$1B, government bribes and Thai prostitutes

Edition #82 - 13 OCT 2023

Caroline Ellison testified that Thai prostitutes and a $100m bribe to the Chinese officials were involved in an attempt to regain access to $1B of Alameda's funds frozen by the Chinese government. She also accused SBF of trying to scam Saudi investors in FTX's final days. Ellison's to-do list included "getting regulators to crack down on Binance" as revealed by the prosecutors.

gaming developments

• Microsoft eyes closing its giant Activision Blizzard deal next week.

• ​​Web3 eSports platform NexGami (ex Light eSports, MetaVirus Games) raised $2M in a Seed funding round from Polygon Ventures, Fundamental Labs, Ledger Capital.

• Axie Infitiny released new collectible Axie Reward system, aka first web3-native battle pass.

• Mythical Games launched a new mobile drag racing game with licensed car NFTs. The game is available on iPhones and Androids and will include car NFTs from brands like McLaren, Aston Martin, and more.

metaverses & AI

• ​​​​​​​​Who invests in metaverse land & why? 4 Types of metaverse real estate Investors.

• Metaverse infrastructure developer Hadean closed Strategic funding round led by Yuga Labs. Amount raised is not disclosed.

• ​​Web3 content creation platform RepubliK raised $6M in a Seed funding round from OKX Ventures, HTX Ventures (ex Huobi Ventures), 6th Man Ventures (6MV), Arcane Group, Coin Merge Strategy (CMS), Comma3 Ventures, Enjin, FBG Capital, Mirana Ventures, OIG Capital (Oracles Investment Group), Signum Capital, Sora Ventures, UOB Venture Management, Define Ventures.

defi

• ​​​​​​​​Real World Asset perpetuals DEX Ostium Labs raised $3.5M funding round from General Catalyst, LocalGlobe, SIG DTI (a Susquehanna International Group Company), Balaji Srinivasan.

• Galaxy Digital Leads $4M Strategic Funding for Parsec Finance to Revolutionize DeFi Transparency.

funding rounds

• ​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Blockchain privacy network Fairblock Network raised $2.5M in a Pre-seed funding round led by Galileo, with participation from Lemniscap, Dialectic, Robot Ventures, GSR Markets LTD, Chorus One, DoraHacks, Reverie.​​

• Cryptocurrency-focused trading and lending platform Membrane Labs raised $20M in a Series A funding round from Brevan Howard Digital, Point72 Ventures, Jane Street, Flow Traders, QCP Capital, Two Sigma Ventures, Electric Capital, Jump Crypto, GSR Markets LTD, Belvedere Trading, Framework Ventures.

• ​​Exchange for environmental assets Neutral raised $3.2M funding round led by North Island Ventures, with participation from Redalpine, Digital Currency Group (DCG), Cerulean Ventures, Factor Capital, Very Early Ventures, Rarestone Capital.

• ​​Tokenized RWA marketplace Untangled Finance raised $13.5M funding round led by Fasanara Capital.

---