Rally, GlobeDX and SingularityDAO highlight active week for crypto raises

Blockchain projects Rally, GlobeDX and SingularityDAO concluded highly successful private sales this week, offering further evidence that smart-money investors were still eyeing up-and-coming digital asset plays. 

Rally, the so-called “crypto for creators” platform, raised $57 million for its community treasury through the sale of its RLY governance token, the project announced Wednesday. The Rally network now has over 100 creator coins representing various artists, with the top-five creators generating an average of $102,000 in weekly transactions.

Global Derivative Exchange, or GlobeDX, also made headlines this week by concluding an $18 million private raise led by major digital-asset players, including Y Combinator, Pantera, OKEx, CMT Digital and Wave Financial. GlobeDX markets itself as the “next-generation cryptocurrency exchange,” offering higher leverage, market depth and access to the Crypto Volatility Index perpetual futures contract.

Meanwhile, SingularityDAO concluded a private sale worth $2.7 million, with major contributions from AlphaBit, GBV, SMO Capital, QCP Capital and several others. The DeFi project, which is backed by Ben Goertzel’s SingularityNET AI marketplace, allows users to earn yield and diversify across a range of cryptocurrencies through an automated basket of assets.

While not quite the same as the 2017 ICO craze, blockchain projects are attracting significant capital during the current bull market. Even major financial institutions, such as JPMorgan Chase, Mastercard and UBS, are participating in the digital asset market through strategic investments. Investors are scrutinizing projects a lot more carefully these days, with many of the raises centered on projects with viable use cases and proven business models. That’s a significant contrast to the 2017 fundraising haul, which was largely driven on hype and euphoria.

The macro view of the cryptocurrency market is that we are still in the very early stages of a burgeoning new industry that many say mirrors the dot-com boom of the 1990s and early 2000s. Although this is likely to breed irrational exuberance on the part of investors, it's also equally likely to produce viable long-term projects.