Mechanism Capital is an investment firm that invests in the cryptocurrency industry with a focus on decentralized finance or DeFi.

Mechanism Capital

Origin Capital provides a real alternative to traditional funding options in the Irish commercial real estate market and is actively providing senior debt funding for investment transactions in excess of €3m. The company offers its clients the opportunity to deal directly with the decision-makers, who take a flexible approach to lending grounded in commercial common sense.

Origin Capital

Sora Ventures is Asia's leading investment firm dedicated to blockchain technology and digital asset. The firm has several businesses including early-stage investments, incubation, advisory, secondary trading, and blockchain conferences.

Sora Ventures

Youbi Capital is a venture capital firm investing in Blockchain technologies and disruptive decentralized applications. The firm is committed to long-term value investment in the Blockchain ecosystem and has invested in more than 20 next-generation Blockchain technologies. It was established in 2017 and is headquartered in Grand Cayman, Midland.

Youbi Capital

Lemniscap is an early stage investment firm specializing in investments in emerging crypto assets.

Lemniscap

Signum Capital invests in distributed ledger technologies and crypto assets. We support game-changing projects that advance us towards the future of blockchain-enabled socioeconomic transformation. Founded in 2017, we are a team of crypto enthusiasts with complementary backgrounds and interdisciplinary perspectives. We believe that the crypto natives are the engine of innovation, and what they build will spillover to the mainstream via cross-pollination with other domains. The Signum team is ready to assist the founders to deploy their ideas, and to facilitate the adoption of their products both inside and outside the crypto community. We are a registered fund management company with the Monetary Authority of Singapore.

Signum Capital

imToken is a feature-rich digital asset wallet enabling multi-chain asset management, DApp browsing and secure, private exchange of value. imToken was established on May 2016, striving to bridge the gap between blockchain technology and general masses with a simple, secure yet powerful digital asset management tool. In the span of 2 years, imToken has expanded our outreach to millions of users from more than 200 countries, becoming the world’s largest Ethereum wallet.

imToken

LedgerPrime is a quantitative and systematic investment firm in the Digital Asset space. With a data centric approach and a commitment to rapid innovation and technology, LedgerPrime seeks to become a global leader in generating sustained and superior risk-adjusted returns.

LedgerPrime

Spartan is a blockchain advisory and asset management firm that specializes in hedge funds, venture capital, and fundraising.

The Spartan Group

Hashkey they offers investment opportunities and solutions to institutions, family offices, funds, and professional accredited investors across the digital asset and blockchain ecosystem.

Hashkey Exchange

Bitlink Capital is a private trading firm that specializes in HFT across cryptocurrencies, sectors, and multi-strategies. They developed relationships with exchanges worldwide, supplying liquidity to exchanges including huobi, liquid, bithumb, coinbase, and others.

Bitlink Capital

BitScale invest in teams and solutions that bring transparency and efficiency to our world with cutting-edge technologies.

BitScale

D1 Ventures is powering the Future of Open Economy.

D1 Ventures

CMS is a principal investment company that focuses on investing in the crypto-asset ecosystem. The firm plans to invest in both liquid and illiquid crypto tokens, as well as equity interests in select businesses.

CMS Holdings

Alliance is the leading Web3 accelerator and founder community.

Alliance DAO

Crypto.com Capital is a venture arm of Crypto.com focused on investing in crypto startups at Seed and Series A stages. It is dedicated to accelerating the growth of promising startups with $200 million earmarked for investment and gives founders building in the crypto industry two things: a reputable lead investor for their Seed or Series A rounds and priority of launch on the growing retail crypto platform with over 10 million users. Crypto.com Capital leads seed rounds with cheque sizes between $100k and $3m and Series A rounds from $3m to $10m and seeking long-term partnerships with entrepreneurs in every sector of the cryptocurrency industry. Crypto.com Capital is led by Bobby Bao, co-founder of Crypto.com.

Crypto.com Capital

GBV Capital is dedicated to invest, develop, and the support blockchain and crypto projects to build our future

GBV Capital

Parataxis Capital is a multi-strategy investment firm focused on the digital asset sector

Parataxis Capital

Strategic Round Capital invests in early-stage blockchain projects. Strategic Round Capital looks for fundamentally strong teams with market-oriented products that are capable of delivering value to their industry segment and having a positive impact on the crypto community.

Strategic Round Capital

Fisher8 Capital operates as an investment firm.

Fisher8 Capital

Harvest Finance automatically farms the highest yields in DeFi.

Harvest Finance

Binance Labs identifies, invests, and empowers viable blockchain entrepreneurs, startups, and communities, providing financing to industry projects that help grow the larger blockchain ecosystem.

Binance Labs

Pendle Finance

Disrupting the traditional financial system using blockchain

Decentralized Finance (DeFi)

Curvance is a DeFi application that provides lending and borrowing services across multiple chains and protocols. Users can earn interest from lending, collateralize assets for borrowing, and consolidate DeFi yields across liquidity pools and interest-bearing stablecoins. The protocol supports Ethereum and Layer 2 chains, such as Arbitrum, Optimism, Scroll, Base, and Polygon zK EVM, and employs liquidity from decentralized exchanges like Curve, Balancer, Velodrome, GMX, and Pendle.Moreover, the Curvance money market leverages the composability of yield-bearing assets and ERC-20 tokens to enable users to create tokenized treasuries, NFT markets, and other primitives to borrow against.The protocol operates as a DAO, governed by holders of its native token, CVE.Funding and financialsIn December 2023, Curvance <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/24645">secured USD 3.6 million</a> in seed funding from more than 20 DAOs, developers, and angel investors including Offchain Labs, Wormhole, Eigenlayer, and Curve Finance.The company earmarked the funding for expanding its operations, supporting security audits, and increasing its employee base.

Curvance is a crosschain lending market for yield-bearing assets and any other ERC-20 tokens on Ethereum, Polygon zkEVM, Base, Arbitrum, and Optimism and aspires to establish itself as the de-facto money market for any ERC-20 token.

Pendle Finance is a decentralized finance protocol that allows users to tokenize and sell future yields.

Pendle Finance is a yield trading platform that enables users to tokenize their yield-bearing assets such as liquid staking tokens. Users can split these assets into a yield-bearing component and a principal token, which can be bought at a discount and redeemed on a given maturity date to capture the yield generated. Furthermore, the protocol also offers an automated market-making system for yield trading.

Deciphering Pendle Finance’s surge and the pop up of Notcoin

Curvance

Offchain Labs

Balancer Labs

Frax Finance

Curve Finance

Scroll.io

Wormhole

Convex Finance

EigenLabs

Mantle Network

Aura Finance

Organizations and protocols that allow individuals to lend their crypto assets and take out collateralized or uncollateralized loans from to/from these projects

Pendle Finance is a yield trading platform that enables users to tokenize their yield-bearing assets such as liquid staking tokens. Users can split these assets into a yield-bearing component and a principal token, which can be bought at a discount and redeemed on a given maturity date to capture the yield generated. Furthermore, the protocol also offers an automated market-making system for yield trading. The platform operates as a DAO governed by holders of its native token, “PENDLE.” Users can also stake PENDLE to receive vePENDLE, which lets holders vote for and direct the flow of yields to different pools. As of August 2023, the protocol operated on Ethereum, Arbitrum, and the BNB Chain. Funding and financialsIn November 2023, Spartan Capital invested an <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/23773">undisclosed amount </a>in Pendle Finance. The investment was executed via over-the-counter purchase, furthering Spartan Group's support towards Pendle, which began during Pendle's launch in 2021. The investment was targeted toward fostering further ambitions of the Pendle project.

MakerDAO is a DAO (governed through the MKR token) that manages the Sky protocol (formerly known as Maker).&nbsp;Developed on the Ethereum blockchain, the protocol allows users to place their funds (through cryptocurrency) as collateral in exchange for its stablecoin DAI, which is pegged to the USD. DAI can be used like any other cryptocurrency and even as savings since holders of DAI are entitled to a return based on the DAI Savings Rate (DSR). The DSR is determined by members of the DAO using a mix of public and proprietary market data.Sky offers access to investing and borrowing DAI through the Oasis app which was developed by some of the creators of protocol. In addition, the protocol is available for developers of DeFi apps who can build apps to facilitate earning, investing, and borrowing DAI. As of May 2024, Sky had integrated with over 400 applications ranging from payment systems to gaming platforms. It generates revenue through stability fees (akin to interest payment on borrowed DAI) and liquidation fees which is an additional charge that occurs when the value of the submitted collateral falls below a set liquidation amount.&nbsp;In April 2022, the protocol announced that it was bridging to StarkNet, a reportedly cheaper and faster zero-knowledge (ZK) overlay chain built by StarkWare. Along with its expansion on Ethereum, the DAO had planned to move toward a multi-chain offering with this rebuild. It planned to roll out this offering in four phases, beginning with a simple bridge between the main blockchain and StarkNet’s Layer 2.&nbsp;In February 2023, the company <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/16269?industryIds=64">launched a new lending platform</a> named Spark Protocol, to enable users to borrow, lend, and stake DAI, the protocol’s stablecoin. The platform, which is a fork of Aave's version 3 (v3), will be built by Phoenix Labs, a research and development company formed by the DAO. Additionally, the company also announced the deployment of etherDAI, a liquid staking derivative for Ethereum that will be pegged to the value of ETH. Furthermore, in March, the protocol went on to<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/17322"> approve several new proposals </a>that make changes to both its governance structure and the investment of its treasury. These changes divide the DAO’s current structure into smaller self-governed and self-sustained units named SubDAOs, which will also have their own tokens in the MakerDAO ecosystem. Moreover, the proposal also planned to increase the protocol’s revenues by investing a part of its reserves (worth USD 7 billion) into real-world assets and money-market funds.&nbsp;The platform outlined its plans for a major update (named Endgame) in May 2023. The launch was proposed to take place in five phases and will ultimately lead to the creation of a new blockchain. The road map is as follows: 1) launching new branding and website as well as upgraded versions of Dai and MKR tokens; 2) launching six Maker SubDAOs, specializing in user acquisition, decentralized frontends, and collateral allocation; 3) introducing new AI tools to assist governance, including tools for summarizing, interpreting, and generating governance proposals; 4) enabling rewards for governance participation; and 5) deploying a new blockchain to house backend logic for SubDAO tokenomics and governance security. The first phase of the update is expected to be rolled out in the summer of 2024.&nbsp;In August 2024, the protocol followed through with the first phase of its plans by <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/32993">rebranding itself under the new name "Sky"</a>, and launching new versions of DAI and MKR tokens named the USDS and SKY.&nbsp;Key customers and partnershipsIn September 2024, Sky<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/33252"> partnered with Aave Labs</a>, to launch the “Sky Aave Force” initiative. The initiative featured key proposals such as integrating the newly launched USDS and sUSDS stablecoins on Aave’s V3 protocol, introducing an incentive program for sUSDS suppliers and deploying a direct deposit module for USDS into the Aave Lido Market. Additionally, the partnership will enable the companies to distribute SPK tokens, the native token of Sky’s lending protocol Spark, to create a market for sUSDS on Aave. Collectively, these initiatives enable users to earn yields on their sUSDS deposits from the revenues generated by Sky’s protocol and mint USDS directly on Aave without meeting the usual collateral requirements.

MakerDAO

Founded by former executives of Qualcomm, Solana Labs is the developer of the Solana blockchain, which uses the native cryptocurrency SOL. The company enables developers to create decentralized applications in its blockchain and is capable of carrying out 50,000 transactions per second (TPS) with a theoretical upper limit of 710,000 TPS for the architecture. As of May 2024, the blockchain averaged around 2,400 TPS. This is in contrast to Ethereum’s average of between 13 to 15 TPS. In addition to transaction speed, Solana also has other advantages such as lower transaction fees and improved scalability, given its proof-of-stake consensus mechanism and underlying architecture. The mechanism also enables users to stake their SOL and earn yields for validating the network. Solana provides the ability to create specialized tooling and programming functionality to tokens through <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/25910">Token Extensions</a>. This allows developers and businesses to establish rules for tokens, such as dictating their functionality and determining their holders, as well as embed features like whitelisting, automatic transfer fees, and confidentiality provisions for transfers.Solana also provides guides and a content aggregator website for developers to discover tools to create dApps on its blockchain. As of May 2024, more than 440 dApps were created on Solana, ranging across use cases such as DeFi, NFTs, and gaming. It also <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/18094">launched a ChatGPT </a>(a chatbot built on OpenAI's GPT model) plugin to allow developers and users to query the blockchain for on-chain data. The plugin works through the ChatGPT interface and allows users to perform various tasks such as checking wallet balances, transferring tokens, and purchasing NFTs.Key customers and partnershipsWeb browser developer Opera partnered with Solana in December 2021 to integrate the blockchain and create a built-in crypto wallet onto the Opera browser to improve accessibility to dApps hosted on the blockchain.As of May 2024, the company served several enterprise clients such as Shopify, Asics, Helio, and Tiplink.Funding and financialsThe total value locked (TVL) in DeFi projects across the Solana blockchain amounted to USD 4 billion as of May 2024. The company raised USD 314 million through an initial coin offering (ICO) of SOL. The ICO was co-led by Polychain Capital and Andreessen Horowitz. The funding was to be used to create a venture investing arm, a trading desk, and support the development of new applications in its blockchain.

Solana

Swiss-based Eidoo is a developer of a wallet that supports cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum, along with tokens such as DAI, MKR, AAVE, and UNI, among others. In addition, Eidoo provides a DeFi marketplace that integrates with its wallet, allowing users to trade any tokens that they hold. Eidoo also offers a debit card that allows the conversion of digital assets into fiat currencies, such as the GBP and EURO, and spending or even withdrawing cash from ATMs.Eidoo began with the proprietary token EDO, which it also used to raise USD 27.9 million in an initial coin offering (ICO) in 2017. The token was then upgraded following its merger with blockchain oracle provider Provable Things to establish pNetwork, the infrastructure that facilitates cross-chain interactions between multiple decentralized apps, governed by the token PNT. To obtain an Eidoo debit card, users are required to stake PNT ranging from 20 to 200,000 for various service tiers.Eidoo had several applications such as virtual account numbers to deposit money and obtain a tokenized representation of their deposit as well as features to buy, hold, and trade NFTs in the roadmap as of December 2021.

Eidoo

Synthetix is a DAO (governed by holders of its native token SNX) that offers a platform on which users can trade and vote on the creation of on-chain synthetic assets, which are derivatives based on real-world assets. These synthetic assets enable traders to capture the price movements of assets such as cryptocurrencies, fiat currencies, stocks, and commodities, among others, with zero slippage. The protocol allows users to stake SNX as collateral for the debt pool and earn weekly rewards. As of April 2022, Synthetix had USD 642 million in total value locked (TVL).Additionally, Synthetix also offers the opportunity for developers to build on top of the platform to tap into its liquidity as well as develop decentralized perpetual futures, options markets, deal coordination markets, and more. As of December 2021, the protocol served large DeFi platforms including 1inch, Curve Finance, Yearn Finance, and Paraswap.In February 2023, Synthetix <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/16609?industryIds=64">deployed version 3 (v3) of its platform </a>on the Ethereum mainnet. V3 reportedly offers more efficient architecture that enables developers to create products that offer a liquid market for any financial derivative, as well as more complex decentralized applications. Additionally, the solution also offers staking and differentiated debt pools, to enable stakers to earn fees from supplying collateral to specific asset pools. The company went on to deploy its protocol on Base, an Ethereum Layer 2 blockchain developed by Coinbase, in April 2024.&nbsp;Moreover, in May 2024, the company launched a new perpetual futures exchange named Infinex. The solution unifies several DeFi applications into a single layer and enables users to trade across multiple chains. Moreover, it provides users access to passkey authentication and social sign-in options.Key customers and partnershipsIn December 2024, Synthetix&nbsp;<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/37190">partnered with Mass</a>, a cryptocurrency application developer, to integrate its leveraged perpetuals platform into a new mobile trading app. The mobile app combines on-chain trading and self-custody features with a centralized exchange interface, allowing users to trade perpetual futures with up to 25x leverage. The app includes streamlined features like Apple and Google logins, sponsored first transactions, crosschain gas tank, and multiple on/off-ramp options via SEPA, ACH, and credit/debit cards.

Synthetix

Compound is an open-source lending protocol built on Ethereum that allows developers to build DeFi applications for functions such as deposits and lending. Compound offers adjusted money market interest rates based on asset-specific supply and demand and supports a number of Ethereum-based assets for users to take collateralized loans and lock-up assets without borrowing. Locked assets are automatically liquidated if an independent oracle determines that the price has dropped too low. Additionally, since assets are stored in a shared pool, even users with liquidated collateral can claim tokens if they are able to repay the general pool. Compound also <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/13038">offers borrowing services</a> for institutional clients that allow them to borrow USD or USDC at a fixed annual percentage rate of 6% using cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin or Ether as collateral, with a loan-to-value of 90%.As of April 2024, Compound had a total value locked (TVL) of USD 2.3 billion. The protocol is governed by its native-token COMP, which along with a variety of other digital assets that are a part of the Compound ecosystem, are supported by Coinbase Custody, a crypto asset custodian. In August 2022, Compound launched a version of its protocol named “Compound III” which features a single borrowable asset. Users can supply collateral that can never be withdrawn by other users (except during liquidation) and borrow USDC.In May 2022, Compound<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/10267"> received a B- credit rating from S&amp;P Global Ratings</a> on its enterprise credit facility which offers 4% annually on deposits of the stablecoin USDC. Notably, Compound claims that this is the first time an "institutional DeFi" product has been scored by a major credit rating agency.Funding and financialsCompound’s last funding round was in November 2019 where it raised USD 25 million in a Series A led by Andreessen Horowitz’s a16z crypto fund to help the company further decentralize the protocol by enabling crypto exchanges and custodians such as Coinbase to maintain the protocol going forward.

Compound

Organizations that allow individuals to invest in tokenized financial and real assets

Organizations that provide fully decentralized insurance products

Organizations that apply NFTs across areas of finance such as documentation and non-fractionalized ownership records for assets

Decentralized exchanges that help connect buyers and sellers of DeFi tokens without the need to rely on an intermediary

Organizations that provide digital wallets for users to take custody of DeFi tokens

Blockchains and related protocols that allow developers to build DeFi apps

All companies within this industry are either blockchain-based platforms or offer blockchain-centric services

Promotes financial inclusivity, allowing those that won't traditionally have access to credit to raise funds

Companies with the infrastructure segment offer solutions for users to build decentralized applications

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PROMINENT_CATEGORY

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Penpie, a SubDAO of a yield aggregation platform called Pendle Protocol, was hacked and lost around USD 27 million in crypto assets. This includes staked ether tokens, Ethena's sUSDE, and wrapped USDC stablecoin. As safety measures, Pendle has secured investors' funds and temporarily paused all contracts.&nbsp;

</div> Analyst QuickTake: 
 This attack adds to the growing list of DeFi lending protocols targeted by hackers within the past few months. Penpie joins the likes of <a href="https: 
//sp-edge.com/companies/1585954"> LI.FI </a> , <a href="https: 
//sp-edge.com/companies/513726"> Loopring </a> , <a href="https: 
//sp-edge.com/companies/3592782"> Sonne Finance </a> , <a href="https: 
//sp-edge.com/companies/1622681"> Dolomite </a> , and <a href="https: 
//sp-edge.com/companies/1741657"> Unizen </a> , which have suffered hacks that led to losses of <a href="https: 
//sp-edge.com/updates/31559"> USD 11 million, </a> &nbsp; <a href="https: 
//sp-edge.com/updates/30275"> USD 5 million </a> , <a href="https: 
//sp-edge.com/updates/29430"> USD 20 million </a> , <a href="https: 
//sp-edge.com/updates/27820"> USD 1.8 million </a> , and <a href="https: 
//sp-edge.com/updates/27462"> USD 2.1 million </a> , respectively. Notably, crypto protocols have <a href="https: 
//decrypt.co/238668/bitcoin-exchange-hack-leads-surging-crypto-stolen-2024"> lost over twice as much </a> in the first half of 2024 (USD 1.38 billion) as last year's (USD 657 million).

Pendle Finance

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