PANews reported on August 26th that Hemi, the Bitcoin programmable layer project, has secured $15 million in a new funding round led by YZi Labs, Republic Digital, and HyperChain Capital, with participation from Breyer Capital, Big Brain Holdings, Crypto.com, DNA Fund, Selini Capital, Protein Capital, Quantstamp, and Web3.com Ventures. This brings the total raised to $30 million, which will be used to advance the development of a network that combines Bitcoin's security with Ethereum's smart contract capabilities. This round of funding will support ecosystem expansion and subsequent token generation activities.
The core of the Hemi stack is the Hemi Virtual Machine (hVM), designed to embed a full Bitcoin node within the EVM. Through cross-chain "tunneling" and a proof-of-stake consensus mechanism, it enables operations such as lending and asset portfolios on the Bitcoin network. Co-founder Jeff Garzik (an early Bitcoin core developer) stated that Bitcoin doesn't need a refactor, but rather supporting tools to unlock its potential. The project claims to have over 100,000 verified users and 400,000 community members, and has integrated or collaborated with over 70 projects, including Sushi, LayerZero, and MetaMask.



BitGo’s move creates further competition in a burgeoning European crypto market that is expected to generate $26 billion revenue this year, according to one estimate. BitGo, a digital asset infrastructure company with more than $100 billion in assets under custody, has received an extension of its license from Germany’s Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin), enabling it to offer crypto services to European investors. The company said its local subsidiary, BitGo Europe, can now provide custody, staking, transfer, and trading services. Institutional clients will also have access to an over-the-counter (OTC) trading desk and multiple liquidity venues.The extension builds on BitGo’s previous Markets-in-Crypto-Assets (MiCA) license, also issued by BaFIN, and adds trading to the existing custody, transfer and staking services. BitGo acquired its initial MiCA license in May 2025, which allowed it to offer certain services to traditional institutions and crypto native companies in the European Union.Read more