Funding Weekly Report | 15 public funding events, Ripple invests $150 million in LMAX; YZi Labs invests tens of millions of dollars in Genius Trading

Highlights of the Period

According to incomplete statistics from PANews, last week (1.12-1.18), there were 15 blockchain investment and financing events worldwide, with a total funding amount exceeding $414 million. The overview is as follows:

• DeFi announced 3 investment and financing events, including YZi Labs investing tens of millions of dollars in Genius Trading, with CZ joining as an advisor;
• Web3+AI track announced 2 investment and financing events, including Web3 smart agent platform Neuramint completing a $5 million seed round;
• Infrastructure & Tools announced 3 investment and financing events, including Project Eleven completing $20 million in funding, with a post-investment valuation of approximately $120 million;
• Centralized Finance announced 5 investment and financing events, including Ripple injecting $150 million into LMAX to promote RLUSD stablecoin settlement applications in the institutional market;
• Other Web3 Applications announced 2 investment and financing events, including “Attention Market” platform Noise completing a $7.1 million seed round, led by Paradigm.

DeFi

YZi Labs invests tens of millions of dollars in Genius Trading, CZ joins as an advisor

Founded by Binance co-founder Zhao Changpeng (CZ) and He Yi, YZi Labs has invested “tens of millions of dollars” in Genius Trading, with CZ also joining as an advisor. Genius aims to build a privacy-first on-chain trading platform offering spot, perpetual contracts, and copy trading, targeting to become a decentralized version of “Binance.” The platform has processed over $60 million in trading volume during testing and plans to launch public privacy protocol testing in Q2 2026.

BeatCoin completes $5 million strategic round, Cogitent Ventures and Go2Mars Labs lead

BeatCoin announced the completion of a $5 million strategic round, led by Cogitent Ventures and Go2Mars Labs, with participation from Castrum Istanbul, Alpha Capital VC, and multiple Asia-Pacific family offices. The funds will be used to develop AI-driven incentive system Beat Points (BP) and the upcoming DEX protocol BeatSwap, aiming to standardize on-chain behaviors into credit assets and promote Web3’s transition from “airdrop-driven” to “value-driven.”

USDat stablecoin protocol developer Saturn completes $800,000 funding, with YZi Labs and others participating

USDat, a stablecoin protocol developer, announced the completion of $800,000 in funding, with participation from YZi Labs, Sora Ventures, and several angel investors in the crypto space. USDat’s revenue sources mainly combine Strategy perpetual preferred stock STRC and U.S. Treasuries. The project states that the protocol aims to introduce institutional-grade credit into DeFi, enabling Strategy credit to be used on-chain and providing a new model for corporate treasuries in decentralized finance.

AI

Konnex completes $15 million strategic financing, promotes “Physical Economy On-Chain”

Konnex announced securing $15 million in strategic investment, aiming to bring the approximately $25 trillion real labor economy from closed systems into a collaborative on-chain ecosystem. Participants include high-belief supporters such as Cogitent Ventures, Liquid Capital, Leland Ventures, Covey Network, Ventures M77, and Block Maven LLC. The project’s vision is to create infrastructure allowing autonomous robots to be scheduled, verified, and paid via contracts like applications, promoting robot labor and services operating under on-chain contracts, settlements, and incentive mechanisms.

Neuramint, Web3 smart agent platform, completes $5 million seed round

Neuramint, a Web3 smart agent platform, completed a $5 million seed round funding, with investors including Maelstrom, Borderless Capital, Symbolic Capital, and others. Neuramint supports cross-chain DeFi, NFT, and DAO automation through a visual drag-and-drop interface, lowering the barrier to smart contract integration. Funds will be used for platform development, SDK expansion, and public beta launch.

Infrastructure & Tools

Project Eleven completes $20 million funding, post-investment valuation about $120 million

Project Eleven completed $20 million in funding, with a post-investment valuation of approximately $120 million, focusing on protecting cryptocurrencies from future quantum computing attacks. The company is developing quantum-resistant cryptographic solutions, aiming to provide upgrade paths for existing public chains and crypto assets to address the potential security risks posed by quantum computing breaking current encryption algorithms.

Stablecoin payment company PhotonPay completes tens of millions of dollars in Series B funding, led by IDG Capital

Stablecoin payment infrastructure provider PhotonPay announced the completion of tens of millions of dollars in Series B funding, led by IDG Capital, with participation from Hillhouse Investment, Enlight Capital, Lightspeed Faction, and Shoplazza. Blacksheep Technology served as exclusive financial advisor. The company did not disclose valuation. The new funds will be used to accelerate expansion of its stablecoin financial payment channels, recruit key talent, and expand global regulatory compliance, focusing on the U.S. and some emerging markets.

Founded in 2015, PhotonPay currently has 11 centers worldwide with over 300 employees. The company states that its “native stablecoin” settlement infrastructure handles over $30 billion annually. It has established partnerships with financial institutions such as J.P. Morgan, Circle, Standard Chartered, DBS, and Mastercard, and plans to strengthen account issuance, merchant acquiring, and foreign exchange services. Starting from 2026, PhotonPay also plans to launch enterprise value-added services, including idle fund yield products and flexible credit tools.

KOLECT completes $1.2 million Pre-Seed funding, led by amber.ac

Emotion-driven quantitative trading infrastructure platform KOLECT completed $1.2 million Pre-Seed funding, led by amber.ac, with participation from Wonder Capital Group, GC Capital, and others. Funds will be used to expand emotion data, zero-code strategy builder, backtesting functions, and CEX/DEX execution systems, aiming to convert the market sentiment of over 3,000 KOLs into investable strategies.

Centralized Finance

Ripple invests $150 million in LMAX, promotes RLUSD stablecoin settlement in institutional markets

According to announcements from Ripple and LMAX Group, the two parties have reached a multi-year strategic cooperation agreement, with Ripple providing $150 million in funding to support the widespread application of RLUSD stablecoin as collateral and settlement asset in LMAX’s global institutional trading system. RLUSD will support crypto, perpetual contracts, CFDs, and some fiat cross-products, aiming to improve cross-asset margin efficiency and enable 24/7 on-chain settlement. The cooperation also includes RLUSD custody via LMAX Custody’s segregated wallets and integration with Ripple Prime to expand institutional liquidity and reduce market fragmentation.

Alpaca completes $150 million Series D funding, led by Drive Capital

Brokerage technology company Alpaca announced the completion of $150 million Series D funding, with a valuation of $1.15 billion, led by Drive Capital, with participation from Citadel Securities, Kraken, and BNP Paribas Ventures, and securing $40 million in credit lines. Alpaca focuses on providing infrastructure for stock, ETF, and crypto trading for enterprises, with annual recurring revenue exceeding $100 million, actively expanding into the Interactive Brokers market.

Latin American stablecoin payment company VelaFi completes $20 million Series B funding

Latin American stablecoin payment infrastructure company VelaFi announced the completion of $20 million Series B funding, led by XVC and Ikuyo, with participation from Planetree and BAI Capital, bringing total funding to over $40 million. Funds will be used to expand compliance, banking connections, and operations in the U.S. and Asia. VelaFi has processed billions of dollars for hundreds of enterprise clients, offering stablecoin solutions including cross-border payments, multi-currency accounts, and asset management.

Singapore-based crypto startup Veera completes $10 million funding to expand on-chain financial services

Singapore-based crypto financial platform Veera announced raising $10 million across Pre-Seed and Seed rounds, with investors including Sigma Capital, CMCC Titan Fund, 6th Man Ventures, and Ayon Capital. Launched in January 2025, Veera’s mobile platform has over 2 million downloads and 220,000 monthly active users. The platform supports self-custody wallets and has launched a “Veera Card” waitlist, planning to support global on-chain asset payments.

Stablecoin service provider Meld completes $7 million funding, led by Lightspeed Faction

Stablecoin service provider Meld announced completing $7 million in funding, led by Lightspeed Faction, with participation from F-Prime, Yolo Investments, and Scytale Digital. Total funding now reaches $15 million, valuation undisclosed. Meld aims to be a one-stop platform for enterprises and individuals to access and convert digital assets globally, targeting to build a “cryptocurrency Visa,” supporting purchases or settlements of stablecoins, Bitcoin, Ethereum, or other digital assets worldwide.

Others

“Attention Market” platform Noise completes $7.1 million seed round, led by Paradigm

Paradigm led a $7.1 million seed round for New York startup Noise, which aims to create an “attention market” based on social media trends, allowing users to bet whether a topic will remain hot, similar to “trend stocks.” Noise will launch on Coinbase’s Base mainnet in the coming months. Previous pre-seed investors include Figment Capital, Anagram, and others.

P2P competitive platform Slips completes $3.5 million seed round

Social P2P competitive platform Slips announced the completion of $3.5 million seed funding, led by Las Olas Capital and Sunset Bay Capital, with participation from Charlotte Hornets and Leeds United co-owner Andrew Schwartzberg. Slips features a non-house user betting mechanism, achieving 500% annual growth. Funds will be used for technology upgrades, team expansion, and user growth, as well as entering the crypto payments, stablecoin withdrawals, and international markets.

Acquisitions

(M&A events are not included in this week’s data statistics)

Polygon Labs acquires Coinme and Sequence for over $250 million

Polygon Labs announced acquiring two crypto startups, Coinme and Sequence, for over $250 million to strengthen its stablecoin payment network. Coinme holds remittance licenses in multiple U.S. states and focuses on crypto ATM infrastructure; Sequence provides wallet and on-chain infrastructure services. Polygon states this move is a “reverse benchmark” of Stripe’s stablecoin strategy, aiming to build a complete on-chain payment stack.

Bakkt agrees to acquire stablecoin payment infrastructure DTR

Bakkt Holdings (NYSE: BKKT) has reached an agreement to acquire global stablecoin payment infrastructure company Distributed Technologies Research Ltd. (DTR) for approximately 9,128,682 Class A common shares, advancing its stablecoin settlement and digital banking business integration. The deal is expected to close after regulatory and shareholder approval, with ICE voting to support it. The company will rename itself “Bakkt, Inc.” on January 22 and hold an investor day on March 17 at the NYSE.

Animoca Brands completes acquisition of digital collectibles and gaming company SOMO

Animoca Brands has completed the acquisition of digital collectibles and gaming company SOMO. SOMO owns products such as “SOMO Codex,” “SOMO Duel,” and the flagship game “SOMO Battleground,” with an ecosystem dedicated to transforming digital collectibles into cross-game playable, live-streamable, and tradable assets.

Yat Siu, co-founder and executive chairman of Animoca Brands, stated that SOMO is building a cultural operating system for collectibles, complementing the company’s existing portfolio. By integrating SOMO into its ecosystem, Animoca Brands plans to leverage its global gaming, community, and partner network to promote the SOMO brand across platforms and grow its community.