News linked to both this project and an event.
According to The Block, Susie Ward, CEO of Bitcoin Policy UK, publicly criticized Strategy founder Michael Saylor’s promotional video for STRC during an interview at last week’s BTC Conference in Prague, calling it “dishonest” for failing to accurately disclose the product’s risk profile. STRC is a perpetual preferred share offering an 11.25% dividend; Strategy raises funds through its issuance to continuously purchase bitcoin. Ward stated that although she is a staunch bitcoin supporter and also a shareholder of Strategy, she remains cautious about the company’s model of accumulating bitcoin via leverage and equity dilution—arguing that such practices tie bitcoin’s reputation to “fiat games,” with some projects resembling meme coin pump-and-dump schemes.
According to The Block, Paradigm has led a $9 million Series A funding round for El Dorado, a Latin American cross-border payment application, with participation from Coinbase Ventures and Verda Ventures.
: Latin American cross-border payment app El Dorado has completed a $9 million Series A funding round, led by venture capital firm Paradigm, with participation from Coinbase Ventures and Verda Ventures. The company stated that its current key growth paths include "non-mainstream payment corridors" such as Brazil and Bolivia. It is already operating in 12 countries, covering markets including Argentina, Brazil, and Colombia, with over 100,000 active users and 5 million processed transactions.Additionally, El Dorado has launched a cross-border payment product for enterprises, incorporating multi-signature and multi-organization architecture, and integrating stablecoin and fiat channels. It operates on a Layer 1 network supported by Tempo, primarily serving real trade scenarios such as electric vehicle imports. (The Block)
According to Odaily, Digital Asset, the developer of the Canton network, has announced the completion of a $355 million equity funding round, led by a16z crypto. Participating investors include subsidiaries of the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, Apollo Funds, BNP Paribas, Citadel Securities, CME Ventures, Coinbase Ventures, HSBC, S&P Global, SBI Group, SoFi, Tradeweb, and others. The project's primary business is developing the Canton blockchain network designed for institutions. The funds will be used to accelerate partnerships with institutional players, pursue mergers and acquisitions, and participate in related projects. (The Block)
financial infrastructure company TVL Capital announced the completion of a $5 million funding round, led by Framework Ventures, with participation from Flow Traders and other institutions. Co-founder Lars previously served as Head of Market Research at The Block. The company's products are benchmarked against traditional exchange-traded products, aiming to build compliant, composable derivatives and diversified yield structures, primarily targeting institutional investors to meet various structured investment and yield management needs.
According to The Block, crypto market maker GSR has received approval from the U.S. Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) to formally complete its acquisition of Portland-based SEC-registered broker-dealer Equilibrium Capital Services, which has now been renamed GSR Securities. Xin Song, CEO of GSR, stated that this acquisition will strengthen its compliant broker-dealer platform in the U.S., with a focus on serving institutional clients. GSR previously disclosed plans to position its business as a “Web3 investment bank”; following the acquisition, it will further expand its tokenized financing services. Additionally, GSR has been highly active this year: in April, it launched the GSR Crypto Core3 ETF on Nasdaq; in March, it acquired token advisory firms Autonomous and Architech, and invested in Libeara—the tokenization platform under SC Ventures; last month, SC Ventures—the fintech investment arm of Standard Chartered Bank—became GSR’s first external shareholder and completed its investment.
According to The Block, Web3 asset management platform XEFFY has completed a $20 million funding round, comprising a $5 million seed round and a $15 million private placement. The funds will be used to expand its Vault management platform, onchain real-world asset (RWA) infrastructure, global community growth, and ecosystem development via the XEFFY Fund.
Cosmos Labs, the core development team behind the Cosmos ecosystem, announced the acquisition of the Cosmos block explorer Mintscan. The team has established a new subsidiary, Cosmos Labs Korea, in Seoul, South Korea, to oversee the construction of several key infrastructure components within the Cosmos ecosystem.According to Barry Plunkett, Co-CEO of Cosmos Labs, negotiations for the deal began in October 2025 and were initiated by the co-founder of Stamper (the legal entity behind Cosmostation), a Korean crypto company. Both parties have not disclosed the transaction amount, financing methods, or whether $ATOM, the Cosmos Hub token, was involved. (The Block)
According to The Block, the number of monthly crypto venture capital deals in May 2026 dropped to approximately 50—the lowest level since before 2021. Both historically most active sectors—infrastructure and crypto financial services—fell to multi-year lows. A large-scale shift of investor attention toward the AI sector, coupled with a shortage of high-quality early-stage projects, are the primary drivers behind this decline in deal volume. Although the number of deals declined, total funding remained relatively high, exhibiting a “fewer deals, larger amounts” pattern—the recent $1 billion fundraising round by prediction market platform Kalshi being a prime example. Analysts note that the current low-noise environment actually presents a window of opportunity for projects with clear use cases and genuine traction. Whether a recovery emerges in the second half of 2026 will depend on whether new sectors beyond prediction markets and financial infrastructure can generate broad-based investment consensus at scale.
According to The Block, the DeFi lending protocol Radiant Capital has announced it will officially cease operations. The protocol suffered a hack in October 2024, losing approximately $51 million; the attacker gained unauthorized access by deploying backdoor contracts on Arbitrum and BNB Chain. Earlier in 2024, the protocol had also been hit by a flash loan attack, resulting in a loss of roughly 1,900 ETH (approximately $4.5 million). After 18 months of recovery efforts, Radiant Capital stated that it has neither recovered a significant portion of the stolen funds nor secured new financing, declaring that “the DAO has no viable path forward.” The protocol will now enter a “maintenance mode”: its frontend and smart contracts remain accessible, allowing users to withdraw funds, repay loans, and manage positions. Any funds recovered in the future will be returned to affected users.
: Texas Deputy Comptroller Kelly Hancock has officially appointed four external members to the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve Advisory Committee. Established pursuant to Senate Bill 21, the committee includes CleanSpark President and CFO Gary Vecchiarelli, Bitcoin mining firm Cormint founder and CEO Jamie McAvity, Southern Methodist University law professor Carla Reyes, and investment executive Laurie Dotter. They will advise the Comptroller on Bitcoin valuation, custody, and risk management. (The Block)
Hypernova has announced the completion of a $3 million pre-seed funding round, led by Lemniscap, with participation from Very Early Ventures, CMS Holdings, Pivot Global, and multiple angel investors from the Hyperliquid ecosystem.The project's main business is building a proprietary trading platform on Hyperliquid, using smart contracts to automate trader payouts, and dynamically determining whether to push positions to market based on trader quality. (The Block)
Bit Digital announced it will provide a $100 million delayed draw term loan facility to a subsidiary of WhiteFiber, an artificial intelligence infrastructure and high-performance computing provider in which it holds a majority stake. The facility can be expanded to $150 million upon mutual agreement and is intended to support WhiteFiber's recent expansion plans in high-performance computing and artificial intelligence.Bit Digital expects that draws under this facility will be funded in whole or in part through a credit line secured by Ethereum. This arrangement allows Bit Digital to earn a financing spread on the loan assets while maintaining exposure to Ethereum.Bit Digital has fully exited its Bitcoin mining operations. The company reported total revenue of $27.9 million and a net loss of $146.7 million for the first quarter of 2026. (The Block)
According to The Block, Bit Digital announced a $100 million delayed-draw term loan to a subsidiary of WhiteFiber, its majority-owned AI infrastructure company. The facility may be expanded to $150 million upon mutual agreement between the parties, to support WhiteFiber’s recent high-performance computing and AI expansion initiatives. Bit Digital stated that the loan proceeds will be disbursed—either partially or in full—through an Ethereum-denominated secured credit facility, enabling the company to retain ETH exposure while earning a financing spread.
According to The Block, cross-chain infrastructure platform Squid has raised $6 million in strategic funding, led by North Island Ventures, with participation from Ripple, Dialectic, and Borderless. The funds will be used to launch a new consumer-facing product. Fig, co-founder of Squid, stated that the product will leverage Squid’s routing and settlement infrastructure to enhance the experience of accessing and managing crypto assets. Squid said that since its launch in 2023, the platform has processed over $6 billion in transaction volume and more than 4 million transactions across more than 100 blockchain networks, serving over 1 million users.
According to The Block, Foundation, a Bitcoin hardware wallet manufacturer, has raised $6.4 million in funding. The round was led by Fulgur Ventures, with participation from Arche Capital. The company plans to accelerate its expansion from Bitcoin self-custody wallets into identity authentication, multi-factor authentication (MFA), and AI agent authorization. Following this round, Foundation’s total funding has reached $16.5 million. Meanwhile, Foundation has announced the full commercial launch of its flagship device, the Passport Prime, and opened its KeyOS platform SDK to developers. The device integrates a Bitcoin hardware wallet, FIDO security key, 2FA storage, secure vault, and 50 GB of encrypted storage.
non-custodial crypto wallet Sorted Wallet has completed a $4.4 million seed funding round, co-led by Tether and Gnosis with a $3.4 million equity investment. Vox Solutions provided an additional $1 million in strategic support, with angel investors including Movement, Angel Invest Group, and the founder of RWA.io also participating. (The Block)
According to The Block, non-custodial crypto wallet Sorted Wallet has raised $4.4 million in seed funding. Tether and Gnosis co-led a $3.4 million equity financing round, while Vox Solutions provided $1 million in strategic support. Angel investors—including Movement, Angel Invest Group, and the founder of RWA.io—also participated in the round.
According to The Block, three Wall Street firms—Benchmark, TD Cowen, and Mizuho—maintained “Buy” ratings on four crypto-related companies—Bitdeer, DeFi Technologies, Strive, and Gemini—on Monday, noting that the market continues to value these platforms, which have pivoted toward AI infrastructure, capital markets tools, and structured financial products, using trading-business valuation multiples. Benchmark analysts reiterated their “Buy” rating on Bitdeer and $27 price target, highlighting its global power asset portfolio of approximately 3.0 GW and the growth of its AI cloud business’s annual recurring revenue—from roughly $10 million at the end of January to approximately $69 million by the end of April. TD Cowen raised its price target for Strive to $30, forecasting a 26.1% Bitcoin yield for the company in 2026. Mizuho maintained its “Outperform” rating on Gemini but lowered its price target from $12 to $10, noting that although Q1 trading volume declined by over 50%, trading revenue remained largely flat—reflecting higher fee rates and an optimized revenue mix.
According to The Block, WLFI treasury company AI Financial released its financial results for the quarter ended March 28, 2026, reporting a net loss of $271.5 million, compared to a net loss of $2.4 million in the same period last year; the company stated that its financial condition raises substantial doubt about its ability to continue as a going concern over the next year. Revenue for the same period totaled $4.7 million, entirely derived from its crypto payment fintech business. AI Financial holds 7.28 billion WLFI tokens, with a fair value of approximately $706 million—markedly down from over $1 billion at the end of December 2025—and recognized an unrealized loss of $348.3 million. The company also noted that certain WLFI tokens are subject to lock-up restrictions, and its liquidity improvement, revenue growth, and ability to secure future financing will impact its continued operations.