According to a recent press release from the company, Pantera Capital sponsored an investment round in which the decentralised exchange (DEX) Brine Fi raised $16.5 million at a valuation of $100 million.
The fundraising round also included participation from Elevation Capital, StarkWare Ltd, Spartan Group, Goodwater Capital, Upsparks Ventures, and Protofund Ventures.
The new money is noteworthy given that venture capital for companies dealing in digital assets has mostly dried up; according to Crunchbase’s report from July, the amount invested in blockchain and cryptocurrency startups in Q2 2023 was 76% lower than it was in the same quarter a year earlier.
The crypto bear market has entered the stage of apathy due to a lack of triggers to draw investors, and trading volumes have also fallen to multi-year lows throughout the summer. DefiLlama data shows that volumes on DEXs have recently averaged slightly over $1 billion per day after briefly increasing in the spring of this year. According to data from The Block, the majority of trade volume continues to be focused on centralised platforms like Coinbase and Binance, which conduct close to $11 billion in daily trading.
Brine Fi is a non-custodial, decentralised orderbook that offers privacy for trading positions through so-called zero-knowledge proofs and is powered by the StarkWare Ethereum scaling system. Thus, traders can place huge orders without being concerned about leading or frightening others. Additionally, the platform boasts quick trade execution. A $3 million to $4 million daily trading volume was recently conducted since it became opened to traders in May.
Paul Veradittakit, managing partner at Pantera Capital, stated in a statement that “Brine tackles some of the most significant challenges holding back institutional and mainstream user adoption in DeFi.” A self-custodial execution layer that is quicker, more dependable, user-friendly, and economical is urgently needed.