Summary

• Franklin Templeton and Ondo Finance have tokenized five ETFs — spanning U.S. equities, fixed income, and gold — available 24/7 through crypto wallets, with no brokerage account required. The partnership is the largest institutional endorsement of on-chain securities distribution to date.

• Ondo Global Markets now controls roughly 70% of the tokenized equity market, with over $700M in TVL and $13B in cumulative trading volume since launching in September 2025. Franklin Templeton brings $1.7T in AUM; Ondo brings the rails.

• This is Crypto as a Service in its clearest form yet. The user just invests in the world’s most in-demand assets. The fact that it runs on-chain is infrastructure, not identity.

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For years, the pitch for tokenized real-world assets was straightforward in theory and messy in practice: put traditional financial products on-chain, unlock 24/7 liquidity, and reach a global audience that doesn’t have access to U.S. brokerage infrastructure. The pitch was right. The execution kept lagging.

This week, something changed.

Franklin Templeton, a 79-year-old institution managing over $1.7 trillion in assets, announced it is partnering with Ondo Finance to tokenize five of its ETFs, distributing them directly onchain via Ondo Global Markets and making them accessible through decentralized and centralized exchanges, and crypto wallets. No brokerage account. No trading hour restrictions. No intermediary standing between the investor and the tokenized asset.

This is not a proof of concept. It’s a model that many other asset managers will follow.

What Ondo and Franklin Templeton Are Building Together

Under the arrangement, Ondo purchases shares of the Franklin ETFs and issues tokens through a special-purpose vehicle. Investors hold rights to the return stream and not the underlying shares, which frees those tokens to be used as collateral or plugged directly into DeFi applications. Franklin Templeton manages the funds. Ondo provides the rails. The five ETFs now available on-chain:

1. Franklin Focused Growth ETF (FFOG) — actively managed U.S. equity, focused on innovative and growth-oriented companies

2. Franklin U.S. Large Cap Multifactor Index ETF (FLQL) — systematic large-cap exposure using a multifactor approach

3. Franklin Responsibly Sourced Gold ETF (FGDL) — gold bullion sourced through responsible supply chains

4. Franklin High Yield Corporate ETF (FLHY) — U.S. high yield corporate bond exposure

5. Franklin Income Equity Focus ETF (INCE) — equity strategy focused on income-oriented securities

These products are initially available in Europe, Asia-Pacific, the Middle East, and Latin America. U.S. availability awaits further regulatory clarity on how third parties can distribute registered funds onchain; a signal that the regulatory conversation is progressing.

In the latest episode of Pantera’s Stateful podcast, Franklin Templeton’s Sandy Kaul and Ondo Finance’s Ian De Bode joined Franklin Bi, General Partner at Pantera to discuss how onchain capital markets are taking shape, from Ondo’s permissionless, 24/7 tokenized ETFs functioning as live DeFi collateral to the longer-horizon reality of AI agents needing blockchain rails to settle transactions at scale.

Why This Is a Crypto as a Service Moment, Not Just an RWA Headline

In my last newsletter, I wrote about the defining thesis for 2026: we are moving from Crypto as a Sector to Crypto as a Service (CaaS). The goal is no longer for users to see the blockchain. The goal is for them to forget it’s even there.

The Ondo x Franklin Templeton partnership is the clearest institutional proof of that thesis I’ve seen.

Think about what’s actually happening here. A retail investor in Singapore or São Paulo opens a crypto wallet and gains access to a Franklin Templeton growth ETF. They’re not thinking about tokenization. They’re not thinking about SPVs or smart contracts. They’re thinking: I can finally gain exposure in U.S. equities at 2am on a Sunday without opening a brokerage account. The blockchain is the infrastructure. The experience is simply investing.

Sandy Kaul, Franklin Templeton’s head of innovation, described the initiative as a test case for “what is really striking the appetite of a new audience.” I’ve heard Sandy use this exact framing before — in fact, in my February piece RWA Is the Gold Rush, I quoted her on just how difficult it is to move from an account-based system to a wallet-based system. That she’s now helping lead the charge on exactly that transition is notable. The new audience isn’t looking for crypto exposure. They already have that. They want diversification, yield, and access to assets that have historically been gated by geography and brokerage infrastructure. Tokenization removes those gates.

This is also the realization of a prediction I made in 8 Predictions for 2025: that RWAs would finally expand beyond the basic products — T-bills, money market funds — into more complex instruments like stocks, ETFs, and bonds, as the infrastructure to mint and maintain them matured. That infrastructure is now here. And Ondo built it.

The Scale of What Ondo Has Built

Pantera has been an early investor in Ondo since before the tokenized treasury market reached $850M — we wrote about the thesis here. I led Pantera’s seed investment back in 2021 and today, Pantera is the largest shareholder in Ondo. Since launching Ondo Global Markets in September 2025, the platform has accumulated over $700M in TVL and powered more than $13 billion in trading volume across 70,000+ cumulative holders. The broader tokenized equity market stands at roughly $950 million as of March 2026, meaning Ondo controls approximately 70% of the category and more than all competing platforms combined. This is a huge testament to Nathan and the entire Ondo team!

Last year, Franklin laid out the structural case: tokenization is expanding the footprint of capital markets to be truly global for the first time - Great Onchain Migration Blockchain Letter.

The Franklin Templeton partnership is the most powerful validation of that thesis yet. When the largest asset manager to directly support on-chain distribution chooses your infrastructure, the market takes notice. BlackRock, NYSE, and others are watching. This is becoming the default model for how traditional finance enters the on-chain world.

For a deeper look at how Pantera has been thinking about the RWA category,this conference call with Ondo’s Nathan Allman and Figure’s Mike Cagney is worth your time.

What Comes Next

The immediate question is U.S. availability. Franklin Templeton has been transparent that domestic access depends on further regulatory clarity; a reasonable constraint, and one that is actively being worked through. As I wrote in Navigating Crypto in 2026, tokenized stocks and equities could grow even faster once the anticipated innovation exemption under the SEC’s Project Crypto debuts. That window is coming.

Longer term, the structural implications are significant. If tokenized ETFs can be used as on-chain collateral, which this structure enables, they become native financial primitives, not just digital mirrors of traditional products. A tokenized Franklin ETF held as collateral in a DeFi protocol is a fundamentally different financial object than an ETF sitting in a Schwab account. That composability is what makes this more than a distribution story. It is the beginning of a new financial stack.

- Paul Veradittakit

Pantera News

OpenFX Funding Announcement

Pantera led OpenFX’s Series A round as the company works to replace fragmented, multi-day FX settlement with a single API that routes cross-border payments 99% faster and 99% cheaper than legacy rails.

The Financial Rails of Agentic Commerce

Pantera’s Cosmo Jiang goes deep on how AI agents are becoming autonomous economic actors — and why crypto rails, stablecoins, and payment standards like x402 are the infrastructure they run on.

Business

Visa Crypto Chief Bets on Stablecoin Settlement

Visa’s stablecoin settlement volumes have reached a $4.5B annualized run rate, growing significantly month over month according to Visa’s head of crypto Cuy Sheffield. His framing — that companies building stablecoin products still need Visa’s merchant network — positions crypto rails and card rails as complementary infrastructure, not competing ones.

Mastercard Launches Crypto Partner Program With 85+ Firms

Binance, Circle, Gemini, PayPal, Paxos, Ripple, BitGo, and Crypto.com are among the participants, focused on cross-border transfers, B2B payments, and global payouts. When Mastercard organizes 85 companies under one program, the “crypto as infrastructure” thesis stops being speculative.

BlackRock Launches Staked Ethereum ETF (ETHB)

BlackRock’s iShares Staked Ethereum Trust debuted on Nasdaq on March 12 with $107M in seed assets, distributing 82% of staking rewards monthly to investors. It’s the first yield-generating crypto ETF from the world’s largest asset manager — and a template that now applies to every proof-of-stake chain.

Regulation

SEC and CFTC Issue Landmark Joint Interpretive Release

The March 17 release established a five-category crypto taxonomy — digital commodities, collectibles, tools, stablecoins, and securities — and classified 16 assets including BTC, ETH, and SOL as commodities under CFTC jurisdiction. This directly clears the runway for the Ondo x Franklin Templeton model to eventually reach U.S. investors.

Kraken Becomes First Digital Asset Bank to Receive a Federal Reserve Master Account

Kraken Financial now has direct access to Fedwire — the interbank network that moves trillions daily — making it the first crypto-native company to gain direct Fed access. It sets a precedent that will matter for every institutional crypto product that follows.

GENIUS Act Clears Its Last Major Hurdle

A Senate stablecoin yield compromise was reached on March 20, removing the key obstacle to a Banking Committee markup targeted for late April. If the CLARITY Act follows, the March 17 commodity classifications get codified into permanent statute.

SEC Innovation Exemption Proposal Submitted to the White House

Chairman Atkins submitted a sandbox proposal that would let eligible companies issue tokens and launch on-chain products without full SEC registration for a limited period. This is the “innovation exemption” I flagged in Navigating Crypto in 2026 as the catalyst for accelerating tokenized equity distribution in the U.S.

New products and deals

Surf Studio Launch: Build Custom Crypto Dashboards and Apps With Just a Prompt

Surf , the crypto-native AI platform and Pantera portfolio company launched Surf Studio, a no-code environment that lets anyone build Web3 dashboards, portfolio trackers, and crypto apps from a plain-language prompt. No engineers, no designers: describe what you need, Surf builds it. The platform spans 40+ blockchains, 29.4B token transfer records, and 120M+ indexed social posts. Try it out.

SoFi and Mastercard Partner to Enable SoFiUSD Across the Global Payments Network

SoFiUSD is now enabled as a settlement currency across Mastercard’s network — covering card-based transactions, cross-border remittances, and B2B transfers, with support planned for Mastercard’s Multi-Token Network. Two of the world’s largest financial rails are now actively integrating bank-issued stablecoins.

TCS Blockchain and PayPal USD Bring On-Chain Settlement to Freight Invoicing

Carriers in the $3T North American trucking industry have historically surrendered up to 30% of net revenues to factoring companies just to get paid. TCS and PayPal USD are settling freight invoices on-chain and cutting out those intermediaries — CaaS where the end user is a trucker, not a crypto trader

Let’s Meet Up

• Bangkok, April 21-23

• Miami, May 5-7

• Park City, May 13-15

Important Disclosures – Certain Sections of This Letter Discuss Pantera’s Advisory Services and Others Discuss Market Commentary. Certain sections of this letter discuss the investment advisory business of Pantera Capital Partners LP and its affiliates (”Pantera”), while other sections of the letter consist solely of general market commentary and do not relate to Pantera’s investment advisory business. Pantera has inserted footnotes throughout the letter to identify these differences. This section provides educational content and general market commentary. Except for specifically-marked sections of this letter, no statements included herein relate to Pantera’s investment advisory services, nor does any content herein reflect or contain any offer of new or additional investment advisory services. This letter is for information purposes only and does not constitute, and should not be construed as, an offer to sell or buy or the solicitation of an offer to sell or buy or subscribe for any securities. Opinions and other statements contained herein do not constitute any form of investment, legal, tax, financial, or other advice or recommendation.

Summary

• 2026 marks the pivot from "Crypto as a Sector" to "Crypto as a Service." After a decade of spectacle followed by institutional validation via ETFs in 2024 and infrastructure buildout in 2025, value will accrue to companies that solve massive legacy problems using blockchain while hiding the technology entirely from end users.

• The next generation of crypto unicorns won’t be built on hype. They will be companies that solve hundred-billion-dollar legacy problems by using blockchain to make products radically more efficient while completely hiding the underlying tech.

• Crypto won the weekend. While U.S. equities sat frozen during the Iran conflict, unable to reprice a material shift in global risk, Bitcoin rallied toward $74,000 and commodities found price discovery on DeFi before traditional markets opened.

As I write this, the world is watching the conflict in Iran unfold in real time. While U.S. equities sat frozen over the weekend, unable to reprice a material shift in global risk, crypto didn't wait. Bitcoin rallied, approaching $74,000 at the time of writing. Oil and gold found price discovery on Hyperliquid (disclosure: a Pantera investment). This isn't new; we saw the same thing last month when China implemented restrictions and commodities were repriced on DeFi platforms before traditional markets opened Monday morning. Traditional hedge funds are increasingly migrating over. The 24/7 nature of crypto is no longer a marketing tagline; it's a structural advantage that legacy finance simply cannot replicate.

And yet, crypto remains deeply oversold relative to where the fundamentals actually are. We’re unarguably in another bear market (my fourth), but this one is categorically different. The regulations are coming through. Institutional money has a seat at the table. The plumbing is in place.

I saw this firsthand at Consensus Hong Kong recently. The energy in Asian markets is a stark contrast to what we’re experiencing in the West. There’s palpable bullishness driven by bipartisan government support, new institutional capital, and a relentless focus on consumer applications. A huge thank you to Michael Lau and the entire Consensus team. Here is my fireside chat with Michael Lau, Chairman of Consensus.

Where I see Asia heading in 2026:

• Cross-border payments via stablecoins, particularly B2B, where fragmented economies make crypto rails a natural fit

• Tokenization of gold, equities, and real estate as banks and fintechs catch up to the U.S.

• Perpetual trading on DeFi accelerating faster than the West, driven by retail adoption

• Prediction markets emerging as a major category, though likely taking a different shape than U.S. counterparts

This brings me to the defining thesis for 2026: we are moving from Crypto as a Sector to Crypto as a Service (CaaS). The goal is no longer for users to see the blockchain. The goal is for them to forget it’s even there.

For over a decade, we built the “spectacle” of crypto—gas wars, TPS counts, modular stacks, ZK-proofs. In 2024, we got our institutional seal of approval via the ETFs. In 2025, we finalized the plumbing. But 2026 is the pivot.

The End of the “Casino” Era

The next generation of unicorns won’t be “L3s for AI-NFTs.” They will be companies that solve $100B+ legacy problems by using blockchain to make a product 10x more efficient—while completely hiding the underlying tech. This brings me to our latest investments:

• Novig: The End of the “Vig” ($75M Series B) Traditional sportsbooks are a broken monopoly. They take a massive “vig” (commission) off the top, leaving users with a dismal 2% profitability rate. We led the $75M round for Novig because they treat a sports bet like a high-frequency financial instrument. By using a peer-to-peer exchange model, Novig users are 23% profitable on average. Most Novig traders don’t care that the back-end uses a decentralized order book; they just care that they get the best odds in the country. That is CaaS in action. Learn more: Pantera’s Investment Thesis | Novig.com | 𝕏 @Novig

• Based: The Consumer Super-App ($11.5M Series A) We recently led the Series A for Based, a composable Web3 consumer super-app within the Hyperliquid ecosystem. For years, “consumer crypto” was synonymous with “clunky.” Based is changing that by making the on-chain experience feel like a premium fintech app. It’s invisible because the complexity of bridging and gas is abstracted away, allowing users to focus on the social and financial utility of their assets.
  Learn more: Pantera’s Investment Thesis | based.one | 𝕏 @BasedOneX

  

• Doppler: The Default Launch Infrastructure ($9M Seed) If Based and Novig are the cars, then Doppler is the high-performance fuel system. We led their $9M round to build the default launch infrastructure for on-chain assets. Doppler allows developers to deploy assets with institutional-grade security and compliance without needing to build the plumbing themselves. It’s the Stripe for on-chain sssets—pure utility, hidden behind an API.

  Learn more: Pantera’s Investment Thesis | doppler.lol | 𝕏 @dopplerprotocol

Why “Invisible” Beats “Viral”

We are seeing this same invisible pivot across our entire portfolio:

• Real-World Assets: Tokenized treasuries are no longer a crypto experiment—they’re becoming the back-end liquidity for global trade.

• AI Agents: Blockchain is providing the Invisible Truth Layer via prediction markets and verifiable data that agents need to operate autonomously with digital money.

Agentic payments will drive this transformation. Payment standards like x402 allow AI agents to transact directly with crypto assets while regulatory clarity on stablecoins smooths the rails. For a deeper dive, see my colleagues’ Cosmo Jiang and Sam Lehman’s piece:

The Founder’s Opportunity

If you are a founder building in 2026, my advice is simple: Stop talking about your tech and start talking about your utility. If your pitch deck has a slide on consensus mechanisms before a slide on customer ROI, then you are building for 2022. We are looking for the teams building the next Novig, Based, and Doppler—the ones who realize that mass crypto adoption actually happens when it becomes so seamless that people stop noticing it.

Business

Anchorage Digital’s Bitcoin Bet: Crypto Bank Takes Stake in Strategy’s STRC

This federally chartered U.S. crypto bank disclosed its perpetual preferred stock holdings issued by Strategy. This action followed a $100 million equity investment from Tether and may signal broader upcoming strategic initiatives.

Major Miner Just Expanded in Texas

Mining manufacturer Canaan Inc provided $39.75 million in stock in exchange for Cipher Mining’s 49% stake in three projects in Texas. This will add 4.4 EH/s and 120 MW of power capacity.

Metalpha, Exos Financial, and BlockchainK2 Announce Joint Venture for US Institutional Digital Asset Market

The joint venture will focus on “OTC derivatives and hedging, digital asset investment strategies, and securities-linked transactions, leveraging Exos’s US regulated platform and BlockchainK2’s tokenization technology.”

Regulation

Hong Kong Expands Crypto Licensing, Stablecoin Regime in 2026-27 Budget

The country plans to create new licensing rules, tokenization initiatives, and stablecoins approvals to further strengthen its standing as global digital asset leader.

Bill to Regulate Crypto Kiosks on the Move

Legislation to regulate crypto kiosks is being discussed in South Carolina’s House and Senate. Often seen in gas stations and convenience stores, customers use these kiosks to buy or sell crypto with fees of 5 to 15% for each transaction.

Crypto.com Receives Conditional Approval for US National Trust Bank Charter

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency conditionally approved Singapore-headquartered Crypto.com’s application for the US charter. The banking entity will be called Foris Dax National Trust Bank DBA Crypto.com National Trust Bank.

New Products and Deals

FEEN Wants to Capture Crypto Trading Culture Through Market-Powered Prediction Game

This gamified crypto prediction market relies on 30-second token races where participants bet on which crypto will “pump the hardest” over this quick burst of time. One of the founders compares this innovation to the compression of longer content into short Tik-Tok videos.

Kraken Introduces Fixed-Rate Crypto Loans for its Pro Users

Flexline crypto-backed loans will carry terms from two days to two years. Proceeds are given in stablecoins or crypto, which can be withdrawn or traded on the platform depending on eligibility requirements.

DeFi Brokerage Launches ‘Project 0 Pay’ for Crypto-Backed Borrowing

Project 0 Pay will allow users to borrow against crypto investments to pay off credit card debt without liquidating assets or disrupting yield generation.

Pantera News

Investing in Based

Pantera leads a $11.5 million investment round for this leading trading platform for Hyperliquid and more. Since its launch in July 2025, Based now makes up more than 1% of global daily Hyperliquid volume, making it the leading Hyperliquid Builder by volume.

The Market Always Wins

Pantera is leading the Series B investment in sports prediction market Novig. This platform provides a new peer-to-peer exchange with better consumer protections: people wager on sports and have higher probabilities of winning because they’re not betting against the house.

Investing in Doppler

We’re making a seed round investment in Whetstone, which has created a custom capital markets protocol for asset issuance and trading: Doppler Protocol. Projects leveraging Doppler Protocol include Zora, Paragraph, Cooprecords, and Ohara among others.

Let’s Meet Up

• Los Angeles, March 13th

• Bangkok, March 20th - 24th

Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, a Managing Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early-stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.

If you have any projects that need funding, feel free to DM me on twitter.

Summary

• Prediction markets aren’t new—they’re finally decentralized. Humans have always put money behind forecasts, but crypto turns this ancient behavior into permissionless, transparent, global markets where prices aggregate real-time collective intelligence instead of opinion polls.

• Infrastructure + regulation unlocked the market. CFTC clarity, TradFi partnerships, and multi-chain scalability have pushed prediction markets from niche experiments to a $3.9B weekly volume category, with platforms embedding directly into brokerages, media, and consumer apps.

• Uncertainty is becoming a financial asset class. As prediction markets evolve into core hedging, data, and forecasting infrastructure, value will accrue to platforms that combine liquidity, integrity, and distribution to price real-world outcomes at global scale.

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For more than a thousand years, humans have sought ways to harness collective wisdom to bet on the future. Ancient Greeks received personalized tokens to slip down a tube system to vote while juries in that culture expressed their verdicts through choosing either a solid stone or one with a hole in the middle. Side bets surely took place at the kapeleia, the ancient tavern of the day.

In the 17th-century Amsterdam stock exchange merchants wagered on cargo ship arrivals and, in the 19th-century, political betting parlors dominated American elections until banned in the 1940s. Then there’s the Chicago Board of Trade’s commodity futures. So, we’ve long understood that putting money behind predictions creates powerful information signals.

Today’s crypto-powered prediction markets are the digital rebirth of this ancient practice—but with a critical difference: they’re permissionless, transparent, and global.

The Information Markets Revolution: What Makes Crypto Prediction Markets Different

Traditional prediction markets required trusted intermediaries to hold stakes, verify outcomes, and distribute winnings. Crypto eliminates these middlemen through blockchain technology. When you place a bet on Polymarket on mostly geopolitical, macroeconomic, and cultural market issues—whether it’s “Will the Fed cut rates in January?” or “Who wins Best Picture at the 2026 Oscars?”—your stake is held in a smart contract, results are verified transparently, and payouts happen automatically using USDC. No bank account required, no geographic restrictions, and no intermediary taking a cut or deciding who gets to play.

Another giant in the industry, Kalshi, focuses 90% of its subject matter on sports with topics like “PGA Famers Insurance Open Winner” and “College Basketball Kent State vs. Akron.” Another rising predictions market, Novig, focuses solely on sports.

The Convergence Moment: Why Now?

With a seven-day trading volume of $3.9 billion, prediction markets are taking off, and here are a few reasons: regulatory maturation, TradFi integration catalysts, and infrastructure breakthroughs.

Most notably on the regulatory side, CFTC approvals enabled operations in the United States. For example, in July 2025, Polymarket acquired the CFTC-licensed derivatives exchange QCX, LLC and clearinghouse QC Clearing LLC. This allows traders to engage with prediction market contracts on Polymarket with confidence and clarity. Kalshi’s $1 billion December raise at an $11 billion valuation also demonstrates institutional confidence. Overall, regulatory clarity is unlocking institutional capital and retail access through established brokerages.

Along with the Intercontinental Exchange’s (ICE) 2 billion investment into Polymarket, ICE will also become a global distributor of Polymarket event driven data, highlighting the comingTradFi integration into prediction markets.

Partnerships deepen the integration. Polymarkets’s multi-year collaboration with TKO Group Holdings causes the predictions market platform to become the official and exclusive partner of UFC and Zuffa Boxing. This allows for a direct blending of prediction market technology with live fan experiences.

Kalshi is partnering with both CNN and CNBC in 2026 with viewers able to see real-time probabilities in news tickers. Both Polymarket and Kalshi have struck deals with Google. Companies entering the space through partnerships and native apps include Robinhood, Fanatics, and Coinbase. The three billion event contracts traded on Robinhood prediction markets in November 2025 (+20% MoM) demonstrating retail adoption at scale.

Technical advances have allowed infrastructure breakthroughs to occur. These include multi-chain expansions with Polygon, Solana, Base, and Gnosis Chain; AI oracle integrations for instant permissionless settlements; and hybrid AMM/order book models reducing friction while improving liquidity. Contrast that to the struggles of Augur, a platform that debuted when tech and regulation wasn’t ready.

Market Dynamics: Leaders and Challengers

Although Polymarket has served as the dominant platform, it will likely continue to be challenged by competitors, offering users diverse options. In fact, in 2025, a dozen organizations either submitted applications to become or became designated contract markets (DCMs), which is an increase of 500% over the previous year. Additionally, other companies want to partner with DCMs as future commission merchants to offer prediction market services.

As a quick comparison between Polymarket and Opinion:

• Polymarket metrics over 30 days, ending on December 3, 2025 include:

  • Open interest: $247.1 million

  • Total notional volume: $4.39 billion

  • 82% market share of category TVL

  • Historical zero fees model driving user adoption

• Opinion metrics over 30 days, ending on December 3, 2025 include how its:

  • TVL surged +110% in 30 days (from $30 million to $63 million)

  • Estimated $4 billion monthly volume indicating potential market share disruption

  • Performance has demonstrated a product-market fit on emerging L2 infrastructure

Network effects and winner-takes-most dynamics are attracting growth capital as these platforms offer scalable diversification from traditional derivatives and betting products. Monetization strategies go beyond fees and include data licensing such as real-time probabilities to news outlets, financial terminals, and more; API integrations with social platforms and applications; and, for some companies, like Robinhood, the opportunity to cross-sell core financial services.

The User Behavior Shift

Traders are migrating to prediction markets where more structured speculation exists with markets serving as hedging instruments and alpha sources for DeFi portfolios. As real-time probabilities outperform traditional polling in political/economic forecasting, this migration will likely also extend into other related event market contracts.

Although initially in the news spotlight because of political predictions, Polymarket isn’t limited to this category. Markets with the largest open interest include:

• Non-election politics: $55 million

• Crypto: $52 million

• Business: $36 million

• Elections: $22 million

• Pop culture: $20 million

• Sports: $20 million

• Total: $242 million

Newer entries include Crypto.com’s partnership with Hollywood.com to launch an entertainment-based prediction market with a focus on films, television shows, theater productions, actors, musicians, and award winners. Limitless offers short-term prediction markets, focusing on crypto and stock prices; it’s an X/Twitter project backed by Coinbase and 1confirmation.

Controversies, Challenges, and Emerging Solutions

Prediction markets wrestle with certain pain points, including centralization risks, manipulation in traditional oracle models, and settlement delays in manual reporting systems.

Regulatory gray zones still exist, including sports betting classification debates. Kalshi, for example, received a November 2025 ruling from a Nevada judge that labeled Kalshi as a gaming platform that was not exempt from state gambling regulations. Kalshi’s stance is that the platform is a federally regulated financial exchange that uses legal derivative contracts with event contract swaps rather than bets. After the ruling, Kalshi began the appeals process. Something similar is also happening in Massachusetts.

Regardless of the case outcomes, issues still needing to be addressed include age-gating and additional responsible gambling concerns. Cross-border regulatory arbitrage may also serve as a headwind factor.

Market manipulation risks that need to be managed include whale influence on low-liquidity markets, wash trading and price manipulation in decentralized settings, and trade-offs between permissionless transactions and market integrity.

We are seeing market formats evolve, including the introduction of perpetual prediction markets for continuous outcomes, combinatorial markets handling complex multi-variable events, and bonding curve mechanisms for dynamic liquidity. Opportunities exist with prediction market probabilities as oracle inputs for DeFi protocols; tokenized positions enabling secondary trading and leverage; and integration with yield strategies and portfolio hedging.

Emerging solutions focus on AI-powered instant settlement for permissionless markets, exchange-integrated oracles that reduce front running, and appchains with embedded consensus for oracle integrity.

Forward-Looking Perspectives

From our vantage point, we see a few catalysts for broader adoption in the near term, including CFTC-approved U.S. platform launches via established brokerages, social platform integration such as through embedded prediction APIs in tweets, and neobank-embedded markets blending finance and speculation.

Additionally, as prediction markets evolve into a standalone financial market category, we’ll likely see the verticalization of prediction markets for the larger sub-market categories (i.e. sports, business, etc.). For instance, sports-focused prediction markets like Novig are focused on building hyper tailored markets and user experiences for sports bettors. As prediction markets become a more normalized consumer behavior, these verticalized prediction markets will likely offer better experiences for users than one-size fits all platforms.

Over the next one to three years, privacy-focused prediction markets may leverage zero-knowledge proofs while governance applications like futarchy and outcome-based decision making may develop.

There could be some roadblocks ahead, including potential regulatory crackdowns limiting global access or product scope, user fatigue if markets fail to deliver accuracy improvements, and competition from traditional platforms adopting blockchain rails.

As further integration does occur, we see a number of positive societal implications:crowd intelligence for resource allocation and policy decisions, decentralized forecasting as public good infrastructure, and a shift from polling to participatory probability markets in media/governance.

The question isn’t whether prediction markets will scale, but how many prediction markets we’ll have and which models will capture the multi-trillion dollar opportunity of pricing real-world uncertainty on-chain as these predictions supplement human intelligence and forecasting.

Business

BitGo Debuts With $2.59 Billion Valuation as Crypto IPO Window Reopens

BitGo received approval from a top U.S. regulator, in December, to convert its state trust bank charter to a national one, allowing the firm to operate nationwide. An expert quoted in the article called BitGo’s IPO the “first major bellwether of the market’s appetite for crypto listings in 2026.”

UBS Explores Crypto Investing for Select Private Banking Clients

This private Swiss bank would initially permit select clients to buy and sell Bitcoin and Ether and then potentially expand the service to Asia-Pacific and United States markets. The lender’s rising crypto focus is occurring, in part, because of increasing digital asset demand by wealthy clients.

Latam Insights: Brazil Opens Crypto to Banks, Colombian Pension-Fund Manager Reveals Bitcoin Fund

Brazil is streamlining processes for banking institutions and brokers to enter the digital asset industry while a Columbian pension fund manager, Proteccion, plans to launch a Bitcoin investment product. Proteccion wants to take advantage of the country’s significant interest in crypto.

Regulation

SEC to Dismiss Winklevoss’ Gemini Crypto Lending Lawsuit

The company has reached a settlement with the New York Department of Financial Services. Customers will get 100% of their crypto assets back.

Binance Seeks EU MiCA License With Greek Subsidiary

The largest crypto exchange in the world now has a Greek presence and is seeking a license. The license would permit the exchange to operate anywhere in the European Union. Binance’s focus on Greece included an awareness of its strong regulatory environment and economy that’s growing faster than the EU average.

Vietnam: Applications for Cryptocurrency Market Licenses Will Begin to Be Accepted on January 20th

About ten banks and securities companies have shared plans to provide crypto exchange services once licensed via the State Security Commission’s regulatory authority.

New Products and Deals

Solana Foundation Partners With Hanwha to Grow Korea’s Crypto Market

As Hanwha Asset Management accelerates its South Korean digital asset strategy, the two parties signed a memorandum of understanding. Goals include strengthening Solana’s local ecosystem and boosting institutional-ready blockchain products.

ARK Invest Files for CoinDesk 20 Crypto Index ETFs

This move serves as the company’s first push into broad crypto exposure with ETFs that would track the daily CoinDesk 20 index performance. One fund would pair Bitcoin with major altcoins while the second fund would pair long index futures with short Bitcoin futures.

Ethereum Foundation Forms Post-Quantum Security Team, Adds $1 Million Research Prize

The foundation is supporting the drive to harden a key hash function, adding a $1 million Poseidon Prize to last year’s $1 million Proximity Prize for broader cryptographic research.

Pantera News

Pantera Wrapped - A Look Back at 2025

2025 was another reminder that crypto never moves in straight lines. Amid historic tailwinds and meaningful progress on U.S. regulatory clarity, markets surged to all time highs, narratives evolved, and momentum periodically reset. While the year ultimately ended below its highs, it marked the reset the industry needed to build toward true escape velocity.

Pantera Blockchain Letter: Market Outlook for 2026

Cosmo Jiang notes how “2025 was not a fundamentals-driven year for returns in the crypto markets. It was a year where macro, positioning, flows and market structure effects were the dominant drivers – particularly for assets outside of Bitcoin. Looking at a timeline of the year’s major macro and policy inflection points helps capture why the tape felt so discontinuous.”

Pantera Congratulations BitGo

For more than a decade, Pantera has supported BitGo as they scaled from early multi-signature wallets to developing comprehensive solutions for institutional investors. The milestone of BitGo’s IPO reflects the maturation of modern finance as digital assets integrate into global markets.

Let’s Meet Up

• Hong Kong, February 10th-11th

• Singapore, February 12th

• New York City, February 26th

• Los Angeles, March 13th

Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, a Managing Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early-stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.

If you have any projects that need funding, feel free to DM me on twitter.

I’ve been investing in blockchain for over a decade now, and the best years are never the smoothest ones.

2025 had everything: regulatory clarity, market volatility, and finally public market access for investors to blockchain through ETFs, DATs and IPOs. At Pantera, we had four portfolio IPOs with a combined market cap of ~$33B billion as of January 2026, a strategic exit (Robinhood acquiring Bitstamp), and more capital deployed than any year in Pantera’s history - we led 85% of our new investments. It was a rollercoaster ride, energizing, and exactly what this industry needed to separate momentum from substance.

The companies that thrived weren’t chasing narratives—they were solving real problems. Stablecoins moved $46 trillion. Infrastructure teams shipped production-grade sequencing layers and parallel execution frameworks. Prediction markets went mainstream, IBIT(Blackrock’s Bitcoin ETF) surpassed $100B AUM and Coinbase joined the Fortune 500.

As we hit the ground running in 2026, let’s take a pause and review 2025 and you’ll see why we believe 2026 will be an even better year.

Thank you to the Pantera team for their help in preparing this report, including Ping Chen, Jonathan Gieg, Enzo Bachaumard, and Raymond Yu.

Full Report: Pantera 2025 Wrapped

Here are some key highlights of 2025:

Our investments last year spanned eight countries in four regions.

1. North America (64.52%)

2. Asia (16.13%)

3. Europe (9.68%)

4. Middle East (9.68%)

Top sectors represented by deal count (31 total investments):

1. Infrastructure (38.71%)

   • Altius – VM-agnostic, parallel execution framework built for L1s, rollups, and appchains seeking high-performance execution and multichain atomic composability. | Follow on X

   • Arch Network – Bitcoin-native smart contract and settlement infrastructure used by developers building applications directly on BTC without bridges. | Follow on X

   • Radius – Decentralized sequencing and blockspace network adopted by rollups and L2 teams to monetize blockspace, improve UX, and enable shared ordering infrastructure. | Follow on X

   • Raiku – Solana-native blockspace marketplace and network extension framework used by Solana appchains and high-throughput applications to guarantee inclusion and capture MEV. | Follow on X

   • Rialo – Modular, omni-chain programmable network built for developers enabling low-latency cross-chain execution, agentic workflows, and autonomous interactions. | Follow on X

   • Symbiotic – Generalized shared security layer used by new and existing decentralized networks to bootstrap sovereign security without sacrificing governance or token design. | Follow on X

   • Zama – Open-source cryptography infrastructure powering enterprises, developers, and governments to run private computation, confidential smart contracts, and privacy-preserving AI using FHE. | Follow on X

2. Internet Capital Markets (16.3%)

   • Accountable – Privacy-preserving financial data and reporting infrastructure used by institutional investors, issuers, and exchanges to verify yield, risk, and disclosures for crypto-native financial products. | Follow on X

   • [Stealth] – Institution-backed crypto exchange built for broker-dealers, market makers, and large asset managers as market structure shifts toward multi-venue best execution.

   • Meanwhile – Crypto-native life insurance and annuities platform serving Bitcoin holders seeking regulated downside protection and long-term BTC-denominated financial products. | Follow on X

   • [Stealth] – Decentralized exchange and liquidity protocol used by traders, developers, and liquidity providers for permissionless token trading and on-chain price discovery.

   • [Stealth] – Token liquidity bootstrapping and capital formation infrastructure used by token issuers and on-chain projects to launch assets, seed deep liquidity, and capture long-term trading fees via Uniswap v4–native mechanisms.

3. Stablecoins (12.9%)

   • Coinflow – Unified fiat and crypto payments platform serving high-risk and high-volume merchants with compliant checkout, embedded fraud protection, and chargeback insurance. | Follow on X

   • Fin – Payments platform enabling individuals, creators, and businesses to instantly send and receive stablecoins, NFTs, and crypto globally with minimal friction, designed for payouts, peer-to-peer transfers, and embedded payment flows. | Follow on X

   • [Stealth] – Decentralized money middleware used by institutions, protocols, and asset issuers to connect off-chain liquidity with on-chain markets.

   • [Stealth] – Real-time cross-border FX settlement infrastructure serving fintechs, payment companies, and global enterprises moving high-value payments instantly and transparently.

   • RedotPay – Consumer-focused stablecoin payments and card platform serving underbanked users and crypto holders who want to spend stablecoins globally via Visa rails, with strong traction across Africa and Asia. | Follow on X

4. Consumer (12.9%)

   • [Stealth] – Crypto-native casino and sportsbook platform serving players with a compliance-first, brand-driven, and VIP-focused gaming experience.

   • [Stealth] – Two-sided sports prediction exchange enabling retail bettors, professional traders, and liquidity providers to trade moneylines, spreads, parlays, and props via a CLOB-style marketplace, delivering tighter pricing and a superior mobile-first experience.

5. AI + Robotics (12.9%)

   • OpenMind – An open-source AI and robotics infrastructure platform building the software and physical reasoning layer for general-purpose robots, enabling scalable, intelligent interaction with the real world through a global machine network. | Follow on X

   • Surf AI – Crypto-native AI research and execution platform used by traders, analysts, exchanges, and KOLs to generate real-time, on-chain-backed intelligence faster than general-purpose AI tools. | Follow on X

   • Vigil – AI-powered trading and research platform building a discretionary hedge fund augmented by a proprietary reasoning system, designed for active traders, hedge funds, and other market participants. | Follow on X

   • [Stealth] – Formal reasoning and verification infrastructure used by blockchain foundations, enterprises, and government-adjacent organizations to mathematically prove code correctness and eliminate hallucinations in mission-critical systems.

6. Enterprise (6.45%)

   • [Stealth] – Institutional-grade custody and transaction management platform used by funds, DAOs, and enterprises to securely manage assets, tokenization, and DeFi workflows.

   • TransCrypts – Self-sovereign identity and data verification protocol used by enterprises to verify income, employment, and financial data via zkTLS while preserving user ownership and privacy. | Follow on X

Fund deployment by stage by deal count (31 total investments):

1. Series A (48.4%)

2. Seed (25.8%)

3. Series B (25.8%)

Full Report: Pantera 2025 Wrapped

Business

Inside Iran’s Growing $7.8 Billion Crypto Ecosystem

Chainalysis released a report that analyzes Iran’s increasingly more rapid crypto growth with on-chain activity now accounting for about half of its total crypto ecosystem in Q4 of 2025. Steadily increasing shares in Iran’s broader economy reflect its growing role.

Avalanche Facilitates Galaxy Digital’s $75M Tokenized CLO Debut

Nasdaq: GLXY closed its first tokenized collateralized loan obligation with a goal of bringing private credit on chain. Tokens are anticipated to be listed on INX’s ATS platform.

CoinGecko CEO Nods to $500m Sale Reports Amid Crypto M&A Bonanza

The company is reviewing “strategic opportunities,” using U.S. investment bank Moelis to advise the firm on the sale. Moelis has participated in $5 trillion-plus in this type of transaction across multiple industries.

Miami’s Crypto-Settled Real Estate Record Broken by $14 Million USDT Transaction

With the deal facilitated by tokenization specialist Propy and property companies being Ciprés and Rilea Group, crypto-secured real estate purchases are increasingly becoming a trend and an alternative to wire transfers.

Algorand Foundation Returns to U.S., Citing Crypto-Friendly Pivot

Returning after years in Singapore, the foundation will have a brand new slate of board members. Jito Foundation also returned to the United States, from the Cayman Islands, also citing the country’s crypto friendliness.

Regulation

Tim Scott Postpones Senate Banking Crypto Vote

The planned January 15th vote will be delayed as Coinbase expresses concerns over innovation stifling, making the CFTC subservient to the SEC, and the potential to eliminate rewards on stablecoins. A new vote date has not yet been set.

New DIFC Crypto Token Regulations Set to Take Effect

Dubai’s International Financial Centre has updated rules after a public consultation last year. Now, financial services firms engaging with crypto will take on direct responsibility to determine if tokens meet the country’s criteria

State Orders Kalshi, Polymarket, Crypto.com to Stop Offering Sports Betting in Tennessee

Letters issued by the state indicate that the sports betting companies are offering the service without proper licensing from the Sports Wagering Council.

Russia Moves to Make Crypto ‘Everyday Finance’ as Lawmakers Prepare Retail Access Bill

If this legislation passes, digital assets would no longer be in a special regulatory category. If removed from the category, broader retail participation can occur with non-qualified investors within cap limits of approximately $3,800.

New Products and Deals

CME Group to Launch Cardano, Chainlink and Stellar Futures, Expanding Regulated Crypto Derivatives

Pending regulatory approval, the CME Group is ready to expand its products, launching futures contracts in a way that further institutionalizes altcoin investments in the United States.

Ethereum Giant BitMine Backs MrBeast with $200 Million

BitMine Immersion Technologies announced an equity investment, a demonstration of how the company is continuing to deploy capital into projects outside the scope of traditional blockchain ventures.

LSEG Debuts Digital Settlement Platform in Blockchain Push

The London Stock Exchange launched a Digital Settlement House that facilitates interactions between separate payment systems when exchanging funds. It uses the technology underpinning crypto but can be used on blockchains or in traditional finance.

State Street Joins Crypto Rush With Digital-Asset Rollout

This custody bank will develop products like stablecoins and tokenized deposits, providing support and collaborating with both money managers and clients.

This Week at Pantera

New Stateful Episode Explores Bitcoin vs Gold: Why 2025 Was Different

Discussion points include how Bitcoin’s $2T wasn’t ready for nation-state flows; how gold’s $20T could absorb central bank diversification; and how nations adopt Bitcoin last, not first.

Pantera is Preparing for Ondo Summit 2026 in New York City

Pantera CEO and Founder Dan Morehead will speak on February 3, 2026. The Ondo Summit is attended by the most influential executives, founders, and leaders shaping the intersection of blockchain and finance.

Participating in Nexus Chat on 2026 Crypto Predictions

With this episode taking place on January 15, Pantera’s research & investments professional, Jay Lu, shares his insights with Nexus CEO and co-founder Daniel Martin.

Let’s Meet Up

• New York City, January 28th-30th

• Hong Kong, February 10th-11th

• Singapore, February 12th

• New York City, February 26th

Important Disclosures

This article has been prepared by Pantera Capital Partners LP and its affiliates (“Pantera”) in order to present high-level information regarding Pantera’s investment activities in 2025 and market commentary. The article is made available for informational purposes only.

This article does not contain all information or material terms pertinent to an investment decision. Nothing contained herein constitutes an offer to sell, or a solicitation to buy, any securities, nor does this article contain any investment recommendation. The article does not contain a representation or warranty as to the future performance of any fund or instrument, and it cannot be relied upon in making any investment decision. All information contained herein should be read in conjunction with, and if applicable, is qualified by, the applicable governing and offering documents of Panera’s funds, which will be provided solely to qualified offerees, when such documents are available.

The information contained in this article is current as of the date indicated. Such information is believed to be reliable, and has been obtained from sources believed to be reliable, but Pantera makes no representation or warranty (express or implied) of any nature, nor accepts any responsibility or liability of any kind, with respect to the fairness, accuracy, completeness, or reasonableness of the information or opinions contained herein. Analyses and opinions contained herein (including market commentary, statements or forecasts) reflect the judgment of Pantera as of the date indicated, and may contain elements of subjectivity (including certain assumptions) or be based on incomplete information. If assumptions used in formulating analyses or opinions are altered or shown to be incorrect, the analyses or opinions contained herein may change. Pantera’s relationships and resources are only one of many factors that relate to the success of an investment. Additionally, Pantera is under no obligation to update, modify or amend this article or to otherwise notify you in the event that any matter stated herein, or any opinion, projection, forecast or estimate set forth herein, changes or subsequently becomes inaccurate.

Certain information contained in this article constitutes “forward-looking statements,” which can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as “may”, “will”, “should”, “expect”, “anticipate”, “target”, “project”, “estimate”, “intend”, “continue” or “believe” or the negatives thereof or other variations thereon or comparable terminology. Due to various risks and uncertainties, actual events or results or the actual policies, procedures and processes of Pantera and the performance of Pantera’s funds may differ materially from those reflected or contemplated in such forward-looking statements and no undue reliance should be placed on these forward-looking statements, nor should the inclusion of these statements be regarded as Pantera’s representation that its funds will achieve any strategy, objectives or other plans.

This article contains references to certain Pantera investments and classifies such investments by listed categories (e.g., sector, round, size). Category determinations are made based on information that is believed to be reliable; however, these classifications incorporate certain subjective judgments and could differ form classifications made by a third-party source.

Pantera is not acting and does not purport to act in any way as an advisor or in a fiduciary capacity vis-a-vis any investor or prospective investor in its funds. Therefore, it is strongly suggested that any prospective investor make an independent evaluation of any possible transactions, including obtaining independent advice in relation to any investment, financial, legal, tax, accounting and/or regulatory issues discussed herein.

An investment in a Pantera fund is speculative and entails substantial risks, including the fact that such an investment would be illiquid and be subject to significant restrictions on transferability. No market is expected to develop for interests in Pantera’s funds. Past performance is not a guide to future performance (although performance is not shown herein). Financial instruments and investment opportunities discussed or referenced herein may not be suitable for all investors, and potential investors must make an independent assessment of the appropriateness of any transaction in light of their own objectives and circumstances, including the possible risk and benefits of entering into such a transaction. An investor in a Pantera fund could lose all or a substantial amount of his or her investment. Returns generated from an investment in Pantera’s funds may not adequately compensate investors for the business and financial risks assumed. While Pantera’s funds are subject to market risks common to other types of investments, including market volatility, the funds employ certain speculative investment practices that may increase the risk of investment loss. The products and strategies in which Pantera’s funds expect to invest may involve above-average risk. Nothing herein is intended to imply that Pantera’s funds’ investment methodologies may be considered “conservative”, “safe”, “risk free” or “risk averse”.

Any case studies presented herein were selected by Pantera to provide information and context with respect to Pantera’s investment processes, and nothing in the article is meant to convey or imply that all investments in Pantera’s portfolio will be selected on the basis of similar criteria. Case studies are not a reflection of all of Pantera’s investments, which may have materially different attributes. Pantera and its principals have made investments in some of the instruments discussed in this article and may in the future make additional investments or trading decisions in connection with such instruments without further notice.

The opinions in videos presented herein solely reflect the opinions of the speakers, and do not reflect Pantera’s opinions.

Geographic classifications based on headquarters domicile. Many portfolio companies operate globally; headquarters location does not reflect operational presence or customer base.

Specific investments named in this document were invested during 2025 and have publicly announced funding rounds disclosing Pantera Capital as an investor. Selection criteria were based on announcement status and timing, not performance. These examples do not represent all investments made in 2025, and Pantera has made additional investments that remain confidential or unannounced.

This document contains links to third-party websites and social media accounts, including portfolio company X (formerly Twitter) accounts. Pantera Capital was not involved in the preparation of content on these third-party sites and does not endorse, control, or assume responsibility for the accuracy or completeness of information contained therein. These links are provided for informational purposes only. Third-party content may change without notice and Pantera has no obligation to update or monitor such content.

Fund deployment by stage reflects combined investment activity across Pantera’s Blockchain Fund (BCF) and Early-Stage Token Fund (EST). Stage classifications (Seed, Series A, Series B) refer to the funding round designation at the time of Pantera’s investment. Data excludes other Pantera fund vehicles.

Portfolio construction criteria and targeted companies described in this article are for illustrative purposes only. Past strategies are not intended to limit Pantera’s future investment activities in any way. There is no guarantee that investment opportunities similar to those described herein will be available or that Pantera will make such investments. Relationships and resources are only one of many factors that relate to the success of an investment or strategy.

All registered and unregistered service marks, trademarks and trade names referred to in this article are the property of their respective owners, and Pantera’s use herein does not imply an affiliation with or endorsement by the owners of these service marks, trademarks, and trade names.

Pantera is an investor in several of the DAT companies included in the DATBoard. Additionally, Pantera is a strategic advisor to at least one DAT company. The DATBoard does not include information on every DAT in existence and does not reflect the views, statements, or positions of any of the referenced DAT companies.

The holidays are upon us and generic gift cards won’t cut it.

If you’re shopping for someone who’s crypto-curious or already deep in the space, this list highlights five simple ways to gift crypto.

These gifts are easy to give, easy to understand, and designed to last across multiple cycles without reading a white paper.

Here’s my top five for the year:

1. AskSurf.ai.

Price: Range of Pricing Plans

Not just a gift. This is an all-year edge. AskSurf.ai rapidly delivers AI crypto research, on-chain insights, sentiment, and unlimited Q&A. Traders, analysts, and creators love it, so this is a gift they’ll use while remembering you monthly.

2. Ledger Nano S Plus: Entry-Level Self-Custody Essential

Price: $59 USD

If someone owns crypto without a hardware wallet, this is the gift to give. Ledger Nano S Plus secures 5,500+ assets across major chains and is the simplest way to say, “I care about your security.”

3. Metal Seed Phrase Backup (Fireproof)

Price: Anywhere from $6.99 to $400 (with a 10K gold beauty for $8,000)

Not the most exciting gift—but essential. A metal seed phrase backup protects recovery phrases from fire, water, and disasters. Most crypto holders don’t have one. That’s why it lands. Gifting a very special person? Pair it with a hardware wallet.

4. Gold Bar Bitcoin Reserve Bourbon Whiskey Limited Edition 750mL

Price: $109.99

This one’s for crypto party favorites. A straight-bourbon blend aged five to fourteen years, it’s limited to 21,000 bottles. A metal Bitcoin coin embedded inside nods to the 21M supply. 21+ friends only.

5. One Shot Miner PRO (2025 Edition): Bitcoin Mining Hobby Device

Price: $59.99

This compact, plug-and-play miner gives you a shot at Bitcoin rewards every ten minutes. It runs 24/7 at low power, making it a fun, hands-on way for hobbyists to join Bitcoin mining.

Like these recommendations? Subscribe to the newsletter.

As we kick off 2026, here are the critical developments I’m tracking that may shape the industry:

Business

Bitmine Accumulates 4.066M ETH and $13.2B in Crypto

This further strengthens Bitmine’s standing as one of the biggest ETH treasuries as it prepares to launch the MAVAN staking network.

Acting CFTC Chair Caroline Pham to Join MoonPay

Pham is leaving as her successor, Michael Selig, gets sworn into the position as CFTC Chair. Sworn in the acting position in January, Pham disclosed her plans to return to the private sector in May.

South Korean Card Giant Completes Stablecoin Payments Pilot for Foreigners

Payment processor BC Card has wrapped up their pilot program that will allow foreign users to pay local merchants via stablecoins.

Regulation

Michael Selig Sworn In as 16th CFTC Chairman

Sworn in on December 22, Selig brings in-depth public and private sector experience across multiple industries, including agriculture, energy, financial, and digital assets.

Arizona Advances Bill To Exempt Bitcoin, Crypto From Property Taxes

Besides exempting digital assets from property taxes, SB 1044 would limit state and local taxes on blockchain activities. This would require passage of a constitutional amendment held in the next election to become law.

Russia Moves to Legalize Domestic Crypto Deals for Retail Buyers

The country’s central bank formulated a regulatory framework that would allow qualified investors and retail investors to buy crypto. Non-qualified investors have the potential of buying up to 300,000 rubles annually of the most liquid cryptocurrencies.

Hong Kong Plans Crypto, Infrastructure Rules for Insurers

The Hong Kong Insurance Authority is recommending a capital framework for crypto and infrastructure that would redirect funds to government-prioritized sectors.

Ghana Legalizes Bitcoin and Crypto Trading Under New Legal Framework

After years of debate, Ghana’s parliament passed the 2025 Virtual Asset Service Providers Bill: a framework for licensing, supervising, and regulating crypto-related businesses.

New Products and Deals

JPMorgan Is Exploring Crypto Trading for Institutional Clients

In response to increased interest, JPMorgan, Chase & Co. is mulling over crypto trading services to institutional clients. The financial institution is currently assessing what services would be most feasible.

Coinbase Bets on Prediction Markets With Clearing Company Acquisition

Shortly after providing access to prediction markets in their current trading interface, Coinbase acquired The Clearing Company to accelerate their strategic plan in this area.

Fiserv to Implement QR Crypto Payments in Argentina

This Milwaukee-based company will leverage its Clover platform to allow customers to pay in crypto and, in exchange, merchants will receive Argentinian pesos.

This Week at Pantera

Pantera Capital Outlook: Consolidating Crypto Gains Under the Trump Administration

Although the shift in the crypto policy environment is real, multiple regulatory and legislative developments still merit close observation as we exit 2025 and enter 2026. Pantera identifies key areas.

The Year of Structural Progress

Pantera Chief Legal Officer Katrina Paglia delves further into structural developments in 2025, providing a comprehensive update on crypto regulation and policy.

Crypto for Advisors: Predictions for 2026

Pantera Capital’s Paul Veradittakit shares his 2026 crypto predictions: RWA tokenization, AI security advances, a big IPO wave, and the shift to institutional adoption.

Important Disclosures – This blog post is made for informational and educational purposes only. This blog post solely reflects the opinion of Paul Veradittakit, and does not reflect Pantera’s opinions. It does not contain all information pertinent to an investment decision. Nothing in this blog post constitutes an investment recommendation or an offer of investment advisory services. This blog post cannot be relied upon in making an investment decision. Nothing contained herein constitutes an offer to sell, or a solicitation to buy, any securities. This blog post contains information believed to be reliable, and has been obtained from sources believed to be reliable, but Pantera makes no representation or warranty (express or implied) of any nature, nor accepts any responsibility or liability of any kind, with respect to the fairness, accuracy, completeness, or reasonableness of the information or opinions contained herein. Forward-looking statements (including predictions) should not be relied upon. There is no guarantee that investments in any instrument or type of instrument described herein will be profitable – all investments carry the inherent risk of total loss. Analyses and opinions contained herein (including market commentary, statements or forecasts) reflect the author’s judgment as of the date this blog post was published, and may contain elements of subjectivity (including certain assumptions) or be based on incomplete information. There is no duty or obligation to update the contents of this blog post. This blog post is not intended to provide, and should not be relied on for accounting, legal, or tax advice, or investment recommendations. Pantera and its principals have made investments in some of the instruments discussed in this communication and may in the future make additional investments or trading decisions in connection with such instruments without further notice.

Before I share my 2026 predictions, I want to reflect on the eight I made for 2025 to check their accuracy. You can read my reasoning for these predictions in more detail at VeradiVerdict.

I awarded myself these subjective self-scores for my eight predictions from 2025, ranking each of my predictions from a 1 (least accurate) through a 5 (most accurate). Results broke down pretty evenly across the rating range with no 1s and two of each of these: 2, 3, 4, and 5.

#1 RWA Growth

Prediction: By year-end, RWAs (excluding stablecoins) will account for 30% of onchain TVL.

Score: 3 out of 5

When I made this prediction, RWAs excluding stablecoins represented 15% of onchain TVL at $13.7 billion. As of December 15, 2025, the amount reached ~16% of TVL at $16.6 billion out of a DeFi TVL of $118 billion. So, while the RWA sector has expanded, it remained at a relatively consistent share of onchain TVL. Top sectors include the following:

• Tokenized Treasures: $8.7 billion

• Tokenized Commodities:$3.2 billion

• Tokenized Private Credit: $2.4 billion

• Tokenized Institutional Funds: $2.4 billion

#2 Bitcoin-Fi

Prediction: 1% of Bitcoins will participate in Bitcoin-Fi.

Score: 4 out of 5

In this case, I actually underestimated the participation percentage. The total percentage of Bitcoin-Fi is 1.4% of the 19.9 million supply as of December 13. Bitcoin’s early stage liquid staking market is currently at $2.5 billion. Projects have included Babylon, Lombard, Arch Network and Mezo.

Another use case is lending and borrowing with more than $1 billion in BTC-backed loans taking place in 2025 by Ledn, a billion-plus by Unchained, and a billion-plus by Coinbase. Key developments included the Babylon-Aave partnership, tBTC credit markets, and stacks ecosystem powered by ALEX Lab, Zest Protocol, and other applications.

#3 Fintechs as Crypto Gateways

Prediction: Fintechs will grow in prevalence and may perhaps rival smaller centralized exchanges in crypto holdings.

Score: 5 out of 5

During 2025, fintechs first rivaled smaller centralized exchanges and then went on to surpass them. Robinhood, at $51 billion according to company reporting, would already exceed the holdings of mid-tier CEXs with Bitfinex at $20.7 billion still standing as a smaller exchange. This shift reflects fintechs’ structural advantages in user acquisition, regulatory positioning, and integrated financial services.

#4 Unichain L2 Dominance

Prediction: Unichain becomes the leading L2 by transaction volume.

Score: 2 out of 5

When looking at Stage 1 L2s in December, Unichain ranks sixth with $260.14 million in total value secured. Above Unichain was:

• Arbitrum One with $17.29 billion TVS

• Base Chain with $12.11 billion TVS

• OP Mainnet with $2.24 billion TVS

• Starknet with $752.57 million TVS

• Ink with $396.63 million TVS

#5: NFT Application-Specific Resurgence

Prediction: Flexibility is what brings NFTs power. The use-cases will only increase.

Score: 2 out of 5

Use case types did grow across sectors in 2025, but NFTs as a whole have faced adoption headwinds. Once used largely for speculative art, practical applications of NFTs now include:

• Gaming ($0.54 trillion market) like World of Dyplans, Pixels, and Seraph

• Ticketing ($1.1 billion market) like OPEN Ticketing Ecosystem, GUTS Tickets, and SeatlabNFT

• RWA tokenization like Propy, RealT, and Lofty

• Decentralized identity systems like Ethereum Name Service, Lens Protocol, and Galxe

Engagement depth has increased with unique active wallets at 2.1 million in Q3 with traders having an average of 8.4 NFTs per wallet compared to 4.2 in Q1.

#6 Restaking Launches

Prediction: Restaking protocols like Eigenlayer, Symbiotic, and Karak will finally launch their tokens, which would pay operators from AVS and slashing.

Score: 3 out of 5

Restaking in the intended instantiation hasn’t seen as much adoption as intended and, instead, we’ve seen prominent restaking protocols expand into adjacent businesses.

EigenLayer/EigenCloud did activate its slashing mechanism on April 17, 2025 and is fully operational. In the fall, they also launched EigenAI and EigenCompute on mainnet alpha to expand beyond infrastructure into AI/compute workloads. Symbiotic, however, expanded to insurance, and most restaking protocols have not launched because of a TVL decrease.

#7 zkTLS Trend

Prediction: zkTLS will bring offchain data on-chain, powering new use cases for DeFi / Fintech and data verification in various industries and use cases.

Score: 5 out of 5

zkTLS already has multiple live product implementations, including these launches:

• TransCrypts launched in 2024 for income and identity verification.

• Accountable in May 2025 for verification of financial data between counterparties.

• Earnifi launched in 2025 for improved EWA underwriting.

• DaisyApp launched in 2025 for verifiable influencer marketing and attribution.

• 3Jane in private beta now for proof of assets and identity to underwrite uncollateralised loan.

• EarnOS for verified user acquisition and attribution.

We’re seeing zkTLS implemented in areas of verification.

#8 Encouraging Regulatory Environment

Prediction: We’ll see a winding down of SEC lawsuits, clear definitions of crypto as a particular asset class, and tax considerations.

Score: 5 out of 5

This three-part prediction came with the following levels of accuracy.

First, major SEC lawsuits did wind down in 2025, including ones against Ripple, Binance, Coinbase, Kraken, and more. All but Ripple concluded without financial penalties with Ripple’s coming with a $125 million penalty.

The year 2025 saw significant regulatory progress but did not provide clear definitions of crypto as a particular asset class. The Digital Asset Market Clarity Act passed through the House in July and is now under consideration by the Senate. This Act would give the CFTC jurisdiction over decentralized tokens and the SEC jurisdiction over centralized/investment tokens. Meanwhile, the SEC released a preliminary, nonbinding token taxonomy in November.

Part three of the prediction, clear tax guidance, came close but didn’t happen. Although foundational clarity on digital assets lays out how they are property, subject to capital gains and ordinary income rules, ambiguities still exist in areas like DeFi broker reporting and non-custodial transactions. Areas of progress include phased implementations of mandatory broker reporting that became effective this year; staking safe harbors for publicly traded trusts/ETFs in November; and ongoing stablecoin regulatory development, post-GENIUS Act.

Moreover, in 2025 the U.S. administration named a crypto czar, created a bitcoin strategic stockpile, formed a digital asset working group, and selected a new SEC chair that embraces innovation.

Nine Predictions for 2026

#1 Real-World Assets (RWA) Takes-Off

As of December 15, 2025, the amount reached ~14% of TVL at $16.6 billion out of a DeFi TVL of $118 billion.

Prediction:

• Treasuries and private credit could at least double.

• Tokenized stocks and equities could grow even faster when the anticipated “Innovation Exemption” under the SEC’s “Project Crypto” debuts.

• One surprise sector (carbon credits, mineral rights, or energy projects) will catch fire. This sector will likely be characterized by fragmented liquidity, global distribution, and a lack of standards, which blockchain-based markets will help resolve.

#2 AI Revolutionizes On-Chain Security

AI security and blockchain development tools are getting scary good. Real-time fraud detection, 95% accurate transaction Bitcoin labeling, and instant smart-contract debugging are here, detecting millions in blockchain vulnerabilities.

Prediction: In 2026, picture bigger shifts toward on-chain intelligence with deterministic, verifiable rules taking over smart contract-based governance. The application will scan code in near real-time, spot logic bugs and exploits instantly, and give immediate debugging feedback. The next big unicorn will be an innovative onchain security firm that will 100x the safety game.

#3 Prediction Markets Are Acquisition Targets

With $28 billion traded in 2025’s first ten months, prediction markets are consolidating around institutional infrastructure. We hit an ATH the week of October 20 at $2.3 billion.

Prediction: A buyout in the industry of more than $1 billion, one that will not involve Polymarket or Kalshi. Winning platforms will build under-the-hood liquidity rails with baked-in market-discovery intelligence that points out where money is hiding and why. Forget shiny new buttons. It’s all about effortlessly giving users superpowers: instant access to hidden pools, smarter routing, and predictive order flow.

Sports-focused platforms like DraftKings and FanDuel have gone mainstream, partnering with media for real-time odds distribution. Newer entries like NoVig, focused on sports, will expand their presence vertically, and new startups will emerge in APAC, as that is a region to watch.

#4 AI Becomes Your Personal Crypto Co-Pilot

Consumer AI platform usage will surge as systems mature, delivering hyper-personalized experiences that meet tailored expectations. Seamless integration makes advanced AI feel effortless, shifting usage from clunky to instant

Prediction: Platforms like Surf.ai will engage people from crypto-curious individuals to active traders in 2026 via intuitive advanced AI models, proprietary crypto datasets, and multi-step workflow agents. I believe that sophisticated technology and accessible design positions Surf as the go-to crypto research tool, delivering instant, on-chain-backed market insights 4× faster than generic options with other platforms of this type also emerging.

#5 Bank Titans Gear Up: G7-Pegged Stablecoin Looms

Ten major banks are in the early stages of exploring a consortium stablecoin issuance pegged to G7 currencies. The financial institutions are determining whether an industry-wide stablecoin would likely provide people and institutions with the benefits of digital currencies in compliant, risk-managed ways. Meanwhile, a group of ten European banks are investigating the issuance of a euro-pegged stablecoin.

Prediction: A consortium of major banks will release their own stablecoin (whether these pilot projects come to fruition in 2026 or a different consortium does).

#6 Privacy, Payments, Perpetuals: The Institutional Trio

Privacy tech is booming in institutional usage with the transparency-secrecy combination of Zama, Canton, and other protocols although retail usage isn’t finding traction or scalability. Stablecoins sit at $310 billion today, more than doubling market cap since 2023, expanding for 25 months in a row. Perpetual swap contracts already make up ~78% of crypto derivative volume, and the gap keeps growing between perps and spot options.

Prediction: For privacy, the gap between institutional and retail will widen in 2026. Stablecoins will have a path to $2 trillion+ long-term, hitting at least $500 billion next year, and the momentum for perpetuals will continue in 2026.

#7 The Institutional Macro View

As of December 15, 17.867% of BTC holdings now rest in the hands of publicly traded and private companies, ETFs, and countries.

Prediction: 2026 won’t be about hype or memes. It will be about consolidation, real compliance, and institutional money being driven by public market liquidity. Crypto will integrate in mainstream platforms, upgrade financial rails, and challenge current incumbents.

#8 The Biggest Crypto IPO Year Ever

2025 already had 335 U.S. IPOs, overall, an increase of 55% from 2024; many of those were crypto-friendly, including nine blockchain IPOs. This includes crypto-native ones like Circle Internet Group with a launch date of May 27, 2025 and crypto-inclusive ones like SPACS; Bitcoin Infrastructure Acquisition Corp, for example, launched on December 2, 2025.

Prediction: 2026 will be an even bigger year for digital asset public listings. Coinbase says that 76% of companies plan to add tokenized assets in 2026 with some eyeing 5%+ of their entire portfolio. Morpho serves as an example protocol with its $8.6 billion TVL in November 2025.

#9 Digital Asset Treasury Consolidation Accelerates

Back in 2021, fewer than ten public companies owned Bitcoin. Fast-forwarding to mid-December, 151 public companies own $95 billion with the number rising to 164 and $148 billion when including governments.

Predictions: 2026 will see brutal pruning. In each major asset class, only one or two players will dominate. Everyone else gets acquired or left behind except for a longer-tail token winner going along for the ride. It’s going global, too. Japan’s Metaplanet is already aggressive, so the U.S. no longer owns the trend as the global treasury landscape diversifies.

Paul Veradittakit

Important Disclosures – This blog post is made available by Pantera Capital Partners LP and its affiliates (“Pantera”) for informational and educational purposes only. This blog post solely reflects the opinion of Paul Veradittakit, and does not reflect Pantera’s opinions. It does not contain all information pertinent to an investment decision. Nothing in this blog post constitutes an investment recommendation or an offer of investment advisory services. This blog post cannot be relied upon in making an investment decision. Nothing contained herein constitutes an offer to sell, or a solicitation to buy, any securities. This blog post contains information believed to be reliable, and has been obtained from sources believed to be reliable, but Pantera makes no representation or warranty (express or implied) of any nature, nor accepts any responsibility or liability of any kind, with respect to the fairness, accuracy, completeness, or reasonableness of the information or opinions contained herein. Forward-looking statements (including predictions) should not be relied upon. There is no guarantee that investments in any instrument or type of instrument described herein will be profitable – all investments carry the inherent risk of total loss. Analyses and opinions contained herein (including market commentary, statements or forecasts) reflect the author’s judgment as of the date this blog post was published, and may contain elements of subjectivity (including certain assumptions) or be based on incomplete information. There is no duty or obligation to update the contents of this blog post. This blog post is not intended to provide, and should not be relied on for accounting, legal, or tax advice, or investment recommendations. Pantera and its principals have made investments in some of the instruments discussed in this communication and may in the future make additional investments or trading decisions in connection with such instruments without further notice.

Predictions are not guarantees of future outcomes. This blog post aims to provide market commentary. The opinions expressed are those of the author as of the date of publication and incorporate subjective judgments.

All registered or unregistered service marks, trademarks and trade names referred to in this blog are the property of their respective owners, and Pantera’s use herein does not imply an affiliation with or endorsement by the owners of these service marks, trademarks and trade names

Business

Pantera, Coinbase Pile on as Crypto Startups Raise $176 million This Week

Pantera Capital, Coinbase Ventures, and DCG led the way in investments into crypto startups this week, bringing this year’s total investment to more than $25 billion. That’s more than double last year’s investments.

YouTube is Now Paying Creators in Crypto, Offering a $100B Path to Finally Exit Banks

The company now includes PayPal’s PYUSD stablecoin as an option in the United States. This payout choice routes users directly through PayPal’s infrastructure without YouTube needing to custody crypto or transfer it directly.

Visa Expands Crypto Business with New Stablecoin Advisory Division

This division will work with banks, fintechs, enterprises, and merchants to analyze market opportunities, device market strategies, and build solutions based on stablecoins.

Regulation

US Regulator Grants Crypto Firms Initial Approval to Launch Trust Banks

The OOC conditionally approved national bank charters from Circle and Ripple and conditionally approved BitGo, Paxos, and Fidelity Digital Assets applications to convert state trust bank chapters into national ones.

SEC Approves DTCC Plan to Tokenize Stocks, Bonds & Treasuries

The SEC signed off on a plan from the DTCC to tokenize stocks, corporate bonds, and U.S. Treasuries. Rather than creating wrapped assets, they will issue onchain representations of securities in their depository.

House Passes INVEST Act to Ease Investment Standards and Boost Capital in Markets

Passing in the House 302 to 123, this Act, if it becomes law, would allow investors to become accredited through an SEC-approved exam rather than having only wealth or income determining who can be an accredited investor.

New Products and Deals

RedotPay Raises $107 Million in Series B

Pantera invests in RedotPay, which focuses on making digital finance accessible, secure, and efficient for everyone, moving beyond traditional fintech to create a fast, simpler, and more reliable users globally.

Solana Confirms Officially XRP Is Coming to Solana

On December 11, Solana confirmed an upcoming bridge between Hex Trust and LayerZero at the Breakpoint global conference along with the issuance of Wrapped XRP on Solana’s blockchain. Hex Trust will launch a 1:1, fully backed wrapped asset wXRP.

IBM Acquires Confluent for $11B and Builds a Unified Stack for AI and Blockchain

Rather than building baseline infrastructure, IBM is focusing on a continuously processing layer of events, transactions, and signals to facilitate the ability of blockchains, tokenized assets, and intelligent systems to operate in near real-time.

This Week at Pantera

Pantera Podcast: State of Crypto VC: $34B Raised, 50% Fewer Deals

I’m excited to share our inaugural episode of Pantera’s Podcast, Stateful. Host Mason Nystrom sits down with me and Franklin Bi, General Partner to discuss the catalysts reshaping crypto venture. Full episode here.

Investing in Surf

Pantera led a $15 million round for Surf.ai, the ChatGpt for crypto. Surf is the first AI model built for crypto markets and extensively used by researchers, traders and users looking to have their crypto questions answered. Top platform questions range from price actions to project fundamentals. Check it out here.

Pantera at Breakpoint Conference

At this global gathering General Partner Cosmo Jiang and Junior Partner Mason Nystrom discussed DATs, L1s, and token buybacks. Next year’s Breakpoint will be held in London, England.

Let’s Meet Up

New York City, December 17th-19th

New York City, January 29th-30th

Hong Kong, Consensus, February 10th-11th

New York City, February 26th

Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, a Managing Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early-stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.

If you have any projects that need funding, feel free to DM me on twitter.

Since Bitcoin’s invention, the blockchain industry’s ethos has been anchored in transparency as an open, immutable ledger that is visible to everyone; trust through verification rather than institutional reputation. This transparency enables decentralized systems to function with integrity and accountability.

But as blockchain technology matures and its applications broaden, transparency alone is no longer sufficient. A new reality is taking shape: privacy is essential for mainstream adoption, and the demand is accelerating across cultural, institutional, and technological fronts. At Pantera we’ve believed in this thesis since day 1, having invested in ZCash back in 2015 as one of the first attempts at bringing privacy to an immutable ledger.

We believe that we’re entering a privacy renaissance, one that blends the ideals of open blockchains with the practical needs of global finance. And this moment provides a backdrop for privacy protocols built from first principles around confidentiality like Zama (launching mainnet soon). Zama’s fully homomorphic encryption (FHE) technology is the absolute fortress that the world needs for mainstream adoption and to withstand the threat of quantum computing in the coming years. Blockchain applications are one area of implementation for Zama’s FHE cryptography and can be explored in other verticals like AI (Zama Concrete), cloud computing, and others.

Another portfolio in a similar vein is Starkware, inventor of zk-STARKs and Validium, a hybrid approach to blockchain privacy and scalability. Starkware’s cryptography similarly is quantum resistant and focused on blockchain use cases, especially with the launch of their latest S- Two prover.

The Cultural Shift: Surveillance Fatigue to Digital Sovereignty

The world has undergone a transformation in how individuals think about data. Years of mass surveillance, algorithmic tracking, and data breaches have made privacy one of the defining cultural themes of the decade. Users now understand that metadata, not just messages or transactions, can reveal intimate details about identity, wealth, location, and relationships. Privacy paired with user ownership of personal sensitive data is the new norm that we’re betting on at Pantera with investments in Zama, Starkware, Transcrypts, and World.

As the public becomes increasingly privacy-conscious, blockchains cannot ignore that digital money must offer confidentiality, not constant legibility. In this environment, privacy is no longer a niche preference. It is part of a broader push toward digital sovereignty.

The Institutional Shift: Transparency Without Privacy Fails at Scale

Institutions are continuing to enter the blockchain ecosystem. Banks, remittance platforms, payment processors, corporates, and fintechs are running pilots and preparing for real volumes across tokenized assets, cross-border settlement, and multi-jurisdiction payment rails.

Yet these institutions cannot operate on fully transparent public ledgers. Corporate cash flows, supplier networks, FX exposures, contract terms, and client transactions cannot be visible to competitors or the public. Enterprises need confidentiality with optional transparency, not full exposure.

This is where earlier pioneers like Zcash laid the groundwork. When Pantera Capital invested in Zcash in 2015, we recognized early that privacy was not merely an ideological preference; it was a requirement for real economic activity. Zcash’s crucial insight was that privacy cannot be bolted onto a system later, especially using zero-knowledge. It must be woven into the core protocol; otherwise it becomes too difficult, fragile, or inefficient to use.

Launched in 2016 as a fork of Bitcoin, Zcash introduced zk-SNARKs that allowed users to shield transaction details while preserving full verifiability. Tornado Cash also represents an important chapter in the evolution of on-chain privacy. The protocol saw meaningful user activity as individuals sought ways to break transactional linkages on public chains.

However, its model of strong privacy without mechanisms for selective disclosure ultimately led to high-profile legal actions by government authorities, forcing the project to effectively pause despite being autonomous code. This outcome highlights a critical lesson: privacy cannot come at the expense of auditability or compliance pathways. It is precisely why technologies like Zama’s fully homomorphic encryption are so fundamental. FHE enables computations on encrypted data while preserving the ability to verify and disclose information selectively, something mixers like Tornado Cash were never designed to offer.

The significance of FHE can be understood when you evaluate the landscape and resources put into building FHE frameworks from technology leaders, including Apple, Microsoft, and others. Their investment in this space signals a clear consensus: scalable, compliant, end-to-end encryption is the future of digital privacy, both for consumers and institutions.

Privacy Is Accelerating Now

The numbers reflect this shift. Privacy-focused crypto assets have seen rising interest from both users and investors. But the true shift is not driven by retail speculation. It is driven by use cases where privacy and transparency must coexist:

• Cross-border payments increasingly rely on blockchains, but businesses and banks cannot expose every payment path.

• Tokenized real-world assets require confidentiality around holdings and investor identity.

• Global supply-chain finance demands that counterparties verify events (shipments, invoices, settlements) without revealing trade secrets.

• Enterprise-grade transaction rails need a model where auditors and regulators have visibility, but the public does not.

At the same time, retail users are increasingly uncomfortable with surveillance-heavy chains where transaction DAGs can be reconstructed with simple tools. Privacy is becoming part of the consumer expectation for digital money.

In short, the market is aligning around a simple truth: blockchains that cannot offer confidentiality will be structurally limited in institutional adoption.

Canton, Zama, Starkware and the New Privacy Architecture

As the privacy renaissance unfolds, a new generation of protocols is emerging to meet institutional needs.

Blockchains like Canton highlight the growing enterprise demand for private transaction execution on shared settlement layers. These systems allow participants to transact privately while benefiting from synchronized global states and shared infrastructure. Canton is a strong signal that enterprises want blockchain benefits without public exposure.

Yet the most transformative leap in private computations may come from Zama, which occupies a fundamentally different and arguably more scalable position in the privacy tech stack.

Zama is pioneering a confidentiality layer using fully homomorphic encryption (FHE), enabling computation on encrypted data. This allows entire smart contracts (inputs, state, and outputs) to remain encrypted while still verifiable on public blockchains. Unlike privacy-first L1s, Zama works across existing ecosystems, particularly the EVM. This means developers and institutions don’t have to adopt a new chain; they can adopt privacy where they already build.

Zama’s architecture represents the next evolution of blockchain privacy: not simply hiding transactions but enabling private smart contracts at scale. This unlocks new classes of applications (private DeFi, encrypted order books, confidential RWA issuance, institutional-grade settlement flows and clearing, and secure multiparty business logic) all without sacrificing decentralization. Some of these applications unlock sooner rather than later.

Privacy assets are gaining attention. Institutions are actively assessing confidentiality layers. Developers want privacy-preserving computation without the latency or complexity of off-chain systems. And regulators are beginning to articulate frameworks that distinguish legitimate confidentiality tools from illicit obfuscation.

Looking Forward

The story of privacy in blockchain is no longer a debate between transparency and secrecy. It is the realization that both are necessary for the next era of decentralized finance. The convergence of cultural attitudes, institutional requirements, and cryptographic breakthroughs is reshaping how blockchains will evolve over the next decade.

Zcash demonstrated the necessity of privacy from a protocol perspective. Protocols like Canton indicate institutional appetite for confidential rails. And Zama is building the infrastructure that could unify these demands into a universal, scalable privacy layer across chains.

Pantera’s early investment in Zcash stemmed from a simple belief: privacy is not optional. Nearly a decade later, that thesis has never been more relevant. The next wave of adoption, from tokenized assets to cross-border payments to enterprise settlement, depends on making blockchain work securely, seamlessly, and privately.

As privacy becomes a defining theme of this market cycle, the protocols that deliver practical, scalable, and compliant confidentiality will define the future landscape. Among them, Zama stands out as one of the most promising and timely leaders in the rising privacy supercycle.

- Paul Veradittakit

Important Disclosures – Certain Sections of This Letter Discuss Pantera’s Advisory Services and Others Discuss Market Commentary. Certain sections of this letter discuss the investment advisory business of Pantera Capital Partners LP and its affiliates (”Pantera”), while other sections of the letter consist solely of general market commentary and do not relate to Pantera’s investment advisory business. Pantera has inserted footnotes throughout the letter to identify these differences. This section provides educational content and general market commentary. Except for specifically-marked sections of this letter, no statements included herein relate to Pantera’s investment advisory services, nor does any content herein reflect or contain any offer of new or additional investment advisory services. This letter is for information purposes only and does not constitute, and should not be construed as, an offer to sell or buy or the solicitation of an offer to sell or buy or subscribe for any securities. Opinions and other statements contained herein do not constitute any form of investment, legal, tax, financial, or other advice or recommendation.

Business

61% of Institutions Plan Crypto Allocation Boost Into Q4, Says Sygnum

Portfolio diversification serves as the primary investment driver for 1,000 respondents surveyed across 43 countries with interest in tokenized RWA jumping from 6% to 26%, YOY.

Major crypto exchange picks Texas for new HQ, citing pro-business rules

Coinbase will move its business registration out of Delaware after a stockholder majority voted to reincorporate in Texas, joining the exit of this state as part of the Dexit movement.

Circle quarterly profit beats estimates on stablecoin growth

Posted adjusted earnings of 36 cents per share beat estimates of 22 cents; total revenue, which includes reserve income, went up 66% to reach $739.8 million.

Regulation

EU Pushes to Centralize Oversight of Region’s Crypto Businesses

As part of a greater initiative to centralize the European Union’s market supervision, France and certain EU institutions are advocating for this plan while other member states disagree.

Wall St regulator to consider crypto token classification, chair says

SEC Chair Paul Atkins announced that the agency would soon consider creating a digital asset classification system to help delineate when they would be securities.

Major Overhaul in US Crypto Regulation: CFTC May Fully Take Over the Spot Market

Congress is reviewing a bill that would formally grant CFTC primary regulatory authority for the digital asset spot market and establish a form of collaboration with the SEC.

New Products and Deals

BlackRock’s $2.5 billion tokenized money market fund gets boost with Binance tie-up

Binance will now accept BUIDL as collateral while BlackRock will issue a new share class of BUIDL on the Binance-launched BNB blockchain that is now mostly decentralized.

Public Acquires CryptoIRA Business from Alto

Long-term investing app Public acquired Alto’s CryptoIRA self-directed IRA platform that opens up private market opportunities to trade cryptos within their individual retirement portfolios.

21shares launches two US crypto index ETFs

These ETFs track cryptocurrencies basket prices for U.S. investors, including Ethereum, Solana, and Dogecoin. 21Shares launched these funds in collaboration with Teucrium Trading.

This Week at Pantera

Crypto Markets, Privacy, And Payments

Up-to-the-minute news in Pantera’s 11/12/2025 Blockchain Letter includes Cosmo Jiang’s acumen into the crypto market, how Zcash is poised at the center of crypto’s privacy revival, upcoming events, and much more.

Rollup TV

Face-to-face with the leaders in digital assets, Pantera Capital joins Flare Networks, Rialo, and the Blockchain Association as they share deep industry insights.

Introducing the DAT Dashboard

Digital Asset Treasury companies can dive into market and asset-level overviews; in-depth DATCo profiles; and pro forma metrics and analytics.

Let’s Meet Up

I am in Los Angeles the week of November 24th, feel free to DM me for a chat!

Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, a Managing Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early-stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.

If you have any projects that need funding, feel free to DM me on twitter.

Summary

• Crypto-as-a-Service (CaaS) is the “SaaS moment” for blockchain. Banks and fintechs no longer build crypto infrastructure from the ground up. They plug into APIs and white-label platforms, launching digital asset features in days and weeks instead of years.

• Mainstream adoption is accelerating through three channels. Banks are partnering with custodians like Coinbase, Anchorage, and BitGo while aggressively exploring tokenized assets; fintechs are issuing their own stablecoins using platforms like M^0; and payment processors like Western Union ($300B annually) and Zelle ($1T+ annually) are now integrating stablecoins for instant, low-cost cross-border settlements.

• Pantera is backing the infrastructure layer. We’re investing in the picks-and-shovels companies (custodians, wallets, APIs, and compliance tools) that make CaaS viable at scale. The institutions that treat blockchain as core infrastructure (not a side project) will capture the next trillion in value.

Crypto-as-a-Service (CaaS) really isn’t complicated. It’s just SaaS fueled by crypto and, with it, institutional and enterprise integration into crypto just got 100x easier. Banks, fintechs, enterprises, and more no longer need to struggle to build in-house crypto capabilities. Instead, they can plug and play, launching in days through time-tested APIs and white-label platforms. Organizations can stay laser focused on customers, rather than worrying about blockchain complexities. They can leverage existing infrastructure to more efficiently and cost-effectively participate in crypto transactions. In other words, they can smoothly integrate into the digital asset ecosystem without the hassle.

CaaS Positioned for Exponential Growth

CaaS is a cloud-based business model and infrastructure solution that enables businesses, fintechs, and developers to integrate cryptocurrency and blockchain functionalities into their operations without building or maintaining the underlying technology from scratch. CaaS provides ready-to-use, scalable services, often delivered via APIs or white-label platforms such as crypto wallets, trading engines, payment gateways, asset storage, custody, and compliance tools. This allows companies to quickly offer digital asset features under their own brand, reducing development costs, time, and technical expertise required. Like other as-a-Service offerings, this setup makes it cost-effective for businesses, ranging from startups to well-established enterprises, to participate. In September 2025, Coinbase Institutional called CaaS one of their company’s biggest growth areas.

At Pantera Capital, we’ve been enabling CaaS growth through our investments since 2013. We strategically pour capital into the infrastructure, tools, and technologies that make CaaS viable at scale. By accelerating the back end of treasuries, custodians, and wallets, we skyrocket the service layers of CaaS.

Benefits of CaaS

Numerous strategic and operational benefits exist when businesses use CaaS to transparently incorporate crypto functionalities into their systems in ways that are faster and more cost effective. They include the following:

• Turnkey integration and seamless embedding: CaaS platforms eliminate the need for custom development cycles, allowing teams to activate features in days rather than months.

• Flexible monetization models:Businesses can adopt subscription-based pricing for predictable costs or opt for pay-per-use billing that aligns expenses with revenue. Either way, this avoids large upfront capital investments.

• Outsourced blockchain complexity: Companies offload technical management while benefiting from a robust, enterprise-grade backend, ensuring near-perfect uptime, real-time monitoring, and automatic failover.

• Developer-friendly APIs and SDKs: Developers can embed wallet creation and key management, smoothly process on-chain settlements, trigger smart contract interactions, and create comprehensive sandbox environments.

• White-label branding and intuitive interfaces: CaaS solutions facilitate customizations that allow non-technical teams to configure free structures, supported assets, and user onboarding flows.

• Additional value-added capabilities: Leading providers bundle ancillary services such as fraud detection powered by on-chain analytics; tax reporting automation; mult-signature treasury management; and cross-chain bridging for asset interoperability

These features transform cryptocurrency from a technical novelty into a revenue-generating product line, all while preserving focus on core business competencies.

Three Core Use Cases

We believe that the world is rapidly evolving into a more crypto-native landscape where individuals and businesses increasingly interact with digital assets. This shift is driven by growing user comfort with blockchain wallets, decentralized applications, and on-chain transactions, fueled by improved user interfaces, educational resources, and real-world utility.

Yet, for crypto to achieve true mainstream integration and widespread adoption, a robust, seamless bridge must span the chasm between traditional finance (TradFi) and decentralized finance (DeFi). Institutions seek the upside of crypto (speed, programmability, and global accessibility) while relying on trusted intermediaries to manage the underlying complexity: tooling, security, technology stacks, and liquidity provision.

Ultimately, this ecosystem convergence has the potential to incrementally bring billions of users on-chain.

Use Case #1: Banks

Banks are increasingly partnering with regulated crypto custodians such as Coinbase Custody, Anchorage Digital, and BitGo to deliver institutional-grade asset safekeeping, insured storage, and seamless spot trading for digital assets like Bitcoin and Ethereum. These foundational services (custody, execution, and basic lending/borrowing) represent the low-hanging fruit of crypto integration, enabling banks to onboard clients without forcing them to exit traditional banking rails.

Beyond these essentials, banks can tap into DeFi protocols to generate competitive yields on idle treasury assets or customer deposits. For instance, they can deploy stablecoins into permissionless lending markets (e.g., Morpho, Aave, or Compound) or liquidity pools on automated market makers (AMMs) like Uniswap, earning real-time, transparent returns that often outpace legacy fixed-income products.

A transformative opportunity lies in real-world asset (RWA) tokenization. Banks can originate and distribute on-chain versions of traditional securities (tokenized U.S. Treasuries (e.g., via BlackRock’s BUIDL fund), corporate bonds, private credit, or even real estate funds) bringing off-chain value onto public blockchains like Ethereum, Polygon, or Base. These RWAs can then be traded peer-to-peer through DeFi protocols such as Morpho (for optimized lending), Pendle (for yield splitting), or Centrifuge (for private credit pools), all while maintaining KYC/AML compliance via whitelisted wallets or institutional vaults. RWAs also serve as high-quality collateral in DeFi lending markets.

Critically, banks can provide seamless stablecoin access without customer churn. Through embedded wallets or custodial sub-accounts, clients can hold USDC, USDT, or FDIC-insured digital dollars directly within their banking app (used for payments, remittances, or yield farming) all while never leaving the bank’s ecosystem. This “walled garden” approach mirrors neobanks but with regulated trust.

Looking ahead, leading banks will likely form consortiums to issue branded stablecoins backed 1:1 by pooled reserves. These could settle instantly on public chains while complying with regulations, thereby bridging legacy finance with programmable money.

The bank that treats blockchain as infrastructure, rather than a sidecar, will likely capture the next trillion in value.

Use Case #2: Fintechs and Neobanks

Fintechs and neobanks are rapidly integrating cryptocurrency into their core offerings through strategic partnerships with established platforms such as Robinhood, Revolut, and Webull. These collaborations enable seamless usage and secure custody of digital assets while providing spot access to tokenized versions of traditional stocks, effectively bridging the gap between conventional finance and blockchain-based markets.

Beyond partnerships, fintechs are empowered to build and launch their own blockchain infrastructures using specialized providers like Alchemy, a dominant player in blockchain development platforms. Alchemy offers scalable node infrastructure, enhanced APIs, and developer tools that simplify the creation of custom layer-1 or layer-2 networks. This enables fintechs to tailor blockchains for specific use cases, such as high-throughput payments, decentralized identity verification, or RWAs, all while ensuring compliance with evolving regulations and optimizing for low latency and cost efficiency.

Fintechs can further deepen their crypto involvement by issuing proprietary stablecoins, leveraging platforms like M^0 that provide a decentralized protocol for minting yield-bearing, fungible stablecoins backed by high-quality collateral such as U.S. Treasury bills. By adopting this model, fintechs gain the ability to mint their own coins on demand, fully control the underlying economics (including interest accrual and redemption mechanisms), secure regulatory alignment through transparent on-chain reserves, and participate in shared governance via decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs). Additionally, they benefit from enhanced liquidity pools across major exchanges and DeFi protocols, reducing fragmentation and improving user adoption. This approach not only generates new revenue streams but also positions fintechs as innovators in programmable money, fostering customer loyalty in a competitive digital economy.

Use Case #3: Payment Processors

Payment companies are building stablecoin sandwiches: multi-layered, cross-border settlement stacks that ingest fiat at one end and output instant, low-cost liquidity in another jurisdiction, all while minimizing FX spreads, intermediary fees, and settlement delays. Elements of the sandwich include:

1. Top Slice (Onramp): A customer in the U.S. sends USD to the payment provider (e.g., Stripe, Circle, Ripple, or a neobank like Mercury).

2. Filling (Minting): The USD is immediately converted 1:1 into a regulated stablecoin—typically USDC (Circle), USDP (Paxos), or a bank-issued digital dollar..

3. Bottom Slice (Offramp): The stablecoin is bridged or swapped into a local-currency stablecoin—e.g., aARS (Argentinian peso-pegged), BRLA (Brazil), or MXNA (Mexico)—or directly into CBDC pilots (e.g., Brazil’s Drex).

4. Settlement: Funds land in a local bank account, mobile wallet, or merchant payout in T+0 (instant), often at <0.1% total cost vs. 3–7% via SWIFT + correspondent banking.

Western Union, the 175-year-old remittance behemoth processing $300B+ annually, recently announced the integration of stablecoins into its ecosystems. CEO Devin McGranahan admitted in July 2025 that the firm historically approached crypto with “caution,” wary of volatility and regulations. But the Genius Act flipped the script.

“With clearer rules now in place, we are seeing real opportunities to integrate digital assets into our business,” McGranahan said during the Q3 2025 earnings call. The result: Western Union is now actively testing stablecoin solutions for treasury settlements and customer payouts, leveraging blockchain to ditch correspondent banking’s drag.

Zelle, the bank-backed P2P powerhouse (owned by Early Warning Services, a consortium of JPMorgan, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, etc.), already moves $1T+ annually in no-fee U.S. transfers via simple phone numbers or emails, enrolling 2,300+ institutions and 150M+ users. But cross-border was a non-starter until now. On October 24, 2025, Early Warning announced a stablecoin initiative to internationalize Zelle, delivering “the same speed and reliability” abroad.

As banks, fintech/neobanks, and payment processors integrate crypto in intuitive, plug and play, compliant ways (involving the least number of regulation parties possible) they can continue to scale their global reach and enhance relationships.

Conclusion

CaaS isn’t hype—it’s the infrastructure shift that makes crypto invisible to the end user. Just as no one thinks about AWS when they stream Netflix or Salesforce when they check their CRM, consumers and businesses won’t think about blockchain when they send instant cross-border payments or access tokenized assets. The winners in this transformation won’t be the companies that bolt crypto onto legacy systems as an afterthought. They’ll be the institutions and enterprises that recognize blockchain as foundational infrastructure and the investors backing the picks-and-shovels layer powering it all. At Pantera, we’re not just predicting this future—we’re building the on-ramp that brings billions on-chain.

- Paul Veradittakit

Important Disclosures – Certain Sections of This Letter Discuss Pantera’s Advisory Services and Others Discuss Market Commentary. Certain sections of this letter discuss the investment advisory business of Pantera Capital Partners LP and its affiliates (”Pantera”), while other sections of the letter consist solely of general market commentary and do not relate to Pantera’s investment advisory business. Pantera has inserted footnotes throughout the letter to identify these differences. This section provides educational content and general market commentary. Except for specifically-marked sections of this letter, no statements included herein relate to Pantera’s investment advisory services, nor does any content herein reflect or contain any offer of new or additional investment advisory services. This letter is for information purposes only and does not constitute, and should not be construed as, an offer to sell or buy or the solicitation of an offer to sell or buy or subscribe for any securities. Opinions and other statements contained herein do not constitute any form of investment, legal, tax, financial, or other advice or recommendation.

Business

Blockworks Shut Down its News Division to Focus on Expanding its Data and Distribution Business, Citing Market Demand for Data-Driven Insight

Blockworks has shut down its news division to focus on expanding its data and distribution business, citing rapid growth and market demand for data-driven insights.

JPMorgan To Accept Bitcoin, Ethereum As Collateral

The program, set to launch by year-end, will let clients pledge Bitcoin and Ethereum for secured loans. A third-party custodian aims to safeguard the pledged tokens to ensure risk compliance.

Coinbase Acquired Echo for $375 Million

Coinbase has acquired Echo, the leading onchain capital raising platform, for approximately $375M

Regulation

President Trump Nominated Mike Selig, a Crypto Ally and Former SEC Official, to Chair the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC)

Selig is chief counsel for the CFTC’s crypto task force and has worked with Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Paul Atkins.

World’s First Yen-Pegged Stablecoin Debuts in Japan

JPYC launched Japan’s first regulated digital yen stablecoin on October 27, 2025, on public blockchains like Ethereum, Polygon, and Avalanche

New Products and Deals

Western Union Announces USDPT Stablecoin on Solana and Digital Asset Network

The Western Union Company (“Western Union”) (NYSE: WU) today announced its plan to launch the U.S. Dollar Payment Token (USDPT), its new stablecoin, and an innovative Digital Asset Network designed to bridge the digital and fiat worlds, enabling real world utility for digital assets.

Ripple Completes Acquisition of Hidden Road and Launches Unified ‘Ripple Prime’

Ripple Prime said it aims to integrate payments, custody, stablecoin, and XRP among various assets and services to pursue operational efficiency and cost reductions.

Aave Labs Acqui-hires Stable Finance Team to Build Consumer-Friendly DeFi Apps

Aave Labs has acquired Stable Finance’s engineering team to develop consumer-friendly DeFi apps, with Stable founder Mario Baxter Cabrera joining as director of product.

This Week at Pantera

Accountable Raises $7.5M Led by Pantera Capital to Set New Standard for Real-Time Financial Verification

Accountable, the new standard for real-time financial verification, today announced it has raised $7.5 million in a round led by Pantera Capital, with participation from OKX Ventures, Onigiri Capital, KPK, and Auros, among others.

Pantera’s Cosmo Jiang Talks New Spot Solana ETF Hitting the Market

Cosmo Jiang, Pantera Capital, joins ‘Fast Money’ to talk spot Solana ETF hitting the market.

Fund V Closing October 31st

Read how Pantera 10x’d spot SOL via Special Opportunities and active management, why a hybrid fund structure matters, Fund V’s Oct 31 close, the IPO backlog releasing, and Solana x DATs.

Let’s Meet Up

I am in Los Angeles the week of November 24th, feel free to DM me for a chat!

Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, , a Managing Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early-stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.

If you have any projects that need funding, feel free to DM me on twitter.

• TransCrypts, Meanwhile and Coinflow are the most recent examples of Pantera Capital investing in companies that drive real-world adoption of blockchain technology

• Meanwhile offers bitcoin-denominated life insurance policies, providing inflation-proof savings and retirement products.

• Coinflow’s infrastructure enables instant, cross-chain settlements and fiat payments for businesses, while TransCrypts is building a tamper-proof, user-owned data backbone for digital identities.

For over a decade at Pantera, we’ve bet on a simple idea: blockchain’s greatest impact will come from solving problems people didn’t even know blockchain could fix. That’s why we’ve backed companies like Circle, Figure, and Bitso—teams that brought blockchain infrastructure to remittances, capital markets, and payments. And it’s why our latest investments in Meanwhile, TransCrypts, and Coinflow follow the same playbook: find massive, broken markets where decentralization creates tangible value for non-crypto users.

Here’s what we’re building:

TransCrypts

User-Owned Digital Identity

Identity fraud will cost over $50 billion globally in 2025. The culprit? Centralized databases that are honeypots for hackers and incompatible across borders.

TransCrypts is building the alternative: a tamper-proof, user-owned data backbone where credentials—work history, health records, education—are anchored to an immutable blockchain. No institution controls your data. No server breach exposes millions of records. And as AI-driven fraud becomes more sophisticated, cryptographic security becomes non-negotiable.

“Our goal is simple: to give people 100% control of their identity,” said Zain Zaidi, CEO and Founder of TransCrypts. “Whether it’s employment, health, or educational records, we’re making verification secure, efficient, and fraud-resistant.”

The market agrees: the digital identity sector is valued at $40 billion in 2025 and projected to hit $203 billion by 2034, with decentralized identity growing at 53–89% annually.

TransCrypts isn’t just protecting identities. It’s returning ownership to users.

Check out TransCrypts | Pantera’s investment thesis

Meanwhile

Bitcoin Denominated Life Insurance

The problem is straightforward: traditional life insurance policies lose purchasing power to inflation, and cross-border savings products are riddled with restrictions. For the 7.1% of global GDP tied up in life insurance, that’s a silent wealth drain.

Meanwhile, regulated by the Bermuda Monetary Authority, offers something different: policies denominated and paid out in bitcoin. Policyholders can borrow up to 90% of their policy’s bitcoin value tax-efficiently, while Meanwhile generates sustainable yield by lending assets to regulated institutions. The result? Inflation-resistant wealth protection that’s programmable, auditable, and borderless.

The traction speaks for itself: Meanwhile’s bitcoin under management grew over 200% this year. Families and institutions are recognizing bitcoin not as speculation, but as a reliable store of value for generational wealth.

“Life insurers have always provided the steady, long-term capital that keeps financial markets moving,” said Zac Townsend, CEO of Meanwhile. “We’re bringing that same role to Bitcoin—helping families save and protect wealth in BTC, while giving institutions new ways to earn returns and launch bitcoin-indexed products that are compliant and easy to scale. This raise lets us build on what’s working and expand it with partners around the world.”

Check out Meanwhile | Meanwhile funding announcement on bloomberg

Coinflow

Cross Chain Stablecoin Payment

Cross-border payments are a $220 billion market growing to $320 billion by 2030. But the system is broken: U.S. e-commerce merchants selling to Africa or Asia pay 7% per transaction plus 2–3 day settlement times. That’s $700 on every $10,000 in sales.
Stablecoins solve this—but most solutions trap users in a single blockchain or force them to manage crypto wallets. Businesses don’t want that complexity.

Coinflow removes it. Their infrastructure enables instant, cross-chain settlements (Solana to Ethereum), supports fiat pay-ins and pay-outs, and includes AI-powered fraud prevention. Merchants get blockchain’s speed and cost savings without touching crypto.

Daniel Lev, founder of Coinflow," At Coinflow, we believe the payment layer of the internet should be instant, secure, and truly global. Merchants shouldn’t be forced to wait days for settlement, lose revenue to fraud, or manage a patchwork of local payment rails."

The numbers: 23x revenue growth since their 2024 seed round, payment coverage in 170+ countries, and a multi-billion-dollar annual transaction run rate. With new funding, they’re expanding payout coverage to 100+ countries across Asia and Latin America.We’re excited to lead the Series A investment in Coinflow, the payments infrastructure for modern money. Coinflow provides a unified payment stack with instant settlement and fraud protection, solving issues that legacy providers haven’t addressed.

Check out Coinflow | Pantera’s investment thesis

Why This Matters

Blockchain’s killer app isn’t a better token or a faster chain. It’s infrastructure that makes life easier, safer, and more efficient for people who will never open a wallet.
Meanwhile protects generational wealth. TransCrypts secures digital lives. Coinflow unlocks global commerce. Together, they represent over $570 billion in addressable market opportunity—and more importantly, millions of people gaining access to services that were previously out of reach.

This is what adoption looks like. And we’re just getting started.

- Paul Veradittakit

Important Disclosures – Certain Sections of This Letter Discuss Pantera’s Advisory Services and Others Discuss Market Commentary. Certain sections of this letter discuss the investment advisory business of Pantera Capital Partners LP and its affiliates (”Pantera”), while other sections of the letter consist solely of general market commentary and do not relate to Pantera’s investment advisory business. Pantera has inserted footnotes throughout the letter to identify these differences. This section provides educational content and general market commentary. Except for specifically-marked sections of this letter, no statements included herein relate to Pantera’s investment advisory services, nor does any content herein reflect or contain any offer of new or additional investment advisory services. This letter is for information purposes only and does not constitute, and should not be construed as, an offer to sell or buy or the solicitation of an offer to sell or buy or subscribe for any securities. Opinions and other statements contained herein do not constitute any form of investment, legal, tax, financial, or other advice or recommendation.

Business

Options for HSDT are on CBOE

Options provide investors with new ways to trade HSDT, helping to drive volume, improve liquidity, and support SOL-per-share accretion.

NYSE Owner Takes $2 billion Stake in Polymarket as Prediction Markets Heat up

Intercontinental Exchange said on Tuesday it would invest up to $2 billion in Polymarket, marking the New York Stock Exchange owner’s expansion into event-driven markets as the once-nascent asset class gains widespread popularity.

Coinbase, Mastercard Eye Billion Dollar Deals for Stablecoin firm BVNK: Report

Coinbase and Mastercard are reportedly in advanced talks to acquire BVNK, a U.K.-based fintech firm building stablecoin infrastructure.

Grayscale Hails Solana as “Crypto’s Financial Bazaar” with Analysts Targeting $300 SOL

Grayscale Research has labeled Solana “crypto’s financial bazaar,” highlighting its deep on-chain economy, strong user growth, and dominant transaction activity as the foundation for long-term value creation.

Regulation

Bybit Secures UAE’s First SCA Virtual Asset License

Bybit says it has become the first cryptocurrency exchange to receive a full Virtual Asset Platform Operator License from the Securities and Commodities Authority (SCA) of the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

New Products and Hot Deals

Joseph Lubin says ‘token-powered economies’ are Coming to Consensys’ Product Suite, including Infura

Lubin said Consensys will tokenize across products, including MetaMask, Linea, and, notably, Infura (DIN).

Meanwhile, the First Regulated Bitcoin Life Insurer, Raises $82M to Meet Strong Demand for Inflation-Proof Savings and Retirement Products

Funding will accelerate global access to BTC-denominated life insurance, annuities, savings and insurance bonds through institutional partners, protecting policyholders worldwide from inflation and currency risk.

Coinflow Closes $25M Series A Led by Pantera Capital To Power Billions in Global Payment Volume

$25M Series A funding round led by Pantera Capital, with participation from CMT Digital, Coinbase Ventures, The Fintech Fund, Jump Capital, Reciprocal Ventures, and founders & operators from more than a dozen other companies.

TransCrypts raises $20M CAD to Expand Blockchain Record Platform

Blockchain-based record verification startup TransCrypts has raised $20 million CAD ($15 million USD) in seed funding to expand its encrypted data infrastructure for employment, education, and healthcare records.

This Week at Pantera

Pantera’s Cosmo Jiang: Solana Poised To Be Next Mega Cap Company as ETF Inflows Surge

Solana could be on track to become the next generation “mega-cap” technology company, according to Pantera Capital General Partner Cosmo Jiang, who said Bitcoin’s years of legitimacy building have ushered in a new phase for the broader crypto landscape.

Dan Morehead: Crypto — The Most Asymmetric Trade in History

Dan Morehead explains why Bitcoin has won the use case of “digital gold” and won’t be surpassed in that.

Dan Morehead explains DATs at the Digital Asset Summit 2025

We probably only need a few DATs that hold the same token, Pantera Capital‘s Dan Morehead says.

Let’s Meet Up

I am in Los Angeles the week of November 24th, feel free to DM me for a chat!

ABOUT ME

Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, , a Managing Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early-stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.

If you have any projects that need funding, feel free to DM me on twitter.

• This month Pantera Capital launched Solana Company (Nasdaq: HSDT), a Solana-backed Digital Asset Treasury that closed over $500 million in private placement with the potential to raise over $1.25 billion aggregate gross proceeds.

• $HSDT Solana Company’s mission is to maximize SOL per share and provide access to one of the most commercially viable blockchains for capital markets.

• Solana is positioned to become the premier destination for consumer applications and decentralized finance, powered by its highly scalable infrastructure, ultra-low transaction fees, and ease of accessibility to anyone with an internet connection.

It’s been an exciting month at Pantera. I’ve been on the road, speaking with our LPs and founders. What comes up the most in these conversations is the topic of DATs or Digital Asset Treasury Companies.

Pantera Capital has been at the forefront of establishing the digital asset treasury (DAT) category. We’ve anchored some of the earliest launches in the US including DeFi Development Corp. (DFDV) and Cantor Equity Partners (CEP), serving as anchor investor in BitMine (BMNR)—now the world’s largest Ethereum DAT—and most recently leading the formation of Solana Company (Nasdaq: HSDT), the preeminent SOL treasury.

Our thesis is straightforward: DATs can generate yield to grow net asset value per share, delivering superior returns compared to holding tokens directly or through ETFs, especially when investing near 1.0x NAV where you benefit from asymmetric risk/reward. After reviewing over 150 pitches and deploying capital across over 20 DATs, we’ve refined our diligence process and deepened our conviction that the best DATs will evolve into large-scale, strategic capital allocators across the digital asset ecosystem. Like any emerging category, this will mature and evolve—but ultimately, DATs provide investors from retail to institutions with accessible public market exposure to the leading blockchain infrastructure our industry is building.

The latest on Solana Company (Nasdaq: HSDT)

• September 15: Pantera Capital and Summer Capital raised more than $500 million in funding to launch HSDT, a Solana Digital Asset Treasury. Read here.

• September 22: HSDT then executed on our capital markets strategy by purchasing 760,190 SOL a week post-launch. Read here.

• September 29: HSDT announced corporate name change to Solana Company and Letter of Intent with Solana Foundation. Read here.

In this issue, we will dive into the DAT thesis and our high conviction for Solana.

Revisiting the DAT Thesis

In our most recent Blockchain letter, Cosmo Jiang said, “DATs can generate yield to grow net asset value per share, resulting in more underlying token ownership over time than just holding spot”. This thesis has been proven by companies like BitMine Immersion, which grew ETH per share by 330% in its first month while accumulating 1.15 million ETH worth $4.9 billion.

As seen in my previous blog, “A New Frontier for Digital Assets”, there are three factors contributing to an increase in share price: growth in underlying per share, mNAV expansion and token price increase.

There are two main ways HSDT maximizes SOL per share: capital markets activity and income generation. Through capital market activities, HSDT can issue stock at a premium, monetize volatility through convertible bonds and buyback shares below NAV. Through income generation activities, Hellius can stake the SOL it holds and generate DeFi yield. Solana typically generates ~7% staking yield. For most investors, staking directly is complex, but HSDT is designed to capture that yield on their behalf — turning SOL’s built-in productivity into incremental value for shareholders.

mNAV expands when there is a high growth of underlying per share, further propelling its share price. Lastly, SOL’s strong performance also increases the value of HSDT shares.

Why Solana

Strong Fundamentals

We believe Solana is positioned to become the premier destination for consumer applications and decentralized finance, powered by its highly scalable infrastructure, ultra-low transaction fees, and ease of accessibility to anyone with an internet connection.

“Solana is cheaper, faster and more accessible than traditional financial rails.”

Solana is the fastest blockchain with 3,500+ transactions per second, <400ms finality, consistent uptime, and <$0.01 transaction fees that enable high volume activities. Solana is the most widely adopted blockchain with 7,500+ new developers onboarded in 2024 and 3.8mm + average daily active wallets processing 23bn+ transactions year-to-date.

Solana is also a financially productive asset with asymmetric upside. It offers 7% native staking yield with a deflationary fee burning mechanism while representing 5% of BTC market cap and 21% of ETH market cap. Solana has gained institutional credibility through utilization by blue-chip financial institutions including tokenized funds by BlackRock, Apollo, and Franklin Templeton, as well as payment rails adoption by PayPal and Stripe.

Solana is underallocated by Institutions

Institutional allocation data tells a compelling story - asymmetric opportunity. Solana sits at a mere 0.9% institutional penetration of total supply, dramatically trailing Bitcoin’s commanding 15.6% and Ethereum’s established 6.8%. This disparity becomes even sharper when examining corporate treasury allocations, where Solana captures just 0.6% versus Bitcoin’s massive 8.8% and Ethereum’s 1.9%. The absolute numbers are staggering: Solana’s $926 million in total institutional holdings represents a rounding error compared to Bitcoin’s $364 billion war chest and Ethereum’s $31 billion allocation. What we’re witnessing is a classic catch-up trade in the making - institutional capital recognizing Solana’s technical superiority and ecosystem momentum while the allocation gap remains wide open. As institutions begin connecting the dots between performance metrics and portfolio allocation, this underweight positioning creates one of crypto’s most compelling asymmetric bets.

Looking Forward

We’re still in the first inning for DATs, and it’ll take time for this category to mature. Not all DATs are created equal—what differentiates one from another is the management team behind it. That’s why with Solana Company (HSDT), we’re committed to building the preeminent SOL treasury to maximize SOL per share and provide access to one of the most commercially viable blockchains for capital markets. Beyond HSDT, Pantera continues to deepen its Solana ecosystem investments in infrastructure and applications like Raiku and Metaplex, while partnering with the Solana Foundation and Solana Labs on strategic initiatives. We believe in Solana’s strong fundamentals as the execution layer to upgrade our global financial system.

To learn more about HSDT, Solana Company here or on Twitter here.

- Paul Veradittakit

Important Disclosures – Certain Sections of This Letter Discuss Pantera’s Advisory Services and Others Discuss Market Commentary. Certain sections of this letter discuss the investment advisory business of Pantera Capital Partners LP and its affiliates (”Pantera”), while other sections of the letter consist solely of general market commentary and do not relate to Pantera’s investment advisory business. Pantera has inserted footnotes throughout the letter to identify these differences. This section provides educational content and general market commentary. Except for specifically-marked sections of this letter, no statements included herein relate to Pantera’s investment advisory services, nor does any content herein reflect or contain any offer of new or additional investment advisory services. This letter is for information purposes only and does not constitute, and should not be construed as, an offer to sell or buy or the solicitation of an offer to sell or buy or subscribe for any securities. Opinions and other statements contained herein do not constitute any form of investment, legal, tax, financial, or other advice or recommendation.

Business

Ripple and Securitize Enable RLUSD Smart Contract Functionality for BlackRock’s BUIDL and VanEck’s VBILL Tokenized Funds

Ripple, the leading provider of digital asset infrastructure for financial institutions, and Securitize, the leading platform for tokenizing real-world assets, today announced a smart contract that would allow holders of BlackRock’s BUIDL and VanEck’s VBILL to exchange their shares to Ripple for Ripple USD (RLUSD).

PayPal launches new P2P payment links

PayPal launches new P2P payment links with upcoming crypto integration (Bitcoin, Ethereum, PYUSD) in the U.S.

Circle Beats USDH to the Punch with USDC Launch on HyperEVM

Circle launched USDC on Hyperliquid’s HyperEVM layer 1 blockchain on September 16, shortly after a $4.6M HYPE purchase by a Circle-linked wallet.

Regulation

SEC approves generic listing standards for crypto ETFs

The U.S. SEC’s approval of generic listing standards for crypto ETFs is expected to accelerate new ETF launches, with BlackRock and Grayscale leading high-volume debuts and industry experts viewing this as a catalyst for broader institutional adoption

New Products and Hot Deals

Raiku closed a $13.5MM raise, led by PanteraCapital, with Jump, Lightspeed, Big Brain and more visionary partners.

Raiku recently closed a $13.5 million funding round led by Pantera Capital. Other participants in the round include Jump, Lightspeed, Big Brain, and additional visionary partners.

Kraken introduced "Kraken Launch," a platform for participating in ICOs

Kraken introduced "Kraken Launch," a platform for participating in ICOs and early token sales directly through Kraken accounts, in partnership with Legion.

Kazakhstan Launches National Stablecoin

Kazakhstan is planning to launch “Evo,” a new stablecoin pegged to its national currency, Tenge. Solana, Mastercard, and several local organizations are supporting the project.

This Week at Pantera

Pantera's Dan Morehead on How Solana Became Crypto’s Most Attractive Asset

Pantera Capital Founder Managing Partner Dan Morehead discusses the growth of the crypto industry, Solana becoming the most attractive asset and how Congress’s stance on the industry has changed over the years.

Solana’s had better performance than bitcoin over the last four years, says Pantera’s Dan Morehead

Dan Morehead, Pantera Capital founder and managing partner, joins ‘Squawk Box’ to discuss the launch of a solana digital asset treasury company, ethereum vs. solana, future of crypto, and more.

Let’s Meet Up

I am in New York City the week of October 6th, feel free to DM me for a chat!

ABOUT ME

Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, , a Managing Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early-stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.

If you have any projects that need funding, feel free to DM me on twitter.

Summary

• Figure Technologies' IPO signifies a major shift in the blockchain industry towards real-world applications, solving practical financial problems like home equity lending.

• Figure's success is attributed to its ability to streamline traditional financial processes, exemplified by reducing loan timelines and fostering a network effect through its marketplace model (Figure Connect) and regulatory milestones like YLDS.

• Figure’s IPO is proof that blockchain's true value lies in enhancing existing financial systems rather than replacing them entirely

Today marks a watershed moment for the blockchain industry. Figure Technologies went public, and we couldn't be more excited about what this represents for the future of finance.

The Power of Real-World Blockchain Applications

At Pantera, we've long believed that the most transformative use cases of blockchain are the ones that directly touch the real economy. Figure exemplifies this thesis perfectly. While much of the crypto world focuses on speculation and financial engineering, Figure is solving actual problems for everyday Americans who need to access the equity tied up in their homes.

The numbers speak for themselves. Figure has revolutionized home equity lending by reducing loan timelines from 30 days to just 5 days. They've facilitated more than $17 billion in loans and processed over $50 billion in public blockchain transactions. As the largest non-bank HELOC lender in the US, they're not just another crypto startup—they're a mature financial services company that happens to be powered by blockchain technology.

The Network Effect is Real

What excites me most about Figure's evolution is their transition into a marketplace model. Today, 170 third parties are originating loans through Figure Connect. This network effect is precisely what we look for in successful blockchain applications—the technology becomes the enabling layer that makes an entire ecosystem more efficient.

Their latest innovation, YLDS, represents another breakthrough: the first SEC-registered yield-bearing stablecoin that's transferable peer-to-peer. This isn't just a technical achievement; it's a regulatory milestone that paves the way for mainstream adoption.

How Blockchain Creates Value at Figure

The magic happens when Figure takes illiquid assets like loans and puts both the assets and their performance history on a shared ledger. This transparency enables better pricing, perfect information flow, and unprecedented control over asset management. It's not blockchain for blockchain's sake—it's blockchain solving real inefficiencies in traditional finance.

Blockchain Has Crossed the Chasm

Figure is proof that blockchain is being used every day in real, pragmatic ways that represent genuine upgrades to our existing financial system.

Consider the data points:

• Stablecoins are powering cross-border payments, internal treasury movements, and remittance use cases

• 10% of US-Mexico remittances now flow through crypto exchange Bitso, much of it using stablecoins

• Tokenized versions of equities and other financial products, typically reserved for the global 1%, are democratizing access worldwide

• Companies like Figure are taking outdated processes like loan origination and reducing friction and cost by using blockchain as an enablement layer

Looking Forward

Figure's IPO isn't just a win for one company—it's validation of our thesis that blockchain's greatest impact comes from improving real-world processes, not creating competitive stand alone financial systems.

As we continue backing the next generation of entrepreneurs building transformative blockchain technologies, Figure stands as proof that the most valuable crypto companies are often the ones that make the existing world work better, not the ones trying to replace it entirely.

The future of finance is being built today, one real-world application at a time. Figure's journey from startup to public company shows us exactly what that future looks like.

- Paul Veradittakit

Business

BlackRock Considers Tokenizing ETFs

BlackRock is exploring tokenizing its ETFs and RWA products onchain, pending regulatory approval, signaling a potential shift in traditional finance toward blockchain infrastructure.

Avalanche Foundation Raising $1B to Fund AVAX Treasury Companies

Avalanche Foundation aims to raise $1 billion through two new U.S.-based crypto treasury companies, with closings expected by October.

Finastra and Circle partnered to enable USDC settlement

Finastra and Circle announced a partnership to enable USDC settlement on the Global PAYplus platform, facilitating faster cross-border payments for banks.

Regulation

Hong Kong’s central bank plans to relax regulations on banks’ crypto holdings

Hong Kong’s central bank is planning to relax regulations on banks’ crypto holdings, signaling a more open approach to digital assets.

New Products and Hot Deals

Binance x Franklin Templeton Partnership

Binance and Franklin Templeton announced a strategic partnership to create efficient, accessible, and scalable digital asset solutions.

Kraken Acquires Breakout

Kraken acquired Breakout, a crypto-native proprietary trading platform, to expand its advanced trading tools.

Avalanche x Toyota

Avalanche partnered with Toyota to develop the Mobility Orchestration Network (MON), a blockchain-based infrastructure for autonomous mobility services and robotaxi networks.

This Week at Pantera

Crypto is so global it's borderless, says Pantera Capital's Ryan Barney

Ryan Barney, Pantera Capital partner, joins ‘The Exchange’ to discuss Figure popping on its IPO trading debut.

Figure IPO - Where Capital Markets Meet Blockchain

Pantera Capital’s Blockchain Letter covers our outlook on Figure and capital markets.

Ex-Symbolic principal joins Pantera to help with crypto-AI investing

Pantera brought Lehman in for his expertise on investments at the intersection of crypto and AI

ABOUT ME

Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, a Managing Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early-stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.

If you have any projects that need funding, feel free to DM me on twitter.

Summary

• Year to date crypto companies have raised more than $16 billion with over 100 M&A deals, putting the industry on track to set a new record and already surpassing the total deal value of 2024.

• This cycle is fundamentally stronger, driven by greater regulatory clarity in the U.S. and growing momentum globally.

• The wave of strategic M&As and IPOs are set to carry forward into the next cycle.

Record-breaking M&A and IPO activity is reshaping and elevating the crypto landscape in 2025. This is fueling an influx of new capital, institutional interest, builders, and users to drive blockchain innovation and adoption. This is a pattern seen in other major technological shifts, where a multi-decade build-out precedes explosive growth. While AI's rise was sustained by decades of infrastructure investment, crypto is on a much faster path to maturity. It has the benefit of building on a more advanced tech stack, allowing it to compound progress with better tools, which is why the market's underlying momentum is now fundamentally different from previous cycles, driven less by speculative hype and more by strategic consolidation.

Momentum Is Accelerating: Why This Cycle Is Different

The crypto market has traced a sine-like pattern, having its ups and downs. Despite the slowdown in the venture capital space, activity under the surface has been bullish consequently due to regulatory tailwinds, a crypto-friendly administration, strong deal flow, companies like Robinhood doubling down in crypto and crypto’s deepening intersections with adjacent verticals. Since its peak in 2022, capital deployment crashed in 2023, recovery kicked in during 2024, and 2025 is seeing a marked acceleration. Q2 2025 alone saw 31 deals exceeding $50 million, with late-stage financing such as IPOs, mergers, and debt driving growth. Year to date, the crypto market has seen more capital enter the space ($16.1B), however crypto venture capital (VC) is mirroring traditional VC, as the capital is concentrated among a smaller number of funds. When capital concentrates, you typically get bigger checks but fewer deals overall. This is a reflection of many crypto companies maturing towards growth stage companies and it also points to the fact that the fundraising landscape has gotten more competitive than ever before for both founders and investors.

A conglomerate of forces is setting this cycle apart from the others. Token prices are rebounding, new products are launching, founders have more confidence to dive into the industry, regulatory tailwinds have provided clarity for stablecoins and digital assets, all unlocking capital into the space. Regulatory ambiguity has created friction between innovators and the Web3 space for years due to the fear of potential retribution. With the Trump Administration’s crypto-friendly attitudes, we have witnessed the cornerstone of on-chain adoption emerge through legislation, with The Genius Act and The Clarity Act. While we cannot say for certain how the deep future will be affected due to these bills, it is certain that these discussions and movements will shave off some hesitation towards investing in the space both intellectually and monetarily. Additionally, The Federal Reserve’s anticipated rate cuts in November are expected to drive more capital into risk assets, with digital asset trading systems (DATS) locking up capital in longer-tail assets. Investors are becoming less risk averse, creating a more enthusiastic flow of capital.

Investment allocation shifts with one-third of capital flowing into “bottom-up” opportunities like perpetuals, token launchpads, prediction markets, and novel DeFi primitives. The remaining two-thirds is targeting “top-down” plays, including DATS, real-world asset tokenization (RWAs), exchange-traded funds (ETFs), and companies entering public markets. These public market assets have dominated this cycle, which in turn allows the broader public better access to crypto assets, marking a very healthy sign for the industry.This balance illustrates a maturing market prioritizing both innovation and integration with traditional finance.

There is a short window where the blueprint of crypto legislation needs to take place, and with the current administration being pro-crypto, that window exists before the 2026 midterm elections. The DeFi Education Fund aims to protect software developers by submitting their response to the Senate Banking Committee’s Digital Asset Market Structure Request for Information and recently publishing a discussion draft of the Responsible Financial Innovation Act of 2025. Last week, the Wyoming Blockchain Symposium 2025 focused on digital asset regulation with an emphasis on the urgency of the U.S. establishing clear crypto regulations and the need for a balanced market structure. Members of the current administration attended the symposium, with an agenda to push forward-thinking regulation. Going into the first quarter of 2026 we can anticipate an even stronger foundation from a regulatory standpoint, one that we have never seen before in previous cycles especially with a ticking clock.

Token Listings and the IPO Market Re-opening

Token listings have declined in 2025, with fewer new tokens holding gains, creating a downstream drag on deal flow. Projects reliant on token launches are finding it harder to secure funding without market traction. In contrast, the IPO window has reopened with 95 companies listed on U.S. exchanges in 2025, raising $15.6 billion by mid-June, which is a 30% increase from 2024. Crypto-related IPOs, including Circle and BitGo, are leading the charge, creating a new trend where investors are allocating towards crypto stocks instead of tokens. Circle’s IPO on June 5, 2025, was a pivotal moment, pricing at $31 per share and rose to $233 by mid-July, delivering over 5x returns and a $44.98 billion market cap. As of recent, Figure and Bullish IPOed with Bullish being the first to raise $1.15 billion partly through stablecoins. BitGo’s planned IPO and $100 million raise in 2023 during a bear market emphasizes investor interest. Crypto companies are now optimizing for revenue and growth over speculative token launches.The surge in crypto IPO and other “top down” plays is attracting traditional investors through the lens of stable, revenue-driven business models over volatile cryptocurrencies. This is just the start of the IPO pipeline, with many more in line in the coming months.

Acquisitions and Industry Maturation

2024 was a record year for acquisitions with over 100 mergers and acquisitions (M&A) totaling $1.73 billion and 2025 is set to surpass 2024 in deal count. From January to July of this year it is already at 76 deals and $6.23 billion, which is 3.6× 2024’s full-year dollar volume and is on pace for 130 deals if the current run rate holds. The momentum in 2025 is less about unleashing pent‑up demand and more a sign of the industry’s natural maturation. Strategic acquisitions, like Robinhood’s purchase of Bitstamp, show established players building integrated platforms. Robinhood's multibillion-dollar bet on crypto’s future is lending even further credibility to the ecosystem, as their crypto revenue surged 98% year-over-year to $160 million in Q2 2025, with the overall company revenue up 45% to $989 million and profits at $386 million. As a backbone of retail-focused stock trading, Robinhood’s embrace of blockchain rails emphasizes the shift toward mainstream, regulated infrastructure. In the same vein, late-stage deals, such as Securitize’s $400 million raise from Mantle in Q2 2025 for RWA tokenization, and Kalshi’s $185 million raise at a $2 billion valuation for prediction markets, highlight a focus on revenue-driven, regulatory-compliant models.

These moves reflect crypto’s focus on building with financial incumbents, and not just chasing speculative opportunities.

The Macroscopic Intersection of Crypto

Crypto is no longer siloed as it’s converging with today’s cutting edge technology and global finance. In AI, OpenMind’s OM1 + FABRIC stack addresses the “missing layer” in the robotics industry, allowing different robots to work together through a decentralized approach. Worldcoin’s iris-scanning identity verification system leverages a blockchain-based identity layer that could enable AI agents to authenticate and transact autonomously, addressing the critical challenge of agents interacting securely in crypto. Decentralized AI platforms like Sahara AI ( a decentralized alternative to Scale AI) and Sentient (a decentralized Hugging Face) are disrupting traditional AI infrastructure. The application layer of crypto AI is still very nascent, but the potential that it harbors could create an entirely new market structure through on-chain agents and trading systems that enable high-frequency trading of tokenized stocks.

In payments, stablecoins, particularly Circle’s USDC has become integral to global payment systems with The GENIUS Act further accelerating USDC adoption. Circle reported a 58.6% revenue growth to $579 million in Q1 2025. Analysts project stable coin transaction volumes could reach $250 billion daily within three years, and potentially even surpass legacy payment systems like Visa within the next decade if the momentum of growth continues. Enterprises like PayPal and Visa are exploring stablecoin integration, blending stablecoins into mainstream payment rails. Robinhood's integration of Arbitrum has allowed Robinhood users to transact USDC natively on Arbitrum, making stablecoin transactions more accessible to retail users. With the Robinhood partnership just being the tip of the iceberg, Arbitrum plays a key role in scaling stablecoin adoption and exemplifies how Layer 2 solutions are bridging crypto with traditional finance.

This intersection of the most critical industries is pooling experts from AI, fintech, and consumer tech, blurring industry lines. Crypto’s role as a backbone for decentralized systems is positioning itself as a critical layer in the global tech stack.

Looking Forward

We anticipate a structurally stronger market cycle in Q4 2025 and Q1 2026. The confluence of unprecedented regulatory clarity, expected rate cuts, and a significant influx of capital from strategic M&A and IPOs is creating a robust foundation. This newfound momentum, driven by a focus on real-world utility, is setting the stage for a period of accelerated growth. Our strategy is to capitalize on this by making concentrated, high-conviction investments in Series A companies poised to define their categories.

Year to date, the U.S. IPO market has surged with 224 IPOs. In the first half of 2024, there were 94 IPOs compared to 165 in the first half of 2025, reflecting a 76% increase. There have been 185 crypto-related deals in the first half of 2025 alone, projecting to surpass 2024’s 248 acquisition deals. High-profile successes like Circle alongside other TradFi giants acquiring crypto companies, is marking the strength of the imminent cycles.

The intersection of crypto with AI, payments, and infrastructure, combined with regulatory tailwinds and strong investor appetite, will push us into an era of accelerated growth. With this, we will continue cementing crypto's role as a pillar of global finance and technology.

- Paul Veradittakit

Business

Crypto Fund Pantera Seeks to Raise Up to $1.25 Billion for Solana Deal

Pantera Capital is seeking to raise up to $1.25 billion to create "Solana Co.," a Nasdaq-listed treasury vehicle dedicated to accumulating and staking Solana (SOL) tokens.

Coinbase Expands International Offerings

Coinbase announced the launch of new trading pairs and expanded its international product suite, targeting growth in non-U.S. markets.

Rarible Acquires Flipp, Expands Product Team

Rarible, a leading NFT marketplace, announced the acquisition of Flipp, a mobile-based crypto trading app.

Regulation

DEF & 110+ Partners Submit Coalition Letter on Developer Protections in Market Structure

On August 1, 2025, DEF submitted their response to the Senate Banking Committee’s Digital Asset Market Structure Request for Information and recently published discussion draft of the Responsible Financial Innovation Act of 2025.

Illinois Enacts Stricter Crypto Consumer Protection Laws

Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker signed two new laws: the Digital Assets and Consumer Protection Act and the Digital Asset Kiosk Act. These laws empower state regulators to oversee crypto exchanges and wallet providers, require anti-fraud measures, cap ATM fees, and limit daily transactions.

Federal Reserve Ends Special Crypto Oversight Program

The U.S. Federal Reserve announced it will sunset its Novel Activities Supervision Program for crypto and fintech, integrating oversight of digital asset activities into its standard regulatory processes by August 2025.

New Products and Hot Deals

Aptos Labs' Shelby Protocol

Aptos Labs, with Jump Crypto, introduced Shelby: a decentralized hot-storage protocol offering sub-second reads, high throughput, smart contract-based access control, and integrated monetization.

Bybit & Tether in Brazil

Bybit partnered with Tether to accelerate crypto adoption in Brazil, offering USD₮ bonuses for new users, event sponsorships, and a national “Learn to Earn” campaign.

CryptoPunks Catch Fire Again

NBA Top Shot NFTs launched in Japan via vending machines, and CryptoPunks saw a surge in trading volume, signaling renewed institutional interest

This Week at Pantera

Blockchain Letter

Pantera’s August discusses how Digital Asset Treasuries (DATs) offer a path to higher returns than holding spot or ETFs by compounding yield into more token ownership per share, where Pantera has already deployed $300M across them globally.

Pantera in Time's Top Venture Capital Firms List

To spotlight the names molding the business landscape, TIME and Statista ranked 350 VC firms at the forefront of catalyzing innovation, supporting emerging startups, and driving the next generation of economic growth.

Pantera Capital's DAT Fund and the Crypto-Stock Wave

The fund leverages token compounding, premium equity issuance, and Ethereum-based strategies to grow NAV per share while mitigating downside through crypto exposure.

ABOUT ME

Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, a Managing Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early-stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.

If you have any projects that need funding, feel free to DM me on twitter.

• Ethereum is establishing its role as the foundational layer for stablecoins, DeFi, and tokenized assets as it enters its second decade.

• Digital Asset Treasuries (DATs) are reducing token float and driving institutional demand for ETH, creating structural price support.

• Regulatory clarity and Ethereum Foundation reforms are positioning Ethereum for long-term growth as the core infrastructure for on-chain capital markets.

The Origin of Ethereum’s Vision

Before Ethereum, Vitalik Buterin was an early Bitcoiner, working at Bitcoin Magazine. Here, he noticed the need for scripting capabilities for application development within Bitcoin. He embraced this vision and built Ethereum with a general scripting language and shared his blueprint of a computer being run on a decentralized permissionless network. At the time, the idea was ambitious, leaving room for skeptics as there was this young kid without any big tech corporate experience, aiming to create something fundamentally new.

What shifted the gaze for me and many other early investors was that applications were wanting to build on Ethereum instead of Bitcoin and its Layer 2s, conveying that Ethereum is better for application development. One of the first killer apps that validated this sentiment was Augur; a decentralized prediction market. Augur illustrated that Ethereum could enable powerful, permissionless applications built on transparency, automation and financial logic. Ethereum also allowed developers to issue tokens, coordinate governance, and raise capital natively, sparking the ICO boom. At Pantera, we launched one of the first ICO funds and backed some of the earliest DeFi applications such as 0x, holding our place at the forefront of the Ethereum evolution.

A Decade of Ethereum

Marking its 10th anniversary, Ethereum is enjoying a long-awaited moment in the sun. Launched in 2015, Ethereum was the first to introduce programmable smart contracts, building a community of developers that set the stage for DeFi, gaming, NFTs and more. Through the decade, this ecosystem fostered continuous innovation that resulted in hosting the majority of DeFi protocols, and serving as the backbone for stablecoins. The infrastructure supporting stablecoins has matured significantly, with the GENIUS-Act providing regulatory clarity, channeling royalties to Ethereum and boosting its demand. While stablecoins like USDC and USDT exist on many chains, Ethereum remains the dominant home for stablecoin activity accounting for nearly 50% of global stablecoin market cap. Ethereum’s robust ecosystem continues to drive price appreciation, fueled by stablecoin adoption and innovative scaling solutions, with Pantera Capital’s strategic investments amplifying this growth.

Pantera’s Ethereum Ecosystem Investments

Over the past decade, Pantera Capital has invested in Ethereum’s ecosystem, backing transformative projects and founders. We are also one of the very few firms to have invested consistently alongside the very existence of Ethereum itself. Key investments include Circle, which powers USDC, a leading stablecoin with over $60 billion market cap and a driving force behindEthereum’s adoption in DeFi and payments. Arbitrum, a leading Layer 2 solution, has captured 100% of Ethereum’s incremental transaction growth in 2023, processing transactions 40x faster and 20x cheaper, with over 1.89 billion transactions since its launch with cumulative DEX trading volume exceeding over $545 Billion, displaying Ethereum’s scalability. More recently, it has emerged as a key player in migrating the infrastructure of capital, powering Robinhood’s launch of Stock Tokens on Arbitrum and serving as the underlying infrastructure of Robinhood Chain. Ondo, contributing significantly to the billion-dollar tokenized treasury market, launched USDY in 2023, showcasing Ethereum’s pivotal role as the core infrastructure for linking real-world assets, like U.S. Treasuries, to on-chain finance. Morpho significantly improved the lending experience on Ethereum, as it reached nearly $1 billion in deposits just a year after its launch, making it one of the fastest DeFi protocols to hit this milestone. Pantera seeded Bitwise’s spot Ethereum ETF, one of the first to gain approval, creating a new venue for institutional capital inflows. As of 2025, Bitwise manages over $4 billion in assets, leveraging Ethereum’s blockchain to power DeFi and tokenized asset strategies. Finally, BitMine, alongside firms like Bit Digital, has added over 840,000 ETH to corporate treasuries, signaling commitment to Ethereum’s value as a reserve asset.

Institutional Demand, DATs, and Ethereum’s Supply Shift

Ethereum surged 53% in July - but this rally wasn’t built on hype. It’s a structural move driven by growing institutional allocations into ETFs and Digital Asset Treasuries (DATs), Ethereum Foundation’s turnaround, coupled with recent regulatory clarity.

Institutions have taken interest in cryptocurrency exposure through ETFs and DATs. U.S. spot ETH ETFs attracted $1.8 billion in inflows last week alone. DATs also began aggressively stacking ETH. SharpLink (SBET) boosted its reserves to 361,000 ETH, while BitMine crossed the $2 billion mark in Ethereum holdings in just 16 days. As MicroStrategy’s Tom Lee highlighted on call with Pantera's Cosmo Jiang, these treasury companies have built-in advantages: cheap capital, equity premiums, staking yields, M&A arbitrage, and operational income that allow every new equity issuance to compound their ETH per share. This unique structure continuously shrinks Ethereum’s free float, providing price support beyond simple demand.

Source: https://www.coinglass.com/eth-etf

DATs are no longer a crypto-native curiosity, serving as an entry point for institutions to dip their toes into crypto and Ethereum, allowing them to gain exposure prior to purchasing spot or transacting on-chain. As I covered in my previous blog “Blockchain Going Public: the Convergence of Public Markets and Digital Assets”, these vehicles concentrate massive buying power, often absorbing more ETH than is issued, driving scarcity, and setting off broader capital rotations into altcoins.

Regulatory Clarity and Ethereum Foundation’s Strategic Turnaround

Regulatory clarity has also transformed historical headwinds to tailwinds. July’s GENIUS Act granted federally chartered status to regulated payment stablecoins. Stablecoins, quietly becoming crypto’s killer app, have already exceeded $250 billion in circulation, with Ethereum settling roughly half of all tokenized dollar transfers globally.

Lastly, Ethereum Foundation's (EF) new leadership and rapid developments are helping the chain evolve rapidly. The turnaround involved a leadership overhaul, Protocol team restructuring, a disciplined treasury policy, and an accelerated technical roadmap to address community criticisms about inefficiency, transparency, and competitiveness. By focusing on L1 scaling, blobspace, UX, and DeFi integration, EF aims to prove Ethereum’s dominance amid growing institutional adoption (e.g., Robinhood’s Stock Tokens on Arbitrum) and competition from blockchains like Solana. While challenges remain, such as retaining talent and managing community expectations, the EF’s strategic shift positions Ethereum to capitalize on the on-chain migration of capital markets, as seen in innovations like Robinhood Chain and Pantera’s ecosystem investments.

Final Thoughts

Stablecoins have finally locked onto dependable rails, reinforced by regulatory clarity from acts like the GENIUS Act, boosting its demand. Digital Asset Treasuries are the engines behind that demand. They vacuum float, boost price, and give institutions a turnkey way to hold crypto. In a market that now prizes structural yield, tokens that have deflationary pressure and linked with real cashflow, will be attractive candidates to be the underlying assets for DATs, further driving Ethereum’s price upward as demand for its blockchain surges.

We are at the cusp of a significant infrastructural shift, one that requires not a silver bullet but a vast array of solutions to numerous confounding issues. At Pantera Capital, we remain committed to investing in those solutions that power the next phase of on-chain capital markets, streamline financial infrastructure, and push the horizon of blockchain innovation. Ethereum stands at the center of this shift as the backbone for stablecoins, the platform of choice for institutions, and a catalyst for the evolving digital asset economy.

- Paul Veradittakit

Business

Why BNB Is Outperforming Altcoins Like XRP, ETH, SOL Today?

BNB surged to a new all-time high of $860 following a wave of U.S.-listed companies announcing major treasury allocations to the token. CEA Industries raised $500M, backed by CZ’s family office, joining Windtree Therapeutics, Liminatus Pharma, and Nano Labs in adopting BNB as a strategic reserve asset.

Anchorage Digital X Ethena Labs

Anchorage Digital and Ethena Labs launched USDtb, the first stablecoin compliant with the U.S. GENIUS Act. Backed 1:1, USDtb’s debut triggered a $4B stablecoin supply surge.

Regulation

Trump Eyes Moving U.S. Economy Further Into Crypto Via Mortgages, 401(k)s

Accelerating efforts to integrate crypto into core U.S. economic systems include a potential executive order allowing 401(k) retirement plans to allocate into digital assets.

Senate Crypto Market Framework Drafts and Ongoing Debates

The Senate Banking Committee introduces a hybrid regulatory model for digital assets, proposing a shared framework where the SEC handles disclosures and the CFTC oversees market activity for a new asset class called “ancillary assets.”

White House Unveiling Crypto Policy Report

The White House administration is working to release a crypto report to outline the administration's views on tokenization, and will lay out regulatory, legislative proposals.

New Products and Hot Deals

Christie’s Debuts Crypto Real Estate Division

The brokerage has spun up a dedicated division that already lists $1 billion in luxury property and recently closed a $65 million Beverly Hills sale entirely in crypto

Stablecoin-Focused Bitcoin Sidechain Plasma Draws $373M in Oversubscribed Token Sale

Stablecoin‑centric Bitcoin sidechain Plasma blew past its $50 million target, raising $373 million and promising $1 billion in on‑chain dollars plus fee‑free transfers at launch.

Everclear Secures Strategic Investment From NEAR Foundation To Scale Cross-Chain Clearing

Cross‑chain clearing protocol Everclear (a Pantera portfolio company) secured strategic funding and tech support from NEAR to speed trust‑less settlement across blockchains.

This Week at Pantera

Blockchain Letter

Pantera’s July note claims that tokenization has crossed “from concept into inevitability” as corporations issue directly on‑chain - setting the stage for an explosion of Digital Asset Treasury (DAT) companies.

Pantera DAT fund II

After the first Digital Asset Treasury fund filled and was fully deployed within a week, Pantera announced a second, larger vehicle to meet investor demand.

Pantera Capital to Invest $250M in Real-World Asset Projects

Ondo Finance is launching a $250 million initiative with Pantera Capital to invest in real-world asset tokenization projects. The program, called Ondo Catalyst, will focus on both equity stakes and token investments.

ABOUT ME

Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, a Managing Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early-stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.

If you have any projects that need funding, feel free to DM me on twitter.

• The GENIUS Act, signed into law, establishes unified standards for stablecoin issuance and reserves.

• The CLARITY Act, passed by the House, defines SEC and CFTC oversight for digital assets and allows for a migration path from SEC to CFTC jurisdiction.

• The Anti-CBDC Provision, included in the NDAA, prohibits the Federal Reserve from issuing a centralized digital dollar without Congressional approval, promoting decentralized solutions.

Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images

What Happened

Last week we saw historic movement in U.S. crypto policy as lawmakers advanced several landmark bills during what Congress dubbed "Crypto Week." President Trump signed the GENIUS Act into law on July 19. The news immediately lifted market sentiment, pushing crypto’s total market cap past $4 trillion for the first time and driving stablecoin issuance to a new high of $261 billion. The Act sets a unified standard for stablecoins, prompting the immediate pilot announcements from financial giants like JPMorgan, Bank of America, PayPal, and Stripe. The clarity in crypto regulation has reduced uncertainty, enabling institutional investors to deploy previously sidelined capital, large banks to enter the stablecoin market compliantly and users to transact privately. The bill positions crypto firmly as a core pillar of the next-generation financial internet and the United States as the "crypto capital" of the world.

After months of debate, the CLARITY Act, which establishes clear guidelines differentiating SEC and CFTC oversight for digital assets, secured bipartisan approval in the House and is now headed swiftly toward the Senate for consideration. The Anti-CBDC provision also cleared a major hurdle by inclusion in the National Defense Authorization Act, prohibiting the Federal Reserve from issuing a centralized digital dollar without explicit Congressional approval.

It is an exciting time for crypto! Let’s break down the GENIUS Act, CLARITY Act, and Anti-CBDC provision, and why these developments matter for the industry.

GENIUS Act

On 19 May, the Senate voted 66‑32 to invoke cloture on the GENIUS Act. On July 17, the US Congress sent it to President Trump’s desk. On July 19, the President signed it into law.

What is the GENIUS Act

The GENIUS Act addresses who can issue a payment stablecoin and outlines the instruments qualified to be the stablecoin’s reserve. The Act changed the market’s view on stablecoins: from mere tradeable opportunities into institutional‑grade payment rails. Stablecoins enables banks and fintechs to deploy them as true programmable dollars that settle in seconds and clear 24/7. We believe this unlocks value across the value chain from machine payments to cross‑border trade, all while keeping global dollar liquidity on ledgers ultimately checked by U.S. regulators. This results in deeper market liquidity, lower settlement friction, and a stronger dollar in the global markets.

• A compliant issuer is either (i) a federally regulated bank, (ii) an OCC‑licensed non‑bank stablecoin issuer, or (iii) a state‑chartered issuer whose aggregate stablecoins in circulation do not exceed US $10 billion in market capitalization.

• The reserve must be equal to or greater than the total face value of all stablecoins outstanding.

• Eligible reserve instruments are U.S. dollars held as cash, demand deposits or insured shares at insured depository institutions, treasury bills maturing in 93 days or less, and overnight reverse‑repurchase agreements fully collateralized by Treasuries.

• Issuers must publish a monthly breakdown of reserves and supply, and obtain an annual independent audit to confirm 1:1 backing and asset eligibility.

Although the act prohibits yield-bearing stablecoins, many projects are likely to adapt by offering alternative forms of rewards, such as loyalty programs and rebates that mimic the effect of yield without explicitly paying interest. This regulatory pressure is expected to accelerate consolidation within the stablecoin industry, as users gravitate toward platforms that provide the most attractive non-yield incentives. In turn, stablecoin providers with robust loyalty or rewards structures may capture greater market share, prompting a shift from a fragmented yield ecosystem toward a more concentrated landscape dominated by a few large players offering innovative, compliance-friendly reward mechanisms.

CLARITY Act

What is the CLARITY Act

The GENIUS Act provides clarity for stablecoin regulation, but there isn’t legislation to ensure the rails on which stablecoins are transacted on to be decentralized and trustless. The CLARITY Act is introduced to fill this gap. It draws a crucial distinction between the oversight roles of the SEC and CFTC when it comes to digital assets.

The CLARITY Act introduces precise legal definitions for digital asset, digital commodity, and mature blockchain systems.

• A digital asset is defined as a digital representation of value or rights recorded on a cryptographically secure distributed ledger.

• A digital commodity is a a fungible digital asset that is not a security, is issued or exists on a mature blockchain system, and is transferable between persons without reliance on intermediaries

• A mature blockchain system is a protocol that is functional, public, and sufficiently decentralized such that no single person or group has unilateral power to control protocol rules or asset issuance

Under the CLARITY Act, the SEC is responsible for tokens that function as investment contracts. Investment contracts are typically tokens issued for fundraising and issued by projects that remain centrally controlled or in early development. In contrast, the CFTC is assigned jurisdiction over digital commodities, fungible digital assets that are not classified as securities and exist on mature blockchain systems. The Act allows digital assets to migrate from SEC to CFTC supervision once they become sufficiently decentralized and widely adopted.

Analysis on the CLARITY Act

The CLARITY Act clearly defines what decentralization entails:

1. A mature blockchain system must be open and interoperable. It must have open source code and must not prohibit anyone from engagement in functional activities with the blockchain.

2. A mature blockchain system must also have a system of governance. No person or group should have the unilateral ability to alter the functionalities and operations of the blockchain system, nor may any person or group have more than 20% of the outstanding voting power of the blockchain system.

In order for a project to graduate from SEC to CFTC jurisdiction, it must be sufficiently decentralized. Tokens regulated by the SEC are treated as securities, with restrictions and regulation akin to publicly traded companies; while tokens under CFTC jurisdiction are classified as digital commodities and are subject to lighter regulatory demands. Projects under the CFTC’s jurisdiction do not need to file detailed reports or restrict access to their tokens, and markets are generally open to all participants, even without accredited investor requirements.

Before the Act, crypto project teams faced a murky landscape - no one quite knew what truly counted as "decentralized," leading to ongoing legal pressure to go above and beyond in their efforts. Now, that's changed: the Act introduces a clear legal definition of decentralization. Instead of aiming for an ever-shifting or unattainable target, teams now have a straightforward, well-defined benchmark to hit. This clarity brings much-needed relief and sets a predictable path forward for innovators.

We believe that this Act will compel teams to balance centralization for performance optimization and decentralization for market access and regulatory tailwinds.

Anti CBDC Provision

What are CBDCs

A Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) is a digital version of a nation’s official currency, directly issued and regulated by the central bank. CBDCs are inherently more vulnerable to government surveillance than stablecoins since every CBDC transaction passes through or can be monitored by the state’s centralized ledger, enabling authorities to track, analyze, or even restrict citizens’ financial activities at a granular level.

CBDCs are different from stablecoins. Stablecoins are privately issued, backed by reserves like fiat currency or government bonds. Thus they lack the central bank guarantees CBDCs have. However, since stablecoins are transacted on public ledgers such as Ethereum and Solana, stablecoin transactions can’t be easily censored by governments or.

What is the Anti CBDC Provision

The Anti-CBDC Provision, formally known as the Anti-CBDC Surveillance State Act, is a legislative measure aimed at preventing the creation and implementation of a central bank digital currency (CBDC) by the Federal Reserve or any other U.S. government agency without explicit authorization from Congress. This provision is aimed at prohibiting government searches and seizures of Americans’ financial data. It also closes loopholes by banning any indirect issuance of a CBDC through third-party intermediaries and requires that any attempt to launch a U.S. digital dollar must first secure clear, formal approval from the legislative branch.

Analysis on the Anti CBDC Provision

The Anti-CBDC Provision pushes financial innovation and activity onto public, decentralized blockchains rather than state-controlled ledgers. Alongside the GENIUS Act and the CLARITY Act, this legislative framework signals a clear policy preference: the U.S. government is choosing to support stablecoins on decentralized ledgers over centrally issued digital money on permissioned government ledgers.

This approach curtails the potential for state-sponsored financial surveillance in a CBDC system and safeguards individual financial privacy. By championing decentralized infrastructure, the legislation aligns with the core ethos of blockchain: ensuring that users maintain sovereignty over their economic lives without fear of transactional censorship.

Final Thoughts

Last week was a historical moment for crypto.

• The CLARITY Act sets a clear standard for digital commodities.

• The GENIUS Act outlines a clear set of rules for stablecoin issuance and operations.

• Finally, the Anti-CBDC provision of the NDAA keeps government surveillance off the table, protecting privacy and encouraging decentralized networks.

With greater regulatory clarity emerging around crypto in the United States, the industry is witnessing a bullish resurgence anchored firmly on American soil. We see a huge demand for local talent: teams that previously sought refuge abroad are returning to the States, and there is a surge in projects actively recruiting US-based policy, developer relations, and partnership experts.

We also see token issuance models evolving to be more US friendly: instead of defaulting to offshore foundation models, many projects are now comfortable issuing tokens directly from Delaware entities. Tokenomics are also being reworked to align better with domestic expectations. Airdrops, as seen with OpenSea, are increasingly targeted at US users. Major platforms such as Telegram are opening Web3 wallets and mini-apps for Americans, highlighting renewed market focus.

This new era of regulatory certainty is igniting powerful momentum across the digital asset sector, fueling a surge of innovative stablecoin banks and payment companies. Established leaders and agile new entrants alike are moving swiftly to deliver institutional-grade solutions in custody, liquidity, compliance, and privacy - critical pillars of a mature crypto ecosystem. Having weathered over 12 years of industry evolution, Pantera has never been more optimistic. With this furious pace of development and a clear legal framework to build upon, the United States is rapidly cementing its role as the undeniable global capital of crypto.

- Paul Veradittakit

Business

Sonnet BioTherapeutics announced an $888M business combination to launch a cryptocurrency treasury reserve strategy, becoming the largest U.S.-listed company to hold HYPE tokens

The newly-created entity is to be named Hyperliquid Strategies Inc (“HSI”), which is expected to hold approximately 12.6 million HYPE tokens

DFDV announced the DFDV Treasury Accelerator – a strategic franchise model to help build public $SOL treasury vehicles worldwide.

DFDV is kicking off the accelerator with support from some of the biggest names in the space: @krakenfx, @PanteraCapital, @Arrington_Cap, @Borderless_cap and RK Capital. These partners will help drive regional launches through investment, guidance, and infrastructure.

Regulation

The U.S. House of Representatives passed three major crypto bills (CLARITY Act, GENIUS Act, Anti-CBDC Surveillance State Act)

The US House of Representatives has officially passed a procedural vote to advance several key pieces of crypto legislation, including the CLARITY Act, the GENIUS Act, and the Anti-CBDC Surveillance State Act.

New Products and Hot Deals

Pump.Fun raised $600M in 12 minutes, reflecting rapid institutional investment in crypto platform

Pump.fun has set a new benchmark in the cryptocurrency world by completing a record-breaking token sale, raising $600 million in just 12 minutes.

Ondo Finance Acquires Strangelove to Accelerate Full-Stack RWA Platform Development

Ondo Finance, a leader in tokenized real-world assets (RWAs), today announced the acquisition of Strangelove, a blockchain development company whose experienced team has unique expertise in building secure and modular blockchain infrastructure.

Coinbase steps into consumer market with stablecoin-powered ‘everything app’ that goes beyond trading

The “Base App,” which replaces Coinbase Wallet, will combine wallet, trading and payment functions as well as social media, messaging and support for mini apps.

This week at Pantera

Pantera DAT Fund Closing

Pantera has created a fund that provides investors access to Digital Asset Treasury (“DAT”) opportunities.

Pantera-backed The Ether Machine set for Nasdaq debut, targets $1.6B raise

The company aims to generate yield through staking, support Ethereum-native projects, and provide institutional infrastructure solutions.

ABOUT ME

Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, a Managing Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early-stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.

If you have any projects that need funding, feel free to DM me on twitter.

• Crypto IPOs are unlocking significant value, despite initial pricing challenges.

• The token transparency framework aims to bring clarity and attract more institutional investment into the token market.

• Tokenized stocks are revolutionizing financial markets, driving efficiency and expanding access to global capital.

Mispriced Crypto IPOs

The story of Coinbase since its IPO is a case study in how public markets struggle to price innovation at the edge of financial infrastructure. We’ve watched COIN swing from euphoric highs, opening 52% above its reference price and briefly touching a $100B valuation, to deep drawdowns, as sentiment and crypto cycles whipsaw the narrative. Each turn of the market seems to reprice Coinbase under a new valuation framework, leaving long-term value investors and builders alike scratching their heads. The Circle IPO is another recent example: despite massive demand for stablecoin exposure, Circle left $1.7 billion on the table in its debut, ranking among the most underpriced offerings of the last few decades. This isn’t just a quirk of crypto, it's a structural problem in how we bring next-generation financial companies to public markets.

Crypto needs a smarter, more adaptive approach to price discovery - one that can bridge the gap between institutional demand and the true value of these platforms as cycles shift.

Call for New Valuation Framework

Tokens still lack their S-1. Mispriced crypto IPOs have proven that when underwriters can’t map token economics to a GAAP-style checklist, meaning they either overpay on hype or underprice on fear. To close that gap, Pantera's Cosmo Jiang teamed up with Blockworks to launch the Token Transparency Report - 40 points that turn protocol opacity into IPO-grade clarity. The framework asks founders to break out revenue by entity, publish vesting curves with labeled insider wallets, and file quarterly token-holder statements on treasury, cash flow, and KPIs. It even pulls back the curtain on market-maker or CEX deals so investors can size liquidity risk before day one. Package those answers, and a startup hands Wall Street everything it needs to price itself for an IPO with confidence.

Why does this matter for valuation?

• Lower discount rates: clear float and dilution data lets banks price closer to intrinsic value.

• Larger buyer base: institutions previously barred from “black-box” protocols can participate after the framework certifies the protocol.

• Regulatory fast-track: the SEC’s April 2025 crypto-offering guidance aligns with the framework’s pillars, so projects walk into the filing window with most of the paperwork already done - speeding approvals and tightening the spread between private and public valuations.

It is hard to view blockchains under the lens of traditional businesses. Ethereum’s latest upgrade makes the point crystal clear i.e. every new block destroys a slice of ETH (think auto share-buyback) while handing stakers a 3–5 % yield (think steady dividend). The right move is to treat issuance minus burn like free cash flow - discount it forward and you’ve got a valuation that fits the chain, not just the balance sheet. But scarcity is only chapter one, speed is the full story. A chain can cap supply all it wants, but real value shows up in the traffic - stablecoins moving across wallets, bridges' activity, DeFi collateral flow. Those live stats are the pulse that fundamentally support a token’s price when headlines wobble.

To capture the whole picture, we should start with the one lens everyone trusts -plain-vanilla cash flows from the company behind the protocol. On-chain income (staking yield minus fee burns) can sit on top as a sensitivity check. Keeping an eye on staking yields, live flow metrics, and simple what-if scenarios is enough to keep the valuation current and ready for Wall Street.

Optimizing the Trading Experience with Tokenized Stocks

At Pantera Capital, we have been supporting the RWA tokenization space by backing Ondo Finance. Recently, we launched a 250 million dollar fund with Ondo to catalyse the RWA tokenization space. The space is maturing as Robinhood announced that they will be tokenising stocks.

Last week, Robinhood launched tokenized stock on their platform. Robinhood’s launch of tokenized stocks highlights a core paradox at the heart of this new financial technology – permissionless vs permissioned finance, and the future role DeFi plays in this.

The promise of permissionless tokenized equities, where anyone can trade stocks on a public blockchain at any time, offers radical openness and global access to US capital markets. However, such democratising comes with a major risk: without traditional market surveillance and regulatory controls, permissionless tokenized stock markets could become breeding grounds for insider trading and market manipulation. On the other hand, permissioned tokenized equities using existing KYC rails would maintain market integrity but limit global access to US capital markets, which is the main selling point of tokenized equities.

We also believe tokenized stock is poised to reshape DeFi. At its core, DeFi’s mission is to build open, programmable financial primitives for any tokenized value, whether that is dollars, stocks, or commodities. Until now, DeFi has largely catered to crypto native tokens, but the arrival of tokenized stocks unlocks a new universe of use cases. However, the structure of tokenized equities will determine who captures the next wave of users and liquidity. In the permissioned model, where access to tokenized equities is gated and compliance is enforced, incumbents with distribution like Robinhood will own the user relationship, while DeFi protocols will be forced to compete to provide liquidity in the backend. In this scenario, the edge for DeFi protocols comes from leveraging blockchain-native expertise to provide the best prices and services for the frontend apps.

If tokenized stocks are issued and traded permissionlessly, the dynamic flips. DeFi protocols can own both the user and the liquidity, enabling a truly open, global capital market. Anyone, anywhere, could trade, lend, or build derivatives on tokenized equities without gatekeepers. This is the vision that excites the DeFi community: a world where the composability and transparency of smart contracts unlock new financial primitives and increase capital efficiency.

The most powerful illustration of this future is the rise of permissionless perpetual futures for tokenized stocks, as seen in Hyperliquid’s HIP-3 upgrade. HIP-3 enables anyone to launch perpetual markets for any asset by staking protocol tokens and configuring oracles, leverage, and funding parameters. To build a perpetual future contract for a tokenized stock, a protocol would: (1) deploy a smart contract referencing a reliable price oracle for the stock token, (2) bootstrap liquidity via on-chain incentives or protocol-native market making, (3) set risk parameters (leverage, funding rates), and (4) open the market to global traders. Robinhood and Coinbase are already moving in this direction, offering perpetuals on tokenized stocks in the EU, but their models remain more permissioned and less composable than what DeFi can achieve.

The endgame is clear: as tokenized stocks proliferate, DeFi will become the default venue for programmable, borderless financial engineering - if, and only if, the rails remain open.

Bitcoin surpasses Google in Market Capitalization

Bitcoin has rocketed past Google’s market cap in 2025, becoming the world’s fifth-largest asset with a $2.128 trillion valuation! Fueled by institutional adoption, spot Bitcoin ETF approvals, and clear regulations, Bitcoin soared above $106,000. This a pivotal moment for bitcoin and crypto as it proves that there is a clear product market fit for programmable money.

Looking Ahead

As Dan Morehead said, investing in crypto currencies has provided returns you can’t get in normal markets. This is why we are seeing traditional public markets financially and structurally converging with crypto. Digital Asset Treasuries and crypto IPOs provide public markets financial exposure to crypto, while stablecoins and tokenization leverages crypto to structurally improve traditional markets. In 10 years, crypto wouldn’t be a niche market where tech enthusiasts talk about, but a core technology powering our daily lives.

- Paul Veradittakit

Business

BlackRock’s Bitcoin (BTC) ETF Now Generates More Revenue Than Its Flagship S&P 500 Fund

The success of IBIT highlights the growing institutional adoption of digital assets and the willingness of investors to pay higher fees for access to Bitcoin through traditional financial products.

Regulation

Exclusive-Circle applies for US trust bank license after bumper IPO

Stablecoin firm Circle is applying to create a national trust bank in the U.S., a major move after its blockbuster IPO valued the company at nearly $18 billion earlier this month.

Lummis Crypto Tax Reform Bill Could Transform U.S. Digital Asset Rules

On July 3, 2025, Lummis introduced a standalone digital asset tax reform bill that, if enacted, could mark a pivotal moment in harmonizing how digital and traditional financial assets are treated under the Internal Revenue Code (IRC).

New Products and Hot Deals

Coinbase buys token manager Liquifi as crypto M&A heats up

The acquisition is part of Coinbase’s broader strategy to expand its infrastructure and services for digital assets, aiming to simplify and streamline token launches for developers and institutional clients.

Ondo Finance to Acquire Oasis Pro, an SEC-Registered Broker-Dealer, Alternative Trading System, and Transfer Agent

This acquisition will empower Ondo to realize their vision of building a robust and accessible tokenized financial system, backed by the strongest regulatory foundations.

CoreWeave to buy Core Scientific in $9 billion deal to meet AI power needs | Reuters

CoreWeave will buy crypto miner Core Scientific in an all-stock deal valued at about $9 billion, it said on Monday, as AI infrastructure firms race to secure the energy and data center capacity needed to power surging demand.

This week at Pantera

Telegram blockchain startup TOP raises $28.5 million at $1 billion valuation | Fortune Crypto

The Open Platform, one of the main app developers on TON, announced Thursday that it has raised a $28.5 million series A at a $1 billion valuation.

Crypto is a better place to start wealth, says Pantera’s Dan Morehead

Dan predicts a significant portion of bank deposits will be replaced with stablecoins in the next ten years.

The Case for Digital Asset Treasury Companies

Fundstrat Managing Partner and Head of Research Tom Lee and Pantera’s Cosmo Jiang dive into the investment case for Digital Asset Treasury companies (DATs), a new frontier for public market crypto exposure.

ABOUT ME

Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, a Managing Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early-stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.

If you have any projects that need funding, feel free to DM me on twitter.

• VLA innovations and economies of scale have catalysed the creation of affordable, efficient and generalised humanoid robots.

• Robotics safety, financing and evaluation are worth exploring as warehouses expand into consumer robotics.

• Crypto will improve robotics by providing economic guarantees for robot safety, and optimising its docking infrastructure, latency and data collection pipelines.

ChatGPT rewrote humanities’ expectations for AI. With the meta of LLMs interacting with the external software world, a lot of people thought AI Agents are the endgame. But when you look at iconic sci fi movies such as Star Wars, Blade Runner or Robocop, it is clear that humanity dreams of the day AI can physically interact with the world – in the form of robotics.

At Pantera Capital, we believe the ChatGPT moment for robotics is on the horizon. First, we will examine how the affordability and advancements in AI changed the space over the past few years. Then we would discuss how battery, latency and data collection optimization will change the space in the coming years and the role crypto plays in it. We would end by explaining why we believe robotics safety, financing, evaluation and education are verticals worth looking at.

What Changed?

AI Breakthroughs

Developments in the multi-modal LLM space is giving robots the brain it needs to carry out complex tasks. Robots mostly perceive its environment through two senses – visual and auditory.

Traditionally, visual models such as convolutional neural networks were tailored for object detection or classification tasks, but they lack the understanding to convert such visions into purposeful actions. LLMs are great at text-based understanding or generation, but they are restricted in their perception of the physical world.

Source: https://arxiv.org/html/2505.04769v1

Using Vision-Language-Action models (VLAs), robots can unify visual perception, language understanding, and physical action in a single computational framework. In February 2025, Figure AI released Helix, a VLA model for generalist humanoid control. Helix sets new standards in the VLA and robotics space by enabling zero-shot generalization, system1/system 2 architecture. With zero-shot generalisation, no extensive retraining is needed for each task the robot does. Helix can generalize instantly to new situations, objects, and instructions. Under system 1/ system 2 architecture, high-level and lightweight reasonings are separated, enabling commercially viable humanoids that combine human-like reasoning with real-time precision.

Affordable Robots are Visible

Technologies that change the world all have one thing in common – they are accessible. Smartphones, personal computers, 3D printing are all made accessible through being affordable by the middle class. When robots such as the Unitree G1 are cheaper than a Honda Accord or the minimum wage of 34K USD in the States, it is not hard to imagine a world where physical and mundane tasks are mostly done by robots.

Source: https://www.unitree.com/g1/

Expanding from Warehouse to Consumer

Robotics is expanding from warehouse solutions to consumers. The world is made for humans. Humans can do everything specialised robots can; specialised robots can’t do everything humans can. Instead of making specialised robots for factories, robotics companies are making more generalised humanoid robots. Thus, the frontier of robotics can not only be observed in warehouses, but in our everyday lives.

Affordability is one of the main bottlenecks for expansion. The metric I look at the most is cost per hour. We define the cost as the opportunity cost of time used for training and charging, the cost of doing the task and the cost of the robot divided by its operational hours. The average wage of the sector is the benchmark to go under.

Source: https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t19.htm

In order to fully penetrate the warehouse sector, cost per hour must be lower than 31.39 USD. The largest consumer sector above is Private Education & Health Services. Robots must cost less than 35.18 USD per hour to penetrate consumer verticals.

Robots are becoming cheaper, more efficient and more generalised.

What are the Next Steps for Robotics?

Battery Optimization

Battery has always been a bottleneck for user-friendly robots. Early electric vehicles such as BMW i3 struggled to gain popularity due to weak battery technology that limited range, increased cost, and reduced practicality. Robots are facing the same challenges. Boston Dynamics’ Spot robot can only operate for 90 minutes before needing a recharge; Unitree G1 has a battery life of around 2 hours. No one wants to manually recharge their robots’ batteries every 2 hours. Therefore, autonomous recharge and docking infrastructure is an area worth looking at. Currently there are two ways robots are recharged – swapping the battery or charging the battery.

Swapping battery trays allow depleted batteries to be quickly swapped out for charged ones, minimizing downtime and enabling robots to operate continuously in the field or on the factory floor. This process can be done both manually and automatically.

Inductive charging charges robots wirelessly, it takes more time to fully recharge the robot but the process can easily be fully automated.

Latency Optimization

Low latency operations can be divided into two categories: perception and teleoperations. Perception is how the robot perceives its surroundings. Teleoperation is when a human is remotely controlling the robot.

According to Cintrini Research, robotic perception starts with cheap sensors but the moat forms in fusion software, low-power compute, and millisecond-tight control loops. Once the robot knows here and there, a lightweight neural network tags obstacles, pallets, or humans. Scene labels feed the planner, which then spits out motor commands to feet, wheels, or arms. Perception latency under 50ms is equivalent to a human’s reflexes - anything slower and your robot is going to be really clumsy. Thus, 90% of the decisions live onboard in the form of a single vision-language-action network.

For a fully autonomous robot, the latency of the high performant VLA must be lower than 50ms; for a teleoperator robot, the latency between the operator and the robot must be lower than 50ms. We can fully appreciate the importance of VLAs here, if visual and text inputs are processed in two models separately and fed into a larger LLM for processing, the latency would be way higher than 50ms.

Data Collection Optimization

There are three ways to collect data: real world video data, synthetic data, teleoperation data. The main constraints for real world data and synthetic data is bridging the difference between how robots behave in physical settings versus how they are modeled in video or simulations. Real world video data lack physical details such as force feedback, joint movement inaccuracies, or material deformation; Simulation data lack unpredictable variables such as sensor failure and friction.

The most promising data collection method is teleoperation, where human operators control robots remotely to perform tasks. Capital for human labor is the major constraint for teleoperation data.

Custom hardware is also being developed to provide high quality data as well. Mecka is providing high-quality, high-volume human movement data with rapid iteration cycles for AI robotics training. It captures several forms of human data with both mainstream methods and custom hardware that is then processed and transformed to be usable in training robotics neural networks. Together, these pipelines shorten the path from data to deployable robotics.

Things to Look at in the Space

Crypto Meets Robotics

Crypto can be used to incentivize trustless parties in improving network efficiencies for robotics. Looking at the key areas above, we believe that crypto can enhance efficiencies in docking infrastructure, latency optimization and data collection.

Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Networks (DePIN) has the potential to docking infrastructure. When humanoid robots, like cars, travel around the world, it is important for charging stations to be as accessible as gas stations. Centralized networks require heavy upfront investment, while DePIN distributes the cost among node operators, allowing charging infrastructure to expand quickly and reach more locations.

DePINs are also positioned to leverage decentralized infrastructure for optimizing latency in teleoperations. DePINs can aggregate computing resources from geographically dispersed edge nodes, teleoperations from. This means commands from a teleoperator to the robot can be processed locally or by the nearest available node, minimizing the distance data must travel and potentially reducing communication latency. However, current DePIN projects primarily focus on decentralized storage, content delivery, and bandwidth sharing. Some projects have demonstrated the benefits of edge computing for applications such as streaming or IoT, but not in robotics or teleoperations.

Teleoperation is the most promising data collection method. However, it is very expensive for a centralised entity to hire specialised personnel to produce teleoperation data. DePIN solves this by incentivising third parties in providing teleoperation data. Reborn uses crypto tokens to reward and coordinate a global network of teleoperators. It turns their contributions into tokenized digital assets, enabling a decentralized, permissionless system where anyone can earn, govern, and help train AGI robots.

Safety is Always a Concern

It is common knowledge that the end goal for robotics is fully autonomous robotics. However, as seen in the block buster Termaintor, the last thing humanity wants is when their autonomy turns them into aggressive robots. AI safety has been a concern for LLMs. But when LLMs have limbs, robotics safety is crucial for robotics to be adopted in society.

Economic security is one of the key pillars for a flourishing robot economy. OpenMind, a company in the space, is building FABRIC—a decentralized coordination layer for machines to establish identity, verify physical presence, and access capital or jobs through cryptographic proofs. Instead of simply managing task marketplaces, FABRIC enables robots to prove who they are, where they are, and what they’ve done—without relying on centralized intermediaries.

Behavioural guardrails and identity attestations are enforced on-chain, allowing anyone to audit compliance. Robots that meet safety, quality, and location criteria are rewarded; those that fail are slashed or disqualified, ensuring both accountability and trust in autonomous machine networks.

Third parties restaking networks such as Symbiotic can also provide equal security guarantees. There is still work to be done on slashing parameters but the technology is already in production. We believe industry wide safety guidelines will be developed soon and slashing parameters would be modelled after the guidelines.

An example of how this can be implemented:

1. A robotics company joins Symbiotic as a network

2. Verifiable Slashing parameters such as “Making physical contact with humans at the force exceeding 2,500 newtons” are established

3. Stakers stake to provide guarantees that the robot wouldn’t violate the slashing parameters

4. If the robots violated the slashing parameters, the stake would be used as compensation to the victim

Under this model, robotics companies are incentivised to put robotics safety as their number 1 priority, while the insurance pooled by the stakers would enhance the consumer adoption of robotics.

Here’s what the Symbiotic team thinks about robotics:

Symbiotic’s universal staking framework was designed to extend the staking concept to any vertical or protocol that could benefit from economic security, whether through shared or individual models. Applications range from insurance to robotics and need to be conceptualized on a case-by-case basis. Robotic networks, for instance, could be built exclusively with Symbiotic’s universal staking framework, enabling stakeholders to provide economic backing for network integrity.

Filling Holes in the Robotics Stack

OpenAI popularised AI, but the groundwork for the ChatGPT moment was done years in advance. Cloud services made it possible for models to not be constricted to local compute, Huggingface made it possible for models to be open-sourced, Kaggle provided a space for AI engineers to experiment in the space. All these baby steps made it possible for AI to be popularised.

Unlike AI, It is hard to get started in robotics with limited capital. For robotics to be popularised, building robots should be as easy as building AI applications.

We believe there is room for improvement in three layers – financing, evaluation and education.

Financing is an issue for robotics. You only need a computer and cloud computing credits to build a computer. To build a fully functioning robot, you need to buy hardware such as motors, sensors and batteries, the cost of which can easily be north of 100K USD. The hardware nature of robotics makes building robotics less flexible and more expensive than building in AI.

The infrastructure for real world robotics evaluation is nascent. In AI, loss functions are well defined and testing operations can be done virtually. However, a good virtual policy doesn’t translate directly to a good policy in the real world. Infrastructure for evaluation of autonomous policies in diverse real world environments is needed for robots to iteratively improve.

Once these rails solidify, talent will flood in and autonomous humanoids will follow the same adoption curve that catapulted Web 2. OpenMind, a crypto robotics company, is already pushing in that direction. OM1, the company’s open-source “Android for robots”, turns raw hardware into upgradeable, economically aware agents. Vision, language, and motion planners click in like phone apps, and every reasoning step appears in plain English so operators can audit or redirect behavior without touching firmware. This ability of reasoning in natural language empowers the next generation of talent to seamlessly move into robotics, making for a great first step to the kind of open platform that can spark the robotics boom the way open source accelerated AI.

Source: A humanoid robot powered by OpenMind’s OM1, the world’s first open-source, AI-native operating system for robots, pressed the button to celebrate an ETF listing on the NASDAQ.

Talent density defines an industry’s trajectory. Structured and accessible education is crucial for talent to be funneled into robotics. OpenMind’s Nasdaq appearance signals the beginning of a new era where intelligent machines play a direct role in both financial innovation and real-world education. OpenMind and Robostore announced the rollout of the first widely adopted educational curriculum for the Unitree G1 humanoid robot across K–12 public schools in the United States. The curriculum is designed to be platform-agnostic and adaptable to various robotic form factors, offering students hands-on experience with robotics. This is an encouraging sign and strengthens our belief that the amount of education material for robotics will be on par with that of AI in a few years.

Looking Ahead

VLA innovations and economies of scale have catalyzed the creation of affordable, efficient and generalised humanoid robots. Robotics safety, financing and evaluation are worth exploring as warehouses expand into consumer robotics. We also have strong conviction that crypto will improve robotics by providing economic guarantees for robot safety, and optimising its docking infrastructure, latency and data collection pipelines.

- Paul Veradittakit

Business

Centrifuge joins Converge as a launch partner

Converge names Centrifuge as its first launch partner adding institutional grade RWA products and developer tooling to its new tokenized marketplace.

U.S. firms pour $844 mln into crypto treasuries

American companies moved $844 million into Bitcoin and Hyperliquid (HYPE), driving a jump in open interest and bullish sentiment for both tokens.

Regulation

Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac ordered to consider crypto as an asset when buying mortgages

FHFA Director William Pulte has ordered Fannie Mae (FNMA) and Freddie Mac (FMCC) to consider cryptocurrency as an asset for single-family mortgage loan risk assessments.

Coinbase Secures MiCA Licence: A Milestone in Europe’s Crypto Evolution

Securing registration in Luxembourg lets Coinbase passport its full suite of crypto services across all 27 EU states under the new MiCA regime.

GENIUS Act Stablecoin Bill Passes Senate

The U.S. Senate approved the GENIUS Act with bipartisan support. The bill mandates full reserves and regular, audited disclosures for large stablecoin issuers, along with clear redemption rights and operational standards.

New Products and Hot Deals

Zama unveils the Zama Confidential Blockchain Protocol and announces their $57m Series B

Zama is unveiling their most ambitious product to date: the Zama Confidential Blockchain Protocol, and announcing their $57m Series B at a valuation of over $1b. The round was led by Pantera Capital and Blockchange.

Stripe acquires Privy: Bringing crypto to everyone

After the recent $1.1b acquisition of Bridge, Stripe is now buying Privy and integrating its 75 M self-custodial wallets into Stripe’s payments stack while keeping the Privy product independent.

Nexus rolls out TestNet III

The verifiable-compute blockchain launches its TestNet across the United States, Vietnam, Nigeria, Russia, India, Indonesia, the United Kingdom, Hong Kong SAR and Mainland China.

This Week at Pantera

Pantera partners with Blockworks Research on the Token Transparency Framework

Cosmo Jiang and Eric Wallach explain consistent disclosure standards for token-based protocols.

Dan Morehead on Bloomberg - Trading Cryptocurrencies Like Hard Assets

Pantera’s Dan Morehead tells Bloomberg’s “Open Interest” that institutional traders now treat Bitcoin like gold, using derivatives and robust custody to hedge geopolitical shocks. Favorable regulations unlock fresh fundraising.

World: A Mission Critical Identity Solution

Pantera believes World’s proof-of-human solution will become critical infrastructure in a future where humans and AI coexist.

ABOUT ME

Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, a Managing Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early-stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.

If you have any projects that need funding, feel free to DM me on twitter.

• Circle’s IPO surged 168% on its first day, highlighting strong public demand for stablecoin and crypto exposure

• Pantera Capital was an early investor, supporting Circle’s pivot from crypto brokerage to launching USDC

• Pantera Capital believes CRCL will serve as a proxy for stablecoin exposure for the foreseeable future

• USDC holds 24.2% of the stablecoin market and leads on Solana

• USDC is favoured by institutions for its compliance

• The stablecoin industry matures as B2B is the dominant type of stablecoin transaction

Circle’s Evolution

On the 4th of June, Circle went public at the New York Stock Exchange, and the stock appreciated in value by 168% in a single trading day. We believe CRCL’s strong performance sends a definitive message –public markets have been starving for stablecoin and crypto exposure.

However, the making of the internet financial system isn’t done overnight. Pantera Capital was an early investor in Circle back in 2014. We’ve supported the team through the many ups and downs of our industry.Let’s take a trip down memory lane and share Circle’s success story from Pantera Capital’s perspective.

Pantera Capital invested in Circle’s Series B round in March of 2014. Since Jeremy has a track record of founding startups such as Allaire Corporation that went public, the investment in Circle was driven by our trust in Jeremy’s ability to execute. Their first product was a beautifully designed brokerage for crypto. It was so well designed I actually got my first bitcoin on Circle.

During the ICO boom in 2018, Circle acquired Poloniex, a crypto exchange. But what caught our eyes is their new product – CENTRE. They believed crypto assets and blockchain technology will allow humans to exchange value and transact with one another instantly, globally, securely and at low cost. Bitcoin was the only known option for value transfer then. But it was too volatile; no one would buy coffee with a volatile currency. CENTRE’s vision was to provide technology to address price volatility and transaction scalability challenges of existing blockchain infrastructures such as bitcoin. CENTRE planned to create a network scheme to manage the creation, redemption and flow of price stable crypto assets under a new organisation independent and separate from Circle.

As huge believers of decentralization and the importance of a price stable alternative to bitcoin, Pantera Capital was the earliest and largest investor on CENTRE’s presale. Circle ultimately decided that a centralized version of CENTRE made more sense. USDC was born.

As big supporters of USDC, Pantera Capital invited Jeremy and the Circle team to speak at Pantera Summits, webinars and worked closely with Circle’s business development team. USDC’s early success cemented Jeremy’s resolve to bring tokenised dollars to the world. He abandoned the exchange part of the business to focus solely on USDC. Jeremy’s decision aligned with Pantera Capital thesis at the time: we believed stablecoins would be first used in DeFi as a stable unit of account. But it would eventually eat into the payments sector to become the dominant means of transfer. Pantera Capital helped build out the ecosystem by onboarding portfolio companies such as Bitso onto USDC. Since USDC is a platform business, Pantera Capital also fostered the Circle ecosystem by co-investing with Circle ventures.

Circle’s IPO is one of many Pantera success stories, and we are proud to have been a part of Circle’s journey to build the next generation of internet money.

USDC and the Stablecoin Market

How has the Stablecoin Market Changed over the Years

Source: Artemis

As we can see above, the volume of stablecoins has grown from 1.9B USD to 6.0B USD in the last two years. Out of all transaction types, B2B payments grew the most, from 119.7M USD to 3.0B USD. Global corporations such as Uber are considering the use of stablecoins to reduce currency costs. Pantera Capital believes this is a strong signal of industry profitability due to the following reasons:

1. B2B clients are more price inelastic than P2P clients

2. B2B clients transfer large amounts of capital around the world frequently

How is USDC Positioned in the Stablecoin Space

USDC is the world’s second-largest stablecoin, holding about 24.2% of the total stablecoin market, while Tether (USDT) leads with around 61.7%. On Solana, USDC is the dominant stablecoin, representing $9.7 billion of Solana’s $12.5 billion stablecoin market as of March 2025. USDC is widely considered the most trusted and regulatory-compliant stablecoin, making it the preferred choice for institutions seeking transparency and lower risk.

Tailwinds

Expanding Product Suite and Strategy

Circle’s growth strategy centers on expanding the Circle stablecoin network by building products that make Circle stablecoins (like USDC) widely accessible and easy to use across the globe. A key part of this strategy is forming partnerships with leading financial and technology companies worldwide. Anchor collaborations include Grab in Singapore, Mercado Libre in Latin America, Nubank in Brazil, SBI Holdings in Japan, Coins.ph for Filipino remittances, and Binance for treasury and platform promotion. Partnership agreements typically involve payments or rebates based on wallet usage and USDC transaction volumes on partner platforms, with terms ranging from one to four years.

CRCL is the only Public Exposure to the Stablecoin Industry

Source: Messari Copilot

Stablecoin has always been a sector of interest, but there was a big jump of funding from 10.7M to 785M USD in 2024. Since 160M of the funding was from late stage private equity funds, we can see there was significant appetite from institutional investors for stablecoin exposure. The 540M USD worth of M&A deals also signaled that the industry is mature and is beginning its concentration phase. But at this point, there are no options in the public market for stablecoin exposure. No retail trader or hedge fund can bet on the winner of this trillion dollar industry.

Source: Messari Copilot

Circle’s IPO is the first time a stablecoin issuer has gone public - giving public markets a piece of stablecoin's unprecedented growth. We strongly believe CRCL’s incredible one week performance of +281.31% indicates that there is huge demand in the public sector for stablecoin exposure. As of today, Circle is one of the only regulation compliant stablecoin corporations that is mature enough for public markets. Thus, Pantera Capital believes CRCL will serve as a proxy for stablecoin exposure for the foreseeable future.

GENIUS Act

CNBC interview with Jeremy, ““To achieve our vision, we needed to build connections with governments and engage with policymakers … because for this to be effective in mainstream society, it must be integrated into the existing framework. We have been among the most licensed, regulated, compliant, and transparent entities in the history of this industry, which has benefited us greatly.”

Circle’s compliance with the GENIUS Act will put it in front of competitors who need to adjust to the Act. Circle’s USDC and EURC are already fully backed by cash and short-term Treasuries, with regular attestations and audits. The GENIUS Act’s requirements enshrine these practices, giving Circle a regulatory “seal of approval” and boosting institutional and retail trust in its stablecoins versus competitors who must now catch up or exit the market.

Looking ahead

The joy of working in venture capital is supporting founders that change the world. Circle is changing how value is transferred and is strengthening the dollar as the global currency reserve. The next time you process an overseas transaction and it gets filled within the second, say thanks Circle!

- Paul Veradittakit

Business

Ripple & Solana Deals in UAE

Ripple's RLUSD stablecoin received regulatory approval in Dubai, and Solana signed an MOU with Dubai VARA to support crypto education and economic integration, reflecting UAE’s growing influence as a global crypto hub.

Regulation

House Advances Crypto Market Structure Bill ("Clarity Act")

The House Agriculture Committee approved the bipartisan Clarity Act, aiming to clarify digital asset regulation and assign the CFTC a leading role, as the Senate nears a final vote on the stablecoin-focused GENIUS Act.

Push for Developer Protection in US Legislation

Crypto advocacy groups are calling for the Blockchain Regulatory Certainty Act to be included in upcoming bills, to clarify that non-custodial platform developers aren’t money transmitters.

Singapore Enacts DTSP Licensing Regime

Beginning June 30, Singapore will require Digital Token Service Providers to hold a local license, with tough capital and compliance standards, in a sweeping effort to mature and consolidate the sector.

New Products and Hot Deals

Hedera Stablecoin Studio

Hedera released Stablecoin Studio, an open-source SDK suite to help developers easily issue and manage stablecoins with native compliance and proof-of-reserve functionalities on the Hedera network

Robinhood Completes its $200M Bitstamp Acquisition

Robinhood completed its $200 million acquisition of Bitstamp, marking its entry into institutional crypto and expanding its global client base across the EU, UK, and Asia.

Pumpfun's $1B Token Sale and Project Moves

Pumpfun revealed plans for a $1 billion token sale at a $40 billion valuation.

Jump Crypto Invests in Securitize

Jump Crypto made a strategic investment in Securitize to strengthen its foothold in on-chain asset tokenization and the emerging onchain capital market.

This week at Pantera

Pantera Reveals Its Bets on Stocks That Adopted ‘Digital Asset Treasury’ Strategy

We were featured on CoinDesk about our investments in publicly-traded companies holding large digital asset reserves, including Bitcoin, Solana, and Ethereum.

Bitcoin as an Institutional Asset with Dan Morehead

Pantera Capital’s Founder Dan Morehead spoke at BITCOIN 2025

Ondo Finance Debuts $693M Treasury Token on XRP Ledger

DeFi platform Ondo Finance added the XRP Ledger as a supported network for its onchain U.S. government debt product.

Chainlink, JPMorgan, Ondo Finance complete crosschain treasury settlement

Chainlink, JPMorgan’s Kinexys, and Ondo Finance completed a crosschain DvP settlement between a permissioned payment network and a public RWA blockchain.

Ondo Expands Tokenized Treasuries to XRP Ledger

Ondo Short-Term U.S. Government Treasuries, or OUSG, the onchain product will integrate Ripple’s U.S. dollar-backed stablecoin RLUSD for subscriptions and redemptions

Symbiotic Launches Tool to Connect Blockchains Using Staked Crypto

Symbiotic enables developers to use staked assets from one blockchain to validate decisions on others, supporting secure, decentralized cross-chain coordination and simplifying multichain infrastructure for dApps and protocols. Relay aims to reduce the need for custom code or centralized relayers.

ABOUT ME

Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, a Managing Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early-stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.

If you have any projects that need funding, feel free to DM me on twitter.

Everyone thought the bitcoin ETF would replace Microstrategy as the best way for public markets to gain exposure to bitcoin. Last January, analysts were predicting “the premium that MicroStrategy shares trade to bitcoin could fall from roughly 40% to between 15% and 25%”.

But it didn’t. Today, Microstrategy trades at a $104B market capitalization, only a mere $24B short of the market capitalization of all Bitcoin ETFs combined. Being traded at a 70% premium to bitcoin, it is clear that the public market believes that Microstrategy offers unrivaled exposure to bitcoin.

Two months ago, Janover, a Nasdaq listed company, was acquired and rebranded under the name DeFi Development Corp. Under the ticker DFDV, the company announced they are “the first public company focused on accumulating and compounding Solana (SOL)”. A month ago, SharpLink Gaming announced the closing of $425 million in private placement funding. Under the ticker SBET, they will “adopt ETH, the native asset of the Ethereum blockchain, as its primary treasury reserve asset”.

In the last two months, two Microstrategy like products have entered the public markets – DFDV for Solana, Sharplink for Ethereum. As a lead investor into both DFDV and Sharplink, Pantera Capital is a strong believer in the unique crypto exposure corporate treasuries bring to the public markets. Now let’s break down what corporate crypto treasuries are and Pantera Capital’s thesis on them.

Digital Asset Treasury Explained

In order to explain what kind of exposure DAT stocks offers to crypto, and how its exposure to crypto differs from ETFs, we have to first understand how Digital Asset Treasuries (DATs) work.

The creation of DATs are fairly simple on paper. A corporation only has to

1. Raise capital from investors in the form of debt or equity

2. Use the capital raised to acquire the treasury asset of your choice. In DFDV’s case, you would purchase Solana

Since treasury assets are part of the corporation’s balance sheet, owning equity of the corporation gets you exposure to the treasury asset; owning DFDV stock gets you exposure to Solana.

Having a smaller operating business helps investors focus on the treasury value rather than the operating business. Therefore, as our GP Cosmo mentioned in the unchained podcast, Nasdaq listed companies with little to no non-treasury related business operations are the best companies to adapt such strategies as most of the equity’s value can be attributed to its treasury.

A deep dive into DATs

As of late May, Microstrategy is traded at 1.7 times the treasury it owns, DFDV at 5.6 times and Sharplink at 8.1 times. If the value of a company is based on its treasury, why does its stock trade at a premium to the value of its treasury? How do we value DATs?

Metrics that Matter

As explained by Cosmo on the Unchained podcast, there are two valuation metrics that Pantera pays attention to – Premium to NAV and Average Growth of Asset per Share.

Premium to NAV

NAV stands for net asset value of the treasury a corporation holds. For DFDV, the NAV would be the value of the Solana DFDV held in its treasury. The premium to NAV metric represents how much more investors are willing to pay to acquire the treasury’s stock relative to purchasing its underlying treasury asset directly. It is calculated by dividing the market capitalization of the stock by NAV.

Average Growth of Underlying Asset per Share

To understand what these metrics means, we have to first understand how there is a premium to NAV. As shown in our newsletter A New Frontier of Crypto Exposure, this premium for MSTR exists as investors believe it is possible to own more BTC per share (BPS) over time through MSTR than just buying a single BTC. Let’s walk through the simple math:

If you buy MSTR at two times NAV (Premium to NAV is 2.00x) , you are buying 0.5 BTC instead of buying 1.0 BTC via spot. However, if MSTR can raise capital and grow BPS 50% per year (last year it grew 74%), by the end of year two you would have 1.1 BTC – more than if you had simply bought a spot.

In the above example, the average growth of underlying asset per share would be 50%. The growth of 0.5 BPS to 1.1 BPS is the upside you captured, justifying your purchase of MSTR at a two times premium to NAV.

Therefore, the average growth of underlying asset per share captures the growth of the treasury in token value normalised by the number of shares issued.

Valuating DATs

What is the underlying asset?

In order for a DAT to be attractive for investors. The treasury asset should be:

1. A widely known asset.

2. An asset that people want exposure to.

3. An asset that is hard to access.

All of Bitcoin, Solana and Ethereum check the first two points. On the third point, cryptocurrency is hard but not impossible for the public market to access. However for large swaths of investors, including equity mutual funds and ETFs, their mandate only allows them to buy operating companies and not assets directly, precluding them from buying BTC but allowing them to buy a BTC-DAT.

Are the Premium to NAV and Average Growth of Underlying Assets per Share justified?

As mentioned in the previous section, people buy DATs at a premium to its treasury in hopes of the corporation to accumulate more tokens such that the number of tokens your share holds in the future is more than the buying 1 unit of the underlying token.

As we can see, the sweet spot is DATs with a low premium to NAV and a high growth of underlying assets per share. But how do we quantify the growth of underlying assets per share? What are common ways DATs increase their treasury?

Purchase More Crypto

One of the easiest ways to raise more capital is to expand the treasury. There are a few ways capital is raised; two common ways include convertible debt and private investment in public equity (PIPE). Private investors can either purchase debt with the option to convert into equity when the stock hits a certain price, or equity.

If the company raises debt, the number of outstanding shares doesn’t increase, thus the number of underlying assets per share would increase. If the company raises equity, as long as it issues equity at a premium to its NAV, the number of underlying assets per share would increase.

It is worth noting that due to the size of DATs, they have exposure to opportunities retail investors don’t have. For example, last month, Upexi purchased 77,879 locked SOL at $151.50 each for a total of $11.8 million. At the current $178.26 price of SOL, this represents a $2.1 million, or 17.7%, built-in gain for investors. Locked tokens are usually held by institutional investors who are willing to sell their tokens at a discount to unlock liquidity. DATs like Upexi can take advantage of their need for liquidity and purchase tokens at a discount.

Validator and Network Participation

Another way a company can increase its treasury is by staking and trading with their treasury. DFDV is a DAT adapting this strategy – they purchased a staking business with 500K staked Solana, generating protocol-native cash flow through self-staking. Since all the yield gained from staking flows back into their treasury, staking increases the underlying assets per share.

What are the risks?

The scenario you want to avoid is the DAT is forced to sell its treasury, decreasing the underlying asset per share. The two main reasons a DAT will be forced to sell are to pay down debt maturities or to cover negative operating cash flow.

Therefore, it is important to look at how much of the capital raised is debt and scrutinize the debt term structure. It is important that the operating company is a self-sustaining and not in a cash burn situation. The competence and reputation of the management team is also important because they need to effectively navigate between the various capital markets tools and effectively market to a larger reach of investors.

What makes DATs unique

They don’t sell

While ETFs are designed to track the price of assets and may rebalance or liquidate positions to meet redemptions or regulatory requirements, these companies buy and hold assets like Bitcoin, Solana, or Ethereum as a long-term strategy. For example, MicroStrategy has consistently added Bitcoin to its treasury regardless of market cycles. This conviction-based approach contrasts with the more passive management of ETFs.

Access to special opportunities

These corporations may also provide access to special opportunities that ETFs generally cannot. DFDV leverages its Solana holdings to participate in staking and validator operations, generating yield and supporting network growth. SharpLink’s Ethereum strategy, backed by industry leaders like ConsenSys, opens the door to protocol-level activities such as staking and DeFi participation, which are unavailable to ETF investors.

Looking ahead

Pantera Capital has actively participated in financing DATs through our investments in DFDV and Sharplink. We believe they not only offer public markets unrivaled exposure to crypto, they also help crypto ecosystems grow by providing staking infrastructure and deflationary pressure on their tokens.

- Paul Veradittakit

DIGESTS

Cypherock X1 Review: A Crypto Hardware Wallet With a Slick Card-Based Security Model

The Cypherock X1 employs a shard-based security model using cards with secure elements, to guard against the threat of wrench attacks.

BUSINESS

Coinbase Knew of Its Data Breach Months Before Disclosing: Reuters

Coinbase reportedly knew of a January data leak at outsourcing firm TaskUs, tied to a wider breach and a $20 million extortion attempt.

Meta Shareholders Overwhelmingly Reject Proposal to Consider Bitcoin Treasury Strategy

The company has $72 billion in cash on its balance sheet, but barely any of the 5 billion shares that voted were in favor of adding bitcoin.

REGULATION

Crypto Lobbyists Urge U.S. Senators to Dodge Distraction in Stablecoin Debate

Top industry advocacy groups requested that the Senate stick to the task at hand as it mulls its stablecoin bill while unrelated amendments loom.

NEW PRODUCTS AND HOT DEALS

Solana Meme Coin Bonk Launches 'Kill-to-Earn' Shooter Game

Bonk has just launched its very first video game, with Bonk Arcade featuring a pay-to-spawn, win-to-earn economic model.

CRO ETF? Canary Capital Files for US Cronos Fund as Altcoin Interest Intensifies

Canary's move to expose U.S. investors to Cronos (CRO) comes soon after Crypto.com revealed a Trump Media team-up.

THIS WEEK AT PANTERA

Pantera Blockchain Letter

Our latest Blockchain Letter breaks down two of the hottest trends in crypto: – Digital Asset Treasury ("DAT") companies emulating the MSTR (Strategy) playbook – Stablecoins and their impact on dollar dominance.

Avantis announce our $8M Series A

Avantis is leading the charge to scale on-chain markets for the rest of the world. Over the last year, the team has become the largest derivatives DEX on Base $7.5B+ in volume. 60K+ users. Novel products: Loss rebates, Zero-fee perps, Zero-slippage BTC trades.

Pantera Capital Doubles Down as Revolving Games Prepares for Publisher Ecosystem Expansion

Their titles like War of Nova, HatchKings, Hatchlings and Genesis have collectively driven millions of downloads, brought users into Web3, and generated millions in revenue.

LETS MEET UP

New York City, June 11-12

ABOUT ME

Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, a Managing Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early-stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.

If you have any projects that need funding, feel free to DM me on twitter.

On the 19th of May, the US Senate voted to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed to the consideration of the GENIUS Act. This procedural vote passed by a margin of 66-32, with more than 15 Democratic senators joining Republicans to clear the 60-vote threshold required to overcome a filibuster. This prevents senators from blocking the act by prolonging debate. As a result, the Senate can now formally begin debate on the GENIUS act at a maximum of 30 additional hours. After this period, the Senate must proceed to a final vote on the GENIUS act. If the Senate approves the GENIUS act, it will then move to the House of Representatives for further consideration.

As mentioned in our last newsletter, stablecoins stands at a market capitalization of $230 billion, and Pantera Capital has been at the forefront of this trend with early investments in Circle, Ethena, M^0, Ondo, and Figure Markets. Now let’s breakdown the GENIUS Act and why it’s significant.

The GENIUS Act Explained

The GENIUS Act, short for the Guiding And Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins (GENIUS) Act of 2025 is the first comprehensive federal framework for regulating payment stablecoins in the United States. Introduced by Senator Bill Hagerty (R-TN) and co-sponsored by bipartisan legislators, the bill aims to provide clarity on what a stablecoin is and who can issue stablecoins.

In the Act, Payment Stablecoin is a digital asset that is designed to be used for payments and settlements. Its issuer must be obliged to convert it for a fixed amount of monetary value and maintain a stable value relative to the fixed amount of monetary value. This definition includes the two main features of stablecoins – it must be pegged to a fixed monetary amount and be stable relative to the fixed monetary amount.

The section on requirements for stablecoin issuers is where it gets interesting. Permitted Payment Stablecoin Issuer must be either a subsidiary of an insured depository institution, a federal qualified nonbank payment stablecoin issuer or a state qualified payment stablecoin issuer. Issuers with a market capitalisation under 10 billion USD may also opt for state regulation. Under this definition, the privilege of issuing stablecoins isn’t confined only to FDIC insured banks. We believe more institutional issuers and smaller state based issuers are getting into the space in the near future.

Payment Stablecoin issuers shall maintain a reserve backing with at least a 1 to 1 basis. The reserve comprises United States dollars, demand deposits or insured shares at insured depository institutions, treasury bills with a maturity of 93 days or less, money market funds and Central Bank reserve deposits. This section is a gold mine as it outlines precisely what assets are eligible to be in stablecoin reserves. It is worth noting that all the sub 93 day bonds and money market funds have a low yield relative to other financial assets.

Consumer protection protocols such as monthly composition value of the issuer’s reserve and the outstanding stablecoins the issuer issued must be published on the issuers website are also put in place to foster transparency and consumer trust in the space.

There is clear bipartisan support for the dollar to remain the dominant global currency through stablecoins. The 66 supporting senators believe that without a comprehensive legislative structure, the dollar will be threatened by foreign stablecoins. However, a main concern of the bill or crypto in general is the Trump family’s use of crypto technologies to evade oversight. The leading opposition voice, Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), published a 2-paged report outlining how the “current draft paves the way for more Trump crypto corruption; expands giant national security loophole for Tether; permits Big Tech companies to issue their own stablecoins; and fails to address several other fundamental flaws”.

Several Senate Democrats have introduced bills targeting Trump’s crypto ventures to prevent the president from potentially profiting. Senator Michael Bennet plans to propose the STABLE Act, preventing elected officials or federal candidates from issuing or endorsing digital assets.

The industry views the GENIUS Act as a positive step towards regulation certainty, as JPMorgan, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Citigroup and other major US banks announced plans in creating a joint crypto stablecoin.

Looking ahead

Last year, we published a comprehensive thesis on stablecoins. With recent updates in mind, let’s dive deeper on how we think the GENIUS Act will transform the stablecoin space.

Stablecoins is poised to become a means of transfer, not a store of value

As mentioned in the previous section,we believe the low yield nature of stablecoin reserves will drive consumers to treat stablecoins as a means of transfer, not a store of value. In other words, although stablecoins make transactions faster and cheaper, why should I hold stablecoins for a 4% yield when I can get a higher return in equities or crypto? As a result, consumers would swap in and out of stablecoins pre and post transaction.

The GENIUS Act will decrease the volume of stationary stablecoins, while increasing the volume of moving stablecoins. Once regulation clarity is established, we believe stablecoins will slowly eat into ACH payment and remittance methods, capturing a market worth 1.8 trillion dollars.

Source: Artemis Analytics

M0 is uniquely positioned to ride the wave of the increase in number of issuers

Since the GENIUS Act opens up the door to three distinct parties to issue stablecoins, we believe the number of issuers in the space will drastically increase in the near future.

As an early supporter of M0, we believe M0 will lead the wave of onboarding new stablecoin issuers. M0 democratizes access to the generation and management of programmable, digital cash instruments. With M0, any of the three eligible issuing parties in the GENIUS Act can easily and quickly issue stablecoins that are compliant with the bill.

Minting Compliant Stablecoins with M0

The M0 protocol lowers the barrier of entry for stablecoin issuers. Let’s break down who are the key players in the M0 model and how does it work:

Minters: Minters are institutions that connect to the protocol to generate and manage the supply of $M, the stablecoin building block on the M0 protocol. Under the GENIUS Act, minters can be either a subsidiary of an insured depository institution, a federal qualified nonbank payment stablecoin issuer or a state qualified payment stablecoin issuer.

Validators: An independent entity that provides timely information about the off-chain collateral being used to generate $M. Conventional validators would be independent auditors such as KPMG or Deloitte.

Earners: A group of entities that are eligible to receive an interest rate from the protocol. This enables the M0 platform to customize yield distribution.

With the definitions of minters and validators in mind, let’s go through how does one mint compliant stablecoins with M0:

1. The minters, validators and earners get permissioned by governance. Governance’s permissioning is essential as malicious minters may mint $M without sufficient backing, resulting in $M value dilution.

2. Minters publish their proof of collateral to their validator. Under the GENIUS Act, eligible collateral includes United States dollars, demand deposits or insured shares at insured depository institutions, treasury bills with a maturity of 93 days or less, money market funds and Central Bank reserve deposits.

3. The validator will value the collateral and publish the value as the minter's on chain collateral.

4. The minter can mint as much $M as the on chain collateral. With on-chain collateral being the upper limit of the value of $M the minter can mint, M0 keeps the minted stablecoin compliant by guaranteeing minted stablecoins to have at least a 1 to 1 backing.

5. If the minter wants to pull a certain amount of collateral out of the protocol, the minter would have to first burn an equal amount of $M to maintain the 1 to 1 backing of the remaining minted $M.

Developing your edge with M0

Minting stablecoins on M0 has numerous advantages including but not limited to:

• Shared liquidity: All stablecoins minted on M0 are part of a unified liquidity pool. If Platform A mints “A-Dollar” and Platform B mints “B-Dollar” on M0, users can swap A-Dollar for B-Dollar instantly and at par, with no price discovery, and both can be used in DeFi apps, exchanges, or wallets that support M0.

• Decentralised Issuance: M0 allows multiple, independent institutions (called “Minters”) to issue stablecoins, rather than relying on a single centralized company. This reduces single points of failure and increases system resilience. Such built in features couldn’t be more relevant today as big banks such as JP Morgan and Citi group just announced plans on exploring the joint issuance of stablecoins.

• Complaint collateral backing: Stablecoins on M0 must have a 1:1 backing, which is compliant with the GENIUS Act

• Rapid deployment: M0 provides SDKs and infrastructure that let builders launch new, feature-rich stablecoins quickly, without needing to develop complex custody, compliance, or minting systems from scratch.

• Cross-chain support: M0 operates on multiple blockchains (like Ethereum and Solana) and supports cross-chain transfers, making stablecoins usable in a wide range of wallets, DeFi protocols, and payment networks.

• Monetization: Builders and platforms can earn a share of the yield generated by the underlying collateral (like U.S. Treasuries) through specifying the group of earners on the protocol level, creating new revenue streams beyond simple transaction fees.

Pantera Capital has been a long time supporter of the stablecoin industry with anchor investments on M0 and others. We are excited to see more stablecoin innovation with the regulation certainty provided by the GENIUS Act.

- Paul Veradittakit

DIGESTS

Bitcoin Falters Near Record, but 'Realized Price' Analysis Suggests Optimistic Outlook

Tracking average exchange withdrawal prices reveals signs of capitulation and a shift toward recovery.

How Crypto Fight Night Became the Industry’s Premier Networking Event

Crypto Fight Night isn’t made for fight fanatics—it’s an event for crypto bros to break bread after months of battling in the trenches.

BUSINESS

Kraken Rolls Out Regulated Crypto Derivatives in Europe

Kraken is offering derivatives trading in digital assets, compliant with Europe's Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFIDII).

REGULATION

SEC Punts on XRP, Dogecoin ETF Decisions

The funds are part of a wave of altcoin-based investment products proposed by issuers in recent months.

SEC Charges Unicoin, Executives Over Alleged $110 Million Crypto Fraud

The SEC alleges Unicoin misled over 5,000 investors in a $100 million crypto

NEW PRODUCTS AND HOT DEALS

True Markets Raises $11M in Series A, Launches Mobile-First DeFi Trading App on Solana

The funding round was co-led by Accomplice and RRE Ventures, with participation from Reciprocal Ventures, Variant Fund and PayPal Ventures.

THIS WEEK AT PANTERA

Pantera X DFDC at Solana Accelerate

We brought together founders, builders, and investors looking to shape the future of the Solana ecosystem for an evening of networking and discussions.

M0 & Artemis Stablecoin Report

This report aims to reframe how we

understand growth in stablecoins

Sahara AI: The SIWA Public Testnet is now live

SIWA serves as the first public gateway to the Sahara Blockchain, a foundational infrastructure layer purpose-built to enable the registration, licensing, and monetization of AI assets

LETS MEET UP

Los Angeles, May 29-30

New York City, June 3

New York City, June 11-12

ABOUT ME

Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, a Managing Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early-stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.

If you have any projects that need funding, feel free to DM me on twitter.

We are at an inflection point and we are so optimistic about what’s ahead—let’s dive in.

Source: Medici Conference 2025

Crypto IPOs: A new era unfolds

As I wrote in The VeradiVerdict, crypto IPOs are ushering in a new era of market maturity. This week, eToro’s Nasdaq debut on May 14, 2025 at a $52 share price pushed its market cap to approximately $5.6 billion. This follows Circle’s IPO filing, FOLD’s and Amber Premium’s IPO all within the past two months.

Another growing trend is publicly traded Digital Asset Treasury companies. Pantera has been at the forefront of that by making large investments in two of the leaders in this space. One is our investment in the first US-listed Solana treasury company, DeFi Development Corp (DFDV, fka JNVR), where we are closely involved with guiding their strategy. DFDV stock is up >22x since we announced our investment in April 2025. Another is our investment in Twenty One Capital (dba Cantor Equity Partners or CEP), the Bitcoin treasury company started by Tether, Softbank and Cantor. CEP is now the second largest digital asset treasury company behind MSTR. CEP was one of our largest investments as a firm and is up >3x since we announced our investment.

On the conference circuit, the chatter was all about how these IPOs signal crypto’s integration into mainstream finance. The IPO pipeline is heating up, offering liquidity, more consumer protection and drawing institutional capital.

Stablecoins: The Next Trillion Dollar Opportunity

Stablecoins are the tip of the spear in crypto right now. The market cap is approximately $230 billion and mostly backed 1:1 by U.S. Treasuries. They represent blockchain’s best shot at powering global financial rails, putting dollars into the hands of 5 billion smartphone users worldwide.

Late last year we published a comprehensive Stablecoin piece that highlights the use cases, opportunities and payments stack that we are investing in and tracking.

Bitcoin Above $100K

Bitcoin is above $100,000 again. Digital gold as the store of value is holding strong and on a trajectory to overtake gold. At Token2049, Dan Morehead provides a multi-decade view on Bitcoin as well as other opportunities in the market.

Pantera Fund V: Betting on visionaries

I recently spoke with Blockworks about my investment approach and how we stay ahead of the curve. Pantera’s raising Fund V and we are all-in on backing the best founders and industry defining companies, from infrastructure to AI and tokenization to consumer apps. As the first U.S. institutional investment firm focused solely on blockchain, we’ve delivered $4.4 billion in profits over 12 years, with 22 portfolio companies reaching unicorn status—I’ve led deals for 11 of those years. The momentum of this week's events—Coinbase's S&P 500 inclusion, Galaxy's uplisting, and JPMorgan's blockchain integration with Ondo and Chainlink—reveals the significant tailwind driving our industry in the U.S. market. We’re investing heavily in U.S. startups and helping global founders expand here, seizing opportunities as valuations lag public markets. Crypto’s at an inflection point and I’m grateful for our community’s vision and perseverance. Here’s to what’s ahead.

- Paul Veradittakit

DIGESTS

What to Expect at Consensus 2025

CoinDesk’s annual event kicks off this Wednesday in Toronto.

Bitcoin Investment Case Holds as US 10-Year Yields Revisit April Highs

Yields on the 10-year are rising amid renewed risk sentiment from U.S.-China tariff relief, testing crypto’s resilience as narratives shift.

BUSINESS

Bitcoin Investment Case Holds as US 10-Year Yields Revisit April Highs

Yields on the 10-year are rising amid renewed risk sentiment from U.S.-China tariff relief, testing crypto’s resilience as narratives shift.

Tether Buys $459 Million in Bitcoin to Fund New BTC Treasury Company

Publicly traded Bitcoin company Twenty One, which will launch via a planned merger, already has a BTC stash piling up—thanks to Tether.

REGULATION

Is the Senate Stablecoin Bill Dead? Here's What's Going On

Crypto policy leaders say the industry’s legislative agenda could evaporate if the GENIUS Act isn’t rescued from death’s door by Friday.

NEW PRODUCTS AND HOT DEALS

Morgan Stanley Digital Assets Head Quits to Start New DeFi Fund

Morgan Stanley’s digital asset markets head is leaving the bank to start his own crypto and digital asset investment fund and trading technology firm, focused on closing the gap between traditional and decentralized finance.

Robinhood to Acquire Kevin O’Leary-Backed WonderFi in $179 Million Deal

The deal is expected to close in the first half of 2025

THIS WEEK AT PANTERA

1. Pantera at Milken Conference

Dan Morehead on stage with Global Leaders to discuss Innovation in Asset Management. View full panel discussion here.

2. Stablecoin Legislation Interview on CNBC

Pantera Chief Legal Officer Katrina Paglia joined CNBC to discuss the Genius Act, stablecoin legislation, and the broader outlook for crypto policy.

3. Ondo expands access to tokenized US Treasuries

Investors can now seamlessly convert in & out of Ondo OUSG with PYUSD, enhancing redemption liquidity and expanding the utility of PYUSD as a liquidity source for RWAs

LETS MEET UP

Los Angeles, May 29-30

New York City, June 3

New York City, June 11-12

ABOUT ME

Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, a Managing Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early-stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.

If you have any projects that need funding, feel free to DM me on twitter.