April 2025 Web3 Financing Panorama Interpretation: Large and Medium-sized Projects as Market Makers, Small Financing Encountering Chill ｜Gate Research Institute

2025-05-13 01:24:25

Summary

According to the Cryptorank Dashboard data on May 7, 2025, the Web3 industry completed a total of 94 financing rounds in April 2025, with a total amount of 2.37 billion USD. Both the scale and number of financing have declined, indicating a clear cooling of the market.
Traditional financing methods are returning, with mergers and structured financing dominating large transactions. This includes multiple cases such as Ripple's acquisition of Hidden Road for $1.25 billion, reflecting the market's preference for resource integration capabilities, risk control mechanisms, and mature development paths.
In April, financing was mainly concentrated in the CeFi sector (1.15 billion USD) and blockchain services (602 million USD), followed by DeFi and Social; this indicates that capital tends to favor Web3 enterprises that possess the ability to integrate with traditional finance and have clear compliance pathways.
The Web3 financing ecosystem is shifting from "scattergun support" to "structured betting," where medium and large projects dominate. Projects with financing amounts exceeding 10 million USD account for 47%, reflecting that capital prefers mid-tier projects with commercial pathways and growth validation capabilities.
Financing rounds show a structure of "small at both ends, large in the middle", with funds clearly concentrated on mid-to-late stage projects. Although seed round projects account for the highest number (41.4%), Series C financing attracts the most funds, accounting for 23.7% of the total financing amount, indicating that capital is focused on mature projects with scaling potential.
Coinbase Ventures leads with investments in 10 projects, covering DeFi, CeFi, and blockchain infrastructure; followed closely by 1kx, a16z CSX, and others.

Financing Overview

According to data released by Cryptorank on May 7, 2025, the Web3 industry completed a total of 94 financing deals in April 2025, with a total financing amount of 2.37 billion USD. Due to Cryptorank's specific handling of statistical criteria, there is some discrepancy between this amount and the total amount obtained by adding the financing amounts of individual projects (approximately 3.68 billion USD); however, to maintain consistency with the analysis trends below, this article uses the original statistical criteria provided by its Dashboard.

Compared to the 5.08 billion dollars and 140 transactions in March 2025, the total financing amount has decreased by more than 53% month-on-month, and the number of financing cases has also dropped below 100, setting a new low in nearly a year.

In the first quarter of 2025, Web3 financing experienced explosive growth, particularly in March, driven by significant transactions such as Abu Dhabi MGX's $2 billion investment in Binance and Kraken's $1.5 billion acquisition of NinjaTrader, leading to a historic peak in total financing. However, the market noticeably cooled in April, with a significant contraction in the number of financing deals.

This phenomenon may be driven by the following factors: short-term wait-and-see sentiment after the concentration of capital release in the first quarter; market corrections or stricter regulatory expectations; or perhaps some financing has shifted toward more discreet private placements or strategic directed phases, resulting in a decrease in publicly disclosed large financing cases. It is worth noting that although the total amount of financing remains high, the number of financing cases has shown a downward trend since March, indicating that capital is accelerating towards a few capital-intensive projects, making it more difficult for small and medium-sized projects to secure financing, and the "Matthew effect" within the industry is gradually becoming apparent.

According to the data analysis of the top 10 financing projects in April 2025, capital is highly concentrated in a few leading projects, further confirming the trend of the "Matthew Effect" in the market continuing to intensify.

CeFi still dominates: Among the top ten projects, 6 belong to the centralized finance (CeFi) sector, with total financing exceeding 1.9 billion dollars, which fully demonstrates that despite the continuous development of the DeFi ecosystem, centralized financial infrastructure remains the most favored area for capital. Among them, SOL Strategies and Securitize respectively completed large fundraising through traditional financing tools such as post-listing debt, indicating that the capital market still provides high valuations and liquidity support for Web3 companies with traditional financial integration capabilities.

Traditional Financing Methods Make a Strong Comeback: Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A), Post-IPO Debt, and Private Placement have become frequent financing methods, reflecting the current market's preference for a "controlling acquisition + structured financing" capital path to enhance resource integration and risk control capabilities. Notably, Hidden Road ranks first with a $1.25 billion merger transaction, acquired by Ripple, indicating that traditional blockchain giants are accelerating their strategic layout in the CeFi credit network field.

Infrastructure projects continue to attract top capital: The only blockchain infrastructure project to make it into the top ten this month is LayerZero, which completed a $55 million funding round with support from a16z, demonstrating that even in a tightening funding environment, foundational interoperability technologies remain highly attractive.

Overall, the financing landscape in April 2025 presents three main characteristics: CeFi dominance, merger-driven, and capital centralization. This not only reflects the growing emphasis of the capital market on compliance, profit models, and integration capabilities but also indicates that the future Web3 financing landscape will further concentrate on a few projects with resource advantages and institutional endorsements.

According to the Cryptorank Dashboard data, the financing landscape of the Web3 industry in April 2025 shows a trend of "CeFi leading the way, robust basic services, favored defensive technologies, and cautious investment in innovative sectors." Capital allocation preferences are gradually shifting from high-risk experimental projects to more mature fields with stronger profitability and integration capabilities. The specific performance is as follows:

CeFi (Centralized Finance) leads with a total financing amount of $1.15 billion, accounting for nearly half of the total financing for the month, indicating that capital still prioritizes betting on centralized projects with traditional financial characteristics and clear compliance paths. Several large transactions (such as Hidden Road and SOL Strategies) have boosted the scale of this sector, highlighting the market's high recognition of CeFi infrastructure integration capabilities.
The total financing amount for the subsequent blockchain service track is $602 million, indicating the market's sustained interest in projects that provide infrastructure and tools for the Web3 ecosystem. This may include development platforms, security solutions, data analytics services, and more, all of which are crucial for the healthy development of the entire ecosystem.
DeFi and Social sectors attracted $215 million and $169 million in financing respectively, which, although less than the scale of CeFi, still maintain a certain level of activity, especially with capital support in the areas of strategy-based MEV platforms and social payment innovations. Although the overall financing for blockchain infrastructure ($125 million) has decreased compared to before, projects like LayerZero continue to gain favor from leading institutions due to technological innovation, maintaining a high level of trust.
Chain-related projects and GameFi raised only $91.2 million and $19.5 million respectively, marking a low in financing this month, indicating that in the current cycle, public chains and innovations in blockchain games have not become the primary focus of capital, with funds flowing more towards sectors with "stronger certainty."

According to the financing scale data of 66 Web3 projects disclosed in April 2025, the financing scale for that month shows a structural characteristic of "dominance of medium scale + share of top scale + cooling of small scale." The overall distribution indicates that the number of medium scale projects is the highest, while the proportion of larger scale projects has significantly increased, and the share of small financing projects is relatively low.

Among them, projects with a financing scale between 3 million and 10 million USD account for as much as 30.3%, making it the most significant financing range. This indicates that a large number of projects that have completed technical validation or initial implementation are receiving a positive response from the capital market regarding their growth potential.

In addition, the number of projects with financing scales exceeding $10 million accounts for 47% of the total. Among them, projects in the ranges of $10 million to $20 million, $20 million to $50 million, and those above $50 million account for 16.7%, 16.7%, and 13.6%, respectively. This data indicates that compared to the previous phase dominated by small and medium-sized financing, the market is paying more attention to projects with mature business paths, clear profit models, and medium to long-term potential, with capital beginning to accelerate its concentration on mid-tier and top-tier projects.

In comparison, projects with financing scales below 1 million USD only account for 6.1%, highlighting the higher difficulty in financing small-scale projects, where investors' risk preferences tend to be conservative and more stringent requirements are placed on the project's fundamentals.

Overall, the financing data for April 2025 reflects that the Web3 financing ecosystem has shifted from "scattergun support" to "structured betting", with capital resources accelerating towards projects with clear development paths and strong integration capabilities.

From the data on the number of financing rounds and the proportion of financing amounts, it can be seen that the current market exhibits a structural characteristic of "a dominance of early-stage projects, with funds concentrated on mid to late-stage rounds"; the capital market is gradually converging on a limited number of mid to late-stage projects that possess scale potential and technological realization capabilities, while being more stringent in the selection of early-stage projects, with investment style tending towards rationality and concentration.

In terms of the proportion of financing rounds, seed rounds account for the highest percentage at 41.4%, indicating that the Web3 industry is still in an active early-stage entrepreneurial phase with a plentiful number of projects. This is followed by strategic rounds and Series A projects, which account for 24.1% and 15.5%, respectively, while Pre-Seed only accounts for 8.6%. Series B and C projects have a smaller proportion, accounting for only 6.9% and 3.4%, indicating that the number of projects entering the mid-to-late stage is still limited.

However, from the perspective of the proportion of financing amount, funds are clearly tilted towards mid-to-late stage projects: Although there are fewer C round projects, they have the strongest capital absorption ability, with a total financing amount of 205 million USD, accounting for 23.7% of the total financing amount; the financing amounts for A round and B round are 177 million and 159 million USD, respectively, both exceeding 18%. In contrast, although the number of seed rounds is the largest, they only account for 18.3% of the total financing amount, while Pre-Seed accounts for only 1.3%.

The phenomenon of "light projects focusing on heavy capital" concentrating in the mid-to-late stages reflects investors' current preference for more stable projects with commercialization capabilities and growth validation, resulting in a relatively lower risk tolerance for early-stage projects. The proportion of financing in the strategic round reached 17.8%, indicating that some mature enterprises or projects are strengthening their ecological layout or integrating resources through targeted financing.

According to data from Cryptorank on May 7, 2025, Coinbase Ventures ranks first by investing in 10 projects, significantly ahead of other institutions, demonstrating its strong engagement and resource integration capabilities in the current cycle. Following closely are 1kx, a16z CSX, and MH Ventures, each investing between 5 to 6 projects, reflecting their ability to maintain a high frequency of investments while also showcasing their clear strategic direction.

From the distribution of investment tracks across various institutions, there are certain differences in investment preferences. For example, Coinbase Ventures has a considerable presence in the DeFi, Blockchain Infrastructure, and CeFi sectors; 1kx is more inclined towards DeFi and Blockchain Infrastructure; while a16z CSX is active in both DeFi and Blockchain Service directions.

Key Financing Projects to Focus on in April

ZAR

Introduction: ZAR is a digital dollar wallet designed to empower local merchants around the world to serve as exchange points for cash and digital dollars. Users can conveniently exchange cash for digital currency through the ZAR app and use virtual and physical debit cards for transactions globally. The product was founded in 2024 by Brandon Timinsky and Sebastian Scholl, aiming to empower "corner shops" around the world to participate in cash and stablecoin exchange transactions, promoting the widespread application of stablecoins in the real economy.【3】

On April 30, ZAR announced the completion of a $7 million financing round, led by Dragonfly Capital and VanEck Ventures.【4】

Investment Institutions/Angel Investors: Dragonfly Capital, a16z CSX, VanEck Ventures, Coinbase Ventures, Solana Ventures, and angel investor Balaji Srinivasan, etc.

Highlights:

The platform has not officially launched yet, but it has attracted around 100,000 users waiting to register. Over 7,000 merchants from 20 countries, including Pakistan, Indonesia, and Nigeria, have expressed their willingness to cooperate, and it is expected to officially launch in the summer of 2025.
Launch a stablecoin pegged to the South African Rand (ZAR), focusing on regions with unstable currencies and weak banking infrastructure, such as Sub-Saharan Africa, to reduce exchange rate volatility and payment costs, and enhance financial access efficiency. The ZAR wallet supports USDC and USDT, providing a stable payment channel based on the US dollar, enhancing user trust and asset stability.
Users can make payments globally using ZAR's virtual or physical debit cards, supporting Apple Pay and Google Pay, avoiding additional fees associated with traditional international exchanges. At the same time, users can achieve two-way exchange between cash and stablecoins at partner merchants, simplifying the process of acquiring and using digital assets, and promoting deep integration of the local economy and digital finance.

Pencil Finance

Introduction: Pencil Finance is a decentralized lending protocol aimed at bringing real-world student loan financing on-chain. It connects investors with verified student loan originators, transforming student debt into a transparent, investable asset class. [5]

On April 30th, Pencil Finance announced the completion of a $10 million liquidity pool financing. The funds have been deployed in the liquidity pool on the Open Campus EDU Chain by Pencil Finance, aimed at supporting its first on-chain education loans and education company debt financing business.

Investment Institutions: Animoca Brands, Open Campus, etc.

Highlights:

Education loans on the blockchain, creating a new track for EduFi. Pencil Finance collaborates with traditional education loan companies to bring education loans from Southeast Asia and the United States onto the blockchain, expanding a new asset class that on-chain investors can allocate. By deploying on-chain and managing transparently, it enhances fund efficiency and lowers financing thresholds.
Risk-weighted structure design, matching different risk preferences. Pencil Finance has launched a student loan risk-weighted protocol that allows whitelisted users to provide liquidity for the loan pool and freely choose to invest in senior (low risk, low return) or subordinated levels (high risk, high return). At the same time, the platform takes on the work of loan deployment and repayment management, ensuring transparency in the process and that returns are traceable on-chain.

CAP

Introduction: CAP is a stablecoin engine designed to break the closed-loop dependence of endogenous incentive models, providing users with a truly sustainable revenue path.** \ ** It supports the issuance of convertible stablecoins pegged to assets such as USD, BTC, and ETH, and democratizes complex strategies traditionally reserved for a few high-level players through the integration of arbitrage, MEV, and RWA yields. 【7】

On April 7, Cap announced the completion of a $11 million financing round, with investors including Franklin Templeton and Triton Capital. The funds will primarily be used to develop its stablecoin engine, which is scheduled to officially launch later this year. [8]

Investment institutions: Franklin Templeton, Triton Capital, GSR, etc.

Highlights:

CAP is a new stablecoin protocol built on MegaETH, which is committed to building a sustainable stablecoin system driven by real income without relying on inflation incentives. CAP does not rely on traditional DeFi incentives such as token issuance, but is supported by external returns such as market making, MEV, arbitrage, and RWA (such as corporate bonds) to avoid the flywheel risk of "incentive depletion → liquidity depletion", and has stronger scalability and anti-cyclical ability.
Users do not need to have complex financial knowledge or connections to obtain a "foolproof" yield experience through CAP. Its stablecoin cUSD is backed by USDC/USDT at a 1:1 ratio, which means it is fully collateralized and always redeemable. Unlike other yield stablecoins that rely on DeFi liquidity incentives, CAP transfers the risk to the restakers (those who stake ETH through EigenLayer to secure the protocol).
CAP builds decentralized infrastructure, integrating on-chain arbitrage, MEV, and traditional bond RWA yield paths to form a synergistic drive. In addition to cUSD, CAP will also launch stablecoins pegged to BTC and ETH to meet the yield needs of users with different risk preferences, expanding access to diverse assets.

Camp Network

Introduction: Camp Network is an innovative Layer-1 blockchain focused on independent intellectual property (IP), aiming to provide a verifiable runtime environment for the next generation of AI agents with user identities. It solves the problem of AI training data attribution and creator monetization by aggregating Web2 data and connecting traditional platforms with blockchain, enabling users to maintain control while monetizing their digital footprint. 【9】

On April 29, Camp Network announced the completion of a $25 million Series A financing, led by 1kx and Blockchain Capital, with participation from institutions such as OKX, Lattice, and Paper Ventures, reaching a valuation of up to $400 million.【10]

Investment Institutions/Angel Investors: 1kx, Blockchain Capital, OKX, Lattice, Paper Ventures, etc.

Highlights:

The core design of Camp Network emphasizes two major capabilities: first, the ability to integrate off-chain data, which can connect with Web2 platforms through APIs, allowing user social, behavioral, and other data to be put on-chain after verification, ensuring authenticity and usability; second, developer-friendliness, by providing standardized toolkits to help developers quickly build DApps based on user data, such as fan tokens, social derivatives protocols, etc., thereby lowering the barriers to building Web3 applications.
Camp Network emphasizes a completely decentralized data storage and identity verification mechanism, effectively avoiding data monopolies and privacy risks associated with traditional platforms. At the same time, its integration with LayerZero provides strong cross-chain compatibility, allowing developers to easily deploy multi-chain interoperable applications. In addition, the platform has robust social data aggregation capabilities, enabling the collection of user profiles from Web2 platforms to provide smarter personalized services for Web3 applications, enhancing user retention and interaction quality.
Camp Network has partnered with leading platforms such as Figma, CoinList, and WalletConnect, and established an ecosystem fund to support developers and creators. Recently, they also collaborated with Movement Labs to promote the application of social data in Web3, accelerating ecosystem expansion.

Blackbird Labs

Introduction: Blackbird is a Web3 loyalty and payment company dedicated to connecting restaurants with customers, providing a fully customizable loyalty program platform and consumer application. The Blackbird app serves as a digital wallet for users, making it easy to manage memberships, view $FLY balances, track activities, and interact with restaurants. [11]

On April 8, Blackbird Labs announced the completion of a $50 million Series B funding round, led by Spark Capital; the funds will be used for equity and warrants for unreleased cryptocurrencies.

Investment Institutions: Spark Capital, Coinbase, a16z crypto, Union Square Ventures, Amex Ventures, etc.

Highlights:

Blackbird's core goal is to eliminate unnecessary intermediaries in the restaurant industry, such as payment processors, through its blockchain platform Flynet. These intermediaries typically take an average of 3% to 5% of a restaurant's revenue without providing corresponding value. Flynet aims to establish a direct connection between restaurants and customers, significantly reducing costs and optimizing the dining experience. For instance, compared to traditional credit card fees that can exceed 3.75%, Flynet charges a fixed rate of only 2%, with 1.5% of that returned instantly to the restaurant for customer acquisition and retention, thereby drastically cutting costs.
Flynet has built a cross-restaurant universal tokenized points system, supporting personalized reward programs based on on-chain behavior. Restaurants can design exclusive experiences for users, including hidden menus, celebrity chef interactions, and more, to incentivize frequent consumption and brand loyalty. Users will receive the platform token FLY as a reward when participating in restaurant consumption, which can be used to offset meal expenses at any restaurant within the Flynet network. Currently, the network covers over 600 quality restaurants in New York City, San Francisco, and Charleston, South Carolina, forming a tradable Web3 dining loyalty ecosystem.
Blackbird also announced the launch of Blackbird Club, a tiered loyalty program designed to reward loyal users with surprises and exclusive experiences, replacing the traditional points redemption model. Members will enjoy exclusive benefits such as booking guarantees, priority pre-sales for exclusive events, hidden menu tastings, and private sessions for friends and family.

Summary

In April 2025, the Web3 industry completed a total of 94 financings totaling $2.37 billion, with both the scale and number of financings declining, and the market cooling significantly. However, there has been a significant shift in the flow and preference of capital, showing a tendency to concentrate in more mature, integrated and compliant areas such as CeFi and blockchain services. Traditional financing methods such as M&A and structured financing have regained dominance, and large amounts of capital have flowed more to mid-to-late-stage and top projects, reflecting investors' emphasis on project commercialization capabilities and steady growth. Although early-stage innovation is still happening, capital is more stringent in the selection of start-up projects, and risk appetite tends to be conservative. The leading institutions represented by Coinbase Ventures are still active and actively deployed in key tracks. It is worth noting that star projects such as ZAR, Pencil Finance, CAP and Camp Network, and Blackbird have shown innovation potential in subdivisions such as stablecoins, education finance, stablecoin income aggregation, IP infrastructure, and crypto catering applications, respectively, and have received support from traditional financial institutions and well-known Web3 funds, indicating that the Web3 ecosystem is still exploring new growth points and application scenarios.

Reference Material:

Cryptorank , https://cryptorank.io/funding-analytics
Cryptorank, https://cryptorank.io/funding-rounds
ZAR, https://www.zar.app/
X, https://x.com/zardotapp/status/1917569020318097627
Pencil Finance, http://pencilfinance.io/
Animoca Brands, https://www.animocabrands.com/pencil-finance-announces-usd10m-for-student-loan-financing-backed-by-animoca-brands-open-campus
CAP, https://caplabs.io/
Coindesk, [https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2025/04/06/cap-raises-usd11m-to-fuel-stablecoin-engine-as-industry-heats-up](https://www.coindesk. com/tech/2025/04/06/cap-raises-usd11m-to-fuel-stablecoin-engine-as-industry-heats-up)
Camp Network, https://www.campnetwork.xyz/
Fortune, [https://fortune.com/crypto/2025/04/29/camp-network-30-million-ai-blockchain-1kx-blockchain-capital/](https://fortune. com/crypto/2025/04/29/camp-network-30-million-ai-blockchain-1kx-blockchain-capital/)
Blackbird Labs, https://www.blackbird.xyz/
Fortune, https://fortune.com/crypto/2025/04/08/blackbird-funding-ben-leventhal-restaurants/

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Last edited on 2025-05-13 01:27:34

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