Strong comeback for fundraising market, Circle IPO

Market is lack of clear trend, plus with the heavy beef between the once-bromance: Trump and Elon Musk,  leaving many uncertain about where things are headed next. In fact, it’s been filled with positive developments, like Circle’s successful IPO, X’s collaboration with Polymarket, and more

As for crypto fundraising, while the total raised this week may be modest, there are promising projects led by exceptional builders and VCs. Notably, Peter Thiel’s Founder Fund is making a comeback, leading a round for Avantis Exchange, let's read more to find out.

1. 3Jane raised $5.2M in a Seed funding round

Uncollateralized DeFi lending platform - 3Jane has raised $5.2M in a Seed funding round led by Paradigm, with participation from Wintermute Ventures, Coinbase Ventures, Breed VC, Robot Ventures, Bodhi Ventures, Andre Cronje, and many more angels from the field.

As a peer-to-pool credit-based money market, 3Jane addresses a core gap in crypto finance: the absence of scalable credit creation. By combining on-chain credit models (Cred Protocol, Blockchain Bureau) with off-chain tools like Plaid and VantageScore via zkTLS, 3Jane enables USDC loans to yield farmers, traders, and even AI agents—backed not by assets, but by future income and creditworthiness.

The protocol also introduces USD3, a yield-bearing stablecoin backed by credit lines, and sUSD3, a leveraged yield token for suppliers assuming first-loss risk. With capital-efficient design, legal-compliant collections via onchain auctions, and a structured rollout plan, 3Jane aims to unlock $60B+ in idle crypto capital and lead the next phase of DeFi’s growth.

3Jane is now live for early credit access ahead of its Q3 2025 mainnet launch

2. Base-based derivatives exchange Avantis raised $8M

Base-based derivatives exchange - Avantis has raised $8M in a Series A funding round led by Pantera Capital, Founders fund of Peter Thiel, with participation from SALT fund, Symbolic Capital and Flowdesk.

Avantis is an advanced on-chain derivatives exchange on Base for cross-asset leverage, where users can long or short synthetic crypto, forex and commodities, or provide liquidity to power trading on these markets.

Launched last year, Avantis has achieved:

• Largest derivatives DEX on Base
• $7.5B+ in volume across 60K+ users
• 70+ assets, 20+ RWAs.
• Several innovative 0-1 products: Loss rebates, zero-fee perpetuals, zero-slippage BTC trading.
• Vibrant partnerships (PythNetwork, Superform Labs, Morpho) and developer ecosystem (5+ major integrations with its SDK, including Keyrock, Copin and Hyperliquid).

With this new funding, Avanitis is building support for 100+ RWAs, a native money market powered by Avantis USDC, Avantis v2 with 10x capital efficiency via cross-margining, and leverage for sports and prediction markets.

3. IOST raised $21M from DWF Labs

Modular RWA infrastructure - IOST has raised $21M in a Strategic funding round from DWF Labs, Presto Labs, Rollman Management Digital. This investment was executed through a tailored allocation mechanism, designed to align incentives, support sustainable network growth, and further decentralize our validator and ecosystem base.

IOST is a multi-chain ecosystem focused on RWA infrastructure. Its core product is IOST 3.0, an innovative, high-performance blockchain platform designed to address the scalability, security, and usability challenges facing mainstream blockchain adoption. Built with a focus on real-world applications, IOST 3.0 combines cutting-edge Layer 2 technology with advanced asset tokenization, decentralized identity, and payment solutions.

This strategic capital will fuel upcoming product rollouts, deepen ecosystem integration, and reinforce IOST’s position at the forefront of RWA 3.0 innovation.

4. Polycule raised $560K from Alliance DAO

Telegram-based Polymarket trading bot - Polycule has raised $560K from Alliance DAO.

Polycule is a streamlined Telegram trading bot designed to simplify trading on Polymarket's prediction markets platform, powered by $PCULE. Its mission is to make prediction markets accessible to everyone through simple commands, without the need to navigate complex platforms or interfaces. 

Founded by @top_jeet_, a 20-year-old entrepreneur from Stanford, Polycule has garnered support from major players in the crypto space. The project was incubated by both Alliance DAO (which also incubated Pumpfun and Believe.app) and Pasternak from Believe.app.

This funding round occurs right after the most major announcement this year, which is X’s partnership with Polymarket. 

5. AI Agents platform Hey Elsa raised $3M from M31 Capital

AI-powered crypto co-pilot HeyElsa raised $3M in a funding round led by M31 Capital, with participation from Base Ecosystem Fund, MH Ventures, Absoluta Digital, 2Shares and Levitate Labs.

By leveraging a chat and voice-powered AI interface, HeyElsa removes the complexities of managing crypto assets like bridging, staking, and swapping. Users can simply communicate their goals in natural language, bypassing the need for multiple wallets, gas tokens, and protocols. 

At its core, HeyElsa utilizes proprietary natural language processing models like DeepSeek, LLaMA, and Mistral, continually refined with real-time blockchain data and user feedback. 

Since its launch, HeyElsa has processed $15M+ in on-chain volume, integrated across 8+ chains, and streamlined gasless execution on Base via Coinbase Smart Wallet. With a focus on simplifying the user experience and providing infrastructure for other Web3 products, HeyElsa is set to expand further with more chains, refined AI models, and growing enterprise integrations.

6. Solana DefI app Neutral Trade raised $2M

On-chain multi-strategy hedge fund - Neutral Trade has raised $2M in a funding round from Ergonia, Skyland Ventures, BlackPine, Enzyme, MonkeDAO, DeFiDad, Nomatic, Danish Chaudhry, Mona El Isa and many more angels in the field.

Neutral Trade is the on-chain multi-strategy hedge fund, built by experienced quants and traders from Goldman Sachs and a Top 3 Global Hedge Fund. It offers a cutting-edge solution for investors seeking stable, risk-adjusted returns through innovative delta-neutral trading and liquidity provision strategies.

Neutral Trade has become known since winning the Colosseum Radar Hackathon in Oct 2024, since then, the protocol has:

• Hit $50M TVL ATH in Jan 2025, in just under 4 months without any private deals
• Delivered $2M in profits to users
• Served 30+ VIP and Liquid Funds clients
• Driving $50m+ TVL and $500m+ trading volume to Drift, while boosting utilisation on their lending pools
• Enabling users to provide liquidity to $JLP on JupiterExchange, without experiencing impermanent loss and asset exposure, returning a stable yield to users

The protocol is set to offer delta-neutral, directional, ETF-style, and structured products on perp DEXes and CEXes, customizable tokenized strategies, cross-chain margin infrastructure, and a global platform connecting quant traders, savers, and capital introducers.

Conclusion

This week saw a total of 33 funding rounds, with the total amount reaching nearly $1.3B, including Circle’s $1.1B IPO. The current fundraising market is showing positive momentum; while the total value may not be massive, the quality of projects has significantly improved, making them attractive to top-tier VCs like Founder Fund, Pantera, and Paradigm. 

Additionally, the master of project incubation, Alliance DAO, has made a move with a half-million-dollar investment in Polycule, a project aligned with the prediction market trend. Will this be another success story, following in the footsteps of Pump.fun or Believe.app, which they previously incubated? Only time will tell how they perform.