Funding Weekly Report | 15 publicly disclosed funding events; Intercontinental Exchange invests an additional $600 million in Polymarket.

Highlights of this episode

According to incomplete statistics from PANews, there were 15 investment and financing events in the global blockchain sector last week (March 23-29), with a total funding scale exceeding US$767 million. An overview is as follows:

• Two investment and financing events were announced in the DeFi sector. Among them, Kairos Labs completed a $2.4 million seed round of financing, led by 6th Man Ventures.
• In the AI+Web3 sector, three investment and financing events were announced, including Origins Network completing an $8 million funding round with investors including Animoca Brands;
• The Infrastructure & Tools sector announced three investment and financing events, including Soneium blockchain co-developer Startale Group completing a $63 million Series A funding round;
• Two investment and financing events were announced in the centralized finance sector, including the completion of a $36 million Series B financing round by cross-border payment company Tazapay, led by Circle Ventures;
• In the prediction market sector, an investment event was announced: Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) invested an additional $600 million in Polymarket.

DeFi

Kairos, an on-chain interest rate swap protocol, has raised $2.4 million in seed funding.

Kairos Labs announced the completion of a $2.4 million seed funding round, led by 6th Man Ventures, with participation from Lattice, Advancit Capital, and Compa Capital. The company also released a technical white paper outlining its permissionless, non-custodial interest rate swap protocol built on the EVM ecosystem. This protocol has already generated over $300 million in notional swap trading volume during its testing phase and is expected to launch on the Ethereum mainnet and Base within weeks. Kairos allows anyone to create swap markets based on fixed/floating interest rates, maturities, collateral, and oracle parameters, providing infrastructure for hedging interest rate volatility for DeFi lending protocols such as Aave and Morpho, and supporting the construction of fixed-income products around ETH staking yields and various on-chain/off-chain interest rates.

Tori Finance Raises Seed Funding Round Led by Delphi Ventures

Tori Finance has announced the completion of its seed round of financing, led by Delphi Ventures. The specific amount raised and valuation in this round have not been disclosed in publicly available information. Tori has launched a composable yield token, strUSD, which packages institutional-grade delta-neutral (market-neutral) strategies onto the blockchain, targeting an annualized return of up to approximately 15%.

AI

Origins Network raises $8 million in funding, with participation from Animoca Brands and others.

Origins Network announced the completion of an $8 million funding round, with investors including Animoca Brands, tbv, Candaq, Castrum, CoinvestorV, and several family offices and angel investors. The project focuses on verifiable compute, planning to continuously build an infrastructure layer for the AI-native future, achieving transparency and verifiability in computing power, data, and execution processes. The company stated that it has received strategic support from AWS and Tencent Cloud, and the next phase will accelerate core infrastructure upgrades, expand decentralized computing power capacity, deepen network-wide AI integration, and invite developers to participate in ecosystem building.

London-based compliance technology company Eunice raises $8 million in funding, with participation from Moonfire Ventures and others.

London-based compliance technology company Eunice has raised $8 million in seed and pre-seed funding rounds. Investors include Moonfire Ventures, Speedinvest, and Openspace Ventures, as well as several angel investors from the finance and crypto industries. Eunice utilizes AI agents to provide traceable and auditable due diligence and disclosure infrastructure for alternative assets such as digital assets and private equity, helping institutions generate structured, asset-grade risk and compliance reports. Initially serving digital asset exchanges and custodians (such as Coinbase, Crypto.com, Copper, and Zodia Custody) and participating in the UK FCA regulatory sandbox, the company is expanding its business to the broader private market, including pension funds, endowments, and funds of funds.

PeakAI, an AI-powered Web3 marketing analytics platform, has raised $2 million in seed funding.

PeakAI, an AI-driven Web3 marketing analytics platform, has raised $2 million in seed funding. Investors include Cogitent Ventures, Covey Network, CatcherVC, 10K Ventures, MARBLEX Corp., PAKA, and ViaBTC Capital. The platform combines blockchain data with decentralized marketing infrastructure to help brands conduct marketing campaigns through micro-influencers and settle transactions in USDC.

Infrastructure & Tools

Soneium, in partnership with developer Startale, has raised $63 million in Series A funding, with participation from SBI Group and others.

Soneium blockchain co-developer Startale Group has completed a $63 million Series A funding round, including a $50 million Series B round led by SBI Group and a $13 million Series C round previously invested by Sony Innovation Fund. The company stated it will use the new funds to expand its Layer 1 network, Strium, to support institutional-grade tokenized securities and real-world asset trading, and to drive the adoption of stablecoins such as JPYSC.

Startale and SBI previously collaborated to launch Strium, a Layer 1 blockchain focused on tokenized securities and real-world asset trading, and JPYSC, the first yen stablecoin backed by a trust bank. Startale also partnered with Sony to launch Soneium, an Ethereum Layer 2 network, and continues to expand its ecosystem.

Ethereum block builder Eureka Labs raises $6.7 million in seed funding.

Ethereum block builder Eureka Labs has raised $6.7 million in seed funding, co-led by Spark Capital and Collider Ventures. The funding utilizes a simple future equity protocol plus token warrants structure. The new capital will be used to advance its "programmable block" technology. Founded in December 2024, the startup has become the fourth largest Ethereum block builder. Its "programmable block" technology allows logic to be added during block building, enabling features such as temporary credits within blocks and state-aware pre-computation, providing developers with greater security at the block level.

Privacy-focused stablecoin payment network Payy raises $6 million in seed funding, led by FirstMark Capital.

Payy, a startup focusing on privacy-focused stablecoin payments, has raised $6 million in seed funding. The round was led by FirstMark Capital, with participation from Robot Ventures and DBA Crypto. Formerly the Web3 database project Polybase, Payy transitioned to stablecoin payments in 2023. It currently offers self-custodied wallets and Visa cards supporting USDC transactions. Payy has also developed the Payy Network, a Layer 2 network on Ethereum using zero-knowledge proofs, enabling on-chain privacy for transaction amounts and addresses. The company claims its platform already reaches over 100,000 users in 120 countries, with an annualized transaction volume of approximately $130 million. Going forward, it will focus on providing stablecoin payment solutions to financial institutions and fintech companies and plans to launch its native token.

Centralized Finance

Cross-border payment company Tazapay has completed a $36 million Series B funding round, led by Circle Ventures.

Singapore-based cross-border payments company Tazapay has completed an extended Series B funding round led by Circle Ventures, bringing its total Series B funding to $36 million. New investors include CMT Digital and Coinbase Ventures, joining Circle Ventures, Peak XV Partners, January Capital, and GMO Venture Partners in this extended round. Existing investors include Ripple, Norinchukin Capital, ARC180, and RTP Global.

Tazapay focuses on building cross-border transaction settlement and payment infrastructure for businesses. It currently holds licenses or has completed registration in Singapore, Canada, Australia, and the United States, and is applying for relevant licenses in the UAE, the EU, and Hong Kong. The company stated that this round of funding will be used to obtain more regulatory approvals and develop products that automate payment processes.

XFX, a foreign exchange settlement company, has completed a $17 million Series A funding round to expand its presence in fiat and stablecoin foreign exchange settlement.

XFX, a foreign exchange settlement startup, announced the completion of a $17 million Series A funding round led by Castle Island Ventures, with participation from Haun Ventures and Coinbase Ventures, among others. This followed a $9 million seed round. Founded by three former Bitso employees and headquartered in Miami, XFX focuses on providing institutional clients with high-speed forex and payment infrastructure between fiat and stablecoins. Currently supporting USD, Mexican Peso, and Colombian Peso, as well as various stablecoins, it emphasizes deep liquidity on a select few currency pairs and plans to use the new funding to expand its quantitative team and strengthen partnerships with trading desks and banks.

Prediction Market

Intercontinental Exchange invests an additional $600 million in Polymarket.

Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) announced the completion of a new $600 million direct cash investment in prediction market platform Polymarket, as part of its equity financing round. Additionally, ICE expects to purchase up to $40 million more in Polymarket securities from existing shareholders. ICE had previously made an initial direct investment of $1 billion in Polymarket in October 2025; this transaction fulfills all of ICE's investment obligations in Polymarket. ICE stated that this investment is not expected to have a material impact on its financial performance or capital return plans, and specific valuation and other terms will be disclosed after the completion of this financing round.

other

Luxury watch raffle platform watch.fun has raised $8.6 million in funding, led by Crypto.com Capital and Solana Ventures.

Luxury watch raffle platform watch.fun has raised $8.6 million in funding, led by Crypto.com Capital and Solana Ventures, with participation from Spartan Capital, Animoca Brands, and others. Based on Solana, watch.fun's main feature is its weekly watch raffles, where participants can enter for as little as $19 to win Rolex Daytona, Audemars Piguet Royal Oak, Patek Philippe Nautilus, and other timepieces. Each raffle is verifiable on-chain and "provably fair." The watches are sourced, authenticated, and shipped by partner Wristcheck. The new funding will be used for product development, expanding the watch catalog, compliance and licensing, global business expansion, and team growth. Plans also include introducing tiered memberships and referral rewards.

On-chain lottery project Megapot completes $5 million Pre-Seed funding round, led by Dragonfly.

Megapot, an on-chain lottery project, announced the completion of a $5 million Pre-Seed funding round, led by Dragonfly, with participation from Coinbase Ventures, Bankless Ventures, and others. The company stated that its initial lottery prize pool exceeds $1 million, with players from 124 countries already purchasing tickets and 19 jackpot winners identified. This funding round will be used to accelerate Megapot's global expansion, launch new gameplay features, and lower the barriers to integration for developers and game operators.

Web3 social gaming platform Verse8 raises $5 million in seed funding.

Web3 social gaming platform Verse8 has raised $5 million in seed funding, with investors including Neowiz, the Story Foundation, Nexpace, Nexus, and MARBLEX Corp. The platform combines social networking, gamification, and blockchain ownership to allow users to create, interact, and monetize content in a decentralized environment, connecting entertainment and the digital economy through on-chain identities and interactive virtual spaces.

Catapult secures latest funding round with participation from KuCoin Ventures.

Catapult announced that it has secured participation from KuCoin Ventures, the venture capital arm of KuCoin, in its latest funding round to accelerate project growth and launch a new phase of expansion. Catapult stated that it is positioning itself as a new type of token issuance platform by combining gamification mechanics with real-world trading scenarios to launch fast-paced, high-volatility, and frictionless token issuance products.

DAT:

Solana-based financial firm Artelo Biosciences completes $11 million private funding round.

Nasdaq-listed Solana treasury company Artelo Biosciences announced the sale of 3,188,407 shares of common stock through a private placement at $3.45 per share, raising a total of $11 million. The new funds will be used for general corporate purposes and to repay some of the transitional debt. According to the latest data from Strategic Solana Reserve, Artelo currently holds 45,883 SOL tokens.

(This financing event is not included in the weekly report statistics)