KuCoin Bags $150M at $10B Valuation to Focus on Web3, NFT, and DeFi

KuCoin has announced raising $150 million pre-Series B funding round led by Jump Crypto. The event also saw the participation of Circle Ventures, IDG Capital, and Matrix Partners.

The valuation of the exchange surged to $10 billion following the financing round.

Beyond Centralized Trading

According to the official press release, the Seychelles-based firm said it will focus on expanding its reach beyond centralized trading. It wants to strengthen its presence in new areas, including Web 3, crypto wallets, GameFi, DeFi, and NFT platforms, with the support of its investment arms like KuCoin Labs and KuCoin Ventures.

As such, KuCoin plans to leverage the public chain built by the community members – KCC – as an infrastructure to deploy resources on top of it to create a decentralized ecosystem.

The new influx of capital will also be poured into building the exchange’s core trading system to improve performance, support the global regulation efforts, and ramp up security and risk management systems.

The platform is now valued at $10 billion, a massive increase since its early days when it raised $20 million in a Series A in November 2018. In a statement, KuCoin CEO Johnny Lyu said,

“The vote of confidence from prominent investors, including Jump Crypto and Circle Ventures, solidifies our vision that one day everyone will be with crypto. KuCoin is built for all classes of investors, and we believe these new investors and partners will contribute to making KuCoin synonymous with a reliable and trustworthy gateway into crypto space.”

The Web 3 Bid

The latest news comes less than a month after KuCoin’s VC arm – KuCoin Ventures, as well as its NFT marketplace – Windvane, announced establishing an NFT-focussed $100 million fund.

Dubbed “Creators Fund,” the main objective is to support and incubate early-stage NFT projects, including art, sports, GameFi, and celebrities. The supported blockchains for this initiative – ETH, BSC, and FLOW – will enable users to choose and buy all digital collectibles on KuCoin cross-chain aggregators.

The company also launched a $100 million fund last year to focus on supporting teams wanting to develop metaverse projects. As reported earlier, the firm plans on using its user traffic to help promote projects INO (Initial NFT Offering).