Highlights of the Period
According to incomplete statistics from PANews, last week (3.9-3.15), there were 15 blockchain investment and financing events worldwide, totaling over $238 million. Overview as follows:
- DeFi track announced 2 investment and financing events, including Unitas Labs, a yield stablecoin protocol, which announced a $13.33 million seed round;
- AI + Web3 announced 2 investment and financing events, including VeryAI completing a $10 million seed round, led by Polychain Capital;
- Infrastructure & Tools field announced 9 investment and financing events, including Zcash Open Development Lab (ZODL) completing over $25 million seed round, with Paradigm, a16z crypto participating;
- Centralized Finance field announced 2 investment and financing events, including stablecoin payment company KAST raising $80 million, led jointly by QED Investors and Left Lane Capital.
DeFi
Yield Stablecoin Protocol Unitas Completes $13.33 Million Seed Round
Unitas Labs, a yield stablecoin protocol, announced the completion of a $13.33 million seed round, with participation from Awaken Finance, Amber Group, BB Fund, Taisu Ventures, Bixin Ventures, SevenX Ventures, and others. Unitas plans to use the funds to build on-chain execution and strategy infrastructure for long-term capital, enhance stable asset yields through transparent market-neutral strategies, and gradually expand to collateralized assets such as BTC, tokenized commodities, and RWA under a unified custody, risk control, and monitoring framework, focusing on compliance integration and DeFi ecosystem connectivity.
DEXTools Raises $3 Million to Launch PerpTools, a Perpetual DEX
DeFi data analytics platform DEXTools announced a $3 million funding round to launch its perpetual DEX “PerpTools.” The round was led by DEXForce and Orderly. PerpTools plans to launch a public beta by the end of Q2 2026, after reaching $150 million in trading volume during closed testing. It will integrate AI-driven analysis, market prediction, and real-time execution, with plans to add copy trading, rule-based automation, and prediction market features. DEXTools CEO stated that PerpTools aims to unify analysis, AI strategy tools, and deep liquidity into a single community governance product.
AI
Palmprint Authentication Company VeryAI Completes $10 Million Seed Round Led by Polychain Capital
Palmprint authentication startup VeryAI completed a $10 million seed round led by Polychain Capital, with participation from Berggruen Institute, Anagram, and several crypto angel investors. VeryAI offers a mobile camera-based palmprint scanning SDK, which partners can integrate into existing apps to combat bot accounts and multi-factor authentication fatigue. Its system analyzes palmprint textures and requires users to perform random gestures to prevent screenshots, screen recordings, and AI forgery. The company claims a false recognition rate of about one in ten million, higher than Apple Face ID’s official level. Currently, VeryAI mainly serves crypto platforms, working with exchange MEXC for withdrawal verification, charging based on registration and re-verification counts, with plans to expand to banks and government clients and add more risk control tools.
AI Entertainment Platform NEXST Completes Over $3 Million Strategic Round, Participated by Castrum Capital, TBV, and Others
Japanese AI entertainment platform NEXST announced over $3 million in strategic funding, with participation from Castrum Capital, TBV, M2M Capital, Becker Ventures, and others, raising approximately $3 million in seed funding. NEXST integrates AI, RWA, and blockchain technology to enable global fans to enjoy entertainment more conveniently and with immersive experiences. It aims to reshape the global entertainment industry through innovative models and cutting-edge technology.
Infrastructure & Tools
Crypto Accounting Platform Cryptio Completes $45 Million Series B Funding, Led by BlackFin Capital Partners and Sentinel Global
Digital asset accounting startup Cryptio announced a $45 million Series B funding round, led by BlackFin Capital Partners and Sentinel Global, with participation from 1kx, BlueYard Capital, and Ledger Cathay Capital. The company provides large institutions with digital asset holdings, custody, crypto loans, and on-chain asset management software. The round was completed three weeks ago, valuation undisclosed. The company has about 110 employees and serves over 450 clients, including stablecoin issuer Circle and BNP Paribas’ blockchain subsidiary.
Zcash Development Lab ZODL Completes Over $25 Million Seed Round
Zcash Open Development Lab (ZODL) announced it has completed over $25 million in seed funding, with investors including Paradigm, a16z crypto, Winklevoss Capital, Coinbase Ventures, and others. Founded by former Electric Coin Company (ECC) head Josh Swihart, ZODL’s team previously launched the Zcash wallet Zodl (originally Zashi). Since its launch in 2024, Zodl has driven Zcash privacy pool growth by over 400%, facilitating over $600 million in ZEC exchanges since October last year. All former ECC members have joined ZODL, continuing to develop Zcash protocol and building self-custody privacy financial platforms.
Solana Ecosystem AI Data Market Kled AI Completes $5.5 Million Seed Round
Solana-based AI data marketplace Kled AI announced a $5.5 million seed round, with investors including Waymo founder Sebastian Thrun, Bernard Arnault’s fund Aglaé Ventures, K5 Global, Diplo, Parable VC, Cox Exponential, and others, bringing total funding to $9 million. Kled AI aims to build a human data marketplace, allowing users to upload files via its consumer app to contribute data. The platform has collected over 12,000 structured datasets covering self-centric data, medical data, urban travel data, and more, for AI labs and enterprises to purchase for model training.
Bitcoin L1 Smart Contract Platform OP_NET Raises $5 Million, Led by Further
Bitcoin L1 native smart contract platform OP_NET announced a $5 million funding round, led by Further, with participation from a16z, Arcanum Capital, Humla Ventures, Morningstar Ventures, G20 Ventures, and UTXO Management. OP_NET’s core function is to transform Bitcoin’s programmability into that of Ethereum-like smart chains, with plans to launch on Bitcoin mainnet on March 17.
Bittensor Infrastructure Startup General Tensor Completes $5 Million Seed and Pre-Seed Rounds
Bittensor infrastructure startup General Tensor announced over-subscribed seed and pre-seed rounds totaling $5 million. Seed funding was led by Goldman Sachs-backed Good Morning Holdings; pre-seed was led by Lvna Capital in December 2024, with participation from DCG, X Ventures, Proof of Talk, and Outliers Fund. Founded in early 2024, General Tensor focuses on building and operating mining, validation, and subnet infrastructure for the decentralized AI network Bittensor. The company claims to generate TAO tokens at about 1/40 of “buy-and-hold” costs. Besides infrastructure, it develops consumer DeFi apps and incubates subnets.
Bitcoin Infrastructure Company Ark Labs Completes $5.2 Million Seed Round, Tether Participates
Bitcoin infrastructure firm Ark Labs completed a $5.2 million seed round, with Tether, Ego Death Capital, Epoch VC, and others participating. Anchorage Digital and former PayPal CFO Ralph Ho also involved.
P2P Web3 Application Engine MarsCat Raises $3 Million, Led by Animoca Brands
P2P Web3 application engine MarsCat raised $3 million, with investors including Animoca Brands, Cogitent Ventures, Cryptogram Venture (CGV), TBV, BD Ventures, and Becker Ventures. MarsCat is a decentralized Web3 platform and application engine based on P2P networks, providing infrastructure for decentralized apps to operate in privacy-first, serverless environments without relying on centralized servers, aiming for secure communication, scalable deployment, and censorship resistance.
Crypto Bank Anchorage Digital Makes Strategic Investment in Immunefi
Crypto financial service provider and the first US federally chartered crypto bank Anchorage Digital announced a strategic investment in Immunefi, acquiring its native token IMU. Immunefi will also provide security services for Anchorage’s non-custodial wallet Porto, supporting institutional clients’ direct participation in DeFi protocols and on-chain investment strategies. Immunefi has protected over $180 billion in TVL across protocols and paid out over $130 million in bug bounties to white-hat hackers.
Private Market Blockchain Infrastructure Corastone Completes New Funding Round, Including Fidelity, Future Standard
Private market blockchain infrastructure firm Corastone announced funding from Fidelity, Future Standard, and Hamilton Lane, amount undisclosed. The new funds will support building a proprietary permissioned blockchain network to provide unified infrastructure and data standards for private markets, enabling higher transaction volumes and more complex trading structures.
Centralized Finance
Stablecoin Payment Company KAST Completes $80 Million Funding, Valued at About $600 Million
Stablecoin payment company KAST completed an $80 million funding round, led by QED Investors and Left Lane Capital. The funds will be used for expansion in North America, Latin America, and the Middle East, as well as hiring, licensing, and product development. The new valuation is approximately $600 million. Sources say the deal was finalized in October, and the company’s annualized revenue this year is expected to reach $100 million.
Stablecoin Company MetaComp Completes Pre-A+ Round, Raised $35 Million in Three Months
Singapore-based digital finance platform MetaComp completed a Pre-A+ round, bringing total funding over three months to $35 million, including participation from a major internet company, Spark Venture, and other investors. Existing shareholders also participated. MetaComp aims to build a Web2.5 payment and wealth management platform, offering stablecoin/fiat hybrid payments and securities/RWA tokenized wealth management. The new funds will accelerate expansion of StableX network in high-growth corridors across Asia, Middle East, Africa, and Latin America, and develop AI-driven strategies supporting proxy Web2.5 payments and wealth services.
DAT
Eightco Holdings Completes $125 Million Financing, Led by Bitmine, with Ark Invest Participating
Crypto asset treasury Eightco Holdings announced a $125 million financing to support its blockchain and AI initiatives. Led by Bitmine with $75 million, Ark Invest and Payward (Kraken’s parent) each invested $25 million. Bitmine Chairman Tom Lee will join Eightco’s board, and Ark Invest’s futurist Brett Winton will serve as an advisory board member. Eightco also announced a $50 million strategic investment in OpenAI and a $25 million investment in Beast Industries, owned by YouTuber MrBeast. Following this news, Eightco’s stock rose 12% on Thursday.
(This financing event is not included in weekly statistics.)
