street, and UBS. Fnality is committed to leveraging distributed ledger technology to build a regulated payment system based on central bank digital currencies to address the slow, expensive, and lengthy cross-border settlement times of traditional wholesale payment systems. The company plans to use this funding to expand its GBP system to the USD and EUR markets, targeting the over $120 billion cross-border payments market.
Stablecoin payment company RedotPay completes $47 million financing, led by Coinbase Ventures
Stablecoin payment company RedotPay has secured $47 million in strategic funding, pushing its valuation past $1 billion and officially becoming a fintech unicorn. This round was led by Coinbase Ventures, with continued support from Galaxy Ventures and Vertex Ventures, as well as participation from an undisclosed global tech entrepreneur. Founded in April 2023, RedotPay offers a stablecoin payment card, a multi-currency wallet, and global payment services. To date, the company has over 5 million users and has achieved $10 billion in total payment transaction volume. Launched in June of this year, the global payment service has gained traction in underdeveloped regions such as Latin America, enabling direct transfers of cryptocurrencies to local bank accounts or e-wallets.
Singapore-based startup Synthesys (formerly Equitize) announced it has secured $11 million in seed and strategic funding to build infrastructure for tokenized securities. Mark Pui led the round. Founded in 2023, Synthesys has developed a global liquidity network that brings together over 40 different primary and secondary distribution channels. Its platform automates cross-jurisdictional compliance and provides a universal liquidity layer for tokenized securities.
Crypto neobank Shield completes $5 million seed round led by Giant Ventures
Shield, a cryptocurrency neobank, announced on Monday that it has completed a $5 million seed round of funding led by Giant Ventures. Other participants in this round of financing include Chris Dixon's a16z cryptocurrency startup accelerator, Factor Capital, and Coinbase and Bank of America as strategic angel investors. The company said it has raised $7 million in funding to date. It is reported that the company was founded in 2022 and shifted to the payment field in 2024. It allows importers and exporters to use US cryptocurrencies for cross-border transactions while providing compliance review services. The new funds will be used to seek more bank partnerships. Although the company already has two major bank partners, it declined to disclose specific names. In addition, the company will continue to improve its compliance products.
Digital Securities Co. Ltd., a Japanese company operating the digital securities platform "renga," announced the completion of a second round of funding for its Series A funding round, totaling 300 million yen (approximately $2.0067 million). This brings the company's total funding since its founding to 1.2 billion yen (approximately $8.02 million). Participants in the latest round include SBI Ventures Three LLC and Mitsubishi UFJ Capital 10 Investment Corporation. As a "digital securities market platform," the company offers services that allow small purchases of a variety of investment products, including real estate funds and solar energy funds. The platform is accessible to both individual and institutional investors.
Coinbase credit card partner Cardless completes $60 million in financing, led by Spark Capital
Cardless, a startup specializing in co-branded credit cards, has secured $60 million in funding led by Spark Capital, with participation from Activant Capital, Industry Ventures, and Pear VC. The new capital will be used to expand functionality and develop projects with prominent brand clients, with some funding allocated to partnerships with Coinbase Global Inc. and Bilt Rewards. Notably, Cardless and Coinbase have a strategic partnership, with Coinbase being its first partner. In June of this year, Cardless launched its embedded credit card platform, which Coinbase leveraged to develop and issue the "Coinbase One Card."
(This round of financing is not included in the statistics of this issue's financing weekly report)
venture capital funds
Crypto VC firm Archetype raises $100 million for its third fund
Crypto venture capital firm Archetype announced the closing of its third fund, which will focus on supporting early-stage seed rounds for blockchain companies. Archetype raised its first $55 million fund in 2021, followed by a second $155 million fund in 2022, at the height of the last cryptocurrency bull run. Although Archetype's third fund is smaller at just $100 million, Egan said the selection of the right backers (i.e., limited partners) was a deliberate decision, with only one new LP brought in.
