From Boom to Balance: The Latest Trends in Crypto Venture Funding

Venture capital has long been the engine behind crypto’s growth. It’s what turns blockchain ideas into real products and platforms. But lately, that engine has slowed down. The pace of funding has dipped, and the flood of capital seen in previous years has started to ease. That said, the space isn’t standing still. Startups are still pulling in fresh capital, and deals are still happening. What’s changed is the intensity. Compared to the rapid-fire dealmaking of earlier cycles, the market now feels more measured.

Funding Momentum Eases as Q2 Trails Q1 Totals

From April to June 2025, crypto startups raised a total of $4.5 billion. While that may sound like a solid number, it’s actually a 22% drop from the first quarter. That dip signals a clear cooling in overall investor appetite.

A closer look at the month-by-month breakdown shows the shift. April brought in $1.29 billion. But by May, that number fell sharply to just $624 million—the lowest point in the quarter. Then, in a strong turnaround, June saw a major rebound with $2.5 billion raised. 

That made it the second-highest funding month of the year so far, just behind March, when a single $2 billion investment from Binance into MGX boosted totals dramatically.

June’s Top Crypto Funding Hits: Who Raised What?

One of the notable funding rounds in recent months came from Rails, a trading platform startup that secured $14 million in a token sale. This adds to an earlier $6 million equity round, bringing its total funding to $20 million. Rails aims to tackle a long-standing challenge in crypto trading—offering high-speed transactions without giving up control of user assets. 

The platform allows users to trade quickly while maintaining full custody of their funds, a feature typically reserved for centralized exchanges. Among its backers are prominent names such as Kraken, Quantstamp, CMCC Global, and Slow Ventures.

Another significant raise came from Yupp, an AI-focused startup that closed a $33 million seed round. Yupp’s platform enables users to compare outputs from major AI models—including ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Grok, and Llama—and uses blockchain incentives to reward participation. 

The round attracted more than 45 investors, with notable participants including Google’s Jeff Dean, Pinterest co-founder Evan Sharp, and Coinbase Ventures. 

OKX, Story, and Beam Secure Funding to Boost Crypto Innovation

Elsewhere in the space, crypto exchange OKX partnered with the startup Story to launch a $10 million fund aimed at backing early-stage teams working at the intersection of intellectual property (IP) and AI. Story uses its native IP token to represent ownership rights on-chain. 

The fund will support projects building applications around IP licensing, data monetization, and programmable IP. Story’s developer, PIP Labs, has already raised $140 million in total funding, including a major Series B round co-led by a16z Crypto and Polychain Capital.

Also attracting attention is Beam, a payment service provider built around stablecoins. Beam raised $7 million in its latest funding round, bringing its total to $14 million. The company plans to expand its footprint across Latin America, Africa, the Asia-Pacific region, and Europe. 

The capital will support more payment integrations, enhanced licensing capabilities in the U.S. and abroad, and growth across engineering and operations.

Other Noteworthy Investments

Beyond the headline deals, bold ideas are still drawing major capital across AI, finance, and decentralized infrastructure. 

These deals show where momentum is building:

• Kalshi, a prediction market platform, raised $185M and is now valued at $2B with backing from Paradigm and Sequoia.
• Xavier Meegan launched a $20 million pre-seed fund called Frachtis, which focuses on early-stage startups in decentralised AI, infrastructure, and related fields.
• Inference Labs secured $6.3M to build cryptographic trust layers for AI agents; investors include Delphi and Arche Capital.
• Blueprint Finance raised $9.5M to expand multichain DeFi tools across Ethereum and Solana, led by Polychain Capital.
• Digital Asset landed $135M to scale the Canton Network for institutional blockchain adoption; Goldman Sachs among backers.

The importance of these funding rounds cannot be understated, as they continue to drive growth and innovation across the crypto and Web3 space. Between April and June 2025, most funding went to crypto firms based in North America. Also, emerging startups in Asia and the Middle East picked up steam, especially those launching token-centric projects at the seed stage. This broadening of interest shows how crypto innovation is spreading across different regions worldwide.