The Block
Quick Take aPriori has raised $8 million in a seed funding round led by Pantera Capital. The round brought the Monad liquid staking platform’s token valuation to at least $100 million, co-founder and CEO Ray S told The Block.
Quick Take Gasless transactions are now live on the TON blockchain following the launch of the W5 smart wallet standard. Users will no longer be required to hold toncoin to facilitate payments and can make transactions using USDT and Notcoin.
Quick Take Kintsu has raised $4 million in seed funding from Brevan Howard Digital, Castle Island Ventures and others. The startup is building a liquid staking protocol on the Monad blockchain.
Quick Take Galaxy Asset Management has raised $113 million for its Galaxy Ventures Fund. It aims to continue fundraising toward a $150 million target.
Quick Take Bitcoin miner MARA has purchased $100 million worth of bitcoin, taking its balance sheet holdings to over 20,000 BTC. MARA also said it intends to adopt a full “HODL” approach to its bitcoin treasury policy, retaining all mined bitcoin and periodically making additional purchases.
Quick Take The web3 community platform OpenSocial Protocol raised $6 million in strategic funding. Framework Ventures and North Island Ventures led the round, with support from Hivemind Capital Partners, Stratos, Moonrock Capital and others. The funding round brings OpenSocial’s total funding raised to $26 million.
Quick Take Bitfarms has adopted a new “poison pill” strategy following a ruling in favor of Riot Platforms regarding its first shareholder rights plan. Riot has been attempting to take over its Bitcoin mining rival since making a $950 million bid for the firm in April.
Quick Take Decentralized prediction markets platform Polymarket has already seen its highest monthly volume in July. The surge in activity is primarily due to heightened interest in betting on U.S. political event outcomes. Data shows a large jump in volume from $110 million in June to over $275 million in July, with monthly users peaking at 33,000.
Quick Take Revolut announced it has received a banking license from UK financial regulators. CEO Nik Storonsky expressed pride in this milestone and aims to make Revolut a preferred bank for UK customers. The approval comes with restrictions during a “mobilization” period, including a £50,000 limit on total customer deposits.
Quick Take Coinbase CISO Jeff Lunglhofer provides an overview of common tactics used by crypto scammers and how to protect against them effectively.