Pintu, Indonesia’s first mobile native cryptocurrency wallet and trading platform, has raised $35 million from some of blockchain’s biggest venture funds — putting the company on track to expand its team and product offerings in the near future. The Series A was led by Lightspeed Venture Partners, a technology-focused investor with broad exposure to blockchain, fintech and data analytics. Several other high-profile venture funds also participated in the raise, including Alameda Ventures, Blockchain.com, Pantera Capital, Coinbase Ventures, Castle Island Ventures and Intudo Ventures. With the funds, Pintu plans to hire additional talent, roll out new product offerings and fuel future …

Cryptocurrency market intelligence provider Messari has concluded a $21 million fundraise that was supported by some of the biggest venture firms in blockchain, once again highlighting growing investor appetite for budding crypto startups. The new funding will aid Messari in expanding its product suites as well as hiring and retaining more engineering and research talent. The company also plans to expand its enterprise offerings targeting institutional players. Ryan Selkis, Messari's co-founder and CEO, further explained to Cointelegraph how the funds will be deployed: "We haven’t yet burnt through our seed capital from 2019, and have been highly capital efficient to …

MakersPlace, a nonfungible token (NFT) market dedicated to digital art, has secured $30 million in Series A financing, highlighting once again that venture funds are keen to back promising NFT plays. The funding round will be used by MakersPlace to scale business operations and acquire additional talent as it continues to attract new users and artists to its platform. The investment was co-led by Bessemer Venture Partners and Pantera Capital, with additional participation from Coinbase Ventures, Sony Music Entertainment, Uncork Capital, Dragon Digital Assets and 9Yards Capital. Several notable angel investors also participated in the round, including Acquavella Galleries, Sabrina …

Investment firm and development studio Polyient has unveiled a nonfungible token (NFT) marketplace with decentralized finance (DeFi) functionality. The marketplace dubbed “PolyientX” is set for a beta release in August on Ethereum, with an official launch targeted for sometime in the fall. The initial launch will feature NFTs from Ape In, a DeFi-enabled NFT collectibles game and Rate Network, a decentralized NFT pricing and rating protocol. According to Polyient, users can stake their NFTs in a vault to earn rewards, describing it as “a unique fee share mechanism where users — not corporate stakeholders — are the beneficiaries of transaction …

Multiverse, a decentralized artificial intelligence ecosystem that funds early-stage tech companies, has secured $15 million in investments from some of blockchain’s biggest venture funds. Samsung Next, an investment group focused on AI, blockchain and fintech, was among the investors, along with Arrington XRP Capital, Huobi Ventures and Fenbushi, Multiverse announced Wednesday. With the raise, Multiverse now has an implied valuation of $250 million, making it one of the largest ecosystem developer funds at the intersection of blockchain and AI. The investment will go towards expanding Multiverse's capacity across engineering, research and marketing. The organization is eyeing a bigger presence in …

Popular Bitcoin (BTC) rewards app Lolli has received fresh backing from venture funds and other investors as it plans to scale its services to a wider audience. On Wednesday, the company announced it had closed a $10 million Series A funding round led by Acrew Capital, with additional participation from UpNorth Management, Animal Capital, Banana Capital and Formula. Influencers such as Logan Paul and Chantel Jeffries also participated. Several of Lolli’s previous backers including Seven Seven Six, 3K VC, Gabriel Leydon and Forerunner Ventures also recommitted to the company in the latest fundraiser. Lolli said the financing will go towards …

Biconomy, a multichain infrastructure network for decentralized applications, has concluded a $9 million private funding round that was co-led by venture firms DACM and Mechanism Capital. Ahmed Al-Balaghi, CEO of Biconomy, said his protocol has been designed to address some of the biggest challenges with Web 3.0 transactions such as gas fees, Ether-only payments and fragmented layer-two solutions. He explained: “If we are able to solve even a fraction of those challenges, we believe we will be able to onboard the next billion users into the DeFi and broader Web 3.0 ecosystem.” Related: A multichain future will accelerate innovators and …

International payments giant Mastercard continues focusing on the digital asset industry by welcoming a batch of major cryptocurrency startups in its fintech accelerator. The company announced Tuesday a new startup engagement program as part of Mastercard Start Path, an accelerator program for fintech startups, aiming to support companies working with digital assets, cryptocurrency and blockchain technology. The program has added seven new startups, including digital wallet and trading platform Uphold, crypto storage firm GK8, American investment platform Domain Money, blockchain oracle startup SupraOracles, blockchain infrastructure provider STACS, digital asset firm Taurus, and Mintable, a marketplace for issuing and trading nonfungible …

Celo-powered crypto wallet Valora has closed on a $20 million funding round, as the company announced it will become a standalone entity. In a Tuesday announcement, Valora said Andreessen Horowitz, Polychain Capital, SV Angel, Nima Capital, NFX, Valor Capital, and others had invested $20 million in a Series A round for the crypto app, which will now operate as an independent company. Jackie Bona, the former head of consumer growth of Celo's cLabs cLabs, will become Valora’s new chief executive officer. "I am delighted to be leading Valora at such a dynamic time in this important evolution, both as an …

Splinterlands — a trading card game built on the blockchain — has concluded a private token sale that netted the company $3.6 million in proceeds, offering further evidence that investors are keen to back promising crypto plays. The sale centered around the SPS token, which was built for the Splintershards Decentralized Autonomous Organization and will form the basis of game-related governance proposals. Through the SPS token, users will have the ability to influence a range of governance-related decisions, including sponsored tournaments, rewards and card balance updates, among other things. Related: NFTs make it possible for gamers to have digital property …

Blockchain infrastructure provider and crypto custodian Fireblocks has secured another $310 million in strategic investments, bringing its total valuation to $2 billion and marking another major milestone for the company. Michael Shaulov, CEO of Fireblocks, told Cointelegraph that the funding would go toward expanding internal capacity, including increasing the research and development and support teams. "In addition, we are aggressively expanding into markets such as EMEA and APAC, and we will use funds to grow our go-to-market team," Shaulov said, adding that Fireblocks will place even more emphasis on strategic partnerships. Since launching in 2019, Fireblocks has raised a cumulative …

Tyson Fury’s first venture into the NFT market resulted in a single NFT selling for almost $1 million on HoDooi.com — a new platform aiming to become the 'eBay of NFTs'. The auction for ‘Lineal by Tyson Fury’ closed on July 16, and represents one of the top athlete-themed sales in the market to date. The NFT depicts a tokenized illustration of Fury with two championship belts over each shoulder and a crown featuring his nickname “Gypsy King” on the front. The NFT includes real-world bonuses such as a signed five-by-five foot painting of the artwork, signed boxing gloves, and …