Blockchain Startups Have Managed to Raise $1.8 Billion through VC Fundings

By Kapil Gauhar

The rising demand among the Venture Capital firms for investment in crypto firms has increased as a new report by Outlier Ventures published that the blockchain startups have managed to raise $1.8 billion through VC investments.

Crypto market has witnessed 343 VC deals during the first half of 2018 which has raised around $1.8 billion. Growth in the VC investment sphere was the result of VC “mega rounds” that amount to over $100 million.

One such example is of Bitmain, which cleared $400 million Series B round in June eventually valuing the company at $12 billion. Circle saw a rocketed growth in its worth when it landed $3 billion valuation after raising $110 million. The mobile payments and cryptocurrency trading firm also took over Poloniex, a popular digital exchange.

Another trend catching fire is of the M&A (Merger and Acquisition). This year saw Coinbase, the largest digital exchange acquiring over seven companies like Cipher browser, Memo.ai, Digital wealth, Earn.com, Paradex, Venovate, and Keystone capital. Other major M&As are Tron’s acquisition of BitTorrent and the Trust wallet getting acquired by Binance.

The expansion of the crypto market is also due to the ever increasing number of decentralised digital exchanges. Besides Bancor, Idex, and Forkdelta that hold 91% of the market, other smaller digital exchanges like Air swap, Radar Relay, and kyber have been successful in raising $10 million Series A.

Even the corporate sector is eyeing the opportunities that crypto world has in store for them. Last month Japanese messaging app Line came up with its exchange Bitbox, Nasdaq CEO Adena Friedman has shown interest in listing their tokens on the exchange, and the well known stock trading app Robinhood integrated tokens with its offerings in the beginning of 2018.

Furthermore, Stablecoins, which allow the investor to hold and transfer fiat currencies pegged tokens between wallets without any requirement of a banking intermediary, are becoming very popular in the market. As of now, there are over ten live stable currency operations supported by blockchain tech. Reportedly, Tether is the largest stablecoin operator with the current market capitalisation of $2.7 billion.

New developments and ever growing capital in the crypto industry is paving way for its global augmentation. It is just a matter of time till the nascent tech becomes one of the biggest inventions ever.