After flirting with a $2 trillion market capitalization for the last couple of days, the cryptocurrency market took a 7% hit on April 7, dropping the total crypto market cap to $1.8 trillion. As the unexpected sell-off took place, investors scrambled to find a reason to explain the move. Analysts typically identify the use of excessive leverage as the prime suspect, as this usually occurs as the market reaches an all-time high and traders get greedy, but this is an easy conclusion to reach. The actual cause could be near impossible to determine. Still, a starting place is looking at …

Cryptocurrency and blockchain-related companies have already received more funding this year than in all of 2020, according to a new report. In the first quarter of 2021, 129 startups focusing on crypto and blockchain technology have received a total of $2.6 billion in funding, Bloomberg reports, citing data from business analytics firm CB Insights. Over the course of 2020, crypto and blockchain firms attracted a total of $2.3 billion in 341 deals. According to the data, 2018 is the record year in terms of funding secured in the crypto industry, with total funding amounting to $3.3 billion. According to CB …

The consolidation of cryptocurrency-related companies surged massively in 2020, hitting a new record in deal activity, according to a new report by professional services network PwC. The total volume of mergers and acquisitions in the crypto industry more than doubled from $481 million in 2019 to $1.1 billion in2020, PwC said in a Monday market overview, as seen by Bloomberg. The average deal size in crypto surged from $19 million in 2019 to nearly $53 million, with crypto fundraising increasing 33% in overall value in 2020. Countries in the EMEA region saw a notable spike in the number of deals, …

Blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis recently added $100 million to its books thanks to investments from a number of parties, including Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff. In a report from CNBC on Friday, Chainalysis CEO Michael Gronager suggested that the success of this fundraising round was due to a feeling of "heightened momentum" in the cryptocurrency space. “Chainalysis, the blockchain analysis company, today announced it secured a $100 million Series D financing led by Paradigm, bringing its valuation to over $2 billion,” the company said on Friday in a statement provided to Cointelegraph. “Previous investors Addition and Ribbit increased their investment in …

Just a few weeks before the filing deadline for U.S. taxpayers, cryptocurrency accounting and data company Lukka said it had raised an additional $53 million in a new funding round. In an announcement today, Lukka said it had completed a $53 million Series D funding round led by Soros Fund Management — a fund created by billionaire investor George Soros — S&P Global, and accounting advisor CPA.com. Lukka said it planned to add additional features for customers dealing in derivatives, DeFi products, and other products of the crypto space. “Innovation in the crypto ecosystem has exposed traditional finance to a …

The Avanti Financial Group has announced that it has raised $37 million in a Series A round, bringing the company closer to launch as a digital asset bank. In a March 25 announcement, Avanti stated that it will use the proceeds to fund the required regulatory capital needed for launch, in addition to funding development and other operating expenses. The round brings the total amount raised to $44 million. Participants in the round are a who’s who of institutional investors including Coinbase Ventures, Binance.US, Morgan Creek Digital, Madison Paige Ventures, AP Capital, and Susquehanna Private Equity Investments, in addition to …

Futures contracts trading has grown immensely over the past year, and proof of this comes from the total rise in open interest. Open interest is the total number of outstanding contracts, and the figure has risen from $3.9 billion to the current $21.5 billion in six months, a 450% increase. Sometimes traders assume that a high or low funding rate and soaring open interest indicate a bullish market, but as Cointelegraph has explained before, this is not the case. This article will take a quick look at the funding rate and how traders interpret the metric when trading perpetual futures …

OpenSea, one of the largest digital collectible marketplaces, has secured backing from venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, or a16z, and others in a new funding round. According to Andreessen Horowitz, the firm is leading a $23 million Series A round for OpenSea alongside a16z’s Cultural Leadership Fund, as well as angel investors Ron Conway, Mark Cuban, Tim Ferriss, Belinda Johnson, Naval Ravikant, Ben Silberman, and others. “OpenSea makes NFTs searchable, usable, and organized,” said a16z general partner Katie Haun. “But it goes further and provides a marketplace that brings all platforms together and eases transactions among all parties, the way …

The mysterious buyer of the world’s most expensive non-fungible token “Everydays: The First 5000 Days” by Beeple, has revealed their identity. Metapurse, a global NFT fund whose founder successfully bid and acquired the piece in a Christie’s auction for $69.3 million in early March, penned a blog post Thursday, disclosing the real names and stories of key figures behind the project. According to the announcement, Vignesh Sundaresan is the real name of MetaKovan, the pseudonymous founder of Metapurse and the buyer of the Beeple’s $69 million NFT. Before founding Metapurse, Sundaresan had been actively involved in the crypto industry since …

Cryptocurrency startup Fireblocks has raised $133 million in a Series C funding round. The investment round was led by venture capital firms Coatue, Ribbit and Stripes, with strategic investment from BNY Mellon and Silicon Valley Bank. Michael Shaulov, CEO of Fireblocks, said the cash injection will allow the company to expand the settlement infrastructure needed to onboard new customers as crypto adoption heats up: “While we have no plans to become a bank, we believe our infrastructure will lend itself perfectly to power an entirely new era of financial services.” Regarding his firm’s investment in Fireblocks, Micky Malka of Ribbit …

Austria-based cryptocurrency firm Bitpanda has closed a $170 million funding round to further the firm's international growth. The latest Series B funding round was led by Valar Ventures — a venture capital firm backed by PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel — Bitpanda announced on Tuesday, and featured partners from Yuri Milner’s investment firm DST Global, which is known as a major investor in United States-based crypto-friendly stock trading app Robinhood. While DST is a new investor in Bitpanda, Valar previously led a $52 million Series A round in September 2020. According to Bitpanda, the new funding round has made the firm …

A fast riser in the decentralized finance, or DeFi, world has announced a $4.9 million raise on Sunday led by major industry venture capital groups — as well as some unusual upstart players. Alchemix, a DeFi lending protocol whose loans automatically repay themselves via deposits into other yield-bearing protocols, announced on Discord the $4.9 million raise led by 10 investors, including industry mainstays CMS Holdings and Alameda Research, as well as upstart crypto VC players such as eGirl Capital. Rounding out the investors are Immutable Capital, Nascent, Protoscale Capital, LedgerPrime, Fisher8 Capital, Orthogonal Trading and one unidentified “individual.” Exiting news! …