Funding Wrap: Crypto startup funding rises for second straight quarter 

Crypto startup funding hit $2.4 billion during the first quarter of 2024, a report from PitchBook published Monday showed. This represents a 40% increase in invested capital from the last quarter of 2023. 

“With positive investor sentiment returning to crypto and barring any major market downturns, we expect the volume and pace of investments to continue increasing throughout the year,” PitchBook analysts wrote in the report. 

Big deals this week include Web3 social media platform Farcaster raising $150 million in a Series A round led by Paradigm. Other investors include a16z crypto, Haun Ventures, Variant and Standard Crypto. 

“Since going permissionless last October, Farcaster has seen 350,000 paid sign-ups and a 50x increase in network activity,” Farcaster co-founder Dan Romero said in a statement Tuesday. 

Read more: Farcaster secures $150M to grow users, add tools for decentralized social media protocol

Farcaster, the protocol behind the much-talked-about social network Warpcast, has gained significant attention in the crypto sphere this year. The company launched its Frames feature, which incorporates identity and payment rails, in February. 

Also this week: EVM layer-2 Plume announced a $10 million seed funding round led by Haun Ventures. Other investors include Galaxy Ventures, Superscrypt and Portal Ventures. 

Plume, built to bring real-world assets on-chain, currently has more than 80 RWA and DeFi projects building on its private testnet, the company said. RWAs include collectibles, alternative assets, synthetics, luxury goods and real estate. 

“While many are attempting to solve tokenization through permissioned environments, Plume stands out by prioritizing a crypto-first approach,” Chris Yin, CEO and co-founder of Plume, said in a statement. “We operate as a permissionless chain, offering seamless compliance tooling as a notable feature.”

Other notable funding news

• Blockless, a decentralized physical infrastructure network (DePIN) project, raised $8 million in pre-seed and seed funding at an undisclosed valuation. 
• Fantom Foundation on Friday announced a $10 million strategic funding round led by Korean fund Hashed. 
• Crypto firm New Form Capital is back on the scene and looking to raise a $100 million fund in the midst of the recent crypto fundraising boom, the Wall Street Journal reported Monday.

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